Thoughts from the mind of Dennis Gunn, 27-02-2002: >Some theories: Recent hardware synths are easy to come by therefore >why emulate one when the real thing is probably sitting right there. Ease of use? Load a song and have all synths & patches sitting right there... >As has been pointed out emulating a recent synth would probably be >far more CPU intensive. Yes, agreed. >The evolution of virtual synths it seems also virtually emulates the >evolution of the hardware synthesizer. Now there's a good thought... >I'll betcha in 5 years virtual instruments will have so totally >surpassed hardware ones that, although people will continue to use >hardware, it will be >more out of a sense of retro aesthetic than anything else Yes, you might very well be right here. OK, so we just have to wait a bit more... Of course I also realise that VSTi's in a sense are still in a sort of baby-phase (not wanting to take away from the wonderful achievements of some). It's only since a short time that computers have become powerful enough to make native synthesis a feasible concept, so indeed we should maybe just wait a couple of years to see where the trend goes. >Mellotrons have a wonderful way of being very present in a rock mix >without overpowering it where real symphonic instruments might tend >to either dominate it or at the other extreme sound like "background". And the bonus question: how come this is true (since indeed it _is_ true, and quite a good observation imo)? -- Hendrik Jan Veenstra <h@...> Omega Art: http://www.ision.nl/users/h/index.html