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Hello all! It's my first post, and I suspect that I'll be around quite a bit asking dopey questions, I hope you'll bear with me. First question...and I'm sure it's a topic brought up before...is about Software Synths. The Roland Soundcanvas that was included in my BIAB package is adaquate for the sounds of drums, bass and drums, but with things like guitar, horns, and strings it...well shall we say it leaves a bit to be desired? So - are there alternate VSTis or whatever that you could suggest that would sound better? I'd happily pay some cash for a significant improvement, although a really nice free download synth would of course be very cool. Thanks!



Yes, as others have written, there are much better softsynths available than the included VSC.

However, as also written, it is much easier with BIAB to use a General Midi softsynth, than one that does not follow the GM specification (most do not).

As was mentioned, the Coyote Forte DXI softsynth, very inexpensive, available for purchase from PGMusic (you can download a free demo to try first), is a GM softsynth with much better sound than VSC.

A GM softsynth that probably sounds better than that, but costs more, and I think uses more of your CPU resources, is Bandstand, from Native Instruments.

Someone mentioned Garritan Personal Orchestra. It is an excellent orchestral synth. As mentioned, it will soon have a new version out, using the Aria sample playback engine. (The old version used Kontakt.) However, it is not GM, so would be more complicated to use. (Unless the new ARIA version has some way to set to a GM mode or something?) Also, as it is a classical orchestra, it may not be as well suited to jazz and pop sounds. Garritan also has a synth called "Jazz and Big Band", which has very good jazz instrument sounds (also not GM though). A couple years ago they announced they would come out with a GM softsynth called GEM, but it never was released (other than a Reason Refill), and no more announcements of it, so I think the idea was dropped.)

Another option for a General MIDI synth is to use a free soundfont player, like sfz, and to load a General MIDI soundfont into it. Here is one that is supposed to be very good--http://www.papelmedia.eu/english/ . It only costs 27 Euro (not sure how that translates into dollars-perhaps $30-40), less than Coyote Forte DXI, and it is supposed to be very good. (Might be interesting if someone did a comparison review of this Papelmedia GM soundfont, against Coyote Forte and Bandstand.)

Of course, as others have mentioned, you could also use a hardware GM sound module, like the Ketron, or those from Roland-Edirol and others. That has the disadvantages of another piece of hardware to connect (and carry with you, if a portable setup), and less flexibility, as the sounds are hard-wired. It has the advantage of using much less CPU and RAM, as your computer then does not have to synthesize the sounds, they are present in the external module. And some--like the Ketron, are supposed to be quite good. This (using an external sound module) used to be very common, before the advent of softsynths.

If you wish to render a creation in BIAB to a .wav file, however, it could be problematical, if you use a hardware sound module, and wish to capture that sound. Then you would have to actually record the sound from the module, routing its sound output to the input of another sound card, or using a microphone to record the sound. With a softsynth, however, you would not have to record like that, the audio file can be automatically rendered.