Universal Audio Spark Review - Worth it?

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I'm a less common breed of engineer when it comes to my approach with technology. First of all I'm a "PC Guy" and I can't tell you how many times soemone has walked in the studio and said "but I thought Macs were better for music?" I also primarily use Cubase and I've always run all my plugins natively. Universal Audio has legendary status in my world but because I work in a lot of different places on a lot of different computers, it never really made sense to use them as I try to keep my workflow as simple and efficient as possible. However now, some of their plugins are able to run natively, so I couldn't help but try!

[@timmah4476]

Cracking video man - the examples are really good and I like the honesty and candid way you talk about your workflow and what's good and what you wish they had (the mix knob!!) - cool vide and really helpful (just bought a Volt 476P so my first foray into the UA world!!)

[@DaniSalat]

Cool Review! For some reason I thought you used UAD DSP but it's nice to see you impressed by how these sound. I'm a UAD fanboy and got all these native versions since I own the dsp ones and couldn't be happier! I agree thourhg regarding delay and mod UAD is kinda lacking as a whole in options and features, not just Spark.

[@BF-up5xw]

Thanks for the whistle stop tour; sometimes it really helps to get a quick overview when it really stays focused like this. The tape saturation is lovely! I can't judge all of the current UAD native plugins relative to alternatives; but I find in general that they are very strong for smooth, rounded tones. So, if you are working with music that calls for that, you might save time using UAD. I have, or have trialled, a few Acustica Audio plugins. Where they overlapped with UAD - for example, Purple covering Pulteq, Ultramarine covering some of the Fairchild sound - I found Acustica Audio harder to set, but better in the end. It was rowdier, harsher, but still very analog sounding. Of course, Acustica Audio was even harder on the CPU than UAD. This means a lot of rendering to audio for me as I use a lot of soft synths and sample players. This is just one comparison; there are lots of other alternatives out there (such as Fuse Audio Labs and Black Rooster) that cover similar kinds of sounds, if not the same hardware, really well. At least now you can just buy the UAD Studer A800 Tape Recorder! Even if it costs quite a bit... Something to consider in a possible future sale for me.

[@Keayes]

I use the wet knob in reaper all the time. I keep forgetting that it isn't normal for every DAW to do this... For all the quality of life features that reaper doesn't have, I'll take this small win haha

[@JayMaasRecording]

Yeah that’s such a cool thing about reaper. Definitely jealous if that one

[@xmatt98x]

UAD just made all the plugins that are currently in the spark bundle available to purchase individually natively (just incase you didn’t know 👌)

[@JayMaasRecording]

Saw that!

[@theandroids]

Its not worth it, especially the subscription model. And they need to release waaay more plugins. Also plenty of plugs out there better than UAD.

[@jeannadeau5084]

please talk slower and played the example a few sec longer.......Thank's

[@citizenworld8094]

press the slow speed option. There. Fixed it for you. (I think his vocal rhythm is perfect, nothing worse than the long drawn Mississippi yawn).