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Acxel II
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GovernorSilver



Joined: Apr 26, 2004
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PostPosted: Wed May 27, 2009 8:06 am    Post subject: Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

mono-poly wrote:
Are you guys geting one?
I really tought about it and how it would work together with my modular gear.


Good question. I guess for you, it might be helpful if the Axcel2 can send/receive control voltage like the MOTU audio interfaces (and any others with DC-coupled outputs) can do with Volta. Then it would be a lot more useful than just an effects processor. BTW, Eventide's H7600 and H8000 - two of the most powerful standalone effects processors in existence - both cost more than the Rack version of the Axcel2.

As a string player, being able to resynthize live audio input from my cello into chords that are tuned to a desired temperament or intonation (eg. Wendy Carlos Just Intonation) would be useful to me. The chords don't always have to sound like a bunch of celli playing together - the resynthesis engine could probably make the chords sound like erhus, or a brass sections, or a gamelan orchestra, or something else.

Intelligent pitch shifting that handles chords as well as single notes seems to be within reach of this thing. One problem with MIDI guitar technology adapted to cello is that pitches are always parsed as MIDI Note Number plus MIDI Pitch Bend. It would be more useful to round the played pitches to the nearest control value instead of taking the floor value all the time.

These are just simple ideas that I'd like to try with an Axcel2.

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Fidgit



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PostPosted: Thu May 28, 2009 7:09 am    Post subject: Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

let's hope this will really happen...

the new website mentions things like "3 years free access to users Forum" (does that mean that the customers will be charged for using the forum after 3 years?!? thanks a lot...)
but doesn't show any photos of the actual units nor one single second of sound. Rolling Eyes

i'd prefer more focus on the product itself...
but let's hope for the best. Exclamation Smile
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TekniK



Joined: Aug 10, 2008
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PostPosted: Thu May 28, 2009 7:49 am    Post subject: Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

I guess the 3 year forum access is because u can DL extra sound libraries then

there where sound samples online in the old site,i think its a matter of time,the new site is just up.

There is a prototype card but for the other units they work on it atm probably
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robsol
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PostPosted: Thu May 28, 2009 9:20 am    Post subject: Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

The sound samples on their old site completely put me off, because their quality was diabolic. It's good that they are gone!

Hopefully they will get some better ones up this time around.

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xjscott



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PostPosted: Thu May 28, 2009 9:36 am    Post subject: Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

Wow, $650 a year for email support, that is very interesting. Clearly I should have been charging for support all along...
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TekniK



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PostPosted: Thu May 28, 2009 9:41 am    Post subject: Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

Muied Lumens wrote:
The sound samples on their old site completely put me off, because their quality was diabolic. It's good that they are gone!

Hopefully they will get some better ones up this time around.


Those where no 'demo' of a sound librarie but rather some test resynthesis done with the proto card

Posted more as a 'proof' to show of the product is comming imo

they where totaly crap indeed

xjscott wrote:
Wow, $650 a year for email support, that is very interesting. Clearly I should have been charging for support all along...


Immagine they sell a acxel to a guy that don't have any clue abouth synthesis...

well he can have support if he made a mess in his machine,but he have to pay for it. its logic..
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BobTheDog



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PostPosted: Thu May 28, 2009 10:02 am    Post subject: Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

TekniK wrote:

Immagine they sell a acxel to a guy that don't have any clue abouth synthesis...

well he can have support if he made a mess in his machine,but he have to pay for it. its logic..


Good job the rest of the world doesn't think that way, I could never afford all the support on the stuff I don't understand!
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TekniK



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PostPosted: Thu May 28, 2009 10:27 am    Post subject: Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

BobTheDog wrote:
TekniK wrote:

Immagine they sell a acxel to a guy that don't have any clue abouth synthesis...

well he can have support if he made a mess in his machine,but he have to pay for it. its logic..


Good job the rest of the world doesn't think that way, I could never afford all the support on the stuff I don't understand!


The problem is,they don't targetting the world..

I once sold a very little custom modular a lot of money,well its was my asking price but the guy did buy it because i made a killer demo in front of him with the system. he did buy it ofcource.

then when he got it home a few days later called me and asked ,how do i get this sound and this sound etc 'like u did'

I told him to take a cource in analog synthesis,i cannot take time even if its 2 hours every time i sell something,and even if i give cource to that guy am sure he still get no single valuable sound out of it.

I think they just don't wanna take the risk when selling machines to ppl that are not familar with resynthesis to spend hours explaning them how to use it all for free,time is money.
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GovernorSilver



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PostPosted: Thu May 28, 2009 10:32 am    Post subject: Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

xjscott wrote:
Wow, $650 a year for email support, that is very interesting. Clearly I should have been charging for support all along...


That is an unfortunate business decision, if this is true.

Does Symbolic Sound charge for customer support of their Kyma products? If so, how much?

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TekniK



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PostPosted: Thu May 28, 2009 10:40 am    Post subject: Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

GovernorSilver wrote:
xjscott wrote:
Wow, $650 a year for email support, that is very interesting. Clearly I should have been charging for support all along...


That is an unfortunate business decision, if this is true.

Does Symbolic Sound charge for customer support of their Kyma products? If so, how much?


I don't think so,but you get a set of 'preset algorithms combinations' with the box so u can start immediately witouth support.and there user base is much bigger,u can obtain info by asking co-user tips.

this is a different machine,and there are no users right now so staff is the only that can offer sollutions to the first custommers,maybe they will change that later once the pruduct has reached a certain amounth of custommers

Last edited by TekniK on Thu May 28, 2009 10:40 am; edited 1 time in total
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BobTheDog



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PostPosted: Thu May 28, 2009 10:40 am    Post subject: Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

SymbolicSound don't charge for support.

They are also extremely helpful.
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BobTheDog



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PostPosted: Thu May 28, 2009 10:41 am    Post subject: Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

xjscott wrote:
Wow, $650 a year for email support, that is very interesting. Clearly I should have been charging for support all along...


Put me off straight away.

Last edited by BobTheDog on Thu May 28, 2009 11:36 am; edited 1 time in total
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TekniK



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PostPosted: Thu May 28, 2009 10:46 am    Post subject: Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

BobTheDog wrote:
GovernorSilver wrote:
xjscott wrote:
Wow, $650 a year for email support, that is very interesting. Clearly I should have been charging for support all along...


That is an unfortunate business decision, if this is true.

Does Symbolic Sound charge for customer support of their Kyma products? If so, how much?


Put me off straight away.


Then it worked! lol
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GovernorSilver



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PostPosted: Thu May 28, 2009 11:36 am    Post subject: Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

TekniK wrote:
BobTheDog wrote:
GovernorSilver wrote:
xjscott wrote:
Wow, $650 a year for email support, that is very interesting. Clearly I should have been charging for support all along...


That is an unfortunate business decision, if this is true.

Does Symbolic Sound charge for customer support of their Kyma products? If so, how much?


Put me off straight away.


Then it worked! lol


I don't think it would be wise to lose BobTheDog as a potential customer. If you have seen his posts on other electro-music.com forums you would know that he is much more intelligent and hard-working than you think. In the short time he has owned his new Kyma Pacarana system, he has already posted multiple user patches.

So if you think he's too stupid and lazy to deserve an Axcel2, think again.

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xjscott



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PostPosted: Thu May 28, 2009 4:51 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

GovernorSilver wrote:
That is an unfortunate business decision, if this is true.


Well, here's the price list where I stumbled into the $650 item, it's the last item listed and the only support option:

http://www.acxel2.com/shop.php

The first year of on-line support is free with the $6950 Studio model, but the $2950 Rack and $1950 Card models you have to pay $650 for it. It's not explained exactly, but presumably the second year with the Studio model you pay for as well.

So as to "if this is true", it sure seems to be true since it's on their site, it's not something I made up. However, perhaps I am misinterpreting it?

Acknowledged that once registered you are allowed to talk to other customers on their forum for 3 years, it sounds like the $650 is only if you want to talk to an actual company person.

Here is the support page:

http://www.acxel2.com/info/support/

Reading this closely, it seems there is (free? and for how long?) standard technical support and then this other priority one that costs extra. Maybe this means they guarantee to telephone you back within 30 minutes of a support request, but otherwise they get back to you whenever, maybe a week or two? The specifics are not clear.

Now on to some speculation about the cost...

Perhaps they are thinking as follows. Support has to be done by engineers because it is very technical. Their engineers perhaps cost $100/hr and they recall from the original Acxel that each customer who needs support enough to pay for it requires 7 hrs of it per year.

I certainly am not criticizing their policy, I find it very interesting though. Clearly some will be put off by the price. But it may also send a signal that this device is very advanced and not for everyone, and perhaps that makes it even more desirable.

$650 for support means this is not a Casiotone designed for teens who work at fast food. Like a Buchla, it's probably going to be acquired mostly by very serious studios and colleges. If you are advanced enough to need this hardware and serious enough to afford it, perhaps $650 is pocket change to get this sort of personal access to their experts in something that is undoubtedly cutting edge technology. Maybe this level of support they provide tutorials and examples directed at the customers specific requirements.

For comparison, I'm pretty sure it costs around $650 or more a year on average to keep a full set of Native Instruments licenses up to date with all the latest bug fixes.
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xjscott



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PostPosted: Thu May 28, 2009 5:12 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

GovernorSilver wrote:
So if you think he's too stupid and lazy to deserve an Axcel2, think again.


BobTheDog is an awesome guy, he has long been a leading contributor on the many forums he posts on.

I don't know TekniK myself, but I don't think he is saying bad things about anyone here. It seems to me that he is just observing that such a support policy is very likely designed to "put people off", as it did Bob, so therefore it "worked as intended." His comment could be seen as a criticism of the policy, or a neutral observation, rather than a criticism of anyone put off. Or perhaps he did mean to criticize, perhaps he could clarify.

My own fascination with the policy is to wonder what the business reasoning was behind it. It seems to me to be a bold statement of eliteness or seriousness or professionalness. That's actually a common thing to do with high-end items. On the other hand, it's not so high end really, the prices, although serious, are pretty good for custom hardware that will be sold in rather small quantities, and not so different from buying a good computer.

But check this out. Digidesign charges $4399 per year for 24/7 premium support access. The customer who really needs that access (obviously this means commercial studios) is probably thrilled to pay it. If you don't need 24/7, Digidesign has a budget $2899 per year support package for customers.

Knowing that, perhaps that puts some perspective on things?
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BobTheDog



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PostPosted: Thu May 28, 2009 11:16 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

xjscott wrote:

For comparison, I'm pretty sure it costs around $650 or more a year on average to keep a full set of Native Instruments licenses up to date with all the latest bug fixes.


Bug fixes are free from NI, even fairly major updates can be free and lifetime support is free.

Most major updates are charged, like Reactor 4 to Reaktor 5.
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BobTheDog



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PostPosted: Thu May 28, 2009 11:30 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

GovernorSilver wrote:

So if you think he's too stupid and lazy to deserve an Axcel2, think again.


xjscott wrote:

BobTheDog is an awesome guy, he has long been a leading contributor on the many forums he posts on.


Guys I'm blushing. I have printed these comments out and will present them to people at work when I mess things up, in fact I might get a T-shirt made up Smile

I think Teknik was probably just making a joke though.

One thing I do know for sure is that this rather high support cost would put me off buying one, I would not have got the Pacarana either if SymbolicSound charged for support.

Avid/Digidesign support can be very expensive, this is one of the reasons that customers are moving away from their products.

Waves charges me about £100 a year for support on £1500 pounds of gear, for this I also get all new versions of the software which is a bit of a sweetener but I think this year I will let it lapse. Lots of customers hate this policy, but then Waves do offer very good support.

The work I am currently doing is to move a company away from using a couple of SGI supercomputers to using lots of consumer level 4 cpu blades instead, the main reason? They don't want to pay the rather expensive SGI support costs.


Andy
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TekniK



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PostPosted: Thu May 28, 2009 11:42 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

xjscott wrote:
$650 for support means this is not a Casiotone designed for teens who work at fast food. Like a Buchla, it's probably going to be acquired mostly by very serious studios and colleges. If you are advanced enough to need this hardware and serious enough to afford it, perhaps $650 is pocket change to get this sort of personal access to their experts in something that is undoubtedly cutting edge technology. Maybe this level of support they provide tutorials and examples directed at the customers specific requirements.



i think thats there target yes.

Any potential user that is familar with complex synthesis should not be taking care to much if you have to pay for support or not but importand is that idarca take care to release a proper manual and that the system is (almost) bugfree at release otherwise support should be free untill it is imo.

GovernorSilver wrote:

I don't think it would be wise to lose BobTheDog as a potential customer. If you have seen his posts on other electro-music.com forums you would know that he is much more intelligent and hard-working than you think. In the short time he has owned his new Kyma Pacarana system, he has already posted multiple user patches.

So if you think he's too stupid and lazy to deserve an Axcel2, think again.



BTW,we don't have to make choices for bob,and he don't care what i think abouth him imo ,
and yes like Andy wrote i whas jokin' (without emoticon like it should be otherwise its not a joke anymore) Wink

a joke.. ,but THIS guy got it right in fact:

xjscott wrote:

I don't know TekniK myself, but I don't think he is saying bad things about anyone here. It seems to me that he is just observing that such a support policy is very likely designed to "put people off", as it did Bob, so therefore it "worked as intended." His comment could be seen as a criticism of the policy, or a neutral observation, rather than a criticism of anyone put off. Or perhaps he did mean to criticize, perhaps he could clarify.
?
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seraph
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PostPosted: Fri May 29, 2009 12:01 am    Post subject: Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

I think we need an official statement on this matter from Idarca Audio.
The sooner, the better Exclamation

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xjscott



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PostPosted: Fri May 29, 2009 12:14 am    Post subject: Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

BobTheDog wrote:
Bug fixes are free from NI, even fairly major updates can be free and lifetime support is free.


Have to disagree with you there. My experience has been as follows. When will Absynth's stuck note problem be fixed? Sorry, not in the current version, in the next version. Oh, still not fixed? Ha ha, wait for next paid upgrade. Oh, it's still not fixed? Didn't get around to it sorry, try the game again, maybe this time you win a prize. Oh sorry, microtonality broke going from FM7 to FM8? Gosh that's sad. Wait for FM9, maybe it will be fixed. Or maybe the whole feature will be dropped. Or maybe there will be no FM9. Well whatever it is, hope your wallet is full since the new version will be the only way to get that bug fix, assuming it is fixed, which it probably won't be. But it's all worth it because we are the best, we are NI.
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TekniK



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PostPosted: Fri May 29, 2009 12:22 am    Post subject: Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

xjscott wrote:
When will Absynth's stuck note problem be fixed? .


huh is that still not fixed!! Shocked thats since version 2 or was it v3?,damn

luckly u have not to pay for support,..such crap lol
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BobTheDog



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PostPosted: Fri May 29, 2009 12:43 am    Post subject: Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

xjscott wrote:
BobTheDog wrote:
Bug fixes are free from NI, even fairly major updates can be free and lifetime support is free.


Have to disagree with you there. My experience has been as follows. When will Absynth's stuck note problem be fixed? Sorry, not in the current version, in the next version. Oh, still not fixed? Ha ha, wait for next paid upgrade. Oh, it's still not fixed? Didn't get around to it sorry, try the game again, maybe this time you win a prize. Oh sorry, microtonality broke going from FM7 to FM8? Gosh that's sad. Wait for FM9, maybe it will be fixed. Or maybe the whole feature will be dropped. Or maybe there will be no FM9. Well whatever it is, hope your wallet is full since the new version will be the only way to get that bug fix, assuming it is fixed, which it probably won't be. But it's all worth it because we are the best, we are NI.



I see your point, most NI stuff still has bugs in and will probably never be fixed or it seems new versions released. The chance of seeing new FM, Reaktor or Absynth I think is very small and they are not fixing bugs on the old stuff so we don't have to worry about paying for them!

NI seems to have moved onto hardware/software combinations with lots of silly soundpacks now, shame really.

The problem is that NI have taken the choice not to fix stuff that they make no money on, maybe if we all had to pay them $650 a year they would but then again nobody would buy NI stuff then!

Andy
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Fidgit



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PostPosted: Fri May 29, 2009 1:29 am    Post subject: Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

another thing which makes me wonder is:

as aditionnal processor, they use "Pentium 4 2 Ghz". how long will these be available in the future?! from todays perspective it's quite an old CPU already and the acxel2 is not even in the stores yet.

will it be even antique and obsolete once the hardware is released? Rolling Eyes
wasn't there any other intel CPU available which is up to date from todays perspective?

it's not that much about the processing power, it's rather about a certain future proof design. it sounds a bit irritating to announce (not even talking about the production yet) the release of hardware with components which are dated at the date of the announcement already.
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TekniK



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PostPosted: Fri May 29, 2009 2:07 am    Post subject: Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

Fidgit wrote:
another thing which makes me wonder is:

as aditionnal processor, they use "Pentium 4 2 Ghz". how long will these be available in the future?! from todays perspective it's quite an old CPU already and the acxel2 is not even in the stores yet.

will it be even antique and obsolete once the hardware is released? Rolling Eyes
wasn't there any other intel CPU available which is up to date from todays perspective?

it's not that much about the processing power, it's rather about a certain future proof design. it sounds a bit irritating to announce (not even talking about the production yet) the release of hardware with components which are dated at the date of the announcement already.


U will have more luck to find NOS P4 cpu's over 20 years then the dedicated processor made they use in the acxel2

If u worried abouth these things then i strongly advise u to sell all ur digital hardware u have.

in 2030 repairing a moog55 vco will be still no problem,but a virus TI u can throw away
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