Zebra Manual

Hi all,

I’m all excited that Zebra 2.5 has come out!

I will be spending the weeks after the holidays on this manual to fill the gaps. And I also need to update the screenshots.

Thankfully about everything written here still applies. The biggest change comes for the XMF filter module. You can learn a lot about it in this Youtube video:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=RTRr5JXPaYU

Everything else, especially everything concerning the installation process is covered in the readmes that come with the downloads.

Stay tuned,

Urs

Zebra V2.3 has been released today

Numerous little additions will make their way into this manual and in turn into the downloadable translated manuals over the next few days and weeks.

The major information needed right now is the update procedure. And that’s a simple one:

On Mac you just download the package and run the installer. It will put all files in place. You can (or maybe: should) however remove any Zebra2.component and Zebra2.vst that still remains in your user location (MacHD/Users/You/Library/Audio…)

On Windows things are as simple. A major point of the update is the improved installation process. You can just install over an existing installation. The previous installer had the option to install “Everything in Vstplugins”. This option is gone (for good reason), but the installer automatically detects the kind of installation that you have on your machine. Anyone who hasn’t got Zebra yet and prefers the “Everything in Vstplugins” method must use the pre-installed version for Receptor for the very first installation, while updates simply happen with the installer. This is fast – and safe.

So… V2.3 is thoroughly tested, it should just work. Run the installer and stay tuned to read about Sideband Filters, Compressor modes and ModMappers!

Urs

Here’s the German version of the manual:

Zebra2 Deutsch

Hans Hafner did this one!

Cheers,

Urs

Hi again,

We also have a Spanish manual now!

Zebra2 Spanish

Thanks to Juanjo Cotado aka jj for his great work!

Cheers,

Urs

Hi all,

we now have French and Italian manuals!

Zebra2 French

Zebra2 Italian

Thanks to Vim Cortez and Mario Bianchi for their efforts!!!

Mario also did an English version in the same layout for download:

Zebra2 English

Cheers,

Urs

To install Zebra2.2 on Receptor hardware, you first need an unpacked Zebra2 for VST Windows on your harddrive.

Note: You can not run the installer on Receptor – but people have successfully installed Zebra2 on Receptor (OS 1.6) following these steps:

If you’re on a PC running Windows, you would just choose the option “Install everything in Vstplugins” during normal installion on your computer. This will not only install Zebra2.dll in Vstplugins\u-he\ – it will also create a folder called “Zebra2.data” which contains presets and support files.

If you’re on MacOS, you can download a “pre-installed” Zebra2 here. Just create a folder called “u-he” and put Zebra2.dll, Zebralette.dll and Zebra2.data into it.

Connect to your Receptor and and move the folder “u-he” containing Zebra2.dll, Zebralette.dll and Zebra2.data to “Drop Installer Here”

Now you should be able to install everything as “unsupported”.

If the Zebra2.data directory can’t be moved into Receptor’s Vstplugins folder, you can manually move it there. It just has to sit next to the .dll files before you can properly run it.

That’s it!

Urs

The update from version 2.0 or 2.1 to version 2.2 is fairly simple; this time there are installers for all platforms. Just follow the instructions after starting the installer. As the old factory presets have been taken out of the installer, you don’t have to be afraid that it reverts your customizations to the patch structure. Only the new bank will be installed. However, there are two possible pitfalls:

Updating on Windows: If you go for the “compact install” option into the Vstplugins directory, you have to manually move all related files from C:\Program Files\u-he\ to Vstplugin\Zebra2.data\ including your registration file. It’s thus recommended to only do the default install into C:\Program Files\u-he\ – just leave the option for compact install unticked

Updating on MacOS X: The installer gives you the choice to install on any writable hard drive or partition. But of course it’s only useful to isntall on your System drive…

Enjoy,

Urs

You can grab the current state of the manual in this archive for offline viewing:

XMF – Cross Modulation Filter

The two XMFs came in with Zebra V2.1 – it’s an extremely powerful filter module that does a lot of analogue stuff, including input dependent distortion and FilterFM. Plus, it’s self-oscillating even without any input signal!

The usage is very straight forward, it has the typical Cutoff and Resonance controls along with 5 Filter Types: 4 Pole Lowpass & Bandpass, 2 Pole Bandpass, Highpass and Bandreject. (More to be added in subsequent updates)

As it’s a stereo filter, it basically processes both stereo sides independently. Fortunately these two filters can be detuned without hitting the cpu much more, so there’s now a modulatable Offset control that detunes left vs. right in semitones. That makes for nice panning effects.

FilterFM lets one modulate the Cutoff frequency by a side chained audio signal. It takes any signal from any module that sits before it in the Grid, but typical usage would be routing an oscillator into the XMF’s side chain.

The Click parameter lets one inject a short impulse into the filter when a note is pressed. This makes for harder attacks and for faster build-up when using self oscillation.

To control the amount of distortion, the first way to go is always to adjust the level of the audio that goes into the filter. Don’t be afraid to set oscillator volumes to less than 10%. This makes for warm & clean sounds. If you need some coloration, move up the Bias parameter which controls the asymmetry of the distortion and adds more even harmonics. But if you need it phat, simply use the Overload knob – just make sure you turn down your speaker’s volume before you do that!

More details soon in an extra chapter!

Enjoy,

Urs

P.S.: Yes, the XMF is expensive on cpu and yet it’s possible to get a good amount of aliasing out of it in extreme settings… use it carefully, and be assured that this is probably the fastest possible implementation of such a filter in software…

Hi all,

Thanks for your feedback! – We embarrassingly forgot to document the Modulation Mixers in the initial version of this manual. However, they are pretty powerful beasts and thus they now have their own little page.

Also, another bunch of frequently asked questions led us to extend explanations such as the Arpeggiator loop parameter.

Last but not least, we have the first working offline version of the manual in html format. It just needs some tweaks before we can post it. Which we will soonishly!

Cheers,

Urs