Sonic Syndicate Scorpion Review - Tony Thomas' Techtrends

Sonic Syndicate Scorpion II VSTi Synth

Tony Thomas

Within the realm of VSTi synths, there seem to be very few that offer great sound and expansive sonic capabilities at a low price point. You can easily spend a week's salary on just a few of the more popular models out there. That is why I was intrigued by Sonic Syndicate's Scorpion II VSTi synth. It sells for a paltry $39 US. That is a fraction for what the "high priced spread" synths are selling for. How does it hold up? Let's find out.

User Interface

You can't get more clear cut than the Scorpion II's array of thirty two knobs and eight switches. It is pretty WYSIWYG if you ask me. The only parameters that are hidden "under the hood" are polyphony, pitch bend range, glide type, filter mode, unison mode and "age" (which can turn this pristine digital synth into a dusty and creaky antique). The interface is attractive, clean and easy to navigate. A nice touch is that all of the knobs are mapped to continuous controller numbers for MIDI automation. Unheard of for such a low-priced VSTi.

Architecture

The Scorpion II is essentially a two oscillator synth with up to four voices (forget the big two handed chords with sustain pedal). It has a single LFO, resonant filter (which can modulate Osc 2's pitch and/or filter) and ADSR EGs for amplitude and filter. Again very straightforward. The biggest curve that the Scorpion II throws at you is the lack of waveform selectors for the oscillators. The default waveform for each oscillator is sawtooth. According to the help file, you create square or pulse waves by inverting one oscillator and adjusting Osc 2's unique phase control. Kind of a strange way to accomplish this--I would have preferred a standard waveform selector. Other amenities besides the phase control are Osc 1's ring mod knob, two thick sounding unison modes, a glide control (adjustable to constant rate or constant time) and adjustable filter modes which include 18 or 30 dB LPFs, inverted 30 dB LPF pr notch filter w/LPF. There are also a couple of cool effects: Chorus, which is self-explanatory, and Spectrum FX which is an aural processor that is capable of embellishing the sound using DSP tricks.

Sound Quality and Performance

Like most analog modeling synths out there, the Scorpion II has its own distinctive sound. The factory patches show off its sonic potential quite well. It is great for basses, lead sounds and pads. The Scorpion seems produce a nice, full stereo sound that is quite pleasing to the ear. The CPU utilization was quite reasonable on my Athlon 1.2 GHz machine--less than 15% in most cases. I would say that the Scorpion II can hold its own sonically against many of the higher priced VSTis. It's biggest limitation is the four note restriction which doesn't seem to be a showstopper for most musical tasks. Its unison modes can produce really fat monophonic sounds. A steal at $39!

For More Information:

http://www.sonic-syndicate.com/