Reaktor 6.5.0: Beta phase has started

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  • chk071
    chk071 Member Posts: 540 Pro
    https://community.native-instruments.com/discussion/comment/52807#Comment_52807

    ... and how many different resolutions, scaling options and DPI you have to cater to in the future...

  • janpeeters
    janpeeters Member Posts: 21 Member

    Does anyone know which instrument is displayed at the top of @Georg_NI's first post? Thanks!

  • Paule
    Paule Member Posts: 1,314 Expert
    edited March 2023

    It's Solar Loop Echo from U/L

    https://www.native-instruments.com/de/reaktor-community/reaktor-user-library/entry/show/13777/

    by Jörg Holzamer

  • janpeeters
    janpeeters Member Posts: 21 Member

    Thanks a lot @Paule

  • srcinvsbl
    srcinvsbl Member Posts: 5 Member

    Any updates happening to the Sample Map Editor? This time please? Please?

  • srcinvsbl
    srcinvsbl Member Posts: 5 Member

    Scaling window for vsti would be nice too. Please and thanks 😊

  • Thasniayoob
    Thasniayoob Member Posts: 2 Newcomer

    Announcing start of Beta phase for January 2023 — Community. Welcome to the new and improved Native Instruments online community.

  • Calagan
    Calagan Member Posts: 187 Advisor
    edited March 2023

    I spent (again) half a day yesterday updating an old session so it can open in Apple Silicon Native.

    It went fluently with any other plugin I have, but with Reaktor it became a total mess, and I think I can share my experience here so (maybe) someone in the NI direction team will hear about that and take some decision for the next update...

    • In order to run this old session with Ableton Live in native AS mode, I needed to replace each Reaktor VST plugin I was using with an AU version. (the only other brand I had issues with was Sonimus : I just needed to replace the Satson instances I had in this session, and it took me only 10 mn in total)
    • In order to do that, I've got 2 options :
    • First option : I save the ensemble for each Reaktor instance, then reopen it with an AU version of Reaktor. So I keep every setting (and especially the volume output) but I need to keep each .ens file with my session : with around 15 instances of Reaktor, it starts to be ridiculous to be obliged to keep 750mo of .ens files only so I can save the volume output of my Reaktor instance (especially that I didn't modificate the original ensembles files and kept the factory structure). Another issue I had with this option : for some strange reason, Reaktor was not finding the wav file associated with the Form ensembles I was saving : so each time I was loading the session, the faulty Reaktor instances (I had 5 or 6 Form instances in the session) were silent and I needed to open them, read the error message, then locate the factory wav file (that was located in the normal factory Form wav sources) and do this for each faulty instance. Saving the session was not helping : each time I was opening it, I had the same issue. Absolutely ridiculous when you just use the factory ensemble without any modification !
    • Second option, I save the preset for each Reaktor Instance. This option has 2 issues. The first one : when you are actually using a Block factory ensemble, you need to find the original ensemble and it's not easy (the navigation panel in Reaktor doesn't inform you about what stuff you are using). It can take maybe 15 minutes to navigate in the whole Block factory folder to find the good ensemble, apply the saved preset to it and compare both versions to be sure it's the same stuff. Then, when you compare the original VST Reaktor to your new AU Reaktor, you find that the volume output is different. But there's no numeric indication of this bloody outpout !!! Ok, you can modificate the ensemble and add a little block that indicate the output volume (like it was told to me in this forum's thread), but come on : it takes ages if you need to do that for 15 different Reaktor ensemble, and then you've got a modificate ensemble that leads you back to the first option (if I'm not wrong)...
    • I took me maybe 3 hours experimenting with the first option, finding it sucks because I can't imagine archiving 750mo of .ens files for each old session I have, then trying to find a way with the second option. In order to equal the volume output in my new AU instances, I needed to use a plastic ruler on my screen to place the little triangle in the same place on the GUI (can you imagine such a stupidity), then I was verifying with a level meter that I had similar level (and it's not easy when you use an ensemble so deeply modulated it never sounds the same each time you launch it).

    In conclusion, could you please fix that aberration in the next Reaktor update ? I don't think it's a huge work to just add a numeric value that's easy to check on the output volume slider. Even better, add a value you can change by clicking right on it and entering a number with your keyboard (like in most plugins). Especially that NI is the only one plugin dev that forces me to do these kind of absurd fixes in order to open some old sessions : NI switches from VST Intel to VST3 (or AU) Apple Silicon and no VST anymore, so there's no way you can re-open old sessions if you worked (like me) ony with VST instances of Reaktor and happen to update your computer.

    This same kind of absurdity repeats with each update of Reaktor or Kontakt : when opening a session full of Reaktor 5 or Kontakt 5 instances, you need to repeat the same absurdity, replacing 5 with 6, if you want to be sure your sessions will open in 3 years without being obliged to install old non compatible plugins...

    And it's even more crazy : I noticed there are some fresh updates for some FX NI plugins. But now, they don't run with OS previous to Mac OS 11, so I will not be able to install them on my old Intel mac running Catalina (that I keep specially for these kind of absurd situations).

    NI was always the reason I was obliged to update my OS (when I didn't't want to) because they never support old OS : we speak now about an OS released in october 2019 that is not anymore supported ! It's a 3 years old OS !!!

    And at the same time, they are the latest in the whole plugin business to update their plugins to the most recent technology that was released in november 2020, a little bit more than 2 years ago. It's quite a small window of operation IMHO...

    I think the NI direction needs to know how much they irritate their users and how much their update policy is absurd.

  • iNate
    iNate Member Posts: 219 Advisor
    edited March 2023

    3 year old OS that isn't even supported by the developer isn't really a great support target for the company developing the products. Typically, developers drop support as Microsoft or Apple drops support for those OS revisions.

    I see no problem with that.

    Telling users that it isn't supported has historically not been enough to stop them from wasting support resources on problems that potentially can't even be addressed by the developer. The only reliable option to avoid this wasteful experience is to simply drop support and forbid installing on the unsupported OS.

    That is fine as long as the developer serves up the latest supported version to the users on those OSes and make it clear that those OS revisions are unsupported platforms.

    The age of the OS is not relevant here. What' relevant is that the OS is unsupported by Apple, so any issues that arise that require Apple to make changes to rectify it cannot be solved, and it isn't worth putting resources towards developing those workarounds for those users, as any Mac that cannot update beyond Catalina is probably around a decade old, anyways.

    That's the cost of running such an old system. Yes, it sucks... but the fact that you use it does not oblige developers to waste resources supporting it.

  • Calagan
    Calagan Member Posts: 187 Advisor
    edited March 2023

    This sounds like madness to me.

    But maybe the words I used were a bit misleading : I don't speak about "support" as "fixing any problem that could occur or being sure it's fully compatible", I speak about the impossibility to even install new plugins on a mac running an OS that is 3 years old (when the NI stuff is not even fully compatible with the last one). Just because Native Access doesn't let you even try it...

    How is it possible that NI is the only one dev I know with such small window of operation OS wise ?

    And like I already said, NI was always the reason I was obliged to update my OS, when every other brand was okay with running 2 or 3 years old OS (and as a pro user, I thinkthat an 18 months old OS is the best compromise on mac for being sure everything is running fine : the last OS available is always buggy).

    I've got around 400 plugins installed on my mac. These plugins come from 53 different brands. On these 53 brands, absolutely NONE prohibit you to install their stuff on an Intel Mac running Catalina. But NI !

    On these 53 brands, the only ones that are not fully Apple Silicon Native are :

    • Reason Studio
    • Kush
    • Sonimus
    • TC Electronic (a lot of their stuff is abandonware since they were bought by Behringer)
    • Native Instruments
    • few stuff from Plugin Alliance (like some Lindell plugins)

    Absolutely none of these brands is prohibiting the installation of their plugins on a mac running Catalina...

    So it's not about wasting ressources about supporting (3 years) old OS. It's about making your life harder when the purpose of professional tools is to make it easier.

    EDIT : and by the way, my main gripe is about Reaktor and the absurd workflow it forces you to accept in order to ensure recalling of old sessions in the future... Again, NI is the only dev I know (among the 53 I use) that is such a mess regarding future proof session recall...

  • Kubrak
    Kubrak Member Posts: 3,033 Expert

    3 year old OS that isn't even supported by the developer isn't really a great support target for the company developing the products. 

    Well, OS is supported, I guess. On x86. Apple Silicon is not yet. And it has obvious reason. Reaktor is not just ordinary plugin. It is compiler from Reaktor symbolic language (ensemble) to target maschine code of given CPU.

    NI has to do two things, make it run on AS and make it create/compile good maschine code for AS that runs reliably, without dropouts.

  • Dave Schulze
    Dave Schulze Member Posts: 16 Member
    https://community.native-instruments.com/discussion/comment/52453#Comment_52453

    I'm not concerned with it being hi-res when it scales, just that it CAN scale. I run 1440p at 27" and sit just over 2 feet away from my monitor. I love being able to scale my VSTs to almost full screen sometimes.

    Now that (as of today) Arturia works in KK (VST3), I'm happy that I can scale it because Arturia and u-he will allow me to scale the loaded VST as large as I want, but it still kind sucks that I can't scale or resize any of the NI stuff or that the interface scales.

    I can tell you that my 46yo eyes, need them bigger and I love having a 27" monitor.

  • iNate
    iNate Member Posts: 219 Advisor

    Arturia has been working in KK for months. I’m not sure why they keep putting that in the patch notes. Lol

  • Kymeia
    Kymeia NKS User Library Mod Posts: 4,727 mod
    https://community.native-instruments.com/discussion/comment/57724#Comment_57724

    Not via the NKS for VST3 - that’s new

  • EvilDragon
    EvilDragon Moderator Posts: 1,028 mod
    https://community.native-instruments.com/discussion/comment/56979#Comment_56979

    Ableton needs to support VST3 migration capability. Then you wouldn't need to do any manual work, old VST2 instances would port seamleslly to latest version VST3 plugins. NI has implemented VST3 migration for Reaktor and Kontakt (and it works in Maschine, KK and Cubase 12 so far) but it is moot if the host doesn't support it. Holler @ Ableton to do something about this.

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