Zolton

For anyone interested in Artefact or Sonorous (the two Dark Intervals libs on sale at Best Service): Both are also on sale at Loot Audio until the 15th at the same prices, and Loot's offering the DI Udu free with either, plus assorted other freebie goodies as part of their 3rd birthday sale.

+2 for Sononym. For the past 3-4 years, they've had a 50% off sale for Black Friday, and also tend to release updates (free for existing users) just before.

If you feel like a double-up on the Audiomodern vibe -- and assuming PB stocks Beat #213 soon, which just came out -- that issue gets you Chordjam Lite, plus the usual Beat samples and freebies and doodads.

It looks like what happened to me was initially the same as others -- NI login info auto-filling into the iZotope/NI login page. Apparently, I was stubborn enough to trigger a "too many failed login attempts" before trying my iZotope password -- a status the website didn't share, but which I saw when I (bravely) logged out of iZotope Product Portal and tried to log back in. The only recourse was to reset my iZotope password, which I did -- so, fine. Now, of course, autofill prevents me from logging into the NI site, because despite both companies using the same auth code/page, the passwords are different. I don't especially mind choosing between two passwords, but I'm not sure my browser (Chrome) will automatically store multiple passwords for the same username and site, now that all the login auth is under the NI umbrella. Not the end of the world. But fairly annoying, for those of us who lean on saved passwords and autocomplete for convenience. If the companies are all going to Frankenstein together under one skin, it'd be nice if they supported a single sign-on as well. (slightly edited for clarity)

Yeah, I'd normally agree that companies like iZotope (or NI) are going to be really slow with fixing things affecting users. And the bigger they get, the slower they move. But in this particular case, (some) users can't log into their website. Which means they can't buy anything new, but can still happily use their old plugins in the meantime. So it costs the company potential cash, and doesn't really put the users out much at all. So I expect this one will be looked into post-haste. If it's enough users to affect the bottom line, they'll probably form a committee to investigate.

Thanks for the info, guys. If I'm not the only one, I'll wait it out and see if they de-FUBAR things for others all at once. Even if not everyone is affected -- pwalpwal, did you get everybody's loyalty offers at once, because you're the only iZotope user allowed to log in now?

Yeah, that's definitely my attitude, too. It's a hobby for me (where "it" means "making music" some days, and "collecting shiny plugins" on others), and I set and keep a strict budget on the madness each month. So if I pay a little more than the absolute basement floor for something interesting, it just means sitting out an impulse buy or two later. Or at least until the next sale. Back to the iZotope topic, maybe it's just me, but I can't log into the iZotope website today. When I try, the auth page forwards to an iZotope-branded login page on the Native Instruments site -- I know they're joined at the subwoofers now, but I think that's the first time I've seen the logins connected. But neither my (old, now, I guess) iZotope account password nor my NI password work. If I say on that page I forgot my password, I get a link to reset my NI password, which I don't really need, since my NI password works when I go directly to the NI site. Meanwhile, the iZotope Product Portal works on my computer (though I haven't tried re-logging in fresh), and all the plugins work, including the ones I just installed this week. Anybody else having a similar issue with their account on the website?

For the moment -- which in this case means "through Monday" -- the ETHERALOYALTY code actually should knock off 30% rather than 20%, according to Zero-G (via VIC):

Well, poo. I jumped on a (pretty nice, admittedly) upgrade deal earlier this week direct from iZotope, because I didn't remember the vendor prices matching the best "loyalty" offers. But Uncle E's price is exactly the same, pre-cart, so I would've saved a few bucks. Seems like every time a tempting deal comes up, I get stuck between "click it before it goes away!" and "be patient and some store will have it for less!", and wind up choosing unwisely.

Also among the Rigid horde available for five bucks each at Plugin Boutique until the end of the month: https://www.pluginboutique.com/manufacturers/258-Rigid-Audio

Try the "VSTI Shortcut" link at top right. They have a single VSTi, but I'm not sure whether it includes all instruments. I opted for the 23(!) Kontakt 5 instruments, also on the VSTi page. Pretty nice. Edited to add: The plugin is VST3 only, I think, and includes samples in WAV format. The Kontakt libs have no separate samples, but links for EXS24 and Live Sampler are included next to the Kontakt links.

I imagine he's probably referring to this project at Seoul National University: http://en.catsnu.com/Project/Gugak.aspx

For anyone potentially interested in Boom's micro packs "Skate" or "Black Powder", those are two of the prizes you can exchange the Boom Coins for (assuming the prizes are the same for everyone, which I suspect they are). The odds of picking up something interesting each day are pretty good, too. The wheel has 10 slots, with: 4x free sound 2x Boom Coin 2x discount vouchers (one 10%, one 15%) 1x 1 free spin 1x 2 free spins Even if you can't immediately use a voucher (they expire two weeks after winning), there's a 60% chance of getting a sound or coin, and another 20% chance of another spin. The individual free sounds in particular add up over time if you spin every day (10 days in a row gets 3 extra spins); I've picked up a couple of hundred over the course of a year or so. Worth an open browser tab and 30 seconds a day, if you're looking to beef up an SFX library.

It also worked (for me) to add Calm, then browse to the Products page and add something else to the cart. When the icon at top then indicated I had one item in the cart, I could see both the paid lib and Calm there and removed the paid item to check out with Calm only. It's as though the "Add to cart" button works on the Calm page, but Calm doesn't count as an item, and since the cart link goes to the home page if the cart is empty you'd never have any way to know. Hardly calm-ing, and yeah, fairly whacked, operationally. Appreciate the freebie, though.

The real (additional) question with anything Melda is whether you're likely to commit (some day) to buying one or more of the big bundles, and which bundle(s) the current plug counts toward. In this case, MPhaserMB counts toward MComplete (of course), MTotalFX (obvs) and MCreativeFX. No matter how little you buy/obtain a plug for, 35% of the regular price is credited against the cost of the relevant bundles. (Melda gives you 70% credit for the purchase price, and assumes plugins bought via 3rd party were 50% off, so 35%.) For MPhaserMB at $43 regular, that's ~$15 credit, minus whatever was paid for to get the freebie. Which only matters if you're eyeing one or more bundles in the long run, but in that case, it can matter quite a bit, eventually. A nice bonus is that Melda credits are applied regardless of any sale going on. For example, registering MPhaserMB should take ~$15 off the cost of the MCreativeFX bundle, which is $711 regular price. When Melda has a BF half-off sale and the bundle is $356, you still get the $15 discount, not half of that or some sale-prorated amount. Lump a few cheapies together over the course of a year or two and wait for a sale on bundles, and it adds up dramatically. It's quite possible to go from zero to MComplete for less than a quarter of the bundle price, a little at a time, if Melda scratches your itch and you're patiently strategic.

As a Cakewalk user curious about Reaper, this modified Echolot theme put most of the basics in familiar places for me, so I could focus on learning about the differences, new features, workflow adjustments, etc.: https://forums.cockos.com/showthread.php?p=2546076

Welp, the proverbial good news / bad news: The 70% off prices are now listed on each item, so it's easier to see what's what. But the sale-on-top-of-sale discounts appear to be dead, as the Blendstruments, for instance, are now $23 each. The common-but-fleeting 8Dio pricing glitch strikes again, it seems.

A bit of testing indicates that for the few items currently on sale (most Blendstruments, Aura Guitars, Berimbau, Ambient Guitar, Guitalele, possibly others), the 70% off stacks with the sale price. The Blendstruments are $10.50 in cart, for example, instead of $78 regular or $35 on sale. The "volume discount" in cart appears to be wacky, though. One or two on-sale Blendstruments in cart, e.g., are $10.50 each, but three or more are $21 each. Usually the 8Dio pricing glitches work in the more favorable direction, so tread carefully if you intend to go a little wild. Edited to add: Also Bazantar is under $20. Hmmm.

Per the update on Niky's post, though, the link on the page is actually for Quad Frohmage, which is also available via the legacy plugin area. That looks different (and older) than the GUI on the Frohmager page, but Ohm Force doesn't appear to have created a link to the new plug, if it yet exists. Maybe the QF unclickable link is a temporary placeholder?

From the linked product page on Plugin Boutique:

Down to 80 signups needed, with 100 hours to go!

Yeah, oddly the only thing I've found that the "$30 off $50" code rejects is Polyscape 2. Even one of the collections, which *includes* Polyscape 2, works, but not Polyscape 2 on its own, due to an apparent policy decision. For those interested in some of the older Karanyi items on sale -- note that the APD "base price" for some of the Karanyi items they carry match the current sale price on Karanyi's site. So if you have a few APD bucks lying around, and you make it in time to use the JULY4 20% code, some of those sale items are currently a little cheaper at APD. Continuo 2 works out to $11.99, for instance.

I was sorely tempted by Continuo 2 and Polyscape 2 for 23 bucks or so, but sadly the coupon doesn't work for the latter. It does, after a bit of testing, work for Analog Tales 2, if that's of interest. I'd probably cave and go for Continuo 2, Analog Tales/Nightmare and something else, but I've already got most everything else on the cheaper side, so I may wind up sitting this one out. Great find, though!

If you're already in the ecosystem (with paid plugins that count toward bundle discounts), it appears that the credits built up are not affected by the discounted prices, which results in huge savings for some. So if, for instance, you'd bought a few plugins that count as $50 toward the cost of the MMixing bundle, which is normally $710, you still get a full $50 off while the bundle is $249. If you're a little deeper in (as I was) and dig the Melda paradigm, the narrowed gaps may be in no-brainer territory. Just make sure you're logged in when you check out the prices on the site.

Two additional perspectives on the question of "need" (or general usefulness) w/r/t MModernCompressor: From what I can find (e.g., this description on Gearspace), it's less directly comparable to MTurboComp (LE) than to MDynamics. It seems like a stripped-down version of MDynamics built in the same framework -- so if you happen to have MDynamics, you probably definitely don't "need" MModernCompressor. (Though I've seen some folks say the "lite" version is nice and easy to use.) More broadly, if you're firmly planning at some point in the future to buy one of the Melda bundles, these cheapie one-off sales come in handy to whittle the prices down to more budget-friendly levels. It definitely helps to know which doodads are in which bundle (Melda's comparison chart is handy for that), and whether a particular plugin thus gets you nearer your goal. Melda's policy is to lop 70% of your purchase price off the relevant bundle(s), and they assume anything bought from a reseller was purchased at half price. So the reduction to your eventual bundle price is ~35% of the full price of the plugin. In this case, MModernCompressor sells on the Melda site for $53 and is included in both the MixingFX and MasteringFX bundle (as well as the TotalFX and MComplete bundles), so it would reduce the price of any of those bundles by around $18. If (and only if) you're dead-set on someday getting one of those bundles, buying one for less than the discount applied to the bundle cost is essentially saving a couple of bucks by starting a payment plan. (Ideally, the plugin is also useful in some way.) Another way to consider "relative value" for Melda reseller sales, in the context of a future bundle buy, is what the plugin effectively costs in the context of each bundle (which are heavily discounted from the individual plugin prices). Just for instance, the MixingFX bundle has 33 plugs for ~$700; dividing the one-off prices of each plugin into that total proportionally (so the more expensive ones stay more expensive), MModernCompressor -- in the context of the MixingFX bundle -- is "worth" around $11.85 of the total price. The MasteringFX bundle has fewer plugins for the same price, so MModernCompressor is "worth" more to the value of that bundle -- a little less than $15. Also, for anyone who is thinking of Melda bundles and can wait it out, there's at least one end-of-year sale (and maybe others) where all the bundles are half-price. That takes the biggest chunk out of the equation, but a strategic low-price grab here and there can add up, too.