PavlovsCat

I'm pretty sure my wife hacked your account and is now making posts! You and Music Man did stop me. I suppose it's no secret that we're all addicted to buying too much. And you're absolutely right of course, that like probably everyone else here, I have a ridiculous amount of virtual synths to the point I haven't really found the time to spend much time with some. But you guys did steal the buzz away when I was ready to purchase and I'm sure you knew exactly what was going on because you experience the same thing yourselves. So, I'm still a little annoyed you guys interrupted me when I was in fulll GAS mode. I can only imagine how much developers would loathe your efforts! But I'm also appreciative because I can see you guys were acting to be helpful. I probably would have bought the synth and all of the presets and I probably would have used it in a maximum of one project or none. So thanks for talking me down.

I don't think I've checked this synth out before, it sounds really good to my ears. Anyone here use it and want to share their thoughts?

I had clicked the "grab the plugin" button numerous times and it didn't work -- although 20 minutes later, it worked. But I also then sent a message just containing the word "limiter" in response to the Hyperbits Masterclass account. This was the response: "You need to click the “grab the plugin” button to access it If for some reason that message isn’t available, then send the word limiter and then follow those steps" After I sent the word limiter, I received the correct link and registered to get the free limiter.

I received a link via Instagram DM that led to a page where I registered and downloaded the plugin.

I had the same reply, then I DMed limiter and received a link and immediately got the limiter. Try it and report back if it worked for you too.

@Starship Krupa They could have exhausted their supply at this point, but I had a response to type "limiter"(without the quotes) in a DM and it worked. Give it a try and please post the result.

For that price, I wish I liked the sound of it, but it doesn't sound like a beautifully sampled piano and the reverb sounds very artificial to me in a way that I really don't like on piano, very much like the Steinway D in their series, which I own but don't care for. There's free grand pianos for Kontakt from Pianobook, SonicCoture and 8Dio that are in a different (better) league than this, that raise the bar for my standards for a paid piano sample library. Aurora's sound design / cinematic patches sound much more appealing to me. But, based on the demos and the D that I own from them, I just don't love how their sampled piano libraries when it comes to a natural sound.

That LOLCOMP GUI looks a lot like they were using some (non-audio) enhancers when they designed it. But it has received some very good reviews and heavy hitter testimonials, so it's easily worth the cost of the magazine, IMO.

Thanks for the tip. I own Studio One Pro 3. I bought it back when Gibson announced it dissolved Cakewalk and was looking for a company to buy its assets. I've been waiting on Bandlab to announce its pricing plans to see if I will switch and upgrade to the latest version of Studio One Pro. But considering that I have dozens of unfinished Cakewalk projects, I would prefer to transition to a perpetual license of Sonar. Now if there's a flawless conversion tool to change my project files to Studio One Pro's format, this would be a lot easier (I remember back when I purchased the Studio One license someone posted a tool, it looked homespun; if anyone is familiar with it , it's still around and works well, I'd be interested in more info).

I definitely was thinking about Image Line when I was writing that (but I actually wasn't aware that Melda offers the same lifetime deal). I did write that it's not a sustainable model to continue doing lifetime software deals for the vast majority of software companies. Where it can work -- and has worked in Image Line's case -- is when the flagship software naturally has a good deal of related software that goes with it. It's not that great of a leap from the freemium model. Image Line can succeed because their model relies heavily on marketing to its customers who've made a lifetime purchase and have, I would guess, figured out a way to optimize lifetime value from those customers that goes far beyond the DAW purchase (plugins, sample libraries, etc.). Of course, it's possible for Bandlab to use a similar strategy -- I'd love it! But it is one that is riskier for the developer, I'm sure you'll agree. But the majority of software companies that offer lifetime deals are, as I described earlier, small upstarts or companies not in great financial shape, that are looking to raise capital fast and have not been successful doing so via investors or normal sales promotions. The ideal for most software companies is the subscription model, as it gives them a regular/recurring source of revenue. When I was recently looking at research for the various software revenue models. as has always been the case, overall, consumers tend to be resistant to subscription software models, whereas business users tend to prefer that model. But there's another twist. Boomers are significantly less fond of subscription software than younger generations, especially Gen Z. So there's definitely a huge differentiation in attitudes by generation. Another thing I remember from the research is that most Boomers have a mental maximum of 3 paid streaming or software subscriptions at a time. Of course, that can also be correlated with the major shift going on in the movie / TV streaming industry where subscription costs are being lowered via the addition of commercials.

A bunch of folks here apparently like Scaler a bunch. Is there a demo? Is it really just focused on teaching or making chord progressions up based on scales and modes? I've watched the video and I'm certainly no virtuoso, but I studied around a year of music theory in addition to several years of piano and organ lessons and was wondering if this brings anything to the table that might be useful for me, or if it's really focused on those who don't know music theory? I think it could be cool if I could pump in a chord progression I've created and it could offer chord substitutions I could audition and consider. Does it do anything like that?

Hey, as long as we can respect each other's views and one another, it's fine to disagree. I just think some people are less than civil -- it was several months ago when a forum member lashed out at me and called me a bunch of defamatory names (the mod deleted the guy's over the top posts) over this conversation, and I wrote the same things as Jim and Bapu. I'm not a fan of people being uncivil, but I'm a total fan of civil debate. As far as Bandlab giving the impression that Cakwalk would always be free, I don't recall if they actually made statements that the product would ALWAYS BE FREE. But, even if they heavily implied it, running a business, it's pretty difficult to sustain giving away a product free with no upgrade or cross-selling path. Sooner or later, they needed to figure out a way to monetize the product, that was easy to determine from day one - and I'm certain that I was making posts on this forum to that effect back then. I'm not feeling too good about the possibility that BandLab will go subscription only and I'll have around 100 projects in the Cakewalk format that I may not be able access unless I pay for a subscription or after Windows does an update that makes the software unusable. However, I still think Bandlab gave us all a fantastic deal by providing several years of what was basically the premium version of Sonar with free upgrades for several years. I realize that anger and rage sells better than gratitude. But I actually do feel gratitude that Bandlab has saved me several hundred dollars over the past several years. I didn't buy the lifetime deal, as it was widely known that Gibson was in trouble when that was announced and that Cakewalk could be closed or sold and those lifetime deals would be worthless. That's the risk some people take. That's the risk some have taken with Musio. Sometimes it turns out well, more often it doesn't. It's a gamble. But overall, I find that Bandlab has done very well by its customers, and if they offer a perpetual license for Sonar at a reasonable price, I'm going to become a paying Bandlab customer for the first time, which is something the outspoken minority of people angry at Bandlab for an agreement they had with Gibson have never been (a paying customer).

To Jim's point, Cakewalk was already dissolved by Gibson by the time Bandlab bought its intellectual property. It truly was the equivalent of a fire sale with Gibson selling off the assets of the company it once owned but dissolved. I get that you and some others are upset, and I'm not an apologist for Bandlab, I'm just a businessperson explaining the fundamentals of business applied to this situation. I'm not a fan of the software subscription model and likely will be using Studio One Pro over Sonar if Bandlab chooses to go subscription only. But the small group of people wrongly -- and repeatedly after given basic information-- is, IMO something the community should care to correct. I think Jim Roseberry made some excellent points, especially, the point that if you're going to be angry with any party after all of these years (which I think it's time to let go), the one party you could make the only somewhat -- but not really--reasonable case to be angry at is Gibson for shutting down Cakewalk and selling its assets nearly a decade ago. If you're this angry after so many years, and you state you've lost faith in the new owners of the Sonar software, why keep posting angry and upset with those doing their best to explain the situation accurately? Consider that Jim bought the same lifetime deal and took the time to explain things to you in a very thoughtful manner and you insulted him. I get that you're upset. But the reality of the situation is, your offer was with a company Gibson owned and dissolved. If you're going to continue being upset over this for the next decade, that's the party to blame. But even more, what's the point? And it would make more sense to vent at Gibson, not the company that bought some of the Cakewalk assets. I think it's extremely unlikely that Bandlab would make a special offer for lifetime deal recipients. I don't think that's a reasonable expectation a fairninded person could have. In other words, after nearly a decade since the Cakewalk division of Gibson was dissolved, its time to realize that the end of that company's lifetime was the end of the lifetime contract, just as it states in that contract, BTW.

I love the M-Tron Pro, but I haven't picked this one up yet. But mostly, I wanted to say, wow, you've really been posting the deals. You remain the undisputed forum champ, the ?. Thanks for making this forum the best of its kind.

Yep, those contracts always pertain to the life of the company you made the contract with, and they do specify that in the agreement. Always. But software companies that do lifetime deals are commonly not in good financial condition, they're mostly trying to raise cash fast when they can't get it from investors or banks.

They can't sell you anything because that company doesn't exist anymore. Bandlab is a different company that purchased SOME OF THE CAKEWALK ASSETS from Gibson.

It's critical to understand that while you see the trademarks, the software and website -- and that can certainly be confusing -- Bandlab never bought the company called Cakewalk which was owned by Gibson. Bandlab only purchased some of the assets -- the intellectual property -- that Gibson sold to them after Gibson dissolved Cakewalk. Bandlab believed those assets had value in the market, which was clearly publicly communicated. No companies that purchase assets in that manner take on the former company's debts and contracts, all of that was handled by Gibson and not part of the sale. Find examples of corporations that took on the financial obligations and contracts of a company where they merely purchased its assets after it was dissolved -- I can't think of a single one. Again, Cakewalk,no longer existed when Bandlab bought those assets from Gibson. Gibson merely sold off as much of the remains of Cakewalk -- in this case, intellectual property such as trademarks, the code for Cakewalk software, the website domain, copyrighted images, etc. IF Bandlab was acquiring the operational company Cakewalk then they would assume its debts and obligations. That's what I think is confusing people who aren't knowledgable on business. It's not the same as purchasing an operating business and assuming their debts and obligations. It definitely would have been easier for most people to understand if Bandlab completely reskinned and modified the former Cakewalk products and didn't use Cakewalk trademarks and the Cakewalk.com domain, but Bandlab saw value in Cakewalk products, its brands/trademarks, it's copyrighted images, etc. I wish people that blaming Bandlab for what happened with a completely different company owned and dissolved by Gibson is not Bandlab's legal or moral responsibility -- Bandlab has absolutely zero ethical responsibility or obligation to consumers who bought a too good to be true offer from Cakewalk, a company they didn't own or buy. The anger is completely misdirected. Hey, I bought Project 5 from the Cakewalk (the actual company) and I believe I even bought some training materials on the software (a book and video training) shortly before they shut the product down. All of my money, time, and energy spent on Project 5 was wasted; it was a dead end. Am I demanding restitution? No. The company that sold it to me -- Cakewalk -- was having financial difficulty and made a decision to cut the product shortly after I purchased it. You could call it bad luck on my part, and I was certainly not happy about it. But stuff like that happens. That's how business / capitalism works. Sometimes products fail or get pulled from the market, sometimes companies we own products from go out of business and it isn't what we hoped for. But whenever anyone buys a "lifetime license" they're buying it for the lifetime of that company, not the buyer's own lifetime, and it doesn't transfer if the company is dissolved and another company buys their assets. It likely wouldn't even be valid if another company purchased the operational Cakewalk, as those kind of offers usually don't allow for that. On a related note, software companies doing lifetime deals are usually not companies in great financial condition. It's a practice usually done when a company is having difficulty having regular sales to generate sufficient revenue and is unable to raise funds from investors or banks, so it keeps them operational. In other words, when a company offers a lifetime deal -- which is not a sustainable business model for nearly any software company, especially for a flagship product -- it is often seen, correctly, as a red flag that the company may not be in very good financial condition. Small upstart software companies that have trouble getting funding will use this model, but the percentage of them that go bankrupt within a few years after that is pretty high.

Yes. There have been users who've posted in this forum about using Evolution with MIDI guitar. If I didn't have tendinitis that makes playing the guitar painful -- also, if I didn't suck at playing guitar! -- I would absolutely be using a guitar MIDI controller with Evolution guitar and bass libraries. You should reach out to Orange Tree Samples to find out more. It sounds like it might be a much more enjoyable way for you to record your guitar parts.

Yeah, last time I explained something taught in HS business class, a different forum member took his already misplaced venom towards Bandlab and turned it on me. But I'll try again. Bandlab purchased some of the intellectual property assets of the dissolved Cakewalk business, that's all. They didn't take over the business. It was no longer operational when Gibson sold off its asssets. As a very simple analogy, it's like an auto mechanic goes out of business and sells off his tools. The mechanic who purchases his tools doesn't inherent his agreements, contracts, and debt obligations. I realize that for those without a business background that this can be pretty confusing. I think the fact that Bandlab is using the same product names makes it all the more confusing for these folks. They mistakenly think it's the same as a company buying another company, which could entail assuming their obligations, but Bandlab only bought the assets of Cakewalk after the company was dissolved.

I had MNTRA for a year where the plugin had tons of problems and the developer was clearly overwhelmed, but always seemed like a decent guy who genuinely cares about customers. In the past several months the problems I had have all been resolved and everything is running smoothly, yet I've never found a fit for it in any of my projects. It's one of those plugins that's fun to play around with, but never gets put to use in any projects. I imagine, for those doing cinematic, gaming, or trailer music this would probably find some use. I do think it can sound pretty cool. But to those who haven't tried MNTRA and remembered or come across old threads where lots of people reported problems with the plugin, I think it's all been resolved by now and this developer is worth giving a try, especially if you like the sound of the demos. I think the current version of the plugin is fine.

I think, they use a small pool of samples plus physical modeling. Orange Tree Samples uses samples plus physical modeling, but they're modeling picking and not the overall tone of guitars and basses, so they still primarily use samples. By comparison, IK has MODO bass and a modeled drum plugin that are primarily using physical modeling, however the drum plugin uses samples for the cymbals, whereas, I don't think the bass plugin uses any samples. And both sound really good. I still find sample libraries sound more realistic, but I am impressed with how good these two plugins sound.

Sorry, I really wasn't clear on that remark I edited my earlier post). I meant that out of indie software developers with a sampler player platform that is open to other developers (not just for the sample developers' own libraries) -- which includes plugins like Rhapsody, Elemtntal, and sforzando, -- I don't see any other company with the level of investment or staff that 8Dio is making with SoundPaint. They're just starting to bring other developers on board, as you can see. Musio. MNDALA, Spitfire's various lines, Orchestra Tools' Sine Player, VSL, and many others are currently actively working on their proprietary closed to third party sample developers, which if you looked at that universe, there's easily a few dozen players. I'm not aware of any of these developers having announced that they're going to open their platform to other sample developers. But, based on what some of our regulars are posting here, it does appear that Cinesamples is committed to their proprietary player for their own sample libraries, which is cool and hopefully, if they keep improving it, it can motivate other competitors to do the same with their proprietary players. I also wasn't looking at players like HALion, UVI or Melda, whose players are open to third party sample developers, but these companies are software companies as opposed to a sample development firm that's making a sample player open to third party sample developers.

If you don't get an answer here, check them out on Discord. I don't own this library, but I am a fan of SoundPaint (I've also consulted to them, to be transparent, but that was long after I became a customer of 8Dio and SoundPaint and owned more than 2 dozen of their libraries at that point). As a sample user, I really appreciate that Troels is pretty involved on the Discord server. It's really easy to give your input there and I do find he listens in my experience there and one on one conversations and he's not just a musician, he has a PhD in AI, so he gets really deep on the software end and is very committed to making the product the best he can get it. I think you, @kitekrazy should join the community and give your input. Kitekrazy has brought up that he'd like to see smaller file size versions of more of their larger libraries. They do offer smaller versions of some libraries, but I think it would be useful to offer smaller files for any libraries that cross a certain size, say 10GB. I share this kind of advice as a consultant, but it's far more valuable coming from a bunch of customers. And my experience is. Troels and Tawnia (the co-founders) would welcome and appreciate customers input to make their products more useful to them. As someone whose spent most of his career working for and with tech companies I find it very exciting when an indie developer thinks outside of the box and is open to outside ideas. Considering how new SoundPaint is and 8Dio's investment in the platform, I think it's a pretty exciting time to provide input. I'm not aware of any indie developer so actively committed the development of a multisample platform (EDIT: that is open to third party developers, as opposed to closed/proprietary sampler plugins only for that developer's own libraries). I also don't know of one that's been as easy to learn and use at a deep level. I've been using Kontakt since the first version, but I don't know how to go as deep with it. But I love Kontakt's scripting capabilities, so I'm definitely not planning on leaving it. But I can do things with SoundPaint that I can't do with Kontakt, plus the SP libraries are excellent quality for far less cost than Kontakt libraries, but for me, the scripting in certain Kontakt libraries (like Evolution guitars and some solo string libraries) remains very important to me for certain types of sampled instruments because I play everything in real time.

I don't need another viola library, and I'm trying and succeeding at cutting my DAW related spending this year, but the sound of the viola in the demos sounds exquisite to my ears. I'd be interested in hearing from his customers on how well put together and scripted this and other Bunker Samples libraries are.

I totally agree with you, Larry. They're constantly running them to the point where $29/$39 US (plus the WUP you only pay with Waves, not competitors; I'd prefer paying more upfront) is the true regular price for Waves plugins.