TheMaartian

Holy cwapola. I had NO idea that those old downloads were retained. On my internal 1 GB SSD system drive. Freed up over 100 GB. Merci beaucoup, y'all!

That's why I'm watching the YT video on the new Morley stomps for AT5 as it's installing. The slowest part is the unpacking of the 2.8 GB distro file (.pak).

No one posted a link to it, so... GForce M-Tron Pro IV

[off topic] I love it here. But France is France. Mind-numbing bureaucracy and fabulous breads, pastries and cheeses. It took the Gironde Préfecture in Bordeaux 11 months to deliver my carte de séjour after my titre de séjour was approved. I've been here almost two years, and only now was I able to apply for the social security system (and then a carte Vitale; another 6-7 months total). That cost me another $2,000 for a traveler's health insurance policy for my titre de séjour renewal. And the excellent boulangeries, patisseries and fromageries cost me 5 cm. on the waistline and required new pants. But I live in the cœur du centre-ville, less than 300 meters from the beach. I bought a new Clio 17 months ago, and it doesn't have 4 000 km on it yet. And my dogs LOVE it, too. The average age here in Arcachon is 70 (except for July and August, when the population goes from 20 000 to 100 000), and almost everyone has a dog. My guys have lots of friends they see/sniff every day. Are you currently in S.A. or Barbados? [/off topic]

Hi, Nigel. I hate it when upgrades default to some new feature and make it non-intuitive to return to the previous version's look and feel. The standalone version takes some time to load. I need to spend more time with the options to see if there's a setting to disable rescanning the libraries on startup (I'm assuming that's the issue). Not sure why the standalone version isn't opening for you, but maybe after doing the following, it will. To get the v6 UI back, and get access to your non-player libraries, open Kontakt in a VST host (Studio One, Cakewalk, Gig Performer, etc). Then click on the gear icon (1), select the "Loading" tab, and then set the "Non-Player Content Base Path" to the correct folder. Then click on the right-most icon (2) once to toggle away from the v7 browser and back to the v6 UI. Then click on the "Files" tab (3) to display the base path you selected, with all of the instrument folders shown in the panel below it. Then try opening the standalone again. Concerning Komplete v14, I bought v9 Ultimate way back. I paid for the Kontakt upgrades from v5 to v6, and v6 to v7, and the Guitar Rig upgrade from v5 to v6. I am perfectly happy with the other VIs from Komplete v9, none of which have seen major upgrades that I'm interested in. And all of the new content in v14 is of little to no interest to me. I've never felt compelled to upgrade Komplete, just the bits and pieces I use. And v14 no longer includes Absynth 5, which is criminal IMO, so I purchased the Absynth 5 dev's new Plasmonic synth (at Rhizomatic). I'll include the dev's statement below.

McAfee and Norton are both intrusive resource hogs. Back in the DOS v3 pre-Windows days, the Norton utilities were essential, but then Symantec bought them and that was the end of a great product. But McAfeer? You've got a virus, pure and simple. You need to clean your system before you do anything else.

It's been on version 1.2.5 for many years. You may find it useful, but it'll never see another update.

Who is "they"? PA or Deskew? Deskew only charges for major version updates, and that's only every couple of years. They had ZERO control over PA's pricing and discounting of Gig Performer.

I can tell you for a fact that Deskew agrees with you 100%. I'm not in a position to share the specifics, but Deskew took it in the shorts.

Everyone is entitled to their own opinion. I will not say that any of the sentiments mentioned in the previous posts are wrong, but I will say that I don't agree with them. I have been a regular user of the unlocked Windows version of Gig Performer since early v2, and an active member of their support forum. Deskew isn't a big company. It's a couple of guys who came from IBM Research who happened to be musicians who needed/wanted a better product for hosting instrument and effects VSTs for live use. Gig Performer is the result. Back when I had to work for a living, I spent over 15 years doing active software development. I also qualified and certified third party software for use in the oil and gas, and SCADA industries. In my opinion, Deskew provides the most responsive and most useful support of any software developer I've every dealt with, going back to the late '70s and my use of DEC PDP-8 minis at Fermilab (octal assembly language with a three-pass paper tape assembler). I remember when the PA-locked version of GP was released. Deskew had to modify GP to lock it to PA's plugins. From the beginning, Deskew made it clear that the PA version would not be updated with every point release (vX.x.x), but from time to time with a dot release. (vX.x). Working on GP and occasionally touring is all they do. The income from GP pays their bills. I have ZERO issues with paying a fair price for such a useful, high quality product. I can tell you that the amount of new functionality that comes with each new release of the full version is astonishing, and they only charge for upgrades when moving to a new major version (vX to vX+1), and that only happens every couple of years (like Studio One). All of that new functionality is driven by their existing user base on their very active support forum. If their requested upgrade pricing from the PA-locked version to the full unlocked version is not worth it to you, cool. But don't complain about it. It's their product and they have a right to price it any way they want. Personally, I have received WAY more value from GP than what I've paid over the years. GP and Studio One are my two main music apps, and I don't see that changing any time soon. Peace, love and understanding.

Fizzy Pickle are baaaaaaack! I like the sparse arrangement. Always excellent vocals from the Mrs. Fun bass line by Bapu. Really nice mix. Is there a cartoon-based YT video coming? ? On a side note: I run a Chrome plugin that disables HTML5 autoplay. It turns out that Soundcloud has one of the audio/video players that won't run if autoplay is not disabled for the site. Even clicking on the play arrow only gives you infinite buffering attempts. It never plays. Once autoplay is disabled, it works great. Just an FYI FWIW.

Not too bad for an activation process. It installed in the proper directories (not using the old Steinberg/VSTPlugins folder for the VST2 version) and allowed the AAX version to not install. I had to create an account the first time I instantiated Frontier, and then had to activate the account via the email they sent, and then back to the activation dialog of the plugin. I'm willing to accept that process without complaining, for what looks like a useful freebie. Here's an old, but useful video for first time users like myself. Note that the version in the video has been updated to add a L/R Control Input setting. Not sure what functionality that adds. Anyone?

I get that, but it's their statement that "or will do it in the future" that concerns me. Do I need to commit to buying one of their paid plugins to keep the Frontier license active? Maybe that's not such a bad thing IF I have a need for one of the others. This limiter looks worth trying out. I normally use TDR's Limiter 6 GE, which I like a lot.

Still not worth it. A new license for Acon Digital's Acoustica Premium Edition, which includes their Restoration Suite and Mastering Suite, costs the same (199 €, VAT included). I bought it years ago and preferred it by a wide margin to Samplitude v6. So much so, that I uninstalled Samplitude and never looked back. It also now supports ARA2. Acoustica Premium Edition

From their website: Frontier is available only for registered D16 software users, who have purchased any product in the past or will do it in the future. It is available free of charge. So, not exactly free.

Will those of us who bought lifetime SPlat licenses get the new Sonar for free? j/k Holding my breath for that would kill me.

No need. Great comment. Leave it. ?

The world lost another great voice yesterday, 5 June. Astrud Gilberto passed away at 83. Here, with the great Stan Getz, who was instrumental in bringing Brazilian bossa nova to American jazz. Here's my favorite version of the song.

I have been wanting a Moog Taurus VI for the longest time. Loved the sound since the first time I saw Geddy use one on stage. It really brings the low end. I snapped this deal up. Cherry Audio did an excellent job with their emulation. I love not having to deal with samples. Super easy to do a keyboard split and route the lowest octave to Lowdown. ??

NOTE: Plasmonic was developed by the dev who developed the beloved Absynth 5 from Native Instruments. This is his new product since NI stupidly dumped Absynth 5. It's an excellent synth.

I can't tell you which companies REQUIRE deactivation, but I would suggest deactivating ALL of them. Some companies have a maximum number of authorizations. If you don't deactivate those first, you will use up another authorization (assuming that you have a spare one left). I would deactivate ALL plugins that use iLok soft licensing (to the machine; an iLok dongle (never reliable for me) or iLok cloud (not me, ever) will just move to the new machine). Most importantly, make sure that you have ALL of the distribution files for your plugins. I went through this recently when I switched from a desktop to a laptop before moving to France (230V) from the U.S. (120V). I got everything (DAWs and plugins) up and running before I dumped the desktop.

Good tip! Thanks.

I bought v9 Ultimate many years ago, and haven't upgraded it since. I paid for Kontakt v6 and v7 upgrades and the Guitar Rig v6 upgrade. I haven't even installed a lot of the sampled instruments (like the drums) that came with v9, just the basses and the horns.

Lest we forget, she was also awesome as Aunty Entity!

When was the last time you saw a new laptop being sold with an optical drive? Most Gen Zers have no optical drive, therefore no CDs/DVDs/Blu-rays. Give a young'en a device with a non-touch screen and watch the fun begin! ?