bitflipper

Same here. The main limitation of Kontakt-based instruments is that you're restricted to the fx that NI have included with the sampler. For the most part, they're actually decent - at least for basic effects such as convolution reverb. But if you want a rotary effect or a believable amp sim or modulated delays they'll often fall short. Or require a lot of obtuse tweaking to get what you're after. That's why external fx are almost in my chain for sampled guitars. I actually don't have a big assortment of amp sims on hand, and have been meaning to add Scuffham S-Gear for years. But Guitar Rig will get me reasonably close as far as amplifier and speaker distortion, then it'll be sweetened with Valhalla Ubermod and/or Valhalla Delay, and sometimes D16's Redopter. A FET-style compressor usually ends up in the chain. Often lots of automation. I also like to use mismatched instrument/amp combinations, such as fat bluesy distortion on an acoustic guitars. OTS' lap steel and Slide Acoustic are favorites for this treatment, as are Indiginus' Delta Blues and The STEEL.

I just found out there's a top-5% subreddit (r/FedEx) that seems dedicated to complaints about FedEx, most of which are identical to mine. I seem to recall that Sweetwater's checkout page included an option to ship via UPS instead. Now I know why. Unfortunately, it looks like UPS is about to go on strike on August 1st. I'm sure FedEx will step up to take up the slack.

You so rarely hear Mr. Gibbons speak, it's almost a surprise when he turns out to be well-spoken and thoughtful.

All of my orchestral libraries work that way. One workaround is to stretch out the previous articulation to where you're currently restarting playback. As Mark noted above, Cakewalk will see that an articulation is in effect even though the starting event has passed and will correctly apply it - but it has to know there's an active articulation in play. If it automatically searched back for previous keyswitch events that could result in some screwy effects if the previous articulation was momentary (meaning only applied during the keyswitch note duration) rather than toggled.

Getting it ready for the gig as best I can without actually having the band present. Should be an interesting first set. Fortunately, our next performance is a one-off low-pressure venue - an afternoon gig, either in a warehouse or in a parking lot next to a busy highway. I'm kinda hoping it's the latter so we can recreate that scene in Nashville where the band's playing in the NASCAR infield during a race. Except it'll be a line of RVs on their way up to Stevens Pass. Think my 2.5:1 compression ratio will be too conservative?

Testing, testing, 1, 2, 3. Happy does not begin to describe my joy and relief. I'll still be carrying the old mixer around for awhile, until I'm confident in the new one. After all, it's basically a laptop with 24 XLRs on the back. Except with a laptop I'd stand a chance of troubleshooting it if it crapped out. If this one dies, it's off to Yokohama.

Doot, doot, doot, lookin' out my back door...and there it was, dumped by my basement door. A door we never use, that you can't even see from the driveway. He must have known I was gonna give him a coarse word or two and made a quick exit. Wonder what my "signature" looked like on his pad. I'm not complaining, though. It's here at last.

Makes sense. Gas is 50 cents cheaper up there than in my neighborhood. Or... the driver has a gambling problem and has to pass too many casinos on the way. There are several between there and here. Wonder what the payout is if you put a digital mixer on red and it hits.

Got excited for a minute when I heard a van pull up, but it was Amazon. They don't seem to have any problem finding my house, they've been here twice this week. But I'm optimistic. Tracker says it's on the truck for delivery. They wouldn't lie about that, would they?

Before this feature was implemented, it was common to get a little burst of reverb at the front of an exported file, which was a tail left over from the previous playthrough. My workaround back then was to start and stop playback three times before starting the export, saying "Penny" between each one. It took months to break that habit even after realizing I didn't have to do it anymore.

OK, then. That means I still have three tries remaining, since they haven't attempted to deliver it even once. I'd gladly go pick it up. Heck, I could have driven to Indiana and back by now. An appropriate malapropism!

Well, technically it would be Sweetwater who's owed compensation, since it was they who paid the freight. As mettelus says, it arrives when it arrives. It would have been nice to have it for the next gig, but the old workhorse analog console still works. So no harm done. Still pissed, though, because they blew me off and blamed it on me. Hey, isn't that defamation?

Looks like FedEx has lied to me again. The tracker has changed from "July 6 by end of day" to just "package delayed". C'mon, FedEx, I need to go to the grocery store. I've run out of food waiting on you.

My grandson ordered a gift for his sister two weeks ago. After three delays, his last notification was "your package may be lost". Which made me scratch my head in confusion, because I thought logistics are so sophisticated nowadays that surely an item's location is always known. What I hadn't considered was employee theft. But it makes sense; security guards, TSA agents and baggage handlers are major theft vectors. But I got good news just now - a different note was added to the tracking log today. For the first time, they've appended the phrase "by end of day" to the scheduled delivery date (today). They haven't been that specific before. Fingers crossed...having Sweetwater re-send the item is not an option in this case.

It's because of drugs. Specifically, a nasty chemical called varenicine, brand name Chantix or Champix. It's a stop-smoking aid. The idea is it binds to the same receptors as nicotine, thus depriving me of the dopamine hit and therefore sucking all the joy out of tobacco use. Unfortunately, it also has a long list of side effects, including insomnia. Also nausea, headaches and nightmares. I've experienced all of them except for the nightmares, which I'd gladly trade for a full night's sleep. Well, I guess not all of them. Haven't had a stroke or died.

Well, it's now the 6th. FedEx is confidently predicting a delivery will happen today. An hour ago the log was updated to simply say "package delayed". No duh. Last night I googled "FedEx customer not available". It returned a litany of complaints going back ten years. Apparently this is a long-established tactic to write off delays without affecting their official on-time histories. FedEx does have a complaint line, but anecdotally it seems it's nothing but a formality and resolutions are rare. I will, however, give it a try if the package doesn't arrive today. If it does come, you better believe I'll heft that package before I sign for it, to make sure they're not trying to hand me an empty box.

I wish. No delivery today, either. Tracker still says "on FedEx vehicle for delivery" with today's date as the delivery date. They didn't even offer a lame excuse like claiming I wasn't home. I'm beginning to wonder if the package is really even on a FedEx truck, or if it's already being offered on Craigslist.

Yeh, I'd really be pissed if I'd paid for overnight delivery and still had to wait a week. Seems like you could either demand a refund or complain to B&H and have them demand a refund on your behalf. But I guess they count on the amount being too small to be worth the effort. Doesn't that defeat the purpose of requiring a signature? I've had items mistakenly delivered to me that were meant for my neighbor. A pre-signed acceptance would mean that item is now mine if I decide to be dishonest. The carrier would be off the hook because the log would show it having been delivered and the delivery acknowledged. Even DoorDash takes better precautions than that.

I once literally chased the FedEx truck down my driveway. He had just driven up, turned around and left while I watched in disbelief from 20 feet away. Never got out of his truck, much less ring the bell or knock. I assume he was on an urgent mission, perhaps delivering transplant organs. And I'm sure he just didn't see me in his mirror as he accelerated away. On another occasion, my gate was closed so they threw a $1200 microphone over it into the bushes where it sat all day and night in the rain until we accidentally discovered it. A testament to the ruggedness of Shure products, it was not damaged. For these reasons I've made a point of being especially vigilant while awaiting deliveries. But...but...the convenience! Remember when we had to drive to a music store, make the purchase and then drive it all the way home?

Everybody knows that feeling of anticipation waiting for the UPS/FedEx/DHL/Amazon truck to come down the street, like a kid waiting for Santa to come down the chimney. FedEx seems to be enjoying it more than I am. The timeline so far... 4 June - ordered my new mixer from Sweetwater, knowing it's back-ordered. The product page says "we expect more in a few months". 28 June - get a call from my guy at Sweetwater, says a few came in unexpectedly and I was on the list to get one. Yay. 1 July - text message from FedEx saying it'll be delivered on the 2nd, signature required. Yay. 2 July - I stay home all day, in the garage with the door open so I don't miss the truck. But there is no delivery, even though the tracking status says "on truck for delivery". At 7:00 pm I check the status again, it says the package wasn't delivered because nobody was home. wtf? Liar! 3 July - tracker says it'll be delivered today. Again, I don't leave the house all day. But no delivery. At 7:00 pm I check the status again. It just says "no delivery attempt made" and the package is back at the distribution center. At this point my mixer has passed my house at least 4 times without stopping. FedEx, you're just taunting me now. 4 July - ha, ha, it's a holiday so no mixer for you. Maybe, maybe on the 5th - if you don't leave the house and camp in the driveway all day. I'm beginning to think their tracker app exists only to remind us of the power they hold, that we'll only get stuff when FedEx deems us worthy. Maybe if I left out cookies.

I'm enjoying the Purple Audio MC77 on vocals, but it's only marginally more capable than the Prochannel 1176. I've also used the Noveltech Vocal Enhancer occasionally, when I want something a bit more aggressive than Saturn. It's a dangerous effect, though. Oven mitts are recommended.

Seriously, Ed? How many vintage/classic/modern/magical EQs can one person handle before their head explodes from excessive mojo infusion?

Yeh, wi-fi can kill audio performance. Network interrupts take priority over audio interrupts, and that sneaky little bugger is constantly chatting with the world, probing for any of his networky cohorts to start a chat. Best to kill that chatty CPU thief when you have better things to do than search for printers. Every version of Windows enables services on initial installation, including some processes that you don't need when your laptop has just one purpose. When you reinstalled Windows, it likely turned on a bunch of things that are either new services or services you'd previously disabled under Win10. LatencyMon is a good start, but it'll only tell you about a specific type of problem (DPC overhead) and may not tip you off to other background processes that are hogging the CPU, memory or I/O bus. You'll still have to painstakingly run down the list of running processes, identify which ones are eating resources and figure out if they're necessary (e.g. antivirus realtime protection). Check out the link that Larioso posted above. It's specifically about using laptops on stage.

And that's not guaranteed. Not because of Win10/11, as they'll be able to read a floppy no problem. However, diskettes can become corrupted over time, and unless the original drive and the drive you're reading from were/are aligned correctly (or equally mis-aligned) the diskettes may not be readable on the new drive. Unless you have other drives available, you'll be outa luck.

First principle of software troubleshooting: figure out what changed. Assuming it's the same laptop with the same applications installed on it, can we assume that the Win11 install is the only thing that's changed? If so, then my first guess would be that the Windows update re-enabled some background processes that weren't running under Win10. For example, were you disabling Wi-Fi previously when using this laptop on stage (recommended)? Maybe Win11 turned it back on. Running LatencyMon could provide a clue.