what to do about NI & Battery problems

I have owned Battery for quite a long time. when I moved my studio to OSX I patiently waited for battery to be updated and immediately purchased that update as soon as I heard it was released. unfortunately there are numerous problems with it, making it almost unusable. there have been numerous postings here about the problems over the past several months. there has been NO REPLY to any of these issues from anyone directly connected to NI, even tho this is THEIR forum. no acknowledgements of the issues, no promises of a fix, NOTHING! I personally find this to be offensive and very bad business.

I was seriously considering purchasing one of their other soft synths, but based on this experience that is not a reasonable thing to do. I can no longer support a company that releases software that is so obviously flawed. I believe that the only way to get NI's attention is to become very vocal and public about the issue.

whenever someone asks about purchasing an NI product on this or another forum. tell them about your experience here. post messages in public places about the lack of customer service and defects in the product. let people know that NI is not responsive to their customers and is, in effect, taking people's money for something that is clearly known to be defective. in the United States there are laws against this kind of thing and customers have recourse. if this is not an international option, taking our problems to the court of public opinion certainly is. perhaps this is the only way to get their attention.

a very dissatisfied customer!

 

New Battery version uploaded

Hi Alhos,

We've been working very hard to get a new and stable update for battery for OS-X. Please check the update. It's just been uploaded. We decided to upload this version because some major issues, especially for the AU plugin have been addressed. However, please check also the known issues section of the update. Unfortunately still a few issues remain that are taking some more time to correct. We will continue to improve our beloved Battery!!

Best regards, Hans Scholten.

 

Hans,

thank you for posting the update. I will download it and review it tonight to see if it resolves some of the not insignificant issues currently in the program. hopefully that will be the case.

that said, it is a shame that it has taken a public rant and threat such as mine to get a response from NI. your company's communication with the customers who are paying you for your products leaves, shall we say, something to be desired. IMNSHO NI would do well to allocate resources to this issue ASAP. trust me when I say that companies who ignore their customer base will eventually fall by the wayside. I have over 20 years experience in the software business, and 11 years running a MIDI software company. I know of what I speak.

Cheers

 

Alhos,

Please keep me updated on your progress. I have yet to upgrade my Battery to OSX (1.3) as I've read all of the problems with it.

However, I really do need a working drum synth.

If it works as a stable OSX AU in Logic, I will update, if not, I'll wait for FXpansions 008.

Which app are you using?

 

Yes.. I agree (or how poor customer service reduces long term revenue)

I'm afraid I agree with Alhos on this one. Even if the upgrade fee was small, it wasn't free and this upgrade was so buggy on so many different platforms that I don't think it's been fair to sell it as a functional update.

Having said that, s**t happens and I'm a pretty forgiving guy. But first you have to apologize. Or something. Anything. I mean, really, come on. Up till this point there really hasn't been ANY acknowledgement by the NI people of problems, etc. I'm sure they were all busy with important things, but all it would take is a 60 second post to these boards saying "We know, we're sorry, we're working on it and will get it to you as fast as we can"

That's all it would've taken. A little investment in customer relations.

As it happens I've been looking into buying a new soft synth and Reaktor was pretty high on my list. But after this experience I'll be going with the Tassman instead. I know I'm only one customer, but I do think a lot of audio gear is sold by word of mouth and I'd guess it adds up.

The thing about good reputations is they take a lot longer to create than destroy.

My 2¢ anyway...

greg

 

Well said, Alhos. NI's getting JakShit out of my wallet from now on.

First NI purchase: Dynamo, because of the included "Logic MIDI-Environment object" (I'm quoting from the retail box). It wasn't included. It was never added. Nor were features that were described in the 1.0 manual. Development killed at 1.03. So much for NI "...will regularly extend the DYNAMO library with new instruments."

Second NI purchase: 4Control. Ships with useless floppy disk; even more useless since the drivers are Windows-only. Independent coders have to write their own Mac drivers. Still gets a "10" from Computer Music. Development killed.

Third: Battery. You know the story there. Let my grandchildren know when version 2.0 hits. My money now goes to LinPlug, Bitshift Audio, and developers who actually deliver what they promise...and who actually respond to forum posts, Chris.

 

I just tried out the new update on my system:

Mac G4 1 GigHz mp
OSX 1.2.8
2 Gig RAM
DP 4.11

It seems to function fine in a basic test with 5-6 tracks of mixed MIDI and Reason. on my system the problem with the sliders seems to have been repaired. in addition, I didn't notice any significant delays in triggering samples.

for this evaluation I didn't have time to do a whole lot because I have other projects I am working on right now. the next time I have a new project I'll try & use Battery instead of Reason for the drum triggering as I have a lot of nice Battery kits.

I have noticed several other users commenting on NI quality, customer service and communication in this and other threads, here and in other forums. hopefully NI will take this to heart and work to improve their record in these departments. while I truly would like to see them do well going forward, it is something that cannot be put on the back burner. these items MUST be a part of the culture of the organization, and generally this comes from the top. I will be watching them in the future and will make my personal decision regarding purchasing other NI products, based on my observations.

good luck...

Al

 

Alhos - what about using multiple outputs in DP? I haven't yet downloaded the update, but was wondering if they fixed that bug yet... Thanks!

 

this is what I do!

I now have Battery.vst running perfectly under DP 4.11 via the Audio Ease VSTWrapper. No GUI glitches, multiple outs, moveable knobs. It's great! Once Pluggo gets here I may finally be able to leave OS 9 behind.

//chris