I’ve been living happily in the Native Instruments ecosystem for samples and Komplete… Until I picked up the Keylab MKIII. I’m sold. I want all the Arturia instruments and effects. I like the UI, the sound qualuty, the preset management, keylab, premium feel. Everything. Love it.
I thought this would be easy! I found Sound Collectors Explorer 2, and almost pulled the trigger until I saw that the versions in that collection are way outdated. FX collection 3 vs 5. V collection 9 vs 10. And Pigments 4 vs 5.
I feel like I’m missing something! What is the best way to get the full collection at the best price? With NI, it’s easy to just get the full Komplete Collection and play on.
I see some sales on. Do I just have to buy things individually? Is a Sound Collectors Explorer 3 hidden somewhere?
There isn’t a one-time-purchase option that gets you everything. Even if we’re only talking about VSTs and not their hardware units, Arturia has various product-lines sold distinctly from each other, including synthesizers and plug-in effects.
I would start with V Collection X.
Hi @Noisewall. Welcome to the community from me as well.
Some info:
To get all Arturia instrument and effect software today, then you need:
V-Collection X - Intruments
The newer SyntheX V and Minibrute V and Augmented Yangtze - Instruments
Pigments - Instrument
Fx Collection 5 - Effects - I think all is in there
There can be different offerings to look out for. But the above is all the Arturia software instruments and effects as of today. It does not include all the available soundpacks, that you among others can find here, and where some is free: https://www.arturia.com/sounds
Yes you are correct. I add it to my previous post.
Personally i would go for the above listed products.
I personallyt think the only reason to consider is if you wan’t to do deep editing in presets belonging to now discontinued applications in cases where the old presets because of a total better rebuild of the instrument no longer can be used in the new, and you are on Windows.
I can be wrong. Please ask Arturia, if you consider.
All older/ legacy presets can afaik be used in the newest Analog Lab, and can be edited some without having the old applications. Again ask Arturia if you consider.
Also i’m not sure about upgrade pricing paths. I suggest you ask Arturia about that, if you consider.
BTW: Keep in mind the current sale as @Funtmaster mention.
Just so you know, I’m a user and external moderator, but i’m not an Arturia employee.
I was sort of in the same boat as you. before you purchase. please read this through. Arturia gives you discounts is seems basted on what you own.
I was going to buy the KeyLab 61 MK3 as I wanted to get the Analog Lab Pro as it would have given me most of the instruments. But as it wasn’t available where I live, I bought a minLab3 to give me something to use with my laptop while I waited and I knew I’d use it as it’s a very portable midi controller. By registering that device, Arturia let me upgrade with a promotion to the V_Collection + SynthX for $299 (that promotion is over I believe). I was a bit disappointed at the time that the V collection didn’t come with Pigments. But I said to myself, I got a good package at a good price so smile and be happy.
This week they have the Black Friday deals. Now I looked and the FX Collection was now on sale for me for $99 (about 80% off) and I think that is because I own the V_collection. They also had the Pigments on sale for $99. I bought the FX_Collection and now it shows the Pigments for $49. So if you are looking to buy them all, then you might get a better price buying them one at a time as when you own more, you seem to get them at a bigger and bigger discount. I don’t know if there is an optimal order to add them. I know when I was starting off, I was thinking to myself that If they offered the whole lot for $500 I’d just buy it. But each of the collections added together was well above that. But now when I look at it, I pretty much got everything for actually below the $500 so I am very happy and having a blast making music.
Thank you for pointing me down the rabbit hole! I just bought the 2 collections and Pigments. The only products still remaining as options to buy on the Arturia Software Center are:
Augmented Yangtze
MiniBrute V
Synthx V
Spark 2
Prophet V3
Not sure about the last two, but I’ll try a little of the recommended patience for the first three. I’ve got my hands full for a while now.
Good community here too. The honeymoon has started!
I hope you will be happy with your purchase @Noisewall .
FYI -
The old Prophet V3 has been spilt into Prophet-5 V and Prophet VS V. It’s a legacy product.
Spark 2 is a very fine drum application. It too is a legacy product.
Ah. That’s helpful! I don’t see any replacement for Spark, but I’d like a better drum sequencer!
One day in, I feel that Arturia is an incredible value. Maybe the best value I’ve ever had. Much more value than a similarly priced, underwhelming update I recently made. The Arturia FX are top tier. And things like Motions are original and inspirational.
I’ve really overlooked Arturia since I’m not soft-synth guy, but there is so much more here. I’ve been playing more synth sampled instruments which felt foolish to me. The Arturia synth presets are fantastic and can easily be played even for non-synth fans. It seems like the Augmented Series gets mixed reviews, but being a sample maker/player, I love them. Still figuring out how/if I’ll use them, but they are fun and powerful.
Yes, the honeymoon is still on, but I feel like some of the Sound Banks rival even Spitfire. Certainly rivals Labs and even the $30 sample packs. For me they have been overlooked too. I’ll give them attention next.
Are there any good Sond Bank Collections or is it all one-off?
Analog Lab have a build in Sound Store. You can audition a few presets from soundpacks there. This is for all software soundpacks.
Pigmnets also have a build in Sound Store. So you can audition Pigments presets in there too.
There are demo tracks for each Soundpack on the _SOUNDS website.
Be aware, that there also are presets for legacy products.
Pigments would be my Desert Island synth. You could spend a lifetime exploring the possibilities. I wouldn’t buy everything. There’s just not enough time in the year to master it all. I prefer to go deep into a few things than collect tons of things which I’ll never have time to fully explore and utilize.
I would agree. Everything comes too easily these days. And what I mean by that is, we’ve become too accustomed to having easy access to ‘everything’. 100 million songs in virtual record libraries we access through perpetual payment, most of which we’ll never listen to, instead of enjoying let’s say 500 albums we’ve actually bought and learned every single nuance of through repetition. Same with films. And now we have access to computerised copies of all the world’s best synthesizers, most of which we’ll never tuly learn to get the absolute best from, whereas our antecedents could work wonders with just the three synths in their studio because they’d learned them thoroughly and even figured out ‘hacks’ to make them do things beyond their original scope.
What I’ve been loving about the Arturia Collections is exploration. That’s the key value to “having it all” for me. After just a week, I don’t feel overwhelmed by the options. Coming from utilizing primarily sample libraries, I think Arturia has been pretty smart about how they’ve organized things. I see Arturia as having basically three segments:
Blank Canvas: Pigments. Even by name, Pigments gives you control over tons of parameters. You can select every “color” in the palette in any combination. Sound designers dream. Anything is possible.
Set Palette: V Collection. Each synth has its own tone and style. Once you know that style, you can refine and tweak. But you’re starting off with a particular palette and canvas.
Paint by number: Labs. Everything is set and sounds great. If you don’t like a preset, it’s better to move on than try to tweak it. Not really great for sound designers but great for players or beginners.
I’m still new to the ecosystem, but I find it fun and manageable. I’ve been lost in sample libraries with option paralysis. But not here. Sure, I could get lost in Pigments for the rest of my life, but it’s not due to option paralysis as much as creative exploration.
V Collection is more focused. Once I find a style I like for a purpose, I can tweak to need.
Labs is just a fun way to explore what other professionals have been able to do within those palettes.
What I did find overwhelming is understanding the options as a new buyer! Now that I’m in, it is amazing. No regrets!
Another consideration is that you have a vague idea of what sort of sound you want for something but don’t have the exact way to articulate it in your head. Then having the #3 can give you the ideas and inspirations to be able to move to #2 or #1.
Sometimes when making a song you need to have a place holder to be able to support some of the song while you build the rest of the foundation. I know I need to have a twinkly piano like sound here. Do you spend the time to design that sound from scratch knowing that once you build up the rest of the song, the idea that you had might have changed to now needing a twinkly multi harmonic?
