SOFT SAMPLE CELL

Although the original hardware Sample Cell system has been around for years, there has until now been no software sampler that would integrate with Pro Tools systems.

Sample editing is limited to trimming start and end points, but Soft Sample Cell provides a well-specified loop editor.

Digidesign's hardware Sample Cell system, now around a decade old, was one of the first serious attempts to integrate sampling into a computer environment. It featured eight audio outputs and up to 32Mb of onboard sample RAM, and could be used multitimbrally. Since then, native-powered soft samplers have taken up the baton, so it's no surprise that Digidesign have come up with a soft version of Sample Cell that relies on the host computer's processing power.

Soft Sample Cell, which runs on the Macintosh platform, is unique insomuch as it is the only soft sampler I know of that will work within Pro Tools software and a TDM/DAE environment (although Emagic's EXS24 can now be integrated into TDM systems using their System Bridge, it only runs within Logic). It has the advantage over the original hardware version that it can access the computer's own memory, thus overriding the 32Mb restriction of its predecessor. It is still multitimbral with multiple outputs (up to 32 using DirectConnect or 16 using Direct I/O) and though it can't record samples, you can create Instruments using samples recorded in an audio program such as Pro Tools. File formats supported are SDII, WAV and AIFF.

The program receives MIDI via OMS (version 2.3.8 is included) and requires a minimum spec of system 9.04 running on a fast G3 or a G4 with more than 128Mb of RAM for any practical application. The documentation insists on a colour monitor, which is perverse when you consider that the program is entirely monochrome and preserves the retro black-and-white 'Doctor T synth editor' look of the original!

Digidesign Soft Sample Cell £304 pros Easy to use. The only soft sampler that works with Pro Tools and in a DAE environment. Flexible output routing capabilities. cons Key floppy disk protection. Only supports Sample Cell sound libraries. Requires Digidesign hardware to work in a third-party sequencer. Graphically dull user interface. summary Soft Sample Cell is pretty much the only game in town if you need a soft sampler to run in a DAE system, but if your main environment is VST or MAS, then you'll need to look elsewhere.

Though the software looks much like the original and is based around a handful of straightforward edit pages, there have been some improvements over the last 10 years or so, not least the upgrading of the resonant low-pass filters, which are now four-pole (24dB/octave). As the computer's own RAM is now used for sample memory, the upper limit has been expanded to a Gigabyte, and Soft Sample Cell's modulation capabilities more closely resemble those of a synth with 18 sources and 26 destinations (there's a maximum of 20 modulation routings per patch). There are three envelopes, one of which is pre-assigned to level, along with two LFOs and one filter per voice, but there's no way to sync controllers to tempo. The edit pages include a loop editor and a Tracking generator with 'user-bendable' curves based on nine breakpoints. Trackers can be used in the modulation matrix to vary the control law by which a source controls a destination.

Sampler Instruments may be either mono or stereo and can be based on a single sample or a set of multisamples with key zones and up to six velocity zones, velocity-switched or crossfaded. Keygroup boundaries may be adjusted by dragging. Each sample can have up to two loops, one of which plays for as long as the key is held down and the other during the release portion of the sound. A separate waveform window is available for loop editing and for creating crossfades to smooth the loop transitions. Here you can make fine adjustments to the loop markers as the sample plays, which makes it quite easy to find the best loop location: after this, a short crossfade may be applied if necessary. For some reason, Soft Sample Cell dictates the maximum and minimum number of samples that may be used for the crossfade, and often the available crossfade time is extremely short.

Once it's installed and running (see box), Soft Sample Cell is actually pretty straightforward to use, even though the interface is visually unexciting and is arranged around a series of edit screens rather than a nice-looking main page with edit screens behind it. Sample loading is via conventional file menu browsers where sounds are arranged as Samples, Instruments and Banks, and you can organise your samples into library folders quite easily. The Instrument control panels look much like mixer channel strips and it is here that you can set the key range, level and panning of the part, choose the MIDI channel on which it operates and define the stereo audio output to which it will be sent. Tuning is on a per-Instrument basis, as is transposition.

Soft Sample Cell's interface presents various independent editing windows, without a unified main page: clockwise from top left are the envelope editor, Instrument control panels, modulation matrix, Tracking generator, modulation source editor and key assign screen.

You can create your own Instruments in Soft Sample Cell by importing audio samples recorded in another application, after which all the usual keygrouping, velocity-switching and crossfade looping functions are available. However, audio editing within the program is limited to trimming the starts and ends of the samples and defining loop points. A number of semi-intelligent functions make setting out keygroups easier, with lots of drag-and-drop functionality to streamline the process. Once a set of keygroups has been created, you can then apply envelopes, filters and modulators to the sounds, though oddly there's no portamento function and no legato triggering option. A series of icon buttons gets you directly to any required edit page, and envelopes can be edited by dragging points on the graphical display.

In stand-alone mode you can choose between two latency settings, Fast or Slow, and in Fast mode I'd say there was around 10mS of latency. Under DirectConnect, the user choice of latency setting is denied as the software manages this automatically. Calling up the CPU performance meter and then running my hand along the keyboard to play 15 or 16 notes showed about a 50 percent load on my 450MHz G4, which is rather heavier than from Emagic's EXS24.

As we're used to with VST Instrument plug-ins, Sample Cell Instruments are saved as part of a Pro Tools Session providing you save the sample bank first and then close it before closing the Pro Tools Session. To test the program from within a third-party sequencer, I used Logic Audio version 4.81. Logic's built-in Sample Cell driver doesn't recognise Soft Sample Cell, so you have to use OMS. Running Logic Audio under DAE, Soft Sample Cell appears as a MIDI Instrument, though its audio output has to be routed via a Logic Aux mixer channel. There's no direct access to the Soft Sample Cell editor from within Logic so this has to be opened separately, but I experienced no problems getting it to work. Other than the means of placing Soft Sample Cell into a track and routing its output, there's no real difference between using it inside a DAE application and as a stand-alone program.

The fact that Soft Sample Cell can't be used in MIDI + Audio sequencers running audio hardware other than Digi's own is disappointing for those who use ASIO-compatible audio systems, but then it's probably fair to say that if you work in a MAS/VST environment, you'd be unlikely to choose Soft Sample Cell anyway as it is less flexible in terms of sample-import capability, and arguably more power-hungry, than the leaders in the VST sampler market. However, Soft Sample Cell does have the advantage that it can be used within a TDM/DAE program. It also has the benefit of being easy to use and it sounds good, which more than mitigates its rather dour interface.

information

£304 including VAT. Digidesign UK +44 (0)1753 653322. +44 (0)1753 654999. Click here to email www.digidesign.com

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