Reaktor 6.5.0: Beta phase has started

I‘d argue it’s better you request getting added to the beta project. You don’t have to install the beta, but you get access to the discussions, bug reports etc., and nobody has to potentially break the NDA.

I think blowing it up and/or having the ability to scale the interface for larger monitors would be primary and essential. Second, would be for the Hi-DPI.

I'm noticing already that the Reaktor 6.5 interface is resizable which is great. But it's the same behavior as Kontakt 7. Even though the window may technically resize, the main interface (buttons, menus, text, etc) does not resize. And most of the instruments also load very small.

Good examples of companies/products doing Scaling well are u-he (e.g. Diva, Repro, etc.) & Arturia (e.g. Analog Lab V). Both offer "Scale" options in the preferences/menus by fixed amounts and up to 200%.

xfer Serum acts like u-he and Arturia, except it is also resizable by dragging the sizing handle in the lower right corner. Some of the interface elements scale with the drag. Other elements of the interface turn off/disappear during resize, then redraw when you release the handle.

It's my opinion that NI absolutely needs this behavior in all products. It's not uncommon for people to have 27" monitors now with 1440p graphics.

Hope it helps!

Dave

1440p @ 27" looks identical to 1080p @ 24.5", so the people using those monitors are really not going to be bothered much, if at all, by the current UI sizing. If you run at any scaling beyond 150% or so, then you're basically below 1080p (in terms of content load on the display) and this is a complete non-issue.

The UI sizing is more crucial for people running 27-32" UHD monitors with fairly low scaling settings (125-175% on Windows 11, for example) to get lots of screen real estate on these sharp display panels.

On those displays, the small UI controls are instantly problematic. Some of the REAKTOR-based instruments and practically unusable in those scenarios (as is Massive, FM8, Absynth, and a number of the FX that still haven't gotten UI Scaling added to them - esp. those developed by Softube).

It works. Developers get to choose what SDK they use for their application UIs. Using a bit of foresight helps in that area. Assume CPUs and GPUs will get faster, display rasters will get larger, etc. With those assumptions, you intuitively make better choices when designing these areas of an application.

Without them, you design for what the "Standard" is at that time and end up in a situation where your software is becoming increasingly unusable to increasing amounts of people who upgrade their hardware.

There is no point getting a UHD display onkly to run it at such a scaling that it's effectively a 1080p monitor, simply because some developers didn't think ahead when designing this stuff.

I upgraded my computer recently, coming from a mid-2012 macbook pro to a 2021 M1 pro with Retina screen, and even on my relatively small 16 inches screen, I was quite amazed by the pixelated look of Kontakt and Reaktor. Since I updated, I truly could see the pixels, and comparison with the other plugins I use was cruel for NI (I don't know of any other plugin I use with such an issue).

This said, I don't think it's a very important update : I would prefer to have soon some native Apple Silicon update, and maybe some code optimization so Reaktor is more stable and lighter on CPU (I'm amazed at the optimizations that went with Arturia's and u-he's synths in the last years, even on old chips). Of course it could be nice to have an UI resolution update, but given the state of the NI ressources allocated to updating Reaktor, I don't think it's the priority and I don't think NI will ask us what we want to update next.

Actually, an ergonomic reface could be much more useful : Reaktor has some seriously painful issues with the GUI, some simple to fix, some more complex, like the search window that comes from the 90's, when you need to manage precisely the output level, when you want to automate some knobs (and can't) or when you loose the left window infos because the ensemble you are loading is very small and the window adapts stupidely without letting you a minimal screen size...