I think it’s cool. Sticking within the framework of the S2400 simplifies the workflow. Currently I’m having to route audio out and back in which is fine but doesn’t really work for headphones that I can figure out. (As the audio channels only cut out from the main outs, not the headphone out, when plugging cables into the back).
Everything is going to be more expensive compared to a DAW. If that’s a concern I’m actually surprised someone would get an S2400 cuz there’s SP-1200 emulations for like $40 in a DAW. But compare this multi effects card to a multi effects guitar pedal or a multi effects eurorack unit and it’s more than fairly priced for what you get. I don’t think you’re going to find many effects pedals with 8 tracks and multiple effects per track for that price.
I do wonder what kind of plugins will be developed and by whom. In the video he mentioned that it will support third party plugins. Would that mean that technically something like Arturia Fragments could be loaded into the machine? And will it only be audio fx, or can we also expect virtual synths etc? If that is the case, I will happily spend 550 bucks on it.
I just saw the one video mentioned above, do we know more than that already? Can’t find anything myself.
Yeah, it would be really cool if some digital drum synth engines could be possible with it. Even then, as it is I’m gonna preorder it as soon as my reverb payouts come lol.
Guess it depends on what effects it ends up being able to run. This thing would be so fun to use totally standalone as long as the effects are not terrible.
A multi-track USB out would be nice - then you can apply your effects in your Daw - or am I missing something? (also I’m potentially ignorantly assuming the plug-ins will be linux category, not WIN/MAC VSTs)
It does already multitrack out over USB. So yeah, in that regard you could apply effects in the DAW pretty simply.
There’s not much info obviously but on the websites store page listing this is what it states:
The S2400 DSP card is a user-installable hardware upgrade for the S2400. No soldering required. The card adds the ability to run multiple fx plugins (VST, LV2, CLAP) inside the box.
Not sure Linux Vst is any different but that’s what’s there.
My main interest would be to resample a sound with the effects on it and then maybe do the pitch up and pitch down thing. For any sort of sound design outside of mixing having the effects built in would definitely simplify the workflow.
I thought they were going to do the board with analogue filters first - I wonder is this still part of their roadmap. It was a while ago when they were talking about it though, haven’t really been following social media of late so maybe I missed it.
Seems like a nice idea to have a vst compatible platform, but probably not for me - I tend to use the S2400 as a flavour box rather than a studio centrepiece or trying to do full tracks in the box, so if I need vst effects I’ll just track in and out of the DAW.
Tbh probably even the analogue filters don’t seem like a must-have for my use case, but would have to weigh it up if/when the option arrives.
It was mentioned in a comment (I think) that the analog board is waiting until after the Caladan. They did a prototype and it didn’t sound up to snuff.
Yeah there was video footage maybe a year ago with the analogue filter card but nothing was said after that (at least, on YouTube) and there was no audio demo, just Brad holding it.
I do think an analogue filter would probably be less useful overall. The built in digital filters are already really good and something being analog doesn’t automatically make it better (quite a few analogue filters I’ve heard sound worse than some digital filters to me).
But who knows. Maybe it’ll come. Hopefully if it does they can both be slotted, but the digital effects seems more useful to me overall.
Except this would be like having a zoom multistomp on each of the 8 channels, plus the masterbus, so you would need 10 multistomps to replicate that. And it looks like there will be two fx sends, which you would need an external mixer, plus 2 more multistomps to replicate.
And also they mentioned it’s going to have SP-404-like live effects as well so you’d probably have to put one of those on the master as well.
$550 is expensive, not sure where people got the $300 number, but also the only really comparable thing would be working in a DAW which isn’t really a fair comparison to hardware (if you wanted performance per dollar not sure why you’d drop up to $1800 on a hardware sampler inspired by a 34 year old hardware sampler in the first place tbh).
Add a 8 channel mixer like a Yamaha? Just attach the zoom FX pedal. Stlll hundreds of pounds cheaper plus you can use the Mixer and Pedal for other projects.
Still not the same thing, because with the fx card you can have a different fx chain on each on the 8 mixer channels, plus an fx chain for the master bus. So to replicate that you would need to have a multistomp on each physical output, so around 10 multistomps.