PavlovsCat

I own it to and agree with your take.

@better5150 Does Bandlab have plans to deactivate the newly released/final version of Cakewalk By Bandlab after a certain period of time? For example, Bandlab gives a certain window of time say 6 months or a year after the final release it will be de-activated, as the company has shifted to Sonar. Or will the final version of Cakewalk by Bandlab work for as long as the user has it on their system (of course, realizing that it will no longer have updates, so it may cease to work at some point, but Bandlab will not intentionally take action to stop it from working).

I just submitted a report to the developer and I'm wondering if others have experienced similar issues. The plugin emits bursts of white noise in response to an effect I had on a vocal and it also silences some low vocal notes, I suppose mistaking them for noise (I'm not a very good singer, but my pitch isn't that far off and this was after using Melodyne to make tweaks). Anyhow, while I sent the dev my report, I'm curious if others have experienced issues like this, because otherwise. It's a really great tool. But given these issues, I have one project where I simply can't use it because there's no way around these problems.

If CbB moves to a subscription, I'll give it a shot. I bought Studio One Pro 3 back when it looked like Cakewalk was closing up. But I've only used it for a few projects I started and abandoned. @Fleer It's the thing -- along with money-- that inspires salespeople to become faux reviewers telling the world how they're giving a completely unbiased review for that plugin/sample library you must get -- and use their affiliate link to buy. And yes, I've facilitated some of that stuff, but as you can easily see, I have a good degree of discomfort for the disingenuous nature of influencers. But in this case, someone who writes a script/program to convert Bandlab by Cakewalk projects to Studio One's format can help the Studio One folks convert more CbB users for the price of giving the developer a free license. There's potentially amazing ROI in that. But yeah, someone's going to rip on me for talking marketing here! It's my day job.

It is people like @JoeGBradford that make me appreciate this forum. While every forum has bad actors (and a few of them really seem to love to hate on me -- in posts and PMs, largely following my making a post asking people not to violate forum policy and make political and posts hostile/intolerant to minority groups as they were doing), there is a relatively small percentage of them in this forum compared to others. Overall, this group has a really friendly and helpful vibe. It's why this is my main music forum and likely why even those who don't use CbB are here. Kudos, Joe! I always enjoy seeing your posts.

That is what I gathered from researching it. Darn. I easily have three dozen projects I'll want to transfer if I switch to Studio One Pro. Thinking out loud, but I kinda want to propose to their top marketing exec to give the guy you mentioned a NFR license if he promises to make the conversion tool for CbB to Pro Studio One.

Wait, this makes me wonder if Bandlab, at some future point, will make CbB 2023.09 cease to activate in the future. I really hope they make their announcement on the new pricing soon, as if they move to a subscription model, I'll be moving to Studio One 5 Pro and I have a lot of finished and unfinished projects in CbB that will need to be converted. I've yet to attempt to convert projects from CbB to Studio One, but it appears it will be a lot of work. I'd love to hear from people who've successfully converted CbB projects to Studio One and any advice they may have, as I want to do this ASAP if Bandlab moves to subscriptions only.

I love all of the freebies that Project Sam puts out, it's really just a blast to play with these libraries. But with my branding and marketing hat on, I have say that recently announcing "The Free Orchestra Version 2.0" on their website (which is for The Free Orchestra first version) stating that it now features 2 new instruments while they also announced the upcoming "The Free Orchestra 2" was kind of comically confusing. Excellent developer, less excellent at naming products and clear communications. Fortunately, today the Project Sam folks removed the big headline for The Free Orchestra (1) version 2.0 update on that library's landing page and added a separate page for the Free Orchestra 2. But I'd suggest there would be significantly less confusion if they simply used one page that quickly conveyed that these are two separate collections of sample libraries. So, anyone who saw the site last night and was confused by it, just think of it this way: there are two different Free Orchestras, 1 and 2. The Free Orchestra 1 is apparently on version 2, but let's leave it "has recently been updated with two additional libraries " as they now present it.

Okay. That doesn't seem problematic to me (FTR, I am not dismissing your personal discomfort with it; I respect that we may see things differently) and the $29 USD price is better than I expected. I'll be buying it. The tool hasn't been perfect. It got fooled and took out my vocal on a breathy low note, but overall, it's pretty impressive and super easy to use. Also note this (the emphasis is my own): "Can GOYO be used offline? While GOYO Beta currently requires an internet connection for usage, we acknowledge the importance of an offline workflow for many of our users. Therefore, we are actively developing an offline activation process for the official release. Why does GOYO require an internet connection? We mandate an internet connection for several reasons. This includes safeguarding against unauthorized copying or tampering of our plugin, as well as collecting essential information such as country or DAW usage to better understand our user base and address support issues. Does GOYO store my audio data? We do not retain any of your audio sample data." https://goyo.app/faq/

For $29, this is an easy yes. @Brian Walton can you be more specific about their exact policies that concerns you. FTR, I'm not arguing or dismissing yoir concerns, I'm just seeking to understand them better.

Project Sam's person who posts on VI Control just made an announcement that the developer is going to be releasing a new series of free sample libraries that will come out the last Thursday of every month for 12 months beginning tomorrow, August 31, 2023. For anyone who knows this developer, even their freebies are really nice. If you don't already have the totally free "The Free Orchestra 1" -- which works in the free KONTAKT Player -- you should pick it up. But be sure to check with them tomorrow to get their first library. From the developer: "The Free Orchestra 2 will be a new library, separate from The Free Orchestra 1. Every last Thursday of the month we will release a new instrument, starting August 31st. (Yes, that's in 1 week) Every newly released instrument can be downloaded as an update through Native Access. Once all the 12 instruments have been released, The Free Orchestra 2 is complete!" https://projectsam.com/

That discount code reminded me of this song from several years ago (my daughter was young and watched the show). I actually found this pretty amusing:

I find Ample Sounds guitar libraries to be superior to Impact Soundworks guitar libraries. I personally didn't find this, but an audio expert friend of mine told me that one of the Impact Soundworks Shreddage libraries contains a television on in the background if you turn up the volume on the individual samples. Dead serious. In any event, the developer and his employees engage in practices I do not believe are ethical, like his employees talking up Impact Soundworks on VI Control without mentioning they work for Impact Soundworks or attacking an Impact Soundworks competitor without specifying they work for a competitor -- and having their boss participate in the same thread. Consequently, I cannot, in good conscience recommend Impact Soundworks libraries or Impact Soundworks as a developer. Besides, Ample Sounds are superior guitar libraries to Impact Soundworks libraries. While they're not in the Kontakt format, they do come with a free player and it installed flawlessly on my machine and for many other users. I've always found the rep from Ample Sounds who posts in this forum to be a decent person (I don't know him, but he behaves as a very good community member -- a class act). IMO, the two sample developers who make the most advanced guitar libraries are Orange Tree Samples and Ample Sounds. I've disclosed it a bunch of times, but I've given consulting advice to around 3 dozen sample developers, including developers who make guitar sample libraries including Orange Tree Samples, Pettinhouse, 8Dio and others. I'm merely stating my personal opinion as a sample library user. For a free sample based guitar library, Ample Sounds is the best there is and the quality for their free guitar plugins is at a level that is beyond many other developers paid guitar libraries.

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This developer does sales almost as much as Waves. It's literally like a bi-weekly thing. Wasn't there a summer sale and now there's an end of summer sale, but I've probably forgotten about a mid-summer sale.

Oops! I accidentally made this post when trying to add some additional sample libraries to my original post. Oh well. For those who gave the original post a like, consider it a notification that I've added more libraries.

@ralfrobert Inspired by your request (I've had a number of people asking for me to create a KONTAKT freebie thread like the other one, but your request inspired me to finally do it) I created a thread of my top favorite / recommended free KONTAKT libraries.

Best FREE Kontakt Libraries - A Curated List of More Than 100 Reviewed and Recommended Free Sample Instruments for the Full Version of Kontakt and Kontakt Player (Updated June 2024) I am not in agreement the new policies and practices of BandLab, am moving away from their software. Consequently. I will not be participating in this forum moving forward and have removed this content from the Cakewalk Forum and will be providing it on my own site (launching mid August 2024; it's my user name with a dot com at the end) where I can regularly update it. You can PM me for information on the new location of this list.

Hey, if you think it will be helpful to you and possibly others, I'll start coming up with a list. Like the other one, I'll invite everyone else to give their takes and make their own lists of recommended freebies.

Yep. There's so many free sample libraries that are good quality. I've contemplated doing a KONTAKT freebie list, but it's a lot of work to compile and keep a list like that updated and the fact that there aren't sticky posts here makes it of questionable value (it disappears in a week). My objective with the list I made was to be helpful for people on a very tight budget who can't afford KONTAKT. But personally, KONTAKT is my go-to sampler. I rarely have a project that doesn't use KONTAKT.

Well, those are only freebies. But the pianos I recommend on that list are all far better than anything I've tried from Muse. For anyone tempted by this Muse deal who's on a tight budget, wait for the next SampleTekk sale and you'll get vastly superior piano sample libraries for cheap.

Nice developer that was very friendly in my interactions. I wouldn't consider the libraries I own from them to be comparable to the top tier KONTAKT developers, but they're decent quality. The business is based in Russia, so those who care, you want to be aware of that.

I agree with Doug. I've downloaded a few of their premium libraries that were given away and they were all far, far below average quality KONTAKT sample libraries. I recall very large file size sample libraries and finding, for example, a huge file size piano sample library had one or two velocity layers -- and it sounded like a free sound font library from the 90s. Some posters have stated that this developer has a history of using other developers' samples and has used several different names in the past. I don't know if any of that's true, but I do know that I found their sample libraries to be unnecessarily bloated, not up to the level I'd expect for a KONTAKT library, to the point it felt like trickery to confuse users that these are detailed sample libraries and they aren't. I would strongly recommend avoiding Muze. They are not a quality developer.

Free to install, then WUP for a lifetime! #WavesLife #WUPclub

While it doesn't compare RX10 with older versions, it spells out the exact functionality of each version so that you can clearly see if the product has your desired functionality or not.