Bargain Center: discussion, gossip, etc.

[Uncle E]

So what does this mean to us exactly when they come out with version 10 of the Waves plugins? I honestly don't 'get' WUP.

I don't think anyone but Waves completely gets it. Basically, when version 10 comes out, you might need to buy WUP if you want new versions, future compatibility, or THE ABILITY TO RESELL YOUR PLUGINS. I think you may be able to get around it by upgrading to bundles but I'm not sure about that.

Lastly, I buy serial numbers from other vendors. I could just hold onto my serials and not activate them on Waves and wait for v10 to hit and then register them, right? That would bypass the issue, no?

Hopefully.

And I'm still not seeing the benefit or detriment to v9 vs v10 yet. Could someone please explain what we'll be getting for v10?

They haven't announced it yet. I'm just making an assumption based on the crazy blowout sale they're doing together with the version 9.91 that was released 2 weeks ago.

[Gamma-UT]

And I'm still not seeing the benefit or detriment to v9 vs v10 yet. Could someone please explain what we'll be getting for v10?

v8 to v9 was an unusually big update - 64bit and a change in copy protection. Before that, v8 just introduced stuff like mousewheel support, some improvement in loading time and a bit of massaging of the bundles (adding V-series plugins to Diamond etc). Similarly, v7 moved graphics rendering to the GPU. I would expect v10 to a similar move – with comparatively little that's obvious to the user, although it's possible that following all the work on Soundgrid they might do something more extensive.

[Rational]

Thanks Unc. Always appreciate it.

Yeah, I think you're probably correct in your assumptions about this. Let's see what happens...

Thanks Gamma. I appreciate the info. Good to know.

I'd love to see Waves add Cuda support to v10. Move all the processing off the CPU onto the GPU and totally take over UAD's DSP benefit! By like 1000x!

Why isn't anyone in the audio plugin market targeting the use of Cuda for DSP duties. It makes SO much sense. There's literally all that power just sitting there waiting to be tapped. For that I might actually pay a WUP fee. That'd be the only benefit big enough for me to do so though. And they should consider making WUP $99 if they really want people to buy into it.

[chk071]

Great deal for Ultrareverb... i paid double that price, and still thought it was the total bargain. Seriously, if you pass on that, you're silly.

[Gamma-UT]

Why isn't anyone in the audio plugin market targeting the use of Cuda for DSP duties. It makes SO much sense. There's literally all that power just sitting there waiting to be tapped. For that I might actually pay a WUP fee. That'd be the only benefit big enough for me to do so though. And they should consider making WUP $99 if they really want people to buy into it.

The latency is terrible with GPU DSP. Works OK for video/graphics; really bad for audio.

[Burillo]

not only that, but GPU's are basically (somewhat general purpose) CPU's with thousands of cores. they work well with highly parallelize-able workloads such as graphics, where you load them up with tons of stuff to do, and wait until it's done. audio workload is all serial - if you put an EQ after a compressor, you can't EQ until you got your result from compression. this puts heavy limits on how much stuff you can do in parallel (which is why AMD cores are usually slower than Intel cores), even before you consider the latency issue.

[Harry_HH]

Beware the WUP, version 10 is coming. With that said, the Greg Wells Signature Series and the Abbey Road Collection are the best Waves bundles, IMO.

So what does this mean to us exactly when they come out with version 10 of the Waves plugins? I honestly don't 'get' WUP.

I for one will NEVER pay $300 to them annually or even once to bring all my plugins up to date. If they do that to me, I'll SOOOOOOOO pissed off if it ends up being a mandatory upgrade to keep up with new DAWs, etc, that I'll then never again buy from them. I'll actively sell all my waves plugins and cast dispersions every chance I get thereafter if so. I actually suggest to them that they drop the WUP bullshit.

I buy my plugins unlike so many others who steal them, and because I do, I don't expect to get continually charged over the years to "maintain" them. (If they have bugs and incompatibility issues, they should fix those for free as they are their mistake for releasing them with poor QA. They should just release new plugins with new names and interfaces and sell those outright if they want to skirt this issue to remain profitable. Just give better value to make the purchase attractive if so.)

Same reason why I won't do Slates ridiculous $15 a month subscription plan. Basically at the end of the month that money is gone up in smoke. Stupid deal for me. No thanks. Will never do that. (If I were a business charging lots of clientele for services this might be different).

Right now as I understand it, WUP is kind of optional and there's no penalty for not updating my WUP, right?

Lastly, I buy serial numbers from other vendors. I could just hold onto my serials and not activate them on Waves and wait for v10 to hit and then register them, right? That would bypass the issue, no?

And I'm still not seeing the benefit or detriment to v9 vs v10 yet. Could someone please explain what we'll be getting for v10?

In short: nothing.

You can continue using your v9 products as today. Exactly as is the case with the previous ver.upgrades, e.g. I run parallel several v8 Waves plugins with the v9, even 32 bit if you bridge those to your 64 bit host.
You have option to upgrade, but its not mandatory. When the ver.9 came, Waves gave even the option to downgrade the ver.9 new plugins to ver.8. What gimmics Waves will find on the next upgrades, and will they make the life of the old versions with the ver.10 more diffucult, that's an other story, but I don't believe in any radical moves in the short term.

[dzilizzi]

I found I only needed to upgrade from 6 or 7 to 9 when ProTools changed from RTAS to AAX. That was right about the time they also changed to using WUP. Since then, I WUP about every other year to get the new additions to the bundles I have. I usually wait until it is worthwhile or they have a sale on the WUP. But if you are happy with what you have and they work fine with your system? I wouldn't bother WUP-ing. Unlike Pro Tools, there is no penalty for not WUP-ing every year.

And I have found it is better to wait until all your WUPs have run out to update. They update all to a year from the last date, which can be more than a year for some items if they aren't all run out. Then you pay more than $300. Otherwise, you can WUP it all for $300. Or $225 if you get a sale.

I should note, I am a PC user. I hear Mac's OS updates regularly mess with the ability to use older versions of Waves. Most plugins require you to pay for updated versions when they make major changes, such as adding AAX ability. Not sure what major change is needed right now to make paying for an upgrade to 10 if yours works.

[Uncle E]

Why isn't anyone in the audio plugin market targeting the use of Cuda for DSP duties. It makes SO much sense. There's literally all that power just sitting there waiting to be tapped.

LiquidSonics and Acustica both did it. With LiquidSonics, it worked great but there wasn't much benefit over using Reverberate natively. With Acustica, it never really worked that well and the typical GPU's back then were only able to load around 7-8 plugins.

[systmu]

Great deal for Ultrareverb... i paid double that price, and still thought it was the total bargain. Seriously, if you pass on that, you're silly.

Yeah I was gong to ask about ultrareverb. only $40 on everyplugin.com. How good would you rate it compared to others?

[dzilizzi]

Great deal for Ultrareverb... i paid double that price, and still thought it was the total bargain. Seriously, if you pass on that, you're silly.

Yeah I was gong to ask about ultrareverb. only $40 on everyplugin.com. How good would you rate it compared to others?

I think if you like to mess with your reverb, it is a really cool plugin. You can EQ the reverb, the delay, the compression and something else. The delay is separate from the reverb and it can be pre or post reverb, as with the compression - pre/post. I played with it a bit last night after I discovered I actually own it with Anthology. Saved me a bit of money. LOL!

For me, I'm more a preset person. There are a lot of them. Didn't play with them all, but it sounds good. But I like the way Stereo Room 2016 sounds a little better. And, since this is my personal opinion? Take it for what it is worth. Definitely is worth the $40, probably not the full price, at least for me.

And? If you only buy one? Get Blackhole. That one is so different from all the others.

[Uncle E]

And? If you only buy one? Get Blackhole. That one is so different from all the others.

I don't know how much Eventide has said or how much they want me to say about this sale but Ultrareverb is only 1/4 of Eventide Reverb Month.

[dermage]

from their mail

Every week during the month of May, we will feature one of our acclaimed reverb plug-ins at an unbelievable price. Save up to 75% off retail price during the special promo period.

[dermage]

actually blackhole was on sale on black friday for 75% off for 49$, so i guess they will bring it again.
ultraverb was $79 though.

[ghettosynth]

For me, I'm more a preset person. There are a lot of them. Didn't play with them all, but it sounds good. But I like the way Stereo Room 2016 sounds a little better. And, since this is my personal opinion? Take it for what it is worth. Definitely is worth the $40, probably not the full price, at least for me.

I really like stereo room as well, but, it doesn't take much manipulation to really see the value of Ultrareverb. It's so fast to shape and tame a reverb and push it in the right direction. Also, Stereo Room is really just a room emulation and it's a vintage hardware emulation at that, so, while it's really cool, it does not cover as much ground as Ultrareverb.

And? If you only buy one? Get Blackhole. That one is so different from all the others.

Agreed. Also, although I have no insight on this, there's some chance that Stereo Room might come around again at focusrite. For that reason alone, I'd put it below Ultrareverb. T-Verb is also a bit specialized. This probably comes down to what reverbs that you already have, in any case, I'd still put Blackhole at the top of the list for most people.