Is KK3 Prime Time Ready yet?

Well since you're going to be verbose in your response I'll return the favor.

In a way I was being facetious in my original response due to the nature of a number of responses (including yours) that suggested they could have corrected a minor deficiency in functionality during a Beta test. Of course you have to have users involved at some point in Beta testing. I've never had a product that didn't use both open and closed Betas. The difference being that closed Betas are closely monitored by assigned people who work throughout the Beta with specific pre-qualified user organizations in a very systematic and scheduled manner. But my statement still stands as to the "unbreakable" rules of software development cycle of planning, development, testing and delivery. Beta testing is always about two things. Stability and collection of future feature enhancements. To be more specific, Betas are typically run by Testing Management under the guidance of Product Management whereas feature development and bug fixes are run by Development Management under the guidance of Program (Project) Management. In a typical versioned product release, the majority of resources from Product Management start organizing toward the next release with a smaller portion of resources allocated toward stability fixes and maintenance releases while both Product Management and Program Management begin to organize toward the NEXT versioned release of the product.

Ableton appears to be organized in this way with the exception that they are MUCH more open and conversant about their maintenance releases than NI but still as protected in their communications regarding the next versioned release as is NI for obvious competitive reasons. I would agree with you in that NI appears to not be as disciplined as Ableton in either it's structure or approach. But there's no doubt that both companies have the same regard and understanding about what a development cycle consists of which generally follows a specific cycle of 1) envisioning and resource scoping of what will be included in the next release, 2) planning the release including the features, resources required and ultimate timing of the release followed by 3) development and internal milestone testing of the release and once they reach the functionality complete milestone is achieved it's released to 4) Testing which includes final internal testing and Beta testing which results in product release. And that's why your insinuation that some feature that wasn't there and brought up in public Beta testing could easily be fixed in 5 minutes. Understanding the dependencies and impact of a new feature on the code base is entirely different than understanding the dependencies and impact of a bug fix.

I have no idea how organized or disorganized NI is in their product development discipline, but I can say there have been many instances that suggest they're still struggling with it such as those you've mentioned. I think they're beginning to see the value of better communication with their user base but they've still got a long way to go to match Ableton. Of course the size of the user base dictates much of this sort of thing. My experience is in working on software releases that have literally millions of users being affected in both corporate and individual usage worldwide. But I've also seen many nightmares as I was often assigned in the field to help various Fortune 500 companies correct their internal product development problems so nothing really surprises me..other than the naivety of end users that don't understand the required discipline it takes to launch a product release.

I think the real real issue is the discrepancy between NIs hardware and software. I don't have a problem with them charging premium for premium-built products, and I do think they're still in the top few percent when it comes to that. All hardware products I've used - Maschine, Kontrol, Traktor Controllers - have always been built to high standards and are just getting better. Apart from the Push 3, I don't have one single piece of gear in my studio that's built like the Kontrol mk3, it's phenomenal.

Problem is: hardware is just one part of the equation with these kind of products. They're all basically computers in a box, to varying degrees. And when you pay the premium, the software has to hold up to the same standards as the hardware. Now NI never promised features like MIDI Templates or on-device play assist to be ready when mk3 launched, however, these features were heavily implied by the way the product was presented and by the feature history of preceding products (mk1 and mk2, that is). It's a bit like if Ableton (to stay with the vibe of this thread) introduced Push 3 standalone, praising it's MPE pads, just for the user to find out that the MPE pads don't work in standalone mode. Oh and by the way, you can't color clips now anymore. Push 2 could, but on Push 3, naah… we'll do that "soon", so at least a year from now. Imagine that outrage.

Customers buy NIs products because they are great hardware-wise, and when the software can't keep up with that, they get mad. If features existed and suddenly don't in a newer software version, they get mad. If a framework is being created that strongly implies something to work which then doesn't, they get mad. Doesn't matter if you promised those things to work or not. Simple as that. And I'm not saying that's fair or whatever, that's just how it is.

Thank you for levelsetting our attention spans. Here's my answer to your question:

I was legitimately simply asking if the KK3 software, as is, is stable enough to use in professional workflows.

Yes, I believe it is. But if you CAN'T SPARE THE TIME to work through issues, then I would recommend that you hold off for the next update, which will likely arrive sometime in September or October.

I share the frustration of a lack of new features but, for my needs, the MK1 still gives me 90% of the functionality that I want! And paired with KK 2.9 it’s incredibly stable. That said, I DO want to upgrade to take advantage of the new features.

Okay, so this is the time for me to mention to you that you should be aware that there is at least one manufacturer problem. Not with the MK3, no. With some computer systems! You see, some manufacturer (or manufacturerS; I don't know for certain) that have certain motherboard, cpu, or other issues happening on some limited number of computers. NI can't say due to NDA, and we don't have enough data points to be able to say at this time. So if you have that combination, you could have problems.

If you do and you do, then we'll be keenly interested in knowing EVERYTHING about your computer, so that we can put 2 and 2 together and maybe figure out which manufacturer(s) are out of spec and/or hiding behind NDA.

If it works for you, great; you're off to the races. But if it doesn't, then maybe you can help us figure this out.

Okay, 'nuff said on that.

Well a lot of that will depend on what you deem to be "professional workflows". I consider much of what I do to fall into that category but I know there are others with much deeper needs than me. But I tend to get a new project about every other week and each one takes at least two days and sometimes more depending on the complexity. My projects range from full orchestras to bare minimum guitar, bass, drums, keys and everything in between and music styles cover pretty much the full range of more popular music. Everything is done with NI or compatible libraries through my S88MK3 which I got in January of this year. I have a pretty complete inventory of libraries ranging from cinematic multi-layered synths and samplers, a bunch of different acoustic and electric pianos, to brass, woodwinds, strings, specialized percussion, a number of different guitars and various specialty items like harps, pedal steel, fiddle, harmonica, several ethnic instrument collections, choirs and vocal ensembles and others I've probably forgotten about. For my work it's been about as stable as any other equipment I own, so I'm never slowed down by it. But I certainly know people out there doing much more complex things than what I'm doing.

To be honest I haven't really been bothered by the graphics since I have dual 27" monitors so I can easily move thing out of the way when I'm working in a cluttered environment and still have easy access to it.

For myself the last update to Komplete finally got most everything I'd heard about stabilized, but then I really hadn't had many of those issues in the first place. I personally haven't found a lot of use for the new templates feature, but I suspect I'll probably get more use out of the keyboard hosted play assist and arp when it's released.