Welcome Mojamusic.

Interesting question! As both plugins rely on convolution as the underlying principle, both _SHOULD_ sound the same, as long as the impulse-responses (IR) used are the same.

In reality, they differ a lot - in regard of the IR-sets offered (SD uses simple wav-files, AV relies on a proprietary format) as well as in the way they allow for manipulation and usage of a given IR. Chances are that you will find more people favoring AV as AudioEase (the makers of AV) have a good reputation for supplying interesting samples from new locations all the time, and for their long-time experience with convolution per se.

OTOH, SD is already there when you own Logic, and you may achieve good results with this plugin too, when you are willing to hunt-down nice samples from nice rooms (... or start to record your own!).

HTH,

Altiverb 4 uses separate SD2 mono files, which is not a proprietary format, but simply an older "open" standard file format.

SD2 files contain exactly the same pulse code modulated information as Aiff and Wave files, meaning there are no sonic differences between all these file formats.

Altiverb 5 and 6 also work with Aiff and Wave files (up to 32bits).

Just a side-note on Dietz' "proprietary" file format remark.

Cheers,

Thanks for the clarification, Peter. I was under the impression that AudioEase protects their IRs.

Hi Dietz,

No they don't use a proprietary format.

To protect their IR copyrights, only registered customers can download new IRs after entering their registered email address.

Apart from the SD2 format for Altiverb 4 there is also a specific filenaming convention and folder setup. That's all. Anyone with the appropriate conversion programs, like AudioEase's own Barbabatch and other Mac-based converters can make libraries for the "old" Altiverb 4.

A problem for PC users is that they cannot create the required Macintosh "data forks", that hold the file format information. So, converting Aiff or Wave IRs should be done on a Mac.

It's good that the newer Altiverb versions can also work with simple Aiif files (up to 32 bit) and Wave (up to 32 bit floating point).

Best regards,

Thanks. This helps a lot.

I use Space Designer for some things, but when it comes down to obtaining a real concert hall environment, Altiverb can't be beat. It's worth every penny! I haven't tried their sound design IR's, but the various concert halls and scoring stages are amazing. Somewhere on their website is a Maarten Spruijt demo that shows a dry piece and the same piece routed through Altiverb, and it's a very honest demonstration. Check it out.

Kerry

Yes, I listened to that demo on Audio Ease website. It was impressive. Have you tried to find third party Concert Hall IRs for Space designer on the net?

Sorry Gentlemen if I am sidetracking. I am currently using Wizoo's W2 engine and am surprised how good it is. I keep hearing that Altiverb is the ticket for orchestral mockups.

Question: Is Altiverb 5 suitable now for problem free usuage in the PC / XP environment?

Many thanks in advance.


Rob

I've never tried to find other IR's for Altiverb... never really had the need. They have so many concert halls and recording spaces already available, and I end up using my favorites over and over.

Well thus far I'm impresed with Altiverb .. as a new user. I stated out doing my own presets which worked to a certain extent for orchestral mixing .. but then I found Maarten Spurjits Presets on the Altiverb menu and used them which taught me a lot about using Alrtiverb again.

And now I've got what I think to be a really good and realistic sound. Although I have experimented deeply with Space Designer aswell and I have some good presets which I use for them too.

I'm going to be publishing a new reverb mix article on my website soon that will contain all these presets for SD.

How do the two compare. I can get a good mix sound out of SD .. but the real depth is only what you get with Altiverb. SD just doesn't have any way to push out and back the sound. (I guess it depends on the IR but I've not found one uet .. and I've looked [:P]).

Then again we've yet to wait for MIR to see what that can give us.

I used Space Designer for years and recently upgraded to Altiverb expecting a slight improvement. More like a vast improvement. First, Altiverb is a stereo in-stereo out processor, so your panning isn't collapsed the way it is in Space Designer. Second, the SD reverbs always sounded metallic to me. Altiverb sounds "high end" by comparison. Just because they use the same technology doesn't mean they sound the same.

@Rob Elliott said:

Sorry Gentlemen if I am sidetracking. I am currently using Wizoo's W2 engine and am surprised how good it is. I keep hearing that Altiverb is the ticket for orchestral mockups.

Question: Is Altiverb 5 suitable now for problem free usuage in the PC / XP environment?

Many thanks in advance.


Rob

Rob--

You may want to consider Altiverb 6 at this point. If there were any problems with v5.x they may have been addressed with this new release.

One caveat-- I'm still trying to sort this out, tho-- they basic version appears to have mono and stereo functionality, but they seemed to have bundled the surround functions with the more expensive $1000 version that includes TDM support.

If you don't need TDM or surround, A6 would certainly be a worth a try at the lower price.

@JWL said:

You may want to consider Altiverb 6 at this point. If there were any problems with v5.x they may have been addressed with this new release.

I don't have Altivervb 6 yet; I'm quite happy with 5, so that tells you a little about using it in the Windows environment. However, I've heard such good things about Wizzoo that I certainly would have discounted it, except to say that it will be unsupported in the future, and I'm a bit wary of using unsupported software products when it comes to the major part of my income.

DG