Are finances curbing your purchase of plugins, music software, upgrades, hardware?

[Starship Krupa]

4 hours ago, Doug Rintoul said:

Not to worry, just sound the letters out and think of someone overweight.

Oh, now I get it.

That term could be weaponized in the wrong "mean girl" hands.

It had me thinking of database connectivity or those things that you connect to your car to read the service codes.

[AndyB01]

On 7/20/2023 at 12:36 AM, El Diablo said:

There's people still using windows 7 and XP that I know of.  Even if support ends for those systems doesn't make them useless.

If your afraid to use the internet after support ends, get yourself a Raspberry PI zero, set it up as a internet firewall and put it between your old computer and the internet for protection.

It doesn't make them useless but it does increase online risk. I don't recall saying I was 'afraid to use the Internet'.

I've worked in cybersec for 25 years, so I know my way around PCs, networks, firewalls and patching risks, thanks. I can make my own judgement calls on whether I want to continue using an unsupported OS.

Cheers all the same.

Andy

[aidan o driscoll]

Sort of related to what this thread is about .. "Some things in life seem to get in the way of music creation. Especially money, time, and family. Lets discuss some solutions!"

 

[InstrEd]

13 hours ago, Doug Rintoul said:

Not to worry, just sound the letters out and think of someone overweight.

Okay. I should now that people will weaponize  the use of acronyms    

[InstrEd]

On the music front I really haven't brought anything this year.  Mixcraft Pro 10 I will upgrade in the fall as I like the company and the upgrade is very reasonable. I use it on my laptop.

Other $20.00 upgrade will be to lengthen my Musicreader PDF subscription for another 2 years.  I use that and Mobilesheets. I like them both and good to have one as a back-up.  The plus with Musicreader is it can be used on all platforms for the price and syncs your PDF files for you.  The negative is it went to a subscription model. But it isn't very costly and I have it on Windows and Android devices.  With Mobilesheets you have to buy for each platform you use it on.  After a few years yes it does become cheaper to use and I'll decide in another few years I'll decide if Musicreader PDF is still worth it to me. 

Medical bills prevented me from upgrading to Kontakt 7 even at the sale price. I'll wait to next sale it upgrade. 
Of course I'll also weigh the cost of the new Cakewalk Bundle too. But this time I'm not in any rush.

[audioschmaudio]

I can afford to buy audio software every now and then just for fun but it might be that the financial insecurity that comes with inflation has made me spend MORE money on it. For two reasons: 1. If I don't spend my savings, they'll just lose value anyway. So 10€ today might have a value of 2€ in a few years. 2. I got hooked by deals because I feel like I'm saving money even though I'm actually spending money on unnecessary things. Yes, I'm irrational like that sometimes. Even reflecting about it doesn't help. It's an addiction, I guess.

[jackson white]

On 7/20/2023 at 1:30 AM, ralfrobert said:

Mixing with Mike ... He just uses Waves  his ears all the time

fixed that for ya. 

wrt the original topic, mos def bought more than needed, but being relatively new to the tarpit, had to live with most of these for a while and do some critical listening before actually hearing what made a difference for me.  ... getting there, and appreciating that the tools available are hardly a limitation for creativity.  it's more about learning than owning. 

the biggest GAS brake here is the ad copy/marketing vids that are 95% recycled ad nauseam bs adjectives for mix moves that could be just as easily done with the ProChannel. and have started to name a project for each new purchase. 

fwiw, a few have been hanging in there and proving themselves where it counts.. planning to upgrade at least a couple project PCs to the latest Intel CPUs/Win11 to see how close one might get to RT tracking with FX and expect a significant purge of the current VST inventory  in the move. 

iirc there was a "game changer" plugin thread somewhere.   might be interesting to expand on that with specifics/audio files? 

[dubdisciple]

Finances always play a part, but plugins have also gotten cheaper. I have slowed down because I honestly don't use a quarter of what I have. I kinda regret biting on IK studio max 3 deal recently. It was cheap but I find myself overwhelmed by volume of total redundancy.  How many 1176 emulations do I need? How many pultecs do I need?  What is hundreds of gigs of synth plugs that largely overlap the same synths in my Arturia collection gonna add to me making better music?  Considering I have an Arturia controller that makes finding sounds far easier than the endless void of Sampletank patches with the same name. I'm not bashing IK. I love IK. Their products have served me well over the years and I think they offer a lot of bang ror the buck. This is just an expression of what happens when you realize how useless it was to add a big bundle of IK on top of the glut on my computer. So much that I realized I didn't install the modo drum 1.5 kits before downloads expired...and didn't care. Practicality is driving me far more than finances. 

[paulo]

On 7/20/2023 at 2:44 AM, Yan Filiatrault said:

You have ChatGPT for that and it’s free 

Thanks for the suggestion, but from what I've seen of that "artificial intelligence" is a very apt description.