So close to buying one.. but...

[Rusty O'Hara]

I was so close to buying one.. but...

Having a look over at the plugorama site, has kind of deflated my hopes a little bit....

The plugins I want to be able to use are:

AudioNerdz Delay Lama
GMedia ImpOSCar Not Supported
NI Absynth (1/2/3) Not Supported
NI B4
NI Battery (1/2) Not Supported
NI FM7
NI Intakt Not Supported
NI Kontakt (2 When out) Not Supported
NI Kompakt
NI Pro-53
NI Reaktor 4 (5 When out) Not Supported
NI Spektral Delay Not Supported
NI Vokator Not Supported
OhmForce Frohmage
OhmForce Hematohm
OhmForce Mobilohm
OhmForce OhmBoyz
OhmForce Ohmygod
OhmForce Predatohm
OhmForce Quad Frohmage
PSPaudioware 84
RGCAusio Z3ta+
Rob Papen Albino (1/2)
Spectrasonics Atmosphere Not Supported
Spectrasonics Trilogy Not Supported
Spectrasonics Stylus / Stylus RMX Not Supported
Steinberg XPhraze Not Supported
Waldorf Attack Not Supported
Waldorf D-Pole Not Supported

So, 29 VST's.

15 of which are supported, 14 which are not.

And from my point of view, absolutly essential ones are not supported...

No Absynth, Battery, Kontakt, Reaktor, Spektral Delay or Xphraze? They're my key ones.

On top of that, I saw another post here which said that NI products cost $29 each to crossgrade.

Q: What about crossgrades from and to ‘regular’ NI products to ‘Receptor’ Versions?

A: All crossgrades costs $29 regardless in which direction and which product.

So, if you are a registered FM7 customer a receptor version costs $29.

If you own a Receptor version and you want to crossgrade to a regular Versions it does also cost $29.

So assuming that they are all available, then thats $319 just so I can use all my NI gear on it.

I'm a Komplete 2 owner, probably spent over $1,000 on NI gear (inc Reaktor EI vol 1 & 2, Syntheic Drums etc)

Feels like a bit of a kick in the teeth to have forked out $1,000 for NI gear, plus $1,400 for the Receptor and then be expected to cough up another $319 so I can actually use my VST's?

And what is the cost to crossgrade other VST's? I've looked on the plugorama site but can't find any details about crossgrade prices.

If we take the figure of $29 as per NI, then that works out at $783 to crossgade all my VST's over.
(Given that Delay Lama & OhmForce Fromhage is free)

And that may or may not include any future releases, eg Kontakt 2, Absynth 3, Reaktor 5 etc.....

I can appreciate the argument that the Receptor runs on a Linux OS, and most VST's are windows based... that they need to be transferred over, etc etc

But surely it's in the intrests of both Muse and the VST developers to keep costs down for the consumers?

Less piracy, growing client base etc etc

Especially from Muse's point of view...

The more VST's that run on Receptor, and the more "Premium" they are; (eg: Big name VST's like Absynth, Reaktor & so on), surely the better it is for them.

And as I understand, there is no serious sampler available?

No Kontakt, no Battery, no Halion, no Mach V ???

Don't get me wrong, there are some good freebies out there, (I use Delay Lama and Fromhage), but when I've paid good money for my VST's and a hardware host, I want to be able to use them....

(Honestly, I'm not intrested in any "freebie" VSTs, or tons of VST's... I've got what I want based on quality, usability etc etc... Thanks, but no thanks)

And not get slugged a shedload for being able to do so.

I mean it looks great, but I can see those costs mounting up quite quickly.

When I read the promotional material, I kind of thought, "Great, I can use this both in the studio and live, imagine using Absynth, Kontakt et al on stage; plus it will take the strain off my computer.

But the more and more I read up about it, the more and more discourged I am.

Today has been spent doing a lot of research on the Receptor.....

This morning, I was basically ready to buy one.... but now....

Any other options?

OpenLabs Neko

No good for me, way too massive etc, I want a rackmount for use with my RS7000


Manifold Labs Plugzilla

Seriously going to start looking into this one as well....

Theres quite a price difference, but compare:

$3,500 : Manifold Labs Plugzilla

vs

$1,400 : Muse Research Receptor
$ 800 : VST Conversion / Cross Grade costs

$2,200 : Total Cost

(Assuming that all the plugins are even supported... And then you have to think of future costs etc..

eg: expecting the Absynth 3, Kontakt 2, and (fingers crossed) Reaktor 5 updates to arrive this year)

Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to put it down or anything.... I was literally so, so close to buying one... but now?

What I would need for me to splash the cash:

1) The VST's I use/own to be supported / work.
2) Not have to pay additional costs to be able to use them.

If the Receptor was like this, I would have brought one today...

Regards,
Rusty

[DanTimis]

As of version 1.1 ImpOSCar and the Spectrasonics plug-ins (original Stylus, nor RMX) are supported. So you have 19 supported, 10 not supported.

I think ImpOscar and the OhmForce cross-grades are free. I will have to check to be absolutely sure. If you already own the Spectrasonics plug-ins it will cost you nothing to install them.

As times goes on we will support more and more NI plug-ins. It may take a little time, but eventually we will support NI Komplete (we would have to support all the included plug-ins first, of course).

Waldorf Attack and D-Pole seem to be discontinued. I looked for them to see if I get them to work on Receptor, but I could not find them. If you can tell me how to get them, I can try.

As for Plugzilla you will probably find that they support far less plug-ins from your list than we do.

[the8bitdeity]

I tried installing the Waldorf Plugins on my Receptor, but it's pretty much useless without a CD drive attached. They use the CD as authorization for the plugin installer.

I think it'd require a custom Muse installer, but it's unlikely since the plugins are dead.

[Robert Karasek]

I tried to install Waldorf Attack but it failed.
Even if Waldorf's plugins are discontinued "Attack" still is one of the finest plugin of its genre...


Rob

[Ben [KVR]]

Current cross-grade pricing is available in this knowledge base article - most are free.

This only includes plug-ins that are currently available officially through Plugorama (i.e not the v1.1 compatible ones).

When impOSCar is available on Plugorama the cross-grade price has been set at $19.95.

[Rusty O'Hara]

Hi,

Thanks for the replies.

I also got a very detailed email from Muse answering a lot of questions that I sent to them, most appreciated.

As I understand it... it mainly boils down to which VST's have very heavy PC based protection and/or ones which have dedicated file types (Reaktors "ENS" etc)

I honestly wish you guys the best of luck.

It's a great idea and one I am very intrested in, but until there is support for NI products, especially Reaktor, Absynth, Kontakt & Battery then I'm going to watch from the sidelines.

When/If you get all the NI gear running, (the 4 mentioned above are the main ones for me) then I'll look again at the costs involved again and try and make another judegement.

Thanks,
Rusty

[Rusty O'Hara]

Waldorf Attack and D-Pole seem to be discontinued. I looked for them to see if I get them to work on Receptor, but I could not find them. If you can tell me how to get them, I can try.

I'd only say try looking on ebay for the Waldorf Edition, this contains Attack, D-Pole & PPG

Umm... this is going to come across sounding really bad..... so be warned.

As Waldorf is dead, and theres probably no way of getting a conversion from them.... Is it possible to run a cracked version to bypass the cd checking?

[the8bitdeity]

not dead, just no longer in production. Remember, these were Steinberg plugins designed by Waldorf. They still are owned by Steinberg AFAIK. Therefore a "cracked" installer would never occur for licensing reasons. I'm disappointed about it, but that's the reality of it.

[Rusty O'Hara]

not dead, just no longer in production. Remember, these were Steinberg plugins designed by Waldorf. They still are owned by Steinberg AFAIK. Therefore a "cracked" installer would never occur for licensing reasons. I'm disappointed about it, but that's the reality of it.

So we should theoratically be able to get an isntaller from Steinberg?

When I meant a cracked installer, I know there is hacked versions that don't require the cd authentication, would these work on the Receptor?

[the8bitdeity]

Ideally, if Muse were to choose to support it it would likely be an installer that would somehow require the Waldorf cds in your host computer, while installing the plugins to Receptor somehow. I think the Muse folks are likely too busy working on supporting existing products, which is quite understandable.

[DanTimis]

It's a great idea and one I am very intrested in, but until there is support for NI products, especially Reaktor, Absynth, Kontakt & Battery then I'm going to watch from the sidelines.

When/If you get all the NI gear running, (the 4 mentioned above are the main ones for me) then I'll look again at the costs involved again and try and make another judegement.

I don't think it's a question of "if," but "when." I cannot give an answer right now (I simply don't know). I hope we will support these soon and I hope you will decide to buy a Receptor then.

[Rusty O'Hara]

It's a great idea and one I am very intrested in, but until there is support for NI products, especially Reaktor, Absynth, Kontakt & Battery then I'm going to watch from the sidelines.

When/If you get all the NI gear running, (the 4 mentioned above are the main ones for me) then I'll look again at the costs involved again and try and make another judgement.

I don't think it's a question of "if," but "when." I cannot give an answer right now (I simply don't know). I hope we will support these soon and I hope you will decide to buy a Receptor then.

Like I said earlier Dan, I wish you guys the best of luck and I'm very intrested in it.

Get those NI products working for me (esp Reaktor, Absynth, Kontakt, Battery & Spektral Delay as they are the main ones I use) and hopefully have very minimal or zero transfer fees....

And you've got yourself another customer.

Thanks for all the information and opinons received, always helpful.

Best,
Rusty

[djeddy]

whoa... I was as close as you were to buying this product. But the crossgrade pretty much killed any chance of buying it.

[Rusty O'Hara]

whoa... I was as close as you were to buying this product. But the crossgrade pretty much killed any chance of buying it.

This still looks a major issue for me as well....

[Sergievsky]

Sorry if this is a dumb question, but what if I buy say an NI plugin originally for the receptor then want to use it in my pc or mac? Do I have to pay for a crossgrade?

I too am on the fence with this thing. But since I don't own any NI yet it doesn't concern me as much, as long as Spectrasonic stuff works, it's almost worth it. The sampler thing is an issue though.
Motu Mach5 working anytime soon? even unsupported? it's the same engine as Atmosphere right?, so maybe not too long?