I wrote this post on another forum, but thought it might be of worth sharing here…
What follows is first impressions, warts and all - of the SoundTower OB-6 editor.
The not so good stuff:
- Though I was able to register my copy, it took a while (and a message to the support team) to get it sorted. On the upside, it is a one-time deal.
- There is no documentation / User Guide available. A note to the support team confirmed. Recommendation from support: Watch Prophet 12 videos to see what is what. This did get me rolling, as well as downloading the Mopho User Guide.
- There are bits and pieces which are confusing (especially with the lack of a user guide) but in some cases - functionality seems to not work... although it had. For example, you can overwrite a Patch Category / change it's name. It won't show up on all the screens initially. Refreshing Bank lists, can be a PITA also. A lot seemed to be, having the screen reflect changes made on the OB, or from other areas of the editor. Not a monumental issue - but in a couple of cases, I was trying to chase down non-existent problems.
The good stuff ( and there is plenty).
- Everything was able to sync up between my Mac and OB-6 Module. Comms back and forth seem fine. A change on the GUI - was reflected in the OB buffer, a change on the OB, was reflected on the GUI screens.
- Bank management, while a little confusing initially... is freaking awesome. Creating and saving banks is easy... and works. This alone, is worth the price of the software. You can easily create banks based on Sets, Genres, Tone types, whatever.
- You can create Filter, Arp and Sequencer templates.
- You can generate "Snapshots" of editing changes... allowing you to go back (I havent spent a lot of time with this - but the one test I did, worked)
- There is a Sequencer Editor... and it is functional. Wish there was documentation for this.. but I've been able to figure out the critical bits
- and . . . . the cool, fun, feature that alone - is worth the price. Oh wait - I already said the Librarian was worth the price. Well - the cool feature in addition to the Librarian is the Sound Generators. The video for the Prophet-12 editor covers these pretty well:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Cq0FODRT8Q What it doesn't say enough about... is if you have certain patch types that you enjoy, and want variations of them --- these Sound Generators are freaking awesome. If I was selling patches for the OB-6, I would be nervous about this technology. Seriously. I fired up the Sound Generator and mixed / matched some patches I really like, and generated a few dozen wonderful 'keepers' in a few minutes. You have to sort though some of the non-keepers that get generated - but my oh my. It also indexes and pulls up every Arp you have loaded. These show up in the SG windows, so you can try different arps with the variations. All your arps are in one place - and ready to audition the sounds, by clicking. This feature alone, is worth the price. oops.. sorry again.
Sorry to sound like an ad. I have no affiliation with SoundTower folks. There is a lot about the OB-6 editor that seems unfinished, and hopefully, they will get around to it. Lack of a manual is pretty sad. That said though -- if you are struggling with managing your patches, this does it - in spades. If you want on-screen editing or viewing of patch settings, this does it - well. If you want to monkey around with auto-generation of patches.. with an easy way to audition existing arps, and save these off - I know of no other game in town.
Joe
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