Hi,

I already own a Emu APS and think it is great but when it comes to sounds I have found it hard to find any other than those that come with the card. I was wondering whether buying a sampler possibly the E5000 Ultra would be of any advantage ?

Would someone kindly inform me of the advantages of having a sampler, what I can do with one and possibly even whether the e5000 is a good buy ?

Thanks

Sinclair

http://mp3.com/sinclairowen

All I can tell you is that I just bought the ultra e6400 It is the model above and came with 8 cd's of sound librairies so i would consider that. you'll spend $300 or $400 more to get more ram, more options and big sounds .


Seep

Hi Sinclair,

It all depends on what you want. Samplers are great tools, especially for being able to keep your sounds fresh. The nice thing about samplers is that, when you want a new sound, you don't have to go out and buy a whole new synth. With a lot of the sample-playback synths today, that is pretty much what you get.

A big advantage for samplers is for doing drums and orchestral work. I have not heard synths produce the same quality drums or orchestral sounds as samplers with good sampler libraries can. Keep in mind though that orchestral sample CD Roms are expensive. There is one library that costs $3500 US!

Anyway, a sampler is a good option. However, there are some important things to think about. If you don't have time to sample (and edit) your own custom sounds and don't have the extra money to invest in some sample CD Roms after buying your sampler, you may want to look at the option that Seep mentioned and go with an e6400 Ultra instead of an E5000.

One thing that I will note though is that I didn't really like the sounds on the 8 CD's that come with the e6400 Ultra. You may like them though. If you do, then it is a good start since you won't have to buy a library from the get-go. You should plan on investing in an external SCSI CD Rom drive and hard drive (or Zip/Jaz) that is compatible with the E-mu sampler.

This is a big part of why I bought an E5000. They are about $400 difference in price. The biggest differences are really the 4 outputs vs 8 and limitation of 64 voice polyphony on the E5000. However, when I priced it out, to go to 128 voices on a e6400, the expanded e6400 cost just a little bit less than buying 2 E5000's. I went the route of being able to buy 2 E5000's instead. Now, I'll be able to load up 256 MB of samples instead of 128 MB of samples.

Oh well, both samplers are great and well, worth the money. I prefer them over the Akai's as EOS is more stable currently.

Good luck with your decision. Once you've used a sampler, you'll wonder how you ever made music without one. HTH

Fernando

Dear Fernando and seep,

Thanks very much for your help, It is very nice of you to take so much time to answer my questions, I think I will go along with Fernando's suggestion however, I would eventually like to load large samples so I guess that buying 2 e5000 will probably be the best idea, even though I can only afford one at the moment !!!

Maybe you can answer andother question please ;-) Once I have bought the e5000 will I be able to connect it to my PC via SCSI and if so what will I be able to do??? I know that I will be able to control it thru midi in cubase. but I already have a scsi hard drive and Cd-rom inside the PC so will i be able to access them through the sampler ???

Thanks for your help once again !!!

Best Regards
Sinclair

http://mp3.com/sinclairowen

Does the E5000 come with EOS Link (I think that is what it is called) software? I think the E6400 does, but I don't know for sure. Fernando, do you use EOS Link or some other PC or Mac program to edit your E5000 samples? I own SoundDiver, but imagine that it might contain limitations when it comes to editing fresh samples (as it is re: K2000, I think).

Hi Sinclair,

One thing I didn't specifically mention (although I intended to) was that the E5000 only comes with 1 CD Rom of sounds. They are about the same calibre of the 8 CD Roms that come with the e6400 IMHO. If having lots of sounds initially is important to you that may be one reason to go with an e6400 instead.

In regards to SCSI and your PC, well you will be able to transfer samples back and forth via SCSI. This is great if you like to do your sample editing on the PC. You cannot however, share your PC's SCSI hard drive for storing E-mu samples, Cubase songs, etc. The E-mu samplers use a proprietary format which the PC cannot recognize and vice versa. You really need a dedicated hard drive for the sampler or a Zip or a Jaz. If you go with a removable media drive, I would personally go for the Jaz since it holds more and is much faster for loading and saving than the Zip drive.

Chances are that your PC's CD Rom drive is IDE and not SCSI. If this is the case, you definitely cannot use it for loading sounds into your sampler. Basically add another $100 US or so in your budget for an external SCSI CD Rom drive. If it is SCSI, there is a chance that the EOS sampler can recognize it and load samples from it. I have not tried this so I don't know for sure. I guess you'll have to try it when you get it.

Good luck and enjoy. You won't regret buying this machine. It's great.

Fernando

I'm considering getting the E5000 also. My question is about storage. Do you recommend buying an internal IDE hard disc for the E5000 or an external Jazz? Are jazz drives as quick as internal hard disc?

Also, which company makes the best sample disc. I've already decided to buy a piano, string, bass, and drum sample libary. Which brands do you recommend?

Hi Wilkes,

EOS Link does not come with the E5000 Ultra. However, from what I've seen, EOS Link does not do much for you. All it does is provide you with a front-panel interface to emulate the front panel of the E5000. It will not transfer samples back and forth, nor will it give you more sample-editing features than what is already in EOS.

I just bought Sounddiver. I haven't had a chance to play with it much so I don't know how much it can do in terms of sample editing. So far, I've only used it for programming some presets. For that it works quite well and it integrates with Logic Audio which is the sequencer I use. I'm hoping to learn SD better in the next few months. I'll have a better idea as to its capabiities then.

I do know that SD is not fully compatible with the latest version of EOS. SD can support up to EOS version 3.x. Some of the extra preset parameters available in EOS 4.02 are simply ignored right now. I believe that a new Sounddiver module for EOS is currently being worked on and should be available probably around April or May.

HTH
Fernando

Hi Clintd,

Well, you can probably find a IDE hard drive that is faster than a Jaz. I don't know if the sampler can fully take advantage of the extra speed or not. Where the Jaz drive can be convenient if for storage. When it fills up, you can put in another cartridge and away you go. This is not as big a deal if you have a CDRW drive that you can make backups of your samples though.

In terms of sample CD ROM libraries, I highly recommend them. However, they can get quite expensive, especially the orchestral ones. I'll give you my recommendations:

Piano - I haven't found one set yet that I like. I haven't tried most of them though. I tried the Ultimate Piano from EastWest. Not that great. It is usable and the sound quality is good. I found it not to be dynamic enough for my taste. Play ff didn't give me the same attack as when playing a real piano.
Bass - Bass Legends by Spectrasonics. Excellent.
Drums - Loops or Hits? NYC Drumworks is pretty good. There are many good ones out there though. One CD Set will probably not cover all of your bases. I like Burning Grooves also. Not a lot of selection but has some good loops too. These are acoustic drums though and I don't know if you're looking for electronic style drums ala 808/909/Linn. For 808/909 type sounds there's a gazillion on the net that you'll be able to find without having to spend a dime. I would spend my money on good acoustic sets and search for others on the net. You won't find good acoustic sets with variations on the drums hits as you will on a CD Rom
Strings - This is where it can get expensive. Prosonus has an orchestral set that isn't too bad and the price is okay. After that you pay quite a bit of money for the Peter Siedlaczek, Miroslav Vitous and Kirk Hunter string libraries. While these are great, they are expensive.

HTH and sorry about the length of this post.
Fernando

Hi,

First of all I would like to thank everyone for their comments especially Fernando. They have really helped me ! I know that the e5000 has 4 outputs, but what I would like to know is whether it is possible to route all of the sounds the sampler is playing at the same time, to the same output ! For example Piano, Bass etc all to one output or is there a limit ???

Thanks Once Again

Sinclair

http://mp3.com/sinclairowen