Re: Chicken Systems Translator thread

[chickeneps]

This is in response to the "Chicken Systems Translator SUCKS!!!" thread.

Hi, guys, looks like Chicken Systems is hugely popular here. =)

We answer phone calls on Translator 12 hours a day, and respond to all support requests very quickly.

OK, time to defend the program... c'mon you guys, try contacting us on these things directly and we'll give you straight answers.

It looks like "G+L Player" was using a version that was quite old, we fixed the not-shutting-down thing a 18 months ago. Even then, it was easy to workaround (a simple switch in the shortcut) and didn't have anything to do with the conversions, which is what the program is for.

G+L, I think that perhaps your issues are local to yourself. We do have over 15,000 users, and most of them enjoy the program and it works for them. We sell about 2 a day, and we follow up on our users and make sure everything is OK for them.

We use it ourselves, because we contract our programming services out to major developers. Note the LPC Guitar K2 announcement; Translator had a big hand in getting that happening. We convert things to and from Kontakt regularly, no problems.

Regarding blue-screens, I've never had a public Translator blue-screen on me. We get reports for other things but never blue-screens. You said "I would assume that any developer would be all over that stuff and make it a priority." - yes, we would if we would knew about it. Why didn't you contact us?

Translator technology is all over Kontakt 2, and NI is quite happy with it. It's continually tested by my whole staff, their whole staff, and both of our beta squads. If anyone has issues, you are welcome to submit a source file and we respond and fix anything immediately.

Why did you start that thread? I assume you were working on the latest version? Give us a call or contact us otherwise - we really do help and we do use this software all the time and it really does a good job - we know, we use it.

I don't mean to be defensive, but this is not typical of Translator at all.

It really sounds like your issues are local to yourself. Call us.

[loophead]

The chickens come home to roost.

You seem to work hard but many of your customers are unable to reap any benefit from it. It seems to me you need to be less defensive and think on how you could change your working model to better support your customers. This may be as easy as having a better communication path, clearer website etc.

I dont think you are a bad guy Garth but I do feel you are quite out of touch. You seem to let software out which has been quite unstable and unfriendly. And if egregious flaws are found it seems to me it is up to you to communicate to your customers about fixes and such.

Telling him to give you a break, because crashing his project is just an undocumented feature and not really what the program is about, is just, well - bullshit. I mean really...

This is not a local issue from what I see, hear and sadly, experience. This has not been the only thread about your software, bluescreens and all and I have yet to see one touting its virtue.

[chickeneps]

Thanks for your post, let me comment.

quote
>Seems your way of doing things is not so user
>friendly. If you have a fix why not tell your
>customers about it directly and clearly, instead of >telling them it is their fault and losing them as
>customers.

I can't tell them because I don't know whom they are! Remember, even you are anonymous, but I am not. The complaint they are bringing up (the blue screen)is unknown to us, so I am not "blaming them" but encouraging them to report it to us, instead of elesewhere, so we can do something about it.

quote
>Seems that of all the 'translations' you seem to
>accomplish regularly is not true of your vast
>customer base

How would you know this? We know two things you do not: we work with the software everyday and it works, and we get plenty of comments on our software, both positive and negative, and we address all of them.

People usually come on forums to complain, but if things work they work.

quote
>who seem to be having as much difficulty on 'their'
>particular flavor of translator as I have had on >mine since purchased.

So, have you contacted us? What is your name? DO you still have the issue? If so, what is it? Let's not be complainers, if there is an issue then do something about it.

(And I am not blaming you or being rude, I just assume that you'd want to do something about any issue you might have. It's being helpful, I hope.)

quote
>You seem to work hard but many of your customers
>are unable to reap any benefit from it.

Have you done a poll? How do you get your numbers?

quote
>It seems to me you need to be less defensive and
>think on how you could change your working model to
>better support your customers. This may be as easy
>as having a better communication path, clearer >website etc.

You are completely correct. That is why we have a forum on one of the largest sampler websites, Northern Sounds. That is why we answer our phones AND publish a phone number. We have an extensive Help file and have a large Troubleshooting section taht is regularly updated. All our documentation is in full form on our web site. Our web site is very clear and is menu-driven and logical. We have Bug Reports page where customers can submit files for us to check and can check online for updates on their particular issue. All of this is clearly stated in the documentation and integrated into the Translator interface.

This has all been in place for the past 3 years.

We regularly post on mailing lsits and forums with no mention of our software but just to help people. I personally ahve been doing this for as long as mailing lists and forums have existed - 10 or so years now.

Our support is legendary and I'm not embarrassed to say that.

quote
> Why did he start that thread ? Because he feels he
> bought a lemon. Is this not quite obvious ? So did
> you ever in the past 18 months send him info to
> the existence and location of this fixed version ?

It's because I don't know who he is! Please note that he never signed his posts and his profile is blank, like yours is. If he had, then I would have answered him differently, since we might have had more information about him. That's why I told him to contact us so we could get all the information.

And I don't know who you are, and you said you had issues. What are they? How do you think I could do anything about issues that have not even been communicated nor from people I don't even know? Please.

Again, if you have an issue with the software, simply contact us and let us know about it. Don't go onto a forum and complain, it doesn't accomplish anything constructive.

Translator is a comprehensive program and has a large matrix of translations built into it. One conversion could crash daily (one that we may not have tested in awhile), while others fly through with flying colors. We try to keep things tight as possible, but we aren't perfect. Which is why if you have an issue, just call us, of course we know our program and the issue usually has an easy answer.

Again, I'm not blaming you or being rude, just suggesting that all these people (the original thread and you) instead of making complaints on a forum anonymously, contact us directly and you'll find nice personal service, and one that quickly takes care of anything and everything.

I'll challenge you with this: call us up and don't reference this forum at all. See what happens. if we are short and are jerks, post that back to the forum. But if we are helpful and considerate and fix whatever is necessary, post that info back to the forum too.

[G&L_player]

This is in response to the "Chicken Systems Translator SUCKS!!!" thread.

We answer phone calls on Translator 12 hours a day, and respond to all support requests very quickly.

This does not imply that you provide solutions- just that you respond to requests.

OK, time to defend the program... c'mon you guys, try contacting us on these things directly and we'll give you straight answers.

I have contacted you many times in the past across many versions...never provided any real solutions- just things I had to do in Windows to work around your buggy software. (been there; done that)

It looks like "G+L Player" was using a version that was quite old, we fixed the not-shutting-down thing a 18 months ago. Even then, it was easy to workaround (a simple switch in the shortcut) and didn't have anything to do with the conversions, which is what the program is for.

Actually, I was using version 2.943 build 98, which I believe is the most current per you site.

You are stepping right in it by admitting that you didn't bother to fix a problem that ran multiple instances. This is UNSAT(isfactory) in the software development arena and you should know that! It took you guys a long time to get around to fixing this. However, you put it on the customer to figure it out and setup a work-around. WOW- doesn't have anything to do with conversions!! (LoL) Pal, when ANY application disrupts the integrity of a system, the problem escalates. You should have been on that in a heartbeat and fixed the thing- not cop an attitude that state "it doesn't have anything to do with conversions."

G+L, I think that perhaps your issues are local to yourself. We do have over 15,000 users, and most of them enjoy the program and it works for them. We sell about 2 a day, and we follow up on our users and make sure everything is OK for them.

I doubt it. If I am creating a Kontakt 2 sample from a Giga sample and Translator locks up my machine (and blue screening) every time I try to open the (translated) sample, it's very likely that others are experiencing much of the same. This is why I made the post- to gather information and vent my frustration with your product and "support".

We use it ourselves, because we contract our programming services out to major developers. Note the LPC Guitar K2 announcement; Translator had a big hand in getting that happening. We convert things to and from Kontakt regularly, no problems.

I wouldn't expect you to be using someone else's product.

It's very easy for developers to fix/adjust things on the fly, particularly when they need it in a hurry (i.e. contracting services, etc...).

Regarding blue-screens, I've never had a public Translator blue-screen on me. We get reports for other things but never blue-screens. You said "I would assume that any developer would be all over that stuff and make it a priority." - yes, we would if we would knew about it. Why didn't you contact us?

I would assume that any application that wasn't shutting itself down (i.e. problem with earlier release; appears to still be going on) would be fixed in a heartbeat. More specifically, I would expect that the dev team would make this necessary release to keep this from continuing- NOT leaving it with the attitude that the conversions work fine; let them use a work-around.

Why didn't I contact you? The definition of insanity is performing the same actions over and over again, expecting different results (i.e. an endless dupe).

Translator technology is all over Kontakt 2, and NI is quite happy with it. It's continually tested by my whole staff, their whole staff, and both of our beta squads. If anyone has issues, you are welcome to submit a source file and we respond and fix anything immediately.

Translator technology would be crazy NOT to be all over K2, simply put.

By the way, your "Kontakt" selection only work if the user selects "Kompakt", else it shows up as "Kompakt". (There you go. You can work on that one!)

Why did you start that thread? I assume you were working on the latest version? Give us a call or contact us otherwise - we really do help and we do use this software all the time and it really does a good job - we know, we use it.

I don't mean to be defensive, but this is not typical of Translator at all.

It really sounds like your issues are local to yourself. Call us.

Once again, I have gotten nowhere with you guys in the past. Every time I have used this product, I have run into one problem or another- every single time! My sample size includes version 2.0, 2.532, and 2.943 (different builds). When your product chokes (no pun intended) it violates the integrity of the entire environment (i.e. doesn't play nice with others). I have to restart constantly- no lie; no joke. It's very, very frustrating!

I don't have ANY other issues like this with ANY other application- just yours. So, as you are pointing the finger at me, claiming that "my problem is local to me," I will easily add that my problems are local to Translator.

FYI: I own a lot of VST's, VSTi's, sequencers, etc... and have not encountered the eratic behaviour that I have experienced with Translator. I cannot depend on it and always find myself wasting a lot of bandwidth troubleshooting. I've got better things to do than QA someone else's product.

The statements that I made are 100% true.

[G&L_player]

The chickens come home to roost.

You seem to work hard but many of your customers are unable to reap any benefit from it. It seems to me you need to be less defensive and think on how you could change your working model to better support your customers. This may be as easy as having a better communication path, clearer website etc.

I dont think you are a bad guy Garth but I do feel you are quite out of touch. You seem to let software out which has been quite unstable and unfriendly. And if egregious flaws are found it seems to me it is up to you to communicate to your customers about fixes and such.

Telling him to give you a break, because crashing his project is just an undocumented feature and not really what the program is about, is just, well - bullshit. I mean really...

This is not a local issue from what I see, hear and sadly, experience. This has not been the only thread about your software, bluescreens and all and I have yet to see one touting its virtue.

Loophead,

I agree.

Your reply was a bit more level-headed than mine, but as you mentioned, my system is getting a jolt every time I have to reboot the thing, etc...

I'll admit, I was a bit peeved last night when I initiated the thread, but that stems from many years of intermittant crashes, bugs, and general violations of my system's integrity. This is not to say that I'm converting samples all the time. However, whenever the task comes up- I run into more of the same. I don't get the same behaviour from any other product. In addition, I don't have the bandwidth to QA someone else's product. I must have wasted a few more hours last night just trouble-shooting the process. So, yeah, I was frustrated, and it's certainly not the first time (i.e. with this product).

G&L

[G&L_player]

You are completely correct. That is why we have a forum on one of the largest sampler websites, Northern Sounds. That is why we answer our phones AND publish a phone number. We have an extensive Help file and have a large Troubleshooting section taht is regularly updated. All our documentation is in full form on our web site. Our web site is very clear and is menu-driven and logical. We have Bug Reports page where customers can submit files for us to check and can check online for updates on their particular issue. All of this is clearly stated in the documentation and integrated into the Translator interface.

WOW- all this and you still release buggy software on a consistent basis. I'm as miffed as you are.

[Lord Snarebottom]

I'm going to chime in here also, since I also had some problems with the soft.

After I purchased the HALion2 edition, I was supposed to be redirected to a download page. That didn't happen. I went to the regular download section and downloaded what I thought to be the app. That didn't work. Through some diligence on my part, I downloaded the demo, then applied the update and my key/serial and finally got it to work. I translated my entire s330 sampler library (yeah I know) into HALion programs, HOWEVER, there was no guidelines on how to specifically do this (the help file is rather lame) I figured it out okay on my own.

Another HOWEVER though is that I'm very good at finding workarounds to lame software and another might not find things to go so easily, and I WAS ready really let go in an angry email.

On top of all of this, my priority mail ordered package has yet to arrive. I ordered Scarbee Imperial Drums a day after I ordered CST, and it arrived today from Europe. So IMO you've got some real issues to deal with here.

[G&L_player]

It's because I don't know who he is! Please note that he never signed his posts and his profile is blank, like yours is. If he had, then I would have answered him differently, since we might have had more information about him. That's why I told him to contact us so we could get all the information.

And I don't know who you are, and you said you had issues. What are they? How do you think I could do anything about issues that have not even been communicated nor from people I don't even know? Please.

You just don't get it, do you? It's not about the WHO; it's about the WHAT!

The whole bit about having information on someone makes it sound like you are running an FBI file on us. How obtrusive!

A bug is a bug is a bug. I'm not talking about cosmetic stuff. I'm referring to problems that affect the stability of one's system. However, you keep trying to localize it, which is basically invalidating my claim(s). Sorry, Charlie. My points were made pretty clear. More specifically, I have endured major problems with EVERY release (and some builds of current releases). You guys are consistent, I'll give you that.

Again, if you have an issue with the software, simply contact us and let us know about it. Don't go onto a forum and complain, it doesn't accomplish anything constructive.

Tranlation: don't be critical of our products in this forum- it's bad for (our) business.

Translator is a comprehensive program and has a large matrix of translations built into it. One conversion could crash daily (one that we may not have tested in awhile), while others fly through with flying colors. We try to keep things tight as possible, but we aren't perfect. Which is why if you have an issue, just call us, of course we know our program and the issue usually has an easy answer.

Inconsistency is the root of confusion. I just read where you stated how rigorous your testing standards are and how your support is legendary. In this paragraph, I believe the translation is: shit happens.

Again, I'm not blaming you or being rude, just suggesting that all these people (the original thread and you) instead of making complaints on a forum anonymously, contact us directly and you'll find nice personal service, and one that quickly takes care of anything and everything.

Hmmmnn...I remember having a spat with some sarcastic dolt (i.e. moderator) on your forum in the past. I was so turned off, I stopped using your product. However, I needed to get some samples converted and decideed to see if you fixed the problem from a few years ago. I was not surprised to find new ones that, once again, left me in the QA mode.

I'll challenge you with this: call us up and don't reference this forum at all. See what happens. if we are short and are jerks, post that back to the forum. But if we are helpful and considerate and fix whatever is necessary, post that info back to the forum too.

Didn't you just state (i.e. above) that posting in this forum was not constructive.

[G&L_player]

I'm going to chime in here also, since I also had some problems with the soft.

After I purchased the HALion2 edition, I was supposed to be redirected to a download page. That didn't happen. I went to the regular download section and downloaded what I thought to be the app. That didn't work. Through some diligence on my part, I downloaded the demo, then applied the update and my key/serial and finally got it to work. I translated my entire s330 sampler library (yeah I know) into HALion programs, HOWEVER, there was no guidelines on how to specifically do this (the help file is rather lame) I figured it out okay on my own.

Another HOWEVER though is that I'm very good at finding workarounds to lame software and another might not find things to go so easily, and I WAS ready really let go in an angry email.

On top of all of this, my priority mail ordered package has yet to arrive. I ordered Scarbee Imperial Drums a day after I ordered CST, and it arrived today from Europe. So IMO you've got some real issues to deal with here.

Snarebottom,

Personally, I can deal with the little stuff and don't mind using work-arounds, as long as they work. The whole deal about the Translatore program running multiple instances and compromising my system's integrity was not easy to deduce at first. This, in fact, went on for a while before I traced it to this program. Of course, this cost me a lot of time/frustration. Unfortunately, the "work-around" did not work correctly. I was still encountering the problem. I could not believe that they didn't jump on this and just plain fix it. It was as though everything was OK as long as the samples converted. H-E-L-L-O! I wonder how many people fell into this whole. If there are 15,000 users and each one wasted an hour (i.e. a very conservative estimate), well...you can do the math. My point is that there are some (non-cosmetic) bugs that should be fixed right away.

It's been two years since I used this product, but I had to get some samples converted. SO, I figured, let's give it a whirl and I updated it. Interestingly, I was applying the same versions (i.e. 2.943) that I was using a few years ago, but a new build. (I would have anticipated a new version, but version-discursion...as long as the problems get fixed.) Much to my chagrin, the programs started acting up again when I tried to open samples that it created. What bothered me was the fact that I could not start another Translator session without rebooting the machine. If I tried to open another instance up, it would begin and disappear. I couldn't even find it listed in the Windows Task Manager (processes)! So, here I was, once again, restarting my machine...just like old times. I probably restarted my machine about 15-20 times last night AND caught 3-4 blue screens. FYI: this machine is just used for MIDI/Music and is very stable.

I just don't have positive experiences with this product and spent $129 on it. I own many of the products that are mentioned on this board and don't have these kinds of problems with any of them. SO, yeah, I am a bit frustrated...and who could blame me?

The part that bothers me the most is the QA (trouble-shooting) that I have to go through to trace this stuff down. I don't have the bandwidth and it keeps me from getting other things down- like USING the samples.

[chickeneps]

G+L:

If you have problems with Translator, simply get a hold of Chicken Systems customer service and let them know your issues, and they'll help you with it. It's that simple. You don't have to complain on forums where it doesn't really do any good.

So instead going on and on about this and that not working, just contact us directly and give us the specifics. Most of our customers don't experience the problems you are, so lets take care of it.

Most of the tech details you mention above are incorrect, and I'll take the time (since this is a public forum) to show this.

The shut-down problem existed before 18 months ago. It was related to the auditioning system not letting go of the sound drivers. We did not write that code, so we couldn't fix it without a total rewrite of the sound system, so it took a while to "fix". The workaround was to add a switch to the shortcut that disabled the auditioning system, which is not necessary for the converisons. It's that simple.

When anyone reported this issue, we had a pre-scripted response that clearly said what the problem was, why it occured, why it was taking a while to resolve it, and how to work-around it.

If you are having problems shutting down the app NOW, we have never heard it from you, no one has reported this and frankly it would surprise me since there's no reason it should do this and I've never seen it neither have our beta testers.

An app running in the background DOES NOT comprimise your systems integrity, you are pulling a Chicken Little here. Translator is a simple utility, it doesn't format your c: drive etc.

You said "The part that bothers me the most is the QA (trouble-shooting) that I have to go through" - you don't have to do this.

You don't have to spend hours checking this stuff out. You don't have to spend minutes checking these things out. Just contact us, and we know what to do about things like this. Explain what is happening, what can replicate the issue, send us a log, etc.

I'm trying to help here, do you want the help? Call us at 1-800-877-6377, or 320-235-9798. Or email us (takes longer), or email us for a Messenger address and we can do that.

Regarding the "WHAT not WHO", of course the WHAT is more important, but I'm talking about that the WHO enables us to check our archives to find out the previous reports and get more information. You said "you contacted us many times before" - so I'm asking who you are so I can access that specific information and solve your problem.

Your main subject here is NOT your software issues, but you are complaining that we don't do anything or enough to solve the problem. You are also criticizing our software. I am defending it; we spend 60+ hours weekly programming it, helping people over the phone etc., and pointing out that your problems are not a reflection of other peoples experiences.

I'm not invalidating your claim - I'm trying to get you to contact us directly so we can help you. I'm not saying this is not happenig to you - I asking you give us the information so we can help you.

Regarding the "spat" with a moderator on a forum, why don't you just call us and speak directly? Person to person communication can do wonders, forum and email communication is good for passing information, but not personal communication. If you are trying to solve tech problems over forums, that's the more ineffective way to do it.

I'm starting to sound like a really bad vinyl record skipping along... contact Chicken Systems Customer Service directly and let us spend the 2-3 minutes necessary to solve your problem.

We test hard and support hard, but unless you contact us, we can simply guess and that's not going to do anyone any good.

Going on:

When we use Translator professionally, we do use that experience to make the program better, of course. But we'd never get anything done if we tweaked Translator all the time during this process. We use Translator without tweaking the program mostly, because it just plain works. Again, if there is an issue you have, contact us directly (broken record again).

Again, you said "When your product chokes (no pun intended) it violates the integrity of the entire environment (i.e. doesn't play nice with others). I have to restart constantly- no lie; no joke. It's very, very frustrating!"

None of our customers have reported this. Please contact us directly and give us the specifics - what you are doing when this happens, send the files involved if needed, send a log or two.

I know you are venting, and I hope all this forum talk is helpful for you. But when you are ready to contact us directly to solve your issue, we'll be ready and attend to you immediately. If you say we haven't helped you before, I can't comment because I don't know who you are so I can't trace those communications and find out what we did or didn't do.

You said "By the way, your "Kontakt" selection only work if the user selects "Kompakt", else it shows up as "Kompakt"."

We cannot replicate this here, and I just checked with a beta tester and he can't replicate it either. We have 3 bug reports related to converting into Kontakt and none of them could have been reported if what you said is true for everyone. Again, please contact us directly for reseolution to these issues.

You said "Why didn't I contact you? The definition of insanity is performing the same actions over and over again, expecting different results (i.e. an endless dupe)."

Again, I can't comment on this, since I still don't know who you are and can't trace any communications we have.

Summary: we are willing to help you resolve any issues. The issues you are bringing up do not happen on other systems, so lets find out what is causing them for you. This entails contacting us directly, please do so.

[chickeneps]

Lord SnareBottom (nice ID):

I'm impressed that you figured out the S330 floppy implementation, you are good at figuring things out! We need to have better documentation for this, I know. But it's hard since there are several different approachs to various tpyes of Roland floppy/CD things. We put that at low priority since we've had so much else to do and there's not many S330 users out there, but thanks for pointing that out. I'll see if I can't dip into this.

We changed our online ordering/download system a couple months ago, perhaps you were caught in that. Our apologies.

The Special Edition CD's are waiting the major Mac upgrade before we start manufacturing them again; since the download is fully functional and causes no issues, it's not a problem to not have the CD. But we want you to have it, and I know you want it, and so it should be fairly soon. If you run into problems, let us know.

[loophead]

Garth you truly just do not get it.

Customers have serious issues and it always miraculously boils down to some bit of code your company did not write. And they are not as savvy as you in finding easy workarounds and they need to tell you whats going on because you never ever seem to have any issues whatsoever.

After doing some searches here and other various forums it seems to boil down to the same issues. Maybe Translator works (many of us dont know because it does not work for us). I will give leeway and for arguments sake speak as if it does work.

Why in the world does your so wonderful Translator live inside code which is so buggy and so unstable an environment it has been known to crash entire OS's, lock up entire computers, delete whole harddrives ?

You have had years of kludging various bits of diverse code together and the result is you seem to need to delete polite posts on your own forum. The feeling from your customers is you just dont really want to hear about the issues because you already know how unstable it is and can not keep up.

Hand it to someone who can and you will find yourself in a much better place in no time. If your internal staff is not capable, dont cobble tiny pieces together, but do an entire integration. Get the bit of valuable code to an expert and have them wrap it all up in a friendly, stable, simple application.

And you dont have to ask me if I've taken a poll on the ratio of happy customers. If you choose to look at this constructively instead of defensively you will IMHO find a better solution, for yourself as well as for us.

[G&L_player]

G+L:
Most of the tech details you mention above are incorrect, and I'll take the time (since this is a public forum) to show this.

This is a pretty vague statement (i.e. "most"), but thank you for "taking the time" to address YOUR concerns.

The shut-down problem existed before 18 months ago. It was related to the auditioning system not letting go of the sound drivers. We did not write that code, so we couldn't fix it without a total rewrite of the sound system, so it took a while to "fix". The workaround was to add a switch to the shortcut that disabled the auditioning system, which is not necessary for the converisons. It's that simple.

Oh, I remember this one all too well. I couldn't figure out what was going on with my system, until I traced it down to your product. Personally, I would have sent an e-mail to the user community that you care so much about, so they wouldn't waste time with it AND save them the frustration.

When anyone reported this issue, we had a pre-scripted response that clearly said what the problem was, why it occured, why it was taking a while to resolve it, and how to work-around it.

My point is that you knew there was a problem and knew that you would/could not fix for a while. The users, however, did not. You waited for each one to report it (i.e. mentioned above). Yeah, I have a problem with this. If you've got 15,000 users...multiply this number by an hour or so and that's how much of other people's time you wasted knowingly. This, of course, does not embed the frustration factor.

If you are having problems shutting down the app NOW, we have never heard it from you, no one has reported this and frankly it would surprise me since there's no reason it should do this and I've never seen it neither have our beta testers.

Once the application chokes on its own translation (e.g. Giga -> K2), I have to stop the process via the WIndows Task Manager. If I try to restart it, it will not come back up...very strange. Yeah, I'm wondering what's going on (or not going on) at this point, as I've initiated a process that starts to come up and disappears- yikes!

FYI: I only use this machine for MIDI- it's clean; stable; and doesn't behave like this with any other apps. In addition, I tried this out on my other Windows machine (both XP Prof; SP2; etc...)

An app running in the background DOES NOT comprimise your systems integrity, you are pulling a Chicken Little here. Translator is a simple utility, it doesn't format your c: drive etc.

If you say that it doesn't. However, when we are talking about MY machine (i.e. with all my licenses; songs; etc...), I'm not going to be as liberal. When the earlier issue of not shutting down was ocurring, my system was acting up afterwards, until I restarted it and did not bring the Translator back up. I am not taking any chances this time around.

You said "The part that bothers me the most is the QA (trouble-shooting) that I have to go through" - you don't have to do this.

You don't have to spend hours checking this stuff out. You don't have to spend minutes checking these things out. Just contact us, and we know what to do about things like this. Explain what is happening, what can replicate the issue, send us a log, etc.

I already have. More specifically, I had to spend a lot of time (i.e. many restarts; a few blue screens) to figure out why my system was behaving as such. FYI: I did not blame Translator initially

I believe that the "explain the issue" process is, in fact, QA'ing. I am now part of the process, as I am spending my bandwidth writing up a situation that somebody should have caught before their product goes out the door. If businesses gett too comfortable with this type of situation, their attitude will be (al la Microsoft) "just send the buggy software out the door and let our free QA testers find the problems." (This is an example of being clever in business.)

I'm trying to help here, do you want the help? Call us at 1-800-877-6377, or 320-235-9798. Or email us (takes longer), or email us for a Messenger address and we can do that.

I believe that my position was made perfectly clear. More precisely, I am looking for a replacement and have eaten the cost of doing business with you. I cannot afford the bandwidth, simply put.

I asked if anybody knew of a good sample conversion product and a few readers complied. I ackowledged their post; checked out their offering(s); and thanked them. Nuff said...

Regarding the "WHAT not WHO", of course the WHAT is more important, but I'm talking about that the WHO enables us to check our archives to find out the previous reports and get more information. You said "you contacted us many times before" - so I'm asking who you are so I can access that specific information and solve your problem.

Your main subject here is NOT your software issues, but you are complaining that we don't do anything or enough to solve the problem. You are also criticizing our software. I am defending it; we spend 60+ hours weekly programming it, helping people over the phone etc., and pointing out that your problems are not a reflection of other peoples experiences.

I don't expect you to accept my position that your product sucks. My position is based on the stability. I simply can't afford to spend all of my time restarting a machine and wondering what's wrong with this thing NOW.

FYI: I'm the guy who's out $129 and many hours of frustration- not you. Your concern is quite obvious- sales. What can I say, we're worlds apart.

I'm not invalidating your claim - I'm trying to get you to contact us directly so we can help you. I'm not saying this is not happenig to you - I asking you give us the information so we can help you.

I believe that when you state that this problem is local to my machine; nobody else is experiencing this; and rant about the "who are you" stuff, that you are, in fact, attempting to invalidate my claim.

It's this simple: I create a K2 sample from a Giga sample with Translator ( v2.943; build 98 ). When I try to open or even look at the samples included in the K2 definition file that it drops, I get Windows errors that bark at Translator. I have to go into Task Manager to knock it off. Now, I cannot start another instance, as Translator attempts to start up and disappears.

This is only scenario 1, which implies that I select "Konpakt" to actually get Translator to process a "Kontakt" sample.

In Scenario 2, I select "Kontakt" and get two error screens that warn me about the conversion, but the converted Giga samples still appear to be OK.

FYI: it was only by haphazzardly selecting "Konpakt", instead of "Kontakt" that I figured out that your GUI has a bug.

Regarding the "spat" with a moderator on a forum, why don't you just call us and speak directly? Person to person communication can do wonders, forum and email communication is good for passing information, but not personal communication. If you are trying to solve tech problems over forums, that's the more ineffective way to do it.

I respectfully disagree. Most forums provide information that cuts back on support calls. This is why most companies offer forums. However, they come at the expense of users speaking their mind, etc...

I'm starting to sound like a really bad vinyl record skipping along... contact Chicken Systems Customer Service directly and let us spend the 2-3 minutes necessary to solve your problem.

We test hard and support hard, but unless you contact us, we can simply guess and that's not going to do anyone any good.

I agree. However, all of these activities do not necessarily translate into customer satisfaction. Doo you want to improve customer satidfaction AND cut back on support costs? Make the product bullet-proof! More specifically, spend you time in the testing phase, particularly if you know there are issues.

Going on:

However, I am not...I've spent enough time on this. If you want this thread to go away- stop adding to it and it will fall in the back.

I'm moving on and I'm not going to spend any more time on you or your product. I wish you well and hope you are able to get you problems straightened out. I am simply not willing to make your problems my problems...and who could blame me?

When we use Translator professionally, we do use that experience to make the program better, of course. But we'd never get anything done if we tweaked Translator all the time during this process. We use Translator without tweaking the program mostly, because it just plain works. Again, if there is an issue you have, contact us directly (broken record again).

Again, you said "When your product chokes (no pun intended) it violates the integrity of the entire environment (i.e. doesn't play nice with others). I have to restart constantly- no lie; no joke. It's very, very frustrating!"

None of our customers have reported this. Please contact us directly and give us the specifics - what you are doing when this happens, send the files involved if needed, send a log or two.

I know you are venting, and I hope all this forum talk is helpful for you. But when you are ready to contact us directly to solve your issue, we'll be ready and attend to you immediately. If you say we haven't helped you before, I can't comment because I don't know who you are so I can't trace those communications and find out what we did or didn't do.

You said "By the way, your "Kontakt" selection only work if the user selects "Kompakt", else it shows up as "Kompakt"."

We cannot replicate this here, and I just checked with a beta tester and he can't replicate it either. We have 3 bug reports related to converting into Kontakt and none of them could have been reported if what you said is true for everyone. Again, please contact us directly for reseolution to these issues.

You said "Why didn't I contact you? The definition of insanity is performing the same actions over and over again, expecting different results (i.e. an endless dupe)."

Again, I can't comment on this, since I still don't know who you are and can't trace any communications we have.

Summary: we are willing to help you resolve any issues. The issues you are bringing up do not happen on other systems, so lets find out what is causing them for you. This entails contacting us directly, please do so.

[chickeneps]

Feel free to contact Customer Service at 800-877-6377 or 320-235-9798, or email at support@chickensys.com for courteous personal service on any issue you have with our products.

Again, none of your issues have been replicated by us or by our beta team or by any of our user base. We say this to assure you that your issues are easier to fix then rewriting lots of code, and also to assure people that Translator is the premier product for converting sounds and managing samples. We offer more formats and features than anyone, and the program is robust and reliable.

We would love to proactively help you, but since you have remained anonymous, we can't really do anything for you until you choose to contact us and give us the information needed to resolve the issues, such as a file or more importantly a log file, to help you.

But if you choose not to, then we wish you well on your travels.

[JaseisMusic]

It is false advertising to say your program does bulk translations when you know very well that many, in fact, most sample CDs of any format, will crash the application, when attemtping bulk translations.