Do you use Reaktor? If not why?

[Hlis93]

As KVR is the plugin discussion capital of the internet. I would like to pose a question that may or may not interest some of the people here and that I have not seen asked before. This is for my own information. I will state that I am a Reaktor fan. I do not intend to argue with you I simply would like to hear your honest opinion.

Here are the questions I would like to ask:

1. If you own Reaktor and do not use it why?
2. If you have looked into Reaktor and did not like it why?
3. If you have no interest in Reaktor Why?

I am not here to convert anyone I am not going to debate your position, as I said, I simply would like to hear what you have to say. I hope to hear from you.

**any comments made here will stay here. I will not be using this in my arguements in the Reaktor forum. This special note is for those Reaktor users that are avid members of KVR and the Reaktor forum.

[MitchK1989]

I have a huge interest in reaktor, but they're annoying about educational discounts.

I am a student, and I was informed that I cannot get a discount on reaktor 5 as a download. I have to FAX an order form and then have the product shipped from GERMANY to CANADA, with all the customs, shipping, and useless crap that entails, just to have a product which is obviously small enough to download.

It's pushing me to look into MAX/MSP...

[Hlis93]

MAX/MSP looks brutal as well, I just looked it up. I am sorry that it is so difficult, students should be encouraged to get involved with these things and they should be made accessible without so much hassle.

[bendedavis]

Lately I've been using it for MIDI randomization, mostly using the 8x8 sequencer. As far as it's sounds, they're not so great. Good for some ambient or weird sounds, but still a bit too unpredictable. Creating my own synths in it is pretty tough and the documentation isn't very good.

[lavoll]

got it with komplete 2. used it a little, but it seemed to large and clunky for anything that i do. i wanted to build an effect, but i gave up

[setAI]

I have been actively intersted in Reaktor since about 98 and the Generator days- I have extensevely tried every demo- both trying ensembles and building my own patches- and while I have always thought reaktor was very powerful and extensive- I have never quite liked the overall sound quality enough to pay for it and found the lack of VST hosting a deal breaker for me-

I came very close to buying Sessions just to have that huge library at my disposal- but when they cancelled it I lost interest- if NI ever do a Sessions type ensemble host again [and support it]I will probably finally buy the thing


I also avoided buying reaktor because I already own Vokator- and I am a hardcore Vokator user since they released it- it has most of the things I like in Reaktor- like granular sample looping and mod step sequencers- in one instrument plus serious FFT processing-

[lordvader48]

I have used Reaktor for about 10 years. It is usually vexing, but sometimes it's useful.

The thing that bothers me the most is how CPU-inefficient it is. It's hard to use more than one or two instances at a time, and I have a fast 2-processor machine.

Many of its "instruments" are more like toys. Not musically useful.

Reaktor is a good package with a lot of potential. I would like to see NI spend some time making some instruments for the Reaktor library that are more accessible for musicians (easier to understand/use) and are more musically useful.

NB: I have not programmed for Reaktor myself, and I do not intend to.

[justin3am]

I had Reaktor for a while before I got into it. I was afraid for a long time that if I got into building I'd stop making music. Sickle and Rachmiel both convinced me that was bullshit. I now make very few (mostly purpose specific) ensembles and make about the same amount of music.

[ouroboros]

I do not have Reaktor.
I looked into it and was interested.
I cannot afford reaktor
Synthedit is free (basically) as is Synthmaker bundled in my FL upgrade.

[sinkmusic]

I have bought R5 last year (used), and i like it a lot, but i must confess i don't use it much, for 2 reasons :

1- my lazyness : i know my VST plugins quite well, and know where to find them in my folders. For Reaktor plugins, you have to launch Reaktor first, etc, and as i like being quick, i often end up loading a vst plugin straight up.
The "auto-save" system is also a pain in the _ss, a workflow killer.

2- the cpu use. On my laptop, most of the ensembles use way too much cpu to be used in realtime (which is what Reaktor is made for, mostly).

One strong point with Reaktor is that i am most of the time very much impresesd with the most basic tools (like basic synths which are awesome), and the experimental stuff have no rival.

[jeffb01]

I used to own reaktor 5 and sold it...

I used to have a real eloquent reason as to why I didn't like it, but it's been a while so here goes, best I can remember...

First, I had high hopes when I bought it...
-what I hated most about it was that while my daw would remember every setting on every synth I had when I reloaded a song, it would not do that with reaktor, my workflow is I come back much later to songs I'm working on and that made it a pain as so I would often find something else to use...
-I loved some of the ensembles (especially the drone ones), but to be honest, and I'm sure it's my own fault, I couldn't figure out many of the more interesting ones..I guess I didn't try super hard either.
-when I bought it, I had high hopes to make my own ensembles...of course, I never bothered and ultimately decided that I would rather spend my limited time making music...

hope this helps...

[Hlis93]

Thanks for your responses to my questions. I would like to expand this question. I have been arguing that Reaktor needs and export function so that instruments can be used as plugins. I tend to use Reaktor in Stand alone but this is in part due that is was impossible as a plugin in my host as Freezing VST was always a hassle. Everything I had running in Reaktor had to be frozen which was not conducive to making music. Having purchased Ableton's Live I am finding this to be a problem again. My answer is export as plugin.

Many programs are allowing this, Synthmaker does although I am in no way confussed about how the two are different, and MAX/MSP does as well. Yet Reaktor requires so much additional fuss, no access to every instrument snapshot etc.

If this was an option would it possibly peak your interest once again? I am asking since this is in part my argument in that forum and I just would like to test if I this makes sense to anyone else as well.

I am also very interested in the previous questions this is just an expansion of the topic.

for those that have mentioned documentation this is also and issue that is in the Reaktor forum as well.

[emdot_ambient]

I've had it since buying Komplete 2 back in late 2004...have it updated to v5 now. But I rarely use it.

Issue 1:
I've always wanted to sink into building my own stuff with it but the learning curve is steep and my time is very limited. If I had a month or more to do nothing but learn that, I'd gladly get into it more.

Issue 2:
I've never liked the way it interfaces with Cubase. Used as a VST or VSTi, I find its GUI and preset/snapshot setup very confusing. When it's used as a plug-in, I really only want it to act like a plug-in. I don't want its internal snapshot thing, prefering to use Cubase's presets.

Issue 3:
I find its default file structure annoying. I was just looking at v5 the other night. The library is separated into Classic, New Additions, blah, blah. Consequently there are several place where it puts Synth ensembles. Now if I start downloading user library material, I have more places to put stuff. Sure, I could rearrange the file structure, but there's more time not spent being productive.

Issue 4:
CPU cost is high, while I find a lot of the ensembles' snapshots require serious tweaking to get decent sound...like for some reason the snapshots tend to be very hot volume wise and I'm always having to trim them back to prevent clipping and distortion in the sound. I don't have that problem with other plug-ins, but Reaktor, Guitar Rig and Spektral Delay seem particularly prone to overly high input levels. Why is that?

Conclusion:
It's big and powerful, but it's also big, power hungry and confusing. Once you start downloading brazillion (sic) user ensembles, you very quickly find that you have no clue what ensembles you have and what's good for what. You almost have to use nothing but Reaktor for months on end in order to become familiar with all that it can do and to know the ensembles you've got at your disposal.

Sometimes more is too much.

But I'm still convinced one day I'll come to know and love it...maybe.

[Polite Company]

Count me in the crowd of people that are interested in it but do not have the funds required to purchase.

[kuniklo]

I use it but in a somewhat limited way. I think of it as a box of sonic weirdness and dump out loops and sounds as audio that I then use as to add color to tracks. It works pretty well for this, particularly with some randomization, and this way I avoid the common hassles (crashing, high cpu load, ensemble file management etc).

Life is too short to get into building in Reaktor.

Some friends of mine and I recently had a "Reaktor Challenge" which was pretty entertaining though. We were each given an hour to produce a track from scratch, using only the sounds in Reaktor 5. They turned out surprisingly well. Here's mine:

http://www.burgerkone.com/music/rin60.mp3