Recording - May 2011 - 43

Overall While calling the FATSO a tape emulation device was revolutionary in 2000, that designation is more subject to challenge in 2011 due to recent advances in high-end modeling plug-ins. Also in 2011, the market place is awash in compressors that offer tubes, switchable transformers and vintage emulation. While that sounds like I am attacking the unit’s relevance in the current decade, I am not. While many compressors now profess vintage vibe, the FATSO is still a unique analog saturation and warming device on the market, and it just so happens to have a couple of compressors thrown in. For over a decade the FATSO Jr. has had a proven track record of adding a warm fuzzy feeling to every buss and instrument it has ridden, and I will tell you the buss compressor alone is worth the $2200 (street) price of admission. Of course I realize that this is not spare change by any means, and luckily for many of us there is now another option...

1.5 to 2.0 clicks more, while simultaneously bringing the output level down. For example, with the hardware input and output levels set to 5 and 5, I had to set the software’s input to 7.5 and its output to 3. Once this was done, however, the two were scary close, and we were all very impressed. If this is the Jr, what happened to the Sr? While having a meticulously modeled FATSO on your DAW is cool, that alone was not good enough for Dave Derr and UA, and that brings us to some additional plug-in-only features. One of the most interesting quandaries in the gear forum world is the fabled FATSO Sr. As the story goes, during the FATSO Jr’s initial design stages Dave intended to add more traditional controls, but for reasons only he knows, these innovations stayed in his lab and a real hardware unit was never commercially produced. But as a plug-in, it has now seen the light of day! [Dave Derr informs us, “The only reason we didn’t make the Sr. originally is that it would have cost close to $4000; it had analog meters and would have been double height. We almost thought the Jr. would be too costly as well, but we’re glad we went ahead and released it!”—Ed.] The FATSO Sr. plug-in gives you a second virtual rack of controls. These include a variable threshold, 4 choices of sidechain filter frequencies (60 / 120 / 240 / 450 Hz), 4 selectable attack times (0.9 / 10 / 30 / 100 msec), 4 release times (0.05 /sec / 0.1 / 0.2 / 0.5 sec), and a variable tranny level. This adds traditional compressor controls previously impossible with the hardware and makes the plug-in FATSO hands-down the most versatile of the 3 current versions. Price and power consumption At $299 the FATSO plug-in is perfectly in line with UA’s other top-line fare, and is available directly from the UA website. The only caveat you need to know before you buy is that, due to its high level of modeled accuracy, it requires quite a bit of UAD-2 real estate and is one of the most CPU-hungry of the UAD-2 plug-in lineup. It won’t even run on the UAD-1 cards. You can expect to get 2 stereo instances on a UAD-2/SOLO card, 4 on a UAD-2/DUO, and 8 on a UAD-2/ QUAD. Mono offers slightly more instances at 3, 6 and 12 respectively, and disabling the Tranny section will also eke out some additional instances— check UA’s online comparison chart for more details. Okay, that’s the original hardware compared to the software... “But what about that UBK thingy?” Here we go.
RECORDING MAY 2011

The FATSO Jr/Sr UAD-2 Plug-in
Developed hand-in-hand by Dave Derr and Universal Audio’s crack team of modeling experts, the UA FATSO Plug-in is both visually and functionally faithful to its real-world counterpart. Every button, knob and LED looks and behaves just like the real thing. It can be run on stereo or mono tracks and... really, that’s about it; everything I described above regarding look, layout and function is the same. If you can drive one, you can drive the other, literally! Listening comparisons Of course when a plug-in models realworld hardware its success hinges on one question: How close does it sound to the real thing? In the case of the FATSO, this is one of the closest plug-in models I have ever heard. Not just content with my own ears I brought in two other engineers to give a listen and they agreed. Yes, there are some subtle differences, such as the low end of the plug-in seemed a tad tighter, and as you would expect, the hardware possessed a touch of added airy nuance, but these differences were far subtler than any of us was expecting. The only major difference: Although each function works the same on the plugin and the hardware unit, be aware you can’t put them on a mix and A/B them side by side with exactly the same input and output settings. As with many plugins, it does take a bit more level to drive the plug-in than the hardware. To get similar results between the two, I had to push the input on the plug-in about

43


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Recording - May 2011

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Recording - May 2011

Recording - May 2011
Fade In
Contents
Talkback
Fast Forward
Phonic S16 Digital Mixer
Lift Your Voice
Chameleon Labs TS-1 MKII Mic
Melodyne In Action
Roland OCTA-CAPTURE
Comparing Auto-Tune and Melodyne editor: A Producer’s Perspective
Samson Meteor Mic
The FATSO Family
Reviewed and Revisited: Antares Auto-Tune 7
Readers’ Tapes
Lauten FC-357 Clarion Mic
It’s Your Music—Know Your Rights. Chapter 14: The Role Of The Producer —Part 2
Game Audio—Your Next Career Move?
sE Electronics Voodoo VR1 Ribbon Mic
Recording’s Bass Column
Advertiser Index
Fade Out
Recording - May 2011 - Recording - May 2011
Recording - May 2011 - Cover2
Recording - May 2011 - 1
Recording - May 2011 - 2
Recording - May 2011 - 3
Recording - May 2011 - Fade In
Recording - May 2011 - 5
Recording - May 2011 - Contents
Recording - May 2011 - 7
Recording - May 2011 - Talkback
Recording - May 2011 - 9
Recording - May 2011 - Fast Forward
Recording - May 2011 - 11
Recording - May 2011 - Phonic S16 Digital Mixer
Recording - May 2011 - 13
Recording - May 2011 - Lift Your Voice
Recording - May 2011 - 15
Recording - May 2011 - 16
Recording - May 2011 - 17
Recording - May 2011 - 18
Recording - May 2011 - 19
Recording - May 2011 - 20
Recording - May 2011 - 21
Recording - May 2011 - 22
Recording - May 2011 - 23
Recording - May 2011 - 24
Recording - May 2011 - 25
Recording - May 2011 - Chameleon Labs TS-1 MKII Mic
Recording - May 2011 - 27
Recording - May 2011 - Melodyne In Action
Recording - May 2011 - 29
Recording - May 2011 - 30
Recording - May 2011 - 31
Recording - May 2011 - 32
Recording - May 2011 - 33
Recording - May 2011 - 34
Recording - May 2011 - 35
Recording - May 2011 - Roland OCTA-CAPTURE
Recording - May 2011 - 37
Recording - May 2011 - Comparing Auto-Tune and Melodyne editor: A Producer’s Perspective
Recording - May 2011 - 39
Recording - May 2011 - Samson Meteor Mic
Recording - May 2011 - 41
Recording - May 2011 - The FATSO Family
Recording - May 2011 - 43
Recording - May 2011 - 44
Recording - May 2011 - 45
Recording - May 2011 - Reviewed and Revisited: Antares Auto-Tune 7
Recording - May 2011 - 47
Recording - May 2011 - Readers’ Tapes
Recording - May 2011 - 49
Recording - May 2011 - Lauten FC-357 Clarion Mic
Recording - May 2011 - 51
Recording - May 2011 - 52
Recording - May 2011 - 53
Recording - May 2011 - 54
Recording - May 2011 - 55
Recording - May 2011 - It’s Your Music—Know Your Rights. Chapter 14: The Role Of The Producer —Part 2
Recording - May 2011 - 57
Recording - May 2011 - Game Audio—Your Next Career Move?
Recording - May 2011 - 59
Recording - May 2011 - sE Electronics Voodoo VR1 Ribbon Mic
Recording - May 2011 - 61
Recording - May 2011 - Recording’s Bass Column
Recording - May 2011 - 63
Recording - May 2011 - 64
Recording - May 2011 - Advertiser Index
Recording - May 2011 - 66
Recording - May 2011 - 67
Recording - May 2011 - 68
Recording - May 2011 - 69
Recording - May 2011 - 70
Recording - May 2011 - 71
Recording - May 2011 - Fade Out
Recording - May 2011 - Cover3
Recording - May 2011 - Cover4
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