Is Antidote really that good?

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Jagwah
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Joined: 16 Jan 2015

12 Apr 2015

Trialed this quite a while ago and hoping to get some honest responses. It's always on my mind because people are always talking it up.

Will Antidote really provide a superior sound, say in comparison to Thor? Is it simply a matter of spending more time with Thor to get what Antidote provides?

Are the oscillators better or do people like it more for the filters and effects?

I played around with Massive for a week or two and it has a far superior sound to anything I ever tried in Reason (imo  :angel: ).  I really like it but I can't stand the clunky workflow with the EMI as I am so used to working in the box where everything flows perfectly. There are a few on board effects on Massive that take it's already great sound to a much higher level. Would anyone compare Antidote with Massive, saying that they are more similar than Predator or Thor?

Hard to take the plunge when I haven't trialed it in so long, would appreciate any honest feedback.

Cheers! :comp:

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Puckboy2000
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12 Apr 2015

It's one of my favorites, but I am partial to synths with good patches out of the box. I like the arp in it as well. I put it up there with Predator.
"Think of how stupid the average person is, and realize half of them are stupider than than that" - George Carlin

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InavigableHeart
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12 Apr 2015

When I trialled Antidote I selected my favourite patches from it and spent a good few hours trying to reproduce them in Thor, but I couldn't match them. I'd say Antidote has a certain richness from that multi-oscillator architecture which is beautiful, Thor's multi-osc options are great but not of the same quality. Personally I think most NI synths have the edge on pretty much anything in Reason, but Antidote is almost there, and, like you say, the contained Reason workflow is second to none.

I still didn't buy Antidote in the end as I already have too many synths, but I'd love it, next sale maybe...

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eXode
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12 Apr 2015

Antidote is my favorite instrument RE.

Mainly because it sounds great out of the box and is straight forward to use.

If you want to compare it to something I think that Sylenth1 is a better comparison (to some extent) than Massive. Antidote uses oscillator banks for each oscillator, similarly to Sylenth1, so you can stack up to 12 oscillators in each bank and these can then be detuned and spread in the stereo field.

Sylenth1 doesn't allow any wave modulation such as pulse width modulation nor does it offer any more than a basic set of waveforms. Antidote offers pulse width modulation as well as some wave tables with sweepable index (i.e. you can sweep smoothly between wave forms).

This feature alone makes it very much worth it over Thor as you'd have to stack a silly amount of Thor's in a Combinator and program your own detune and stereo spread to get close this feature.

Then there's the DYAD mode in Antidote which basically enables a second oscillator bank for each of the two banks. When enabled, the DYAD mode creates an additional oscillator bank that shares the same settings as the main bank but with its tuning shifted to a selectable number of half tones above the reference bank (i.e. +3, +4, +5, +7 semi tones, etc)

This might sound a bit complicated but in short it enables you to create chords with up to 4 notes even though there's just 2 main oscillator banks.

But then there are some other things such as the phase control over each oscillator bank. You can have them free running like an analog synth or you can have them start at a fixed phase. This feature is simply not available in Thor.

I like the filters very much. They are perhaps a bit basic, but works very well for analogue type sounds. The Sallen Key and Diode Ladder filter are real gems.

Then there's the effects. The effects are, imho, all are of very good quality, esp the reverb is great (it's basically the same as the DR-1).

For me, like I stated initially, what I love about Antidote is it's sound and the fact that it's very simple to create great sounds out of the box. As much as I love the Combinator and Thor, it's a fresh change to be able to get production ready sounds right out of Antidote without much need for anything else.

Here's a little demo I did for one of my products. All synth sounds (except drums) including applied FX are from Antidote, some mastering is applied:


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Jagwah
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12 Apr 2015

Thanks guys, all very useful comments.

@ Exode your demo sounds amazing. Just been on Youtube trying to hear as much as I can and it really does stand out in a way that Massive does over other Reason instruments. Thanks for all the info, particularly what Antidote can do that Thor can't. Also, you mentioned getting production ready results out of the box with Antidote and that is what I found with Massive, I think Antidote is perfect for me, cheers.



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zakalwe
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Joined: 22 Jan 2015

12 Apr 2015

the chord mode and filters are really nice.  I just wish the filter section could be tapped by audio in like the effects.

inmatus
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Joined: 25 Mar 2015

12 Apr 2015

Yes

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Emian
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12 Apr 2015


the sound of Antidote is clean/huge out of the box. the FX are great; but i personally prefer Predator over Antidote, because it's more versatile to me, & predator can sound more gritty/dirty then Antidote.
 
I must say that i DO like antidote for deep basslines tough, & i still am happy to own it, but maybe wait to buy untill next sale ;)


"i might be established, but i'll never be establishement "
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Faastwalker
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Location: NSW, Australia

13 Apr 2015

I bought it & hardly use it. Was initially blown away by some of the sounds. But then it didn't get used much. However, every so often I fire it up & can usually find what I'm looking for with this thing. It is hugely capable of a broad range of sounds in particualr string / pad sounds. I rarely use it for much else, even though I think this has most bases covered pretty well. It's a bit of a secret weapon for me but personally I have a lot more fun with Parsec & it's ability to push sounds into quite absract territory with little effort. Antidote is very good but I wonder which synth I'd buy in Reason if they were all available at the same time & I had to choose one. There's a good amount of choice now.

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raymondh
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13 Apr 2015

I really like Antidote. I don't think it replaces Thor, or Predator, it really is it's own beast with it's own signature sound.

+1 on eXode's comments, also I find Antidote extremely easy to program, it's really hard *not* to make it sound fantastic. 

In a mix, it's often a good idea to reduce the amount of delay and reverb, which tend to be quite liberal on the factory presets.

There's some very good Antidote refills available with amazing combinators in them. (and don't forget our very own Propellerhead Users Community Winter Antidote refill)



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Wensell
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13 Apr 2015


I love the sounds Antidote offers, but its way to CPU heavy for my use/rig.
Mac Mini 2,4 Quadcore, 16 GB ram, SSD disc. I guess the problem is that I work at the lowest latency possible - recording guitar etc. If I had a more systematic workflow, perhaps replacing thor with Antidote in the mixing process, after raising the latency, I would use it more.. But then I would have to be a systematic person. LOL.

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Benedict
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13 Apr 2015

I am thinking maybe sample rate is your issue. Are you wasting resources on running at above 16/44? 

:)
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Bonkhead
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13 Apr 2015

InavigableHeart wrote: I'd say Antidote has a certain richness from that multi-oscillator architecture which is beautiful, Thor's multi-osc options are great but not of the same quality. Personally I think most NI synths have the edge on pretty much anything in Reason, but Antidote is almost there, and, like you say, the contained Reason workflow is second to none.
 
this ^ :)
I use it in all my songs.

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submonsterz
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Joined: 07 Feb 2015

13 Apr 2015

I chose predator and stuck with it even after trialling antidote and at that time predator having all its issues which almost all have been resolved .
I'd still chose predator now too. Predator layererd with noxious mmmmmm nice.

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mbfrancis
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13 Apr 2015

Antidote is wonderful, it pulls off easily what would take a tremendously long time to wire up in a combi using Thors - specifically rich detuned multi-oscillator patches.  That said, it is a resource hog, so usually I have to print my parts almost immediately.
Producer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist. I make indie pop as Port Streets, 90s/shoegaze as Swooner, and Electro as Yours Mine.

TheFilterMob
Posts: 33
Joined: 19 Feb 2015

14 Apr 2015

The antidote is definitely a great synthesizer in my opinion!  Thor is is great for its own reasons like the triple oscillators and triple filters, delays, clip/saturation emulation and chorus, but the antidote has more effects like the phaser,eq,compressor and a different type of distortion….  I'd say its up there with parsec and thor!  Great synth!!!!
I'm a Propellerhead for life!

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EnochLight
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14 Apr 2015

eXode wrote:Here's a little demo I did for one of my products. All synth sounds (except drums) including applied FX are from Antidote, some mastering is applied:

Holy crap dude - nice!!!  You just made another sale - just bought this.  I don't know how I missed this from earlier this year.
Win 10 | Ableton Live 11 Suite |  Reason 12 | i7 3770k @ 3.5 Ghz | 16 GB RAM | RME Babyface Pro | Akai MPC Live 2 & Akai Force | Roland System 8, MX1, TB3 | Dreadbox Typhon | Korg Minilogue XD

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devilfish
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15 Apr 2015

Is Antidote really that good?
YES !

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doctecazoid
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15 Apr 2015

Every synth available in Reason (either native or RE) has a sonic signature that differentiates it from all the others.

For my money, Antidote is the go-to synth for what I call large-scale pad timbres.  (Large scale = big, massive-sounding, lots of animation).  I agree that the effects are also first rate.

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chimp_spanner
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Joined: 06 Mar 2015

16 Apr 2015

I wish I had've got this at the introductory price. One of my biggest (Reason related) regrets haha. I do intend to pick it up but the Rack Shop has had so much of my money lately, I need to cool it a bit and start making music with it all! But what I do remember from the trial period was that it was way easier to get BIG sounds from it than Thor. Thor always sounds a little flat to my ears. I wish they had've added a unison spread feature to the multi-osc, or even a global unison function. Silly!

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