A Better GM giga lib

[donnie]

Would any of you be interested in a better GM library? I\'ve been kicking this around for awhile. Is there a need or want for this? What about at the $100 price point?

Any input is greatly appreciated!

Donnie

[SteveHanlon]

oH yeah!

I got GM 500 but it\'s still synthy sounding.

If you can make the variety that a GM offers but sample the real thing then I\'d buy it.

Just get rid of the silly sound effects toward the high numbers.

[Magpel]

Yes, would be interested if it were *vastly* superior to the GM 500, which has been a grave disappointment for me that I practically never use. I\'ve heard 8MB GM sets that sound superior. What exactly did they spend 500MB on?

That was the first lib that proved to me that the lavish sample sizes afforded by Giga in no way guarantees superior sampling.

[TheJDog]

I definately think this would be a great idea. I know people would like to get rid of their cheap SBLive cards to clean their systems up. I still think the Giga products need to ship with a nice General Midi set. I mean you buy the product and you have nothing real to mess with out of the box. Even Halion ships with loads of samples to get you started?

Just my 2 cents worth,
JDog

[Hardy Heern]

Yes, I\'m certain that there is a strong demand for a quality GM Bank, even if only to act as a sketch pad. Otherwise, things can just get too complicated which can damage creativity.
If it\'s good maybe Tascam would do a deal and bundle it. That would be excellent to get people started following purchase. Also a lot of us hobbyists cannot justify spending thousands but would still like to have a pallet of quality sounds. Most folk seem disappointed with the Conexant GM sounds. Being one of the first suppliers, I guess they could get away with it when there wasn\'t much else.
I\'ve even produced some decent stuff with my old Sound Canvas, in the past,(as Roland chose the sounds with care.) Soundfonts can also sound remarkably good. Remember, modestly priced sounds can be excellent when they are correctly used with sympathetic MIDI tweaking. Contrarily, I\'ve heard some demos here, using very expensive samples, where the composers have clearly just played them out of the box on a keyboard, in piano style....it might be quick but it just doesn\'t work I\'m afraid.....IMHO

[thesoundsmith]

Oh, yeah-especially at at $100 price point. I use my GM500 a LOT, as I don\'t have the high quality brass and strings that I need (ProSonus) yet. But I especially miss a good quality:

electric piano
acoustic bass
rock-style guitars that don\'t put a thump on each note when they are played rapidly
lush-sounding strings (don\'t have to be \'orchestral\', but better than my Sound Canvas...
rock jazz or big-band style brass, so they can be used as pop horns
and whatever else can sound more natural than what\'s already out there.

My ongoing goal has been to pull together a \'primary\' GM set (I\'ll leave out the exotic stuff to get more room for quality \'standard\' pop/jazz/big band instruments.

From what I see on the boards, the real orchestrators want Garritan and Dan Dean and Nick, a few K$ for a live-orchestra sound.

I want to use Giga live, and the requirements are somewhat different. Night club, jazz, rock, blues, pop requirements are very different, and I think there are a bunch of us who want it. But the difference between a REALLY high-quality sample of the sort that Giga can use and just a very good, usable sample gets lost in the clink of beer vlasses and conversation. OTOH, the cheesy patches in most GM instruments is obvious even to the average listener. Something that would address this would be REALLY cool!!!

Dasher (who can never make a short post when a long one will do as well!!!)

[esperlad]

I would be interested in someting like this. I was thinking how nice it would be if someone made an extensive GM library. My idea included several dynamic layers and additional articulations via keyswitching. Personally, I would not mind the special effects, but I think the standard instruments need to be well-sampled first.

[Mark_Knecht]

Donnie,
Probably at the $100 point I\'d at least consider it. $50 I\'d just buy it as long as I didn\'t hear anything negative. At $150 I\'d probably not bother unless people absolutely raved about the quality.

Cheers,
Mark


Originally posted by donnie:
Would any of you be interested in a better GM library? I\'ve been kicking this around for awhile. Is there a need or want for this? What about at the $100 price point?

Any input is greatly appreciated!

Donnie<font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana, Arial\">

[jmccord]

I would definitely pay $100 or even a little more for a good GM library. I suspect your market would be hobbyists (like me), people playing live and maybe real composers for sketching things out. Right now I use my digital piano for non-Giga sounds and I\'d very much like something better!

[Deep White]

Me.

I bought the GM500 library and found it unusable almost at all. And I couldn\'t resell it to someone else.... images/icons/mad.gif

[LifeForceExplorer]

I feel like the Conexant GM500 library is already a handy enough tool for its purpose, just mocking things up really. And its been a great way for me to start learning how to use Giga with my sequencer. It was cheap and I can use 20 plus GM500 instruments pretty heavily in just GS96 and still be within my polyphony limits! If you make it higher quality wouldnt you have to compromise this which is actually one of its main virtues - along with the fact that it has basic versions of some of the more exotic instruments that one cant afford at the beginning while learning Giga (and paying for it and for all the computer upgrading one has gone through).

My vote, Donnie, would be for you guys who are very experienced at Giga to give Tascam a run for their money and write a \"Giga Tips and Tricks\" manual. Black and white, word-processing prepared, bound at Kinkos - doesnt even have to be fancy. I bet a lot of us Giga novices would shell out 25 bucks FAST for this kind of simple hands on advice - especially if the long-awaited Tascam CD manual finally hits the market soon at 99 bucks the way its been rumored to be priced! Just some thoughts.

[KingIdiot]

IMO

GigaStudio is the WORST option for a GM bank of samples.

It doesn\'t even respond to \"standard\" GM controller functions.

however if Jeff made a GM \"basic\" function for his \"virtuoso\" software.... then yah.

I dont even have GM 500, but I already think it could be enhanced since its release was some time ago.

[mschiff]

Donnie,

Absolutely. I would buy it.

-- Martin

[LHong]

I\'m interested and would pay $100(+) for better GM-Giga-sample library sets. One thing is please try to ensure it be compatible with the GM-500, so far we are happy with its GM plug-N-play functionality (98SE).