Version 1 had a couple bugaboos, a couple FR's needed - but it worked. Note, the last time I used it was on OS 10.8 and Logic 9.1.8 - since then I went to reason for 18 months, and now back to logic.. First purchase in so long, and such a nightmare. And i was SO excited to get it too:(
This is a long post but right now i strongly advise against any yosemite/logicX users even *considering* this purchase. I have reproduced it on two machines.. My old sandy bridge laptop with OS 10.9 and Logic 10.2, and my 7 day old retina MBP OS 10.10.5 and logic 10.2. Super fast flash drive, 900GB free space, barely anything installed. These steinberg bugfests are just, well bugfests. I will categorically say right now, that this is the most bug ridden suite of virtual instruments I have bought in years, if not ever, and they are a disgrace in their current form, especially in this day and age of relative general stability in DAWs.
1) First I installed hypnotic dance. Zero presets would appear in the dedicated hypnotic browser in the AU version. Only the default "trance chord" preset. That's IT.
I then launched HD in cubase, and the presets appeared there. Then relaunched in logic, and now they are there in the AU!
Conclusion: The only way to get the presets to "generate" is to open them in a vst3 host first. If you are buying the AU for logic only, you will never be able to get the HypnoticDance presets, which is the entire point of Hypnotic Dance - the 300 presets. So do NOT buy hypnotic dance as a standalone instrument if you plan to use it only in Logic. You have been warned. Triebwerk and Dark Planet showed their presets correctly. They have other issues though.....
2) Random crashes of all Halion based stuff in Logic. Usually happens after you have had a padshop or retrologue in a project, then move to a halion based instrument. Whether Halion 5, triebwerk, Hypnotic, etc - they will always eventually crash at some point on insertion if you are using other steinberg stuff. Insert, instacrash - logic POOF.
I have reproduced over 2 dozen crashes already (and saved 5 of the dumps in notepad and PM'd Guillermo - but that PM was written way before i had so many crashes, as initially i thought it was only triebwerk that had the issue, but it's triebwerk, Hypnotic, Dark Planet and Halion 5. Curiously, Halion SONIC seems fairly stable - in Logic).
So why not just use halion sonic to load the Triebwerk etc patches for now you ask?
BECAUSE - drumroll - in their wisdom they decided not to give HS left/right arrows for preset browsing, and unlike cubase you just cant load with up/down on the KB either with the AU, you have to press return for every preset load - and then it takes away focus from the logic qwerty midi, so every single preset loaded, you have to click back on the logic midi KB to play it. If you are using a laptop without a midi controller, that is.
It gets worse, much worse - Only halion FULL shows all the presets - halionsonic in cubase OR Logic now shows 773 presets IN TOTAL LMAO!, halionsonic SE has over 3,000 (but SE is cubase only, no AU), and halion FULL has 5835 (with *all* AVST2 libraries installed). At one point it showed over 6,000 but it has never gone back there. W T F is that about? Another glitch?
Why are so many presets not available in Halion Sonic anymore? But all the included ones from Halion SE are still there? IS this a bug, or by design, that the installer makes it that you need to instantiate Halion full to play most of the Halion Sonic Sounds, once it has been installed?
Like for example, open halion sonic, pick triebwerk as a category, 0 available. Same with Dark Planet. But Hypnotic Dance has the full 300 available in Halion Sonic. All three of these libraries have their full content available in Halion Sonic SE! WTF! But not in the full hailon sonic 2! WTF!
Switch to using the dedicated instruments for dark planet and triebwerk themselves, and all presets are available as listed in the specs. Switch to halion full, and load triebwerk or dark planet, and ditto. All presets available.
Halion Sonic has been completely stripped to bare shells of what it was before install of Halion 5.And unable to load most of the presets of most of the halion player libraries.
So my question is - Should this be how it is? And if not, does there have to be a particular exact install order? steinberg, please tell me.
Furthermore, when i click on support i get the prompt to talk to local distributor. Yeah right, like they will have even the faintest *clue* how to help me. All they are there to do is sell.
So I am writing it here.
3) Left / right preset browser arrows on all the AU library players (strings, dark, hypnotic, triebwerk) but NOT on Halion Sonic or Halion full. And Halion sonic is the only one that doesn't crash, but will only load 773 of the 5835 presets. Mind you, that same problem exists in Cubase also - only halion full can now see all the sounds.
4) Cpu is very high on a macbook pro 2.8ghz quad haswell, 1tb flash, 16gb ram. At least 3x that of Kontakt 5. Playing a few chords of the heavier patches eats almost an entire thread in logic.
5) Groove Agent 4 full version is completely broken, in both logic AND Cubase. Click the preset browser, and you see all the presets appear momentary, then vanish to blank. Not one single kit exists to load. If you then load groove agent SE in it’s place, Cubase crashes. Logic crashes with Groove agent 4 full version quite regularly. Completely and utterly unusable in every sense of the word.
6)Halion Sonic 2 crashes Cubase on exit. Halion SE is ok.
And to think I had planned to use this set as my main composition set of instruments.
They SOUND great, don't get me wrong. But the only ones that don't crash in logic are padshop/retrologue and halion sonic, all three with terrible AU browser functionality, and Halion Sonic missing 90% of presets. The others even randomly crash Cubase!
Honestly I am beside myself. This post may seem dramatic to you, but I am unemployed and cannot just throw away $300, and i also now strongly regret my cubase upgrade. And I spent so long downloading these on an adsl connection, and now if i can't get it working, because of my OCD i will want to reformat and reinstall from scratch rather than remove them all, which will take 24 + hrs to reinstall logic again with all it's banks. I mean if they don't fix it, i am just going to get rid of everything “steinberg" as i am really THAT annoyed. Lesson learned, as soon as logic and banks are installed, and nothing else, make a HD clone.
The main issue? I bet Steinberg *won't* fix it, well, not the AU's.
They have proven with the state of their AU's, that it is a joke platform to them. Guillermo assures me otherwise but i refuse to believe it. prove me wrong! it is hard to believe they even had a decent beta test on this. How could they miss so many fundamental, essential issues? I am sure they will fix the vst3 versions though.
Besides the crashes, i will ask Guillermo:
1) is there a specific order to install Absolute collection 2?
2) Is it normal for only Halion FULL to show all the available presets of all halion engine instruments, and for those that used to be visible in Halion Sonic 2, to suddenly not be available in it anymore?
3) If I keep this bundle will you take my report seriously and fix the crashes? Mind you without preset arrows on halion it is really painful to navigate - and that's not a big ask to add such a thing I would think.
4) Exactly how many presets, should show up in Halion 5 with the AVST2 collection installed? Is 5835 the correct number? How many should Halion Sonic2 Show? Is 773 the correct number?
5) IS zero the correct number of presets for groove agent 4 full version? LOL
http://pastebin.com/WTLNB8WE
http://pastebin.com/nSqtNRyJ
http://pastebin.com/0HpjFtHQ
and many many more...
*multiple edits for spelling only, absolutely nothing else*
EDIT: the mavericks machine with absolute v1 is fine, it was an out of memory crash.
The issues is with collection 2, specific parts of that, and yosemite/logicX
