KVR Audio

AdmiralQuality · Post by **AdmiralQuality** » Tue Oct 10, 2006 10:24 pm

She's done! Or at least done enough to get her out and start testing in large numbers. You can try her free for a week, FULLY-FUNCTIONING, and hopefully buy her afterward. There is a special introductory offer during the Beta period of $69.95 USD. That's $60 off the regular price of $129.95! (I expect Beta will last at least until the end of the year, possibly longer depending on how many improvements we add. Don't worry though, we won't release version 1.0 without ample warning in advance. And you'll know it's getting close because the Beta version number will be 0.9x.)

A word of warning before you download her: Poly-Ana uses a LOT of CPU power. We know this, it's an intentional result of the technique we use in her voice engine. But we DO EXPECT TO DRAMATICALLY IMPROVE PERFORMANCE OVER THE BETA PERIOD. So, if you have a slow machine, or if you absolutely need a feature from the Coming Soon list, then you will want to WAIT before using up your free week evaluation period! Again, there is no hurry to get the $69.95 Buy-in-Beta offer, it's going to be in Beta for months and we just started today, so if you're unsure, just hang on a little while longer. Most features will be filled in sooner, rather than later. Weeks, not months.

But... if you can live for a while without the effect version, have lots of CPU power to spare (or are willing to make some sacrifices in order to get such an authentic, convincing, analog sound) then go ahead and try her now! We hope you like her. And we hope that if you like what we're doing, even if you think it's not quite perfect yet (and we agree) that you'll buy this product early. Early sales mean a LOT to a small company like us, and will do a lot to help make this product better, sooner. As well as helping us hire more people so we can make more new products. (Two per year is a bit slower than we'd like!)

Thanks again for your patience everyone. And special thanks to Christian Budde (for the curve code) and aciddose (for the "sine" wave code). And thanks as well to the staff of KVR for this wonderful resource we all share. This product would probably not exist if not for this place.

Poly-Ana main page:
http://www.admiralquality.com/products/Poly-Ana/

Features and Coming Soon list:
http://www.admiralquality.com/products/ ... atures.php

Download:
http://www.admiralquality.com/download/ ... t=Poly-Ana 8.47 MB

Authorize:
http://www.admiralquality.com/purchase/

Note: Payment through Share-it.com is coming soon, unfortunately it takes a few days for them to add things by hand. Paypal.com is ready to go now though -- we think, the first few sales will be testing this so if there are any problems... DON'T PANIC! We'll be monitoring the site carefully over the next few days and if you don't receive a key, we'll have one emailed to you manually within 24 hours (and usually within minutes.)

Some of you have inquired about free copies for Beta testing. Sorry, the incentive to submit bug reports is to get us to fix the bugs! I would also recommend any sound designers against making a lot of presets at first in order to earn a free copy as the voice architecture isn't 100% nailed-down yet -- so we'd potentially be buying presets from you that will require more tweaking. But what you CAN do to earn a free copy is make us Poly-Ana demo songs! There aren't any particular rules other than the material has to be your own, but we'd obviously prefer that Poly-Ana be the only synth you use. (And if you can make something 100% with Poly-Ana, with no other sound generators or effects, we'll be THAT much more impressed.) So, if you're poor, use your free week to make a killer demo .mp3 and send it to us! (Email it or PM me here to arrange for file transfer.) If it's good enough that we want to use it on the site, then yes, that will earn you a free copy. We're not in this business to give our stuff away though, so it's going to have to be REALLY impressive work.

Finally, I also want to sincerely apologize to the Mac community... we WANT to support you, we just can't afford a Mac and development tools yet. If Windows sales of this product are sufficient to justify that investment, then we PROMISE we'll get to porting this product to the Mac ASAP!

Thanks again everyone. Enjoy...

TotcProductions · Post by **TotcProductions** » Tue Oct 10, 2006 10:31 pm

aaah...you're one tough sonofabitch Admiral...

....but, I haven't paid for anything but a few upgrades in quite a while (one of the perks of pro sound design

)...so, if it meets my expectations, I guess I can't say no at 70 dollars.

Will report back shortly.

peace

autodafe · Post by **autodafe** » Tue Oct 10, 2006 10:53 pm

can't wait to test it !!!

bduffy · Post by **bduffy** » Tue Oct 10, 2006 11:14 pm

So just to be clear: if we want to beta-test it now, that will use up our one-week grace period for the remainder of Poly-Ana's lifecycle?

AdmiralQuality · Post by **AdmiralQuality** » Tue Oct 10, 2006 11:19 pm

bduffy wrote:So just to be clear: if we want to beta-test it now, that will use up our one-week grace period for the remainder of Poly-Ana's lifecycle?

Yes. That's why I'm advising you wait if you're not already feeling keen on it or are worried about CPU usage (which is only going to get better from here).

You might even just want to wait a day or two and see what other people are saying about it.

Cheers.

bduffy · Post by **bduffy** » Tue Oct 10, 2006 11:30 pm

AdmiralQuality wrote:
bduffy wrote:So just to be clear: if we want to beta-test it now, that will use up our one-week grace period for the remainder of Poly-Ana's lifecycle?
Yes. That's why I'm advising you wait if you're not already feeling keen on it or are worried about CPU usage (which is only going to get better from here).

You might even just want to wait a day or two and see what other people are saying about it.

Cheers.

Cool, thanks for the advice. It's good to be warned! I'm uninstalling now, as much as it pains me.

EDIT: Wait - could I try it on a different machine and let it expire and save my main machine for later?

fred-hal · Post by **fred-hal** » Tue Oct 10, 2006 11:38 pm

Any mp3's around?

AdmiralQuality · Post by **AdmiralQuality** » Tue Oct 10, 2006 11:39 pm

bduffy wrote:EDIT: Wait - could I try it on a different machine and let it expire and save my main machine for later?

Yep. It's a per-machine license (which some people don't like... though we have been historically generous with issuing extra keys to those who make any reasonable request, but we unfortunately can't promise that as policy and reserve the right to say "no")

But the up-side of per-machine is that you get to evaluate it on as many machines as you have! Stick it to the man! (OMG, *I'm* the man!

)

AdmiralQuality · Post by **AdmiralQuality** » Tue Oct 10, 2006 11:47 pm

fred-hal wrote:Any mp3's around?

bduffy · Post by **bduffy** » Tue Oct 10, 2006 11:49 pm

AdmiralQuality wrote:
bduffy wrote:EDIT: Wait - could I try it on a different machine and let it expire and save my main machine for later?
Yep. It's a per-machine license (which some people don't like... though we have been historically generous with issuing extra keys to those who make any reasonable request, but we unfortunately can't promise that as policy and reserve the right to say "no")

But the up-side of per-machine is that you get to evaluate it on as many machines as you have! Stick it to the man! (OMG, *I'm* the man! )

Ha ha! I just installed this on the Nuendo machine (which I don't use as much, but this room has the keyboard controller), and all I gotta say is:

Dude. Dude, dude. DUDE! This thing sounds pretty !@%$# good.

TotcProductions · Post by **TotcProductions** » Tue Oct 10, 2006 11:51 pm

HOLY SHIT!!!

That's all I can say! It just sounds Gorgeous! I'll even slap it up next to my MiniMonsta!!! Outstanding sound...CPU isn't a problem for me, due to a fast processor, and it's been addressed already, so I won't bring it up here. Sound is just...amazing....lush, wide, deep, warm, and superlative you'd like! Envelope response, IMO, is very analog-ish, same with the rest of the controls.

In fact, I only have 1 complaint....that fuckin GUI is impossible to read....don't get me wrong, it's absolutely gorgeous to look at...but I can't see what's on the controls to the left of the keyboard, as they are all very small, and facing upward...it's very hard to read what's what on the knobs, though, it gets easier as you turn them toward their arrows. But yeah, everything facing upward, with labels on top, is really hard to see. I'm not on some whacko screen resolution either so...I'm a tweaker, obviously, so being able to see what I'm doing is right up there with sound quality. Maybe you could do something like Korg did with the legacy collection? (where you have a shot of the whole interface, on which all the controls can be used, but then there would be pages that are 'zoomed in' on the various modules to allow for precise editing...know what I'm saying?).

So there ya go....I've never been sold on a synth so quickly....If the interface issue is addressed...I'll pay whatever the tag says, no questions asked!

Peace

bduffy · Post by **bduffy** » Tue Oct 10, 2006 11:55 pm

So it's not just me! I got my PayPal account ready to go over here!

Hey, did that "Huck Finn" patch almost blow your nuts off, Totc? That was instant love for me. Wow.

And I agree about the interface. I absolutley adore its largeness, its look, the feel; but as a very modest tweaker on LCD monitors...I simply don't know what a lot of these things are. But I would say if you loaded this with enough presets, then whatever!

Or how about floating hints over hotspots?

AdmiralQuality · Post by **AdmiralQuality** » Wed Oct 11, 2006 12:05 am

bduffy wrote:Or how about floating hints over hotspots?

Yes, I think "tooltips" will probably have to be an option. For me, they spoil the immersion... but i have friends with bad eyesight and even the labels that it's possible to read they can't read (who reads a synth anyway? Grab a knob and listen!)

But seriously, yes, I'll add that as an option for those who don't mind magic holograms popping up over their authentic 70's hardware synth.

Note that there is already a "tooltip" - the parameter display at the top. It will tell you what the param you're editing is and it's value.

And yes, the left hand panel is impossible to read certain things... but what the controls are is so obvious that I found I didn't mind (eventually documentation will fill you in on what they all are, but they're the usual synth voice assignment controls.)

Anyway, noted guys. And it's great to hear someone who's not working with me, or a friend, or a family member say they like the sound. THAT'S why I took a year of my life off to build this girl! I stumbled across the filter a year ago this month and thought "Holy Grail!!! I'm 90% of the way to a synth!" Well... 11 months later... and it's *still* only first Beta!

Software development always goes over-time but really, I expected to be done months ago. So glad to hear you guys think it was worth it. Whaddya know, maybe I'm not crazy? (Much.)

TotcProductions · Post by **TotcProductions** » Wed Oct 11, 2006 12:06 am

bduffy wrote: So it's not just me! I got my PayPal account ready to go over here!

Hey, did that "Huck Finn" patch almost blow your nuts off, Totc? That was instant love for me. Wow.

And I agree about the interface. I absolutley adore its largeness, its look, the feel; but as a very modest tweaker on LCD monitors...I simply don't know what a lot of these things are. But I would say if you loaded this with enough presets, then whatever!

Or how about floating hints over hotspots?

Nope,

Not just you! I played the first patch, the default one, and went "egh, we'll see"...then "Huck Finn" came up and BOOM! Sold!

Immediately started diving into the controls...absolutely sick sound on this thing! Very excited....obviously

Come to think of it, Floating boxes displaying the parameter name in full, and the current position as you move it would be another good way of addressing the interface problem.

peace

TotcProductions · Post by **TotcProductions** » Wed Oct 11, 2006 12:07 am

Maybe you are crazy, but a madman can be an artist.

peace

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