Kontakt 4.0.2 VST Audio/Engine/Driver glitches

I've had this problem on two different machines in Sonar 8 and FL Studio 9. It's a little sketchy as to specifically what instrument/action is causing this but so far I've pretty consistently reproduced the following:

1.Insert Kontakt 4 VST
2.Load an instrument and sequence some notes
3.Playback seems OK
4.Drag the library instrument Band>Upright Piano to replace the instrument already loaded.
5.Playback seems OK
6.

a.In Sonar, stopping playback causes minor audible glitch, but upon restarting playback, no audio is heard and playback cursor moves unsteadily. Only replacing instrument again restores playback

b.In FL Studio stopping playback causes loud pop and cpu/audio meter overload, sometimes, playback won't resume, sometimes clears after a moment or two, or resetting transport (hitting stop again) clears problem.

Other things I've noted: Band>Grand Piano and Ragtime Piano will exhibit the problem sometimes also, especially if loaded after Band>Upright Piano. Other instruments don't seem to cause the problem, but obviously I've only tested it with a handful of other instruments.

Can anyone try this to confirm if they see the same behavior?

Some Specs:

Komplete 6
Sonar 8
FL Studio 9
Vista Ultimate (32bit)
Intel Core 2 Duo E8500
4 GB DDR2 800 RAM

 

I'm experiencing something that may be related to the issue you report.

I am using Logic 9.0.2 with Kontakt 4.0.2.

Here is what I am experiencing:

1. Load up any of the Akoustic Piano patches or the upright piano patch you mention into Kontakt (there may be other patches that cause this problem since I have not looked yet).
2. Add some notes to the track.
3. Play back the track.
4. Stop the playback.
5. Restart playback and then intermittently, I get two to three loud audio pops (loud enough to do speaker damage if the levels were set high enough).
6. Hit stop and get more pops intermittently.

I do not have to try to replace an instrument to make this happen, it intermittently happens with the patch that is already loaded.

At first I thought that this might be a Snow Leopard related issue, however, after I read the post from Zigbert who is on a PC I discounted that. The issue he is seeing with FL Studio on a PC is very similar to what I am experiencing on my Mac Pro with Logic Pro.

I hope that this can be diagnosed and corrected pretty quickly since someone is going to loose a pair of expensive speakers due to this bug.


----------------------------------------------Update-----------------------------------------------------

This same problem happens with Kontakt 3.5 also.

Interestingly however, if I load the Akoustic Piano plugin itself and the same patch, the problem does not occur.

I have reported this problem to NI tech support. however, this was before I found out that Kontakt 3.5 was exhibiting the same problem. I pointed tech support to this thread so hopefully they will see my update and the reports from anyone else that can reproduce this problem.

 

Actually, I've reproduced the problem without replacing the instrument also, just loading it initially.

I posted about this on another forum, and another user who has the same issue reports that disabling the script for the instrument view eliminates the issue. I've confirmed that myself, and I had already noted that the three instruments in question all share a single unique instrument view.

I just looked at the actual scripts, although there are two files for grand piano and upright piano, I suspect they are just differently named version of the same script (they both say "instrument grand piano" in the text file itself) If the Akoustik Piano instruments use the same script, then I guess this is a likely culprit.

So disabling the script prevents the glitches/overloads, but the instrument doesn't sound right anymore. I don't know enough about what the script is doing to the playback of the various sample groups to know why, so for the time being I guess I'll just be using the orchestral libraries grand pianos. I will also file a tech support ticket and pass along this info.

 

Zigbert,

If you have Kontakt 3.5 please give it a try to confirm that your experiencing the problem with it as well.

Also, its strange that the problem does not occur with the Akoustic Piano plugin itself with the same patch (and presumably same script).

I wonder what other patches also exhibit this problem? I have not been using Kontakt as my go-to sampler for quite a while so I had not noticed this problem before. I just started auditioning Kontakt 4's library after I upgraded to Komplete 6 to see if there was any reason to begin working with it more and then this happened. I have never been a real fan of Kontakt since it has always exhibited more bugs then I was willing to deal with and I had hoped that this new version might change my opinion...needless to say this has not warmed me up to it.

Dave

 

There has been over 70 views of this thread, surely someone else must have experienced this problem. If so, please report your experience here since I referenced this thread in my email reporting this bug to tech support. The more info they have the better.

How about you moderators, can you reproduce this problem on your systems?

Thanks

Dave

 

Bump.

 

Have you deactivated multi-processor support in the options of the Kontakt plugin? I had tons of drop outs and high CPU with this option active.

 

I received this response from NI Tech Support on this issue:

"Thanks for the information; this seems to be related to a long-standing bug
that we thought had been fixed sometime ago, but I guess it is still
persisting on some systems.

I am in touch with our developers about this, I'll let you know what I can
find out or if there is any update on this."

Since we now know that this is a bug, it would be nice to know which patches cause the problem so that we can avoid them until the bug is fixed. The risk to your monitors and ears is serious if you experience this problem. If you have your monitors or headphones volume up when this occurs you could easily blow the speakers or damage your hearing.

So far, I have experienced the problem with any of the Akousti Piano patches or the Upright Piano patch from the Kontakt 4 library are loaded into Kontakt 3.5 or 4.

If you experience this problem with any of the other patches please list them so we can all avoid them.

Lets hope that NI corrects this bug quickly before someone looses their monitors or worse, their ears.

Dave

 

Update: the 4.0.3 update seems (after preliminary testing) to have fixed the issue I was having with the band>upright, ragtime, and grand piano instruments, hopefully won't have a recurrence later.

 

I still experience the problem with the piano patches as I did earlier after the 4.0.3 upgrade. The same for the old Acoustic Piano patches when loaded into Kontakt 4.0.3. The new piano patches (New York, etc,) sold separately are fine however. I will just have to stay away from the piano patches that shipped with Kontakt 4 and Acoustic Piano plugin.

Dave

 

Well, I guess I spoke too soon. Had been working fine after updating to 4.0.3, until I set a looping section in Sonar 8 with a sequence playing the Band>Upright Piano patch. Then the problem recurred.

This is getting frustrating. The new piano instrument series looks interesting, but I don't really like the idea of having to spend 80 bucks just to get a decent upright piano sound (when a working one is supposed to be included in the factory library).

 

I get it too

I'm experiencing the same problem you all have. Every time I stop certain samples (Concert Grand from the Orchestral bank just to name one) I get this extremely loud, unpleasant buzz/popping noise. It sometimes makes me jump out of surprise. I instantly turn down the speakers and hit stop.

When I hit stop, though, the program is frozen for half a second before actually stopping. The CPU meter also goes all the way up as others say.

I filed a ticket for this on Monday or Tuesday and still haven't gotten a response. It's very difficult to use these samples when you can't stop them, and with an issue this large I don't see how it has existed this long without being fixed. You'd think developers would instantly fix this issue and release an update. Even a patch would suffice. I'm pretty disappointed considering I spent a lot of money on Komplete 6 to get a malfunctioning program.

Don't get me wrong. I love NI's software, but this bug just ruins Kontakt for me.

 

As far as your cursor moving unsteadily problem, this can happen if you have the "Scroll Lock" accidentally activated in Sonar.

Regards,

 

Hello,
I am having the exact same problem using the Grand Piano in Kontakt in Kore in REAPER. Every time I try to record and then stop, a very loud pop sounds and persists several times usually causing blasting popping/crackling noises to come out of my speakers, for several seconds. This is REALLY SERIOUS because I don't want my speaker cones ruined!

 

Same issue here. I'm using Logic 9.1.1 in 32bit mode, Kontakt 4.0.5 and an Akoustik Piano patch (fittingly it's the Concert Grand Pop Me patch!).

I also have this infuriating bug where I can't open the instrument's gui when double clicking. It's just taken about ten attempts.



iMac i7, 8mb ram, 2TB drive, OS 10.6.3

 

Exact same problem here with Concert Grand. This is really annoying, especially on a product that cost this much. And seems to happen across different OSes, different hosts and different platforms.

NI should fix really this problem.

Sonar PE 8.5.3 32-bit on Windows 7 64-bit, Kontakt 4 (4.0.5.3186).

 

Happened again last night using Kontakt 4.1