RealGuitar (and RealStrat/RealLP) 3 -- thoughts, issues etc?

[Spitfire31]

Encouraged by Compyfox' knowledgeable eulogies above, I went ahead and updated my RG, RS and RLP to version 3, after I had checked that the Mac version of the Aspyr/Activision GH World Tour game + guitar controller, that I was lucky to find at a rock bottom price, worked fine with the enclosed GH WT game.

So far, so good.

The controller is apparently the very latest version, with the sensor strip on the neck and the Star Power button - exactly like the one on the Musiclab videos.

It's also recognised in, for instance, Live 8 (four 'Virtual MIDI Drivers' (Game Controller 1-4) listed.

But the only action I get from it with RG, LPC or RS in Joystick mode is the Fret lights lighting up - and in the wrong order: Orange tab equals Orange and Blue Equals Blue BUT the Yellow tab lights up Green, Red tab = Yellow and the top Green tab gives a Red light in RLP/RS/RG!

None of the other controls have any effect at all - tilting the controller doesn't budge the Tilt value which remains frozen at 64, and so on. No strumming, nada, with the exception of the partly erroneous Fret tab lights.

I'm of course hugely disappointed.

Any advice at all on how to get this gizmo to work properly on my Mac would be most appreciated.

Best,

Joachim

[lingyai]

Encouraged by Compyfox' knowledgeable eulogies above, I went ahead and updated my RG, RS and RLP to version 3, after I had checked that the Mac version of the Aspyr/Activision GH World Tour game + guitar controller, that I was lucky to find at a rock bottom price, worked fine with the enclosed GH WT game.

So far, so good.

The controller is apparently the very latest version, with the sensor strip on the neck and the Star Power button - exactly like the one on the Musiclab videos.

It's also recognised in, for instance, Live 8 (four 'Virtual MIDI Drivers' (Game Controller 1-4) listed.

But the only action I get from it with RG, LPC or RS in Joystick mode is the Fret lights lighting up - and in the wrong order: Orange tab equals Orange and Blue Equals Blue BUT the Yellow tab lights up Green, Red tab = Yellow and the top Green tab gives a Red light in RLP/RS/RG!

None of the other controls have any effect at all - tilting the controller doesn't budge the Tilt value which remains frozen at 64, and so on. No strumming, nada, with the exception of the partly erroneous Fret tab lights.

I'm of course hugely disappointed.

Any advice at all on how to get this gizmo to work properly on my Mac would be most appreciated.

Best,

Joachim

Hmmm. That really sucks. I'm sorry to hear it. I suggest you post on their forum. Let us know how it goes.

[Spitfire31]

Hmmm. That really sucks. I'm sorry to hear it. I suggest you post on their forum. Let us know how it goes.

Thanks for the sympathy!

I already posted in all three Real-forums at Musiclab. I'll keep you posted over here if anything turns up.

/Joachim

[lingyai]

Compyfox -- any words of wisdom for our friend here?

[Compyfox]

Sorry for the late response. A lot of stuff to do over here.

Any advice at all on how to get this gizmo to work properly on my Mac would be most appreciated.

I need some further input on it to actually help (like: what guitar, and is it PS3 or XB360).

One way or another, contact Musiclab's support section through support@... Confirm in this mail once more than not every wireless receiver works right out of the box (I adressed this several times through mails, so they know what's up). Don't do this though the forums, support mail is more efficient and direct.

Important for them to know is the following:
OS system, host (name and version), guitar type (especially which: PS3 or XB360), what kind of receiver, the driver version (and where you got it from). Best if you make a pack of the driver and a photo of the receiver.



Here is the deal:
My XB360 wireless receiver is not an official Microsoft one, but a rebuilt. With wireless guitars, I had the very same problem as you describe: switched color buttons (yellow and blue in my case) and the strumming didn't work. If you record a MIDI track, you'll easily see that certain notes are shifted or switched around - so you can't trigger anything.

This is why I recommended to include a learn function. It was there in the Beta's/RC's - but I don't know (still haven't installed the official release) if it's still implemented or put into action. If it is, you can access it through the gear symbol (setup) in the Joystick mode and hope for the best. If it's like the RC, it'll drop a TXT with further info for the developers (which you can send in).


It is a sad sideeffect of these guitars and rare testers with several branches/builds on both Win/Mac. You can't rule out everything, and not every build of the receiver is the same. But this is why you shouldn't overlook technical support.

However, if you're using a cabled guitar and the buttons are switched around, then something is wrong with the Mac drivers.



One fix you can try for the time being (until there is a bugfix from the devs) is filtering the incoming key signals, and switch them to the appropriate one with a MIDI input filter. Use a MIDI keyboard or a MIDI track to find out the correct notes, then create custom MIDI filters (it's hard to pull off in Cubase, but possible - should be possible in other hosts as well).

Can't help much more than this.



lingyai:
How is it working for you? Did you get your guitar yet? Any issues?

[Spitfire31]

Hi Compyfox,

Many thanks for the advice and pointers!

In fact, I have already contacted Musiclab support and hope for some feedback soon.

The controller is wireless and the package, which includes the USB dongle, is neither PS3 nor XB360 but a package for Mac by Asphyr/Activision. There was no driver per se to install, just the app along with many GB:s of content.

I'll investigate the 'learn' function in RG, if available.

Thanks again!

/Joachim

[Compyfox]

Oh, so you got the Mac port of World Tour - sorry, I can't help you there. Chances are this device is yet again totally different.

I'm sure the support will guide you through it and we'll see a bugfix in the near future (or a suitable learn function - if not available already).

[lingyai]

lingyai:
How is it working for you? Did you get your guitar yet? Any issues?

The GH controller arived, but I'm waiting to hear back from MusicLab support before I install version 3 -- they'd had to give me a special patch to make RG2 work within my DAW, Acid Pro 7, and I want to know if something like that is needed again. I don't want to just run the installers for RG 3 until I know, as I don't want to screw anything up. Once I finally get set up, I'll post my experiences here. I'm really looking forward to strumming out Kum-Bay-Ya on a plastic guitar!

By the way, which DAW do you use RG3 in?

[Compyfox]

RG3 installs in parallel to RG2. It's just that the registry entries (or at least the link in the DLL in your VSTplugins folder) will be rewritten to access RG3.


I'm using the RG3 engine (RG/RS/RLPC) in Cubase 6.0.6 on WinXP.

[lingyai]

This just arrived from support:

"Please uninstall current version of RealGuitar, then run RealGuitar 3/RealStrat 3/RealLPC 3 full installers. We didn't test version 3 in Acid yet. Please report your progress."


I sense trouble ahead. By following their advice, I risk losing all my existing Acid projects which use RG2.

And if RG3 doesn't work in Acid, then I'll have to buy/learn another DAW just to use RG3 -- which opens up the huge question of, which DAW? Cubase is too expensive (around £500); my gut reaction to Reaper after a few hours of trying to do simple things is like what you see in Edvard Munch's "The Scream"; Studio 1 has many complaints about routing problems...

Sometimes I just hate this hobby....

[Spitfire31]

Oh, so you got the Mac port of World Tour - sorry, I can't help you there. Chances are this device is yet again totally different.

I'm sure the support will guide you through it and we'll see a bugfix in the near future (or a suitable learn function - if not available already).

The controller (wireless guitar and USB receiver) seems to be standard PS3 ones, according to what I've googled: "Redoctane Wireless Controller for PC, part # 95451.805", the USB receiver pt # 95451.806.

It works fine with the Mac version of GH WT.

Following your advice (should've thought of it meself, shouldn't I?), I recorded a track with RG in Live 8. The only controls that result in MIDI notes are the Fret tabs. Then, Up Strum and Up Cursor cause a blink with the Live 'MIDI received' signal, but no notes that I can find.

In RG, the Joystick Settings pref pane doesn't show any Controller name (but if I disconnect the USB receiver, it says 'No controller found', so obviously my #95451.805 is recognized somehow). If I put my cursor where the name of the controller should be, I get a white square with a black check mark following the cursor as long as it is within the text area.

The Learn button is still there, but it only lights up when I keep pressing it, so it doesn't seem very eager to learn anything.

Mac Intel 10.6.8, 16GB RAM.

/Joachim

[Compyfox]

No worries, lingyai.
I think the patch was only applied to the root folder of the engine (read: program files/musiclab/RG2). So I'd make a backup in your case (including the DLL's in the VST plugin folder), then uninstall and fresh-install RG3.

If something goes wrong, you can still roll back.


Regarding compatibility to projects with RG2 - well, you need to re-setup certain settings again. Else it should work right out of the box (the DLL is called the same).



Speaking of trouble shooting:
Spitfire31, did the Mac guitar come with a regular USB slot? If so, maybe try to connect it through USB directly to the Mac. If the buttons are now correct, it's not a driver issue, but the routing within the wireless receiver. If not, then it's the drivers.


EDIT:
Actually, if it's the PS3 build "disguised" in as PC/MAC guitar, then chances are that there are still driver issues. I have to take a closer look to the learn function myself. But with Release Candidates, it popped up a screen where it told you what to do and in the end resulted in a TXT file.

I think you have the same issues as I have (incoming data received, but VSTi can't interpret it). So it is a receiver issue (mapping) that only the devs can fix.

Aparently, the Windows/Mac reveicers are also not unified. Same with the drivers.

[Compyfox]

I just mint-installed all RG(s) - read: no beta's or release candidates anymore, but the official ones from the Login section.

I can confirm that (at least on my end) the Joystick mode is not fixed (engine from 01st August, I had custom made fixed files from mid August) and that there is no Learn Function for the guitars.


I adressed this again to the support section. All I can ask is for patience. Should your guitars (cabled ones especially, or the PS3 wireless ones) work right out of the box - then you're lucky. For everyone else, please be patient.

[Spitfire31]

Good news! I just got an email from Konstantin at Musiclab in reply to my support ticket about the Mac/PC GH controllers not working.

The latest update to RealGuitar/RealStrat/RealLPC (3.0.0.7049) now works perfectly with my Mac Activision/Asphyr GH WT guitar controller! Even the slide bar works fine.

I would assume that this is also the case for the PC version.

The Learn function apparently still doesn't work and there may be one or two little glitches, but I'm finally having lots of fun.

Many thanks to Musiclab for the update!

/Joachim

[Compyfox]

I think with "learn" function, you mean Host learn. I speak of an own button within the setup panel in the Joystick mode GUI which was only there in the beta (for me at least).

I still have to wait and get an answer from Musiclab regarding a global learn function (as requested during Beta times). And I didn't get any word of an update either. You're the only one so far that wrote a number higher than .7000, and only for the Mac version.