A fast attack 1176 wouldn't have those same issues - but would have its own. The LA2A does 'that thing' which could be characterized as a smooth, silky, and warm - BUT it also exacerbates sibilance in vocals and leads to a front end bump that can be so 'wrong' in many situations. I don't mean to push back on your question, but honestly, the term 'best' is one that is completely contextual, and since the context is so different in every song it is pretty much impossible to quantify. Therefore, the comparisons and shootouts could go on and on. There are quite a few LA2A emulations - or at least plug-ins that compress and put a 'two knobbed, simple silver interface' on the front. The polarity invert / sum to cancel thing was just to give some kind of objective measure to my subjective opinion. I was surprised how it captured the vibe - which is what you want in the end - well, what I want at least. Softube and NI are pretty much new comers, and so to be honest, I thought it would 'sound like a compressor' and that would be that. I just did a quite Google search for 'UAD Waves LA2A' and I see many. The simple answer is that I don't have the Waves version :) The VC2A plug-in can be purchased on its own for $99.00 outside of the Komplete 9 Ultimate package, and is available in AU, AAX, RTAS, and VST formats. While the 5 dB gain difference was admittedly more radical than I would have expected, since both the Gain and the Peak Reduction knobs are marked with meaningless arbitrary units (0-100), getting the an appropriate sound out of an LA2A has always been about turning the knobs until it sounded right. In essence, both of the plug-ins had the same desired sonic quality and give you the same vibe that one usually wants when inserting an LA2A into the signal chain. At higher compression settings, the VC2A has the same characteristic artifacts producing a thick transient bump at the attack and slightly over-esssed sibilance on vocals. What does this mean? Well, the soft tube VC2A gives that smooth, silky sound that the LA2A is known for. I went so far as to polarity invert one of the channels and got them to almost completely cancel for the sustaining portions, with the biggest level variation (15 db) being on the very front attack (the first 10 ms or so) during the transition from 0d B to the desired amount of GR. With the GR meters giving the same indication on both units, the sound that was produced by both devices was nearly identical. While the basic two-knob settings were different, when matched by ear, what wasn't dissimilar was the aural result. Surprisingly however, this difference includes just the Gain knob (different by 5 dB!). Find out more info here:Р”Р„s you may have noticed above, identical parameter settings will not produce identical outputs. Universal Audio recently released a vastly improved emulation (NOT USED IN THIS REVIEW). IMPORTANT: Paul conducted this shootout using the OLD version of UA's LA-2A plug-in released 10 years ago. Thus, if the hardware units are different, then the emulated or modeled plug-ins are going to be different as well, and that's exactly the case here. No two original hardware LA2A's are ever going to be the exact same. But there are a couple of things you need to keep in mind. You can watch and listen to the audio shootout between the two below and make your own judgements. So how did the Softube emulation stack up? Really, really well. This keeps the compressor from reacting adversely to low frequencies. The VC 2A (VC = Vintage Compressor), includes a mix/blend control allowing for parallel compression, a sidechain circuit for ducking or effects, and a high pass filter in the detector circuit.

Whereas UA kept their LA2A emulation completely faithful to the original unit, Softube added a few additional features. With Native Instruments and Softube releasing a native (non-hardware accelerated) version, I was eager to see how it compares with both the hardware, and Universal Audio's own digital emulation. I also have the UAD LA2A plug-in as a first call go-to in many vocal chains. The VC 2A and LA 2A stack up very well against each other.Р”Р„s an owner and daily user of Universal Audio's LA610 mic pre (610 mic pre, LA2A compressor combo) I have the LA2A sound well ingrained in my head.

Waves cla 2a review