Brian Walton

"pre-order" Wondering if it will be release and still relevant. Price is awfuly steap.

Interesting, is this based on having experience with the beta 2 for scaler as well or just on previous versions? Would certainly be curious where you find chord prism to be a better option.

It will be a paid upgrade unless you buy it within this window from all reports I've read. There is already another thread on this in the deals section. I'll be surprised if anyone recommends ChordPrism over Scaler 2.

No DAW is world class at this Soundforge is the gold standard. This isn't to say something isn't better, but if you have the Pro version (and since it was upgraded to 64 bit), realistically it is highly unlikely you would need anything else. Goldwave is fine, but looks horrific. The annoying part of all of these is lack of real smooth integration in Cakewalk.

Yes, and I was only aware of one big price drop when it was out. Honestly I'd expect Scaler 2 to have an up-tick in price. I can't predict the future, but I'd personally expect $49 to be the new discounted price (when it does go on sale) for Scaler 2. Who knows though. I wouldn't say this about many programs, but seems like $49 is a reasonable price. With Scaler 1 going on sale for $29 last year, hopeful for a $20 upgrade cost.

I'd rather die than pay that much for a reverb that isn't a pedal or rack mount unit. (considering the other options on the market)

For free, I was a champion of Breverb, but Phoenix blows it out of the water for natual - not there kind of algo reverb (not a fan of the single ilok policy - so had to buy 2). Great that Breverb can be used on any project/machine though.

I love Reverb, but honestly just a few are really all I need. Phoenix XenoVerb Arturia Plate (was using WAVES Abbey Road, but so CPU hungry that I more or less gave up on it) NI - Replica and Raum Hyperspace CM Overloud Remaxtix for Convolution Even with that I feel like I don't really need the others I have

Which if the other statements made about upgrade pricing hold true, seems like the upgrade will be pretty reasonable. I was expecting a bump in price for the product overall, but this grace period suggests a timeframe where you can actaully order the thing for $49.

The "TV" as a monitor problem has nothing to do with a 4K card to drive it. just trust the articles and stay away from them as an option. Too much glare, reflections, flicker, etc. They are fine if you are going to spend an hour a day in front of it, but if you are using it for long session and on a regular basis, they are painful to look at in that setting with computer type of content (ie. not watching video)

Out of the two I'd keep the Dell. Wouldn't even consider the Samsung. That being said, neither would be my choice.

It is actual reality. My experience and you can look up the fact I wasn't the only one. WAVES flat out refused to help unless an upgrade to v10 or 11 was made. I followed the directions to a "t" and I have managed a large fleet of computers and IT professionals, I'm not exactly a novice in the area of software deployment. v10 are running fine on my machines right now, but v9 are still dead in the water and I have no inteniton on upgrading them. The OP wanted real world advice, and I'm not going to sit by and blindly say it is all perfect on the WAVES front. Example other user had to pay $200 to get them to work,a and others note issues as well: http://forum.cakewalk.com/Waves-plugin-issues-SOLVED-m3765828.aspx https://www.kvraudio.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=515929 They also have one of the poorest liscencing terms in the business. One single install per purchase.

I have over 20 WAVES plugins. They should in theory work. However, what version of the one WAVES plugin do you have? If it isn't 10 or 11, I would be somewhat concerned that it will not work after you buy new plugins that are v11. And WAVES won't support you on that plugin unless you pay for the WUP which will probably cost about as much as buying it on sale. This isn't conjecture, this is from experience, where I have v9 plugins that literally no longer work (and I am well above average when it comes to computers, it is part of my full time job). If you buy v11s now, I would expect those to continue to work for 3-5 years as long as you do not try to install Waves Central again, or purchase more plugins by them. If you do, then all bets are off, as WAVES central Updates have historically been problematic. The VST standards changing are not your concern over that time frame, it is WAVE's own unreliable update and authorization process. I'd take a long hard look at what you are trying to get from WAVES and then consider alternative products. Omni Channel is one of the only ones I've found that is hard to find elsewhere for a reasonable sum. PSP Ininistrip being an obvious one, but far more expensive (and the authorization method not being world better thanks to iLok. They make good sounding plugins, but in my experience have been in the lowest end for reliability if you make changes to the system, and outside of the WUP (which is outrageous) they do not offer support even with their slogan of "your plugins should continue to work" for old versions. Yes, those VST standards haven't been broken, but the authorization and install method got jacked up when they rolled out new WAVES Central and new Versions.

All of their top tier programs are something special. I think I'd want Neutron Advanced as providing the most value to the average user. The potential gains there seem of a higher order than the improvements of Ozone Advanced over Elements. Of course if you are a Mastering Engineer, Ozone Advance would pay for itself at the $166 price.

It is actually quite powerful on its own. If they were not giving it away, it is a no-brainer purchase on sale. While the "re mixing" functions of the higher tier options are kind of mind blowing. Arguably that stuff should be handled by the mix in the first place (which most of us are likley the author of).

Yeah, sounds like your software and RAM then. 8 gigs of ram is bare bones considering Win10 can eat up almost 4 of that. Vegas and Hitfilm are not that efficient. One of my machines is a 3rd gen i3, with external graphics card adn 16 gigs of RAM. I can run 4 1080P multicams without much issue, at a medium bit rate. Of course I also have a better machine. But giving a point of reference using a 7+ year old computer. If you are doing a bunch of advanced color grading , etc that certainly can bog things down. On old machines sometimes you have to do the grade/effect part render that into something to actually edit on. 4K is also a nightmare from a processing standpoint...and yes, proxy is a must, which is super annoying. Only reason to do it in my mind is if the footage is required to be in that for submission to NexFlix or similar. 50MBPS is also a pretty high bit rate. Since most Blurays are going to be in the 30ish range (and literally max out at 40), the question also becomes does your camera offer a more modest bit rate, to help lessen the load? If hundreds of millions of dollar projects can release on 25-30MBPS , I'm a firm believer that working well above that isn't really necessary. If you have quality glass, it isn't going to really matter. And if the release format is Youtube Talking Heads, all the more true. It just gets annoying seeing the work get dumbed down so low anyway.

Your problem likley lies with your Graphics Card and the Software you are using for editing and has nothing to do with your computer processor (unless you don't have an external GPU and that would be the mistake right there). Or your machine is like 10+ years old (or has a pathetic amount of RAM)

Not sure, but requires ilok and is only $10 at Plugin Boutique, so not exact an earth shattering deal at $1.

8- track version of the software Complete waste of time with Bandlab being free. ? I've never found much value out of the article format. The plugins that are bundled are excellent though.

I'm tempted to try to get the White, because that is one I missed. However, it did say it is a limited time deal....the question is if it is being enforced.

Yes, though even as a beginner with Cakewalk I jumped in with Sonar 2XL Producer. It wasn't until the Sonar X series that I downloaded the really stripped down versions to see what they were like. Realistically those looked like the exact same program just with fewer options and add-ins. A beginner can use Cakewalk Bandlab, but it doesn't really offer much in the way of easy music creation, it assumes you know about Music Theory - or dependent on drag and drop audio files/midi files to try to create something, or treat it like a digital tape machine where you actually know how to play an instrument. It seems the shift these days of what a "beginner" means in music production is a complete lack of knowledge of music (chords, notes, etc), and with that trend to cater to these individuals there are tools that can effectively reduce the need for some of that knowledge. I don't think Cakewalk needs a stripped down version, it just could use a few added tools to better cater to such individuals. Think built in chord track, EZ Keys, and Scaler.

All those are basically in the free instruments thread here and then some. Why it took you 6 months to find such a thread here.....that is a different question. We don't need bloatware with Cakewalk when such free options exist. Cakewalk isn't designed like an app on your phone for beginners. It is a professional grade tool to record and produce music. I agree it could use some improvements to make things easier for a beginner...but that isn't related to the instruments included. Things like a Chord Track are what Cakewalk could benefit from. Cake does come bundled with enough instruments to make music with. Most of which never get used by someone that does some research to grab better quality free ones.

Please tell me which player other than Kontakt plays Kontakt files. A definition of proprietary might be needed here.

Nice, that should handle just about anything....the qeustion as it seems you have found is it a time killer for actual productions becuase it has "so " much control. When I was looking at it for use, I thought this would be fun to play with, but just too much for day to day use.

Which one, they have like 6 reverb plugins, and all their plguins have complicated features? ?