To N.I from a loyal customer

Dear N.I (i know this is a forum for users but i also now that N.I reads these post)

I'am a long time loyal customer. I got my mk1 the day it first came out so i have been on it since day one.
I rarely write anything here on forum, so i want to take my chance now and ventilate little around machine and this forum in general.
Lets's start with the forum. Ahh the machine forum in the early days was a heavenly place for me. Where you could come with any stuped q and everybody replied with such detail and care. Nowdays its just to much. The threads are about BS and the interesting ones goes off the topic after two or three replies. I don't know what happened but it is what it is. (to me)

now to the maschine

lets me ask you something N.I. Since when do people know what they want?????
THEY SIMPLE DON'T
I've been on machine since day one. You had a clear vision in da beginning it was going to be a software/hardware drum machine!! thats it!!!
It was so beautiful on v.1 to v1.8 where everything works so fast. Everything is hands on etc etc. (yea i got back to 1.8)
Now, i wanna say that Maschine Studio is a beautiful piece of hardware. And machine 2.0 software is probably better on machine studio then them other controller. But here is where i can't wrap my head around this. Now this machine studio controller is just a midi controller with fancy screens. Now the price is a joke so lets just leave it there i don't even want to disscuss it. This is what i want to ask??? WHY DONT YOU GIVE YOUR LOYAL MK1 MK2 CUSTOMERS A CROSSGRADE PRICE FOR MASCHINE STUDIO. Really u want us to buy it at full price even tough the price is already ridicules.
Now where is that clear vision u had from start? Is it a drum machine or is it some kind of DAW. Right now its none.
U are listening to all these amateur users that never sold a beat in their life. A mixer page really?? i have been in the mixer page 5-10 times and only when the project gets big so i can see easier how my stuff is routet. Every real musician would told u that u don't need a mixer page in a drum machine because a professional sets his volume by da ear and not by vision. And only in da final mixing stage does he need a mixer.
Second: SO MUCH EMPTY GREY! why don't you use the space better.
Stuff that took a push to do now takes two or three moves before its done. And not to mention the stuff that was in machine 1.8 now is complete gone. It's called v 2.0 because its supposed to have all the previous stuff already in it.
The expansions that u have to pay 50euro for are getting lighter and lighter with actual samples and more and more presets for massive and now drum synths. So in about 6 month are we going to pay 50 euros just for presets?? It's a joke. And isn't the whole idea with the drum synth that they are simple because the user is suppose to make it fun and easy to make hes on samples. Not buy presets for them in expansions. I got so many things to say about the version 2.0 and later. I understand its complete new but the vision and the workflow does not function as it supposed to function. It's not a drum machine anymore. Look here the machine/daw BS is going to complete bury you. Now here is a advice for free ( send me something later, and don't forget . Don't listen to all these posts here on forum i say 70 percent of the users are amateurs that don't know what they want so they want it all until they mess it up. If you want a daw, then N.I make a complete new DAW whiteout machine and ad machine inside that DAW but as a sidekick.So that you can run the daw completely separate, or run the daw and machine software inside the daw well implement and so on, or run the machine stand alone for better performance when on stage live. Thats one for free. Now my point here is, think N.I because you are losin it, the prices, the software lack of vision what it is, the expansions, no cross grade offer, N.I i swear i want to be loyal, i just checked my account and just the year 2013 i have spent almost 2000euros just on software. Thats more then a months pay for almost everyone of us here. But i promise you, keep going this way and I guarantee it i'am off the wagon. So please get yo act together or hire me......

 

and just for the fact i don't want a daw i don't need a daw. I have Logic and every other musician have a well invested daw. And most of us don't want to leave Logic or pro tools and its not just that Logic is on version 10 and machine is on v2 its not that hard math. I simply don't have that time to wait for u to catch up on all off that and then wait for all the bugs to get fixed. I simply won't can't and will not do. Its my opinion, so respect it like we used to respect and disscuess each others differences when the forum first came to light

 

maybe it's just me but if a move takes 2,3 or 4 to complete the task I'd rather just do it with 1 mouse click.

 

Loyal subjects never question their King.

 

chuckles

 

Common sense says move on to something and not spend 4 plus years on a forum complaining about maschine because it doesn't have mp3 support like some people want lol.

 

so what about those without a DAW those that just wanna use maschine standalone with nothing else?

 

I actually think that mp3 support makes a lot of sense for Maschine. It is a sampler and many people sample mp3s these days.

while I have not had Maschine as long as you have (only a year) I disagree with most of this. I followed Maschine from the time of its creation but I was happy on my hardware rig and then Reason rig and a friend got me to really check out Maschine. With that said I spent a lot of time with 1.8 and I feel 2.0 is a much much needed revision. Their vision was a drum machine and Maschine still is very much so a drum machine. There are a few features that take a couple more button pushes but for the most part its not all that different. I am on the MK2 and it runs great with 2.0 I have friends on MK1s who are very happy on 2.0. I have sold beats and I do not consider selling beats to be a big "professional" thing or at least nothing that makes you a professional. Also understand that not all of us make music or beats with the goal in mind of selling them to rappers. I know a lot of guys who make all kinds of EDM music who have no interest in selling beats but what to release albums of instrumental music and love Maschine for that. I got almost everything I asked for in 2.0 as well. The only features I did not get are rewire support, mp3 support and audio tracks. I'd also love to get PDC so I can use my more heavy vst fx on my sounds when needed. Point is you don't know everyone's situation and are complaining because its not perfect for you and you alone. For me 2.0 is a no brainer for Maschine owners. For many 1.8 is superior. That is the beauty of having choices. If you want a straight across drum machine that will only do that the Mpc Ren might be a better choice for you because i doubt that Akai is going to deviate too far from giving the Ren that classic Mpc feel. For me 1.8 allows me to do what I used to do with my Mpc and trinity easily. I load a sound I record it to maschine. Pick next sound and arrange. I can even do some light mixing with maschine which is great I love the new plug in strip. I hated that 4 slot system because some sounds require more than just 4 slots and I would use these during the creation process. For example I may load a snare run it through eq distortion delay and reverb and then compress that to get the sound I really hear in my head. 1.8 of course cannot do this. I love the new browser because while it does have a couple of extra steps I find it to be much faster for me to find exactly what I am looking for. I love to use Maschine as a stand alone music creation tool where i can create and arrange my music and if needed I can drop it into a DAW to mix. To me that is a great thing. Native Instruments got it right. Its not a DAW not trying to be a DAW but it is trying to be everything you need to make music and it does that well. I do agree they should have a crossgrade price for the Studio hardware but it is what it is. I am staying on my Mk2 for a while.

 

Or stop complaining about the cost of Studio.

 

That's true. & I wouldn't have a problem if Maschine supported MP3s. But, couldn't care less if it don't. I'll just jack my phone into my audio interface & sample it from there. That's how I do youtube as well. & if I hear something/anything I want to use, I record it with my phone, then sample it into Maschine when I get home.


These phones nowadays are badass.

 

KevWestBeats

You over here on the forum blogging counterpoints and I am over on Youtube waiting on another one of your videos!!!

Put your sword down and Hop To It, Dude!!!:lol::lol::lol:

 

I agree phones are bad ass these days. For me its an ease of use thing but people will get music done with or without it. At this point audio companies need to come to grips with the fact that mp3 is now a standard audio format. Is it ideal? No but we now have an entire generation of kids who have never owned a cd and only know mp3. I had a friend on Xbox who I played Call Of Duty with he was born in 1997 and has never owned an actual cd. He has always had an itunes account. He is 17/18 years old. For people like that I say Keep it simple for them. I prefer having vinyl for sampling personally. I like the limitations when it comes to sampling to only have a few crates of records around.

lol. My laptop needs a new fan. I am waiting for it to come in the mail special order and its supposed to be here any day now. The cooling pad I am using is good for web browsing and making music but it can't handle recording video right now. I did do some articles on my website though if you want to check those out. www.KevWestBeats.com the site is up to date and I did a written review of Sounds In HD Hip Hop Domination a few days ago.

 

Will check that out, KevWestBeats

 

My thing about MP3 support is that, all maschine is going to do is convert it to a WAV or AIFF file anyway since you can't edit MP3s directly. Why not just fire up audacity and convert the file and drag that into machine? Is it convenient to be able to drag and drop audio directly form iTunes into Logic, yeah, but I can easily convert the audio file anyway using audacity so what's the big deal?

Now MP3 export is a different thing. i would be awesome if we could export MP3 or AAC directly from Maschine. Even that is not that big a deal for me.

 

Its more of the idea that I don't want to have to deal with a separate program for something so simple. I don't care if Maschine did convert it internally or not its the point that people like things that are convienent and the easier the better. Manual converting is easy but I would still rather just bring it in by itself. Reduce the steps and get me to making music faster.

 

mp3 support is a great idea, the whole core of the concept of workflow is based on convenience, thats what workflow is about. as a samplist I never judge the soundsource of what someone else is sampling. i know some cats that only concern themselves with 24bit files and others that only mess with mp3s and personally it doesn't matter to me. One great thing about mp3 support is that it would aid allot of cats who are just learning and getting into sampling. Not needing to use another app to convert anything and making it as simple as ableton is a great booster for people learning new technics etc....
there's no downside to it, only good things can come from adding more formats imho, especially allot more people would buy maschine, get ni more money, and hopefully lead to them getting he 100 or so more devs they need to tweak the software.

 

There are a couple of downsides.

It encourages people to use sub standard audio files as sample sources and it encourages people to use music that has been illegally downloaded rather than bought.

 

Am I missing something here ? If you sample an mp3 won't it just end up being a wave file? Or load/imoort an mp3 wouldn't it up sample it to match your project format @ 24/44.1/88.2/96k? I am not aware of being able use different formats within a project nor would I want to. But exporting to an mp3 for a listen on the go would be nice.

 

You can't "up sample" an audio file. An mp3 has missing low frequency and high frequency content. You can't add that content back into the file by changing the format. Once it's gone, it's gone.

 

You can of course up sample any audio file, puzzle factory is correct however that you would not gain anything from doing that (Once it is gone it is gone), however any app that allows the use of multiple formats within it's framework will automagically up sample them into raw information for playback/editing (Whatever native raw format said app uses)
One thing that should be noted by anybody who 'thinks' they want to use mp3 directly on the pads, most mp3 encoders (Haven't found one that doesn't yet) have inaccurate timing, they add a little bit of silence mostly to the start of audio files and sometimes to the end of audio files, this would make editing in and of itself something of a continual PITA.

MP3 as a delivery format has one obvious issue and one not so obvious
1 As puzzlefactory has noted above, MP3 is actually very poor in terms of lost frequencies, this is not some audiophile nonsense by the way, it is a very very low proportion of people who can not tell the difference between a 320kbps and a 16 bit 44.1 wav, not even going to talk about 24/96 here.
2 Most people do not even realize that to deliver via mp3 is actually a payable licence situation, that's right, you have to have a licence that you pay for from the Motion Picture Entertainment Group, yes they are not enforcing this right now, but that does not mean that at some point in the future they are not going to. (Even for one mp3 on your site, it is a legal requirement, again, not being enforced yet)

Personally i would suggest people look at FLAC and then OGG (Note, for myself i would never used a compressed format for music making)