Beta testing for Waldorf

[Kriminal]

Its not your forum, users can post what the like.

[chk071]

If you have specific problems concerning Waldorf products besides contacting Waldorf support a good idea would be contacting me (e.g. by PM) instead of starting "rants" like e.g. this thread.

Sure, but what had this to do with the intention of the OP starting this thread?

What is his intention other than make Waldorf bad in a public forum? The usual way to inform the company of bugs, and asking them to fix them, would be to contact them. That's constructive. This is destructive. But the usual way of doing things here, so i'm not surprised at all. Much more fun to rant on teh internet, instead of making something useful with your time.

[Ingonator]

If you have specific problems concerning Waldorf products besides contacting Waldorf support a good idea would be contacting me (e.g. by PM) instead of starting "rants" like e.g. this thread.

Sure, but what had this to do with the intention of the OP starting this thread?

What is his intention other than make Waldorf bad in a public forum? The usual way to inform the company of bugs, and asking them to fix them, would be to contact them. That's constructive. This is destructive. But the usual way of doing things here, so i'm not surprised at all. Much more fun to rant on teh internet, instead of making something useful with your time.

This is exactly my point.

As someone officially related to Waldorf oen of my tasks is to offer help fixig bugs (or at least forwarding the problems to the right people) but threads like this are not helpful IMO.

What's even worse for me as someone who had spent a lot of his time with bug fixes (especially for the Waldorf plugin updates) recently it is odd that such a thread is started at a time when Waldorf is publishing multiple updates for different products.


Ingo

[chk071]

Apart from that, if i'm not ok with a product, be it buggy, or in any other way displeasing to me, i bring it back, and when it's my impression that the company is to blame for bad quality, then i stop buying from that company. When i buy a microwave, and it's not working, and the company isn't able to fix it, i bring it back, i don't go online and cry my heart out about it. That's really a weird behavior.

[PHassan]

Im not trying to troll here but i have a right to express my view.
To me, blofeld now is where it should be in the first place when it was released. I agree that waldorf finally understood how to treat customers but not so long ago there was zero hope, people starting petitions etc. And now you expect people to just forget about it ? my single post wont change people perception towards waldorf.

[chk071]

my single post wont change people perception towards waldorf.

Maybe not, but i've read things like "Due to the reputation of company XY i retreated from buying any of their products" as if KVR reputation would be the indicator of what a company is like. Not even internet reputation in general is an indicator of that. I read a lot here about how bad the support of another company is here, but when i needed the support of said company, it was absolutely flawless. I don't doubt that Waldorf has to catch up on certain things, them concentrating on bug fixes now, and hiring beta testers is showing that. But i wonder what posts like yours will achieve? Why not list some bugs you encountered, and send them to Ingo, so he can forward them to Waldorf? I mean, you're right at the source here, how much better can it get? I just wonder if they have much time now while working on the several software updates. I think that's also a frequent general false assumption here, that companies in this business are so large, and have such a manpower, that they can work simultaneously on everything.

[kmonkey]

Im not trying to troll here but i have a right to express my view.
To me, blofeld now is where it should be in the first place when it was released.

You do realize you just pointed out how things works in software since from beginning of software era for EVERY developer EVER existed. Starting from Operating system developers such as Microsfot and Apple etc, huge and tiny application develoeprs and so on.

There was NEVER i mean literally NEVER in existence of our world - some software which was "right there" upon release. Even the most stable DAW (i think people at KVR think Reason is most stable) have revision, updates and bug fixing.

So sorry if you did not get that "thing" about software already but if you did then you are just trolling and whining man.

And quite honestly i don't get your point. If you think that Blofeld now (by your opinion) is where it should be right from the start - what do you want? Do you really have so much time to whine here? Ahhh i see now when i reread your thread....you feel entitled to learn Waldorf how to treat customers...

Oh well...why did i expected something more original...

[Compyfox]

Im curious what you guys think about it...

Don't touch hosts, VSTi and VST plugins then.


BTW:
My Kurzweil K2000 is still on v1.00 Calvin, and aside form "aging issues" (one of the outputs is louder than the other), it's still working like it should. And while we're on it, "upgrading" that thing was not just handled through a simple USB connection and a self-running installer - like it is done at this day and age.

[bluedad]

Im curious what you guys think about it...

Don't touch hosts, VSTi and VST plugins then.


BTW:
My Kurzweil K2000 is still on v1.00 Calvin, and aside form "aging issues" (one of the outputs is louder than the other), it's still working like it should. And while we're on it, "upgrading" that thing was not just handled through a simple USB connection and a self-running installer - like it is done at this day and age.

My Waldorf Microwave XT is still working flawlessly, too.

[Aural Chaos]

The consensus on FB, Waldorf's own forum and the Waldorf mailing list is that there are STILL bugs in the latest Blofeld OS, the one that was years in the making. Or years in the ignoring.

I enjoy my Blofeld, and in fact recommend it to others. It is also a fact that it is the buggiest piece of music gear I've ever owned.

[Shy]

Keep in mind that you're talking about relatively very stable software. Even some of the most "high-end" audio production-related digital hardware, like Eventide's DSP7500/Orville (software version 3) and even H7600/H8000 (software version 5.6), have SO MANY BUGS, you don't even want to know, and yet they're still used by many people and considered the best, because not only is there no better alternative, there is no alternative that comes anywhere near it. That's the key point. And that's not stuff that's been in development for a couple of years, but for over TWENTY years.

The complaints about bugs and usability issues are valid, and if you're so pissed by the problems that you don't feel it's worth it, then say it and/or do something about it if possible, BUT, some people try to make it seem as if Waldorf is a bad company that doesn't care about its users. I understand why someone may feel that, if some bug is too serious for them and hasn't been solved for years. It's true that quality control has not been good enough, and that's a valid complaint, but no one can seriously claim that it has been their intention to "use all their users as beta testers" or something like that. At most, maybe they've felt that something is still worth releasing despite some known bugs, but that doesn't count as malicious intent. It's a company that has released some unique synthesizers that have no real alternative in hardware, which are far more complex than most hardware instruments, with far more features, and they're bound to have far more errors.

It's very tough for a company to even survive in the very limited and specialized field of business Waldorf is in, let alone be successful. Resources are very limited and everything considered, we (including me, even if I don't really like most of their current hardware) should be thankful that companies like that even exist nowadays and produce unique instruments that no one else even has what's necessary to produce, which is technical skill and talent (Pulse 2 is actually a very nice sounding and -musical- instrument, that's not something to take lightly) as well as business management and financial capability (you know how insane it is to manufacture hardware in this scale, for a small company?). Companies like Yamaha and Roland which make things like "workstations" (huge amount of different features) have far more resources and aim at different and larger markets (and yet they're entering the more "niche" markets lately). Those products have always had many bugs, but today updates/fixes are much easier. Access's Virus TI synths are another example of products that have been very popular for a long time, despite the fact that they've had countless bugs as well, because they have no real alternative. Always in progress.

[Aural Chaos]

When you have a product whose current OS version is A BETA VERSION for two years ( as was the case with the Blofeld until recently), then you can forgive someone for saying that the company used its customers as beta testers. Except if they actually were beta testing, the company would have been interested in their bug reports and responsive to implementing fixes.

[Shy]

The latest version of something can even be "pre-alpha", but if it fixes bugs that the last "stable" version has and you choose to use it, you still don't necessarily count as a tester. The decision to name it "beta" was just to prevent anyone from holding Waldorf responsible for their Blofeld's functionality getting ruined, compared to the non-beta release, because of it. They knew it wasn't clean enough, and had they not named it "beta", you'd get complaints that they didn't, so either way, you have complaints, because there are bugs either way and because a company hasn't been confident enough to claim either version of their software is actually "stable".

[EvilDragon]

Nobody forced you to use the beta OS if you don't want to.

[kmonkey]

edit: nevermind