DP 6 more hassle than it's worth?

[beautypill]

I know this kind of gloomy/nervous talk isn't always welcome here, but I still worry that a larger problem is MOTU's marketing. It is, in my opinion, still the largest problem facing the company; more than even the particular stability/compatibility issues plaguing DP6.01. Those will get fixed. But where are the funds for continuing software updates going to come from if the program itself doesn't have market penetration?

I know there's no hard data to support or refute my notion that DP is an island with beaches moving inward, it's just a feeling I get from talking to the musicians and clients at my studio.

If you want DP6.1 and DP6.2 and, eventually DP7 (and we all do, otherwise we wouldn't be here) young people need to keep coming to the program. This is capitalism. Sales fund the R&D department, y'know? Young people are where it's at. It's been stated everywhere from hack political speeches to hack Whitney Houston songs, but it's true: children are our future.

I personally feel that a skin-able DP6.1 is going to go a long way towards finding a larger user-base for this program.

Aesthetics are, if not everything, certainly very important. I've said it before, but MOTU should keep an eye on Apple's sense of style. Showing cool people doing cool stuff with your product... that's the way to go!

- c

[willheim]

i would wait for 6.1

[Kubi]

The good news is the plug-in compatibility issues are being addressed one by one and should be history soon. And I'm confident MOTU is busy addressing the bugs DP6 clearly still has (i.e. the 'merge' issues in another thread on this board, which seem to have happened to more than just one user...)

So between all these little issues I for one am leaving DP6 in the box until they're all addressed. I think DP6.01 is not worth the hassle. DP6.13 will be hassle-free!

[monkey man]

i would wait for 6.1

... and pray for a miracle. I am. MOTU needs to pull one out of the hat IMHO, as it so often has.

[kassonica]

i would wait for 6.1

... and pray for a miracle. I am. MOTU needs to pull one out of the hat IMHO, as it so often has.

HEAR HEAR

A true believer YAY..

Of course +1

And for those NEW to DP if you think DP6 is going to be the end of DP 'cause it's the worst' DP4 was a nightmare yet they recovered better than EVER

I rest my case to the doubting thomas's

[peppersax]

Recording Arts,
I uninstalled DP 6 and 5.0 and reinstalled 5.0 and everything is back and running. I'll start with 6.1 in 2009. Anyway, my rig is G5 dual 2 Ghz with 8G RAM, 0S X 10.4.11, All MOTU setup (MTP AV, 828) with Machfive 1 as my sampler, spectrasonics plug-ins, waves bundle, Nomads, drumcore 2.5, thousand samples, Trinity Plus as a controller, Tannoy active 800's, Neumann TLM-103 and Blue Mouse.

[JMSchur]

Definitely yes! after fifteen years of using DP, I've given up and moved to Logic. I depend on Native Instruments plugs and got tired of waiting for MOTU to fix the myriad issues. I'm still learning Logic but so far it's been hassle free.

[tommymandel]

6.01 is solid on my Intel Laptop (OSX 10.4.11) using the Mac Native Hardware,

but just lately, the combination of Nomad ProducerPack Demo plus SuperiorDrummer v.2.0* has my G5DP 2.3 running at about 50% Audio Performance, which is a lot higher than it used to. Almost carnivorous the way it eats processing power, like something's churning under the hood.

[*]which works great, btw, I'm not dissing this amazing sounding and flexible Virtual Drum Kit in the least...

[James Steele]

Definitely yes! after fifteen years of using DP, I've given up and moved to Logic. I depend on Native Instruments plugs and got tired of waiting for MOTU to fix the myriad issues. I'm still learning Logic but so far it's been hassle free.

The "myriad issues" with the Native Instrument plugs and DP 6 that you had was a problem with PPC Macs running Leopard. Your system, if it was running Tiger would not have any of these issues. Like you, I had these problems, and was tired of waiting, but I decided it was better to spend a day downgrading my system back to Tiger (10.4.11) than use Logic. All my NI stuff is working great now. I bought Logic Express 8 to mess with and found it such a hassle to get around in that I immediately decided to go through the hassle of dowgrading to Tiger.

Unless you really want to give up Digital Performer and learn Logic, I'd suggest you might consider going back to OS 10.4.11 and all your NI stuff should be fine again. It just wasn't worth it to me to learn Logic just so I could run Leopard on my PPC machine. When I go to an Intel box, that's when I'll go to Leopard. BTW, the Intel/Leopard/DP6 combo doesn't have any major problems with NI plugs.

P.S. I'm not excusing MOTU/NI for the situation that exists, but I finally threw in the towel and decided to look at it realistically. PPC systems are going to be unsupported soon and I have to wonder how much time and effort MOTU or NI is going to invest to fix a problem that only exists on PPC machines that were upgraded to Leopard.

[pcm]

I know this kind of gloomy/nervous talk isn't always welcome here, but I still worry that a larger problem is MOTU's marketing. It is, in my opinion, still the largest problem facing the company; more than even the particular stability/compatibility issues plaguing DP6.01. Those will get fixed. But where are the funds for continuing software updates going to come from if the program itself doesn't have market penetration?

- c

I fear that this has been the case for several years already...

[James Steele]

Yep... this is brought up all the time. And as also been said many times, MOTU has some popular hardware products that sell rather well so they're not relying on DP sales as their sole revenue source.

[tommymandel]

Sounds like you guys are heading towards (short of advocating) an Open Source rewriting of DP - (with MOTU's approval, of course, since they are morphing into a company driven by profits from their Hardware?)

[billf]

But where are the funds for continuing software updates going to come from if the program itself doesn't have market penetration?

...

I've said it before, but MOTU should keep an eye on Apple's sense of style. Showing cool people doing cool stuff with your product... that's the way to go!

I have two thoughts about your post:

First, if you're that worried about the future of DP, you can always hedge your bets by learning Logic. However...

Second, I think that MOTU has morphed into a hardware company which also produces software that will run on its products. Sort of like Apple.

[bOing]

Oh dear, someone said "penetration".

But on that note, there is room for a company that only makes a DAW with the benefits being a more focussed company that can deal with customers in a quick and transparent way. I think what I'm seeing from ALL users of today's DAWs is a disenchantment because these now bloated digital audio companies are way too inaccessible, and their customer service is often done by people who don't write code or use the DAW professionally - because they work for less money.

On a related note, the other day my internet customer service representative turned out to be working from Mumbai, India [sidebar: it was the day of that terror attack]. Having someone so remote and unfamiliar with my concerns gave me the feeling that I was being left to drift, alone, hoping that someone thousands of miles away might care, or even understand what I needed to get done. Luckily it's not the 20th century anymore. But in some ways, that's too bad, because quality and accountability were also once popular themes. Which brings me around to Reaper.

I keep wanting to talk about a new DAW called "Reaper" and I don't mean to offend anyone for sounding treasonous. But when I started looking for a new DAW I was taken by surprise by aspects of Reaper that seemed so out of place in today's hurried and buried world. One of them is the level of interaction between customers and developers. The other is an entirely original approach to recording that I have not seen in any other DAW.

The "buzz" surrounding Reaper is huge for a program that no one has heard of... But to show you where that program has already been - customizing GUI colors is part of the preferences menu. Furthermore, yesterday on their website I saw that a book is being written by a dedicated user/programmer to teach users how to further customize the look of the GUI.Now THAT'S flexibility. User Skins make the DAW experience PERSONAL! versus a remote "tough sh*t" attitude about what we have to stare at for many hours each day.

Add to that Reaper's constant updates, open forum alpha and beta testing, and the attentive interaction by the DAW programmers to all forum members, new or old, and I think that whatever MOTU does in the future may not affect me for very much longer.

That said, I'm working on a song that I began in Reaper and had to switch back to DP for just because I'm more familiar with the interface and implementation. Besides that, Reaper is still in Mac Beta and awaiting a burst of new features and improvements for the Mac in the coming months. So I'm hooked, but not quite ready to leave the comfort of my old surroundings. So in that sense, I'm also stuck, which makes the MOTU indifference seem that much more insulting. (Did anyone notice how quickly Nomad Factory jumped on the plugin problems me and Renaissance were having? It stands out because the owners care, and show it in a hands on way.)

James, I also tried out Logic Express recently and found it the furthest thing from intuitive. I'm surprised at how UN-MAC-LIKE it really is versus say a long-standing MAC appropriate app. like Photohop or something... Logic began on Windows, but so did Reaper. Yet with Reaper I was immediately able to work, explore, amuse and inspire myself with countless features that I have NEVER seen elsewhere or implemented in such a unique fashion.

If I can make any suggestion here today, it's to have DP users check out http://www.reaper.fm and dig around a bit. Read the first few pages of the PDF manual and you'll see what's coming - a new attitude, and a great new product. Then take heart in the fact that you will have not only the depth of DP to use in the future but also the promise of true innovation in a DAW that's written not just for the money, but for the adventure of attaining simple perfection and a sense of musical community.

At the very least, such options will put more power into the hands of people like myself who are still waiting for customer service or head office to actually give a sh*t. I have yet to hear "on the record" from MOTU as to there being any visual problem with the new DP 6.0 user interface, other than the new release having toned it down by a few degrees of glaring white. I also don't expect improvements in features that are well documented in the manual, but work poorly in the real world - such as time stretching, for instance. That would take away valuable time in adding newer features.

So is DP6 worth it? That verdict is still up in the air for many of us. But the fact that it's a hassle is not.

[James Steele]

Sounds like you guys are heading towards (short of advocating) an Open Source rewriting of DP - (with MOTU's approval, of course, since they are morphing into a company driven by profits from their Hardware?)

Hmmmm.... I'm not. I didn't mean to say anything of the kind. I just stated that MOTU is more diverse than simply having DP as their sole product.