Kontakt DFD problems

Hi there.

Can anyone help?

I have 2 hardrives, C for vista and D for music applications and samples. We are trying to load the DFD extension for Kompakt onto D drive with the music applications... every time my friend downloads it the DFD extension ends up on C drive and not D drive... The download does not seem to allow location choice..

Can anyone help here?

Kindest regards David

Intel* Core™ 2 Quad Q6600 Quad Core Processor(2.4GHz,8MB Cache,1066MHz)
Genuine Windows Vista™ Home Premium Edition
PCI-Express Mainboard - SLI nForce 680i SLI(C55XE) - Intel Core 2 Duo/Quad-Core - ATX
4GB DDR2 667MHz Memory ( 4 x 1GB Samsung)
500GB Serial ATA Hard Drive with 16MB Buffer
Multi-format Memory Card Reader (matx)
Addition 500 gig D drive hardrive

 

The DFD extension is a tiny extension that must sit in a specific place on your system. Run the installer, let it go where it's supposed to go, and leave it alone -- don't try and move it -- or it won't work properly.

 

this sounds sub-optimal, at least according to East-West -- the music 'applications' also should go on the C drive. 'Only' the samples belong on the separate drive.

 

I don't think it makes much of a difference where the application goes. The application is launched once, and might occasionally be queried if the user selects a new button/menu/feature/etc. But 99% of the hard drive accessing work that Kontakt/Kompakt does is simply fetching the samples from the drive for disk streaming. And it's accustomed to (and designed for) fetching multiple samples at once.

So it's extremely unlikely that you'd see any benefit at all from keeping the application and samples separate vs. on the same drive.

 

Maybe so, David. I certainly defer to your knowledge; East West, in all their literature, recommends putting applications on a drive separate from the drive where the samples are stored -- just passing along that word. I am intrigued at the notion that this may be unnecessary.

Maybe what they are really saying is -- "don't put the samples on the drive where the OS / boot resides"

 

What they are probably reasoning is this:

DFD (disk streaming), by its very nature, is very hard drive-intensive. Kontakt (and all related derivatives) is fetching megabytes and megabytes of data (potentially) with every note you play, and every time it goes to fetch data, it needs it to arrive very quickly since sample playback is such a real-time phenomenon. That's why the fastest hard drives are important for streaming. And also why some people -- especially with older hard drive technology -- get very concerned about the wear and tear on the drives which are being streamed from.

Simply loading the Kontakt application or plug-in isn't that hard on the computer. The program itself is, say, around 100MB, not all of which needs to be initially loaded into RAM.

EastWest may recommend putting the samples on their own drive either for the wear and tear reason, or for the throughput: that for optimal performance, they'd like sample fetching to be the only thing that drive is doing.

The wear and tear reason is, I think, less of an issue. Ten years ago, hard drives were a lot more fickle and less reliable than they are today. But after going through dozens of hard drives myself in the last couple of decades, my personal opinion is that (1) some hard drives that have seen light use (e.g. no streaming) can fail quickly, (2) some hard drives that have seen heavy use (e.g. heavy streaming, or frequent large track count projects) can last several years with no problem, and (3) I've seen NO correlation between hard drive brands' reliability. I've used WD, Seagate, Hitachi, Maxtor, etc, and all have failed me at some point, and all have had drives that lasted several years. I don't see any rhyme or reason or patterns to it. Granted, this is an unscientific survey.

I would probably recommend putting samples on a separate drive, partially for optimal streaming (that hard drive doesn't have to do anything else) and also for organization (I just like having my "Samples" drive that holds all my samples in one place). I don't think it makes any difference where the application is located.

As always, have a backup. Hard drives can fail at any time, without warning.