VSL (Vienna Symphonic Library)

I purchased the Vienna Special Edition, and everything sounds great! These samples are the industry standard for good reason. Unfortunately, if you really want a variety of articulations (such as ponticello tremolo), you'll need to buy the extended library. This doubles the cost. Also be prepared for a bit of a learning curve, not to mention a ton of re-mixing if you already had your arrangement almost finished using a sample library other than the VI. Still, you've got to take the plunge if you need really tasty orchestra samples. You won't be disappointed, but it may take a little while (initially) to have it sounding the way you want SUITABILITY/PERFORMANCE Vienna Special edition it's amazing for it's price, I have some others libraries for scoring films, but with Vienna I have way more possibilities when it comes to phrasing and expression, plus it takes me less time to give the perfect organic touch to my film scores, it sounds just great. I love it! You will love it too, because when it comes to using vst’s in todays market there are literally a ton of different vst’s. Vienna is one that you will be able to use in almost all genre’s of music. They also update the program several times a year so you can download the upgrade and fixes for free. I ran this on my macbook and it worked perfectly . I am not too sure about pc’s though, but it will probably work fine. You can call them at any time if you have any questions they have a great customer support line. OVERALL OPINION This sample library is truly amazing. The level of realism that is possible for this price is truly astounding. I highly recommend this library. To really get the most out of it though, you'll have to work a little on your mix, in particular, your dry instrument tracks to reverb ratios. Once you get it right, though, it can have amazingly life-like outcomes

VSL installed without any problems. It certainly does take a while though, because the libraries for the Vienna instruments are really huge. So expect to set aside a couple hours to get this up and running. After the lengthy database copying, there is a lengthy registration task you'll have to go through. This software is very expensive so it is understandable that registration would take a while. After the long installation, you'll have to make sure you DAW has it registered. You'll also want to configure your MIDI controller to properly control the parameters in the interface. The manual provided is very in depth about the sound sources, but could definitely go into more detail about the interface. We installed this on a Mac G5 with 4GB of RAM. The program using it was Logic. Vienna Strings does work just fine in this system. The performance is typical for sample based playback, except that the RAM requirements are larger than normal. This is of course because the samples are so high quality, but be warned that you will need all the RAM you can get - especially if you want to be creating a lot of instruments in one project. It is fairly stable although loading too many instruments and filling up the RAM can cause some stability issues. I have been using Vienna products for a while now at the larger studio where I work. These products are very expensive so usually only large facilities can afford them. I can easily tell you having used a lot of sample based strings, that these are the best you can get. There are so many sample layers and articulations it is mind boggling. The sound is very clear and up front, and somehow manages to sound natural as can be. Nothing compares to a real string player, but this is by far the best anyone has done in the digital realm. The legato connections could still be improved a bit as with almost all sample based string players, but other than that the sound is superior. Since this is so expensive, it kills the value a little bit, but this is still the best. Very highly recommended.