Reaktor 6.5.0: Beta phase has started

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

Thanks a lot @Paule

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

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.

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...

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.