Now I Understand Why People Hate iLok

[hueynym]

I don't understand this at all. I've used an iLok (and at least 3 other dongles for various Video/Audio programs simultaneously) since 2009. I have 297 plugins registered on my iLok3, which I purchased last year after my iLok1 became too full for all my licences. I don't think I've ever had a problem with it on my iMac. Sure, I've had problems (that were dealt with easily) with PACE, and one PACE-based dongle I had to have shipped from France to the US which got caught up in customs - NOTHING to do with iLok, or the ZDT backup service.

[Unaspected]

I obtained an iLok for free with my copy of Pro Tools 10. It survived being washed in the pocket of some trousers and continues to work to this day! All software validations have been quick and painless. I've used it on multiple systems without issue.

However, I don't like the concept. It just seems to be a necessary evil if you want to run certain software.

[ghettosynth]

@ghetto

Okay, never heard of Ircam Verb 3 so I just listened to a brief demo.

Very impressive. Yep, don't have any reverbs that can do what it does. That morph feature is particularly impressive. And I would suppose that, for somebody who absolutely needed to do creative reverb processing such as starting a piano solo with a room verb and then have it morph into a hall with a big orchestra joining in, yeah, that could be really handy. I'm sure even I, as little talent as I have, could think of creative uses for it.

But at the end of the day, it's just a reverb. There are other reverbs out there with good and even excellent sounding impulses. So unless Verb 3 was dirt cheap (it's not even close to that at over 600 euros) I just don't need it. In fact, I'd have to have my head examined to spend THAT much on a reverb for what I use reverbs for.

Ok, but hold the phone, that you don't need iLok, or that someone can create music without iLok are not the same thing as "nobody needs iLok."

So yeah, unless you're an industry professional and your livelihood depends on this stuff, I can't see the average hobbyist spending 600 euro on a reverb.

Yeah, so to be clear, I didn't spend that much. I'm pretty sure that I got the Ircam bundle that it comes in on a half price sale with that crazy Don't Crack coupon promo, the plugimon thing, where you could get a coupon for $100 when you spent X. I don't recall the details but it was an intentional and targeted purchase with some other stuff from that promotion. Still, it wasn't cheap, but I can assure you that you've spent a LOT more than I have on this stuff, I've seen your list.

And I have no doubt that there's other high end products out there that also cost a lot of money that use iLok as well. So yeah, for those people who absolutely demand products that are not the norm, ironically, those are probably your only options.

Pitchmap is pretty specific, that's why I pointed it out and nobody yet has pointed to an alternative. Pitchmap does polyphonic pitch tracking and shifting.

Wonderful. So you've probably addressed 5% of the population that doesn't do this just for kicks.

You do know that I only do this for kicks, right?

But guess what? There are more of me in the world than there are of you and your other professional colleagues.

Trust me. We DON'T need iLok.

PS - For the record, I have 42 iLok licenses.

I think that you are completely underestimating what is the "prosumer" market, which you are a part of, like it or not. It doesn't take much "need" at all to realize that for certain things, the better tools are dongle protected. For someone doing ambient music an interesting reverb is worth as much as an interesting sample library might be to you. I seem to recall you spending hundreds of dollars on specialized sample libraries, no?

For me, the category of plugins that I am trying to avoid is C/R. These days if you aren't huge I'm not bothering with C/R plugins at all and I get miffed when I accidentally buy one.

[fmr]

"Real time work" is a measure of system capacity, not system and/or OS stability. System stability is about the hardware playing nice with the OS and the OS playing nice with itself.

It's THE measure, at least in what concerns music. And the problems here have nothing to do with system stability, but with Pace incompatibility, or lack of 100% compatibility.

How many Mac OS daemons have you had to run "delayed start"? Me, none that I can remember.

In Windows, I didn't hear about that either, until I had to deal with iLOK. Which, IMO, says something about Pace incompetence in what concerns Windows.

Its not that Mac OS doesn't have ANY problems. I didn't say that. Safari, for example, I can get that to lock up with the right javascript, requiring manual intervention. Maybe some other occasional issues with spotlight indexer or whatever.

My point is that IME windows have a lot more baggage than Mac OS... CEIP, for example. Why? The occasional windows update requiring a rollback of said update. Certain windows services notoriously consuming lots of CPU even across reboots (requiring lots of googling to find workarounds, learn that its been a bug for several years, etc etc).

The "baggage" Windows carries has to do, IMO, with the Microsoft concern of retro-compatibility, something Apple simply don't care. That's why I am still able to run software written for Windows XP in Windows 10 (not all of it, but I am), while in OS X, I'm lucky if I can still run something written for something prior to 10.9

And at least in Windows, you can perform a rollback of an update. Can you do that in OS X? Anyway, the issue here is Pace, and iLOK software. And I think the problem is related with Bonjour routines, which are from Apple but are the foundation for the Pace software IN WINDOWS. No wonder things don't run smooth.

But what pissed me more was their arrogant and disrepectful response when I reported them the problems I was experiencing with Windows 10. To me, that showed clearly they dont care about Windows. If they did, they would have asked me for more details, and they would even thank me for being testing iLOK with a pre-release version of an OS, and would have worked with me to solve the problems (which I solved on my own, without their help).

[wagtunes]

@ghetto

You're probably right. I probably have underestimated the market. And yes, I suppose looking at the insane amount of plugins I've purchased as well as the number of iLok protected plugins I've purchased, I'm part of that market too.

But here's what I do know absolutely without a doubt. Were it not for Vocaloid, if I were really against iLok (Let's say I had serious problems with it that made me hate it to the point where it literally made my life hell) I would find alternatives to all the things I have. Certainly my orchestral libraries (all EWQL) could be replaced by non iLok alternatives that are actually of better quality. Yes, infinitely more expensive, but better. I wouldn't be losing anything with the switch. In fact, I'd be gaining. Some of it, like Softube Modular, I'd miss. But then there's Reaktor Blocks that, if I really took the time to learn, might actually make it so that I wouldn't miss Softube at all.

I guess all I'm trying to say is that there are things out there that aren't iLok protected that will still allow you to do your job. I mean look at it this way. There was a time when some of these products didn't exist and yet people were still doing there job anyway. Nothing is so urgently critical that if you didn't have it you might as well sell your PC and go sit on a street corner with a monkey and a guitar playing for nickels. We'd somehow survive without iLok.

As for getting Verb 3 for a hundred bucks or whatever you paid for it, I wish. Maybe a sale will come along because that is one cool reverb. But you know what? Somehow I'll live without it. That's pretty much all I'm saying.

And you know what, I can also understand you not liking C/R. I can imagine how big a pain that must be when you have to reinstall everything with a new OS and you have to enter in all those serial numbers again. It will be a total nightmare for me I'm sure. And yeah, if everything I had was iLok protected, I just reinstall, plug in my dongle and I'm done. Trust me, I get that. And not being an iLok hater, in that regard, I wish everything I had was iLok protected too.

But I do get the other side. That was my only point of this whole thread. Yesterday, when looking up my licenses to give you the number, iLok wouldn't start yet again because PACE wasn't running yet again. Only this time I simply opened Task Manager (first chance to test to see if it worked) went to services, started it up and all was good. It took all of like 30 seconds if that.

So what was one a royal PITA (having to start up my PC again) is now a minor annoyance.

That doesn't mean I still don't empathize with the other side.

Now to go check out that "other" iLok thing that has no replacement.

[robotmonkey]

I guess all I'm trying to say is that there are things out there that aren't iLok protected that will still allow you to do your job. I mean look at it this way. There was a time when some of these products didn't exist and yet people were still doing there job anyway. Nothing is so urgently critical that if you didn't have it you might as well sell your PC and go sit on a street corner with a monkey and a guitar playing for nickels. We'd somehow survive without iLok.

This!

Even though I agree that there's some very good plugins that use iLok, I can see myself easily living without any iLok protected plugins. I could work only with Waves and still get everything done. Add to that Plugin Alliance and NI and you are pretty much covered. And this is not even including all the great small developers like Valhalla or Fabfilter or u-he. One could even switch to UAD. Granted, UAD plugins need a huge and expensive dongle but at least this dongle is useful for something and has value in itself.

My most unique and most expensive (38$) iLok plugin is XILS PolyKBII.5. That I would probably miss somewhat but it could be replaced with the player version that I used a long time before upgrading to full version. The rest are either giveways, freebies that came with hardware or super cheap bargains. There's certainly some very nice stuff there from that I have come to use and love but there are certainly high quality replacements available for all of them.

[ghettosynth]

As for getting Verb 3 for a hundred bucks or whatever you paid for it, I wish. Maybe a sale will come along because that is one cool reverb. But you know what? Somehow I'll live without it. That's pretty much all I'm saying.

No, it wasn't that cheap. Don't Crack had a $100 off coupon with a certain size order. Or it might have been a $50 coupon that I used, I don't remember. I just remember it was on sale for something like half off, then there was the Don't Crack discount, and then on top of that the coupon. Probably around $250 or $300 IIRC and I got their weird speech processor and morpher as well.

I guess all I'm trying to say is that there are things out there that aren't iLok protected that will still allow you to do your job. I mean look at it this way. There was a time when some of these products didn't exist and yet people were still doing there job anyway. Nothing is so urgently critical that if you didn't have it you might as well sell your PC and go sit on a street corner with a monkey and a guitar playing for nickels. We'd somehow survive without iLok.

Sure, but, this is Layzer's argument. There are free tools for almost everything so why buy anything when you can still get your job done with free tools? It is ALWAYS a balance between how much pain something causes vs how much gain it yields. I think that the pain with iLok is overestimated and the gain underestimated. The gain here does not have to be measured in terms of productivity or something so important. For me, it's just measured in joy. My favorite effects plugins are almost entirely on iLok and I love using those plugins. These arguments are silly to me and I suspect to many others who really enjoy their Ircam/Flux/Eventide/Lexicon/Zynaptiq/Soundtoys/Ina/etc. plugins.

@robotmonkey To suggest that Waves can replace this stuff is pretty hilarious. I like Waves well enough, and I probably have as many Waves plugins as I do iLok plugins, but creative plugins are NOT their forte LOL! I don't think that there is a single waves reverb that I'd put in the "best of" spot for any category. I like AR Plates, but not as much as I like Soundtoys Little Plate.

[HSum]

It is ALWAYS a balance between how much pain something causes vs how much gain it yields. I think that the pain with iLok is overestimated and the gain underestimated. The gain here does not have to be measured in terms of productivity or something so important. For me, it's just measured in joy.

As one of the many long time ProTools users without any problems, I totally agree with that. But it would be impossible to replace it with anything else Same for Zynaptiq/SynchroArts/Lexicon stuff.

[Nielzie]

Did somebody already start a "Now I understand why iLok hates people" thread?

[robotmonkey]

@robotmonkey To suggest that Waves can replace this stuff is pretty hilarious. I like Waves well enough, and I probably have as many Waves plugins as I do iLok plugins, but creative plugins are NOT their forte LOL! I don't think that there is a single waves reverb that I'd put in the "best of" spot for any category. I like AR Plates, but not as much as I like Soundtoys Little Plate.

Actually I think Waves H-Verb and AR Plates are there among the best, no doubt about that. They have plenty of standout plugins that are either the best or among the best plugins in their respective categories.

I agree that not all Eventide/Soundtoys plugins could be replaced directly one-to-one with Waves. Waves is more geared towards traditional mixing plugins than special fx. Still I could easily work and mix only with Waves plugins without sacrificing anything in sound quality and not much in creative control. In the end no-one except me would be able to tell the difference anyway.

For more strange stuff there's plenty of options from PA, NI and others.

[ghettosynth]

It is ALWAYS a balance between how much pain something causes vs how much gain it yields. I think that the pain with iLok is overestimated and the gain underestimated. The gain here does not have to be measured in terms of productivity or something so important. For me, it's just measured in joy.

As one of the many long time ProTools users without any problems, I totally agree with that. But it would be impossible to replace it with anything else Same for Zynaptiq/SynchroArts/Lexicon stuff.

Yes, I'm not suggesting that you can replace Verb3 with free plugins. Only that if your attitude is "it's just a reverb", then you can certainly find other reverbs. For people who use these plugins the differences matter. For the most part it seems that the "haters" are non-users. That's what I was getting at earlier, people should be honest about their experience with these things before telling others how much they suck and that they should switch to non iLok plugins because they're all the same. If you just hate the idea and you're hoping that Zynaptiq is going to see it your way or that those of us who prefer dongles to CR are going to join your boycott then you're just pissing into the wind.

[chk071]

For the most part it seems that the "haters" are non-users. That's what I was getting at earlier, people should be honest about their experience with these things before telling others how much they suck and that they should switch to non iLok plugins because they're all the same.

Hey, don't expect too much. It's still KVR after all.

[Armagibbon]

For the most part it seems that the "haters" are non-users.

Hey nah I use ilok everywhere and I f*ckin hate the chance that my shit could get locked if the servers go south... or they run a wack update that eats licenses ahahaha
So yea we got paranoid and bought zdt after that. Thats a business move. And you know what? I think its f*ckin extortion and gives em a reason to do it again but we got no choice. Not even personally. Cant vote with my wallet or move all my ilok shit to elicenser or gobbler or native access or whatever. Gotta pay up that protection money right? Its pocket change yea but its fuckin wrong they charge for it at all cus they know peeps are gonna buy it when their shit breaks and its iloks fault.

Just cant be serious thinkin this shit is good for anybody. Live with it yea. But no love here man.

[ghettosynth]

For the most part it seems that the "haters" are non-users.

Hey nah I use ilok everywhere

Yes, with any statistical assertion, there will be outliers. Hence "for the most part."

Just cant be serious thinkin this shit is good for anybody. Live with it yea. But no love here man.

But it is. The reason that the better software is on iLok and you find yourself willing to deal with it is because the firms that make those plugins aren't willing to take greater risks given the state of piracy in the plugin market.

So, in other words, without the stronger methods of protection, those firms might not choose to engage in this market and, consequently, you would not have the plugins that you have.

I should point out here that arguing that iLok has been cracked isn't a counter to this point. If it were, those firms would say "hmm, iLok is costing us money and we can make more money if we don't pay Pace and instead use something less crackable, since iLok is cracked anyway." No, they don't say that because their perception is that, despite that some efforts have been made in cracking iLok protected software, they still view it as one of the safer, if not the safest methods of copy protection.

Some firms do believe this, naturally, e.g. Cycling 74 moved away from iLok. In their case though, they always had, what I presume was their own, but in any case, other, C/R based, protection methods, iLok was just an option. Firms that have not developed their own methods as a core competency, probably don't view developing their own methods as worthwhile given the risk/cost profile of using iLok.

[kbaccki]

"Real time work" is a measure of system capacity, not system and/or OS stability. System stability is about the hardware playing nice with the OS and the OS playing nice with itself.

It's THE measure, at least in what concerns music.

Pegging your CPU and disk does not generally affect system stability (it may slow down significantly but, for example, Windows Explorer doesn't crash and disappear). Bad updates, interfering processes (possibly antivirus, system services doing interruptive things, etc.) potentially cause system instability. Could be on bootup, restart, or during use.

And the problems here have nothing to do with system stability, but with Pace incompatibility, or lack of 100% compatibility.

PACE compatibility is a system stability issue, IMO.

The "baggage" Windows carries has to do, IMO, with the Microsoft concern of retro-compatibility, something Apple simply don't care. That's why I am still able to run software written for Windows XP in Windows 10 (not all of it, but I am), while in OS X, I'm lucky if I can still run something written for something prior to 10.9

I do appreciate Windows compatibility. The fact that I can run a really old VSTi like Sonic Cat Purity in Reaper x64 via jbridge (I know, a simple doohickey, but I have some REALLY cool and useful patches that I seem to keep recycling all the time), or loading an old project containing Kjaerhus plugs, or whatever. Or run an old app or game in compatibility mode, etc.

And at least in Windows, you can perform a rollback of an update. Can you do that in OS X? Anyway, the issue here is Pace, and iLOK software. And I think the problem is related with Bonjour routines, which are from Apple but are the foundation for the Pace software IN WINDOWS. No wonder things don't run smooth.

I will say that Apple is freaking annoying with shoving forward compatibility down your throat. I guess it's good for them... minimize support cost and whatever. My one major gripe with them. Developers are more or less required to follow Apple's lead, so backward compatibility is generally an afterthought. Recently needed to test devices on devices running iOS 11.3. For that you "need" Xcode 9.3 to get the 11.3 device support for debugging. Can't install Xcode 9.3 on Sierra... you need High Sierra.(*) Of course I do, what was I thinking? And on and on. In a strictly controlled corporate environment this is a problem. Need backward compatibility on iOS devices? Better have a drawer full of them running various versions, cuz you ain't rolling anything back anywhere. I have like 6 or 7 phones... 4s to 7... running 9.3.5 up to 11.3. A handful of iPads, etc. I mean come on already.

(*) you can work around this by manually dropping 11.3 and 11.4 device support into Xcode 9.2 running on Sierra. Oh, and you can change the Info.plist for Xcode 9.3 so it can run on Sierra. So you don't actually need either Xcode 9.3 or High Sierra after all. Both of which speaks to the shear insanity. Does Apple take me for a fool? I think they do!