Reply to Analog n Stuff

So here's a topic of great debate for all of you: How analog is analog enough?

There's no getting around the fact that "the average" analog synth sounds a hell of a lot different that "the average" softsynth. It seems like there's an awful lot of emphasis on getting softsynths to sound more analog, but when is enough?

With enough time you could theoretically take a sample from a hardware synth, use enough oscillators in an additive softsynth, subtract your signal from the sample, and use the difference to add more oscillators and tune it down to the transients (which you could also generate in the softsynth). So how close is important?

And also, why purchase a dozen different hardware synths for different processes instead of getting one good analog oscillator (or set of them) and process the signal with software? It'd still be "analog" and a hell of a lot cheaper.

What're your thoughts?