Two different Hammond B3's would sound different, too... and somebody would prefer one over the other!

There are some interesting points about his comparison... Firstly, the idea of putting a couple of studio monitors in roughly the same place as the edges of the horn's throw. This is obviously ideal for getting as close as possible to the separation a real Leslie has, but unless you are running a rig expressly for this purpose (no other keyboards at all), they are much closer together than the average stereo keyboard rig, or most decent sized studio's nearfields. Even my little home studio's HR824's are about 4 1/2' apart or more. This tends to make Leslie sims a little too 'wide' to get a really accurate recreation, and a stereo PA? Forget about it!

This is why I wish, on all keyboards with a stereo Leslie sim, that they had a 'width' control to the stereo spread of the sound. In fact, for any stereo samples (piano in particular) a 'width' control would be of enormous help. Sure, if you are recording just one thing at a time, or ONLY using the B3 sim on your arranger/WS, you can pan the two channels a little closer, but if you are doing a show from the one keyboard, obviously, collapsing the stereo image to get a better Leslie sim also collapses everything else (including the all-important reverbs and choruses).

So... pretty please, with bells on it - can we have 'width' controls for stereo sounds on our TOTL gear? My ancient K2500 has had it for donkey's years...

The other thing about the comparison is - I wish he had spent more time matching the ramp up and down times for the low rotor... It makes a VERY noticeable difference between the two. I am sure, if matched more closely, what is already a very close comparison would sound even closer. Maybe close enough to fool more of us.

And personally, I think the Chorus section is more of a difference between the two than the Leslie. Again, if it is adjustable on the Nord, he MIGHT have been able to get it closer to his particular B3 (he doesn't say much about the model, age or mods of it).

There's one last thing he does that I think helps the sim out bigtime, and is something that more of us could do to help our B3 clones... He distant mikes the monitors. In other words, what you hear has been thrown around the room he is in as much as the real Leslie. This is something many clone users either forget, or their hardware doesn't allow them to do, but you NEVER hear a real Leslie up close and dry as a bone. Even when some reverb is added afterwards, the real Leslie has some of the 'room' sound captured by the mikes, and this changes the sound remarkably.

For those of us with clones, remembering to run the sim through a small room (or medium small) reverb FIRST, and THEN adding the larger reverb (if you use any at all) can make a clone Leslie sound FAR more like the real thing. Or even, if recording, try what he has done... set up a stereo rig close together, and distant mike it in a lively-ish room. Leslie nirvana!

Now, maybe if only someone would be this careful, and do a direct C1 to XK-3c comparison, this would help put to rest the 'Clone Wars' and we Jedi can go back to our homes!