Do you mean just the differences in the studio pack or overall ?

Anyway....
The UAD 1176 is brilliant and the Dreamverb is superb.

They're the ones I use all the time.

I have the Fairchild and I do like the sound of it, but I still tend to reach for the 1176 unless I want something special.

I think they're all good.
The little delay, flanger, etc. are throw aways but useful as they are in DSP.

You'd think they'd have a proper multi-tap delay though :-(

I don't have the Pultec EQ or EMT plate yet.

Nigel (guitar FX) is a DSP hungry little mother but it does sound good and my guitarist people say very like the artist/s they emulate.

To put it in context I have the TC Powercore as well and the UAD makes the TC 247 a total joke IMHO!

I prefer the UAD Dreamverb to the TC MegaVerb so far.
The Dreaverb cam sound bright or warm, whereas the TC tends to be more middly.

I'm also p*ssed with TC because my Intonator isn't installing and their anal retentive authorisation system has been flawed for myself and several of my colleages. And it takes TC WEEKS to sort it out :-(

When copy protection gets in the way of legitimate owners, is definitely the time to buy something else!

The only good thing about the TC Powercore is the Access Virus - and they didn't make that ;-)

When copy protection gets in the way of legitimate owners, is definitely the time to buy something else!

You and the others need to get on the PC forums out there and also on the companies website and make some noise about this issue. Also go to the reviews area of the online dealers and make this known. Copy protection is an unfortunate reality for all of us but a poorly written one that prevents the softwares use is a disgrace. They have your money and you effectively have nothing. Make some noise, there's nothing these guys hate more than bad press. You might also contact the better business bureau in the softwares makers state and lodge a complaint. This is not like a defective product that can be shipped back for repair. They can and will unlock the copy protection if the heat gets turned up enough.

Good Luck!

Well my ? is do they do as good of job as the hardware? Considering for 899 you can get all of these:

Single unpartitioned supercomputer DSP Chip
Bus mastering DMA for zero host load and maximum transfer rate
Fully PCI 2.1 compliant, supports 66MHz and faster bus timing
7" form factor (PCI short card)
Compatible with the Magma PCI Expansion Chassis
More DSP headroom per plug-in than other multichip DSP cards
Supported sampling Rates from 32 kHz - 192 kHz Best Sounding Plug-In Collection
1176SE: Definitive Vintage FET Compressor Emulations
1176LN: Definitive Vintage FET Compressor Emulations
LA-2A: Most Popular Optical Compressor of All Time
CS-1: Complete Professional Channel Strip
(+3 plug-in modules, included)
RealVerb Pro: Industry Standard Reverb
Nigel: Amp, Cab, & FX for Guitar and Beyond
(+8 plug-in modules, included)
Pultec EQP-1A: Classic Silky EQ
Pultec Pro: Complete Vintage EQ
Cambridge EQ: Smooth Analog Surgical Precision
DreamVerb: Advanced Professional Reverb Toolkit
Fairchild 670: World Renown Tube Compressor

Digital will never be 100% like any analog gear until digital goes the next step.

But in the menatime, DSP is as close as you can get - because it is erm. hardware (almost).

The reason I have so many hardware accelerated DSP cards is because
1) they sound good and
2) because they sound good ALL the time.

Unlike VST and RTAS plug-ins which pander to the OS demands on the CPU, DSP cards only have one job in life!

It's not all perfect of course. It still relies on crappy written DSP code, (anal copy protection like TC), PCI/Firewire bus bandwidth and the OS not poking it's nose in where it isn't wanted.

Plus your host app/protools/sequencer needs to know what it's doing (so no hope there).

But it's as good as it gets for now!

I don't have a 30K Fairchild to AB against, but those that have say it's close.
All I know is I "LOVE" the sound of the UAD-1 whether it's a faithful emulation or not.
It's better than any thing else I own or have used.

Well actually 1 native compressor is on a par, but I can't talk about that yet.

I don't think you'd ever regret getting a UAD-1.

The only downside is even though DSP loaded, they are NEVER powerful enough. You can "always" max them out with some configuration or other. But that's why they are chainable - LOL.

If you're on a budget consider getting the base card and just adding the Dreamverb, or Fairchild, or whatever as YOU need them.

Hey man thanks alot for your time, i am not on the fence anymore. Peace Ryan