REASON 4 - finally some new info!

[fgimian]

Reason has definitely hit the big time in massive studios. I remember seeing a bonus DVD of an album being produced in a large studio and they were Rewiring Reason into Protools.

The album was Saosin - Self-titled LP, absolutely awesome album btw!

Cheers
Fots

[keyman_sam]

The reality is this : No one gives half a shit about what people in some stupid forum think about Reason. KVR doesnt exist for 99.99% of the world. Reason 4 will sell like hotcakes, just like Reason 3 or 2.5. End of story.

[blank/diod]

But, as I said in the other big thread, ReWire was introduced before Reason came out as a way to incorporate Propellerhead's products into the emerging VST environment, without them going to all the problem of making their products VSTi. They've stuck with that original work-around for almost 10 years now, even though it's clear that VST/VSTi is the dominant virtual instrument format.

ReWire is certainly not for everyone and I can see why you find it a hassle, but you've got the chronology wrong there.

ReWire is no "VSTi workaround", it predates VSTi. Steinberg introduced VST (not VSTi) first. Then Props and Steinberg co-developed ReWire in late 1997, and lo and behold shortly thereafter Steiny introduced their own solution called VSTi, back then vastly inferior to ReWire in many ways (latency, number of channels and various features) but with the obvious advantage of tighter integration with the host. Great for single instruments, perhaps not so great for separate environments with their own timeline.

While ReBirth might have made a decent candidate for a VSTi plug, Reason would not, for reasons pointed out by headquest and others. What sets Reason apart is the rack paradigm and the way you can make devices interact with eachother through CV. With VSTi each instrument is its own isolated island, you can't make crazy CV routing between an Arturia Moog Modular V and a NI Massive. Conversely, allowing VSTi into Reason would negate the whole rack idea as no two VSTi makers can agree on what size the GUI should be. Any such rack would look like a vertical version of the NY skyline.

Ironically, if Props themselves would decide to create a host they wouldn't need ReWire as they could decide exactly how to integrate Reason... they could do some conjoined twin type thing.

[SARcazm]

This is a welcome update, especially the changing time sigs feature, and I certainly don't really care if Reason ever supports VSTs or not. However, I would like to see Rewire updated and all hosts fully implement it. For example, since Sonar 3, if you open a project which has a rewire connection in it, it will also open the rewired peoject, yet Ableton Live (at least up to ver 5) doesn't. There's also the need to use a VST effect in the host but then to feed the audio back into the slave for further processing.

[headquest]

Just to clarify here, you do understand that I'm talking about taking the entire rack and putting that in a VSTi plugin, not the individual devices, right?

Yes, I realise that, so I see how the internal routing would work. But I don't really see how the routing between the host and Reason would work more efficiently than it already does using Rewire...?

Also I don't see how you would end up with more flexibility than we currently have - in fact as I picture it we would have less flexibility. I'll illustrate using a host that we both use - Tracktion.

At present we can open up Reason as a Rewire slave in Tracktion. We can ditch Reason's mixer and cable up a whole pile of Reason's devices into its hardware interface. Back in Tracktion we can select to sequence each Reason device from a seperate track, and route the audio return channel for that instrument straight back into Tracktion. It's all very easy to do, as you will know.
Having done that, each Reason instrument has its own Tracktion track including MIDI sequencing out and the audio return. So we can also drop different VST effects straight onto each seperate Reason device within the Tracktion track, and mix the whole thing together in Tracktion.
This is all very easy and effective.
If Reason existed as a multitimbral synth I would think things would get very complicated and messy. In Tracktion, as you know, multitimbral synths require the use of Tracktion's Racks. A Tracktion map for Reason VSTi would be a great big mess, surely? And given the PDC issue with Tracktion's racks, there would be another pile of fresh problems introduced.

I'm just trying to understand what you are looking for here? How is this an improvement? I'm sure you must have thought about this more than I have, and I'm interested to hear your solution

Also in one of the posts you mentioned that it would be possible to have multiple Reason instances as a VST, which is perhaps your workaround for the scenario I just presented...? But in that case don't you think there would be a much greater CPU hit than there is running a single instance of Reason as a Rewire slave?

[Lance]

Does Reason 4 (beta) support multicore CPU? So is it a multithreaded app?

How much CPU Thor eats (for massive sounds with high poliphony)? So how much is it optimized?

[headquest]

I'm loading up the beta later today, but am afriad it might not be possible to answer those questions (NDA). So this is maybe a subject where I need to go quiet for a time

[Lance]

I'm loading up the beta later today, but am afriad it might not be possible to answer those questions (NDA). So this is maybe a subject where I need to go quiet for a time

NDA?

National Dart Association?
National Dance Association?
Nuclear Decommissioning Authority?

non-disclosure agreement

OK, I forgot to think for such thing when asked, I thought R4 has a common public beta for Reason owners, whithout RDA.

I hope the Props will optimize as they used to, and also havn't forgotten the multicore support.

[headquest]

I think it will probably go more public in degrees, kinda like Ableton. But I'm not sure. They selected a few from those that signed up. There a stiff pile of stuff you agree to when you actually register! (and you have to uninstall Reason 3 to take part, so there's quite a commitment!).

[_oswald]

(and you have to uninstall Reason 3 to take part, so there's quite a commitment!).

Well, there goes my interest in the Beta. After they pulled that with the Beta for R3, I dropped out instantly and went back to 2.5.

[Warmonger]

Here are the advantages to a VSTi versus Rewire (as I see them):
1) Bypass the first note bug in Tracktion. This isn't a very good reason for it, but it would be one ancillary benefit.

2) Patches are saved automatically with the song, and Reason is instantiated (and patches loaded) automatically when you load the song. There are advantages to this beyond the time saved when loading; it makes backing up easier, for example.

3) Using the same mechanism to load Reason as any other instrument just feels more elegant. In Tracktion, this is no big deal since a filter is a filter, but for other hosts, this can be a major advantage (it can effectively mean multiple stereo pairs, easier setup, etc.). I've used Reason rewired with a fair number of hosts, and Tracktion handles it more transparently than any other host I've used. Live is pretty good too. But if you look at the worst case instead of the best case, you'll see that Rewire implementations often leave a lot to be desired.

4) This goes beyond my original description, but they could then allow for some form of audio input, allowing the use of Reason as a live effect rack. Yes, they can do this already in standalone, but with a VSTi, there's no need for the additional audio features like audio recording, tracks, or any of the other features that would be required to make audio input useful in Reason.

You mentioned the multi-out VST thing. If this ever happened, I'd generally be using one instrument (meaning one Combi patch) per Reason instance. The CPU usage of the Reason rack itself is minimal, and is probably dwarfed even by a single Subtractor instance. In other cases, you may be able to get away with mixing in Reason itself, if you really just want to add a vocal track to an existing song.

[Meffy]

NEWS UPDATE -- You can in fact take part in the version 4 beta without uninstalling Reason 3. It's preferred to uninstall the old version for neatness' sake, but the two can coexist. This comes from an official Props source who said it was okay to post this information.

[_oswald]

Here are the advantages to a VSTi versus Rewire (as I see them):
1) Bypass the first note bug in Tracktion. This isn't a very good reason for it, but it would be one ancillary benefit.

Or, perhaps Tracktion could shape up to be a decent host with proper ReWire support?

3) Using the same mechanism to load Reason as any other instrument just feels more elegant. In Tracktion, this is no big deal since a filter is a filter, but for other hosts, this can be a major advantage (it can effectively mean multiple stereo pairs, easier setup, etc.). I've used Reason rewired with a fair number of hosts, and Tracktion handles it more transparently than any other host I've used. Live is pretty good too. But if you look at the worst case instead of the best case, you'll see that Rewire implementations often leave a lot to be desired.

Again, that's a host issue - not a ReWire issue. Look at how ProTools (until 7) handled RTAS instruments - you had to have one MIDI track and one AUX track for one instrument, with the MIDI track feeding into instrument with was inserted on the AUX track. In 7 they introduced 'Instrument Tracks' which are a streamlining of the two. What Digidesign did, was streamline an old standard.

Proposing the the Props move to another product base for the sake of compensating with poor ReWire implimentation is going up the hill backwards, and with one foot.

[Warmonger]

I'd agree with you if those were my only points. I'd also agree with you if I was suggesting that Reason become VSTi only, but my proposition is meant to be a third alternative (versus Rewire and standalone).

I know that this is never going to happen, but ignoring the practicalities of running a profitable business, and instead thinking about what would be ideal for the end-user, I fail to see how a Reason VSTi is a bad thing.

[_oswald]

I'd agree with you if those were my only points. I'd also agree with you if I was suggesting that Reason become VSTi only, but my proposition is meant to be a third alternative (versus Rewire and standalone).

I know that this is never going to happen, but ignoring the practicalities of running a profitable business, and instead thinking about what would be ideal for the end-user, I fail to see how a Reason VSTi is a bad thing.

If the Propellerheads were in a situation where their profits were at risk, I'm sure they'd consider a VSTi release.

However, since they have not and continue to shrug it off, I think they're running a profitable buisness. Also, with the sales that I can only imagine it garners, I'd say that most end-users are sitting just fine.