Tezza

I tried to get the A-series Kontrol keyboard tested at a retail outlet in the city , said could I bring my laptop in to try with my kontrol software, they said no, only have a few, they are in boxes, can only buy a box. None are even on demo. They do have some demos of other keyboards though, not many, they won't take it out of the box to let you try.

I couldn't get hold of the S61 mki or the s49 mkii. They were both available in my area but they sold before I could get to them. I don't like the mki because it has those touch strips instead of the solid pitch and modulation wheels. I could live with it though, at least you can turn the lights off. On the markii you cannot turn the lights off. I couldn't live with that. They have the Fatar keybed which is supposed to be good. Some are saying that the A series kontrol keybeds are also good. I won't buy another keyboard without testing it out though. I get what you are saying about testing on the DAW, Keybed has to be good and velocities also, I don't know how you do that though other than buy secondhand and if you don't like then move on. The nearest music shop to me is about 100kms away. They don't carry a lot and what they do carry, you can't really try in the shop as they are not hooked up.

I love these guys, a bunch of Russians in their 60's (half of which can't even speak english) who decided not to retire and create a Chicago cover band instead, gone viral! I am using their interpretation of this song as a reference track in a rock song that I want to put real sounding trumpets and brass in.

That's sad, you may look back on the time with the band with fondness once the emotional commotion settles. I think both singer songwriter DAW recording and playing with others is good, it doesn't have to be one or the other. It's even better if you can use your DAW to record the whole band. Given the chance, all males are egonauts even the quiet ones when their circumstances change and not just in bands either, I am in some political parties and groups...unbelievable! Learning to deal with and point out egoistic behavior in a way that doesn't offend is hard to do but very rewarding if you can do it. I think the key is professionalism and sticking to the agenda of song creation, the songs come first. In bands I played in where there was a producer or manager pushing for achievement that was NOT a band member, they were the most stable and productive and fun. Perhaps you just need to get a manager or producer for the band. That way, the manager can take care of band member complaints against other band members and act as an independent adjudicator or a referee in a cage fight! When I record different vocals, guitars, keyboards and bass by myself, I try to take on the stereotypical ego's of each person and fight for the limelight in the tracks. You get an interesting perspective on others views that way. Only problem is, when I am the bass player, there's no other bandmates girlfriends to sleep with!

wtf? I think someone was on mushrooms when they named that one, it also looks like it might be a paid one.

I'm on win 7, I can't say I get crashes or it is slow. I've also got an old 4th gen i5. I upgraded some parts of the computer, gave it a big SSD for samples, smaller one for OS but kept a 7200rpm HD for recording audio and a new DVD drive, I kept the original i5 cpu and the 8gig of ram because I couldn't see a reason to upgrade them. Zero latency on vocals and guitar because I use the UR44 direct monitor DSP and use pedals with the guitar. Amp sims and VST instruments are acceptable with latency, I can go down to 64ms or even 32 if I shut some of the tracks down which I don't need to record that part anyway. I have my DAW offline without unnecessary motherboard drivers loaded or any wifi or Antivirus installed. You shouldn't be getting crashes at all, even if you are on win7. I use Cakewalk with komplete ultimate 10, some other synths and a few other third party FX plugins I am weaning myself off of. I also have Studio One V3 (moving away from), Mixcraft 8(nice to play with occasionally), and Cubase Pro 10 (bought as an experiment, currently battling with it). They all run fine on my system. I don't have a problem with the stability of DAW's, it's more about the interface, the workflow and whether or not it can be an "all in one" system requiring fewer third party FX plugins. I think when people are getting regular crashes, unless they are really overloading things, then it is probably hardware related, like using a single hard drive or lack of ram/incompatible ram sticks, a laptop mobile CPU or something really weak, then it's badly maintained computers which haven't been cleaned or defraged or windows reinstalled for years, then its the internet with wifi and antivirus, all horrid things as far as I am concerned.

Authorization drives me mad. I recently upgraded my computer which took just 1 and a half hours to put all the bits in, yet it took 2 weeks to install and properly authorize the software. I tried to update my Komplete Ultimate 10 to version 12, catastrophe because only can be done from the internet (despite me having the hard drive) and my internet is bad, then the third party plugins had some problems and "number of activations" had been exceeded also Steinberg UR44 reverbs etc, soft elicenser got wiped and had to get it reinitialized in my account. etc then Melodyne.... All of the problems I experienced related to companies procedures for protecting their software. It was the delays in them getting back to me, or being able to contact them at all to resolve problems that can only be resolved at their end, I couldn't fix them myself. Making me rethink using third party plugins at all or at least reducing them.

I also wonder about the reliability of playing projects made in older versions of Sonar in the newer Cakewalk. They always say it's backward compatible but weird things can happen. The test I guess, is whether new projects begun in Cakewalk perform better than projects transferred over from Sonar.

Well said! It's like the cheaper midi controllers with "piano feel" keybeds are fighting against you when you play them, constant pressure against your fingers as opposed to the synth style controllers which are not that bad. I've found that in general, keybeds with aftertouch always seem a little better. Even the Samson 49 I tried was nice as was the Novation impulse and Roland A500 but they all come with baggage when it comes to setting them up, getting a bit old in the tooth now I guess. Looking for a basic high quality midi keyboard controller by itself (with no faders/pots etc) seems impossible, the only one I can think of is the studio logic series which are as rare as hens teeth here in Australia and quite expensive to buy new. Even the newer stuff, the Nektar P and T series are not getting great reviews when it comes the the keybed. I've got a chance at trying a Kontrol s61 mk1 tomorrow, they are supposed to have nice keys. The new A series Kontrol keyboards seem to be getting good reviews regarding their keys despite being the cheaper version of the S series. I've not tried either the Kontrols or the Arturias yet. They are next on the list. I would be interested in your opinion of the Arturia when you get to try it.

I only ever use 64 bit, 64bit OS, 64 bit DAW, 64 bit plugins and instruments, I've always done that. Stable as a rock here. I don't know, but suspect that using 32 bit plugins through the bridge does not add to stability of the DAW. I've seen many instances where people complain of crashes and it's traced back to using some 32 bit plugin in a 64 bit DAW, 32 bit plugins can also be really old, using very early versions of VST. Mixcraft was the same. I think I've posted about this at least 30 times on different DAW sites, following crashing being tracked back to this. This may or may not be the cause here though. Cakewalk should go 64 bit native in my view. It would probably cut down on the crash reports here on the forum. Burn the bridge!

Thanks Scook, I don't know how I missed that, I'll give it a shot when I get back to my DAW, there might be a keyboard shortcut indicated in the paste special dialog box as well if that's the case, I know in Studio One it was "Shift + D" or something like that, I'll have a look. I'm glad Cakewalk can do this at least.

I'm pretty sure Cakewalk cannot do this, but thought I would check in case I've missed something. If you have a midi clip like a drum midi loop and you want to create shared duplicates of that midi part, how do you do this? To be clear, a shared midi clip is where you duplicate an original midi clip and then any changes you make in the original are reflected in the shared duplicate clip(s). I know you can duplicate clips which you can then change (but the changes are not reflected in the other clips) and I'm aware of being able to turn them into a groove clip and stretching out. Neither of these methods are the same as a shared duplicate. Can Cakewalk do this? Thanks.

Love George Benson!

Piano in 162 is a sample library of a Steinway Model B grand piano, available in Kontakt, SFZ, and Korg Kronos formats. http://ivyaudio.com/Piano-in-162

Those Focusrite drivers can be finnicky, it always pays to make sure you have the latest one, they can update frequently sometimes. Second gen is a bit better than first gen. I think it is also important to report it to Focusrite as well, I had a problem with a 2i4 and Studio One once, I told them about it and they came out with an update to fix it.

Thanks Mark, I wasn't even aware that Kontakt could play these files, I have Komplete Ultimate 10 with the paid version of Kontakt. I'll give Kontakt a go first and if there is too much going on, I'll try the Sforzando.

Erik, I know you are a freeware expert, why don't you ask the moderators to put up a Freeware FX and VSTi subforum like the deals subforum. If we can have a subforum for third party profit making entities, then surely we can have one for freeware. This would also be consistent with Bandlabs community focus surely. It could be a subforum of this forum, (instruments and effects). That way, it would be for instruments and effects only, not for DAW's or other stuff.

This looks great, SFZ is not a format I have used though, I think I can play SFZ format in Kontakt. Is there a reason that Sforzando would be better at playing SFZ files than Kontakt? And if you were new to SFZ, is this the best one?

With the LX, it helps to clarify what model you are talking about, the older LX61, which I have, works fine for me but I have seen some complaints regarding integration with Cakewalk about the LX61+ which is the newer model, they are pretty much the same, except flashing leds and a couple of other things. They do use different integration files from Nektar though. I also have the GX61 (new model) and that has very different key action to my LX61 but it could be the same as the newer LX61+, I don't know. I find the LX (older version) to have easier to play keys that seem to have lower travel (synth like?), I can do a run more easily and reach for more complex chords and play them cleanly. The GX seems to have more travel and stiffer to play (more piano like) which makes these things more difficult for me. I have shorter fingers though. For me, same as using .10 gauge strings vs .09 on my Strat. If I use the GX and .10 gauge strings on the Strat, it takes more effort and my fingers tire more quickly. I've opted for the LX and .09 gauge strings which is like coming home, I can play both instruments all day without thinking about it.

Yes, I use he older model Nektar Impact LX61 which is fantastic with Cakewalk, everything (i mean everything) works as it should without setting anything up at all, even just using the old Sonar integration files from the Nektar website. I was looking at the Arturia and Kontrol keyboards as well, others that I have tried, I always keep running back to the LX61. My pet peves with the mk2 KK keyboards is that you cannot turn the keybed lights off, whereas you could with the mk1. Also, the 8 encoders can all be different resistances. These things can bug the hell out of some people. Haven't tried Arturia but if the setup is that much of a pain, I don't think I will.

Thanks mate, excellent post, I'm still on Win 7 but looking to move to Win 10, with Komplete Ultimate 10, the performance of NI stuff under Win 10 is a priority for me.

Windows shouldn't be that bad. I admit I've never used a mac but I've never felt inclined to. For me, windows runs fine on both my laptop and my desktop PC. I am using windows 7 still though. You probably just need to do a general cleanup and defrag or maybe you have a slow hard drive to start with or not enough ram. With an SSD you shouldn't worry about it. There really shouldn't be many problems at all. It can get a little slower as time goes by depending on how much you use it but a system clean and defrag usually fixes that. Really, it should be 6 - 12 months before it needs this. It shouldn't get that slow. I've thought about switching to Mac but the limited options/greater difficulty in adding hard drives and upgrading turns me off. You don't give the specs of your current system, perhaps there is a way to upgrade it without too much cost. Also, you don't say what the problems are. It might be possible to get what you already have running well.

So glad I found this, only $14.00 for Cubase Pro 10 explained, will grab it tomorrow. I like the Groove 3 videos because i can download the full video to my laptop at the library and then transfer it to a USB stick and watch on TV while operating my DAW.

Are there any published rules for using the forum? I cannot seem to find them if there are.

Thanks, I'll try this with my 598's and Morphit.