Wave Arts has presented a new saturation plug-in, simply called Tube Saturator, claiming it’s “the world’s most accurate real time tube amp plug-in”. I’m skeptic, and a little interested.
From Wave Arts:
Unlike other tube simulators, which use radically simplified models, Tube Saturator uses state of the art circuit simulation technology to capture every nuance of an analog circuit. With circuit simulation, the analog schematic completely defines the signal processing. The schematic is converted into a system of non-linear differential equations which is solved at each sampling period, in realtime. That’s mathematical talk for “it sounds exactly like the analog circuit”.
I’ll bite. Other tube simulators do not use “radically simplified models”, while many probably do, this does not mean everyone does. For instance, I believe SPL with their TwinTube by no means do this. Softube, which don’t have a pure tube saturator only products with tube emulations included, most certainly don’t. As for older plug-ins, such as DUY Valve or Antares Tube, I don’t know. Maybe they do or maybe they don’t.
The circuit simulation technology is extremely CPU intensive, and hence we are only able to simulate very simple circuits. Tube Saturator is in fact a basic circuit consisting of a Baxandall type three-band EQ feeding two 12AX7 triode preamp stages. It’s similar to preamp stages you’d find in a guitar amp, but it is by no means a complete guitar amplifier model, that would be way too expensive to simulate even with today’s fast CPUs. However, it is extremely accurate, and hence you can get the same distortion and tonal characteristics that you’d expect from a real tube preamp.
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Increasing the Drive control increases the (digital) input gain while decreasing the (digital) output gain, so you can easily adjust distortion levels. The FAT switch changes the bias circuit of the first preamp stage to increase gain.
From the description, it sounds like it will be most interesting on signals where you want an apparent distortion, even if Wave Arts states you can use it for “a little warmth”. As I said, looks interesting. Would especially be interested in seeing how well it fares against SPL TwinTube.
I am looking out for it too. Wave arts have made great plug ins in the past. Their channelstrip is to my ears still one of the most “analog” sounding ones. I prefer it over the early waves modells. Still this text sounds a bit blabla… You really can’t say that UA is using simple mathematics. Or indeed SPL.
apparently CPU usage is off-the-charts, even on i7/Nehalem machines, so dunno if that bodes well for the complexity of the model, even if you can only use one or two instances at the moment?
still, progress is good. thumbs up to Wave Arts!
I downloaded the demo. I run Logic 9 (sorry, but I am preparing for the fall off protools
) on a dual quad core 2.8 with 8Gb internal memory. I guess you can call that well spec’ed. But man: what a power hog! Can we place snapshots in these comments?
I won’t say anything about sound yet (to early) but I am comparing it to UA precision enhancer (I know: kind of a different beast) PSP Vintage Warmer 2 and McDSP… I hated antares tube anyway so I guess it will always be better than that!
All I can say for now is that it’s really cool when strapped on the masterbus. However… When you dial in the FAT mode (which is indeed FAT)it gets really noisy. Sounds to me like some sort off artefacts. Like the occasional hiss here and there. I don’t mind hiss as such, but I do mind occasional hiss
Anyone else tried the demo?
How is this one compared to spl twintube? Or compared to the warmth in the oxford dynamics?
>> “How is this one compared to spl twintube? Or compared to the warmth in the oxford dynamics?”
I would do a quick shootout, but I’m waiting for my MacPro to arrive (I’ve just moved) and am afraid to even install it on my MacBook
>>”All I can say for now is that it’s really cool”
“Cool” as in “wicked for this fucked up track” or “cool” as in “this might be nice to have on the master in the future”?
Well, after a goof night sleep that followed late hours listening to this plug in I would rate it: equal to twintube but different. Let me explain. They both have a way of making a mix sound larger than live. I think the tube element is best emulated by SPL but I don’t know WHAT they both emulated so that is just me. I lived with SPL hardware units so it is very possible that that affects my judgement.
Tube Saturator is a very cool plug in, but I am still not completely sure why it uses so much CPU power. It is 3 to 4% per instance on my dual quad. Giving me about 32 instances to play with should I desire that. That’s more than T-Racks 3 for instance.
How many TubeSaturator instances are possible with different CPU´s? I get near of 30% of CPU power use in my 2.8 quad core with the plugin demo. That barely let broad for two instances! ….!
Wow. I know I’n way late with this, but I was changing computers when the demo showed up, and never got a chance to try it until last night. Power hog is an understatement. Quad Nehalem, and it’s using HALF my CPU power for one instance. Unbelievable. WHY? And guess what? The tube in the no-brainer $15 little cast off, the Trackbox? BLOWS IT AWAY.