Dude, I was joking. Was it too thin for you? Cheer up.

I even added smileys so nerds could understand it and not make a fuss, but apparently, to no avail. Went completely over the head. In fact, most got the joke, except an "odd one out". Well, can't blame a country man for being a bit too thick now and then, can we.

I love TAL. I own LX, J-8 and TAL-Mod and would love Patrick to do Roland JX synth. In fact, I said I'd love him to do JX-8P / MKS-70. The hell's a problem with some of you, though.

Yep, you definitely crack me up!

Good. Don't burst like an air balloon just yet.

I don't have TAL-UNO (very happy with the Softube Model 84) but I do have TAL-J-8 and love it to bits, and use their free chorus all the time. So I instabought this to support the company. So far it sounds absolutely gorgeous.

Well, here's an example. Here's some patches I recorded on the real AJ2 that I cannot get the vst to sound like, sadly. It sounds great as it is, don't get me wrong, it just lacks a bit of the real unit juice you can definitely hear in this clip. I believe it is the filter that makes all the difference.

That's cool man. I gotta learn to make leads like that with it.

Are you serious? Look I am not trying to be harsh but that is exactly what I am talking about. So...you provided recordings of something that you can not recreate today. You have a memory of how you could recreate it but it doesn't work. Well I am not surprised but that's not evidence of Talpha being different.

The fact that you can not get the same sounding patches out of Talpha doesn't mean much.

It barely means you can not recreate it entirely in the second row.

How many times does that happen when you work with HW only? I mean I can never recreate the same thing I recorded a year ago (unless saving patches).

Unless you post Sysex from your hardware and then post it here and I'll match it for you.

So you have the hardware. Post Sysex patch, post midi clip, and post a dry sound recording that can not be matched according to you - and I'll take the challenge and waste my time to match it for you. Would you be convinced then?

Don't throw some recording and then tell me "I can not match it". You know very well that's not how comparisons are made.

1. create patch on your hardware to your liking
2. create midi clip with sequence (4 bars at least)
3. record output (dry, unprocessed, PAN in the center so no PAN LAW discrepancy between DAWs will affect hearing)
4. export patch

upload everything here

edit: your upload is a nice example but without patches you know very well it is a tapping in the dark and potentially any synth could get it close with an absurd amount of tuning and guessing. So please post proper examples.

Agree on that, the filter doesn't do it justice.
Try filtering it with a analog emulated filter, I tried Arturia Filter Mini and Arturia MS-20 and it sounds great thru those filters.

Looks promising! Will have to test it out!

I remember the Alpha sounding quite saturated at max volume with all oscillators including sub, the low bump eq and chorus enabled. I would guess this hasn't been modeled here though.

I wonder if this is the start of a trend and within the next year we'll see Arturia, Softube and perhaps Behringer wanting in on the alpha juno action

The Drop would be fantastic for this

So instead of posting some samples properly, you are all "remembering" something, some characteristic, some attribute out of your memory. Or adding completely unrelated tools (unrelated to how close this thing is to the instrument it tries to emulate) like the MS-20 filter from Artuira and calling it better.

Super nice way to be objective and value a tool on a "how close it is" basis. Just super. Makes sense totally. Mandella effect on a large scale. Typically.

I love this thing, as I said I always wanted an Alpha Juno 2, and this is as close as i'll get, and I love it.

I love TAL as a company , always been one of the good ones.

I look forward to the ultimate hoover preset pack

And if anyone can point me how to make the break from Scott Brown - Detonated , as i'm pretty sure its made on an AJ2. i'd appreciate it. ( I love that break )

try this one, play mid range of the keyboard, Need a bit of PARA EQ action and a gatesequencer + arp to get the riff.

Here are some third party banks, I've converted them from sysex already, just drop the folder in your TAL presets folder.

Dude, I have the patches saved. I might even have a copy of the bank saved in a sysex file in my computer, will check at home after work.
I am telling you, it doesn't sound like my HW unit.
wth you don't understand? If you match it, cool, but I made these patches sounding like this without much effort, it's the synthesizer that sounds really good and it doesn't need too much effort. The vst is great, just NOT as great as the real one. Same as with the other Juno, Jupiter, CS80, Minimoog, etc emulations. They can sound great. Not the same though.

Is it possible to open a syx file directly in the VST, or you have to read it in oldschool MIDI style?

I have a lot of patches saved, and if it's easy to open them in the VST i might even hook up my poor Alpha that's sitting in a closet.

That would be awesome, as the alpha is one of my alltime favorite synthesizers and would love to see it covered more in the vst world, as well.
And yes, it does sound a bit saturated with full volume, I love the colour it imparts. Not always, because with high resonance sounds it can turn a bit harsh, but in other cases it gives a nice warmer tone.

Sweet, filters are indeed the juice

Yes you can load in single patches, complete banks right from the synth as a sysex dump or as an import from disk.

From the manual:
Import Sysex to Presets…
This will import Alpha Juno or MKS-50 sysex files with the ending “syx”. It will
automatically save the presets as TAL-Pha preset files in a folder with the
name of the file.
Sysex to Preset Files
This creates preset files in the case the plug-in receives Alpha Juno or
MKS-50 presets via sysex through MIDI input.
Lock send Sysex
This makes sure that SYSEX on the top right of the plug-in stays active or
inactive also when changing presets.

I never owned an alpha or mks50. To be honest I never quite liked them, even after spending lots of times in music stores trying to do so.
However I helped test this, and I know Patrick had many rounds of calibration and recalibration with his own unit. @ homesweethome .... if you could send Patrick the sysex of those patches you say you can't replicate so he could see where his emulation falls short, I am sure he would appreciate it.. I know I heard lots of software vs hardware audio tests he sent me, and it reached a point where I couldn't tell the difference... but I didn't have a physical hardware to do my own tests.

rsp

Ok i wired up the Alpha :D

First of all, loading the same sysex messages results in slightly different settings, so it was hard to match it even with the help of patches.

For example the resonance was higher on the VST, the LFO was a little slower. I had to manually adjust these to get it closer.

There were patches where i could make it sound almost exactly the same. But there is something-something with the filter that is different.

Here is what the manual says:

This might be the key for some of the differences.

I've uploaded some examples where i could identify a difference. Each sample the HW plays first, then the VST.

Some comments:
Brass chorus - Here i find the HW sound much smoother, and thicker, like the the sound is more dense and creamy.

Modwave Keys - Something really off with the LFO-pitch on the VST, and the envelope sounds more punchy on the HW, like it has some sort of compressor

Noisy chorus keys - Again, just a slightly denser chorus sound, and the noise was easier on the ears in the wav files, but i can't hear that much difference now in MP3 LOL.

Reso test - Here the resonance on the VST sounds so much harsher, the HW has a more solid fundamental tone. I don't know if it's just different parameters (?)

Reso valves - This is the most obviously different. Nothing really matches. Envelopes sound lazy, resonance is peaky, sounds harsh. The HW just has this watery-smooth filter action. The VST just hurts my ears. I think this really has to do with what i quoted from the manual. If it's really that, i I'd like to see the original as an option, cause it's just way nicer sounding.

Seq Bass - This is very close, i would use any of those. The HW again has that compression like attack, and the resonance goes deeper, so it sounds more punchy. (might be just some off-parameters) The midrange of the resonance on the VST is too loud, like it's not sitting inside the sound. But the overal tone is really spot on. I like the HW much more when the filter opens up. (again i think it's because the reso thing)

Tha sweep - The filter's character is captured really good. Here i had to lover the resonance to match the HW. Again same thing with the resonance. It is needlessly aggressive in the middle, and top. The whole clip sounds like it has a wide boost at 1-2khz compared to the smooth easy sound of the HW

Agro Bass - This is again rather different, the way the oscillators intermodulate the noise is really satisfying on the HW

Anyway this is a good effort, and captures the vibe of the unit pretty good. If the reso can be made less nasal and creamier, i think it could be perfect.

Same.
Not that one unfortunately (it's a good one!) but a couple of other types incl other Scott Brown/Shoop! ones - On Youtube search:
"Alpha Juno on Roland V-Synth, Hoovers, Processing, plus DAW Tip & Tricks" and find Raveystabs's video where he recreates them, from a AJ2 waveform sample, first on a V-Synth and then in the DAW. There's some cool pointers here :-)

Thanks for sharing.
Are these coming from this list?
http://llamamusic.com/mks50/mks-50_p....html#skipdown
I saw that posted on Facebook

yep

Ok cool thnx

I think a vintage/modern switch for the resonance would be neat. I wonder how much the age of the components in the HW might be affecting this?

By the way, am I the only one calling this "TAL-Phalpha"?

Most rave tracks from that era used samples of the alpha juno. Even if the artist owned the original they would still sample it and also other records.

So you could be hearing sounds that have been sampled many times over. And with samplers that add grit / crunch etc

TAL are already one step ahead. Their sampler is perfect for this sort of thing!

I think the track you mention has a peak filter being modulated on the alpha juno sample. Many rave producers used high pass, sweeping peak or notch filters on the juno samples.

Scott brown has said he used an emu sp1200 in the early days. At some point will have moved onto akai or emu however. So I can't say which was used on that particular track

Oh yeah, I know they are all sampled -resampled, altered etc. But what's cool is they all originated from the AJ and now I have a good emu, I can do the same.

Gonna be fun experimenting.

I'll look at TAL sampler, as I doubt Kontakt is ideal for this, it maybe better, but sometimes I find working with Kontakt just irritating.

I would say Tal sampler is much better than kontakt for this sort of thing. If you like any form of 90s music you'll find it satisfying to re sample everything ??

I’m calling if tALPHA → t?

Thanks for doing this. Sure wish I had an Alpha JUNO in the cupboard

To my ears, the env slopes don't sound the same; keeping in mind obviously that the env when patched to the VCF has quite an effect on timbre. The attack phase seems way softer on the vst like it is set slightly longer, perhaps the scaling is a bit off...? Not to mention the scaling of the key tracking. I've long wondered how that param was scaled in the og design, since it isn't fully divulged in the manual. Of course, if either/both of those vst parameters are slightly off in their internal scaling implementations, it's gonna have a big effect on timbre differences.

Obviously, this is compared to your specific unit no less, though it *is* all digital control underneath, right? So I'm not expecting Jupiter-level differences between aged hardware units.

I like that the TAL adds some extra options such as osc re-triggering and some different PWM options. It seems to have the classic LPF "bass boost" setting, which I didn't think the Alphas had (?), On the other hand, I find the way that these options are presented to be slightly messy and confusing.

There was a noticeable difference in fundamental tone on some examples... I was wondering if this could have been caused by osc re-triggering, or a different LPF value mapping? Sub PWM? etc..

With all respect, are you reasonably confident that you ruled out those additional vst options, and wiggled the patches to get a match (and if so, was it by much)?

If you say that is as close as you could get on those examples, I'll take your word for it.

disclosure: I had my eye on an opportunity to buy a HW Alpha JUNO in recent times, and the vst didn't really satiate my GAS...