Had. Just talked myself out of pulling the trigger but listening to this has gone and decided it 🤦🏻♀ Will take me a whole year to pay off but then I’m set for life. Between this and my sub37 I can’t see myself needing any other. In fact it will save me money in the long run! Thanks 👍
Dude first off ur iridium patches r some of the best I’ve ever heard, and I’ve listened to so many. I don’t use pre bought patches, I love making/attempting to make my own, but from your comments about the iridium u love it just as much as I do. I feel this is the synth I’ve been waiting all my life for haha, it blows my mind, it’s just incredible. I had a rough ride getting one that was 100%, but think the one I have is the one, fingers crossed. Keep up the great work.
I'm buying this Bank the day I can afford $2,500 for the Waldorf first 😥 I've spent way too much on plugins/vsts that I don't even use... Thanks for the video mate🤝
Thanks for your comment! Iridium sure is expensive but IMO absolutely worth it. On the other hand, excellent music can be produced with a lot of tools, even freeware - it doesn't need to be that one. But I'm, sure you already know that.
I like the Hydrasynth but it would be Waldorf Iridium without any hesitation. The hydrasynth is cool but the Iridium plays in a different category. An incredibly vast synth engine including VA, granular, Physical Modelling, FM and Wavetable, the possibilities to load your own samples and a wider sweet spot would be my main reasons here. If you'd like to compare something in a similar price range, you might want to include Korg's modwave, too. Quite a cool wavetable synth with a wider sweet spot, sample support and live performance features. It doesn't go as far as the Hydrasynth in terms of sound design, though.
Hi Man, thanks for putting up that high quality content, that makes us want this Synthesizer even more. What is the Song of the synth bassline you play 07:45 - 07:51? Its in my head but I don´t remenber, 80/90s probably...
@@limbicbits I agree, Adamski/Seal has more soul/authenticity, also the background story using only 8 tracks for the recording is more interesting. I am a funk bassist so the massive synth bass of the George Micheal version is more appealing to me ;-) I tried to find the synth that was used for it, maybe a Juno (I don´t think DX7) but had no luck.
Thanks! (shameless self promo following) I've just published a book with several sound design and mixing tipps for electronic music which you can find here: limbicbits.com/book-electronic-music-production/ Also, manuals are a great start into sound design. I've learned a lot from reading the AN1X and Access Virus manuals. These can even be a great source if you don't own the synths. Later on, I recommend to try and rebuild patches you like. That way, you'll train your ears to hear subtle elements of a sound.
The Iridium is a wonder weapon. However, a lot of sounds are simply not usable for straight pop musik. Lots of impressing frooaarshwoooshkraak - sounds but at the end I need simple synth brass, bass, and other simple synths sounds. Is it worth the money if you have a studio stuffed with a lot, and I mean a lot of synths ?
It's a great synth and also capable of doing simple brass, bass etc sounds. But to be honest, these would be disciplines almost every other synth is capable of. So if you're mainly searching a synth for standards and you already have lots of alternatives, it's definitely not worth buying more stuff. My device is: Keep your setup minimal and chosen thoughtfully instead of hording synths you barely use. But that's just my opinion. Others have fun hiding behind walls of keyboards and that's also totally fine but it would be a super uninspiring scenario for me.
I've planned to release a second Iridium / Quantum sound pack next year and I'm sure there will also dub chords included. Most likely I'll dive a bit deeper into its FM engine for that matter
The only downside of Iridium are those small pads, not even velocity sensitive if I’m correct. If Hydrasynth could pull it off for 900 bucks.. The only drawback on this great synth. It would be better to leave it without pads and put more controls on there. Would look more pro.
Do the pads serve any other purposes besides triggering notes? I've read this complaint before, but the module is obviously intended for being hooked up to any keyboard one already has. You also remind me of those folks who point out "x has insignificant drawback y," when I know the instrument they're talking about has far, far more serious issues.
@@Jason75913 Of course it’s meant to be hooked up to a keyboard or a sequencer, it’s a desktop synth. Still, those pads are half baked, they should make them velocity sensitive and bigger, like on Hydrasynth, or not include them at all and put more synth controls there. Other than that, this synth is a monster. It’s got subtractive, wavetable, FM, granular and physical modelling synthesis under the hood, so yeah, pretty powerful and it sounds great.
I get your point and although it would've been great to have these velocity sensitive I still appreciate that section. Especially the combination of Arp, chord mode, scales and predefined velocity settings is great to experiment.
Rolf Whörmann(the developer) said in a interview that the pads were mainly meant for controlling the Arp and Sequencer. But I agree, velocity is welcome. Also I experience the pads as a bit wobbly, a world of difference with the Hydrasynth desktop pads. But overall it's the most versatile synth I own.
It definitely is for me. I haven't enjoyed sound design and making music so much for a while now as I do with the Iridium. And I was pretty skeptical first. With the second part of your question you put me in some kind of a dilemma, though. I really like the Peak and its sound. But I guess that if I would have to choose either Iridium or Peak, I'd choose Iridium. Sound wise they're both excellent. But Iridium offers just so much features for sound design that it would be my first choice. Both complement each other quite well.
@@limbicbits It(Iridium) really is a nice piece of kit. The wavetable synth is the only thing missing in my “studio”. I was thinking about getting the Hydra, it’s great and all, but Iridium sounds so nice and it’s got so many synthesis methods in it, I wouldn’t need anything else really. But then the price.. I said to myself, I won’t spend more than 1200 bucks for one piece of kit, cause that already is too much in a way. Maybe I’ll have to brake this rule of mine🙂
@@LukezyM I can totally understand that. But the combination of FM, wavetable, granular and more makes it an outstanding unit. It might even replace other synths / samplers in your studio
The Iridium is still not a desert island machine to me - I would prefer my Moog One by far, and then the Quantum (after the last update). But if you don't want to take these because they are too heavy, this is my recommendation! Nice presets.
you could literally buy 3 Iridium's for the price of the Moog one. am interested in why you would pick the Quantum over this ? its something I've been considering
@@synkuk Yes, true. I bought the Quantum when the Iridium was already released, comparing them face to face at the store. The Q simply gave me joy to play, the Iridium was more like "okay, that would reduce my CPU". The filters in the Quantum are not as impressive like in the MoogOne, but far better than the dozens of simulations in the Iridium to my taste. Another important thing to me is the extreme price drop that every digital synth undergoes over the time. That's not true for (most) analog synths. Anyways, if the Iridium would have a price tag like 1.500 USD it would be a no brainer. Like that, I'd prefer to buy 10 different top notch VSTis, which can easily do what the Iridium can do - and much more. Ah, okay, besides the CPU thing 😄
@@MFASonic I suppose my issue with pretty much all VST's is the lack of physical contact with the instrument ( yes I know omnisphere can map to a physical synth ..) .. and be it analog or digital I prefer a box with knobs .. for example .. Ti2 Virus, Digitone, Peak and even the 'plugins' in my akai force get used a ton more than any VST on my PC and I love playing with them .. I'm kind wondering if I just prefer the physical connection whereas others prefer it all in their laptop
@@synkuk That's how it is for me too. Some people say "it's just a VST in a box!!" and I say GOOD! The "box" is kind of a big deal! I'm relatively young and I've spent my whole life on computers. I just wanna have some time away from my laptop and spend time with something that feels like a physical instrument.
@@benbowland Yes totally , I ended up getting the Iridium Keyboard .. and I couldn't be happier .. must admit I question the existence of the Quantum with this on the market.
@@limbicbits There are some pretty capable iOS synths which allow you to create your own presets and import them via Files app, so that gives the opportunity for patch makers to sell packs. Examples of iOS synths are "Continua", "LayR", "Lagrange", or even better "Drambo" which is a modular system which allows infinite possibilities
"Continua" has presets included from some artists like Red Means Recording for example. Regarding "Drambo" there is a big community behind it but there is a lack of patch makers as it was released with few presets to let users do their own sound design so there are patches, but done by amateurs. I would love to see patches for Drambo, I am sure I would buy them
@@limbicbits nice! I have a personal project to port all the Novation Circuit patches I have (including yours!) to Drambo modular system. I recorded and exported all the single cycle waveforms the circuit has before selling it so I could emulate it later in other synths. I think Drambo will give me that opportunity as you can "draw" your own LFO shapes so I could mimic those special ones the circuit had. But well... This is if I have free time though..
there are parallels in the sound engine but they have a different sound. But even more than the sound it's the haptic experience why I like this synth so much. On the other hand, Pigments is a fantastic synth plug-in which would appear in my Top 3 VST PlugIns without any doubts.
