randyhyde wrote:
And yet, the better control surfaces out there have them. So why wouldn't it be a good idea to support them?
Let me be more clear.... I don't think the 102 channel generic MIDI control template should include scribble strips. I think that because I took that template to be a generic template. It's not supposed to be product specific. In my mind that was always Bob finally responding to what I told him years before which was he should expand the General MIDI template beyond the stupid 16 channel limit (more flawed logic on his part... because there were only 16 MIDI channels, how can you have more than 16 channels of control... snore...).
I am not saying he shouldn't support scribble strips. Just not with that template. What he SHOULD do and been doing all along is working with as many controllers as he possibly can and creating templates for them if he is not going to make it possible for an end user to roll their own. He should be working with the new Behringers. If it was me I would also be looking to turn an X32 into a control surface, probably via OSC. (even though I think that protocol sucks, it's the only real alternative to MIDI) I would have made better templates for the Mackie stuff. Perhaps the AVID Eucon stuff at least the artist series. I probably wouldn't bother with the bigger surfaces if it were me those are simply not cost effective for a SAC product.
Well, I suppose you're talking about me here.
Certainly over the past three years my experiences with control surfaces and SAC have taught me that expecting anything to change is a misplaced expectation. I'm not expecting anything this round. Bob's stubbornness on the control surface issue has cost him a lot of sales and a lot of ill will from the audio community.
No, I am not talking about you. You never took my comments as personal attacks against you. I'm not going to bother mentioning names, especially since they don't use their real names anyway.
Here's how it would happen: I'd have a small PC (netbook or similar) read the Ethernet data in, translate it, and pass it to Mackie units via USB or MIDI.
I understand, that just sounds like even more of a kludge to me. When the real answer is that the software should just support surfaces directly.
The NRPN issue is easy enough to work around. Remember that PC in the middle between SAC and the control surfaces? It handles all that quite easily. I've written an Ethernet interface that patches into Windows (using drivers like MIDI-Ox) that solve the data transmission and synchronization problems SAC has. The big problem is data. Bob ships out everything, not just the data that has changed. If stuff gets backed up on a real MIDI interface (e.g., as happens on Mackie XT or similar units) SAC has real problems. But if you stick a computer in the middle, that largely goes away. Of course, with better programming (e.g., shipping only the values that have changed) SAC's problems would go away -- but that's probably expecting too much from Bob's programming skills, to be honest.
Thank for that I literally LOL'd on that one.
Not expecting it. Not holding my breath. Just looking for the final excuse to jump ship when something better comes along (something better will have to include a decent reverb, btw).
It does... even Joe likes it.
IMO, the big advantage of SAC (and AMP?) in the sub-$5,000 area is:
1) Better quality sound (assuming the use of decent preamps),
2) Better routing options (as much as I hate to admit it, I'd pick SAC over the LS9 I'm using in the black box theater I manage),
3) Expandability,
4) Effects options,
5) SAC Remote with the host on the stage
The big drawbacks to SAC are:
1) User interface and ease of learning
2) Control surface support!
3) Dependence on Windows (especially older versions),
4) Rider compatibility (even X32s are getting respect in this department these days!)
5) Never living up to the promise, no expectations of new feature sets.
Well AMP should at least mitigate drawback 1,2,3 and 5. Or it at least has the potential to.
A I can hardly wait for the "But AMP does this...." comments on Bob L's board.
And you actually expect those comments to stick around for more than a few minutes?
Not to mention all the private messages of condemnation anyone that makes a comment like that would have to endure from the self appointed forum cop over there.
Hopefully AMP's forum will be so popular that there will be almost no traffic on the old forum except for the Kool Aids.