Reason 3.0 announced

[pitchdrifter]

Lucille, your car driving skills are aquired from the manual too, aren't they?

Seriously though, if you understood (from the specs or from using it) what all the wiring is about we'd not be having this conversation.
Do you use any modular synthesizers? I mean real ones, not 'I use reaktor.. presets'. Reason in flexibility is close, because you can route CV and audio between the modules.

I'm no reason fanboy, believe me. Nor was I bashing FL (which I owned and used for over a year). However in terms of wiring and fast working, reason is rather unique. I also own reaktor - yes I can route anything I want there and way more than reason does - but its not comparable to reason in terms of ease of use and workflow for writing music.
Reaktor has 'macros', modules/containers you can save and recall at any time, with GUI elements saved with the macro. Top stuff. But still its not what I'd take with me on a laptop to get ideas to paper.

Thats why I consider the combinator in reason to be genious, because it expands on the modular ideology behind reason and makes big dimensions more accessible. I.e. it doesn't become totally messy to keep track of really big setups.

You can utilize the same ideas in reason to create a sound that you have within any multi OSC synth. You use 1 OSC for the attack noise for instance, as a noise burst. The others you use one as the patch basic, a third to make it sound fatter by adding it an octave below.
What prevents you from using a whole synth for the attack phase, instead of a single OSC? Of course that takes careful programming a patch (or combination in this case), because it can get messy if you just pile up sounds without making them fit together and give each it's own job. Same problem with a normal synth patch though.
The same concept is used in hardware synths all the time, as 'combis' or 'multis' - which is nothing else, a combination of solo patches, assembled sensibly. Only reason goes a step further and lets you serially chain things up as much as in a parallel way.


Markus

[shamann]

We just can't wait to get our fingers on this can we. As much as people here are trashing Reason, I bet everyone on this thread would love to load up all these new features to see what's really going on.

Not me, Reason hurts my eyes. Rebirth always hurt my eyes too. Probably the only thing keeping me from giving it a whirl.

[drez]

Not me, Reason hurts my eyes. Rebirth always hurt my eyes too. Probably the only thing keeping me from giving it a whirl.

Use the force, Luke

[lucille]

sorry--logic gap here:

You use reason; your familiar with the cv routing in
reason--yes?--what additionally do expect to find in the Combinator? aside from velocity splits and patch portability and skinning. I'm sorry--you seem like a serious person--I just don't follow the logic.

[headquest]

Not me, Reason hurts my eyes. Rebirth always hurt my eyes too. Probably the only thing keeping me from giving it a whirl.

According to posts on the Ableton forum I understand that the "small print" says that in Reason 3 the rack will display bigger.

So that's one less thing to make yhou go blind, shamann

[drez]

sorry--logic gap here:

You use reason; your familiar with the cv routing in
reason--yes?--what additionally do expect to find in the Combinator? aside from velocity splits and patch portability and skinning. I'm sorry--you seem like a serious person--I just don't follow the logic.

-The abililty to assign bunches of parameters to a single control with various min/max values. This is a major major feature. Think massive filter sync's and LFO tweaks.
-The ability to PLAY an unlimited (CPU Willing) number of modules at once.
-The ability to step through matrix and redrum patterns at the press of a button. This can add amazing movement to combi patches.
-I can modulate combinator modules from OTHER combinator modules...now I can affect tons of other modules in other Combinators via CV from a central Combinator. That can be HUGE for massive parameter changes on a cosmic scale!
-I can minimize the entire combinator in a 1U rack space!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! People have been asking for this forever!


There are so many things that you can do with it. Just sit back and TRY and imagine what is possible!

Need a massive 3 Octave Full String section? I used to have to copy multiple zones into the NNXT. Now I can just dump 6 NNXT's into a combinator and tweak away. Need to create a string run out of that? simple...do it with a matrix or two and trigger it with a pattern change button.

I play live in front of +18,000 people on weekends and I need to make sure my rig works. With Splits and layers native to Reason, its going to make playing live easy and crash proof. Its like shoving master keyboard control into software. These additions are PERFECT for me. I don't just sequence, I perform with no room for error. This is going to make it sooooo much easier while at the same time letting me create thicker sounds for live work.

Tons of options.

[TeeLangSun]

Why do people keep sayin this type of thing? Yes Reason is stable, but so are a lot of other hosts and VST's . Thats not even a valid argument anymore. I know first hand Reason is very stable, but so are my other hosts with VST's, so what.

Really? All the time? A VST NEVER takes out your host? I find that hard to believe. I love VST/AU/DX/RTAS/MAS/OU812/XYZ/RTFM, but the very nature of third party software that runs inside a host makes for the possibility that something doesn't work the way it's supposed to at some point.

This is the strong point to Reason, and I don't think it's unreasonable to mention it.

Now the fact that crashes and incompatibility are almost non existent compared to a few years ago, you have a point with that, but no host could possibly be as stable as Reason 100% of the time IMO.

But if I crash once or twice a year, like I currently do with FL Studio running whatever plugins I want, I won't be unhappy about that. In fact, that's the kind of quality to write home to Mom about. The fact that FL is this good in terms of quality makes me have more respect for it than Reason doesn't have nearly the kind of features and options of FL Studio.

[headquest]

But if I crash once or twice a year, like I currently do with FL Studio running whatever plugins I want, I won't be unhappy about that. In fact, that's the kind of quality to write home to Mom about. The fact that FL is this good in terms of quality makes me have more respect for it than Reason doesn't have nearly the kind of features and options of FL Studio.

If you had a crash on stage twice a year I think you would be unhappy

I've used FL and I like it a lot (although I have found the developers rude in some of their posts here at KVR, which is quite off-putting )

However, I think FL is primarily good for electronic music genres. Reason I think excels at a wider range of music.

Being from a classical background, I just love the fact that Reason 2.5 ships with a full-on set of orchestral samples to cover most eventualities. I would otherwise be looking at GPO or similar (actually I'm quite interested in GigaStudio 3, anyway )

I'm not sure of any other software in *this class* that ships with that range of samples to suit different genres. FL certainly doesn't and I'm not aware that P5 or Orion do either. Certainly the sequencers don't.

Rarely mentioned I know, but a BIG selling point for me

[zircon]

oh actually it is genius. You can spout of about FL all day. In reason you can route cables the way you want, as well as have a practically unlimited amount of devices (again, wired in any way you desire). That makes quite a difference.

Maybe some of you just don't understand reason or never pressed TAB, but please refrain from sharing your totally uniformed brainfarts. If you don't have a clue what you're talking about, don't try to sell it as a fact.

What's up with Reason fanboys and flying into defense mode? I LIKE REASON! It's one of my favorite programs. I've said it before, if I had to pick one program and not buy anything else, it would be Reason. However, I'm saying that the concept of the Combinator isn't genius. Is it a good, common-sense addition to Reason? Yes, but it's not a unique idea. For my purposes playing around with the cables in Reason doesn't give me any sounds my current VST setup can't produce. It's an interesting paradigm, but so far I haven't heard anything particularly interesting created with it.

Reason too has a unique, proprietary and customizable routing structure. Its called "add some spiders and hit the TAB key". You can route stuff all over the freakin place! That's what makes it 'modular'. And now with the combinator, you can do it once, map your controllers to the 'master' controllers on the combinator and make complete 'synths' in a preset recallable at any time.

Not quite what I mean - with the V-Synth, you can have two osc signals mix and run through a TB303 filter followed by a sideband fitler. Or, you could have one osc run through a distortion amp module, and the other run through a formant filter, then have one of those filtered osc signals ring modulate the other. Or frequency modulate the other. Or you could have one osc run through a bitrate/samplerate reducer, hard sync with the second osc (which is not going through anything yet), and have the resulting signal pass through a speaker-modeling module.

I'm not trying to downplay the quality of Reason synths here, but they're still limited in what they can do, just like Reason is (and always will be, because Prop wants to keep out audio recording and VST hosting). Which brings me back to the point I keep repeating, which is that Reason 3.0 should implement more effect machines and synths, because that's what it does best anyway.

[digitaldoom]

I don't think there is a Reason user out there who would not love to see more effects and synths in Reason.

If people are sad () that Reason didn't include VST support, they just needed to read the Props statements regarding Reason more closely. Reason is an instrument, not a VST host. They (Props) also pride themselves on the stability of Reason. If they incorporated VST instruments into Reason, then they would open Reason to crashing when a badly coded VST was loaded. Also, Reason would then not be just a modular instrument, it would be a VST Host Sequencer (of which it will never be). I think alot of the instabilities/crashes seen in VST Hosts (FLStudio, Cubase SX, etc) are very often caused by the VST's themselves (coding problems, configuration issue's, etc).

Personally, I doubt that the Props have no plans of adding any more Instrument or Effects Modules to Reason. My 'guess' is that either they will pull a suprise Module out prior to release that were trying to keep hide at the moment, or... they will release a Reason 3.5 update containing new Module(s). Just a guess (prediction)....

[spaceman]

Personally, I doubt that the Props have no plans of adding any more Instrument or Effects Modules to Reason. My 'guess' is that either they will pull a suprise Module out prior to release that were trying to keep hide at the moment, or... they will release a Reason 3.5 update containing new Module(s). Just a guess (prediction)....

that's my guess too

[lucille]

surprise module? you guys are really reaching into
fantasy land.

[d1071]

This may be really dumb but what if Prop made a Reason VSTi which could then be used in other hosts? Would that be an improvement vis-a-vis Rewire yet not bring into play the whole stability issue?

Just thinking if this would help the people that want VST support (although I know it's not exactly the same thing) but not effect stability (at least within Reason).

Just some thoughts. Please no flames. May not have thought this through enough.

[digitaldoom]

surprise module? you guys are really reaching into
fantasy land.

Yeah the idea of 'ever' adding new modules to a modular application is just crazy isn't it...

[zircon]

If people are sad () that Reason didn't include VST support, they just needed to read the Props statements regarding Reason more closely. Reason is an instrument, not a VST host. They (Props) also pride themselves on the stability of Reason. If they incorporated VST instruments into Reason, then they would open Reason to crashing when a badly coded VST was loaded. Also, Reason would then not be just a modular instrument, it would be a VST Host Sequencer (of which it will never be). I think alot of the instabilities/crashes seen in VST Hosts (FLStudio, Cubase SX, etc) are very often caused by the VST's themselves (coding problems, configuration issue's, etc).

Just to clarify, in case you were responding to my comments, I do NOT think Reason should implement VST hosting. I'm also fine with no audio recording. However, Props should understand that because of those facts, MANY people are going to be using Reason in conjunction with other programs, through ReWire and such. It follows logically, then, that those people will probably be doing their final mixing and mastering outside of Reason, and thus, I don't think spending time and money on developing mastering tools for Reason is a good idea.