Pianoteq version 2 demo version available

Eleventh Hour Sound · Post by **Eleventh Hour Sound** » Fri Apr 06, 2007 6:16 pm

There's been some discussion about the Pianoteq piano... Version 2 is available with a 45 day demo.... [word is in that the demo has 8-10 notes disabled] : (

http://www.pianoteq.com/news

http://www.pianoteq.com/trialversion

From their site:

Pianoteq news

2007-04-04: Pianoteq 2 is here!

Version 2 of Pianoteq is now available for download. Thanks to a new soundboard model, the help of the many constructive suggestions from Pianoteq users and a stimulating beta team, we created a new beautiful sounding piano, the C2, offering 7 variations able to meet the most demanding musicians. This new version also offers a stand-alone player and some additional features (see product page for further details). The upgrade is free for all customers. The trial version can be downloaded by everyone, is functional for 45 days and can be installed by former trial users as well.

zandurian · Post by **zandurian** » Fri Apr 06, 2007 8:22 pm

do I need to un-install the old trial version first?

Eleventh Hour Sound · Post by **Eleventh Hour Sound** » Fri Apr 06, 2007 8:26 pm

Not sure, I never installed it. Maybe check their instructions?

Shooshie · Post by **Shooshie** » Fri Apr 06, 2007 8:57 pm

I'm trying it out as we speak. It's very interesting. There's something almost hauntingly beautiful about it, and yet it's still somehow... I don't know... sterile? I'd love to give it a real try, but the stupid company that made it has disabled about 8 or 10 of the most important keys. Can't play anything by Chopin, Skriabin, Beethoven, or just about anything else on it, because you get to these emotional spots and hammer down on a change, but there's no damn note there.

They limited us to 45 days for the demo. Why the F__k would they take away 10% of the notes? What can you play with white keys? New Age? Sheesh!!!

[cough, cough]... ok. Tantrum over. I'll try to evaluate it in an adult fashion. Too bad the company has a juvenile attitu... wups. Ok... I'm ok. Deep breaths...

Shooshie

Eleventh Hour Sound · Post by **Eleventh Hour Sound** » Fri Apr 06, 2007 9:27 pm

Hate that! Maybe it's the 10 notes that sound terrible... <Laughing> It's like when I tried a T-Racks mastering demo years ago and it had white noise bursts every 15 seconds!

Eventually I got a working demo, bought it, and I love it, but the first impression was not good...

hoovoo@spymac.com · Post by **hoovoo@spymac.com** » Fri Apr 06, 2007 10:19 pm

Shoosh you're absolutely right.
I'd rather have a fully functional 5-day demo than a crippled 45 day one!
Only pianists can understand this frustration

Other than that, the sound is more than decent...

(i'll email them and ask politely if even a 3-day demo is possible)

OldTimey · Post by **OldTimey** » Fri Apr 06, 2007 11:21 pm

hoovoo@spymac.com wrote:Shoosh you're absolutely right.
I'd rather have a fully functional 5-day demo than a crippled 45 day one!
Only pianists can understand this frustration

Other than that, the sound is more than decent...

(i'll email them and ask politely if even a 3-day demo is possible)

I'm a half-assed (lessons stopped at age 17) pianist and i can understand this. I'm still on day 30 of the demo for Pianoteq 1. When all things are considered, I am absolutely AMAZED that a 8MB piece of code can produce sounds like that.

They can't touch Ivory in many ways, it just doesn't sound as good, as real, as expressive, but...the full Ivory is what 40Gigs large??? It's kinda scary...the future of physical modelling is very bright.

Can anyone out there think of a 8MB Piano Library, on ANY synth ever made that sounds remotely as good as PianoTeq?

mhschmieder · Post by **mhschmieder** » Fri Apr 06, 2007 11:29 pm

I was so blown away by the Pianoteq 2 demo last night that I never found time to post my review here

. I would buy it right away if I could, but I am in cash-only mode for two weeks until all my replacement bank cards and credit cards arrive. Very frustrating, as I have tracking sessions these next two weeks and can't use the demo for that due to the missing notes!

Quite simply, this is the most musical and expressive digital piano yet, and has no major flaws that cannot be corrected through programming/tweaking. I compared a tracking session of Pianoteq 2 vs. Akoustik Piano using a variety of settings and styles, and Akoustik sounded like a toy in comparison. Aside from its upper register problems (which presumably can be partially corrected if loaded into Kontakt 2 and then edited), the notes sound disconnected from each other no matter how much I tweak the MIDI to try to improve the articulation.

With Pianoteq 2, I really feel that I am at a grand piano. The closest I have ever come to this is with General Music's DRAKE technology, which combines sampling with physical modeling. The advantage of pure 100% physical modeling is that you can model any piano you want, using the same program and base data. No need to replacing a sample set later on. I think it is clear that this program will be with us for a VERY long time, and that it will generate its own support base even if computer platforms come and go, or if the company doesn't last forever.

It is unfortunate that the dollar is so weak right now, but at least it is priced in euros and not in Sterling! has anyone been watching currency rates lately to have a measure of whether the conversion between euros and Dollars is fairly stable, going up, or going down?

HooVoo · Post by **HooVoo** » Sat Apr 07, 2007 2:41 am

Well, i did write to them about a fully functional 3-5-day demo and here's their reply:

Hi Harry,

Thanks for your comments.

We understand what you mean and we wish we could release a fully functional trial version with all keys intact but for security reasons this is unfortunately not an option for us as the software then easily can be cracked and spread like wildfire. This is the unpleasant reality that many software developers must face today. Pianoteq is especially vulnerable as the file size is very small in comparison and based on a unique technology. We hope you understand.

just thought i'd share it with you...

Shooshie · Post by **Shooshie** » Sat Apr 07, 2007 3:58 am

I played piano all evening, and all night. From PianoTeq to Ivory, and back and forth, again and again. In the end, there is no question in my mind that Ivory is the superior instrument by a lenghty margin, especially for solo work, but I am thoroughly blown away by PianoTeq. Eight Megabytes? Good grief. There's just no comparison from a horsepower standpoint. Modeling is in its early years. Think of what this is going to be like in 5 years. By then, I'm sure we'll be able to kiss the heavy bloat of Ivory goodbye.

I was especially impressed with all the settings. I'd give anything to have such control over Ivory. I'm using Ivory as my model, and doing everything I can to program PianoTeq to sound like it. Unfortunately, one of the other limitations of the demo is apparently there is no place to save your piano. You have to start over each time you boot it. With as many as 40 controls, the options are practically without limits, but it would sure help to be able to save them.

[I just read the manual. I never found a way to save your own presets. I'm assuming you have to do that via your host, such as Digital Performer. The StandAlone version simply does not have a "Save" command anywhere on it.]

In time, I may find the way to make it sound as good as Ivory. I did experiment with every control, but I just haven't found anything to make the sound similar. Maybe the EQ will help. It's still amazing, and for ensemble work, who could beat it? Based on the adjustability of it, I'd say we're looking at a paradigm shift on the level of AltiVerb. But the sound has yet to prove to me that it can match Ivory. Well... I've got 45 days to find out.

How much does this thing cost?

Shooshie

Shooshie · Post by **Shooshie** » Sat Apr 07, 2007 4:08 am

Just listened to some of the demos on the PianoTeq site. They are incredibly good. There's just one complaint I have -- it's what makes Ivory superior in my tastes -- and that's the metallic tone in the 800hz - 1800hz range. Above that, the tone gets very piano-like. Below that, it's very piano-like. But in that most important of registers, it spreads and sounds a little like bells, more than hammered strings. There is so much you can do with it, though, it may be possible to eliminate that. I'm going to work on overtones and EQ. The purity of sound, if and when I can get what I want, will be unprecedented in my experience.

Shooshie

Eleventh Hour Sound · Post by **Eleventh Hour Sound** » Sat Apr 07, 2007 5:22 am

The audio demos used to be from version 1... Do you know if they updated with version 2?

mhschmieder · Post by **mhschmieder** » Sun Apr 08, 2007 1:11 am

I should point out that I have never actually had a chance to PLAY Ivory (not that I think there is a demo available anyway). I own Akoustik Piano because it came with my Komplete 4 upgrade last December. Keyboard magazine (or was it EM?) prefers it over Ivory, by a hair, and of course has different preferences once talking on a style-by-style basis vs. general overall impression.

I am not really assuming necessarily that I would not find certain aspects of Ivory superior to Pianoteq at this point in time. But due to the CPU requirements of Ivory, it is not an option for me. And as Pianoteq feels and sounds like a real acoustic instrument to me, it meets my needs.

Certainly many of us might find the need to keep both a modeling solution and a sampling solution at hand; especially for tracking work, where the known timbre of a specific model may trump the playability of Pianoteq or GEM's DRAKE technology. Both are still valid approaches and have their benefits.

But as my favourite piano anyways is one which has not yet been sampled, it is no loss for me to drop the Steinway samples in favour of what is essentially a Fazioli physical model.

I wrote to Modartt to inquire whether it might be possible for me to model the Mason & Hamlin pianos (Ravel's favourite and mine as well), but as they have a unique x-brace that allows the entire piano to resonate in sympathy, Pianoteq does not yet allow this detail of altering the basic physical models.

There has been some misinformation in one of the other forums stating that Modartt used a pianoforte as their model. What they did do was model a pianoforte as a free suite of presets shortly after they completed their hybrid model of the Fazioli, Bosendorfer and Yamaha.

Shooshie · Post by **Shooshie** » Sun Apr 08, 2007 3:17 am

In your stand-alone version, is there a way to save presets on which you've worked for hours? That's very annoying. I finally created an Excel spreadsheet with the numerical values of every single parameter recorded. It actually takes less time than figuring it out again.

Shooshie

monkey man · Post by **monkey man** » Sun Apr 08, 2007 5:39 am

Shooshie wrote:They limited us to 45 days for the demo. Why the F__k would they take away 10% of the notes? What can you play with white keys? New Age? Sheesh!!!
[cough, cough]... ok. Tantrum over. I'll try to evaluate it in an adult fashion. Too bad the company has a juvenile attitu... wups. Ok... I'm ok. Deep breaths...
Shooshie

LOL!

Hanging on every word here.
V1 sounded "plasticy" to me; I'm assuming a decent improvement in V2.

Does anyone know whether or not the demos have been updated from V1, as RecordingArts asked?