[adam]

Well, I haven't used their software at all, but both Prof and I own Virus hardware synths, so I'd say it's worth looking into.

If you're looking for effects, I'd recommend anything and everything by PSP. Processor inefficient on my mac, but I think people were getting better performance out of them on PC. They have trial demos, so you can't lose.

For soft synths, my next acquisition will be Absynth. You can hear samples of that on Native Instruments' site.