Rainclouds In The Virtual Sky

The one real quibble I had with NuVerb isn't Lexicon's fault, but the problem I ran into significantly diminishes the value of the product for project-studio people like myself, and you need to face up to it if you plan on buying this system. One of the attractions of NuVerb is its potential to be integrated into a Digital Audio Workstation, and central to its development and marketing has been the notion that you can use it with Digidesign Pro Tools (which even allows you to launch NuVerb from within the application). Included in the NuVerb Manual is a description of how to hook up NuVerb to a Pro Tools System. It works. So far, so good.

All the sales people I spoke to assured me that NuVerb would run in real time and that yes I could use it in conjunction with the Digidesign Audio Interface, which seems reasonable as the interface has four A/D and D/A converters and speaks AES/EBU. An utterly obvious application here is to simply insert NuVerb into an Aux Bus Send/Return configuration in your console and use it as a live reverb in the time-honored manner. I was stunned to find you can't do it! Why? Because Pro Tools will not pass the Audio Input to any output when it isn't on screen. It simply mutes. The only time you can hear NuVerb processing input is when Pro Tools is active on the screen. This means that you can't listen to NuVerb while you are making any adjustments to it. If you want to do that (I personally consider it a necessity), you've got to buy a separate A/D - D/A converter, which'll set you back another grand and force you to do a heap more patching (repatch the digital IO in both analog and digital realms) whenever you do want to use NuVerb with Pro Tools! To me this is an incredible and infuriating waste of money, resource and studio integration. Unfortunately, it also makes you have to wonder about Digidesign. What were they thinking of?

Summary

NuVerb is a pioneering product and kind of a brave step for Lexicon. When you compare its cost ($1799) with the cost of the high-end reverbs like the 300 ($4995) and 480 ($7200 - $13,500 depending on options), it seems like a really good deal. However, remember you need a Macintosh, you are going to have to pick up a digital interface for it, and you'll have to drop yet another $495 if you wish to use it with TDM. Figure your installed cost is going to be around $2500 - $3000. This is still not a bad deal at all for the range of reverb and other goodies provided.

A really high-powered possibility also is lurking out there. Grab an older Mac II with a bunch of slots, drop two or three NuVerbs in it, buy the interfaces, normal 'em to all your Aux busses. Now you have a really potent array of multi-effects possibilities built into your console with a really nice interface that will talk to all your reverbs and compressors, complete with automation (meaning automated control of EQ, compression and stereophony in addition to reverb!), for under $8,000. Of course, you've got to put up with the lunacy of yet another Macintosh in your studio, but if you can, it's a pretty interesting idea for when your studio gets to that level. For postproduction, it would be absolutely killer!

At a more mundane level, NuVerb is a really good product in a virtual setting. That setting has some rough edges, and at present it prevents NuVerb from having all the value that is inherent in its design. However, once Digidesign decides to permit the Digital Audio Interface to function as a stand-alone device with third-party software/hardware combinations, NuVerb will be an awesome addition to the anybody's studio!