pro tools 11

[warpie]

The problem with iLok is when you do location recordings. Personally, I don't like carrying it with me and also having to occupying one of my two USB ports. Also, if I'm not mistaken d***heads have already managed to crack iLok so I can't see the reason why iLok is more secure than other methods.

I'm also user of Max/MSP and I really like the fact that Cycling74 gives you the option for iLok or challenge response. I've been using the challenge respond option and it only takes me a few seconds to authorise the software on my new machines. I've changed three machines since I got Max/MSP and I never had a single problem. I would appreciate if Avid did the same.

AFAIK, Max/MSP has never been cracked but maybe this is down to the fact that not many people/hackers care about it (?)

ruairioflaherty, sorry if I sounded a bit harsh. It wasn't my intention  but I don't believe that liking/hating iLok has to do with the degree of professionalism.

 

[barclaycon]

So....ilok is great, Pro Tools is inexpensive, all the existing plugins will work on the new version, clients are only interested if you have the latest Avid hardware......
Anybody that criticizes PT or Avid is 'whining'...
Mmm

 

[MartyMart]

There are reasons why I call it "Poo Tools" .... and I am a professional user since PT4 !

Have PT10 and will stick there for a while.

MM.

 

[jplebre]

My issues about ilok:
not all software is on it. Therefore, it's purpose is defeated.

Otherwise, would be perfect solution specially with the ZDT offer.

for my stuff and the stuff at work on iloks - heaven! everything else it's been a pain.

 

[ruairioflaherty]

So....ilok is great, Pro Tools is inexpensive, all the existing plugins will work on the new version, clients are only interested if you have the latest Avid hardware......
Anybody that criticizes PT or Avid is 'whining'...
Mmm

It's all about perspective.

ilok is great - I think so

Pro Tools is inexpensive - For Pro Users yes I believe so, for everyone else it depends

All the existing plugins will work on the new version - Nobody said that here or elsewhere, it is not true

clients are only interested if you have the latest Avid hardware - I do not agree with this at all

Anybody that criticizes PT or Avid is 'whining' - I've grown tried of the constant negativity around the same old topics, it is swallowing the internet whole

A used Pro Tools 10 license is already very affordable, I would suggest camping out on that version while the changes around 11 shake out and get on with making records - does anyone really believe that Avid holds the keys to our ability to make great art or a good living??

 

[sr1200]

I would love to know about the "il0k hack". Ive been looking for years for something to clone an ilik just as a backup (since zdt for ilik really means we'll get back to you in less than a week.  I have no intention of using it for nafarious purposes, just a backup, just incase. (since i now have 4 of these dumb dongles layin around frOm buying things that cone with them)

 

[Andy Peters]

Am I the only one who hates ilok?  ;D

Clearly, you've never had to deal with FlexLM, or the ridiculous cloud-based clusterfuck Altium pushed on its users, or that weird dongle/license-key thing that Aldec pushed on its users ...

iLok does it right. If you need to use a license across different machines, you just plug in the iLok and it works. No need to have Internet access or futz with oddball license files, or worse, have to explain to a software vendor that you've had to move to a different workstation because the old one died before you could deallocate its license ..

About the only thing I can think of that iLok doesn't do is site licenses. And maybe it does, I just haven't looked.

-a

 

[ruairioflaherty]

cloud-based clusterf**k

Fantastic!  I want a T-Shirt with that on and I don't even look good in a T-Shirt.

 

[MartyMart]

I would love to know about the "il0k hack". Ive been looking for years for something to clone an ilik just as a backup (since zdt for ilik really means we'll get back to you in less than a week.  I have no intention of using it for nafarious purposes, just a backup, just incase. (since i now have 4 of these dumb dongles layin around frOm buying things that cone with them)

I had three of them, then bought an iLok2 and moved all the licenses on to the iLok2.
USB slots still get used up by Arturia dongle, Korg dongle, Reason dongle ......

M.

 

[Indecline]

What I love about PT11 is that all the old HD systems just keep getting cheaper  8)

I would much rather have an HD5 rig with mutiple 192's + cash than the newest PT Native system or HDX. I can't justify the price/performance difference between the newer and older systems to invest in the latest and greatest PT incarnation (in my case at least, tracking and mixing bands). Eventually I'll have to jump ship, but for now I'll just ride the coat tails of the latest legacy gear to hit the market.

 

[sr1200]

I was really tempted to do that. Once hdx was announced hd3 accel systems were going for under 3k in some instances.  One persons jump ship is anothers step up.

The only down side of being behind the "latest and greatest" is if you ever want to move up to the newest system, it gets to the point it is right now where the hardware is just no longer compatible with what is out there and winds up costing way more in the long run.

Dont know how much i trust avid saying that the current hardware will have a longer life cycle than the hd ios (blue face/192s). If they can squeeze the market, avid wouldnt hesitate to drop the hammer on us.

 

[ruairioflaherty]

Dont know how much i trust avid saying that the current hardware will have a longer life cycle than the hd ios (blue face/192s). If they can squeeze the market, avid wouldnt hesitate to drop the hammer on us.

The Blue 192io were Avid's flagship for just under 10 years, introduced in 2002.  I would say that's a pretty decent run for any piece of digital gear.

 

[jplebre]

Dont know how much i trust avid saying that the current hardware will have a longer life cycle than the hd ios (blue face/192s). If they can squeeze the market, avid wouldnt hesitate to drop the hammer on us.

The Blue 192io were Avid's flagship for just under 10 years, introduced in 2002.  I would say that's a pretty decent run for any piece of digital gear.

Not really. everyone knew that those interfaces where behind everything the competition had to offer.
unfortunately, most owners were stuck with that. But when brands like SSL, Apoggee, Prism, Lynx etc started bringing digi-link options, for most studio owners the option to abandon those were clear. I never did so much work like int the late 20xx upgrading studios to lynx, prism and others.

 

[pucho812]

yeah the 192's were fine when they were the only thing available and even then a lot of times there were used in digital I/O with another converter doing A/D and D/A.

the only reason they had such a run was because they were not bad but not great either. the real abandonment of he 192's came when other companies offered symmetrical  I/O in 16 channels and other amounts for around the same price as a 192.  symmetrical meaning same amount of input and output channels.

what really drives me nuts is how digi/avid bottlenecks the throughput  of the system when there is no need to do so other then they want you to buy a full HD/HDX system.

 

[sr1200]

@pucho  not sure what you mean by bottle necking...  My digi002 can handle more IO than my HDio's can simultaneously.  If anything the HD is bottlenecked.

(002 could simultaneously handle 18 channels of i/o, even though the HD I/O has something like 28 available io on the analog version, you can only use any given 16 at a time)

 

[jplebre]

32 I/O is not enough for a lot of applications. Which is the top limit for HD1 and native (note, NOT HD|Native).
That's a bottleneck.

And if I'm saying that for 32 I/o, imagine 18I/o.
The 002 was probably the most complete option that poped up in the market. But was also more expensive than any of the competitors and was easily surpassed by other brands.

Products in the line of the 002 now offer 2 pairs of adat, spdif or aes, etc. 32i/o with USB works a charm and doesn't cost much more than the 002 did.

Also, the 002 digicore software was pretty limiting.

Digi/Avid "hardware requirements limitations" then the free for all crippled 32i/o are a bottleneck as well. The option is to spend another £4000 and upgrade to HD (software + core card), then another £3000 for the accel card for a miserable 64i/o

This is what's ridiculous. The software is the most comprehensive in the market for high end applications, but this crippling limitations are a test to the consumers patience and a joke!

Now, imagine, our 96i/o setups with 3x £3000 cards. We were forced to upgrade PCI to PCI-E. Then We paid a nice amount of money to upgrade to 9. Which in turn forced us to upgrade our HD/Sync. Now we have to upgrade to 11 which means HDX cards (replacing the above mentioned) plus the 11 software.

And still, we are talking of 96i/o setups.

Crippling? Much.

 

[sr1200]

I guess im just thinking differently on it.  If you're in need of more than 32 i/o then you're not a project or home studio which the vanilla PT options are meant for. If you're rolling a 96 channel board that you want to output 96 channels of audio to, again, you're above the intended class of user for that software, and if youre in that tier of users, your business model should be putting more than enough away to upgrade your core recording system every 10 years.  In addition, who was it that said if you need more than 24 tracks you're doing something wrong? lol jk.  Think of what the investment was to get 4 24 track machines to do the same 96 tracks.  Certainly way more than an HDX3 system with interfaces and the maintenance and tape costs would probably exceed that in a 10 year period.  Again, just a different point of view.  I never look at any of my gear (especially computer gear) as a buy it once and done.  It evolves just as techniques and styles change for the art, but just as in any other art things tend to go in circles.  (i remember about a decade ago where using analog gear for certain genres was looked DOWN upon, now its seen as the holy grail) You can never "win" haha. 8)

 

[jplebre]

your business model should be putting more than enough away to upgrade your core recording system every 10 years.

Yes, but Avid/Digi forced these kind of upgrades 3 times in the past 4 years.
I have one dubbing theatre, I hate to think about how the businesses that have "many" studios (eg. dubbing theatres) are doing.

Mind you, we have a training dubbing theatre. 96tracks is nothing! we have 2 machines like that in our theatre.

In addition, who was it that said if you need more than 24 tracks you're doing something wrong? lol jk.  Think of what the investment was to get 4 24 track machines to do the same 96 tracks. 

You forget:
- Location recording of large broadcast events
- Music location recordings on multi-stage/multi-artist situations
- Post production/movie mixing
- Large theatres/shows

Recording studio - yeah 24i/o is more than enough - eg. "learn to bounce"/"You are doing something wrong" etc.

I've was somewhat involved in some setups for some large blockbusters that hit the theatre last december. The channel count on one of them was over 500 tracks.


-----

Thinking of music stuff: small businesses, single/multi facility recording studios, freelance mixing engineers, etc.
Summing - people that don't need those fancy multi-system integration and synchronization facilities and advanced workflow integration and god-send ammounts of I/O.

People that record some bands and that 24i/o at one given time is plenty to cover 99% of the situations.

1 - Protools is not cheap. Reaper is free, cubase is cheaper, etc. So why be the most expensive option and being so limited/cripling?
2 - Myself, after getting used to advanced automations (comprehensive "write to", snapshot, preview), VCA faders, and what avid calls "advanced editing features" I don't think I could go back
3 - Loosing the option of the input monitoring

Yes this for me is very cripling. Avid's giving me a choice - loose a £1k bundle that I paid for, or pay and extra $600 (price to be confirmed) to keep the above features.
Ok I should keep some money for upgrades - which I do - but why should I pay for my features again?

Do you see my "grief"?

Yes I could change for Cubase. Still, most of the important works I interface with are with PT.
Most VIP clients are PT
PT still deals better with OMF than any of the competition.
My workflow is about 1000x better on protools (I'm sort of called "Ninja" by my clients) - this means bugger all, as I could always re-learn, but it's time consuming and taking steps back.

The not-update option? Not an option. AVID is making sure of that.
In fact, I did not update to 10 and my life has been a living hell. Clients are sending me PTX files and the amount of bugs is unbelievable. I HAD to update. I was forced to. 11 will do that even more so.

 

[jplebre]

@SR1200, nothing against you bro

It just it's proven AVID listens to the forumites across the webs' more than it does their client/support emails.

 

[sr1200]

No offense taken, I love a good debate.  If you're at 10 now, you should be good for quite some time.  The file format isnt changing for 11 (ptx is it for now).  Not quite sure what you mean by bugs, ive had to swap between ptf and ptx sessions dozens of times and haven't had an issue with anything.  I would be interested to hear about what isn't working btw as I have associates that have mentioned problems with this as well.

AFAIK, the 9 to 10 was the only file format change, and 10-11 is the only hardware update change thats happened since, geeze forever ago.  From what I've read, the 192 intefaces will still work with 11, there just will be some things (like heat, and other things I personally would never use) that wouldn't be available to 192 and 96 users.

The cards, yes, kaput, but they were long in the tooth as it was. 

I will agree with you 110% about the toolkit fiasco.  As someone that owns a vanilla license with the toolkit as well as an HD license, I take it as a slap in the face (or wallet) that those that owned the toolkit get nothing (as of right now... there are rumors around this may change) for their investment.