VST bugs - or how devs just don't give a damn

MrGr

Okay, this needs a separate thread. Put everything braindead about your VST in here. Only requirement: it must be an obvious issue that apparently the devs don't care to fix.

At least, in this case you can select custom paths instead of the default ones. But really, how hard is it to understand that a global program needs global access to data files?!?

MacMacMac

MrGr Regarding your Hauptwerk item, above ...

I think it's only natural for some items to be placed in a user's profile folder. A different user will have different content that what you have. So his stuff will be located in his folder, not yours.

Anyway ... this is a PC (personal computer) world. That is, most computers are used by just one user. That renders the point quite moot.

In the rare case where that does not apply you can simply change the folder name (during installation) to suit your needs.

As for your other items ... I wonder why you use this forum to raise such complaints? If (as you suggest) the software publisher has no intention of releasing a remedy for a problem, then do you expect anyone here to do so?

MrGr

iZotope Iris 2: same thing, installs presets and essential LFO files into admin folders without even asking. No fix to date. They don't care.

MrGr

Steinberg has a download manger, but nothing informs you about patch releases, especially not in a central location like Arturia does. If you click in Dorico 4 Pro (!!!! not exactly cheap software) on "check for updates", you land on the generic Steinberg downloads page, not even a Dorico page, essentially telling you "go check yourself, dumbass". On top of that, Dorico 4 Pro has no way to connect Mixer controls to a MIDI device. Holy cow.

Frédéric L

MrGr The Steinberg download manager is even worse : it proposes me some version of Cubase I havn’t purchase and not the versions I have.

MrGr

Garritan CFX produces clicks when the UI is open. They never fixed it. I'm running on a modern CPU and a NVM.e with > 3 TB/s read speed. The stats don't show any sample loading issues. It's just the UI that seems to interfere with the processing thread for some people.

MrGr

Ableton Live installer puts a complete copy of the installation files onto your Windows system drive. And, with each update, it gets another copy added………. so if you update Live Lite 10 times, say good bye to 26 GB of your system drive.

MrGr

Not exactly VST, but ASIO has no built-in support for mixing. Very annoying. I have to use ASIO Link Pro to run multiple audio programs at the same time. And that's neither developed any more, nor does it work with everything.

MrGr

Again, a tiny bit OT: Steinberg VST3 licensing allows existing license holders (before VST3 introduction) to continue to use VST2, while new licensees are denied that option. In Germany that should count as a distortion of competition, which should make it illegal. Example: there are plugins out there that only allow VST2 plugins to be embedded. If you have signed Steinberg's license agreement (a German company btw) since VST3 release, you're out of luck: no legal way to write a plugin for those plugins. Except if you re-implement the VST2 interface yourself - not sure if there is a good alternative implementation out there that doesn't require the official Steinberg license agreement. Are you even allowed to re-implement the VST2 structures legally?

MrGr

Cubase dropped support for 32 bit VSTs - that's why Cubase 8.5 is still popular with many folks. Lol. Just imagine: you are the inventor of the VST standard, and you just start to drop 32 bit plugin support for no good reason… must be some mindset like: our plugins are all 64 bit, and who would run outdated, non-Steinberg stuff anyways in Cubase? Planned obsolescence comes to mind. At least other companies profit from that unbearable mindset, ie. jbridge or Reaper.

MrGr

Steinberg Grand 3 noises:

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1LEVfPQE4klYBZsRaZoI7GXZg8XJ0ZuL2?usp=sharing

(minor, not really relevant issue: preload size limit is fixed at 1200 MB and shared among all instances. No way to increase it. I have 32 GB RAM… why not allow me to use it?)

MrGr

MacMacMac you don't understand. I run stuff under an unprivileged account. Installing stuff where you cannot access it, is just plain incompetent. Those libraries are meant for all users anyway. If your argument would be correct, why even bother to install stuff in C:\Program Files at all? Why does the installer want admin privileges?

On top of that: The VST link plugin is not installed where any DAW can find it. The app itself requires 48/96 kHz sampling…. what if I want to integrate into a project that doesn't have that sampling? It also requires 128+ samples buffer size. Very, very intrusive. I guess if you only want to turn your PC into an organ for playing, that's fine. Just run as admin, ignore all security aspects, disconnect the PC from the net, ignore the fact that you have to fix defects easily preventable by the devs and you are good to go.

MrGr

MacMacMac on more to add regarding Hauptwerk:

sample buffer size of 128 - my stuff usually runs fine with 32 samples buffer. Lots of cracks and distortions. And the CPU is hardly getting used… so don't tell me I need a larger buffer size…. idk man, seems like a really horrible product to me. The sound seems wonderful, but the technicalities seem just astoundingly awful. To me it seems they don't have multithreading under control and try to circumnavigate their issues with forcing a huge sample buffer size on the user.

MacMacMac

MrGr When you said that it installs sample sets and working data into C:\Users\admin ... I thought you were logged in as "admin".

If that's not the case, I wonder ... how would the installer expect there to be a user named "admin"?
Most PC's have no such user.

Frédéric L

The Waves Grand Rhapsody Piano installer does something wrong with the encoding of the user path. When I had an accentuated user folder, it fails to install. I had to create an other user with no accent, and install it from this account !

David B

I think the main technical problem with VSL Synchron Pianos is the lack of multithreading support and non-apple based app. However, it's possible both of those will be remedied when they switch to universal binary sometime this year.

I noticed that VSL Synchron Pianos ran better on my Intel Macs compared to the new Macs running Rosetta. I've had to increase the buffer to get the same performance. Hopefully, the update will solves these issues.

God Bless,
David

MrGr

David B like I said, the installer ofc requires admin privileges to install stuff into the global Program Files folder and therefore can ONLY be run with admin privileges. But that discussion is a bit nonsensical because there are other VSTs that not even allow a customization of installation paths and where you have to reverse-engineer the install location in order to manually fix it. G-Force Minimonsta comes to mind, beyond those already mentioned.

Update: just like I thought: if it can't handle stuff at low CPU usage with 128 samples buffer size, it won't work reliably with 1024 samples buffer size either….

MrGr

Acousticsamples B-5 V3 organ produces sound distortions each time you touch the draw bars. Not sure if that's authentic, because that's what they claim to be. 😄

MrGr

A new candidate for the "insane developer of the month" category:

https://spitfireaudio.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/360009167093-How-to-remove-a-library-from-Native-Access-Windows-

This seems to apply to all non-NI products registered with NI………. there is no uninstall button. Instead you have to delete the installed stuff manually AND use regedit to remove the then erroring list entry from the native access product manager app……. and that regedit procedure doesn't even work because they forgot to mention that "current user" is actually not the current user of the app and you have to use the admin account here.

Sometimes I just wonder why those companies don't just use Steam. It just works [tm]. The big ones could also use Epic. I guess Steam's platform offers decent exposure for its 30% cut - as long as you need it. But that's just my first guess. https://www.pcgamer.com/most-game-devs-dont-think-steam-earns-its-30-revenue-cut/

Johnstaf

For me it's Vienna Imperial. I still think it's the most lifelike VST when it comes to capturing the subtleties of piano playing. A couple of notes go out of tune when pedalled. I wish they would pitch shift other keys to eliminate the bad notes. VSL already pitch shift to create some black notes to keep the data demands down, so I'd imagine it would be doable. Maybe it's not. It's thirteen years old, so they probably won't change it now.