The newborn has arrived.

[Will.]

Next is out and in BETA mode and for the past 24hrs I have been testing and creating some tracks. So far i am liking the look and feel. What i am most impressed with it, is the fact that it handles live performances ten times better than CbB. I was jamming with it, did some DJ work with it and for two hours straight it held its own on major projects. That is a huge positive side to it - really impressed!

It took me 5mins to figure out its workflow. 

I love the new Sampler and Xsampler features. Great new stock plugins. Everything is so straight forward, but there are some downsides,drawbacks,cons (what ever you want to call it) to some features that can be improved. Such as the Track Pane that is not Scalable. It crops the window/pane instead of resizing the plugins and effects on it to smaller. The height is perfect though. Also theirs NO console? Perhaps I have missed this one, but I couldnt find it. Arranger Pane is there for those who use it. 

I wont use it as a main DAW though, but for mobility use like writting demos or features when collaborating while travelling - for sure! For now i am still testing it out looking for features that might have a different names and taps. 

Heres what i can tell you upfront! Its gona pick up popularity with the EDM community! I already have gotten one other producer to try it out. 

[Will.]

Where can we give proper feedback on next? 

[Noel Borthwick]

On the next discord channel. The discussion is there. This is the suggestions topic.

https://discord.com/channels/1024921285953863700/1065147809805893712

[BigT1]

I like the  visual so far.  I had to read the manual to understand how plugins get inserted.   Once I knew what to look for and where to click I was in business.

The vibe for the track workflow is similar to Ableton with everything in-line at the bottom of the screen and track controls at the left instead of the right.  The initial plugin window (before expanding) looks OK with some of the plugins that i tried.  The initial window shows a handful of parameters.  This might be ok if the user is allowed to change the parameters to suit their own workflow.

On an instrument track, I tried adding KONTAKT 7 and loading up session strings pro.  The initial parameters look like a mess.  These parameter have numbers for names that mean nothing at the moment.  Opening / expanding the edit window is the only way that I can see to work with that type of instrument, so far, and I'm ok with that.

Had to read the manual on how to stretch a clip.  I spent time trying to figure out how to "STRETCH ENABLE" a clip.  The manual shows an icon in lower right corner of clip, if the clip is "STRETCH ENABLED."   After a few minutes of messing around,  I tried to just control drag like the manual stated and it just worked.  The stretch enable icon was not there before nor did it show up after the stretch.

Splits, fades worked.

I can't wait to try this on my main music system which is a mac.

This test is on a windows machine test.

Things I would like:

 

    Scroll playhead left or right by keyboard command. (I use this when writing midi passages.)  I use this probably more than looping.

 

    Zoom    (Manual says: Go to View > Zoom In or View > Zoom Out.)  When I went to VIEW... I didn't see ZOOM.   Also - manual says :  Press ALT+LEFT/RIGHT (Windows) / CMD+LEFT/RIGHT (Mac).   This did not work.

Alt + LEFT/RIGHT arrows moved the track selection up and down.  I was able to get horizontal zoom working with CTL+LEFT/RIGHT arrows....

 

    I would like to see a Warp / Transient marker for when I'm stretching audio clips for ease of aligning similar clips.

My workflow is
1. Track,
2. Make certain each track sounds the way that I want it.
3. Export all individual tracks.
4. Import tracks to new project.
5. Mix for balance.
6. Master.

This program could potentially take care of steps 1 through 3.  AND I could see myself putting this to use in this context alone and being happy with it as it's own creation tool.

I don't like mixing in Ableton, and I don't think I would like this NEXT too much for mixing.  I'll play with it some more.  I was really hoping this would be able to open my old Cakewalk projects on a Mac.  I'll try this when I get home.  I like having a vertical mixer where I can jump left and right to tracks to eq, pan, send for FX and balance my mix.  I know a lot of people like to mix as they go... I don't.

[Will.]

30 minutes ago, BigT1 said:

I like the  visual so far.  I had to read the manual to understand how plugins get inserted.   Once I knew what to look for and where to click I was in business.

The vibe for the track workflow is similar to Ableton with everything in-line at the bottom of the screen and track controls at the left instead of the right.  The initial plugin window (before expanding) looks OK with some of the plugins that i tried.  The initial window shows a handful of parameters.  This might be ok if the user is allowed to change the parameters to suit their own workflow.

On an instrument track, I tried adding KONTAKT 7 and loading up session strings pro.  The initial parameters look like a mess.  These parameter have numbers for names that mean nothing at the moment.  Opening / expanding the edit window is the only way that I can see to work with that type of instrument, so far, and I'm ok with that.

Had to read the manual on how to stretch a clip.  I spent time trying to figure out how to "STRETCH ENABLE" a clip.  The manual shows an icon in lower right corner of clip, if the clip is "STRETCH ENABLED."   After a few minutes of messing around,  I tried to just control drag like the manual stated and it just worked.  The stretch enable icon was not there before nor did it show up after the stretch.

Splits, fades worked.

I can't wait to try this on my main music system which is a mac.

This test is on a windows machine test.

Things I would like:

 

    Scroll playhead left or right by keyboard command. (I use this when writing midi passages.)  I use this probably more than looping.

 

    Zoom    (Manual says: Go to View > Zoom In or View > Zoom Out.)  When I went to VIEW... I didn't see ZOOM.   Also - manual says :  Press ALT+LEFT/RIGHT (Windows) / CMD+LEFT/RIGHT (Mac).   This did not work.

Alt + LEFT/RIGHT arrows moved the track selection up and down.  I was able to get horizontal zoom working with CTL+LEFT/RIGHT arrows....

 

    I would like to see a Warp / Transient marker for when I'm stretching audio clips for ease of aligning similar clips.

My workflow is
1. Track,
2. Make certain each track sounds the way that I want it.
3. Export all individual tracks.
4. Import tracks to new project.
5. Mix for balance.
6. Master.

This program could potentially take care of steps 1 through 3.  AND I could see myself putting this to use in this context alone and being happy with it as it's own creation tool.

I don't like mixing in Ableton, and I don't think I would like this NEXT too much for mixing.  I'll play with it some more.  I was really hoping this would be able to open my old Cakewalk projects on a Mac.  I'll try this when I get home.  I like having a vertical mixer where I can jump left and right to tracks to eq, pan, send for FX and balance my mix.  I know a lot of people like to mix as they go... I don't.

You might want to copy and paste your feedback on the discord platform in the link given above by Noel. 

Edited September 28, 2023 by Will.

[BigT1]

I did that as well.  The whole discord system is a  mess.  I don't know how many will really want to mess with it.  This way... people that don't want to get into that Discord mess can still see what's up...

 

[Noel Borthwick]

This is the wrong forum to post information on Next