Not impressed by NAMM product announcements

[hibidy]

Holy crap, Jobs looks like the loony leader of a cult on this photo. Oh wait...

[koolkeys]

So what's going on with Cakewalk? Lowest common denominator keyboards, monitors, audio cards? Roland took them over, and made them into the, "Crazy Eddie," of pro audio. I'm sure the vapor-ware, super synth of two or three NAMMS past, shows up in a few years, branded as a Roland something or other, with a $2,750, instead of a $199. It will be dsp, and whatever, I'm sure it will be nice....


An overseas company, snatches up an American brand, and its the same strategy every time...

Make low cost, budget stuff, rake in money on what was a great name. When the name fails, sell it to a manufacturer, who then puts that name on a power cord, you soon find at Walmarts.............. Phillips, Cakewalk, RCA.......




Sick, sad, world..

I don't know that I would agree with that. I mean, are Roland NOT supposed to produce hardware any more, just because they bought a software company? Why not create new keyboards and interfaces? It's not like Sonar hasn't been updated on schedule. It has. And as a matter of fact, they have had an even better outlook IMO on how to handle updates. They have been refining the software and making it better, and even offering a full update as a ".5" update for less than usual.

I know it's easy to look at it from the other angle and say that Roland has somehow destroyed Cakewalk, but I see absolutely ZERO evidence that this has happened. Of course Roland is going to release more hardware. It's what they do! But I don't see where the software has suffered really.

Brent

[ckatrun411]

I don't think the software has suffered. I think, "the brand," has suffered. I see nothing wrong with Cakewalk hardware, per se, but it would be nice if the hardware was going to take on RME, or Genelec. Roland are seemingly using the Cakewalk name, to push entry level stuff.


Same thing will be done with hummer.................. This is the current trend. Its quite sad, imo

[eduardo_b]

@ed: didn't Comdex turn into CES?

As I remember it, Comdex was mid-November in LV and CES was mid-January in LV even then.

What I do remember is how CD-ROMs were going to be the next big thing for computers and then I went to Internet World in Boston and the next year in L.A., and it was obvious that the CD-ROM industry was doomed. Only CES has survived. Wasn't there an annual show in L.A. every year called E3? It was mostly geated toward video games if I remember it correctly.

[eduardo_b]

I don't know that I would agree with that. I mean, are Roland NOT supposed to produce hardware any more, just because they bought a software company?

It seems to me that hardware companies are leveraging software to their advantage, not replacing hardware with it. And, really, for hardware these annual shows make far more sense.

[eduardo_b]

I don't think the software has suffered. I think, "the brand," has suffered. I see nothing wrong with Cakewalk hardware, per se, but it would be nice if the hardware was going to take on RME, or Genelec. Roland are seemingly using the Cakewalk name, to push entry level stuff.

The entry level market is probably the largest sector in terms of potential customers, but it's also the most price sensitive. Can't get newbies to buy expensive gear, so they need products in the price range these customers will accept.

[justin3am]

@ed: didn't Comdex turn into CES?

As I remember it, Comdex was mid-November in LV and CES was mid-January in LV even then.

Wow, so they had NAB, Comdex and CES. I guess one had to go.

What I do remember is how CD-ROMs were going to be the next big thing for computers and then I went to Internet World in Boston and the next year in L.A., and it was obvious that the CD-ROM industry was doomed. Only CES has survived. Wasn't there an annual show in L.A. every year called E3? It was mostly geated toward video games if I remember it correctly.

E3 (electronic entertainment expo?) still happens every year in May I think but it's all video games now. For a few years it was closed to the public, I think they opened it to the public again last year.

[eduardo_b]

@ed: didn't Comdex turn into CES?

As I remember it, Comdex was mid-November in LV and CES was mid-January in LV even then.

Wow, so they had NAB, Comdex and CES. I guess one had to go.

Totally forgot about NAB. Less than three months...for those who are going.

[jonnyG]

NAMM isn't the only trade show that's gone a bit "emperor's new clothes" recently. Maybe it's just a sign of the economic times (it's bloody expensive to set up an exhibition and a lot of companies haven't risked developing exotic new farkles anyway). Or maybe the trade show in general is dying on it's arse.

...Upgrades to 64 bit...

Drew

OK, this may seem tedious in the extreme but it really, really needs to be done, so props to the companies that are finally getting off their butts and doing it. 64bit isn't going to go away.

[visa tapani]

Korg Wavedrum would be super interesting for me if they offered a USB-out and possibility to use the data in whichever program in whatever way I'd like. That would make a mean free-improvisation instrument paired with, say, some granular synthesis in Max/MSP. Unfortunately it only has an audio out so you can only use it with its inbuilt sounds. Shame...

[deastman]

Korg Wavedrum would be super interesting for me if they offered a USB-out and possibility to use the data in whichever program in whatever way I'd like. That would make a mean free-improvisation instrument paired with, say, some granular synthesis in Max/MSP. Unfortunately it only has an audio out so you can only use it with its inbuilt sounds. Shame...

I bought one of the new Wavedrums, so I hope I'm qualified to comment on this... A lot of people are complaining about the lack of MIDI or USB. I agree that this would have been extremely useful for editing and storing your custom patches in a nice, friendly GUI interface on a PC, and also for installing firmware updates. Other than that, it makes absolutely no sense.

Some people wanted a MIDI out so they could trigger external devices. The Wavedrum is NOT a MIDI trigger device. It is a real live drum head, and the actual vibrations of that head are directly used to generate the sounds you hear.

As far as taking "the data" out of the Wavedrum to use in Max/MSP, it seems that you want to transform this instrument into an entirely different beast than what it is. It isn't a question of "inbuilt sounds". The vibrations of the drum are fed into a variety of different algorithms, thereby generating sounds. If all you want is "data" to drive Max/MSP, get your own drum head and a piezo, and away you go. Ignoring the physical modeling, etc. components of the Wavedrum means that you are missing the point entirely.

[visa tapani]

I disagree and would argue you're missing the point somewhat. The biggest achievement of Wavedrum is IMO not its inbuilt physical modeling and other synthesis components, but the DSP that makes sense of all the data gathered from the multiple piezos. This is where the magic happens and why it responds so well to different playing techniques, brushes etc. After this the interpreted data could be used to drive whatever. Notice that I wasn't talking about midi-out at any point, but USB-out. In this scenario, the interpretative DSP would be a program in the computer, and it could for example translate the data to different streams of OSC.

Doing this myself with a drum head and (not one but) a number of piezos would be fiendishly difficult and would take months of full-time research. Wavedrum does not contain one piezo, but a whole bunch of them, and the genius of the system is how it interprets different amplitudes, gestures etc across the different piezos. This has nothing to do with its inbuilt physical modeling synthesis.

So I fully stand by my earlier statement. Although I realize that for the majority of the Wavedrum's target audience the approach they've taken is probably sufficient.

[deastman]

I disagree and would argue you're missing the point somewhat. The biggest achievement of Wavedrum is IMO not its inbuilt physical modeling and other synthesis components, but the DSP that makes sense of all the data gathered from the multiple piezos. This is where the magic happens and why it responds so well to different playing techniques, brushes etc. After this the interpreted data could be used to drive whatever. Notice that I wasn't talking about midi-out at any point, but USB-out. In this scenario, the interpretative DSP would be a program in the computer, and it could for example translate the data to different streams of OSC.

Doing this myself with a drum head and (not one but) a number of piezos would be fiendishly difficult and would take months of full-time research. Wavedrum does not contain one piezo, but a whole bunch of them, and the genius of the system is how it interprets different amplitudes, gestures etc across the different piezos. This has nothing to do with its inbuilt physical modeling synthesis.

So I fully stand by my earlier statement. Although I realize that for the majority of the Wavedrum's target audience the approach they've taken is probably sufficient.

From my understanding of how it works, I think you're giving far too much credit to the "interpretation" of audio data fed into the system. There isn't "a whole bunch" of piezos, just one or possibly two for the head and rim, plus a pressure sensor in the middle. The vibrations act as an exciter for a physical modeling algorithm, a simple amplitude modulator, get filtered in the subtractive algorithm, etc. It really isn't doing the massive data analysis your post implies.

[visa tapani]

Hmm maybe I've gotten the wrong impression. It does seem quite sensitive to different areas of the skin, though, but maybe that's something else.

In any case, most of the sounds I've heard in different demo videos are quite corny and gimmicky, so in order for me to use it I'd need to be able to customize it a lot...