The Sound Board

For some time I've had my eye / wallet on the Eventide H3000. I've too many effects, plain and simple, but when I listened to the demos of the H3000 it seemed so good for both subtle and extreme that I figured I might well make an exception when it next came to sale time, and here it is. Here's the products / prices:

Blackhole $49
H910 Harmonizer $49
H3000 Factory $79
SP2016 $79
Omnipressor $49
Toni Visconti TVerb $79

I'm guessing this is available from all the usual sources, here's JRR Shop's offer page - https://www.jrrshop.com/eventide?dir=de ... _from_date

FWIW, the only two I have are Blackhole, which I find I never use, and SP2016, which has some interesting spatialization and I do find uses for it,

FWIW I use Blackhole frequently - surprisingly often I need something enormous and glassy, and there ain't nothing better.

I use the SP2016 all the time. In fact, a quarter of an hour into any mix, and I'll usually find I have loaded up anywhere between 5 and 10 instances already. It's something I have to fight against because it's become an automatism — never good, these automatisms — and it has me neglecting other equally wonderful tools.

The Eventide harmonizers (there's two of them) are another big favourite. They also make it into just about everything I do.

_

The SP 2016 was a bit surprising. What do you find the H3000 useful for?

I have no experience with the H3000, Larry, it's the H910 which I have. And I use it for lots of things though few of them come under the header of chasing ‘realism’ with samples. (Although the plugin can be useful in that area too, to add, for example, very subtle and irregular pitch instabilities to certain parts and thus mask the inevitable sterility of samples a bit. Works quite well.)
But 7 times out of 10, I’ll use the H910 in more experimental ways. (I happen to have a line of music — those slightly weird electro-acoustic pieces that I like to do — for which the H910 offers endless very exciting possibilties.)
And it can also be used for more technical things like, say, thickening the sound of drums (in ways that can’t be done with other tools) or as a chorus alternative, or to add width and motion to synth parts … Truly, few plugins have managed so quickly to become part of that small handfull of tools I no longer want to be without as this H910.

_

The H910 is special. I had no prior knowledge of it but when it showed up as a freebie in my Presonus account I took it for a spin and it's quite marvelous on acoustic and electric guitars (I'd take it as far and say ANY stringed instrument), background vocals, lead vocals, whatever.

And when you set up 2 different AUXes with an H910 on each, one bordering on 100-101% and the other 99-100% you get twice the fun

So weird how we gravitate to different things. Larry has found no use for Blackhole whereas you've have to prise it from my cold dead hands. I have the UAD 910 and never found a single use for it, but I've never tried using it in the ways you two have.

Check this out, specially made for you

Aww, thanks Thomas! It could be my imagination, but I sort of hear glitching once or twice, the first time right after you switch in... so maybe its just the DAW settling down with the processing change. I only mention it because I heard that glitching a lot when I was road testing the UAD version.

Oddly enough, that kind of effect is one of the things I'm hoping to get from the H3000, seems to do some lovely gentle chorurs / flangy thickening.

Yes the glitch is probably StudioOne, should have used the "Line IN" button on the GUI instead... Next time!

Historically, isn’t the H3000 the better known one? I b’lieve we had one in outer rack. Certainly a Harmonizer, but I thought that was a 2000...

Lawrence wrote: ↑Feb 14, 2020 6:25 am Historically, isn’t the H3000 the better known one? I b’lieve we had one in outer rack. Certainly a Harmonizer, but I thought that was a 2000...

The 910 was first released in 1975 says here Larry - https://reverb.com/news/tech-behind-eve ... harmonizer - while the H3000 was late 80s so guess it depends on the era. When I played around with the 910 it mostly struck me as an historical curiosity since clearly its pitch shifting was technically quite poor-sounding to me and much of the appeal I figured was just in the glitches. I feel that way about a few of their plugins, though I get warm-and-fuzzier about old analogue circuitry than digital whose artefacts tend to just grate on me.

The H3000 is no spring chicken either of course, but I'd be disappointed if it wasn't a lot more finessed.

But as Thomas and Piet show, used right the 910 can still sound great (as is so often the case!)

Yeah, I just looked it up too. I think we had the big boy.

Thinking about going for the 3000. Do I need it, hell no, but of course....G.A.S.

Does the H910 something similar as soundtoys crystallizer? And is it maybe redundant if I already own it or does it bring something significantly different to the table?

Ooooo, Crystallizer! Love it.

I'd say no, they are different (at least I use them differently).

Take the demo for a spin and see if you like it.

Crystallizer is a very cool plugin, and probably does trace it's roots back to something like the Eventide 1745M, one of their earliest delays. If I remember, the 1745 was the first, and it used shift registers, it was redesigned using "real" memory, giving it a lot longer delay, or wider pitch shift.

I have enough parts - in boxes - to build a couple 1745Ms... know anyone that is up for a challenging (read time consuming) project???

Before Auto Tune, Melodyne, and the like, I knew engineers who relied on the H3000 for vocal fixing. It was a highly regarded box back in the 90s. Of course, H3000 Factory isn't a complete H3000 emulation; but it does include Patch Factory and Mod Factory algorithms. At the current price, you get a fraction of the algorithms at a fraction of the cost.

Guy Rowland wrote: ↑Feb 13, 2020 6:42 am FWIW I use Blackhole frequently - surprisingly often I need something enormous and glassy, and there ain't nothing better.

Count me in as another satisfied Blackhole user. It's my go-to for extra long, spacious reverb.

Best,

Geoff

Thomas Mavian wrote: ↑Feb 16, 2020 6:15 am Ooooo, Crystallizer! Love it.

I'd say no, they are different (at least I use them differently).

Take the demo for a spin and see if you like it.

Thank you Thomas

Finally had a bit of time to play with my shiny new old H3000 Factory. Seems a very useful grab bag of tried and true, and lots of wild stuff. There are some useful utilities here - in the drum section one patch is a sub enhancer which is tunable low end oomph, and various snare enhancers that adds more noise or crack. Oddly enough, there's lots of variations of the stero H910 trick! I prefered the micro pitch shift algorithm which seemed less OTT and more solid, for want of a better word.

The real time pitch shifting isn't bad for its age - comparing with the 910 the latter is more flangy the former a bit more crunchy. Take your pick.

Overall quite nice to have, probably only when trying in real world situations compared to what I have will I know if its essentially redundant or does offer new useful colours.