I would like Arturia support to actually support

[tehlord]

I bought a Minilab which arrived last week. I registered it on the Arturia website, downloaded the software (after finding it myself, the link in the manual does not work) on my PC and most was well.

I then tried to do the same thing on my Mac. I couldn't find the installers in my account any more (for Mac or PC) but once again managed to find them myself on the forums.

It was then I found out that the activation code I'd been given for the software only works on one machine. I have put in a support ticket, which I've received an acknowledgement email for with a link to a ticket tracker (which also does not work), but as yet no response from Arturia after a week. I have also posted on the Arturia forum, which has also had no response after 3 days.

This is completely unacceptable.

Oh, I did receive an email asking if I wanted to crossgrage to V collection 3 though. At this point, how about no.


Sort it out.

[Naiw]

I bought a Minilab which arrived last week. I registered it on the Arturia website, downloaded the software (after finding it myself, the link in the manual does not work) on my PC and most was well.

I then tried to do the same thing on my Mac. I couldn't find the installers in my account any more (for Mac or PC) but once again managed to find them myself on the forums.

It was then I found out that the activation code I'd been given for the software only works on one machine. I have put in a support ticket, which I've received an acknowledgement email for with a link to a ticket tracker (which also does not work), but as yet no response from Arturia after a week. I have also posted on the Arturia forum, which has also had no response after 3 days.

This is completely unacceptable.

Oh, I did receive an email asking if I wanted to crossgrage to V collection 3 though. At this point, how about no.


Sort it out.

I have no idea about the support quality or response. So far I haven't contacted Arturia support on my own.

I do however know that the Arturia site explicitly said that the soft license would only work on the computer you install it on. If you want to use the software on several computers you have to get a hardware dongle and transfer the license to it. You can then install the software on any computer, and launch it as long as you have the usb stick in.

[V0RT3X]

Personally I have bought only one product from them and it was the Prophet V when it was still selling for $249.99 at my local music store. I had very few issues with it and thought i got my moneys worth for the Prophet VS emulation. Anyhow I registered and stuff and went on to their forums and saw many complaints regarding bugs in future products I was interested in of theirs. None of the complaints seemed to get any attention or response from the developers or fellow users! As a matter of fact the forums were pretty dead..

This was quite a few years ago, but their attitude really really put me off every buying another one of their products. I personally believe if you sell something, that you SUPPORT it to the best of your abilities!

Hopefully they get back to you and give you a good response!

[pedx1ng]

This was quite a few years ago, but their attitude really really put me off every buying another one of their products. I personally believe if you sell something, that you SUPPORT it to the best of your abilities!

Hopefully they get back to you and give you a good response!

Yep, I had a dire experience with them as well. I had the Analog Laboratory 49-key keyboard. After a couple of months I had an issue where light key-presses would not register at all on keys in one of the octaves. It wasn't an issue of velocity scale and sending low values, it simply didn't register presses unless they were medium-to-hard in force. I thought it was a fairly clear issue and put in a ticket on their website. I never got a response so I was wondering what was going on and eventually found out they closed the ticket without even sending any kind of response! After that I took a look on their forums and saw other people were having issues with the keyboard as well with no resolution.

Oh well, I learned that I should do more diligent research beforehand and of course to never buy anything Arturia again.

Edit: spelling

[paladium]

i have a minilab as well + 3 of their plugins , i would rate their support as
good and the elicenser software works as expected , buy a secondhand dongle
and transfer your license on that , the software harddisc based elicenser
can give headaches and only supports 1 machine

[tehlord]

From the single page 'manual' in the box :-

For your information licenses are managed through the eLicense Control Center (proerty of blah blah). This third-party application allows you to download new licenses using activation codes, as well as transfer licenses.


Now I'm fully aware what the elicenser is, I have a dongle in my machine for Cubase.

My point is that at no point was it made clear in any of the documentation or registration procedure that I'd be able to use it ONCE, and even if that is the case (preposterous) then they need to answer their effing support requests.

[Naiw]

As I said above, it ought to be self-explanatory from the following wording.

http://www.arturia.com/evolution/en/sup ... enser.html

"How to use my instrument(s) on several computers?

The use of the USB-eLicenser is imperative in this case. Your instrument(s) will run on any computer on which:
the latest version of the instrument is installed,
the latest version of the eLCC is installed,
the USB-eLicenser is plugged into.
If you did not download your license(s) on the hardware dongle at first activation, you still can transfer onto through a simple drag-and-drop within the eLicenser Control Center."

[tehlord]

As I said above, it ought to be self-explanatory from the following wording.

http://www.arturia.com/evolution/en/sup ... enser.html

"How to use my instrument(s) on several computers?

The use of the USB-eLicenser is imperative in this case. Your instrument(s) will run on any computer on which:
the latest version of the instrument is installed,
the latest version of the eLCC is installed,
the USB-eLicenser is plugged into.
If you did not download your license(s) on the hardware dongle at first activation, you still can transfer onto through a simple drag-and-drop within the eLicenser Control Center."

This isn't really the point.

It simply implies that I can download a soft elicenser onto my dongle, and then use the dongle to run Analog Lab on my other machine, when I need the dongle plugged into my main machine to run Cubase.

What should happen is that I should be able to use the soft elicenser on both machines, and this is the question I have asked for support for from Arturia.

[Naiw]

As I said above, it ought to be self-explanatory from the following wording.

http://www.arturia.com/evolution/en/sup ... enser.html

"How to use my instrument(s) on several computers?

The use of the USB-eLicenser is imperative in this case. Your instrument(s) will run on any computer on which:
the latest version of the instrument is installed,
the latest version of the eLCC is installed,
the USB-eLicenser is plugged into.
If you did not download your license(s) on the hardware dongle at first activation, you still can transfer onto through a simple drag-and-drop within the eLicenser Control Center."

This isn't really the point.

It simply implies that I can download a soft elicenser onto my dongle, and then use the dongle to run Analog Lab on my other machine, when I need the dongle plugged into my main machine to run Cubase.

What should happen is that I should be able to use the soft elicenser on both machines, and this is the question I have asked for support for from Arturia.

No that's an issue related to elicenser, as you obviously can't plug in the dongle in both computers simultaneously you obviously need either two dongles or just accept you can't launch cubase while you're using the arturia tools on the other computer.

You are not the only one in the world who has two or more computers, we all face the same limitations when it comes to DRM.

Personally I hate it, I think it's a disaster that I have to pay 300 eur or more to have the previledge to only be able to run the software on one application at a time.

Others use an online DRM system so you can register multiple computers, but often those are limited to two active computers and sometimes limit the amount of times you can deactivate the software as well...

Toontracks drummer series for example allows for 4 deactivations and two active activations.
IK Multimedias products allows you to generate up to 5 activation serials.

I think even such system sucks arse, I use laptops a lot and have several of them. Some windows, some mac os (and even a few with linux on, but I never do music on those) and I quickly burn through these activations- sometimes they even invalidate themselves if you install a new harddrive, upgrade memory, etc

it's a horrible system and everyone knows that there are cracked versions for absolutely free available at certain sources.

So I agree with you that it's a pain in the arse- however I think the eLicenser dongle is a decent solution... but I would really wish for that they allowed to create a temporary soft elicense from the dongle; Like say that's valid for 15 days or so, so you can use your licenses on that other platform when you need it- I would totally accept move the dongle around to update this expiry date.

Right now the only option is to either get your hands on a pirate version which is easy as cake, but the problem is of course they're not as fast with updates.

DRM is and always been a pain for loyal customers, a joy and challange for crackers and a goldmine for the DRM developers.
For the manufacturer of the software it's of course expensive to license DRM technology and I think it's just silly as it provides no protection at all in reality. As stated the crackers proven time and time again they can create software emulations of an hardware bundle, they can generate activations and so on and sure it might take a few months, but once cracked it all lost it's value.

It certainly ain't improving the sales though and it annoys the hell out of customers.

But I still think your original post is moot or atleast to me it was just plain obvious that it would be functional on just one computer- but then again I've encountered the eLicenser technology before- back in 2002 when i bought Cubase for the first and last time.

After noticing how much eLicenser f**ked up my system I ditched Steinberg for good... Or atleast I though until I noticed they purchased eLicenser (which previously was developed by a company called Syncrosoft).

And Arturias V-Collection was the first software I purchased in over 10 years that had this kind of DRM.

I think it improved but I still think companies such as Arturia are morons to pay for such technology.

The best DRM system I've encountered so far is the one Native Instruments uses (Which I believe is an inhouse thing.) it's actually pretty transparent once you activated your system, I've installed ex Reaktor on all my windows and mac computers and it just works and that makes me willing to buy more products from them in the future.

Arturia? Really not sure, it all depends on what they come up with the next year- I like the arturia synths but I rather encourage a developer such as U-he who not only does products that sounds amazing (and often more realistic IMHO than Arturias products) but also has a DRM system that is just serial based, (besides he's a very nice person something you'll notice if you ever get in touch with him via ex the support.)

But to summarize, I totally agree with your frustration- I do not agree on that this information was not available on Arturias site however.

[tehlord]

Whilst I agree that the majority of the information is to be found on the arturia site if you look, the problem is you have to look, really hard. That does not also alter the fact that I have had a support email ignored twice in the period of nearly 10 days, a forum post ignored at their own forum, and now here too.

Furthermore I'm getting more bugs and glitches which I now know is going to be a total pain to resolve.

The is the last Arturia product I will ever buy, and I'll make sure that as many people I know (which is a considerable amount) avoid this company too.