Ok, as usual, let us get the press details out of the way and then get into the meat:

• Including the 5 star awarded GALAXY STEINWAY - a STEINWAY D, sampled in stereo and 5.1 surround with an incredible dynamic range,

• the VIENNA GRAND IMPERIAL -a huge and powerful BOESENDORFER 290 with great bottom end and punch,  and the 1929 GERMAN BABY GRAND - a 75-year-old VINTAGE BLUETHNER with a beautiful intimate tone. 

• More than 6000 samples in 24 Bit 

• Up to 13 modeled velocity zones for a wide and smooth dynamic range 

• real Sustain Resonance and Release recorded with multiple velocity and timing 

• real Una Corda Samples (Vienna Grand & Baby Grand) 

• Adjustable Hammer –, Pedal-, Damper- and String noises 

• Sympathetic String Resonance with real overtones 

• Sostenuto and Redamper pedal functions 

• Based on Native Instruments KONTAKT 2 PLAYER 

• Specially designed User Interface 

• Integrated Help Window 

• Direct control of all important functions in the Main Menu 

• Detailed editing in 11 Special Menus 

• One-knob control of tone colour, warmth, low end, loudness, punch and dynamics

• Adjustable Stereo width and position 

• Flexible and easy to use Velocity Editor 

• Specially designed Compressor for typical pop-piano Sounds 

• WARP-section with 4 FX-machines for drastic sound design 

• Pad machine for generating spherical and atmospheric synth pads 

• Convolution-reverb with lots of rooms, halls and ambiences
  
  

Recorded in Galaxy Studios and Hansahaus Studios (2 Jazz-Grammy-Awards) with high end and Vintage microphones (Brauner, Neumann, DPA) and state-of-the-art equipment (Neve Capricorn, SSL 9000, Preamps by Neve, Focusrite Red Series, Summit etc.)  

Testing conducted on a Pentium 4, 2.8 GHz with 2 gigs of ram.

Near the top right hand of the GUI you are given the facility to check how much ram a particular preset uses, how much it drains the CPU and so on. This is actually quite a useful function and helps to keep an eye on voice, ram and handling functions.  

As is clearly evident the GUI is sensibly organized offering menus and sub menus for each section of the preset handling.
By highlighting a particular function, like Main for example, all knobs and sub menus are instantly available under the main menu options. To access each sub menu you simply click on the relevant menu option and additional editing menus are instantly available and highlighted in orange.  

Once an ‘instrument’ has been loaded you are then offered, via the drop down menu in Main, additional presets of the existing instrument (Styles). Not only do you have the standard variations galore but you also have a generous array of Warped, Totally Warped (Warped but more extreme) and Playing With Pads (this is a combination of the master instrument layered with one or two pad sounds) presets. 


 

The Preset Menu offers a good array of well designed presets that also benefit from the editing features available in the sub menus.  

You can, of course, tweak away and store your own presets.  

I will very briefly explain what each menu does, however to get the best out of this vsti it is best for you to explore all the tools available within each menu.  

Tone
The interesting option here is that of ‘Colour’.   If this knob is turned clockwise the piano will sound harder, and if turned anticlockwise the piano will sound softer and warmer. The manual states that this is not an EQ control as each turn of the knob accesses ‘different sounding samples’ with no change or restriction in dynamics. For instance, when turning the knob to the right, 'harder' samples, usually related to higher velocities, are triggered by softer velocities, while the level difference is being rebalanced. And harder samples not just sound more brilliant than softer samples, but also have a harder attack, and vice versa.
This is an interesting tool in practice and although an algorithmic EQ might have made more sense and been more detailed in terms of total sonic control, you still have to admire the innovative coding to get a function that does what it says on the tin.  

Resonance deals with the volume of the piano’s resonance. Warmth and Punch are self explanatory and really fun to use. There are many other editing features (Loudness, Low Keys, Soft Pedal) but two more that stick out are Lid, which allows the user control over the Lid (open, half closed and closed) and Comp (Compression). The compressor is very basic with preset selections for type and one knob that controls a combination of threshold, ratio and so on. A bit arbitrary but useful.  

Anatomy
This is a funky way of saying ‘Dynamic Control’ But it’s not as simple as that as Galaxy 2 offers a great deal of editing and overall tune, pitch, voice etc control. What stands out for me are two functions that I really like: Width and Listening Position. Width is always a winner, especially nowadays where everyone and their pets want to stretch the extremes of the stereo width under the false impression that it is sonically both correct and pleasing. In terms of this vsti width offers a sensible approach to stereo field stretching.  

Listening Position is a clever little utility that switches the pan positions of the piano depending on whether you are a player or someone in the audience. Basically depressing the Player button switches/swaps the pan positions of both the bass and treble notes allowing for a different perspective when playing.  

Finally, and a must for all piano vstis, is a sub menu for the Velocity Editor. This section allows the user to select from a number of different velocity curves, from a drop down menu, for playing responses, and also allows the user to create their own customized curves or to edit an existing one and to save this along with the preset.  

Noises
This menu deals with all the standard hammer, damper, release and string noises and is self explanatory.  

Space
Best described as: ‘creating space with the use of reverbs’. You have a choice or combination of using both the IRs (Impulse Responses) and the built-in reverb (ECO). You have a basic selection of editing tools but you are afforded another drop down menu of preset templates for both the IRs and built-in reverbs.  

I must say that the qualities of the IRs are actually very good and I was able to create some good ambiences just by basic editing.  

The IRs can be CPU hungry as everyone who has dealt with IRs will know, and this is where the ECO reverb can come in handy as it is much less stressful on the CPU.  

Warp
A wonderful tool that always seems to be amiss from other piano vstis. Is this because a piano is only meant to sound like a piano?  

The Pad Machine allows for layering pad sounds with the existing piano preset. You can select a pre determined template preset from the drop down menu. You can also edit an existing preset albeit limited in functionality.  

Random Warp is exactly that and randomly configures the Warp engine to create a new texture.  

The Degrader does exactly that: it degrades the preset using a number of tools that are editable from the edit sub menu. A drop down menu of presets is also supplied.  

The Spiritualizer adds………..er…..Spirit to the preset. Clicking on edit opens up sub menus that require some reading to understand what they actually do.  

The Madness knob creates metallic and flanged sounds and offers a drop down menu of presets to choose from. The knob simply applies more or less of the effect. There is also a Filter section with a drop down menu of filter templates with basic editing functions.
 
Ghost Mode simply uses the resonances of the presets samples without the actual samples (they are turned off). This allows for some really weird and atmospheric textures.  
The Alterizer is a morphing function and has the usual drop down preset menu options. Editing enables the use of an IR (Impulse Response) to alter the original sound. These IRs are available from another drop down menu in edit mode.  

Original knob allows for mixing the original sound with the IR and the volume knob controls the gain output of this section.  

The Time Traveller is simply a Delay unit with the standard drop down preset selection menu and editing features.      


Conclusion:   For me the acid test of any vsti hinges on a number of factors: easy of use, CPU strain, intuitive, quality and representation, value for money and creativity.  

Galaxy 2’s GUI is both simple to use and a breeze to navigate. A well thought out GUI can make all the difference between a successful product and a dead duck. Each menu sensibly houses the relevant sub menu for editing and management. But the GUI also cleverly affords a single screen to show all edits on a global scale.  

The CPU strain is a little on the heavy side but as there is a vast library of samples to sift through it is not surprising that it takes the amount of time that it does to load an instrument. With the use of DFD this CPU hog can be minimized.  

The quality of the samples and the sheer amount of work undertaken to manage them into a sound design concept has to be applauded. There are no tail-offs of dead samples, no wastage of dead air at the start of the samples, no redundant use of the velocity layers and their switching, no badly gain structured samples, and finally, the sheer quality of the recordings is excellent. The recordings alone have been professionally executed and this is a breath of fresh air for me as a sound designer that is anal when it comes to sample management.  

The pianos are well represented, both in terms of accuracy and in sample management. Although a subjective area to negotiate I have found that there are some acid tests to compare original sound sources to their sampled counterparts. In terms of these three pianos there is very little to discern the authenticity of the originals from the sampled offerings. A truly fine ear would probably pick up the ‘colour’ of the samples as the recordings have been via distinct microphones, but it would be self defeating to try to pick flaws in the actual sample management.
With most piano libraries, sampled or emulated, it is always the low registers that can cause difficulties as all sorts of harmonic anomalies can take place. I found this not to be as prominent as in other piano vstis. On a couple of instances the low end could have been deemed to be ‘coloured’ but with the tools available managing any of the registers is easy. The crux of the matter is in the intro to this piece. Certain microphones were used deliberately to add ‘colour’ to the recordings and this has been achieved…….but subtly. It does not take away from the body of the original but adds a little extra that can be useful when searching for something different.  

In terms of creativity Galaxy 2 affords some wonderful tools, albeit a little limited and unconventional compared to the competition. However, this takes nothing away from the pleasure of sonic manipulation. Maybe not detailed enough for fully fledged sound design projects, but hell, this is a piano vsti, so what am I complaining about?
The Warp function alone makes this a dream vsti as it would serve quite well as a vst in it’s own right. The ability to alter an acoustic instrument into an extreme synthetic one can only be a winner. But more importantly it is how well that the Warp function mangles sounds into something both extreme and yet useful. I think a pat on the back for the coders is in order.  

I have my own favoured vstis that I always go back to when searching for a sampled piano, and yes they are all good, but there is something inherently ‘playable’ about Galaxy 2 that makes me want to use it more than the others. I think it is an overall combination of all the above that keeps veering me towards Galaxy 2.    

In terms of value for money, I cannot recommend a better piano vsti than Galaxy 2. For features, sounds, playability and the Warp function Galaxy 2 is on it’s own.  

Ignore at your own peril!  

Eddie Bazil (Zukan)
www.samplecraze.com