Cupwise Rayphlex Compressors Mk2 [Nebula]

When this set was first released (September 2012) it had the distinction with many Nebula users as being the first Nebula compressor that 'actually works'. Before this release, Nebula had a reputation with many as not being very good for actual compression, and compressor programs were commonly used just for their tone, in combination with VST plug-ins to do the actual gain reduction. I think it's more than fair to say that this release helped change all that.

The hardware has a great reputation for precision, and being somewhat transparent, while still having its own character. It has lots of controls and features (including an extra high frequency control section, which I sampled for use here), which made it very tricky to sample, but that's part of what drew me to them. It also has amazing specs as far as noise/distortion goes, and who knows, they may one day be considered a modern classic. Some people seem to think of them as such already.

Here's what's in this library:

Separate hard and soft knee knee compressor programs, with sampled adjustable controls for ratio, attack, and release.

Additional hard and soft knee compressor programs, which include high frequency enhancement controls which can prevent high frequencies from becoming overly compressed. The idea is to prevent a dull sound when lots of compression is happening. These programs are very CPU intensive because of the extra controls. On my system at 96khz, I can just barely run the full version live, however lite versions run a little bit better. You should expect similar results (44.1 or 48khz use less resources so you may find those ok), and really they should be thought of as a bonus which you may or may not be able to use. I feel the other, main compressor programs (without the HF controls) are more than worth the asking price of this library. So if you can get these ones working, it's a nice bonus.

The 'softer' knee compressor programs- sampled from the hardware's automatic mode, which actually has an even softer knee than the main soft knee mode. These programs also include the high frequency enhancement controls. These programs aren't quite as complex as the main hard/soft knee with HFcon ones, so they use less CPU.

A 'preamp-style' program sampled from the units with the compression bypassed, and with an on/off switch for bass phase enhancement. This is kind of a bonus feature on the hardware. It's a subtle effect that in some cases can be used to bring low bass 'more into focus'. With this program you can use the bass phase enhancer with any material, regardless of whether you pair it with any compression programs from this library. Low CPU use.

Another preamp-style program that was sampled from the units with their output tube stage being overdriven, and with the compression bypassed. You get a kind of overdrive effect caused by the tube stage. You can dial in how much you want with the 'od' and 'dist' controls.

All compressors come in lite, full, and shq varieties. Lite uses the least amount of CPU and has no sampled harmonics. It's good for auditioning and setting up the effect in your mix before rendering. Full versions add some sampled harmonics at a cost of more CPU use. SHQ (super high quality) have the most complete, best quality model of the compressors, but use a lot of CPU and can only be used for rendering.

This great compressor library comes with some really nice skins for both Nebula 3 and Nebula 4, by JPN!

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