Making Music
  Computer Music Software and Hardware

East West - 3 Virtual Instruments
    Hardcore Bass
    Bösendorfer 290
    Stormdrum

East-West and Native Instruments combine talents to produce a range of New Generation instruments. We sample three of the latest... 

It can't be easy thinking up new instruments to make an impact on today's over-saturated synth and sampler software market. How many radically different ways can you combine analogue synth modules? How many new ways are there to use a collection of samples? Giving the user an infinite number of controls and telling them to 'get on with it', may let the vendor promote with 'as many sounds as your imagination can create' but most musicians are wise to this and, as we all know, the majority of users tend not to create their own sounds anyway.

So you can imagine the Native Instruments marketing guys and gals pacing around inside a room until one of them has a eureka moment. Users essentially want sounds, good sounds and lots of them, so why not create an instrument with lots of ready-to-go, high-quality sounds based on samples with an interface that let's users tweak parameters if they want to do so. Even though most users don't mess much with the presets in an instrument, if the facility is not there they tend not to buy it. Odd, isn't it!

So welcome to the New Sampling Generation, a collaboration between East-West, Zero-G and Native Instruments. NI provides the sample playback engines by way of customised versions of Kompakt and Intakt and the other companies provide the samples, carefully honed into instruments. The general modus operandi is similar for all three so we'll look at that first and then at the individual programs. 

Big mamma of a machine

All three programs install easily but there are a few caveats. Forget the minimum system requirements. You need a Big Machine to run these programs. Don't even think of trying to run them unless you have 512Mb RAM minimum and if you want to run other software, too, 1Gb is certainly not unreasonable. East West recommends up to 1.5Gb RAM for the Bösendorfer! There is an option to let you stream samples from the hard disk during playback but, oddly, this has to be downloaded and installed separately; goodness knows why.

All packs include both PC and Mac versions and contain both stand-alone and plug-in versions of the programs. The plug-ins cover all major formats on both platforms although some plug-in formats such as RTAS and Core Audio support may not be currently available but are promised as free downloads so check what you need and availability before buying.

Be aware that the Mac version of Stormdrum requires System OS X. The others will run under OS X but activate the Classic Environment. It's a tough time for Mac users, deciding whether or not to move over to OS X (the purchase of a new Mac is the ideal time to do this!), so make sure that your system can handle whatever instruments you decide to buy and that you're happy to revert to Classic mode if necessary.

Also, take careful note of the amount of hard disc space you need for storing the samples - over 2Gb for the Bösendorfer, 2.3Gb for the Hardcore Bass and a whopping 4.6Gb for Stormdrum. Add to this the space required for your other music software and for any audio files you create when recording and you'll soon realise that you may need a larger-than-average hard disk or, better still, a second drive. PC users also take note that you require a DVD drive. Macs have had them for years but they're still not standard on PCs. Finally, you must register the software within five days or it will stop working. An Internet connection is useful here.