Somebody tried Harrison Mixbus for Windows?

[BenLoftis]

To be clear I wasn't really talking eye candy ...

Oops I agree completely, "eye candy" was the wrong term. I think I know what you are getting at. We're making some changes in the upcoming v2.3 which will help you make subgroups faster.

Many of the other "workflow" functions you suggest have been implemented in Ardour v3 which will become Mixbus v3. We don't have to wait on the Ardour guys to add anything, we are all working together.

Best,
Ben

[LawrenceF]

Thanks Ben.

BTW, out of curiosity, I just tried your automation example from the video in my other two daws and you're absolutely right. One does it the "correct" way, the way shown in your video, deleting only the range and leaving the rest of the envelope intact. The other one actually doesn't do that , it changes the envelope shape - outside of the range - because, like you said earlier, it focuses on "existing points", not the actual envelope itself.

Good example.

It shall remain nameless to protect the innocent.

[Endor-8o8]

Anyone having difficulties with vst scanning in Mixbus ? It doesn't wanna recognize my Softube plugs (win7)...

[arkmabat]

$39

"Don'tCrac[k] Promotion - through June 12!"

This vs Reaper. Let the comments fly...

[wasi]

$39

"Don'tCrac[k] Promotion - through June 12!"

This vs Reaper. Let the comments fly...

lol, as much fun I'm having exploring Mixbus, it's no real competition to any major DAW out there. You need a 'regular', full-featured DAW, then you may want to get Mixbus for mastering.

But at $40 it's worth getting just to say thanks for the video tutorials. I also have this conspiracy theory that the two mainstream OSs will become more and more 'closed', eventually deprieving us of non-Apple/MS approved software and plugins, so I am stocking up on canned food and linux compatible software.

[glokraw]

$39

"Don'tCrac[k] Promotion - through June 12!"

This vs Reaper. Let the comments fly...

I could master the reaper output with the other linux apps
using this. Seems worth staying out of the Carl's Jr. drive-through
for a week, to reclaim $40

[fedexnman]

[MickGael]

I have a fondness for Harrison as a company, which is part of the reason I bought a license.

That said, using it is (sadly) a singularly frustrating experience, so I almost never use it. It is clunky, and the workflow and logic is completely alien to me. And while it sounds good, I have to wrestle with it constantly. I use a D-Box and there seems to be no way to integrate it (at least that I can find from the I/O options it seems to recognize. By comparison, Cubase is dead simple. Just now I wanted to check to see if it is recognizing 64-bit plugins ('m running 64-bit across the board) and the latest update of Mixbus crashed. Magic.

[codec_spurt]

I've been looking for an app to mess about with in Linux, just for loading up a few wavs and maybe rearranging them. I suppose I could use Audacity, but I was wanting more something in the DAW vein than an Editor vein.


I know I have EnergyXT2 but I am still yet to get around to setting it up. It won't run most of my favourite plugins and the Audio editing whilst surprisingly excellent, being both flexible and a lot of fun, is very buggy and not in a good way. We are talking pop your cones/eardrums nastiness. Not good.


Then I saw this. Never heard of it before. No idea what it might be. Saw it ran in Linux and thought ok, I'll take a flyer on it. Read up some stuff. Never seen so many polarised opinions on a bit of software ever, ranging from it being the holy grail of analogue mixing itb to trash that shouldn't be sold because it doesn't even work.

So I knew what I was letting myself in for. I heard that it runs much more stable on Linux than in windows, and the fact that it is based on Ardour with Jack that kind of makes sense. Not a massive fan of Ardour, but I respect what they are trying to do, however misguided I or others may think they are. Enough politics.

Well, I only tested it in windows. It took me about four hours to install. Let me just repeat that for anyone skimming over this, FOUR hours to install. Then a further couple of hours to debug why it wouldn't load any of my VSTs. A lesser mortal would have been a little upset possibly by this point, but not me, oh no, masochism I have learned to love since deciding I wanted to make music on a computer with security. At least I'm not bitter about it. It was all good wholesome fun. So I have nothing bad to say about Mixbus in this department. If I am such a mug that I want to run security on my system, then I must pay the price. They all make me pay it - Presonus, FLStudio, Ableton... So Harrison are no different in this regard. I take full responsibility. There's only me and about three other people in the world that run with this level of security, so I'm afraid we don't count when it comes to installers and preset management etc. I am slowly getting the picture...


So with that little matter out of the way, the fun then really began. And boy, was it fun, for a while. About ten minutes in I had my first crash, trying to load a reverb plugin onto one of the buses. Better not do that again. I won't bore you with further details, but suffice it to say, the program crashed on me about a dozen times in a few hours. I was not doing anything over the top. I couldn't if I wanted to. The 6 or 7 tracks brought my triple core to its knees. Yes this program does work on multiple cores. One for Audio Processing and the other for the GUI. This is probably why they say it needs a minimum of a dual core. It is expecting it and I doubt it would work at all without one. No matter, it still won't fly with much more than 8 tracks loaded.

As for the plugins, it really is a bit much that you are expected to pay so much for them. I am sure they are superb quality, but come on, we are talking hundreds of dollars here, for plugins that most of us already have. If you want to brag about compatibility between users of your DAW then at least make them free. Give us that much at least. I never expect anything for nothing. And I'm not saying you should work for nothing, but leverage them for pity's sake. If you can't make a going concern out of the whole package then outsource and get some third party vst vendors on board. I don't care how good they are, in this day and age, there is always someone better. Just a thought.

To sell the DAW for such a knockdown price and then to charge so much for the plugins on top, smacks of, not sharp practice, but a certain amount of desperation. We VST users are a discerning and wily lot. We shell over our hard earned, we expect a certain something back, not something for nothing, but added value, shall we say. You had on opportunity here to provide that added value and leverage a bit of good will from it. To be perfectly blunt, in this day and age, if you had given them away for free, no one would have appreciated them anyway. We are saturated with the things. Are you a DAW manufacturer or plugin manufacturer?


Now the good bits.

What can I say? The whole concept is amazing. The EQs are extremely musical and tweakable. The Compressors sound fantastic and are well designed with the few options they have. Having them all on a channel each saves time and improves workflow. The saturation is subtle but does impart a certain something. I'm sure it could be achieved by putting certain plugins on every track. But this way is so much more elegant.

I really love this program. A lot. After finding its weaknesses, I learned to avoid the crashes, and after about eight hours I was making sweet music from stems I had laying around. There's a certain instantaneous feedback feel to the ergonomics. It's easy to make things sound bad, but it's just as easy to make them sound good. Whereas the saturation for example, I found to be very subtle until I pushed it over. Just what you want.

I can find uses for it in the mixing department which is what it was intended for. I shall make a custom vst folder and just put in one or two of my best vsts . The VST management is excellent with good feedback. I know I can get about a maximum of eight stereo tracks going on my system and that is more than enough for mixing down. I can even imagine just loading a stereo file into Mixbus and not even mixing with it but pre-mastering. There really are an awful lot of options and flexibility held within.

I'm looking forward to getting this working on my Debian install on my hard drive as well. Plus now that I have a licence I can put it on any of my compatible distros I have lying around. I hear that it works better on some than others, but it did say that it worked on Debian and seeing as I have a perfectly good working version of that on the go, it will be my first port of call.


Being blunt again, if I didn't have the option of putting it on to a Linux system with all the increased stability that supposedly brings, then I would probably have been more than a little disappointed with this program. It is not stable. There is no doubt about that. Not on windows 7 64 bit anyway. It remains to be seen if it is much better on Linux. I hope and expect it will be. Many people say that it is.


As to future upgrades, it would be nice if a stable version at least was brought out and given to the customers that have supported the program so far. It's fair enough that maybe a version 3 that was super stable and whatever is a paid for option, but please, don't just bring out a stable version of this and label it version 3 with a big price tag. I really like this program a lot and if I got a stable upgrade, I would be more than happy to then, in the future, pay out a bit more for something more on top again. It would create an awful lot of goodwill and that is something that I see is sorely lacking at the moment with this program. From that base you can really move forward, because this is a great concept, when it works it works like a dream and fills a gap that nothing else fills.


And I just have to say, that the customer support is second to none with these people. Polite, professional and prompt. Even when dealing with people like me and all my frustrations that I mentioned earlier.


Mixbus is 30 quid, multi-platform and with unlimited and super responsive technical support. Imho it does something that no other software does in this niche, at this price at least. You know the pitfalls. You know the drawbacks. There must be more than a few people out there though that would benefit by having this in their workflow, for the price of what they would pay for a plugin. And there's a whole load of youtube tutorials to help you make your mind up. Buy it now while it is a bargain. You really wouldn't want to pay more for it when the sale ends.

[LawrenceF]

The one and only single thing I don't like about it is that it's running on top of Ardour.

The console design is great, the sound is great, the mixer workflow for mixing with the Harrison DSP UI controls is great, the Harrison guys are f'ing cool, responsive, and smart as hell when it comes to all things pro audio. It's a near perfect situation, except that it's tied to a workstation that just isn't a great Windows workstation yet by any stretch of the imagination.

Probably a much more pleasing experience on Linux.

Just as a mere speculative thought... imagine a Mixbus version of say... Reaper. They really should have cut that deal with Cockos, given that the Steinberg's and similar of the world are likely a lot less receptive to that kind of collaboration and code sharing.

[BenLoftis]

@LawrenceF:

We did approach the Reaper guys. In theory they were interested; but when we got into the details of how to share code ( and later keep up with who owns what ) it became complicated. We needed to change the core of the mixing engine, and (understandably) neither of us wanted to share that information without a complicated contract. So it didn't get far.

Ardour, being open-source, allows us to modify it indefinitely until we get what we want. We want to make mixing engines, and DSP, and control surfaces, and I/O. Sharing the development of the workstation (to do the import/export/cut/copy/paste, etc) allows us to focus on our interests. For example, SSL funded development of the OSX port, several years ago. There have been other big-name collaborators as well.

There are some other open-source, cross-platform apps ( like Traverso ) which could also host the Mixbus engine, but Ardour aligned most closely with our long-term goals.

Best,
Ben

[LawrenceF]

Thanks a lot Ben.

I wonder if there's a way to collaborate with PreSonus and Studio One, maybe create an optional ARA version of the Mixbua DSP for that host. I suppose the legal matters would still be quite complex but they seem to be open to collaboration, like they did with Celemony and ARA.

The general idea of Mixbus in S1 kinda gives me a woody.

At any rate, i think what you guys are doing is pretty great. Thanks.

[Jed]

Tonight I installed Jack for Windows (I use Win7 64 bit) and then routed a 10 track Ableton mix to Mixbus (channel by channel directly inside Live)

Doing this meant Ardour was effectively removed from the equation. Each channel of Live sends to a stereo track in Mixbus, and I set Mixbus to do the monitoring.

I then sent the Mixbus master back to a new track in Live so I could record the mixed output

Sounds way harder than it is and I effectively ended up with Live diectly coupled to the Mixbus mixer.

I've saved the Mixbus session as a template for future use. This saves all the Mixbus channel routings which is great.

So my workflow is:

1) Compose inside Live as per normal using my normal asio driver

2) When ready to mix, change to Jack asio driver (inside Live) and quickly change the output of each Live track to a Jack channel (eg Live Track 1 to Jack Ch3-4, Live Track 2 to Jack Ch5-6 etc)

3) Add a new track to Live and receive from Jack channel that will send back from Mixbus master (I use Jack Ch 31-32 for this)

4) Fire up my Template in Mixbus, set Live up to loop through the song, and away I go mixing till it sounds good. The Mixbus transport never starts as all Mixbus is doing is processing the audio sent by Live in real time.

5) When mixing is complete record the Mixbus Master into the new Live track - job done.

This is a really great way to use Mixbus in any DAW and means you don't have to learn Ardours workflow, commands etc.

Hope thats of interest to someone

Cheers
Jed

[codec_spurt]

This is some interesting information.

BenLoftis, just a FYI, but on KVR we have our own Linux Midi guru - jeffh who coded PyDAW. He's busy at work presently, but his original incantations/invocations were extremely well received, with more than a few of us making music on a Linux system that just was not possible, previously.

Though I do seem to remember some bad blood between people with the Ardour project. I can't remember what it was. And maybe it would be good to get that out in the open now before things go further. Not to bitch and open old wounds but to clear the air and provide a frame work for all of us to move forward.

I would be more than happy to abandon windows for a fully working and stable Mixbus.

I bet many others would too.



I have a lot more to say, but, I'll just leave it at that for now.


Would it be possible to tell us, Ben, if you are at least considering Midi support in Mixbus?


cheers.

[codec_spurt]

The general idea of Mixbus in S1 kinda gives me a woody.

At any rate, i think what you guys are doing is pretty great. Thanks.

Oh lordy.


Me too.