A Beatles Virtual Instrument

[Eleventh Hour Sound]

Nice! I think EastWest just introduced a massive drum library... oh yea and a massive piano library. I wonder if they use Play Engine?

On a slightly related topic : ) I've been running BFD2 in standalone mode, routing MIDI date through the IAC bus and it's really kind of nice having my drums in a separate app that doesn't crash DP, and even stays alive when DP crashes... Kinda like a 32 bit play? <grin>

ON TOPIC UPDATE (imagine that!)

PLAY ENGINE 1.0.045 BETA (64-BIT THREADING) HAS BEEN POSTED:

http://www.soundsonline-forums.com/show ... hp?t=11591

For those who've missed the previous 64-bit Public BETA announcements and releases, these versions indeed access all of the RAM you have installed on your computer even with DP running in 32-bit.

So, the notion that everything on your computer has to be running in 64-bit mode before it will work is not completely true. Apple has said that one can run 64-bit and 32-bit apps concurrently. There may be greater *benefits* with everything running in 64-bit, but the notion that running a 64-bit plugin in a 32-bit app being impossible has been misleading and not 100% accurate.

Doug Rogers has made a point of letting people know that one must use a 64-bit-capable machine. The other situation under which one might experience no appreciable performance benefits is when there are less than 4GB RAM installed in the machine since the whole point was to break this limit.

If your machine can take 8/16/32 GB RAM, all of the memory will now be put to good use.

[Frodo]

...and it's really kind of nice having my drums in a separate app that doesn't crash DP, and even stays alive when DP crashes... Kinda like a 32 bit play? <grin>

Great point, RA. Indeed-- it's wonderful to have some recourse for semi-cooperative frameworks or for plugins that otherwise wrest CPU cycles from DP. As a matter of fact, the first few releases of PLAY sent DP into a total coma. I'm glad they got this sorted out at last.

As for EW, some of the info is scattered and a little confusing. I know that the Complete Composer's Collection is for Kompakt/Kontakt, and it appears to be a new way to move stock on the older versions now that the free PLAY offer has expired.

Of the new releases slated for the 31st:

Chris Hein Bass-- Kompakt/Kontakt
Ethno World 4- Kompakt/Kontakt
Goliath- PLAY
SD2- PLAY
Forbidden Planet- PLAY
QL Pianos- PLAY

EWQLSO-- currently Kompakt/Kontakt with PLAY release *pending*.

EWQLSC-- currently Kompakt/Kontakt with PLAY release unknown at this time.

I'm sure they'll get around to releasing PLAY versions of everything in time. The next step for them will be to get PLAY released for Leopard. I'm still getting mixed reports from EW about using Leopard.

[Frodo]

MAJOR PLAY UPDATE

East West has posted PLAY 1.0.046.

This is NOT beta. It's the real deal. FYI, this version breaks the 3.5-4GB RAM limit and will access all available RAM on your computer as a plugin inside DP. EW emphasizes that the computer must be a 64-bit machine for this to happen. (64-bit data paths are native to most G-series PPCs and all Intel Macs.)

http://www.soundsonline.com/updates.php

RTAS support
Tiger and Leopard support

[Eleventh Hour Sound]

WHAT?

That's awesome!

Now that someone's ran the 5 minute mile.....

Who's next?

MAJOR PLAY UPDATE

East West has posted PLAY 1.0.046.

This is NOT beta. It's the real deal. FYI, this version breaks the 3.5-4GB RAM limit and will access all available RAM on your computer as a plugin inside DP. EW emphasizes that the computer must be a 64-bit machine for this to happen. (64-bit data paths are native to most G-series PPCs and all Intel Macs.)

http://www.soundsonline.com/updates.php

RTAS support
Tiger and Leopard support

[zed]

MAJOR PLAY UPDATE

East West has posted PLAY 1.0.046.

This is NOT beta. It's the real deal. FYI, this version breaks the 3.5-4GB RAM limit and will access all available RAM on your computer as a plugin inside DP. EW emphasizes that the computer must be a 64-bit machine for this to happen. (64-bit data paths are native to most G-series PPCs and all Intel Macs.)

Groovey! When you say G-series PPCs, does it go without saying that most or all G5s are 64-bit machines, and that some G4s (or G3s?) would have already had 64 bit architecture? I don't know much about these things.

I'm looking forward to giving the new PLAY a thorough audition!
Now I wish I had some more RAM...

[Frodo]

Groovey! When you say G-series PPCs, does it go without saying that most or all G5s are 64-bit machines, and that some G4s (or G3s?) would have already had 64 bit architecture? I don't know much about these things.

Yes-- it's safe to say exactly that. This stipulation, however, includes more Macs than would be reasonable on which to run Tiger/Leopard with enough RAM for it to make sense. Any Mac that can take 8GB or more will benefit. There will, of course, be a reasonable consideration for other technical requirements such as bus speeds/sizes and CPU stealth. The 1999 G3 has a 64-bit data path, but I don't think anyone would recommend it for much of anything with its 66Mhz bus speeds or its 233 Mhz CPU. Oh-- and that RAM limit of 768 MB won't go very far, either.

I would say that anything below a 1.8 Dual G5 would get tricky where new software technology is concerned for reasons other than the data path.

I'm looking forward to giving the new PLAY a thorough audition!

Now I wish I had some more RAM...

Oh, I'm definitely going for more RAM at this point. This version of PLAY is THE version I've been waiting for over the past 53 weeks.

The RAM issue has been the brick wall to date. It's the reason why some users of large orchestral libraries have had no choice but to add computers to run them in a network-- just to access another 2GB of RAM at a time (on older PPCs) and another 4-8 GB on later PPCs. There is a guy who had 8 or more MacMinis and at least one tower networked together to run earlier incarnations of VSL, for example. EW speaks of its Platinum Orchestra running on 8 PPCs. It has really turned into more hardware than "necessary" only because the RAM access conks out at 3-4GB. In fact, Macs do a little better than PCs once did (pre X64) because so many users spoke of something called a "3 GB Switch" to help break that limit.

With machines now capable of holding 8-16-32 GB of RAM, and with this new version of PLAY officially released, the first truly meaningful and usable payoffs for the long-awaited new computer age are finally beginning to manifest themselves.

[beautypill]

I bought Fab Four about half a year or so ago. It was totally unusable. Outrageously unusable. Like "How could they even have brought this to the marketplace?!?" unusable.

I de-installed it and put it on my shelf. Haven't thought about it except to occasionally look up at my shelf and get bummed that I spent $400 for nothing.

With this new version, is it worth wading back into the waters? Should I try re-loading it?

Forgive me if I don't have the time to read all 85 pages of this majestic thread to find out.

Can anyone simplify the scenario for me? Is Fab Four finally free of bugs?

- c

[Frodo]

I bought Fab Four about half a year or so ago. It was totally unusable. Outrageously unusable. Like "How could they even have brought this to the marketplace?!?" unusable.

LOL-- if you read some of my posts from last summer, you'll find that I was no less disenchanted with it than you. I mean, for a while I was calling it 4F instead of F4.

I de-installed it and put it on my shelf. Haven't thought about it except to occasionally look up at my shelf and get bummed that I spent $400 for nothing.

With this new version, is it worth wading back into the waters? Should I try re-loading it?

It took many months for them to fine tune it to this point, but I've got to say that it really is worth checking out whether or not you have more than 4GB of RAM installed. They fixed most of the original GUI issues in DP from what I can tell. The only thing that still kind of bothers me is that the Browser windows flash white when trying to access sub directories, but this is minor and I'm sure will get tweaked in due time. At least the submenus actually appear now!! I think it's really worth another try.

Forgive me if I don't have the time to read all 85 pages of this majestic thread to find out.

Oh, what's the matter beautypill? It's a shorter read than Webster's Dictionary (and probably not nearly as interesting!).

Can anyone simplify the scenario for me? Is Fab Four finally free of bugs?

- c

Free of bugs? Nothing is 100% bug-free. Other than the Browser flashing white when navigating sub directories, I've not found anything major just yet because I've done a full project with it.

The thing that has me smiling is that it works! I can actually boot up and lay in some tracks without having to worry that DP will go into a coma with one patch loaded. I think that users might discover different ways they might prefer for it to work, but as far as basic functionality and general reliability, I think they got it hammered out at last.

I'll be posting progress reports as I work with it more.

Oh, happy day.

[zed]

With this new version, is it worth wading back into the waters? Should I try re-loading it?

Yes. As Frodo said, the plugin has come a long way since it was first released. It plays much better with DP, both in terms of the GUI and in the overall plugin efficiency.

There is a new Engine Level control in the Settings > Streaming preferences which helps optimize the PLAY engine depending on your computer speed. The default is "1", but with a G5 you may get better results by increasing the value. It can go up to 5.

Still absent, unfortunately, is user control of the pitch bend range.

[Frodo]

Still absent, unfortunately, is user control of the pitch bend range.

Hey Mr. Zed:

Can you tell me more about this? I'm getting pitch bend control pretty well on this end, range and all.

[zed]

Still absent, unfortunately, is user control of the pitch bend range.

Hey Mr. Zed:

Can you tell me more about this? I'm getting pitch bend control pretty well on this end, range and all.

Really?

I am talking about the ability to set the range to be something different from its default. Most sample engines allow you to adjust this range by up to +/- 24 semitones. PLAY instruments come with a default pitch bend range of 3, and to my knowledge there is no way to change this.

If you are experiencing something different then I would be delighted to hear about it.

[Frodo]

3 semi tones-- hmm.

Let me get back to you on this...

[Frodo]

Hey Mister Zed:

Here's the source of my confusion-- and I apologize in advance for it.

I'd worked on a test project with FabFour, some real guitars, and some guitar samples from another library in Kontakt 2. It's been a little while, but I did remember having some pretty wild pitch bends on that track.

I had pitch bends in FabFour as well, but non of them were bigger than a major second or minor third.

So, here's some news for you, fwiw. Doesn't look like we're going to ever see FabFour go past the three semi-tone limit.

The producers made a decision not to go beyond the +/- 3 semitones for quality reasons.

Beyond a certain point samples begin to degrade in quality when stretched up or down.

Regards,
Jay Coffman

EASTWEST
Technical Support

[zed]

So, here's some news for you, fwiw. Doesn't look like we're going to ever see FabFour go past the three semi-tone limit.

The producers made a decision not to go beyond the +/- 3 semitones for quality reasons.

Beyond a certain point samples begin to degrade in quality when stretched up or down.

Regards,
Jay Coffman

EASTWEST
Technical Support

Are you trying to infuriate me!!

Is this an e-mail that you got back in response to asking about this?? I have been told that it will be dealt with... eventually.

If this is true, it is a major error in judgement, in my opinion. For me this is particularly annoying because I invested a lot of money updating my MIDI guitar system specifically so that I could play the Fab Four guitar samples on a MIDI guitar, and it has been very annoying not to be able to so. PLUS very frustrating not to be able swap MIDI basslines and guitar mockups with Fab Four replacements (in older projects) because my MIDI files all used the pitch bend of +/-12.

Of course the sound quality degrades in quality when you stretch it too far. Doh. But not allowing the user control of that parameter is ridiculous... every other major sample engine allows this. You can't disable a feature just because some moron might use it distastefully and then bemoan the quality of your product. It should be up to the user to decide how much is too much. When you are sliding and bending strings on a MIDI guitar, those stretches only enhance the realism.

Were the Beatles prevented from experimenting with things in the studio because the quality might degrade?? Gosh, the Beatles would have been pretty dry and uninteresting if their focus was on avoiding degradation. There is no question in my mind that some of those Fab Four sounds could probably be made to sound even more interesting, in some cases, if you had more control of bending and tuning the samples.

GRRrrrrr.

[Frodo]

That was exactly my point in my inquiry. It's one thing if the feature was an oversight. It's overreaching when developers make too many assumptions that impact on MUSICAL decisions its users would otherwise make.

So, it's not a "bug" in the software, it's perhaps the result of creative short-sightedness where the users' hands are tied.

I have been told that it will be dealt with... eventually.

If this is true, it is a major error in judgement, in my opinion. For me this is particularly annoying...

I was thinking the same things in terms of how you'd feel about it for a lot of reasons we've discussed at other times.

But as I rejoice over the 4GB limit being broken and question FabFour specifically for certain limitations, I have to remind myself that I got this to serve as a barometer for how their orchestral library might work under PLAY.

I also have to remind myself just how I ended up the proud owner of a Casino, a Rickenbacker 360, a Gretsh, a Hofner, and a Ric 4003. Small consolation on the MIDI front, I know.

What a shame, though-- a rock VI with a 3 semi-tone pitch bend limit. Not very soulful, is it?