Native Instruments B4 II DXi

30 years of pro stage/studio experience. Have real B3 and several leslies and a variety of clones over the years. I use this stand alone and as a plug-in with Sonar 7. I've tested this on many different computer systems with a variety of audio interfaces.

Easy to use. Sound is wonderful as long as you don't use the overdrive. The overdrive has horrible digital crackling sound and is completely unusable. This is very odd because the orginal B4 had a much warmer overdrive. Version II has more bass and a lot of new features - I don't care much for the many of the speaker emulations and prefer the DI setting for most things.

Except for the crappy overdrive, the sound is awesome. The leslie simulation is the best I've heard. The tonewheel sound is excellent. If you turn off the leslie sim and overdrive and run it through a real leslie then it works really well. Sadly, this is why more people haven't complained about the unusable overdrive - they just assume you have to use a real leslie with it. But the leslie sim, when run in stereo, is very useable if it only had a desent tube overdrive to go with it.

If the overdrive didn't have that obnoxious digital crackle I would rate this a 10 -- but the overdrive problem drops it to a 4.

Unless you want to use it with clean sound or with a real leslie, it is pretty useless and you are better off to stick with the original B4.

Workarounds in the studio is to turn off the overdrive and use a third party overdrive plugin and then run that through a third plugin for the leslie effect. A real pain and prevents me from using it live as a standalone outside of Sonar. I end up just running the original B4.

Save your money and either use the original version or get another product.

Use in SONAR 6 PE.

Pretty easy to use, but I have MIDI on/off problems with the Dxi and VST versions. So far, NI has been no help.

The drive feature is unusable, thus redering all the sounds un-driven and too clean sounding.

There is some controversy among users whether or not it's the just the drive, the sounds themselves or the combination of the two.

Consenses has it, however, that the original B4 was much superior in sound.

NI has yet to even acknowledge the problem even though it has been posted in their forum extensively.

If they fix the drive/sounds, there is no reason why it shouldn't get a 9 rating.

I was raised on jazz, especially classic Hammond jazz (Smith, Holmes, Brother Jack). I started guitar lessons at 8 and was playing pop/rock guitar in bars (illegaly)at 14. I also played bass in a free-form jazz group and we had a Hammond in the band. I always loved that Hammond sound, but what a pain to drag that thing around. I always had a guitar and amp in the house, but only dragged them out for sing-a-longs when company came.

I always wanted a real Hammond so when the B4 came out, I was very excited. I was also well prepared, working in the computer industry for the past 16 years. I have 4 computers (all homemade) and installed the original B4 software on one of them.

My B4 II setup is currently on a homebrew AMD 2800+ Barton system with WinXP Pro,1 Gig of RAM and 160 Gigs of mass storage. I use the DXI version of the instrument in Sonar 4, tickle the keys with an EDIROL PCR-M 49 and playback through an Ensoniq soundcard to a set of Macke monitors. CPU and storage issues haven't been a problem, even with up to 12 tracks of instrumentation.

I went into the woodshed for about a year with the original B4, and by the time the B4 V II came out, I had some good jazz chops.

I always thought the orginal B4 was "nice for the money" but it really didn't sound like a tone wheel Hammond. Close, but no cigar. My ear is pretty proficient and I can tell the difference between the original B4 and the B4 V II.

And what a difference it is. With the addition of a sweeter tube amp, spring and digital reverb, phenomenal Leslie and tone cab selections and more accurate modeling of the real instrument, it's a knockout punch, IMHO.

Having several years experience with the original, I find the B4 II no more difficult to operaten than the original B4. Both may intimidate some musicians who haven't messed around with software synths, but if you RTFM you shouldn't have a big problem.

Sit down for a week of Sundays, and you'll be able to tweak this instrument into sounding like it's 400 pound relative, in solo work and most especially in a mix. I output in stereo, and the Leslie(s) pulse back and forth between the two channels. It even has an "Air" control knob to create the 'whoosh' of a closely miced Lesle.

The presets are a good starting point, but not as nice as the orginal B4 presets. But once you finish tweaking, I defy anyone to tell me that this software (in a mix)isn't a tonewheel Hammond.

Well worth the money if you've got the computing power to play all 91 wheels.

I played several dedicated keys with Hammond like sounds, including the Nord Electro 2, the Korg Workstation and some Rolands. None of them can touch the versatility and control you get with this instrument.

It's never crashed, sounds better than any MIDI rack syth or sampler I've heard. To my ear it sounds very, very close to it's big, heavy brother. Combined with Sonar, it's about as much fun a keyboardist can have.