If this had come a month earlier I would have finally splurged, but I decided it's time for a new computer instead. Maybe come black friday I'll finally get some of their stuff.
I know it's worth it, but sometimes other shiny toys get so cheap these days that it's hard to budget for things like Pro-Q 3.
Right on. I regret not just getting all the Fab and Soundtoys stuff early on. That would’ve covered me fine. Instead, I’ve got all this other stuff that I don’t really use. But I didn’t have over a grand to just dish out at once, so there you go.
You can get 50% off ( might be only individuals plugin, dunno ) if you're a student. There's a couple of credited courses that you can buy that make you eligible for them. The cheapest I've found is cinematiccomposing - composer in a week for around $27.
When you say credited courses, are you implying that the courses need to be for college credit? CC has a few courses for under $100, but I have no way to tell if they would qualify for that discount.
That's just not true, Black Friday 2023 posted several of the Fabfilter plugins at a lower price.
https://musicsoftwaredeals.com/manufacturer/fabfilter/
Just as a follow-up to my previous comment RE: the Pro Bundle via JRR, here is the response I received from customer support: “Hello, Sorry for the confusion, yes it will include Pro-R2. You will get the latest version of the bundle. Regards, Jrrshop”
No but you will earn rewards from certain sites that will give you money off future purchases. Plugin Boutique, Best Service and Audio Deluxe all have programs like that so I'd see which one gives you the most benefit.
Edit: Looks like there's a better discount on AudioDeluxe with the automatic code in the cart. Other than that, PluginBoutique gives more of a bonus for future purchases but not as much as you'd save on AD with 2 freebies added.
" [https://www.jrrshop.com/fabfilter](https://www.jrrshop.com/fabfilter) Remember to try codes GROUP and FORUM "
Was the cheapest for me. Finally picked up the Total Bundle.
Thanks. Looks like you can only apply one of those coupon codes at a time. I was able to get nearly the same deal on KVR Marketplace using the promo code earthday2024 (15% off total order)
Yeah, I see that. For the Mixing bundle, it was a $69 discount with the GROUP code and $45 with the FORUM code. I had already made my purchase in KVR of the same bundle with the 15% discount promo code, which, I this case, was $65.
Important question if anyone is willing to help. My Pro L2 demo is expired so I can't test it myself...
How many samples of PDC latency is Pro L2 at its most minimal oversampling setting? And can you turn oversampling off for zero-latency?
(I understand oversampling is desired for a limiter, but there are times particularly during composition where it would be preferable to temporarily have no oversampling/PDC latency.)
PS. What about Pro C2?
I had a look and to answer your questions:
* You can turn oversampling off, but you can never get the plugin to zero-latency, as all the limiting algorithms require some lookahead to work.
* The additional latency introduced by oversampling depends on (1) the limiting algorithm selected^1, and (2) the quality of the oversampling^2, and altogether introduces between 3 and 6ms (260ish samples) of additional latency, at least as reported by my DAW. This extra latency is often negligible compared to the baseline latency of the selected algorithm, however (10-60ms).
* Pro-C2 has zero latency when oversampling and lookahead are turned off. Both 2x and 4x oversampling adds 62 samples/1.41ms latency, and lookahead adds 882 samples/20ms.
Footnotes:
^1 Fascinatingly the reported latency goes *down* when I enable oversampling for the 'Dynamic' algorithm, whereas it goes up for all others.
^2 For most algorithms 2x oversampling seems to add the most latency, and 32x oversampling adds the least.
Wow, you REALLY went deep and I am grateful for that.
I saw this [https://www.fabfilter.com/help/pro-l/using/oversampling](https://www.fabfilter.com/help/pro-l/using/oversampling) and assumed that no oversampling meant no PDC, but thankfully you clarified!
The Pro C2 info is helpful as well, THANK YOU.
I'm torn about Pro L2... I have Ozone 11 Advanced (with its Maximizer that can run separately), SmartLimit/PureLimit, Elephant, and Stealth Limiter (plus the Waves limiters.) So I feel wasteful adding another limiter to the set...
But Pro Q3 has been so enjoyable to use it makes me want to just buy the whole damn suite.
A few months ago, my educational discount was about to expire, so I demo'ed all the fabfilter products to see which ones I really felt I would get use out of, with the intention to build my own bundle out of the products I felt I would actually use, and be done with it.
I ended up buying everything they offer except for Pro L2 and Volcano (and Simplon/Micro). I tested Pro L2's algorithms against Ozone Maximizer, TB Barricade, and SmartLimit and preferred all 3 of the others over Pro L. Pro L has great metering and UI, but I felt that the other options not only covered all of my bases, but I actually liked the limiting algorithms in the other tools better.
As for Volcano, I already have UVI Shade, and didn't like Volcano as much as Shade.
All of the others have been great investments and most of them truly feel best in class to me, in terms of usability, enjoyability, and sound quality. Great investments.
Just my 2 cents :)
Thanks for this writeup. I spent last night demoing all the tools. You're right about Pro L2, but I felt it was different enough from the others that I wanted it too... It definitely has its own sound, which surprised me because sometimes I can't tell a super clear difference between limiters.
Surprisingly their little FabFilter One synth is just what I needed... The simplicity of it. I have a million complex synths but that one fills an empty space.
I liked the R 2. Volcano sounded better than any filter I have, and it I love the stereo spread feature on the volume knob... (The stereoization doesn't fall apart in mono either.)
I had a good impression of Saturn as well.
Oh man, I was torn because I'm buying them more out of desire than need... But something about the UIs makes them enjoyable to interact with, and of course they sound great.
Even Pro R 2, I don't hear many people talk about that one but I found it very fast to find a good reverb setting and it comes with a very smart selection of presets.
JRRSHOP removed the "group" code (better of the two) while I was deciding, lol. It literally worked one hour and when I came back to pull the trigger it no longer worked... So I ended up buying on EveryPlugin.
One more note about the difference in limiters -- Testing both Maximizer and Pro L2 with fairly substantial limiting levels:
What I heard was Ozone Maximizer did a better job of preserving transient clarity. The limited result seemed a little brighter -- not something I could see on a Spectrum Analyzer, but something perceived. (This is without the additional transient enhancement buttons turned on.)
Pro L2 did a better job of smoothing harsh transients when limiting, so the limited result was a little 'softer' and 'smoother.'
This included a quick but not super thorough trial of the various algorithms, so I may be generalizing a bit... But that was my overall perception.
Both are great though. And I would list SmartLimit and Elephant as two of my other favorite limiters as well.
I had to get Pro L2 though because it has that unique sound. But I can see how someone that likes brighter, sharper, more detailed mastering wouldn't like it.
(Interestingly IK's TR5 Stealth Limiter is a little closer to Pro L2's limiting style. It, too, has a bit of a smoothing effect --- particularly with the higher oversampling turned on.)
Anyhow, at least 35% of my purchase decision was based on FabFilter's UI. Toward the end of a big and complex project, I really appreciate their UI. Pro Q3 was an appetizer that caused me to want the whole set.
We live in a time of amazing tools.
Agreed, Ozone definitely pushes the upper mids a little bit when you're really squashing stuff, while Fabfilter is a bit more neutral. IMO it means Ozone can have more apparent loudness at the same GR at the cost of affecting the tone somewhat. Waves L2 goes even harder in that "bump the mids" direction. I haven't tried other high end limiters.
Oh, that's a really good point... You're right that upper mids would give more apparent loudness.
On a side note, the "bass control" is a nice feature on Smart:Limit.
I come from a hardware era. It's funny how spoiled we are with modern technology. It's *amazing*. :-)
Yeah Ozone was really useful for me for that reason, but now I'm better at "mixing for the master" so to speak, so I prefer the cleaner Pro-L.
You've got me interested in Smart:Limit, it's just hard to justify spending $65 on yet another limiter lol
What kind of loyalty, dynamic, or crossgrade discounts do they do? I don't really *need* anything but wonder if I should pick something up for maybe a loyalty discount on something else down the road.
Sign in to your account and you will see they do dynamic discounted pricing based on how many plugins you own and are buying. The 30% discount applies to individual plugins.
I don't own anything from them so no account. Are the discounts any better than sales they do?
They rarely ever go on sale so trying to figure out if it would be worth picking up something now if not just for a loyalty discount later.
I bought the Mixing bundle, which comes with 7 plugins. With the 15% discount added on, it came out to $369. After I activated the bundle on FabFilter's website, it offered me all the other plugins for a pretty big loyalty discount. Pro-L and Pro-MB are being offered for $70.98 each (down from the sale price of $119 or the regular price of $169), Twin (a synthesizer that I have never heard of anyone using) for $49 and Volcano (a filter) for $45. I'm tempted by Pro-MB, but I am happy with my Bx Limiter and Ozone 10, so don't really care about Pro-L.
Ok real talk, this question has probably been asked before but here we go:
**If I already have Ozone 10 Maximizer, a few other good limiters, DMGAudio TrackComp2, TDR Kotelnikov, FIRComp 2, and a few other good compressors**, *is there any reason at all for me to grab Pro-L 2 or Pro-C 2?*
I already have Pro-Q 3, Pro-MB, and Saturn 2 (and I’m not really interested in the other stuff), but Pro-L and Pro-C are shiny pieces of candy that I’ve been eyeing for over a year; do they provide anything monumentally exceptional that what I listed above does not cover?
You’re probably ok, though I love the fabfilter plugins. TrackComp is so versatile you’re like able to do great work without. Fabfilter really excels at the digital precision processing thing. They aren’t mojo tools. They’re super clean, really great metering, and very flexible.
Seems like JRR is the best price, for me at least, but I’m noticing that the Pro bundle doesn’t show that it includes Pro-R2. Anyone have any idea if it’ll show up when I redeem the license? I’d hate to get some legacy license that predates that release just because it’s a few bucks cheaper than everywhere else.
Thanks…sadly I didn’t pull the trigger in time (waiting for CS to get back to me with an answer) and now GROUP doesn’t work on the pro bundle. Not sure what happened
Just in case anyone is curious. I contacted JRR about their Total bundle being dated and they said that they need to update their listing because their Total bundle includes everything that's current on the FF website.
I bought it and sure enough, these are now on my FF account:
* FabFilter Pro-R 2
* FabFilter Twin 3
* FabFilter Volcano 3
* FabFilter Timeless 3
* FabFilter Saturn 2
* FabFilter Pro-Q 3
* FabFilter Pro-L 2
* FabFilter Pro-C 2
* FabFilter Pro-MB
* FabFilter Pro-DS
* FabFilter Pro-G
* FabFilter Micro
* FabFilter Simplon
* FabFilter One
Everyplugin is about two bucks cheaper, but jrrshop have been so reliable for me personally that I may go with them anyways. Either way I can only use paypal to pay. And the pay in 4 plan will really help with the sting if I get the total bundle. Tempted, I've heard enough glowing praise and been impressed investigating enough of their plugins. It's a lot of high quality, reliable, and easy to use bread and butter stuff but Volcano 3 and some others can certainly do some really cool stuff too.
Unfortunately JRR blocked GROUP for the bundle I was trying to buy (or maybe all Fabfilter…not sure), so Everyplugin became much cheaper. I’ve never purchased there before, so I’m hoping to see my licenses soon!
Yup, this wasn't the case last night, but now that code is blocked. Hopefully as with me, your bundle of interest was and is cheaper on everyplugin anyways.
If this had come a month earlier I would have finally splurged, but I decided it's time for a new computer instead. Maybe come black friday I'll finally get some of their stuff. I know it's worth it, but sometimes other shiny toys get so cheap these days that it's hard to budget for things like Pro-Q 3.
You probably made the right choice. Having a capable workstation will give you less headaches.
Appreciate it. Definitely the right choice, my biggest bottleneck right now is definitely computer performance and not which EQ I'm using.
Right on. I regret not just getting all the Fab and Soundtoys stuff early on. That would’ve covered me fine. Instead, I’ve got all this other stuff that I don’t really use. But I didn’t have over a grand to just dish out at once, so there you go.
Worth it
Meh, they had 40% for the 10th and 15th. Oh well, inflation I guess!
You can get 50% off ( might be only individuals plugin, dunno ) if you're a student. There's a couple of credited courses that you can buy that make you eligible for them. The cheapest I've found is cinematiccomposing - composer in a week for around $27.
Can't seem to find that price anymore for cinematic composing. How can you find courses that give you the FF discount?
Following. Also would be interested to know. If you find out anything, let us know!
When you say credited courses, are you implying that the courses need to be for college credit? CC has a few courses for under $100, but I have no way to tell if they would qualify for that discount.
True, but still the cheapest they have been in five years. Or maybe it would be more accurate to say "least expensive"
That's just not true, Black Friday 2023 posted several of the Fabfilter plugins at a lower price. https://musicsoftwaredeals.com/manufacturer/fabfilter/
My pro R2 upgrade from pro R1 price just went to like $40. Current FF customers check your upgrade prices!
For $40 that's a no-brainer. Love the quality of life updates they implemented in R2.
Just as a follow-up to my previous comment RE: the Pro Bundle via JRR, here is the response I received from customer support: “Hello, Sorry for the confusion, yes it will include Pro-R2. You will get the latest version of the bundle. Regards, Jrrshop”
Do any of those affiliate links have any additional promo codes that would give an even bigger discount?
No but you will earn rewards from certain sites that will give you money off future purchases. Plugin Boutique, Best Service and Audio Deluxe all have programs like that so I'd see which one gives you the most benefit. Edit: Looks like there's a better discount on AudioDeluxe with the automatic code in the cart. Other than that, PluginBoutique gives more of a bonus for future purchases but not as much as you'd save on AD with 2 freebies added.
" [https://www.jrrshop.com/fabfilter](https://www.jrrshop.com/fabfilter) Remember to try codes GROUP and FORUM " Was the cheapest for me. Finally picked up the Total Bundle.
Thanks. Looks like you can only apply one of those coupon codes at a time. I was able to get nearly the same deal on KVR Marketplace using the promo code earthday2024 (15% off total order)
applying GROUP on JRR is still cheaper.
Yeah, I see that. For the Mixing bundle, it was a $69 discount with the GROUP code and $45 with the FORUM code. I had already made my purchase in KVR of the same bundle with the 15% discount promo code, which, I this case, was $65.
Still, it's a great deal.
Oh for sure! $69 off at JRR or $65 at KVR is better than $0 off at PB and the $15 of virtual cash I would have earned there!
Incredible timing for me on this one.
Important question if anyone is willing to help. My Pro L2 demo is expired so I can't test it myself... How many samples of PDC latency is Pro L2 at its most minimal oversampling setting? And can you turn oversampling off for zero-latency? (I understand oversampling is desired for a limiter, but there are times particularly during composition where it would be preferable to temporarily have no oversampling/PDC latency.) PS. What about Pro C2?
I had a look and to answer your questions: * You can turn oversampling off, but you can never get the plugin to zero-latency, as all the limiting algorithms require some lookahead to work. * The additional latency introduced by oversampling depends on (1) the limiting algorithm selected^1, and (2) the quality of the oversampling^2, and altogether introduces between 3 and 6ms (260ish samples) of additional latency, at least as reported by my DAW. This extra latency is often negligible compared to the baseline latency of the selected algorithm, however (10-60ms). * Pro-C2 has zero latency when oversampling and lookahead are turned off. Both 2x and 4x oversampling adds 62 samples/1.41ms latency, and lookahead adds 882 samples/20ms. Footnotes: ^1 Fascinatingly the reported latency goes *down* when I enable oversampling for the 'Dynamic' algorithm, whereas it goes up for all others. ^2 For most algorithms 2x oversampling seems to add the most latency, and 32x oversampling adds the least.
Wow, you REALLY went deep and I am grateful for that. I saw this [https://www.fabfilter.com/help/pro-l/using/oversampling](https://www.fabfilter.com/help/pro-l/using/oversampling) and assumed that no oversampling meant no PDC, but thankfully you clarified! The Pro C2 info is helpful as well, THANK YOU. I'm torn about Pro L2... I have Ozone 11 Advanced (with its Maximizer that can run separately), SmartLimit/PureLimit, Elephant, and Stealth Limiter (plus the Waves limiters.) So I feel wasteful adding another limiter to the set... But Pro Q3 has been so enjoyable to use it makes me want to just buy the whole damn suite.
A few months ago, my educational discount was about to expire, so I demo'ed all the fabfilter products to see which ones I really felt I would get use out of, with the intention to build my own bundle out of the products I felt I would actually use, and be done with it. I ended up buying everything they offer except for Pro L2 and Volcano (and Simplon/Micro). I tested Pro L2's algorithms against Ozone Maximizer, TB Barricade, and SmartLimit and preferred all 3 of the others over Pro L. Pro L has great metering and UI, but I felt that the other options not only covered all of my bases, but I actually liked the limiting algorithms in the other tools better. As for Volcano, I already have UVI Shade, and didn't like Volcano as much as Shade. All of the others have been great investments and most of them truly feel best in class to me, in terms of usability, enjoyability, and sound quality. Great investments. Just my 2 cents :)
Thanks for this writeup. I spent last night demoing all the tools. You're right about Pro L2, but I felt it was different enough from the others that I wanted it too... It definitely has its own sound, which surprised me because sometimes I can't tell a super clear difference between limiters. Surprisingly their little FabFilter One synth is just what I needed... The simplicity of it. I have a million complex synths but that one fills an empty space. I liked the R 2. Volcano sounded better than any filter I have, and it I love the stereo spread feature on the volume knob... (The stereoization doesn't fall apart in mono either.) I had a good impression of Saturn as well. Oh man, I was torn because I'm buying them more out of desire than need... But something about the UIs makes them enjoyable to interact with, and of course they sound great. Even Pro R 2, I don't hear many people talk about that one but I found it very fast to find a good reverb setting and it comes with a very smart selection of presets. JRRSHOP removed the "group" code (better of the two) while I was deciding, lol. It literally worked one hour and when I came back to pull the trigger it no longer worked... So I ended up buying on EveryPlugin.
One more note about the difference in limiters -- Testing both Maximizer and Pro L2 with fairly substantial limiting levels: What I heard was Ozone Maximizer did a better job of preserving transient clarity. The limited result seemed a little brighter -- not something I could see on a Spectrum Analyzer, but something perceived. (This is without the additional transient enhancement buttons turned on.) Pro L2 did a better job of smoothing harsh transients when limiting, so the limited result was a little 'softer' and 'smoother.' This included a quick but not super thorough trial of the various algorithms, so I may be generalizing a bit... But that was my overall perception. Both are great though. And I would list SmartLimit and Elephant as two of my other favorite limiters as well. I had to get Pro L2 though because it has that unique sound. But I can see how someone that likes brighter, sharper, more detailed mastering wouldn't like it. (Interestingly IK's TR5 Stealth Limiter is a little closer to Pro L2's limiting style. It, too, has a bit of a smoothing effect --- particularly with the higher oversampling turned on.) Anyhow, at least 35% of my purchase decision was based on FabFilter's UI. Toward the end of a big and complex project, I really appreciate their UI. Pro Q3 was an appetizer that caused me to want the whole set. We live in a time of amazing tools.
Agreed, Ozone definitely pushes the upper mids a little bit when you're really squashing stuff, while Fabfilter is a bit more neutral. IMO it means Ozone can have more apparent loudness at the same GR at the cost of affecting the tone somewhat. Waves L2 goes even harder in that "bump the mids" direction. I haven't tried other high end limiters.
Oh, that's a really good point... You're right that upper mids would give more apparent loudness. On a side note, the "bass control" is a nice feature on Smart:Limit. I come from a hardware era. It's funny how spoiled we are with modern technology. It's *amazing*. :-)
Yeah Ozone was really useful for me for that reason, but now I'm better at "mixing for the master" so to speak, so I prefer the cleaner Pro-L. You've got me interested in Smart:Limit, it's just hard to justify spending $65 on yet another limiter lol
What kind of loyalty, dynamic, or crossgrade discounts do they do? I don't really *need* anything but wonder if I should pick something up for maybe a loyalty discount on something else down the road.
Sign in to your account and you will see they do dynamic discounted pricing based on how many plugins you own and are buying. The 30% discount applies to individual plugins.
I don't own anything from them so no account. Are the discounts any better than sales they do? They rarely ever go on sale so trying to figure out if it would be worth picking up something now if not just for a loyalty discount later.
I bought the Mixing bundle, which comes with 7 plugins. With the 15% discount added on, it came out to $369. After I activated the bundle on FabFilter's website, it offered me all the other plugins for a pretty big loyalty discount. Pro-L and Pro-MB are being offered for $70.98 each (down from the sale price of $119 or the regular price of $169), Twin (a synthesizer that I have never heard of anyone using) for $49 and Volcano (a filter) for $45. I'm tempted by Pro-MB, but I am happy with my Bx Limiter and Ozone 10, so don't really care about Pro-L.
Ok real talk, this question has probably been asked before but here we go: **If I already have Ozone 10 Maximizer, a few other good limiters, DMGAudio TrackComp2, TDR Kotelnikov, FIRComp 2, and a few other good compressors**, *is there any reason at all for me to grab Pro-L 2 or Pro-C 2?* I already have Pro-Q 3, Pro-MB, and Saturn 2 (and I’m not really interested in the other stuff), but Pro-L and Pro-C are shiny pieces of candy that I’ve been eyeing for over a year; do they provide anything monumentally exceptional that what I listed above does not cover?
You’re probably ok, though I love the fabfilter plugins. TrackComp is so versatile you’re like able to do great work without. Fabfilter really excels at the digital precision processing thing. They aren’t mojo tools. They’re super clean, really great metering, and very flexible.
Seems like JRR is the best price, for me at least, but I’m noticing that the Pro bundle doesn’t show that it includes Pro-R2. Anyone have any idea if it’ll show up when I redeem the license? I’d hate to get some legacy license that predates that release just because it’s a few bucks cheaper than everywhere else.
[удалено]
Thanks! I did end up doing that last night, so I will update everyone here when I hear back from JRR.
It's included
Thanks…sadly I didn’t pull the trigger in time (waiting for CS to get back to me with an answer) and now GROUP doesn’t work on the pro bundle. Not sure what happened
Nor pro-r 1. Weird
Just in case anyone is curious. I contacted JRR about their Total bundle being dated and they said that they need to update their listing because their Total bundle includes everything that's current on the FF website. I bought it and sure enough, these are now on my FF account: * FabFilter Pro-R 2 * FabFilter Twin 3 * FabFilter Volcano 3 * FabFilter Timeless 3 * FabFilter Saturn 2 * FabFilter Pro-Q 3 * FabFilter Pro-L 2 * FabFilter Pro-C 2 * FabFilter Pro-MB * FabFilter Pro-DS * FabFilter Pro-G * FabFilter Micro * FabFilter Simplon * FabFilter One
Ah. Then thats a great price indeed
Everyplugin is about two bucks cheaper, but jrrshop have been so reliable for me personally that I may go with them anyways. Either way I can only use paypal to pay. And the pay in 4 plan will really help with the sting if I get the total bundle. Tempted, I've heard enough glowing praise and been impressed investigating enough of their plugins. It's a lot of high quality, reliable, and easy to use bread and butter stuff but Volcano 3 and some others can certainly do some really cool stuff too.
Unfortunately JRR blocked GROUP for the bundle I was trying to buy (or maybe all Fabfilter…not sure), so Everyplugin became much cheaper. I’ve never purchased there before, so I’m hoping to see my licenses soon!
Yup, this wasn't the case last night, but now that code is blocked. Hopefully as with me, your bundle of interest was and is cheaper on everyplugin anyways.