PavlovsCat

Only after googling the problem of presets not showing up in my PA plugins did a come across a thread by @Starship Krupa that explained that the problem is actually due to Cakewalk by Bandlab. I imagine that there's no solution to getting presets on PA plugins to show up since you made that post, Erik? I had wondered what the problem was for a long time before seeing your posts. So thank you for that post.

I haven't. I tried the fix stated earlier in this thread, but it didn't work. So I put in a support ticket with NI. That said, it's no big hurry, the e-vouchers are only for use on products that are not on sale.

@User 905133We'll just have to agree to disagree. But instead of writing long missives telling me how I'm wrong for using my past experience with his flagship synth and the condition of his website to assess that his other plugins PROBABLY aren't exceptional; wouldn't it make more sense for you to download some of his plugins and share your thoughts? I have in the past. I was just sharing my experience, my thoughts and entertaining the possibility that there might be some gem there that I missed. Your posts are merely critiques of my posts. I clearly stated that it's not impossible that this developer has some decent plugins and asked anyone to share if they found that to be the case. Based on my experience, the developer's website and the feedback comments from people in this thread who have tried his plugins -- like MrFigg who has made multiple posts sharing how he was unhappy with the plugins and has been attempting to remove them from his PC -- the signs don't point in a positive direction. And, no, to answer your remark, I didn't contact the developer to inform him I wasn't impressed with his Infinity synth and offer him unsolicited advice for improvements as you suggested and the vast majority of people wouldn't do that either -- as unsolicited, highly critical advice is often not well received. Like most people who download and install a free plugin they didn't find to their satisfaction, I simply deleted the plugin, as others in this thread have shared they've done. Anyhow, you and I just see things differently. We can move on. It's no big deal. You've made your point that you disagree with me a number of times. I think we're all clear on that.

Dubious? I downloaded Infinity years ago and it was poorly designed and less than mediocre sound-wise (of course, that's subjective). You used a strawman argument to make it appear I made a point I never made. I never asserted or implied a well designed website is a sign of a high quality developer as you stated. My point was that a poorly designed website with coding (it is terrible on a mobile phone, as someone pointed out; the site clearly doesn't use a responsive design), design, usability and user experience issues is a piece of software that doesn't reflect a high quality software developer and I've worked with dozens of them over the years, from small ones to managing areas including development myself. A website is a piece of software. If a developer's site has problems on mobile and was clearly coded to a standard that is more than a decade past (pre mobile), that's a red flag, IMO. It speaks to quality standards, knowledge of usability and user experience led design. [REFERENCE: https://validator.w3.org/nu/?doc=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.stagecraftsoftware.com%2F] Of course, as I made clear, it doesn't make it certain the developer doesn't have skills. It just makes the probability of the developer not having high standards in their product software development much more likely than if they had a well designed and up to date well-coded website. You can feel free to disagree, of course. I'm just stating my thoughts. But I never stated I thought it was certain that the developer doesn't have some decent plugins. I'm saying that there are a lot of signs that reflect poor quality and poor judgment. That's all. You can download his plugins and report back and if you find something truly good, I'd be open to checking it out.

I'm just going to be super candid. RED FLAG #1 The website design looks like it was done by a hobbyist in the 90s. It isn't well coded or mobile-friendly. Consider that this is a software developer and the website is also software. It doesn't send a message that reflects this developer is serious about usability or user experience -- or stated another way, about how his products (in this case, the website) work. Is it functional? Yes, to an extent and in certain conditions (it doesn't contain audio to provide examples and is difficult to view on a mobile phone). It looks like the site of a hobbyist who is unlikely to know about properly testing an app or anything about user experience design or even beta testing. A stock template based WordPress site, which a lot of developers and small retailers use in this business. But the lack of discernment by the developer sends up a red flag for me, especially after my experience downloading their flagship synth, Infinity, and finding it to be less than stellar. RED FLAG #2 It's 2023. What plugin developer of audio plugins tries to sell their audio and effects plugins without featuring audio demos on the product pages? That's an odd omission. RED FLAG #3 I searched for videos on YouTube about their drum plugin, not a single video came up. This developer might be talented at coding plugins, he might be a wonderful person, but all signs point to his output presented on this site as not being up to fundamental professional standards -- at least in terms of user interfaces and usability-- for even a small developer. There's plenty of free stuff that covers this same ground as what this dev is selling that's really good. Years ago I downloaded Infinity synth when it was free and deleted it shortly thereafter. Everything-- from my past experience (with Infinity) to the website design from 1996, communicates that this is not worth our time. If anyone here who has tried any of these plugins has found them to be high quality and worthy of recommendation, please chime in. But so far, the posts in this thread appear to confirm what I'm sure most of us suspect.

Okay, the other plugin on sales that has my attention, after watching the below video, is theAcme Opticom XLA-3 compressor. Any opinions on it? The compressor sounds especially good on the electric bass in this mix. Granted, it adds a ton of color, but it sounds very good for a rock bass, IMO.

I actually haven't picked a UAD plugin up yet. But I love seeing their plugin (now native -- at least the ones I've paid attention to) prices come down so significantly, at least for sales. As we've all been noticing, lot of the once very high priced plugin brands have become more accessible recently. I'm looking at you to join them, FabFilter! (A couple of my friends who know A LOT MORE than I do about mixing and mastering are always telling me to buy FabFilter stuff, but considering the quality of my playing and audience of a handful of family and friends, I think I'm best off with a more modest spending limit). In the meantime, this month has been like Black Friday in May with big sales from NI, United Plugins, Plugin Alliance, etc.

Fleer is one of my forum favs, but I do think that a tarring and feathering is warranted for this one.

I purchased KOMPLETE UPDATE (the standard version) from Best Service a little while ago and the serial was sent out to me immediately. When I plugged the serial it in Native Access I needed to do a refresh and everything was there. I own a lot of Izotope plugins, but the mixing and mastering plugins I own are the version before the current one, so KOMPLETE UPDATE moved me up to the latest version of Ozone Standard. I have no idea if that will end up showing up in my Izotope list of products at their site and in their app, but it currently does not show up in either. But it installed fine. As far as KONTAKT 7, I have been told from some KONTAKT sample developers that there are significant advances NI made from KONTAKT 6 from their perspectives, so it is a worthwhile purchase. There are some simple end user changes that I like too, like the ability to create a starred lists of your favorite presets, just like you can do with a lot of synths for your favorite patches.

I was contemplating Noveltech's Vocal Enhancer or Character. Both have been around for more than a decade and have good reviews -- from around a decade ago. I was wondering if anyone here owns it and has opinions on it. Thanks in advance. Here's a review of it from Sound on Sound: https://www.soundonsound.com/reviews/noveltech-character-vocal-enhancer-native A "review" from an influencer: https://www.pro-tools-expert.com/home-page/2013/2/16/noveltech-vocal-enhancer-video-review.html

Historically, the e-vouchers have only been for use on non-sale items from NI, so they're really only useful when you want to buy something when there isn't a sale on it. I've given away more e-vouchers to other forum members than I've used. The one that interests me is the Plugin Alliance voucher. In any event, I wouldn't rush to any conclusions that NI or a retailer is dishonest. There's no need to start defaming them on the forum. Instead, reach out to them and attempt to resolve things before going off half baked in forums. I feel confident that they'll make things right, based on my past experience with NI and the mentioned retailers.

@Fleer I did a bunch of searches for YouTube videos of this library in the past, but most end up with results for Emergence Audio's Cello Textures. I was curious how playable the patches are? Do you see it mainly as a really abstract library that one would use for cinematic scoring or might you imagine using it in a piece with acoustic piano? At 14 bucks, it's very tempting. Thanks for the insights. It seems that you already own most of the libraries and plugins that interest me!

I remember downloading their Infinity synth as a freebie several years ago and finding it meh and deleting it. Is there anything of theirs that anyone here would recommend?

I have their 145B (Wurlitzer electric piano) and absolutely love it.

I think we're in need of one of cclarry's SSD deals.

I picked up the free version years ago and really liked it, as I recall. For some reason, no doubt, because I own so many drum libraries (hey, I used to play drums professionally, so I love the sound of good drums), I completely forgot about it. But this library is really nice and the capabilities in KONTAKT are really thorough. In addition to what I consider the musts for an acoustic drum library, like the ability to mix each drum, adjust overhead mics ... it includes actual recordings of different turnings of, at least the snares (from memory, I think each snare has 3 different tunings) and something I found a really nice surprise-- it has a built-in transient designer, plus it's set up to work with my Roland V-Drums. Yep, at $29.99 USD, it's a no-brainer, IMO. I strongly recommend people who own the full version of KONTAKT use the link Fleer shared (the full version works with the free KONTAKT PLAYER. The only question I have is, isn't APD the shop that often sends out an email with an extra $5 USD -- or something like that -- off of their sale price after an item has been on sale for a while?

Great to see. A bunch of us have been waiting for this sale.

Hopefully, but my guess is no as Ujam was just doing a sale with Plugin Boutique for the original Amber for $19 that they pulled as soon as they released V2 and PB replaced that offer with an upgrade offer for owners of V1 for $49 USD. So, even if you bought it the day before release, they're pitching the upgrade for $49 USD. https://www.pluginboutique.com/product/1-Instruments/64-Virtual-Instrument/10599-AMBER-2-Upgrade-from-AMBER-1

Audio Baby, to be consistent.

I have several lofi plugins. MELLO-FI and the XLN RC-20 are among my favorites. Highly recommended and a complete no-brainer as a freebie.

I haven't picked up a Computer Music in a bit. I think I may bite on this deal. I think their publication is often an enjoyable read and the freebies are a fun little extra.

And most of us are using plugins to get things to sound as if they were recorded on tape. Progress! But it has made it a lot more challenging to sell your music through live shows., I too miss the days of musicians able to sell records , tapes and CDs at shows and cool mom and pop record stores. I performed back in those days.

It's surprising that they've kept making CDs for this long considering that the CD market greatly declined years ago. As someone noted, unless you're targeting your music to an audience that is 40+ years old CDs really aren't likely to move. There are a good deal of Gen Z'ers now as old as their early 20s that have never even owned a music CD. I put myself through college playing drums and handling the printing of posters and CD inserts for indie record labels if I really want to age myself (one of those bands was named Nirvana)!

Eventide EChannel channel strip plugin for Mac & Win, is 70% off - $29 (reg. $99) - until May 31st at DontCrack. https://store.dontcrack.com/product_info.php?products_id=4333 I noticed that it's on sale for the same price at other retailers. Several of their other plugins are also on sale, including Ultra Channel for $49 USD at Plugin Fox: https://pluginfox.com/search?type=product&q=Eventide

I'm in love with cellos, so I'm interested every time a new library enters the market. The demos sound nice, but,, just based on the demos, IMO, it doesn't sound in the same league as the best solo cellos on the market (Tina Guo, Bohemian Cello, Sonixinema, Chris Hein...).