It is coming out new faster of operating system that is based on Kubuntu 9.10


CLICK ON YOUTUBE VIDEO








Demo of new Kubuntu 9.10 on OS 4.0, with KDE effects Cube on the 12 Desktops. Next video demo will include the all desktops features under Touch screen mode.
Demo of new Kubuntu 9.10 on OS 4.0, with KDE effects Cube on the 12 Desktops.
Next video demo will include the all desktops features under Touch screen mode.


New faster loading of startup, faster playing, changing of sounds and other possible functions that offer NEW Kubuntu 9.10

Thanks Magica Alfa

I saw this yesterday and thought it was freaking awesome, very powerful and super smooth. I really do think that the future of all keyboards will be OPEN platforms and that it's happening NOW. There are only 4 companies in the world producing instruments like this. Muse Research, SMPro Audio, Open Labs and Lionstracs.

Muse Research and SM Pro Audio products are not true open systems. You cannot install whatever you want on them because they need compatibility added or in the case of SMPro, you need Wizard files. Writing your own is next to impossible unless you totally throw yourself at it and are extremely technically minded.

So really you only have Open Labs and Lionstracs offering true open keyboards right now. The Open Labs systems are slick for sure but this is their 5th Generation and you don't exactly get value for money. To get a Neko with all the controllers on board will cost you dearly.

The new Lionstracs keyboards on the other hand are much better priced and they come with the dedicated controllers. Being Linux based you also have that Multi Host which Open Labs don't. So technically this has all the makings of a being success.

Interesting times ahead for sure. I know for sure that I will never buy a closed keyboard every again.

Regards
James

[This message has been edited by Irishacts (edited 12-29-2009).]

Thanks guys!
You saw there just the first basic features..
Beginn 2010 is available the new OS 4 and I will shown the TON of the new features in realtime.
Kubuntu 9.10 is really AMAZING and double fast as before...a true DREAMS for Windows OS!
Anyway...happy new year to all SZ!

Being a gadget lover (who also loves throwing away money), I'd love to have one to play with in the studio, but, I would definitely wait for the next two or three iterations (motherboards, ram, USB - USB3 already out, etc. change so fast) given Dom's 'work-in-progress' approach to OS development. I have to say, I'm more impressed by the POTENTIAL, than anything I've heard (could be a CD playing in the background, for all I know). It's so difficult to demonstrate the real potential of a machine (instrument?) such as this. I'd say that the potential buyer would need to bring something (like imagination and creativity and musical sensibility) to the table as well. I don't think this is your grandfathers 'plug in and play' party toy.

As far as this approach being the wave of the future, it's hard to say. The 'lazy' will always be among us (ask Ian ). Those devices that require a substantial investment in time and study in order to realize their potential, will always have a limited market IMO. It also depends on the way music itself goes. If electronic music (as depicted in Sci-Fi movies, etc.) begins to totally replace more traditional music (classical, folk), then perhaps machines like this WILL be the easiest way to produce such music. But what is it they will be replacing? Certainly not acoustic instruments. Synths? If so, wouldn't this then be just evolutionary? A better mousetrap, so to speak? Who knows? I'm losing my own train of thought . Anyway, Dom, send me one for evaluation. I'll give you my report in about a year, at which time you can send me the GROOVE II for evaluation. As part of the deal, I'll keep Diki at bay until you've had time to produce a first class demo.

chas

Chas...
Fortunally the train for the evaluation is passed..
Megaaudio.de already full tested the new Groove products and they have also on stock. http://www.megaaudio.de/newsletter/news/Liontracs_News_Dec09.html

Want to laugh?
removed the arranger styles module from the OS installer and we get the contract distribution.
Another probe that the arranger keyboards will dead really soon, they want only Sounds Workstation!
From April we start to shipping 50 groove every months..try to ask one to Megaaudio..
I'm not allowed anymore to sell my products in the whole north europe.

About the USB3 at this moment I can not offer, just the available hardware: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LoIbTz1-1RI

Is better that you wait the new Audya 2 for this all new hardware features..
Happy new year.

Ah..forget to tell...
You can come to test the Groove, Vasio/Ebony racks and Stage on Musikmesse by Megaaudio stand.
SEEM (not depend on me) that will dimostrate all our products Armin woods, then you can also learn how to play HiTech keyboards http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F4hMyJkAk6U
Happy new year again.

I'm sorry, but if I want to play with linux desktop cubes while watching videos and a horrible house music track, I would buy a COMPUTER, not a KEYBOARD...

Hi cgiles



I don't think it will be a quick transition, but I believe it's a guaranteed transition and that it's already well underway.

Right now in the arranger VS workstation world, Workstations dominate arrangers many times over in sales and people who buy them are prepared to put in the extra work it takes to create something on them. So the vast majority of people are technical minded.

The DAW / VSTi PC setup is also hugely popular, easily many times the Arranger market too, and it has hurt the workstation market. The response there was to start integrating workstations into the software world by including applications that make the workstation display on a DAW like a VSTi, and to include full editor abilities.

The existence of the OASYS alone is proof that KORG are developing OPEN keyboards and you can bet that the future of the company is pinned on that technology. They spent 10 years on the OASYS project so you can expect to see a little OASYS in many products to come.

Not to mention the fact that there are already a number of dedicated VSTi devices out now like Open Labs, Receptor, V-Machines and now Lionstracs. Being a V-Machine owner myself I can tell you that they are very popular. You just need to hang out in the right places to see this.

So, it's already happen and Lionstracs, Open Labs and SMPro Audio are just the first out of the gate to support the needs of the next generation keyboards.



There will always be countless styles of music that cover every instrument imaginable. Orchestral music for example has been around longer than any other style of music and yet you can find guys all over the world now sitting in a home studio sequencing the entire score for block buster movies.

Just hang out on the VSL forums and you will see what I mean.

The sound you can produce with software far exceeds closed keyboards. Take PianoTeq as the perfect example. It's a 16MB program based on modelling technology and it sounds exactly like a real piano.

There's not a closed keyboard or sample library in the world that could compare to it it's so realistic and totally playable, just as if your playing the real thing.




There never will be a substitute for the real thing, but applications like VSL and countless others will certainly take away a huge chunk of their business.

Why hire an orchestra when you can hire a Studio that can produce the same sounds with VSL.

It's actually an interesting subject, the future is certainly going to be different and exciting.

Regards
James

so long that the qranger in lionstracs workstation is available,

so that you can make styles, there wil be no problem. qranger wil be ever the best part in lionstracs workstations.

for people who know how to program styles , is an workstaion with engine arranger better than a regular arranger. it does not matter for styles creators if a workstaion comes without styles. but you should be able programming styles in taht workstation. qranger is getting better and better.



[This message has been edited by AFG Music (edited 12-31-2009).]

Yeah but look at what's on each of the the desktop cubes and now tell that doesn't make you drool.

The function of any OPEN keyboard is to give you all the benefits of dedicated hardware controllers (and workstations) as well as a PC without the hassle and headaches that go with them.

It's the best of both worlds if you know what I mean. You get to install what you want and have it operate seamlessly like a normal workstaion.

Regards
James


[This message has been edited by Irishacts (edited 12-31-2009).]

all this demonstrates is that Liontracs dont have the 1st clue about who their target market is or what kind of product they are actually selling. This kind of amateur guerilla marketing just smacks of desperation.

This is a great product, being touted to the wrong people...

We are arranger players here, first and foremost (mostly!). We have already eschewed workstations and non-interactive electronic music production. For many of us, the arranger was the product that released us from the drudgery of making music in a foundation upwards, piece by piece non-interactive linear fashion, SMF or MP3 backing track manner. Yes, years ago, most of us that moved away from full live band music and went towards producing our own music tracks used the forerunner of products like this. Sure, back then, it was a Frankenstein's monster of many different pieces of gear, cobbled together firstly with C/V signals and gates, then DMX, then MIDI, then finally the first integrated WS's appeared.

But the WAY the music was made was always similar. You made the drum track first, then laid down a bassline, then added some rhythm, then some leads (or whatever your workflow was), building a composition piecemeal from the ground up. But then came arrangers... Now, you could do it simultaneously. One hand could create an entire backing track, on the spot! Then do it again differently a second time, and a third, and a fourth, in less time than you could create ONE track with the old system.

So, we moved on.

This product is the logical end point of that first, non interactive, linear system. And, I might add, a GREAT product. But for THAT way of making music. But I am still confused why Dom tries so hard to tout it here, where, on the whole, we have already decided that even conventional WS's, let alone über-techno ones like this are really not quite our cup of tea.

We play jazz, we play oldies, we play music originally played by HUMANS, on the whole. Not techno, not trance, not hiphop or rap (again, MOST of us ), not industrial or chilldown... And those musics are this thing's forte. Once again, don't get me wrong. For what it does best, this thing is, if you are capable of operating it, one of the most amazing things out there. But, as I have said so many times in the past, unless you are ALREADY making amazing music using your computer, using VSTi's and groove production tools to make music that really floats your boat, and wow's your friends or clients, what on earth is it good for, especially to a forum of arranger players playing classic pop and jazz music?

I don't believe that, if you haven't already mastered computer music production using a computer, how is basically tacking a keyboard on to exactly the same thing going to make any difference? I don't believe the learning curve is going to be any less, I don't believe the frustration is going to be any less, and I don't believe that this will make making music (similar to what we are already very happy about, using an arranger) even a fraction as easy as we already have it...

Dom has had what, four or five YEARS to come to terms with the fact that making something like this work as a decent arranger is simply beyond not only the average (or even above average) arranger player's skill and ability, but beyond his as well. But he still comes here to show it off. Yes, it's a great product, but it is NOT an arranger, or even CLOSE to an arranger. Personally, I think it is time for it to move on to the forums that DO deal with these types of products, and the types of musicians and producers that DO make music that this product is best at...

For those of us that DO use these kinds of products, well, we already participate in those forums, so it will not drop off the radar, but this IS the General ARRANGER Forum... What's next? Harpsichord manufacturers touting their latest baroque creations? Guitarists endlessly arguing tube configurations? Heaven help us! Maybe even drummers talking shell diameters and birch vs. maple?

Because they all have about as much relevance on THIS forum as a Linux Groove production tool, IMO

It may well be the future. But I honestly doubt it is the future for US here...

Hi All
This post was started by a member NOT Lionstracs.
Lionstracs just replied to say that he had dropped the arranger functions on the Groove, (Although it can still be loaded if required) and is targeting it at the Groove/Workstation market, where it has been readily accepted, so I can’t see the point of the postings that say it’s not an arranger, when Lionstracs has already said that the Groove is not an arranger.
This thread would probably be better transferred to the LIonstracs forum, to stop people getting confused about what it’s about.

Bill

Diki, this is one of those rare times that I disagree with you. I already know that you don't take a difference of opinion personally, so I feel very free to say this. YES, this is a general arranger forum BUT.....nearly every member here has some kind of non-arranger keyboard, some of which they even use as part of their professional rigs. I, myself, have at least 10 non-arranger keyboards. Cass has an XK-1 which he loves, Mike has a G7, YOU have a Triton and a Kurzweil and probably others, Rikki (and Frank) never saw a piece of music software they didn't love, Ian has a bunch of stuff, and let's not even talk about Russ. The point is, because the main focus on this board is arranger keyboards, doesn't mean that we have no interest in other types of music making tools. I don't think Doms 'touting' an electronic keyboard (of whatever variety) is the same as a harpsichord maker touting HIS product. But then of course you know that.

Frankly, I think Dom has busted his butt over the last four or five years, against unbelievable odds, to try to come up with a product that musicians might embrace and produce beautiful music with. Frankly, I can't see any other motive he might have had (it certainly wasn't to make money ). I think he should be applauded, not demonized (not that you've done that - I think your questioning of certain aspects of his product line were reasonable and (usually) civil). I guess what I have a problem with is the attitude that 'if it's not arranger related (which, BTW, most of his products have been), don't bring it to this board. I, for one, like to see everything that's out there, no matter what the setting (within reason, of course). How else (besides some of Fran's recommendations) would I know what to waste the next pile of money on .

I'm just saying, there's no such thing as too much knowledge. Dom seems to be a decent guy, certainly dedicated to his mission, who has put a lot of time, effort, and money into this project. I think he HAS listened to you (and his distributors) and abandoned the 'arranger' aspect of this project. So NOW can we look at it as what it was all along, a very modern (by big three standards) workstation with huge upside potential in certain markets and as a studio (and possibly performance) tool. JMO.

chas

PS: Picked that DM-10 kit last evening from the UPS freight center (15 minutes from my house). It wasn't scheduled for delivery 'till Tuesday. Now I have all week-end to play with it. Just opened it up. Factory fresh in every way. I don't know how these guys (djgearforless) can afford to sell it at this price, but I ain't complaining .
Please don't roast me, it's just another opinion.

How do you make that out ?. I'm actually really curious because it's marketed at the workstation and DAW market which means Lionstracs are targeting the vast majority of the keyboard players.

The arranger market is the smallest market and the general arranger user is not someone who is technically minded.

I'm genuinely curious why you said what you said and what you must be thinking.

Regards
James

+1 Well said.

This is not being targeted at arranger users although you can install arranger software on it. It's targeted at DAW and Workstaion users which are the vast majority of keyboard players. The Arranger market is the smallest market and the “””general””” arranger user is not someone who can program or who is very technically minded.

That said, there is also no harm in talking about the keyboard here in an arranger forum. We talk about everything else here, so no harm done.

Regards
James

ok, the groove is a workstation and the MS is a workstation like diki said,

but if you have a worksation with out arranger option and one with arranger option,

which one would you take?

I personally pick up the one with with arranger function!

why?

because if you can make styles, then your sound and rhythm that are unique.

as a style maker, style that you create will sound better because you've made with your taste.



[This message has been edited by AFG Music (edited 01-01-2010).]

That's not exactly a question that has a straight answer.

In general “closed keyboard terms” I'd take the keyboard without the arranger function because it will be more advanced and totally reprogrammable, as well as designed for a much more advanced user than the one with the arranger functions.

This is the typical difference between all Arranger and Workstations keyboards right now and the type of user they are designed for. Workstations are simply designed for more advanced users who expect to have to program everything and write songs track by track.

However if it's a OPEN keyboard then the question is actually rather pointless since they keyboard technically has no function other than to be a HOST for whatever the end users needs are.

The only thing that still follows through though is the ability of the end user.

So with that in mind, an open keyboard is not ideal for the general arranger user because they can't program and are not generally technically minded. Where on the other hand the workstation & DAW users will take to an OPEN keyboard like a Duck to Water. It's simply an natural progression for them.

Obviously you Magica Alfa are not the typical Arranger user and you are one of the few who are technically minded.

Just my 2 cent's.

Regards
James

James did you click on the link ?

1.What did you see ?
2. what explanation was given about the product ?
3. Who do you think this product is aimed at ?
4. from the presentation who do you believe Liontracs is aiming the product at and tell me how you deduced this from the presentation ?
5. From the youtube link what do you think were the key features Liontracs were promoting about their product that set them apart from their competitors ?
6.What did the presentation actually say about Liontracs the company or the product?

Click on any of the liontracs youtube demos. Remember this is a product that they are selling to the world and not to friends and family !!

You actually provided more information about the Liontracs product in the few sentences you wrote from your own research than Liontracs !!!!!

This is basic marketing theory.

I saw a poor demonstration with no information .... zero , terrible audio recording and terrible video recording . This isnt an arranger versus workstaion issue. This is about a supposedly professional company wishing to take money from genuine customers that today uses EXACTLY the same amateurish preasentations not just to our small community but the world at large that it did 5 YEARS ago when the first liontracs products were being touted as the next best thing and the methods then were inefective as they are now.

Liontracs said

'want to laugh? removed the arranger styles module from the OS installer and we get the contract distribution.
Another probe that the arranger keyboards will dead really soon, they want only Sounds Workstation!'

You havent been on this site long James but Liontracs was told by members on this forum YEARS ago including myself and Diki that he was not selling the right product to the right people. The moment he dropped the arranger function (which was frankly crap) from his instrument he gets a serious contract for his instrument as a workstation!!! Do you think it is only recently that he had been advised to do this ?

Come on !!!!!

last bit ....

The only product that i have some understanding about that is a direct competitor is Open Labs, http://www.youtube.com/user/OpenLabsInc#p/c/A4C625C9D98DE268/4/e5Ohz-GoNdw

click on the link above and look through any of their demonstrations and ask yourself the same QUESTIONS 1-6 .

Compare the two and tell me which company would you be most confident in buying from and why . Be honest .....

I hope this clarifies my comments.


[This message has been edited by spalding (edited 01-02-2010).]

[This message has been edited by spalding (edited 01-02-2010).]

all this demostrates that someone there is still full frustrated and desperated..

IF my products sounds so bad, infos so bad...why then megaudio choose to distribuite my all products on whole north Europe??
Openlabs asked to Megaaudio for the distribution too, but after they have tested..refused all.

Do you think that the 3 products managers of megaaudio are so stupid and only value what the people from this forums says? Com on...

Openlabs have reaally a NICE webpages, nice pictures and products, but the windows OS remain anyway crappy!
Just one application at once: or reaper, or Forte or...or.. always one.

Anyway..let megaudio sell now...not anymore my problem..
Happy new year

Thing is, chas, I don't discuss my Triton or Kurzweil here, I don't post about tips and tricks for it, I don't expect that people here will find it very useful. There are Korg Forums and Kurzweil forums for those WS's, and THAT'S where I go to to listen and discuss those keyboards. No-one there much wants to hear about my arranger, it's a WS forum... and no-one, to be quite frank, has much use or skill to use here for a Groove WS VSTi player.

We've already had five years or so of listening to mostly godawful user AND factory demos of the MS when it tried to be an arranger. It was a complete bust. It was a GREAT VSTi player, with a really awful arranger front end (c'mon, man! No Bass inversions after five years? ) and a terrible selection of styles and basic soundset. Sure, you COULD make it sound better, but it is obvious no-one succeeded at that task, not even the manufacturer!

So, now it's a WS/Groove production tool. Great! And now, it belongs on the Groove/WS forum. It's not that those things don't get an occasional mention here, but Jeez! Dom can't sneeze without it gets trumpeted here. No-one comes here and touts every new OS upgrade to K2600's, or M3's or FantomG's, or tries to discuss them seriously with us. They do it on the forum that the users of those products populate. Sure, every now and again, they pop up on our radar. But give the Lionstracs products a rest, already! They LONG ago failed on the whole to pass muster with us.

I wish the Lionstracs people all the best, think they have got a great product, and wish them nothing but success... In the WS world. But they don't belong here, other than peripheral discussion. This incessant info blitz is out of place. Kurzweil users don't bring their baggage here, MotifXS users don't bring their baggage here, and for this to remain the General ARRANGER forum, neither should Lionstracs. They decided they no longer want to develop an arranger. Good for them! I'm sure they'll take off now they have woken up to who their REAL market is.

It just ain't us...

You are right it is not your problem now. You should have hired someone to market your product properly years ago as it has been painfully obvious for years that you lacked any competance in that department . At least finally your product has a chance to be marketed directly to the right end users hopefully in a way that shows it in its best light . I am confident that megaaudio will make a better job of marketing your product than you have....I mean they cant do much worse can they ???

Good luck Dom :-)

Yeah, maybe you're right, Diki. But for some reason, it just doesn't seem to bother me as much. It's not like he's on here every day; usually just occasionally to announce a 'new' OS upgrade (which, sadly, sometimes also requires a major hardware upgrade ). I just view Dom as an entrepreneur swimming upstream in a strong current. Undaunted, ever optimistic, and with an undeniably unique product (which may or may not be ahead of it's time, and which is still trying to define itself). In fact, aren't there just as many Mediastation owners here as ,say, Wersi owners (personally, I'd rather have a Mediatation or GROOVE ). We constantly hear all the latest about that home organ disguised as an uber-expensive arranger with cabinetry that's garantees that it won't be moved for at least 20 years once you get it home. Not much interest there either, but nobody complains.

Hey, you have to root for the underdog, don't you? The first guys out of the gate always get clobbered but somebody's got to be first, right? When he does finally 'get it right' and has a stable, correctly priced, usable musical instrument that represents a great 'bang for the buck' for it's intended use, Chas and Diki will be among the first to line up for one . When that time comes, we might as well hear it here first .

From now on, all of his marketing will be done by his distributor, so what's the point of dumping on him now. For all practical purposes, he's outta' here. JMO.

chas

for people like diki and others who say, why we talk about lionstracs products. a forum is a place for things to write about. In this case arrangers. for people who have ever used a Roland G1000, know that it was sold as a workstation, but it had arranger function. it does not matter whether you think about lionstracs keyboard products, or see the MS or Groove as an arranger or workstaion. You must be free to write about things within forum rules. to look on what products are discussed in this forum lately. It is Yamaha Ketron Wersi-lionstracs and sometimes korg. if we do not talk about this products what are you talking about in this forum?

I think diki will begin again, with all his observations known. short diki we already know what you think about these products. but as a keyboard lover, when I see those new products, an arranger or they complete an arranger, no matter or it is a synth module or whatever, I talk about it in this forum. and it is not outside forum rules. but insulting people is outside all rules.

you are free to write-domenico is free and other users are free to write about things but inside forum rules respect for each other.

[This message has been edited by AFG Music (edited 01-02-2010).]

Hi spalding



I saw the keyboard running on OS 4.0, switching between multiple desktops screens, a number of very cool VSTi's launched, two DVD's playing back at the same time, a wave file streaming and being adjusted in real time as well as the dedicated hardware sliders being used to adjust other things like EQ real-time.

When you look at it like that, there is quite a lot to be impressed at.



If you look at the video title and the opening text, the demo does indeed cover everything it was supposed to cover. It was never going to be demonstration to answer all your questions about the keyboard, it was only a demo to show OS 4 running.



Workstation / DAW users, which are the majority of keyboard players in this world.
If you read my last reply I go into more detail on this.



Sort of the same questions as number 3, but the reason why I believe it's for workstation and DAW users is because it's a PC running Linux that acts as a VST HOST and comes with dedicated hardware controls and custom software that allows it to all be merged into one seamless package.

Sort of like everything workstation and DAW users need and are already doing only without the headache and the need for multiple pieces of equipment. Not to mention it's for technically minded people who are comfortable with computers and the need to program and sequence entire songs track by track, just as every workstation user does.

My previous post covers some of this too.



Everything the title of the video says. OS 4.0 running with multiple desktops but they didn't point out that it was also running a lot of software at the same time. You have notice that yourself and appreciate it for all it is.



It's a video to demo OS 4.0 and multiple desktops, nothing more.



Personally I was very impressed by the video because I could see what Lionstracs were trying to demonstrate with OS 4.0, but more importantly I could also see what was running in the background during all this.

It's quite a list of program running and if it were me doing the demo, I would have made it blatantly clear to anyone watching just want how freaking cool this was and how smooth the system ran everything.

The same can be said of any of the other demo's. You can see what's going on, but it's not exactly a point that Lionstracs are driving home to anyone who is unclear about what they are seeing.



Well I've said it in the past that a product specialist is needed to promote the keyboards through the use of quality demo's. By quality I mean direct line audio into a desk, a tripod but most importantly I would like to see it in a real world situation. By that I mean sitting down in front of the keyboard and laying down a few tracks of a song, showing how the custom software ties all this together and makes the keyboard seamless. Do that and the concept should be clear to everyone.

This is a seriously cool keyboard but a lot of what is being demonstrated is not being explained to people who might not have a clear understanding of what they are looking at, so they may not be appreciated as much as they should.

It also depends where you post the demo's too. A Workstation forum react very differently to this kind of technology than an Arranger forum will. They accept it very easily and the questions are very different.



Yes I've seen it said on the forum many times. I think when you look at the past there have been a number of issues that needed to be overcome as well as the realisation of who the products are to be targeted at.

So the medaistation to me is sort of like a lesson learned and learned very well. The new X-6 Series and the Rack Units that are on the way are seriously prime time targeted at the right people without a shadow of doubt.

A stable system that is truly OPEN. Second Gen and finally ready to be that VST HOST targeted at the workstation and DAW users who are the majority of keyboard players.

Ok, it can work for arranger users too, but arranger users expectations are very different from Workstation and DAW users. Arranger users expect it to be like a closed arranger out of the box. This will simply never happen in my opinion because there is no such thing as a VSTi Arranger program that comes with it's own Engine and Styles.

How the keyboard sounds as an arranger should have never been something Lionstracs should have taken on. They should have only ever focused on the HOST and the integration of all the systems they built.



Yes, Open Labs cover all the things I've even mentioned myself in this post. They focus on the HOST, the systems they built and they demonstrate it in a real world situation by where they sit down and lay down some tracks.

Lionstracs X-6 can do all that too, but it doesn't come across as clear to anyone who may not have a great understanding of what they are looking at in the first place.

Regards
James

Thanks james for your reply.
I'm a little bored to reply here, because also for my not native english language, I can not explain all.

If on the OL the basic application is the Reaper for produce professional music, do not forget that this features is FULL working on the Groove too: http://www.lionstracs.com/demo/reaper22.jpeg
here you can see the Reaper on external 22" touch screen, ( we can use now 3 external touch displays)
with the difference that we can run multiple ASIO hosts or VST inside the repare, + the all OS 4 basic application.
Read here and then you can understand what I mean: http://forum.openlabs.com/index.php?showtopic=1569
regards

What a lot of persons seem to forget is that this new product can have arranger capability.
So its place on this forum is very relevant.

Sure arranger features may not be the primary focus and the arranger section may not be developed as fully as it should, but it still has an arranger component and so discussion about it on this forum should be encouraged.

And, as arranger players become more and more like DJS, and as they have the need to play more modern music, and as more and more arranger players see the need for wave/mp3, midi and style integration, this product will become even more relevant to this forum.

In the West you have new generation arranger player who want more.
For example:

midi styles with many intro-variation-endings, fill-ins
audio + midi styles
programmable chords
styles with long recording length.
styles with more than one drumkit,
good style editor
good sound
freedom in choosing the track for a sound and not a permanent track for certain sounds. and more ..................

This and more is possible in just lionstracs qranger. it would be someday the best arranger. but remember you need to know what style programming is this product. or most be special styles made for this product for sale from third party, if you are unhappy with internal styles. do not forget you can also convert styles EMC Style converter



[This message has been edited by AFG Music (edited 01-02-2010).]

Hi .



No problem, I'm just replying in order to help people understand more about what you were actually demonstrating in the video. As you know this demo was not just about a desktop cube flipping to different desktops. There's actually quite a lot of seriously cool software running here at the same time and not everyone is picking up on that or how smooth OS 4.0 is running.



Yes, anything that runs on Open Labs will run on the Lionstracs plus you have lots more benefits.

The comment about Open Labs is more about the demonstrations presented though as they suite the type of user on this forum better. They get to see the keyboard doing normal day to day things like laying down a few tracks. Sometimes it's the simplest of things that have the biggest impact on people.

Regards
James

Yes, and I would like to add that my comments about the keyboard not being directed at arranger user is not something that applies to everyone either. It's an OPEN keybaord so it can be whatever you want it to be.

My comments is more about the ability of the “““General””” arranger user and their needs. They just expect very different things from Workstation and DAW users. I'm sure there are plenty of arranger users would are technically minded enough and who could turn it into the ultimate arranger / workstation, but in the overall scheme of things they are far and few between.

Where the vast majority of workstation and daw users would take to all this like a duck to water.

Regards
James

James you got all that from the demo ????? You must be the one person they aimed that demo at then ;'-). And question 4 is not the same as question 3 but i am not surpised you did not spot the difference as neither did Liontracs. These are YOUR explanations of what was going on in the demo and who the product is aimed at not Liontracs which is precisely the problem but i am not going to labour the point.

If you think that was a professional demonstration and a good peice of marketing then there is no point in debating it with you. look at the open labs demonstrations again and compare the two. You will see they use musicians making music on there systems and not simply demonstrating technology.

Seems to me the neko message is getting out there clearly and professionally to some very high profile and some very ordinary musicians. And even lowly people like me can clearly see the purpose of the neko as a musician even if i might never by one.

i wonder why that is...

You never answered my question. Who would you have more confidence in buying from ? i am not talking about having one given to you like a member here did with the MS . funnily that person started to sing the praises of the MS when they got into bed with the company.I am not insinuating that you are doing the same James. Pleas dont misunderstand me.

Anyway i have said enough.



[This message has been edited by spalding (edited 01-02-2010).]

Just take what I said and look at the video now. You should be able to see all the different VSTi's, the two DVD's, and all the other things I mentioned running while the topic the video was to cover was demonstrated.

I'm not making anything up here, just look and you can see yourself.



Question 4 was two questions, half of which I did answer in 3, and the rest in my post above. Still I did take the time to reply again and expand on everything I've pervious post already. I'm simply trying to help you by answering your questions and sharing my view video.



Please see my reply to you on your comment about “This is basic marketing theory” because I've covered this. You have either not read what I said, or you have misunderstood something alone the way. If the latter, just let me know and I'll try explain myself a different way.



Yep I said more or less the same thing myself already. My reply to you on the basic marketing also covers this to a point.



I don't see that question being asked anywhere in your previous post, and it's not like I was trying to avoid you. Look at the length of my reply

Do a search on the forum, I've been one of the people who has been up on Lionstracs back over the Mediastation for a very long time. Right now I'm all over KETRON like a rash because of their shameless behaviour and OS4.0. I've done the same to KORG in my time and heck I own KORG Forums. I'm not bought out, and I'm not posting here because I have a vested intersecting in anything to do with lionstracs. Simply fact is, I hate seeing broken **** on the market because it's my fellow musicians who suffer not the company who built it.

From what I gather right now the only ones with any known issues are Ketron. So everyone else has their house well in order and Ketron will hopefully too come NAMM on the 14th and OS 4.0.

Good, so everyone happy. 2010 should be a good year. If things remain like that I would have no problem buying a Audya 2, just as much as I would have no problem buying a Lionstracs X-6 or a rack unit.

That siad, my days of buying closed keyboards is now finished. The OASYS was the first taste of OPEN, and whatever I buy next will be fully OPEN. I've seen the light if you know what I mean.

I'm sick of reading tte spec sheet and wondering how much sample RAM I have and so on. It's OPEN all the way for me from now on.

Regards
James

Look, I'm sorry, but I can't help laughing when Dom et al get all indignant about being consigned to the WS forums. They've had five years to find out they DON'T have a viable arranger, to the point where they've actually rebranded the product, dropped arranger development and now sell the same thing as a WS to the WS crowd.

And they still want us to take it seriously?

Have you fixed the plethora of problems that Dennis outlayed describing its' many issues AS AN ARRANGER? Have you created any more TOTL content for it to rival its' closed competitors? No....

Same Emperor, same clothes.

You playing live out, much, James..? Solo, OMB work, that kind of thing?

Bet you aren't using an MS...

Open stuff has its' place, but as the best tool for the average arranger OMB to use, it still has a VERY long way to go.

Content, content, and more content. THAT'S what the arranger market's vast majority want. You don't think Yamaha would LOVE to save a fortune and sell their arrangers with no usable styles (obviously, a HUGE part of R&D for a new model for them, or Dom could have afforded it, too), and leave it all in the hands of their users, do you? They aren't that stupid. Lionstracs is, apparently.

Even Ketron realized that their Audya would stand or fall on the strengths of its' included styles, NOT on whether it could play audio files as part of a style (but you had to make them yourself). Lionstracs didn't though.

Different tools for different jobs. Want to make utterly original music, ambient soundscapes, groove based music? Open keyboard's your best bet every time. Want to go out to a restaurant and entertain the diners with some jazz and light pop, oldies and standards? Open keyboard is NOT the best bet, in fact, it's the WORST. Dom never got this. Still doesn't, IMO.

I only wish he could play worth a damn. The MS might have turned out FAR more a player's tool than a studio wonk's. Still could be, if he bothered to make it a GREAT arranger, THEN add the 'open' stuff. But he always felt that 'open' was sufficient by itself. It's resounding failure to make any serious inroads to the arranger market ought to convince him of his error.

But no, you'll NEVER hear Dom admit it. Only his actions to change to designating his product a 'GrooveStation/WS' do that.

Hi Diki.



All Studio work theses days mate. I am thinking about going back on the road again though. My wife is not happy about that though so we will see.



Quite a few toys in the Studio but the only thing getting any use right now is my KORG OASYS and the V-Machine. So much so that I will be selling my M3 very soon and a few other items.

I've down sized my Studio in a big way over the last 2 years. Works wonders too, I get tons more work down now and my quality is much higher.



Ok, but lets look at this another way. Technically it's not the fault of the open keyboard. There is not one single Arranger VSTi in existence anywhere that has it's own sound engine and I doubt you will ever see one either as arrangers are becoming increasingly less interesting.

You can probably find a million workstation VSTi's though. So from an OPEN keyboard point of view, I don't think you will ever see one becoming a out of the box all dancing arranger like a closed keyboard comes.

Not everyone uses arrangers in OMB settings either. The last arranger I played with on stage was a Technics Kn800 and since then I've used workstations. Played 7 nights a week with just a Trinity for many years.

Hanging out on KORG Forums I can tell you I'm far from alone. Most people there who gig use workstations, and the arrangers. It's a pretty mixed bag if you ask me.



Yes but lets compare the difference here.

Yamaha are selling a closed arranger keyboard that offers a set list of features and functions that cannot be expanded at any point by the end user. It's a closed system.

Lionstracs are not selling an arranger or a workstation. They are selling a VST HOST that you can use to run your third party VSTi Synths on. So no matter what way you look at this, the only duty Lionstracs have is to provide a platform to you that allows you to install your VSTi's on, and that the entire system and it's custom software runs flawlessly.

They are not responsible for any sound produced. That lies with the developer of the VSTi.

So comparing it to a closed keyboard is pointless when Lionstracs are not even responsible for so much a single factory sound. If it comes totally empty but functions flawlessly, then job well done. It's an OPEN keyboard and it's up to YOU to install what you need.

Its a very different concept.



Well I'm not going to sit here and tell you that the OPEN keyboard is universally better in any situation when the person playing it and how technically minded they are matters just as much as what instrument they own.

An OPEN keyboard is technically limitless, so if you have the abilities to handle it, then it will surpass any closed system in a heart beat. If the user doesn't, then this is not for them.

The only way I could see an OPEN keyboard being universally better as an arranger for every level of user is if Dom hired a programmer to setup all the styles and optimise them with the sound engine so that the keyboard is all singing and dancing out of the box with no effort at all.




I'd like the opportunity to do the demo work myself, but I can't see it happening.

Cheers
James

JAMES, thanks for really nice explanation.
That I want to tell to you guy but it is hard to explain things so close.

MS is VST host for all matters. Interesting is that is also prepared for live playing. That means that you can play with any kind of sounds or styles or things that you want on MS- it is like playing tool.

And Interface that is look like on keyboards from box is ready any time. So When you play on stage you are playing like out from BOX.

I'm sorry James, but perhaps you haven't been here for the last five years while Dom CONSTANTLY told us that the MS WAS an arranger. He NEVER came here and told us it was an empty VSTi player, and that we would HAVE to do all the work ourselves for it to sound better than a Casio. Dom himself made the comparison...

And Yamaha, Ketron and Korg have samplers in them. This makes them pretty much identical to an open machine, albeit at a different level. You are using your V-Machine primarily as a sampler, aren't you? My G70 has a virtual B3 in it... how is this different to running B4 on a VSTi? Plus it has a lot of sounds in it that rival many VSTi's... Bottom line is, open or closed, the musician on the whole needs a palette of sounds to work with that will cover most music, and many of the TOTL closed models have that covered VERY well, already. If you think in terms of playing the vast majority of music that most arranger players do, a T3 or PA2X can do most of it without even going to the sampler, and that can cover most other needs.

I said from day one that all the MS was was a blank slate, and have tried to point out from day one also that making styles and soundsets as good as, let alone better than a closed arranger was beyond the skill of any of us. Time has born me out. I haven't heard a user style on the MS yet that gave even my G70 a run for its' money. But Dom constantly dissed closed arrangers as passé, but never acknowledged that the CONTENT is what makes arranger players buy arrangers, and his keyboard had NONE worth talking about.

An open keyboard IS technically unlimited, but it takes a player with prodigious technical skills to create something on it that a child with a T3 could do in his sleep! Let's face it, arrangers are bought by people that DON'T want the already better soundsets that modern WS have. They are bought by people that don't want the techno and hiphop loops that come with modern WS's. They are bought by people that want familiar sounds and styles of yesteryear, and no WS, open or closed, caters to their taste.

Sure, someone COULD make an open keyboard geared to the older player. But he would first have to stock it with what a great closed arranger already has. He would have to make an OS that provides the live player all the conveniences that a great arranger already has... And in this area in particular, Dom failed miserably. You mentioned that only the content needs to be provided, IF the OS of an arranger is provided. And here as well, the MS failed badly. You only have to read Dennis's post about his real life experience with the MS to see that, OK, maybe it's all right to expect the user to provide all his own content, but you shouldn't expect him to write the OS too! For Pete's sake! No Bass inversions, let alone chord inversions (for just one example)... A Casio can do that!

For the MS to be competitive as an arranger, it not only needs content equal to the best of the closed arrangers, but an OS that is their equal too. The list of OS features geared to the arranger player that are missing on the MS is formidable. Not to mention that many things it DID implement, it did so in a very clumsy, inelegant manner. Dom needed FAR more than just a few styles and a soundset to make it work.

Didn't stop him constantly telling us it WAS better than any closed arranger, though. It would take more than you doing a few demos to get this off the ground. Look at the Audya. Incredible demos. Doesn't stop it being a dog, though, as iffy as the OS is at the moment. An arranger is the whole package. Content, OS, hardware, ergonomics and features. Hardware alone isn't even close. And that's all Dom ever provided.

To be honest, I am not sure it's even going to fly in the WS world, if the content is as bad as it was as an arranger. Even closed WS's like the MoXS and M3 and the Oasys (c'mon, man! That's no more open than an Audya. It only ran proprietary add ons. You could add virtual modeling boards to a MotifES. Did that make it an 'open' WS? ) have awesome content in them when you buy them. Great sounds, great arps, great loops. Add in the sampler, they aren't anywhere near as closed as all that! Dom tries to sell this with content as poor as the MS had, he's still got an uphill battle. Or is he selling it completely empty and finally acknowledging that the user WILL have to do everything themselves? That would be a nice change!

As I have said ad nauseam, the only people that could make an open arranger as good as a closed one are the very people making sounds and styles for the closed market. No-one out in the real world has ever accomplished this task, and if they could, they would already BE working for Korg or Yamaha or Roland. What would you estimate, James? Be honest... how many people do you know capable of turning an open VSTi player into a full on arranger capable of blowing the T3 out of the water?

And of those tiny few (if any), how many would even WANT to? Players good enough to make TOTL styles got WAY better things to do with their time!

Theoretically, you COULD build a rocket to the moon. All the parts are available. But who actually has? Open keyboards are the same thing. You COULD turn them into something better than a T3. But first you would need the skills to make a T3. No-one expects you to be able to build a piano before you can play it. It's considered OK to leave that to the piano builders. And expecting you to build a TOTL arranger out of a Frankenstein's monster of different pieces parts is as equally dumb, IMO. Leave it to the experts.

Plenty of expansion 'openness' on even arrangers like the T3 or PA2X if they have a sampler. Enough for 99% of the arranger playing demographic, anyway. The MS was a product for the 1%. Even Dom can't make a living on that margin, despite eschewing making any decent content for the MS while he WAS calling it an arranger

Give it a rest Diki
Lionstracs has realised its mistake and moved on, (The workstation market) and to keep repeating the “I’m right you’re wrong” rhetoric ad nauseam, serves no useful purpose. (You are only doing the same as you criticised Lionstracs for doing)
Move on

Bill

Hi Diki.



You can call it whatever you want, it's primary function is as a VST HOST which clearly means it can do whatever you want. How well it sounds doing that is the end users problem.



lol.... No chances in hell mate, that's a pretty ridiculous comparison. A sample library is simply more PCM data. Where an open keyboard can install completely new Sequencers, Synth Engines, Modelling Technology, heck you can even watch your XXX collection of DVD's while your gigging with it



Come on man, it's me your talking to here. You know very well that your stuck what you have on your keyboard where an open keyboard will run any B3 or any of the thousands of VSTi synth in the world.



Maybe so since there are plenty poor VSTi's out there, but your G70 wouldn't stand a chance against a premium VSTi.

Something like Quantum Leap Goliath for example would destroy the G70 hands down in a sound by sound comparison.



I don't get your point because the second the next model is out with new improved sounds, the old keyboards will be up for sale. Where using something like Goliath on an open keyboard would shoot you instantly years beyond the sound of any closed keyboard.



I haven't heard a style playing back of any good quality either but the keyboard is not to blame. The choice of VSTi's that were used as the sound engine to drive the Arranger are in my opinion very poor quality. The Yamaha XG70 and the Roland Sound Canvas are cheap sound engines that don't stand up to stock sounds on a closed keyboard.

If a premium VSTi was used, then it would instantly sound a million times better than anything we have hear so far.

However, since there is also no such thing as a VSTi Arranger that comes with it's own sound engine, the end user will have to pair the arranger with an engine and then adjust levels and so on to get the most from the arranger functions.

Again, none of that has anything to do with Lionstracs though. It's not their problem nobody develops a VSTi Arranger that comes with it's own quality sound engine and ready to go content like the thousands of VSTi synth you can buy do.

So if you want to use an OPEN keyboard as an arranger and have it sounding a million times better than anything on the market right now, then be prepaid to do some work and to buy a sound engine to go with the arranger software.



Yeah imagine having to do all the work yourself to create something and not depend on others to hold your hand. Diki, I've covered all this already. An open keyboard is not for everyone. If you don't have the ability to use what is in front of you, then you have the wrong keyboard.

This is why some people buy a T3 over a Pa2X when the PA2X is far more advanced in all functions. It's too much machine for some, and so they go with the one they can use and that matches their abilities.



Your barking up the wrong tree entirely because you trying to push the blame of how the VSTi Arranger software sounds back on Lionstracs when the function of the keyboard is a VST HOST.

For example..... if I buy and install Pianoteq on the Mediastation I'm not going to turn around to Lionstracs and say well done guys, the Piano sounds fantastic. How it sounds has feck all to do with Lionstracs because they didn't write the Pianoteq.

Remember what defines and open keyboard is it's ability to act as a VST HOST and its custom OS that makes managing third party software a seamless.



No comment on that because feature requests are fine by me and can be found on any product support forum for every keyboard going. I could write a book on the things I'd like to see KORG add to my OASYS.



Hmmm.... Better yes, but better for everyone, no. I can't stress how important that is. There is no such thing as a universally better keyboard for everyone because not everyone has the ability to control such a complex machine. Those who do though have the opportunity to take it and far exceed the ability of a close arranger.



Ooooh it will. Lionstracs have already secured the future of this keyboard. There's another thread on the forum that explains this.



lol.... What does OASYS stand for and how many closed keyboard do you know of which can have receive multiply new sound engines from software updates. The OASYS has 7 Synth engines.



Making sounds and writing styles has nothing to do with building a keyboard, be it open or closed. For Roland, Yamaha or KORG to turn around and build an open arranger, sound designers and style programmers would be at the bottom of a very long list of things needed to make it happen. The programmers are the ones who write the systems.



Probably the majority of workstation user I know, but very few arranger users. You also ask this question as if it's the only goal everyone should try to achieve with the OPEN keyboard.

Most of my friends who could do what you ask wouldn't even want to because to them the T3 suck just as much as every other home arranger keyboard.



1% of what, the Arranger users who can make use it ? Again you automatically assume that the only goal here is for people to use it as an arranger. Sorry mate, but that's by far the least interesting part about the keyboards. The majority of keyboard players are workstation and DAW users. Arrangers are in the minority by a long shot.

So this is indeed marketed at the biggest section of the keyboard market there is and not your 1%.

Regards
James.

Sorry James, but I just don't think you get the main point of what I have been saying...

IN THEORY, yes, the MS ought to be everything that you say it is. It is in the actual practice that reality comes crashing in. Personally, I don't think that even YOU could make the MS as good as a T3. Why do I think this? Because you HAVEN'T. And, trust me, if anyone could, they would have the world beating a path to their door to buy the styles and sounds to turn the MS into what it promised it was going to be. Why haven't YOU bought Goliath, and created a few hundred styles as good as the T3's or PA2X's or E80's? You could make a fortune doing that...

Or could you? Only a handful of MS's out there. No copy protection (so your styles would be pirated the minute you sold ONE set). Very few sales to people that WANT to use it as an arranger (bet you 90% or more are just doing duty as a VSTi player)...

You see, it's all well and good to say you COULD do this or that. Trouble comes when reality rears it's ugly head. You say people COULD make the MS into a great arranger. OK, be honest. What percentage of the players here at SZ (OK, let's widen the field - what percentage of ALL players you personally know) have the skills to make even ONE style as good as a T3? Now scale that up to the hundreds you actually need... Personally, I haven't heard ONE user style that approaches the ROM ones for live feel, great flow between variations, cool fills and Intro/Endings, and general all around usefulness. NOT ONE.

You see, were I to actually believe you, there would be hundreds. Thousands. All as good as the T3's ROM styles (or insert your favorite closed arranger here). BUT THEIR AIN'T. How can you keep shouting the open party line, with such a complete lack of evidence? Let's be honest. It is exactly the SAME job to create styles for a closed arranger as it is for an open one (maybe easier, because you already have a well balanced and cohesive soundset to work with). No easier, no harder. So... let's take this fact as a starter. If people can't create their own styles in any number or quality, what on earth makes you think they can do it once they get an open arranger? All of a sudden, they are going to turn into style making virtuosi because they made a purchase? Don't be ridiculous..

The truth is, it's one of the hardest tasks in programming to make a style that rivals the best the closed boys do. All evidence backs me up. I'm afraid that theoretically just doesn't cut it. As I said, 'theoretically' you could make a space rocket. Who has actually succeeded? One guy (Burt Rattan)..? Out of how many billions on this planet?

Where are YOUR styles posted, James? Can I listen to how well you have achieved what you claim is so easy for everyone else to do? Got some jazz styles, some disco or R&B, some alt rock stuff that comes close to Y, R & K's best ROM styles? No? Perhaps you could show me up wrong by demonstrating for us how easy it is all to do. Or admit that theory isn't quite the same as practice.

A piano is a piano. No-one makes the ridiculous suggestion that owning a piano is all you need to be a virtuoso. It takes skill, it takes practice, it takes genes, it takes a lifetime of work to be a virtuoso. And few that even PUT that lifetime in become one. But apparently, we ALL could become virtuoso style creators and soundset designers, just with the purchase of a magical bean... sorry, I meant an open keyboard.

I don't believe in fairy tales, and you shouldn't spread them as if they were true.

Their are gaping holes in much of the rest of your post, I don't have time to address them all, maybe just to say that Dom DID design the arranger OS for the MS. And it couldn't do bass inversions. You can't blame the VSTi makers for something that is NOT what they designed. That one squarely rests on Lionstracs. Take a look at much of the rest of my post without so much defensiveness, and you'll see that, in PRACTICAL terms, much is right. Yes, in THEORY, things OUGHT to be on the side of the open arranger. But once the real world intrudes on the theory, they simply don't.

And please, for the last time, don't equate an arranger with a WS. Two different tools, to do two different things. Yes, I believe the Lionstracs is an awesome WS/Groovebox, perfect for making music that WS/Groovebox's excel at. Might even get one, one day. But, for all my playing and programming skill (modestly, please take this!) even I wouldn't touch one with a barge pole with a view to turning it into a practical, day to day gigging arranger. You haven't, either. Maybe there's a little voice at the back of your head kind of agreeing with me on this one. I don't see you dumping your Korg PA and moving wholesale to this. And, let's face it, if you took yourself seriously, you would...

yes for somebody is this workstation. But this workstation is many steps above others.

But also arranger is integrated. And how many workstations are have arranger inside. I mean typically arranger that can read what you want. Any style and you can play with it.

Yes Diki you are right that workstation and arranger in ordinary way are totally different.

But in new age they will be same market.

We both are using one keyboard for playing in the band and also for one man band or duo.

You are right that keyboard need to be prepared for playing out from box.

But some users wants to use keyboard in other way. We want freedom.

That offer systems like Lionstracs, Wersi, Openlabs, etc.

Diki is roland lover, i like roland products to, only i did not forget that roland sold G800 and roland G1000 as a workstaion with arranger option, maybe is diki forget that.

it is only what someone understands by name workstaion.

workstaion can also mean extensive editing of styles sounds and audio, which in some products is missing, so a arranger can be a workstation to like Roland G1000. an arranger is software, for example if korg like it,they can put PA serie arranger software to korg oasys, there wil be no problem, but they do not do that. maybe someday we get synths from big 3 with arranger option without styles, for me it wil be a good idea, becouse some players likes only arranger option and editing. it is not importent if a synth with a arranger option and editing comes without styles for some people.

Hi Diki.



No, the only reason why you haven't heard me doing that is because I don't own one and you know this.



Again, because I don't have an open keyboard and your suggestion is simply not practical for one man to achieve in order to have a product they can sell. To write a few hundred styles would take one man years of work.




So now all of a sudden people have to write their own styles from scratch ? Come on man, a quick search on google and you can download the factory styles from ever major keyboard.

As for making them work on the Mediastation or any OPEN keyboard, I've already covered this in detail in my posts above. It's not rocket science but it does take a certain technical ability.

Such are the efforts you must take to create your personal ultimate arranger if that is indeed what you want this open VST HOST to behave as.



Again you do not have to write your own styles.
Arranger users load styles from all sorts of different keyboards all the time.




Again with the broken record , your just trying to create the illusion that you have to make your own styles which is total nonsense. I know why your doing this too, your just trying to make things sound as complicated as possible.



Your words not mine.
I've made it very clear in all my posts who the keyboards are marketed at and that it takes a end user with a certain ability to be able to make it their ultimate arranger if that's what they want this VST HOST to be. I've also clearly said it's not for everyone. You only need to read my posts in this thread to see all this.

Your post is actually entirely pointless as it bears no connection to anything you have said previously or my reply to your previous post .



Be nice now. I've been very objective and very open about my views and who I think this keyboard is for, and what is actually possible. You haven't presented a single argument that can stand against my views becase I'm very much sitting in the middle on this all anyway.

Your problem is based exactly on what your “idea” of what an arranger should be. You want someone else to do all the work for you and to leave the opening of the box and the wow factor to you.

Good for you. So stick to your closed arrangers. There's nothing at all wrong with them and if they offer you all you need, then perfect. Just don't piss all over this thread just because you don't like the idea of having to customise something before you can use it even if that means having to buy an entire sound engine to drive the arranger.

It is what it is and exactly what an OPEN keyboard should be.



I scene hostility and a little nonsense www.live-styler.de



So you believe it's an awesome workstation / groove box, yet you can't accept it as an arranger. It boils down to everything I've been saying all along in this thread.

VSTi Synths come as complete packages, ready to go and fully of content that does not need any work at all. But there is no such thing as a VSTi Arranger that comes in such a complete state.

Content is not the problem, neither is function. The problem is there is no sound engine at all and so you have to use a second program paired with the arranger in order to produce a sound. With that also comes the fact that each style needs to be adjusted in volume and assigned sound in order to get the most form the system.

That's all. No writing your own styles or anything silly like that.

Regards
James.

PS: Chill out man. I'm not going to argue with you over a keyboard.

[This message has been edited by Irishacts (edited 01-05-2010).]

Sorry James, but having struggled for years to make translated styles sound as good as the originals, I'm afraid once again I have to disagree. You yourself probably know that the sound and the performance are inextricably linked. Change the sound, and the performance needs to be changed. Sometimes in a large manner. You know all too well that, I would have thought.

Drum sounds with multi velocity samples, cross switched instrument samples, velocity curves that don't match up, non-linear controller responses, not to mention performance switches (like Yamaha Mega Voice stuff), all of these make translating a style from one arranger to another an exercise in frustration. Yep, sure.... you can get close. But it is rare to see a translation better the original. And that's dealing with closed arrangers, who already have well balanced soundsets, and a fair degree of common tones.

Throw an open arranger into the mix, with it's hodgepdge of different sources, all with different velocity responses (until you spend weeks trying vainly to get them to match), all with different EQ responses, all with drumkits with sample switching in totally different places and totally different sounds, and it's easy to see why, so far, there's once again very little proof of your theory...

Once again, if a player is NOT already making translations that rival the TOTL ROM styles (I've heard very few that come close to the original), what use is that open arranger?

Honestly, James, I'm coming from the same place as you, I use VSTi's for lots of music, but perhaps I'm just more of a pragmatist. As good as they are, until someone actually DOES make a coherent soundset and a few hundred style (what 99% of the arranger market is looking for OOTB) for an open arranger with an OS that IS geared towards the users of closed ones, I just don't see this flying.

You have a PA2x don't you (or is it a PA1X)? Seriously, now. Would you honestly sell it, and just about all your other closed hardware, to get an MS if you had to gig a large variety of music on it? I know I wouldn't. But, once aging, theory rears its' ugly head. It's all well and good to proselytize these things, but another altogether to back up your words with action.

I'm sorry I take such a narrow definition of the word 'arranger', but I'm afraid that, I truly believe that well over 99% of the entire arranger playing world agrees with me. I mean, for one thing, the MS is not some über-expensive Scala, or even an Oasys. Yet it has pretty much tanked in the arranger market. To the point that Dom has thrown in the towel, and is now marketing it as what it was all along... A VSTi player with groove and arranger (albeit clunky) capabilities, but no intrinsic content of any value. If the MS had truly been what arranger players wanted, they would have bought it in droves.

I'm pretty sure I could cobble a bunch of vintage analog modular synths together, work out some sophisticated sequencing voltage voodoo, and create something that COULD, if you had all day, maybe make something interesting musically that you could get to follow chords played a bit. But I'm not insane enough to try and market it as an 'arranger' to the whole arranger world... Spending an entire DAY to make one piece of music that wouldn't rival a T3 (unless you were going for Kraftwerk!) and would never sound as good doing a foxtrot wouldn't strike me as a particularly good investment of my time and money.

I'm sorry, but you nailed it, for me. You said YOU wouldn't be able to take the time to program the hundreds of styles you might need as a gigging pro (or even a well rounded amateur). And I'm sorry, but I don't think you would want to spend the time making hundreds of translations, either. Especially once you got to hear how poorly they fare when compared to their originals...

Come to think of it, you have an Oasys AND a PA, don't you..? Now SURELY, you ought to be able to translate all the PA's styles over to the Oasys, and build Karma setups that could do much of what the styles do. But your not crazy enough to do that, when you already have something that does the job MUCH better. THAT'S really the point I've been trying to make. Sure, you COULD use a Swiss Army knife as a hammer. But why would you, if you already had a hammer?

And use that Swiss Army knife as a hammer for very long, and you'll be WISHING you never gave up your hammer.

Hi Diki.



Ok, I get where your going here but your still thinking CLOSED Keyboard.

Yes there is a link because the sounds on a closed keyboard are very limited by the number of layers of samples they have. Most sounds will have only 1 layer, some bigger sounds might have 2 or 3. Because of this there is a sweet spot where the performance played on them will sound best.

When converting styles from one make of a keyboard to another, the sweet spots in the performance many not match up to the sounds used, and so on... which is the entire basis for your argument here.

The problem with that is though you are thinking totally CLOSED Keyboard minded. You don't take into consideration the fact that a premium VSTI will offer sounds that don't have anywhere near the limitations of a closed keyboard. You get sounds that are FAR more detailed here, large samples, more of them, many times more layers.

So why do you think they won't sound as good as the original sounds on a closed keyboard preforming the pattern ?

Imagine using Pianoteq as your source for all Piano and Rhodes sounds ? It's so detailed that the midi standards actually limit it by what it could actually do.



I agree, I've said more or less the exact same thing in this thread a number of times at this stage. This is exactly why I've been saying that I'm delighted to see that Lionstracs are marketing the new keyboards at the workstation market.

The thing is though, if there are any arranger users out there who are technically minded and like the idea of surpassing the standards of a closed arranger, then an OPEN keyboard is the machine for them and there are huge benefits to be had if you put in the work.

You have to do the work yourself because as I've already said countless times in this thread, there is no such things as a VSTi Arranger that comes with it's own sound engine and content. None in the same sense as a VSTi Synth comes as a load up and instant play piece of software that requires no additional work.

Lionstracs could very easily make the Mediastation or the new keyboards typical arranger user friendly. It's just a matter of pairing the arranger with a quality vsti synth and having someone with the skill to do the work optimise 2 or 3 hundred styles taken from the net.

The catch with them paying someone to do that though is that they can't sell the work once completed. They would have to give it away for free because of copyright law on styles. So is that worth the cost to make the keybaord more typical arranger user friendly. I don't know.




No, don't twist my words. You where taking about writing new styles. Writing styles is far more effort than just downloading the best of the best collection from the net and remapping the sounds.

Remapping sounds is something I could do very easily, but it woudl be illegal for me to sell that work due to the copyright on styles. I'd have to give it away for free.

This is why I've said in my previous post to you that the only way you will see the type of OOTB arranger that YOU expect from Lionstracs is if they pay someone to do the work and they turn around and give it all away for free.

Simply doing that so they can sell keyboards to people like you is not the total solution either. A VSTi of premium quality would need to be purchased as well.



Well actually that would disprove your point quite simply because the OASYS would instantly make the styles sound better even if I just recorded the midi out of the Pa1X into the Sequencer and remapped everything so the OASYS sounds were used.

I think I've got a few songs on my mixing desks HDD where I've actually on this with a Pa1X and a Triton Studio. Possible even my OASYS. I'll see if I can pull the songs out.



If only you where living close by and you could visit the Studio. You totally don't even acknowledge your own abilities Diki. I think you just need a push and the opportunity to see what can be done and you be a changed man.

Regards
James

Well, James, I am afraid I AM talking from experience here. And I believe you are still talking theoretically. I have a plethora of Korg translations, Yamaha translations and Technics conversions. And JUST by substituting sounds (in my G70's case, especially with older styles, I ALREADY have sounds that are 'better' than the originals), I rarely ever get something that sounds as good as the original. I just don't think that you are getting the fact that, even though a sound from a VSTi may be WAY more realistic, that is no guarantee that it is going to match up to the performance very well. For me, at least, the sound IS the performance.

Call up three different brass patches. Try to play the same part. You can't. They sound so different, you adjust your playing to the strengths of each one. Same with bass sounds, pads, you name it. Piano is the simplest, and even that you have to adjust if the original performance leveraged the sample switching to emphasize dynamics. And don't even get me STARTED on how difficult it is to get drum Parts to translate to other drum kits cross platform. We have moved a LONG way away from simple GM/GS sounds on most TOTL arrangers. Drum kits are no longer mapped consistently, there's no standard for multi sample crossover points (say where the snare skin turns into a rimshot, just for a simple two sound example - multiply that by the number of samples a snare has... my G70 has four on each of many snares available per kit). What about ruffs, stick drags, tom flams, timbale flourishes, all the many things different in each closed arranger different from the basic GM/GS spec? Now take into account say bass parts, that may have performance samples all mapped differently, slaps, clicks, pops, mutes, notes that trigger mutes, etc.. How on earth do you map that onto a sound that has them all in different places?

You end up with nearly as much work as if you had decided to create a style from scratch. There are no macros... you have to do almost as much work for each different arranger you are translating from.

You see, I'm not talking about getting close. I'm not talking about getting adequate. I'm talking about being BETTER than the original... after all, what's the POINT of a open arranger if you don't end up with 'better'? Might as well buy the original, if it is going to take you MONTHS if not years to translate all the styles you need to even equal the original, let alone better it.

You are thinking old school, James Modern TOTL arrangers have FAR more nuance and detail in the sounds than older ones did. And the style creators leveraged that nuance for all it is worth. And it is translating that nuance that is so difficult. I'm afraid you glommed onto the ONE sound that doesn't have that much problem (Pianoteq) translating. But you conveniently ignored the drumkits, or things like Mega voice guitars and basses. You know. The FOUNDATION of the style...

The thing is, Yamaha and the rest do EXACTLY what you think Dom couldn't do. They make tons of new styles (and have a back library of hundreds) and give them away for free with each new arranger model. Or do they? You pay for the arranger, don't you..? You are paying for the styles, too.

Here's where Dom slipped. He thought that the content was something that arranger players could do without, make themselves, translate, whatever. I am convinced he DOESN'T have the musical skills to do this, and severely underestimated how hard it is. He thought that the technical aspects of the arranger would be sufficient. And a handful of people went along with it. And, from everything I've heard posted, NONE of them succeeded, at least at the level rivaling a T3, etc..

And, like most people that see this new, exciting technology and look past its' daunting flaws, I think you are still underestimating it yourself.

I don't think I DO sell myself short. I've tried making styles, and I've tried making translations, and even with my skill (take that as modestly as you want!) I find it VERY hard to equal the best of the ROM styles when played back on the arranger they were created for.

I'm afraid your offer to compare things between a Triton and a PA just doesn't hold water. The PA was BASED on the Triton. You want to impress me, take a style from a T3, with mega guitars and lots of nuanced drums (maybe an ethnic multipad layered on it), and replicate it on your PA. Better yet, replicate the MIDI file of the Yamaha style on a V-Machine...

Not as easy, I betcha!

It would be interesting to hear how people on both sides of this discussion define “arranger”.
It seems as if we have two (or may be more) type of arranger users.
The ones who support and understand open arrangers use styles the way most Yamaha users use their styles. They use third party styles, the change sounds of individual parts of styles, they copy parts from one style and put them in another to create a new style …. I think in Yamaha terms they call it style assembly.

On the other side however, those who do not understand and do not see the use of open arranger are still stuck on the close arranger concept and use an arranger with just the OOTB styles and sounds. The Audya would be the perfect arranger for them where there is not style creation and the editing is limited.

Hi Diki,

We are getting nowhere here at all. Your just locked into an idea here and there is no way I can even have a conversation with you that would make you consider the possibility of what I'm saying.

I go through your posts and I comment on each part, and you won't even return the curtsey and do the same because you don't even want to discuss the points I make.

Maybe I'm wasting my time because your not the type of user who can or wants do move beyond all your preloaded factory presets content you get with your closed arranger. Which is fine, I'm not knocking closed keyboards at all. They have their place just as any keyboard has.

So I'll leave it at that. I've spent far too much time on this already and we have gotten absolutely nowhere whatsoever. Your still saying all the exact same things.

Regards
James

As are you, James. Difference is, you are still talking about what OUGHT to be possible (but haven't actually tried), and I am talking about what IS possible, at least on any reasonable timeframe.

We have far more in common that you think, James. I DO use VSTi's, I DO use complex WS's as well as arrangers, I am pretty aware of everything you've said. Thing is, you refuse to acknowledge the herculean task of preparing an open keyboard to do the job that any good TOTL arranger can do, OOTB.

When I want to make one off, original productions, I primarily use WS's and VSTi's. But to do the job at a very high level, it takes a LONG time to do anything. Days on each tune, weeks or even months per album. And an album is a paltry ten or so songs. Scale that up to the hundreds of styles you need to be able to cover ALL the bases, and you can understand why no-one is using these things as an gigging arranger, yet.

Fran's sits at home, and never gigs. Dennis's got returned after its' shortcomings were made apparent. We had a guy gigging one from Romania, or somewhere in that vicinity, and nothing he posted impressed in the least. The only decent things I've heard from the MS were one off sequences, and those were few and far between, or some techno loop stuff (some off the MS website) that have no practical use unless you are playing to the DJ crowd...

There isn't ONE person using their MS as a full gigging arranger on this forum, and little on the web other than Serbian type music (whose practitioners don't HAVE a closed arranger as a viable alternative to choose instead).

All I have EVER said to all the 'theoretical' proselytizers on this forum is. first, why don't YOU go and get one, and SHOW us how easy it all is...? Telling us all how it OUGHT to be doable, but you have no experience to make that conclusion other than conjecture is such a cop out. It's amazing how all the people that think an open arranger is the future DON'T have one. And all those that DO have one are using closed arrangers to gig with.

Maybe we ARE at an impasse, James... I truly believe that you have completely ignored the salient points of my posts, too. You haven't refuted anything, merely repeated the same theoretical objections to my position. Me, I'm a practical man. I can do the math. Let's say it takes me two or three days to make a really good translation of a single style. I am talking balls to the wall, WAY better than the original, no cobbled together bull... All the drum nuances remapped to a VSTi (I'm just theoretically imagining there IS a VSTi with a drumkit that CAN map to the original, personally, I ain't heard one yet), all the guitar Mega stuff remapped to alternative switches, yada yada yada...

That means, it's only going to take two or three YEARS to make 300 styles or so (what I need to cover everything I use my G70 for... reggae to swing to alt rock to disco to ballroom to...). Now, I don't know about you, but I haven't got that kind of time

Sure, if you are sitting at home with all the time in the world, doing one offs of original tunes, then yes, the open arranger might be just the tool. But, OTOH, a computer rig for VSTi's and a couple of good closed WS's (with samplers and a TOTL sample library) and a DAW sequencer could do the job just as well. After all, that's basically what YOU have decided to use, for all your stuff. Oasys, computer rig, V-machine as a VSTi host, all the other gear.

But for those of us that play thousands of songs, using hundreds of styles, or those of us that barely can operate our closed arrangers, for those of us that can't write good styles, for those of us that struggle to make translations sound even usable, let alone better than the original, the open arranger is a complete bust.

And sad to say, from everything I've read and heard on this forum, that's basically EVERYBODY. The only people disagreeing with this don't even HAVE one. Those that do (or did) are definitely in that group...

Can we revisit this topic once you have actually taken your own advice, gone out and bought an MS, and can report from actual experience just how easy or impossible this is..? We are just talking in circles until you do...

Sure, maybe I could put a kit car together from all the little bits and pieces in about ten years or so (if you count the time I'd have to learn to be a mechanic, too!). But I've got to drive to the gig TONIGHT... And I don't have the patience for someone that keeps telling me what a great Porsche kit car replica such and such a company make, and how I ought to get one, especially if he hasn't made one himself...

I'm member from SLOVENIA(EUROPA) I use MS for giging as arranger.

Also some my colegues here are using MS as arranger.

My MS is prepared with normal styles like 8 beat, 16 beat, samba, cha cha, polka, waltzer, reggae dance etc. . .


I play with it usually 50% styles and 50 % mp3/midi files ( but this are only drums + bass prepared - the rest I'm playing).

And interesting what is possible to do with it.


BR

God, Diki's posts qualify as essays, both in quality and quantity! If you are on Skype Diki, and you have spare minutes, I would like to talk to you. I will have a lot to learn.

Anyway, the thing is that, as usual, everyone here is right.

Domenik is right on his struggle to deliver a keyboard that will please as many potential customers as he can, using as many technological advances as he can to his benefit.

James is right in seeing a very capable machine doing things that would bring other, more ordinary machines to their knees, from a technical perspective.

Diki is right in seeing a "rebranded" product, finally on the steps of being offered to the "correct" market.

Spalding is right that the presentation is lacking (read really sucks) when viewed from a sales-marketing perspective.

I stand by Spalding. As I have (in my infinitely nonexistent wisdom) pointed out to Dom years ago, (and I have the link to prove it), he really needed, and now probably DESERVES, a marketing department.

Someone who will explain....
not what the keyboard can do,
but what the keyboard can do FOR YOU.

Sales will triple, IMHO. And correct me if I am wrong, word of mouth and "word of ear" (pardon my pun), still works for both older musicians, and techno kids around.

The most used phrase is still "see the video and HEAR how good this instrument SOUNDS", and not simply "Hey guys, watch this".

I also understand that Domenik may suffer from the "It's my money, therefore I know best" syndrome, which plagues most Greek company owners. And both Italy and Greece sit very close on the world map, especially when viewed from the North American point of view. I bet even Spalding from Birmingham sees them alike. And he is the most right of all.

Dom, the product seems very worthy. Market it well and you won't believe what you've been missing all this time.

Sorry for the tiring message.
Theodore

Magica... more demos, then...

If you are gigging with it, let's hear it. Let's apply the only objective standard we have (our ears) and let's decide for ourselves if all the trouble you have gone through to voice and style the beast actually HAS ended up with something that blows a closed arranger away. Tons of demos. Selections in a wide variety of styles. No MP3 or SMF stuff (because I can buy a perfectly good WS to do that). Straight ahead style play ONLY.

In the end, that's the final arbiter. Technical specs and capabilities don't mean jack in the face of the actual SOUND...

Did you make your styles from scratch, did you translate them from other arrangers, did you use LiveStyler on older Yamaha styles, did you use the internal ROM styles, do you use the internal sounds, or a VSTi like Goliath, and how long does it take you to prepare up a song or style?

Details, details...

I'm not going to even try to argue with you, at least you yourself are talking from actual experience, rather than James' theoretical point of view, but I need to actually HEAR what you are doing with it, to see if our ideas of 'good' actually coincide. I am afraid, in the past, I've heard all too many things that sound really average, or even worse than a T3/PA2/Audya/E80 (often little better than a cheap arranger), but their posters are just SO proud they managed to get anything semi decent from the MS that they are willing to overlook the fact that, OOTB, they can get something WAY better from a closed one. The process itself, rather than the end result is what they enjoy.

Sadly, the vast majority of style demos posted so far other than loop groove hiphop and acid jazz stuff have failed to impress me, whereas T3/2 users, PA2 users, S910 users, and even G70/E80 users have managed to post things that are quite impressive. Certainly the manufacturer demo-ers have made those closed arrangers sound amazing... (and Dom's have failed miserably)

That's all I'm looking for. Amazing That's what it takes to match up to the closed arrangers, and that's what it takes to match the hyperbole of the fanboys (that don't own one).

Got anything amazing? Live playing, just the MS... I'd love to hear it...

At this point (actually, from Day One of its' release) talking about the MS is pointless. Want to wow me, want me to change my mind about open arrangers, want me to even buy one? You HAVE to play me live stuff that blows away the closed ones.

Still waiting, after four or more years...

Sorry, trident, but I don't Skype, and the only thing I can teach you, you seem to have a pretty good handle on... Don't listen to those that hype things they don't have, don't believe everything that you read, and use your ears ALONE as a final judge of anything. And ALWAYS pay attention to the man behind the curtain!