HALion Sonic 3

[rumlee]

When can I expect HALion Sonic 3 to replace the almost 3 years old HALion Sonic 2?

[mroekalea]

after we have halion 6

[mroekalea]

HalionSonic is based on Halion, so it would be logic that first Halion 6 is brought up...

[rumlee]

they were released the same time, so when to expect a replace?

[rumlee]

I am using Cubase 8.5, so I do not see the potential in buying Sonic 2, when I already have sonic se 2, that´s why I ask. So Steinberg, can you please give us an update on progress?

[jaslan]

You are basing whether or not you should upgrade on the numbers and letters used in the name but you should be basing it on the fearures and whether or not you need them, in my opinion. When HS3 does come out, my guess is that cubase will include "HSSE3" anyway so it will be the same dilemma. HS2 has a vastly greater library than HSSE2 but, more importantly, it has much greater capability to edit the programs, for example the Flex Phraser, modulation, envelopes, effects, etc. HALion is even more powerful in these respects. There are some demos you can try to see if the features benefit you enough to warrant the price.
Hope this helps.

[rumlee]

You are basing whether or not you should upgrade on the numbers and letters used in the name but you should be basing it on the fearures and whether or not you need them, in my opinion. When HS3 does come out, my guess is that cubase will include "HSSE3" anyway so it will be the same dilemma. HS2 has a vastly greater library than HSSE2 but, more importantly, it has much greater capability to edit the programs, for example the Flex Phraser, modulation, envelopes, effects, etc. HALion is even more powerful in these respects. There are some demos you can try to see if the features benefit you enough to warrant the price.
Hope this helps.

I am not basing it only on the numbers.

[Muziksculp]

Hi,

Hopefully HS3 will have a fully re-sizable GUI, like Halion 5 . The current HS2 is a bit of a pain to work with.

Oh and I'm surely looking forward to see what Halion 6 and Halion Sonic 3 will offer.

Cheers,
Muziksculp

[trusampler]

Please Steinberg concentrate on sound quality for Halion Sonic 3. Feature wise Halion Sonic 2, is great,perhaps a larger Gui is needed,but sound quality should imo be their major new feature for the next version.

They have the opportunity to make this a leader in the bread n butter dept. one of the things thats missing in the rompler area in vsts.

Being that Yamaha has released the new Montage,which completely leaves the XS,XF in terms of sound quality, I would hope now, we can truly get at least the sound quality of the ES or XS models within Halion SONIC 3.

Currently the sound quality in Halion SONIC leaves alot to be desired,please Steinberg concentrate on sound quality for version 3.

[trusampler]

Faster Load times, perhaps a feature like Kontakt where sounds are compressed to load faster?
Better Guitar patches both acoustic and electric, played with the older Motif XS today,and it's a shame that the XS can still sound better in terms of sound quality on most patches then Halion Sonic version 1,now 2, please with V 3 don't let this be a reality.

[Romantique Tp]

Halion Sonic 2 already has better sounding samples than the Motif XF, the patches are just simpler and there's far less abuse of effects.

[trusampler]

Halion Sonic 2 already has better sounding samples than the Motif XF, the patches are just simpler and there's far less abuse of effects.

Not sure where or what kind of monitors or DA/converters your listening to that on, but that statement is clearly not fact. Halion Sonic may have larger sample data, but better sounding samples? Im in disagreement with that statement, as an owner of the Montage, as well as previous Rack XS,Motif XF. I know this board is very well,and one thing Yamaha didn't skimp on is there sample data, although it's compressed into a little over 300 megabytes of Rom,it still sounds alot better then Halion Sonic 2.

Take for instance,if you strip down a patch from both the XS and Halion Sonic, meaning no effects. Play each note, you will notice the XS has more body to the patches, why? Why is the key,and the answer is, the XS has 8 elements or better terms (8 layers) assigned to each patch, Yamaha sound designers (who over the course of years with the Motif series) have expertly crafted the best tones they can out of each element and programmed it very well accordingly.

Halion sonic 2 has 4 options to layer a patch in their edit page. This is just one equation to it's shortcomings on the playback level, but along with that,it doesn't have the history in the patches that the Yamaha does. Meaning, the patches in Halion Sonic are not identical to those of the XS, so thats why the samples sound so different.

What I would like to see is Yamaha take Halion Sonic to a new sonic level, and at least give us the same sound quality of that of an XS. This would at the very minimum require adding more layers to the edit page, then perhaps Yamaha sound designers, could duplicate those XS patches in Halion Sonic.

You brought up an excellent point regarding the Effects in halion sonic, they are ridiculous in some cases, what they should do, is strip the FX program the best patches they can, and then add FX, but in the case of the current Halion sonic, I think those sound designers, were only able to work with what architecture they we're given at the time.

Hypersonic 2 (developed by Wizoo - now AIR) had imo much better sounding Efx ( but way less modern) and a better synth (wavetables etc.) this is why the synth sounds in Hypersonic 2 even sound better then Halion Sonic 2, at close listen.

This post doesn't mean Halion Sonic 2 isn't a good rompler, but great, like an XS,not even close.

[trusampler]

Back on topic:

1. Sound Quality - Please update the content and audio engine to sound more like the hardware.

2. I'd like to see patches load alot faster. My Halion Sonic data is on an SSD and it could and should be alot faster for loading these samples. Take Kontakt compression .ncw files for example, much faster then halion.

3. Better emulations of the Patches from the Yamaha Motif ES,XS or even the abilty to load patches from the motif series. Make it a real Rompler based on the exact Yamaha hardware, or create a completely new product using the sounds and samples used in the older hardware no longer being sold.Korg did this and did very well obviously.

[cnk]

So when will we see Halion 6 and/or Halion Sonic 3?

[cnk]

any news?

[Tacman7]

I would like an update to change the gui so you can see it, the plug in is small on my screen.

[Felipe Garcia]

The wait is over: HALion 6 and HALion Sonic 3 have been released today.

https://www.steinberg.net/en/products/v ... alion.html