KVR Audio

audiojunkie · Post by **audiojunkie** » Wed Aug 27, 2025 6:06 pm

It would seem to me that the smartest move, when using Native Instruments products, is to ONLY PURCHASE LIBRARIES THAT 3rd PARTIES CREATE FOR KONTAKT PLAYER. As I understand it, by doing this, you will never be stuck without being able to use the library as long as Kontakt Player is still supported.

Does anyone see any problems in this logic? I myself am on 100% sure, and I am hypothesizing.

Ah_Dziz · Post by **Ah_Dziz** » Wed Aug 27, 2025 6:21 pm

NI has attempted to stop activating old libraries before. They have killed many of their own libraries' activation. Provided you have the data for your libraries on your hord drive you should be able to run them in Kontakt as long as NI still exists. I wouldn't rely on this 100 percent but it's a relative certainty. I'd personally rather not have "player libraries" as there is then no way to get screwed on reactivating them down the road.

mabian · Post by **mabian** » Wed Aug 27, 2025 9:36 pm

EvilDragon wrote: Wed Aug 27, 2025 4:02 pm Only versions of Kontakt which are not found on the system will be migrated from.

Migration also works in K7, you don't need K8 necessarily. So if you had some old K2-K6 instances, they will move to K7.

Until you upgrade to K8 full and then you can remove K7 etc.

Yes but there are libraries that are being upgraded so they only work with Kontakt 8... so here we are again... Kontakt 8 is needed for those, so I can't remove K7 to be able to use the not-official libraries, but need K8 for the ones that are updated so they need K8... unless I am careful not to update them... a real hell

- Mario

noiseboyuk · Post by **noiseboyuk** » Wed Aug 27, 2025 9:52 pm

EvilDragon wrote: Wed Jun 18, 2025 11:31 am NVMe helps only with initial loading of the instrument (it cannot help at all with parsing the patches, that's fully single core CPU bound) but as far as streaming performance it does not provide any benefits from a regular SATA SSD.

Omnisphere and - pretty sure - Opus are two examples of plugins that can definitely make full use of NVMe speeds.

Would be great if NI rewrote that streaming code one day - it was top of the league 15 years ago, but lags way behind now.

EvilDragon · Post by **EvilDragon** » Wed Aug 27, 2025 11:08 pm

Well the thing is: this is extremely risky code to change, and so it is very unlikely to happen. It's still very performant. Or are you have a lot of issues when streaming thousands of voices?

Note that disk streaming code has no relation to initial patch load/parse operation, this is entirely single-thread CPU bound.

concealed identity · Post by **concealed identity** » Thu Aug 28, 2025 8:52 am

mabian wrote: Wed Aug 27, 2025 9:36 pm
EvilDragon wrote: Wed Aug 27, 2025 4:02 pm Only versions of Kontakt which are not found on the system will be migrated from.

Migration also works in K7, you don't need K8 necessarily. So if you had some old K2-K6 instances, they will move to K7.

Until you upgrade to K8 full and then you can remove K7 etc.
Yes but there are libraries that are being upgraded so they only work with Kontakt 8... so here we are again... Kontakt 8 is needed for those, so I can't remove K7 to be able to use the not-official libraries, but need K8 for the ones that are updated so they need K8... unless I am careful not to update them... a real hell

- Mario

Yeah this is exactly the problem, and plugin migration doesn't solve it. If you want to keep the full version of Kontakt 7 on your computer and open up old projects with these libraries, you have to make sure you don't update any libraries and install from those manual links on any new computers.

This is really on NI, they need to find a more workable solution for users than this.

clipnotic · Post by **clipnotic** » Thu Aug 28, 2025 9:17 am

it's not my job to fix such programmers crap with backups and so on! They easily could create a new library version instead of this "auto update shit", but they didn't, because they want force their customers to buy the new shit! Their upgrade prices are also ridiculous, as an owner of the Collector's Edition 14 you have to pay the same as an owner of the Collector's Edition 12 and so on.Yes, I know their 50% sales, but it's still a rip-off. They really do everthing to scare of their customers!

mi-os · Post by **mi-os** » Thu Aug 28, 2025 11:10 am

You can just upgrade Kontakt if you have Komplete. You're not forced to upgrade Komplete every time.

clipnotic · Post by **clipnotic** » Thu Aug 28, 2025 12:54 pm

Oh yeah, for 99 €, what a great offer for just their sample player

EvilDragon · Post by **EvilDragon** » Thu Aug 28, 2025 2:23 pm

concealed identity wrote: Thu Aug 28, 2025 8:52 amYeah this is exactly the problem, and plugin migration doesn't solve it.

Yes it does, as I mentioned already. Old projects can all be migrated to latest version of Kontakt, provided you have the latest version of Kontakt of course.

mabian · Post by **mabian** » Thu Aug 28, 2025 2:30 pm

EvilDragon wrote: Thu Aug 28, 2025 2:23 pm
concealed identity wrote: Thu Aug 28, 2025 8:52 amYeah this is exactly the problem, and plugin migration doesn't solve it.
Yes it does, as I mentioned already.

No it doesn't, if you have to keep both a full and a player version of Kontakt.
The full one for not "registered" libraries that don't run in the player, the player for updated libraries that require it.
In this scenario you're gold only if you keep the full version up to date, which is something I - and I am not alone it seems - am not too keen in investing money.
Evildragon, I don't understand why you insist in defending this NI choice which - we have given ample proof I believe - has been proven as faulty in this regard...

Why can't you admit there are flaws in the way they decided to manage all of this?

- Mario

concealed identity · Post by **concealed identity** » Thu Aug 28, 2025 2:32 pm

You don't say? The solution to the problem of "NI updates make my software unusable unless I buy the new version of Kontakt" is "Buy the new version of Kontakt"?

If everybody at NI has this level of awareness, it's no wonder these problems happen...

Etienne1973 · Post by **Etienne1973** » Thu Aug 28, 2025 2:42 pm

clipnotic wrote: Thu Aug 28, 2025 12:54 pm Oh yeah, for 99 €, what a great offer for just their sample player

Waiting for 50% sale seems a good advice.

I don‘t update everytime. Still on Kontakt 6 here.

Everyone can update from Kontakt 2 - 7 for the same 50% reduced price to get Kontakt 8.

But I‘ll wait.

SLiC · Post by **SLiC** » Thu Aug 28, 2025 2:55 pm

I went from 6 to 8 and it was a worthwhile update IMO, 8.1 and 8.2 have added even more value.
With a MK3 keyboard its a pretty powerful combo now.

jancivil · Post by **jancivil** » Fri Aug 29, 2025 12:25 am

This updating libraries as per version numbers is a very simple matter. I don't much like K7 and I have nothing 3rd party that requires K8. At some juncture point with 7 I minded a lot less than subsequent builds, I created a few snapshots in 2, possibly I've forgotten something, then 3 libraries. The nkis still run in K6. So NA haz updates of a number of libraries I've had a long time. There is one reason these see updates today: so as to run in later numbered versions. So, nope. These snapshots can provide a default view I don't hate in K7 and don't have to care about. Except for the mindless update of one thing I've used once, and a library I bought that was made in 7 (NI has copies of both saved in 6) this is the only trouble I've got myself into.

This can be my mileage only, but I can't imagine having any sudden impulse to Update All, if only because of the time expenditure. Why am I doing something? Is there a reason for this action. Before a certain juncture of 7 I'd never found launching Kontakt particularly unpleasant, so up to this point I was in the habit of a kind of thought-free updating is good per se notion. Not compelled particularly but why not. Now there's a why not.

Native Instruments - Kontakt 8