My opinion is the Deluge is a really fantastic instrument, but not a very proficient sampling groovebox, it plays back loaded samples very well, but actually sampling or recording are non intuitive, a bit clumsy, and still lacking in basic features, such as trim and save, threshold sampling, and so on.
That said it can play the role of a sampling groovebox but it is more of a super multi skilled handyman, than a specialist craftsman.
2024 i think the best bang for buck is Sonicwares new Lofi-12 XT. Its looking almost complete from the off. Yeah 8 tracks but has parameter locking and can manage loads of samples in each track. Really well thought out and a good alternative to the SP or KO for sure.
what would you say it needs for completion?
I really struggled for a while, trying to decide between the Deluge and Oxi One. In the end, the deciding factor for me was the combination of price and the ability to buy the unit from one of my favorite and most used stores. That may seem silly to many but it is important to me.
For Deluge, export stems for a song instead of having to manually resample everything.
Community firmware has been a godsend and breathes new life to the Deluge. Though I wish we could lean into the oled display more now as an owner myself now. However, the fact I can understand the device a lot better thanks to the screen is a mega plus.
he was talking about the sonicware lofi-xt, I was just curious.
My bad.
Personally the deluge stays king until someone else releases a groovebox (daw box?) with a better arranger. I spend most of my time arranging songs and that alone makes it the best sequencer for me, being able to do drums and some synth parts on it too is just a bonus
Also the community firmware sounds a lot better than official. The improved reverb, compressor, and limiting instead of clipping make a huge difference
From a community firmware commit last week!
Blockquote
Moves a bunch of work out of the UI handling routines and makes calling
renderUIsForOLEDvery cheap. Useful for the upcoming work to do more
interesting things with the OLED UI
I dont know what they are up to, but looking forward to it.
Tasty, cannot wait.
I feel like with a decksaver, the deluge would stack pretty well with other devices.
Maybe it needs an āundoāā¦Altho everyone seems happy with the old school alternative of saving lots
Their Discord is like a holiday. Dont think ive seen a single grumble about bugs.
Its great Sonicware can make something like this and it works/fully featured from the off. It has a really well thought out UI. Lets not forget its taken Synthstrom a good 8 years of firmware updates. Tbh i think the Lofi XT would be a great companion for the Deluge - they both excel at different things, the Lofi is much better suited for sampling etc
For all the people who say theyāve not heard good music on the Deluge, go listen to Oakland Ghosts on YT. For example,
Itās definitely possible to make great music on the Delly.
Yeeeeeah stay tuned guys !
To those who say havenāt heard good music on deluge, thatās specifically down to who is using it. Maybe they were commenting about my videos not sounding cool or goodā¦
So my videos might not be ābangersā they are just really quickly made placeholders so I can use examples of different ways how you can work on it with your music.
I would say that about any groovebox, I have used gear that people discredited and its very clear its up to the end user.
I donāt even listen to boards of canadaā¦ shrug.
Either way it is getting pretty exciting at least for me and hang on for a batch of new videos once the public firmware goes stable 1.1
omgosh no worries man, please donāt start prioritizing the quality of the music in the tutorial over the instruction there is nothing wrong with music sounding nice, but that is 3000% not what I watch a tutorial for, I actually find it painful if a tutorial turns out to be more about the personal music the tutor is makingā¦
and when it comes to the deluge in particular imho focused, to the point, clear, step bye step tutorials are extremely appreciated!!!
EXACTLY haha thanks yeah I try to keep my personal music out of my tutorials.
I can not wait to release these videosā¦ I guess Iāll try to keep making more just waiting for the OK from the developers!
I wouldāve said that Deluge is the king prior to the open sourcing, relative to how well designed and overwhelmingly useful the box has been to me compared to (not exaggerating) every other piece of (non acoustic) music production gear/instruments I own or have ever owned.
After open sourcing, itās no longer a king but some kind of higher power deity or something, beyond us all.
Are any of its individual features āthe bestā? Who knows, likely not, but the combination it offers is completely unmatched in my very robust setup (and Iād imagine most anyone elseās as well) for creating songs/ideas quickly on the go in a way that can be usable live or translated via midi into more refined stuff in the studio ā itād be the last thing Iād part with if I needed to liquidate my entire studio.
UPD: Oh, forgot to note (if it matters) Iām still on the 7SEG screen ā one of the reasons I havenāt gone for the upgrade is literally I would be bummed to not have my deluge handy for the time it would be away!
Itās the most intuitive sequencer and it has no limits
Love my Deluge!
But it certainly does have limits, at least when regarding features anyway.
Not sure its the most intuitive, either. Itās a very fast flow once learned. But there are a lot of slightly convoluted shortcuts to do simple things unfortunately.
I think this is down to the relatively small amount of buttons and slightly bizarre choices.
For example, a dedicated button for Sync-Scaling?!?? Yet no dedicated button(s) for Copy/Paste?
Great MIDI sequencing of notes etc. Yet no MIDI CC LFOās?
Just two examples, there are many more I could give.
Donāt get me wrong. I love it. I will never sell it. Too useful for me. I love itās āno limits except CPUā philosophy, itās an all round great machine.
Just not the best MIDI sequencer/studio brain anymore, for me anyway, Hapax has taken over that role, itās better suited to it.