Giga/Virtual Instrument Sound Quality

I have recently read some interesting discussion about Virtual Instruments like Giga and others taking the place of hardware synths, alot of it from members of this board whom I've come to respect. I do have some concerns that I didn't hear addressed... For instance, my recordings improved by orders of magnitude when I learned to "run my synths through some tubes", yet I hear people talking about using ADAT bridges, and other directly digital means of recording softsynths. Doesn't this kinda take away that warmth that some analog processing imposes on the sound? I had an experience where I did a project with alot of Piano and Strings. The Strings were from various samplers through Manley pres and Apogee converters. The Piano was from Bitheads Blacks & Whites. The mastering engineer wanted to know how I recorded the piano because it had a "digitalness" to it. That was the only instrument recorded "direct to disk". Ever since then I have been very reluctant to take the plunge into soft synths, and when I do (as I feel I must eventually), I REALLY can't see not using SOME type of high-end tube processing somewhere in the chain. Am I wrong about this, or is it just the library that I used in that project that caused the "digitalness". John

John, with high quality convertors it's always possible to send your 'internal' sounds out via quality analogue hardware. That way you are not constrained by the convertors of whatever hardware module you're using. It's a win, win.

The solution is really simple. New type of digital products is being introduced that not only sounds like the best of analog, but like ALL the best analog. Take a company like Sintefex . Just like Altiverb they use sample impulses to imitate old gear. But not just one sample. The use 100's of samples to capture the various setting you would do with a compressor or eq. The units they have sampled so far is like a who's who of vintage prestige audio products. There is SSL compressors being captured, but not just the compressor, the complete signal chain in an ssl console, fairchild, neve pre, pultec, manley, and the list goes on and on. The product is being endorsed by the top mastering engineers in the world, and would fit perfectly in a digital signal chain. I know I want one....

Maxserg, I'm not saying this is a genuine 100 % perfect emulation of the gear they are taking impulses from. But does it really have to be? What are we really looking for? I guess something that color the sound in a plesant way. And that is what this is about. This is not just one single snapshot of the sound from a compressor, but 100's of snapshots for each unit they are imitating. Does it sound great? I don't really know. Some say it is revolutionary. It might be. Anyway, it is just another toy.....