How many times a year does MOTU's Digital Performer go on sale?

[Jermusic]

I've been using Digital Performer 11 in demo mode and was aware that they did a sale ($195-$199US crossgrade price) for Black Friday a few weeks ago.

I'd like to know if MOTU does Christmas sales/other sales throughout the year for Digital Performer or are they stingy with it?

[dayjob]

i've never noticed it being on sale but i've only bought updates from previous versions. Jrrshop is a good place to look though. built in forum/group discount codes sometimes work.

xmas is pretty close so i guess you'll find out pretty soon if there's a winter sale.

[Trensharo]

They run sales fairly regularly, they're just NEVER widely known.

I got it during the Black Friday Sale and regret it. Support was responsive, until I asked for a refund. Do not buy this if you are on Windows. The feature set is nice, but it's pre-Alpha level of bugginess on this platform - particularly when it comes to VST plug-in support.

I heard that was pretty bad even on macOS, especially for VST3... But I haven't been able to do anything music-related with the DAW. I've only been troubleshooting, so I ended up uninstalling it. I had to buy a new Audio Interface because it doesn't work with the M-Audio ASIO driver everything else on both of my machines have no issue with (Price Increase: $150+) and I cannot get all of my VST plug-ins to show up (VST2 or VST3). Komplete Kontrol never works unless I reinstall it, and it will disappear from the DAW 100% of the time anytime it updates, which means I always have to update it and then immediately reinstall it. Some of them I can force by re-installing. Others... good luck. I've never been able to get Maschine 2 to show up in the DAW, despite passing the VST Validator, for example.

The VST Validator fails tons of plugins, and is not consistent across different machines - or even on the same machine. You can clear the plug-in cache and different plug-ins will fail.

If DP or any of your plug-ins update, then you can end up with different failures, or plug-ins disappearing from the plug-in choosers; forcing you to reinstall them in order to get them show up ... assuming that works at all. If you get it working, best solution is to lock your system configuration down - do NOT update DP or ANY of your plug-ins - otherwise you can fall into a troubleshooting loop just trying to get them to show up in the DAW (God help you if you are working on any products that use those plug-ins).

It is like the 2001-era Linux of DAWs on Windows. Avoid it if you value your time (and money).

[Jermusic]

They run sales fairly regularly, they're just NEVER widely known.

I got it during the Black Friday Sale and regret it. Support was responsive, until I asked for a refund. Do not buy this if you are on Windows. The feature set is nice, but it's pre-Alpha level of bugginess on this platform - particularly when it comes to VST plug-in support.

I heard that was pretty bad even on macOS, especially for VST3... But I haven't been able to do anything music-related with the DAW. I've only been troubleshooting, so I ended up uninstalling it. I had to buy a new Audio Interface because it doesn't work with the M-Audio ASIO driver everything else on both of my machines have no issue with (Price Increase: $150+) and I cannot get all of my VST plug-ins to show up (VST2 or VST3). Komplete Kontrol never works unless I reinstall it, and it will disappear from the DAW 100% of the time anytime it updates, which means I always have to update it and then immediately reinstall it. Some of them I can force by re-installing. Others... good luck. I've never been able to get Maschine 2 to show up in the DAW, despite passing the VST Validator, for example.

The VST Validator fails tons of plugins, and is not consistent across different machines - or even on the same machine. You can clear the plug-in cache and different plug-ins will fail.

If DP or any of your plug-ins update, then you can end up with different failures, or plug-ins disappearing from the plug-in choosers; forcing you to reinstall them in order to get them show up ... assuming that works at all. If you get it working, best solution is to lock your system configuration down - do NOT update DP or ANY of your plug-ins - otherwise you can fall into a troubleshooting loop just trying to get them to show up in the DAW (God help you if you are working on any products that use those plug-ins).

It is like the 2001-era Linux of DAWs on Windows. Avoid it if you value your time (and money).

Did you get the competitive upgrade on Black Friday? That's the deal I saw but I was still not ready to buy as I was testing it out at the time. It's around $200 US and pretty generous as far as what MOTU will accept when it comes to competitive products (FL Studio, Cubase (ANY VERSION! - NICE etc...)). So that means that Digital Performer 11 can end up costing around the same as FL Studio Producer Edition of Logic Pro X. I was expecting a Winter sale but there is none as of today.

MOTU DP 11 is expensive at $500 US. As far as I know, only 2 DAWs cost more (not including suite versions of DAWs): Cubase Pro and Pro Tools.

As far as issues, I am a Windows-only user and there is no question that Digital Performer 11 is laggy and slow on there. It's not nearly as snappy as Reaper, FL Studio etc...

As far as plugins, I loaded some of mine like Kontakt Player, Best Service ENGINE, Steinberg HALion 6 and they seemed to be stable (there were a few crashes but I don't know if they were related to VSTis) on my system although Best Service ENGINE was very resource hungry and I had pops and cracks due to poor performance with only a few instances loaded. I never have this problem with other DAWs I own like Reaper, FL Studio. In the end, I did not do enough testing with my VSTis to know if it would really hold up in terms of stability. During my demoing period, I was using DP 11's own instruments most of the time.

In the end, in spite of the performance issues on Windows, what draws me to this DAW is the insane power it has. Linear sequencing or pattern based sequencing can get really deep in this DAW. You can do so much with sequencing in DP 11! DP 11 is literally like a fusion between Cubase, FL Studio and Ableton Live - with a bit of MPC Software in there with the sequences.

[Trensharo]

Did you get the competitive upgrade on Black Friday?

Yes.

That's the deal I saw but I was still not ready to buy as I was testing it out at the time. It's around $200 US and pretty generous as far as what MOTU will accept when it comes to competitive products (FL Studio, Cubase (ANY VERSION! - NICE etc...)). So that means that Digital Performer 11 can end up costing around the same as FL Studio Producer Edition of Logic Pro X. I was expecting a Winter sale but there is none as of today.

Their sales aren't as cyclical as other vendors.

On macOS, there is almost no reason to consider DP11 over Logic Pro X, especially with how expensive MOTU's upgrades are ($195, or so). You'd need a legit business reason to do that, IMHO, considering Logic Pro has some of the same pattern based tooling that piqued your interest in DP11.

MOTU DP 11 is expensive at $500 US. As far as I know, only 2 DAWs cost more (not including suite versions of DAWs): Cubase Pro and Pro Tools.

Samplitude Pro X Suite, Ableton Live Suite, Pyramix Pro SKUs, etc.

As far as issues, I am a Windows-only user and there is no question that Digital Performer 11 is laggy and slow on there. It's not nearly as snappy as Reaper, FL Studio etc...

I noticed no lagginess or slowdowns. The issue is their VST support is pre-Alpha level.

As far as plugins, I loaded some of mine like Kontakt Player, Best Service ENGINE, Steinberg HALion 6 and they seemed to be stable (there were a few crashes but I don't know if they were related to VSTis) on my system although Best Service ENGINE was very resource hungry and I had pops and cracks due to poor performance with only a few instances loaded. I never have this problem with other DAWs I own like Reaper, FL Studio. In the end, I did not do enough testing with my VSTis to know if it would really hold up in terms of stability. During my demoing period, I was using DP 11's own instruments most of the time.

The issues are random and unpredictable. Like I said, Komplete Kontrol works after reinstalling it sometimes. If NI updates it, it can disappear from the DAW - like any other plugin. I couldn't get Maschine 2 to show up in the DAW at all. Half of iZotope Neutron Plug-ins fail, and it would take me like 20 minutes of toggling them enabled/disabled to get them to show up in the plug-in chooser.

Some UJAM virtual instruments would not show up.

I had it on my Desktop and Laptop. The list of plug-ins that fail the scan were different on each machine. The plugins that would be absent from the plugin chooser differed.

If I cleared the plug-in cache and rescanned the plug-ins, some that were failures would be passes, and others that passed would fail. So, there is no consistency in their VST plugin validation, which makes it impossible for an end-user to troubleshoot; considering the validator gives no usable feedback. There is no way to file a usable bug report when a plug-in fails or won't show up.

DP has its own plug-in format, like Pro Tools. Their stock plugins are all in this format (MAS), so you will never notice issues with them.

In the end, in spite of the performance issues on Windows, what draws me to this DAW is the insane power it has. Linear sequencing or pattern based sequencing can get really deep in this DAW. You can do so much with sequencing in DP 11! DP 11 is literally like a fusion between Cubase, FL Studio and Ableton Live - with a bit of MPC Software in there with the sequences.

None of that matters if the DAW is unusable due to it not allowing me to use multiples of my plug-ins. I got it for the same reasons you're interested in it. It's feature set is immense and it's a great general purpose DAW - in theory - as a result. Plus, the cross-grade pricing made it seem worthwhile.

In the end, it turned out to not be worth it. I ended up spending almost the same cost replacing an audio interface, so by that point I had paid the price of Ableton Live 11 Standard (upgrade from Lite); and I've spent countless hours over the past month troubleshooting. I haven't been able to do anything music related in it. The software is unusable because it cannot reliably support VST plug-ins.

I don't think you should gamble your money on this DAW - if you're on Windows. Save up longer and get Ableton Live, or use the MPC Software as a plug-in with your current DAW. Cakewalk is free. I'd use that over DP11 on Windows, knowing what I know now. It's a far more dependable solution.

This is the issue I'm referring to:

https://imgur.com/w2ZlpED

Keep in mind, this was after an hour+ of reinstalling software and toggling enable/disable to get Massive X, Battery 4, and REAKTOR to even show up in the DAW. That that's only for Native Instruments' Virtual Instruments. Not FX Plugins and not the issues I've had with stuff from other vendors.

Also, if you use an M-Audio interface, do not buy this DAW unless you're okay with using ASIO4ALL, which forces your Interface/ASIO Driver to lose multi-client access support (as it's a WDM wrapper, not a "native" ASIO driver in the stricter sense).

[jancivil]

I bought DP as a crossgrade from Logic like that. They made me send them the title page of the Logic manual to qualify.

[Trensharo]

I bought DP as a crossgrade from Logic like that. They made me send them the title page of the Logic manual to qualify.

Yes, receipt, about box with serial, or a screenshot of your account with the registration in it.