How important is VST3 support for you as a customer

[jupiter8]

Just imagine how good things would be if they implemented the same sidechain for VST2 plugins as they did for VST3. Then you could have had the precious 4 years ago. There's no technical reason for them not to do it,the reason was to force people over to VST3.

[hibidy]

So this thread is basically about a couple of snipers shooting on everything related to Steinberg and its customers. Not very impressed, to be honest.

By the way, the list of developers that already moved to Vst3 is begining to look like a "Who Is Who" of the audio business.

Of course, there are important developers that don't see the point. Coincidentally, they use to be the same that produce some of the most RAM intensive plugins out there while not releasing 64bit versions of them until 2011 or even later, who knows.

Because they know better than their customers, obviously.

If you actually read the thread, you'd see that the TITLE has been mostly ignored and.....

Oh, I see your point

[trimph1]

Well, I don't know...it looks like there will be a whole pile of customers who will have to be dragged into VST3 if they are to get anything new then...

But, as I see it, that looks to be a ways off yet...the numbers who said that they do not give a ... about VST3 are still pretty high...

I do still see the point about SB using this to force licensing agreements..would not surprise me in a bit if that is the case...

[aciddose]

i'm not going to say i'm 100% certain, i just can't think of any other logical reason they'd want to specifically make these kinds of changes to the interface but to limit use of the interface through obscuring the issues just like au, rtas and other formats currently have.

if it wasn't that, it would have to be that they actually didn't really care, and the change was just done for absolutely no reason.

[Elektrobolt]

Anyways, VST3 is already in place and supported by several vendors.

At some point (just like older versions of Windows, Macs or Unix, and applications programmed for these obsolete systems) compatibility will be an issue. This is inevitable in the way we use software today.

As for statistics (of the votes in the thread)...

The percentage of people that prefer VST3 is slightly over 32% (at the time of me writing this), which is a respectable lot in itself.

The last option of "What the heck is.." votes (nearly 9%) do not even know what VST3 is and therefore might not know what they are missing, and so could easily (and even already) be VST3 customers.

Which leaves the remaining votes of "I don't care about.." (nearly 59%), does not mean they are against VST3, merely that they can live with an alternative. This group could also be potential customers.

So basing a business in not supporting VST3 on principle, could potentially be bad for any business in the future.

[Benutzername]

Note expression could open up a whole new world if adopted by other plugins and host though

Of course note expression opens up a lot of possibilities but I don't think it will change anything in the DAW world at all. Polyphonic control messages have been around for decades but they were never really used by performers, sound designers or composers. I don't think VST3.5 will instantly make a difference just because you have more than one controller number available at the same time.

Please remember: The way you can inline edit note specific controllers in Cubase6 is a great addition to the piano roll. But this editor is not part of VST3.5, it is part of Cubase. Every compatible host may implement the editing of note expression values in a totally different way. Most likely the editing will just look like the current poly aftertouch editing methods with an additional selectable controller number.

[Freaqpeak]

yes reaper's gui (i'm told, "if you customize it then...") is hard to use, but it does apparently do the impossible - it supports vst2 sidechaining. attacking it for any other unrelated issue like it's gui is just another fallacious argument.

Who said anything about impossible? I can do sidechaining with VST2 also. In Cubase. Just not as easy as with VST3 though. I don't know how Reaper does it, of its actually part of VST2 spec or if it is some Reaper specific workaround. I don't care.

Anyways, Reapers OWN plugins crash in other hosts, for example Cubase... so I guess Reapers plugins doesn't follow the VST spec in the first place.

Forget about sidechaining. You didn't comment on actual new features of VST3 and VST3.5........

[trimph1]

I'm still waiting on what could not be done using VST2.4 that you can with VST3.1---through VST3.5....


....in other words...what else is NEW in that set?

[Elektrobolt]

I'm still waiting on what could not be done using VST2.4 that you can with VST3.1---through VST3.5....

....in other words...what else is NEW in that set?

Your wait is over. Everything that VST2.4 cannot do is NEW in VST3.

What COULD have been done is irrelevant. After all, using your logic, one COULD have done it ALL in VST1, but of course that never happened either. New versions, updates and upgrades, are a part of current software development. Standards evolve too.

However, VST3 is here now, doing it.

[hibidy]

per the OP and the original question, I just don't care.

Does that mean it wouldn't be nice? Of course it would.

[Elektrobolt]

Polyphonic control messages have been around for decades but they were never really used by performers, sound designers or composers.

I would say that Aftertouch have been used plenty.

It's one of the few control messages with hardware controllers made for performance on a keyboard.

The way you can inline edit note specific controllers in Cubase6 is a great addition to the piano roll. But this editor is not part of VST3.5, it is part of Cubase. Every compatible host may implement the editing of note expression values in a totally different way. Most likely the editing will just look like the current poly aftertouch editing methods with an additional selectable controller number.

Of course a host can implement a NE editor differently, but a compatible host would need to support the basic protocol of receiving and transmitting notes with NE controller values, and if editing is to be supported (likely, one would hope) it needs somehow be on a note by note basis.

The NE controller values belong to the note they are added to. When you move the note the controller values follows the note. NE controller values are not tied to a channel, like MIDI controller data is, but to individual notes.

[Benutzername]

The NE controller values belong to the note they are added to. When you move the note the controller values follows the note. NE controller values are not tied to a channel, like MIDI controller data is, but to individual notes.

Like polyAT for example?

[ericj23]

The NE controller values belong to the note they are added to. When you move the note the controller values follows the note. NE controller values are not tied to a channel, like MIDI controller data is, but to individual notes.

Like polyAT for example?

indeed - but there is much much more of them - so polyphonic panning, volume, filter settings etc etc etc etc etc
Basically as many as the plug-in shows to the OS

[Urs]

Well, one thing that a plug can do is report that expression map thing. That is, the host can display the name of each drum in a drum synth without extra work on the user's side. It can also display those "performance keys" of synths like Symthohm-Melohman on extra tracks without any extra work on the users side. That's a great plus for people who work with orchestra libraries where each instrument has its own set of performance controllers. A plugin has to support that though.

The other thing, note expressions, is a completely different thing, but it basically sources form the same idea. Specifically, the expression controllers in orchestra libraries can be controlled per each note. Again, this feature might also be useful for synths like the Melohman ones, for drum-synths and so on.

It might also be useful for normal synths and instruments in conjunction with exotic controllers. The Eigenharp for instance can send various controllers per note and there are players who have been waiting for this feature. This can not be done with VST2 and just one per-note controller (PolyAT). To overcome this, players of the Eigenharp have to create multiple instances of the same instrument in their host, which costs a considerable amount of cpu and is yet not as flexible.

To a large portion of musicians who neither use orchestra libraries nor exotic controllers it might not really matter all that much.

[Benutzername]

The NE controller values belong to the note they are added to. When you move the note the controller values follows the note. NE controller values are not tied to a channel, like MIDI controller data is, but to individual notes.

Like polyAT for example?

indeed - but there is much much more of them - so polyphonic panning, volume, filter settings etc etc etc etc etc
Basically as many as the plug-in shows to the OS

Sure, but synths and sequencers could do this already twenty years ago. But apart from a nice effect now and then it has never been used much. All the effects you mentioned can be easily created with any VSTi and even existing hardware just by using multiple MIDI channels and/or tracks if needed. So the possibilities are already there but where is new revolutionary new music created with per note effects?

I don't see how VST3.5 could change the game just because you are not limited to a single polyphonic controller per MIDI channel anymore.