John Maar

Until you mentioned that this was a Bösendorfer 280VC, I was going to pass. I've never had a chance to play a real 280, so this will have to suffice! Interesting that the UVI Austrian Grand supports the 97-key 290 keybed. The 280VC has the standard 88 kays. I wonder if NI will release an S97 update to their S88 keyboard. Wishful thinking.

The only collections I don't have yet are Satriani, Brian May and Dimebag Darrell, so this one does me no good. Maybe Black Friday.

Cthulhu is only $39. Serum, on the other hand, is pricey. I never bought it. But I did notice that the dev posted a recent update for Cthulhu (v1.24b2, dated May 2021). Downloading from my account now. Release notes: Version 1.24b1 (May 2021) - fix: sync improvements - fix: graphics performance improvements - fix: MIDI program changes now work with Cthulhu UI hidden - fix: some CPU reduction

I upgraded from Studio 4 to Studio 5 last year at this time. FWIW, I paid $136.85. $80 sounds pretty good!

I got 2 emails, one with the loyalty discount (I have Riffer), and one without. The discount code email came first. Weird. So, 29€ instead of 39€, direct from AudioModern.

My mother bought a 6' Kawai in the '80s. That fit beautifully in her living room. It sounded great and had a lovely feeling keybed.

The real ones are gorgeous instruments. Made down the hill in Scottsdale. Ravenscroft Pianos

I just checked my iLok account. All my VI Labs pianos, including the Ravenscroft, have 3 authorizations. Soft (PC) authorizations are supported, so you don't need a physical dongle.

The Xtra Styles will ALWAYS remain separate from the main program. The Xtra packs go on sale around Black Friday, when the next major release becomes available. The current sale price is the regular sale price. In other words, it won't ever be cheaper. If you don't have any of them, now's as good a time as any to pick up all 11 Xtra Styles packs (since you have 2021 Ultra).

How many years have we been waiting for the v2 upgrade? Sheesh.

Then you must still be under 18! I recall from my visits to Dublin that under-18s got Smithwick's. Under-21s got a Smithwick's with a head of Guinness. 21 and up? Full on Guinness! Of course, those were general guidelines followed by no one! 😄

The photos of that strat don't do the color scheme justice. Years ago, I bought a GC/MF exclusive build of the Ascari GT in Irish Ale. Gorgeous. Excellent quality fit and finish. Love the piping. The third 'bucker and 10-way switch were the exclusives.

Just very slow. As in "VERY". I also noticed a Percussion LABS instrument available for d/l.

Sure could have used those extra JAM points when I bought Miroslav 2 last week. I only had 10 left at the time. At least I have a few in the bank again.

WAY too much fun for a Friday morning Premiere!

In Session Audio show very good attention to detail. For example, when you use the Shaker in Shimmer, Shake, Strike and render the audio, you get the authentic pre-shake sound before the beat that a human would create moving the shaker into place getting ready for the beat. That little thing sold me on the company.

Shimmer, Shake, Strike is so good that I added Fluid Strike as the 4 for 3 freebie to the Creator trio. Got all 4 for under $340. Excellent price.

I gave up on CyberLink and Corel. They NEVER stop pushing ads, and I never used much of the bloatware crap (ex-squeeze me; premium add-ons) they install. Tried VideoPad from NCH. It's kind of a joke. I looked at Resolve, but it's way more complex than I want to deal with. And I'm never going to need/buy DaVinci's hardware (the whole purpose of making the entry-level Resolve free). I wanted a permanent license, not a subscription, so I shrugged, decided to dance with the devil and bought a license to Adobe Premiere Elements. I need to make YouTube videos. That's all. It works great for that. It's fast. And no bloatware.

Good drives! Good price! I've got 2 x 2TB T7's and 1 x 2TB X5 (Thunderbolt 3) for my samples drive. Here's a tip. BEFORE you write anything to one of these drives, reformat it from exFAT to NTFS. I can't locate the article explaining why, but there's a significant performance hit if you leave it as exFAT.

I paid $56.72 after the conversion of pounds to dollars by PayPal and using 10 pounds loyalty points. Thanks for the heads up! EDIT: The current exchange rate is .7164 pounds/dollar. PayPal gave me .6964, a good rate.

Thanks for taking the time! [wipes brow and feels better about purchase!] Once I get moved to France, I'm going to help my niece get a YouTube channel going. It will have a Tour de France focus. I can handle all of the audio processing, but needed a video editor I could live with. High Hopes! [apologies to the Floyd 😇]

Your video has already paid for itself! Not in a million years would I have thought to double-click on the magnifying glass icon. That link you posted that includes the search criteria is the one I bookmarked. I'm not going to count on remembering the double-click trick.

Excellent Reid! Thanks. I too just purchased Adobe Premiere Elements. I've burned through several video editors (CyberLink, Corel, a couple of lower-end ones). Never happy for one reason or another. I'm hoping Premiere will do what I need, without installing all of the bloat and product advertising. I've been happy with Affinity's trio (Designer, Photo, Publisher; $25/each when on sale; best software deal going), so I only need a video editor. And I want one with a perpetual license, not a subscription. I'd be interested in your feedback on the changes you had to make to your workflow.

Certainly not going to rival Shimmer, Shake, Strike, but still nice to have. One note on Pulse. The download and install directory needs to be set to the target, not your download directory (which it defaults to). I had to move the installed folder to my Kontakt Instruments folder. I'm used to separately specified download and install paths. I over-complicate darn near everything. 😝

Gig Performer is terrific. I've been using it for a couple of years now. One thing to be aware of with the Plugin Alliance version is that it hasn't been and won't be updated on the same schedule as a licensed version direct from Deskew (who have never had a sale; like Subaru). I've never regretted paying full price ($149). I was SO happy to move on from Cantabile. Dual licenses (Windows and Mac) are $199 for both. Great if you work with Windows in the studio and Apple live. https://gigperformer.com/