Mac Pro running logic 8 on leopard. PLAY makes logic crash every 2 minutes.
Anyone got any ideas?

Rubbish bin?

You can't sell it so unless you want to wait for them to get it right I see no other option.

I don't usually like going around knocking other people's work and when I don't have anything good to say I'd usually rather say nothing, but EW play is complete rubbish, and their forum sucks. I can not think of a single good thing about it. I got voices of passion as a free product in one of their proportions and I it was nothing but problems. High CPU usage, drop outs all the time,problems exported Cubase mixdown, the interface is terrible, they managed to take as much screen real estate as possible while still keeping everything very hard to read.

I can not think of a single good thing about it, which is a shame since their libraries are very good. I have a lot of their Kontakt stuff and not even if they pay me I'll downgrade them to play!

I sooooooo agree.....
I bought th EW ultimate Pianos and have tried for 4 months to get it working in LOgic 7 on my G5....... its rubbish and the support is rubbish
Drops out all the time,,,, have got all the latest versions.
....a wast of £250........will never buy from them again....
ROB

Quote Paul Farrer:

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Mac Pro running logic 8 on leopard. PLAY makes logic crash every 2 minutes.
Anyone got any ideas?

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PLAY IMO is the buggiest, most unstable sample playback engine I have ever had the misfortune to buy and try to use. Which PLAY libraries are you trying run Paul - SD2 perchance or worse still, Pianos?

Myself and a few colleagues have been having an extended public argument on a forum with the CEO of EWQL for the last 9 months about SD2, MOR and VOP. They all exhibit the same instability issues caused by a fundamental flaw with the PLAY engine.

The reality is that EWQL refuses to accept that PLAY has any flaws, bugs or is in any way unreliable, and asserts instead that we who are having problems are either, 1. imagining them, 2. don't know how to use a modern computer (I kid you not) or 3. that the specs of our computers are not up to snuff since SD2 uses eleventy gazillion samples per note. Their usual response to any criticism is to cite how many awards they have won for their samples, or which film composer has used their samples in the latest Hollywood blockbuster (again, I kid you not).

There's abosolutely no use whatever going through their customer support channels (that should be Victim Support BTW) and any mention of bugs on their own forums will get you banned.

I'll spare you any more gory details, but I'd bet you're having the same issues as we are (which of course don't exist or are as rare as rocking horse pooh).

Cheers

'ello Paul, good to see you pop your head up above the parapet again.

As above, Play is really rather buggy to say the least. Plenty of things you can try though. Do you still have my number? I'll be up on the hills later in the week so can swing by and help you swear at it if you like?

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Ars longa, vita brevis, occasio praeceps, experimentum periculosum, iudicium difficile.

The only libraries I am running in Play are VOP and Storm Drum 2. Both of which crash ALL THE TIME, so much so I always bounce down anything I do in PLAY and remove it asap.
I updated to the latest version of Play yesterday and it has made it worse, which I didn't think was even possible. I would love to upgrade my Symphonic Orchestra libraries but they only sell them for Play now. What a ridiculous state of affairs. I love the libraries but why should the front end be SO bad? Can't we get Apple to make EXS24 a bit more open to other libraries? *crosses fingers* *prays to Steve Jobs shrine*

Love the sounds, hate the bloated buggy interface. Don't even attempt to run SD2 anymore and only occasionally give VOP a whirl.

On a related note, I got two of the funniest / most infuriating emails a couple of weeks ago from an online retailer in the US that I've dealt with in the past. This is his general mail out (2 parts) - read and weep......


Dear Friends,

I'm writing to speak directly to posts I'm seeing in various forums telling customers to think twice before they buy any EastWest PLAY library. This is not true.

All the EastWest PLAY libraries have been designed for 64bit PC and Mac systems with at least 8GB RAM.

On the PC, this means running under Vista or XP64. You need a motherboard that can handle a minimum 8GB RAM, or one that can hadle 16GB RAM but with 8GB installed. On the Mac, you need 8-16GB RAM. On the PC, the sequencing programs operating at 64bit are the newest version of Sonar and Nuendo. Cubase 4BETA is operating at 64bit. If you mix 32bit applications with 64bit applications the system will drop down to a 32bit level of operation. Because each company uses a different scheme for streaming samples off the hard drive, you need to assign one drive per companny. For example, if you have a lot of libraries with K2 players, then apply one drive to Kontakt only.

On the Mac, both Logic and DP6 are 32 bit, while the Mac itself is 64bit. With Digital Performer, PLAY will operate in multitimbral mode, with Logic, one instance per articulation (like the EXS24). On the new Mac Pros, you can get upto 32 instances using Logic.

Some users are experiencing issues because they're not installing their free PLAY updates. Once these updates are installed, PLAY is working fine on many systems.

As a reminder, the Buy 1 Get 1 Free sale ends November 30th.
http://www.truespec.com/play-1get-free-c-134.html

Blessings from,

Peter & Caroline Alexander
Alexander University, Inc.
www.truespec.com



and then, in case it wasn't clear enough,


Dear Friends,

One additional point. You can still use PLAY very effectively on Pentium 4 Systems, G5 systems, etc. You just get fewer instances.

Peter Alexander



Do you get the feeling EW are a little bit sensitive about their white elephant?

Well mine's an 8 core mac pro with 16GB of ram and I can't get two of the bastards running without the spinning beach-ball of death popping up every 2 minutes.

Edited by Paul Farrer (03/12/08 07:03 PM)

Don't get me started on that email... so many factual inaccuracies it's untrue...

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Ars longa, vita brevis, occasio praeceps, experimentum periculosum, iudicium difficile.

Quote Paul Farrer:

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I would love to upgrade my Symphonic Orchestra libraries but they only sell them for Play now.

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Man, oh man, I'm in exactly the same boat and am constantly looking out for anyone who might be selling the NI Kompakt version of Platinum, which I foolishly failed to upgrade to before they took it off the market forever

I have been using MOR, Gypsy and Fab Four - I also got VOP free in one of their promotions but haven't installed it. Like everyone else, I love the sounds but they are so glitchy - I can usually manage one or two instruments at a time on my G5. I just use the violin in Gypsy, rock chugs and a lead guitar in MOR, that's about it. Try to use a bass or a drumkit at the same time and it's all over. With that kind of performance how are we supposed to trust it to run full orchestras?!

I hate the interface as well - why have that massive knob in the middle which is basically a distended metering section, massive knobs for totally secondary functions like ADT, and yet have not enough space to list all the articulations without scrolling? And within the articualtion list the individual volume controls are ridiculous

Basically I'm not surprised they giving them away in two-for-one deals even though the sounds are great. They say cryptic things like "works better on Intel Macs" and "we have a duty to produce products that utilize the power of the latest computers" - sure they can do that but they're leaving a sizeable chunk of the market out in the cold.

And if I had a Mac Pro with 16GB of RAM and it still didn't work, I'd be even more annoyed about, so you have my total sympathy

Ben

Funny.... I was slapped down by their support, and some other users for not running on a Mac.... as apparently it runs perfectly on Macs...... ROFL.

Apart from a couple of forum users elsewhere who claim to have had no issue whatsoever, I don't know of a single pro, let alone hobbyist who has anything but issues with Play.

A great shame - yet again EWQL have come out with some nice samples, yet in their haste to get away from Native Instruments have successfully and comprehensively shot themselves in the foot.

Begs the question how the collosal VSL library suddenly popped up with their own player way ahead of schedule then their host and now plugin suite, and it all just works, yet Play after 18 months on the market is still un-Play-able.

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Ars longa, vita brevis, occasio praeceps, experimentum periculosum, iudicium difficile.

What I do find a bit puzzling is why the SOS reviews of PLAY - I think they're done by Dave Stewart though don't quote me on that - fail to mention any of these infuriating issues which seemingly afflict all PLAY libraries for both PC and Mac users.

It's all the more curious since I remember thinking that the same reviewer slated the VSL player for being buggy when virtually no one on the planet had had any problems with it at all.

WITCH HUNT!!!!!


burn,burn,burn,burn,burn,burn,burn,burn,burn,burn,burn,burn,burn,burn,burn,burn,burn,bur n,burn,burn,burn,burn,burn,burn,burn,burn,burn,burn,burn,burn,burn,burn,burn,burn,burn,bur n,burn,burn,burn,burn,burn,burn,burn,burn,burn,

But then have you ever read a review in SOS that was anything other than polite, middle of the road and full of bland platitudes? Usually knowledegably written, but anything approaching unequivocal criticism is unheard of.

errr, I can cite several examples of a real slating in the pages of SOS.

assorted monitors , a roland digital mixer, one or two mics, and various softwares, and some oddball processors, have had their sales careers abruptly slashed by a poor SOS review....


i recall one beuaty by Hugh...

" I cannot think of a single reason to recommend these monitors."

or words very close to that....


my advice, keep an old PPC machine to hand, and use the old NI based versions.....

Play is horrible. I run it on a PC Q9450, xp with 4gb Ram, initially I had Goliath, it's a total pain. From day one it has always hung on the last moment of install, the point where it's all actually installed but the routine won't close. Irritating. Tech support said uninstall, clean register etc, this trick has worked once, but it still always wants to update although I have the latest version. It loses the reverbs for no reason, says I need to update, although I **have** the latest version . I added SD2, what a pain to get my PC to work around the glitchy install.
Love the sounds, but it's glitchy as a clicky thing in a box marked "clicks". Experimenting with different settings helps slightly, to the point where it clicks/pops when first loaded, then settles down, no idea why. I'm no novice, I am happy to tweak and everything else I seem get running like a dream, but this one just doesn't add up, whatever PC tweaks I make. The other day I had 6 instances running at once (a new record, that) including 4 droney sounds (usually very click prone) succesfully, showing CPU 10%, but the whole time I felt like it could all collapse at any moment...
Not to be trusted, which is a shame 'cos the sounds are great.

Quote Herewego:

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Play is horrible. I run it on a PC Q9450, xp with 4gb Ram, initially I had Goliath, it's a total pain. From day one it has always hung on the last moment of install, the point where it's all actually installed but the routine won't close.

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That's the problem I had, and it was solved by disabling all network connections. One of the moderators in the forum actually suggested this and it worked. He did it privately though, and of course they deleted my thread were I posted this, so I could never post a solution there for other people to see.

Quote Nuno_:

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Quote Herewego:

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Play is horrible. I run it on a PC Q9450, xp with 4gb Ram, initially I had Goliath, it's a total pain. From day one it has always hung on the last moment of install, the point where it's all actually installed but the routine won't close.

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That's the problem I had, and it was solved by disabling all network connections. One of the moderators in the forum actually suggested this and it worked. He did it privately though, and of course they deleted my thread were I posted this, so I could never post a solution there for other people to see.

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Ah so there's a fix that will break things? So when their much vaunted and still not appeared "network" functionality appears it won't work because everyone will have disconnected their networks? What about those of us who use VSL's Vienna Ensemble for very nice, shiny and happy audio and MIDI over LAN? Or people like me who then use a second network connection for Euphonix EuCon?

Dear oh dear...

Shall I mention the "support" chap on the forum who told me I should only try and run Play on a 32-bit system with "minimum least 4Gb free RAM".... he didn't like it one bit when I pointed out this was a physical impossibility!?

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Ars longa, vita brevis, occasio praeceps, experimentum periculosum, iudicium difficile.

Hey Nuno thanks for the tip, duly noted

Quote Nuno_:

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of course they deleted my thread were I posted this, so I could never post a solution there for other people to see.

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Here's one for the search engines...

Goliath Play install hang problem installation fail

Play won't install

Quote idris y draig:

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errr, I can cite several examples of a real slating in the pages of SOS.

assorted monitors , a roland digital mixer, one or two mics, and various softwares, and some oddball processors, have had their sales careers abruptly slashed by a poor SOS review....


i recall one beuaty by Hugh...

" I cannot think of a single reason to recommend these monitors."

or words very close to that....

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Can you calm my doubting heart and post some links to any reviews that become real slatings - I really want to believe it's true, but a little voice in the back of my head keeps saying it can't possibly be

Quote Herewego:

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Here's one for the search engines...

Goliath Play install hang problem installation fail

Play won't install

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Sorry, didn't quite catch that Herewego - did you say

East West PLAY won't install?

.....or was it maybe.....

East West PLAY Quantum Leap won't install.

No, I think what you actually said afterall was

East West PLAY won't install.

Quote redleicester:

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Ah so there's a fix that will break things? So when their much vaunted and still not appeared "network" functionality appears it won't work because everyone will have disconnected their networks?

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Actually, it's only during installation that this needs to be done, if you do have this problem, which I don't think everyone has.

The whole company is in denial because that is the premise on which it is founded. They'd rather call you a liar than admit they made a mistake. I had an unpleasant experience with them a couple of years ago, so I'm not surprised at what's happening with Play. It comes from the top...

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madtheory creations
Synths and pianos for Kontakt

Edited by Tomás Mulcahy (04/12/08 11:14 AM)

Usually, I'm the first to bash a company for selling shoddy products, but I haven't had a single problem with Play/SD2, on both my MBP and Mac Pro-8. Why's that? Am I just lucky? Somehow, I find that hard to believe. I think it more likely that PLAY is particularly sensitive to the presence of incompatible 3rd party apps - at least on the Mac, dunno about PCs. Personally, I use tons of commercial apps, shareware an freeware. No probs whatsoever (touch wood).

(PS: Hi reid, here we go again! )

To say that Play is unstable would be the understatement of the century! It completely destroyed my G5. Even uninstalling SD2 did nothing. A complete clean install was required to get things up and running. What we, my Technician and I (thanks Dan), couldn't understand was, it essentially is only playing back MIDI loops and yet caused absolute havoc. It also shut down access to any other software on my computer!
My advice to anyone contemplating buying a Play driven plug in is don't do it and to East West I would say, go away and start again...
As someone has already pointed out I have bought SD2 and therefore the license, so cannot sell it. It will sit on my shelf until one day maybe someone will finally fix it

+1

Yep - same problems

Glitchy Playback
Crappy Interface – what really annoys me is the volume sliders - rubbish.
More than 2 instances – forget it.

I got the platinum orchestra for play and barely use it. I just stick with the Gold version in Kontakt (absolutely solid) and use the other samples as and when is necessary in Play - but essentially I try and avoid it.

Their support is awful: I had problems registering MOR and they responded after a week via email requesting I resubmit my query! Good job I managed to sort it myself because it was like talking to the cat.

The sounds are blooming fantastic – especially those basses in MOR!! Just a shame about PLAY

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Support your right to arm bears!

I posted once on their forums a few years back asking if a licence transfer was possible (since I thought I would not want my copy of Silver after all since I wanted Gold). Got deleted immediately. The place is run by the bleedin' Gestapo. I really hate that muzzling of criticism and free speech by Doug Rogers and the moderators (and my post was not even critical, it was just a question!).

These guys are "head in sand" all day, and the mystery for me is why SOS continues to feature their products (and in this/last month's issue, them) without mentioning that many people have huge problems with their products. I bought Gold on Kontakt and that is great - bought the Play upgrade and am glad I have never installed it.

All in all, their arrogance is breathtaking.

So, SOS, what's the answer?

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www.youtube.com/leonardngmusic

Well this week I have screaming deadlines with Gladiators, Dancing on Ice a Playstation 3 game and The Krypton Factor, so its the perfect time for it all to be acting like a Atari 520ST with a faulty diskdrive
:-(
I feel a 'Notes From The Deadline' rant coming....

Edited by Paul Farrer (04/12/08 05:06 PM)

Quote Paul Farrer:

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Well this week I have screaming deadlines with Gladiators, Dancing on Ice a Playstation 3 game and The Krypton Factor, so its the perfect time for it all to be acting like a Atari 520ST with a faulty diskdrive
:-(
I feel a 'Notes From The Deadline' rant coming....

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ooooh the irony. Last month your short article coincided with a major interview with Doug Rogers in SOS... If only...

Paul,

While I'm not sure what the prob is, for the sake of getting you up and running with Sd2, try deselecting "stream from disk" for every sound you have loaded. It's in the file menu I think under "current instrument".

You are then bypassing the disk streaming and hopefully that will help in the short term!

Cheers

Paul

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paul-thomson.com

Quote reid:

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Can you calm my doubting heart and post some links to any reviews that become real slatings - I really want to believe it's true, but a little voice in the back of my head keeps saying it can't possibly be

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http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/dec03/articles/maudiobx5.htm#2

http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/Feb02/articles/maudiosp5b.asp


neither of these gave a glowing report, and both products were basically sales flops as a result... and "updated" or withdrawn sooner than otherwise planned....

there are others , but i actually have work to do rather than spend the time i'd normally be sleeping in, digging out negative reviews for the unbeleiver..

Well, that's me told - I didn't realise Paul and Hugh could be so uncomprimising, so merciless, so, so......insulting!

Seriously though, thanks for pulling those reviews out of the past - neither's quite what you could call a 'slating' , but they're certainly to the point. Back on topic, it does seem bizarre that the Dave Stewart reviews made no reference whatsoever to the widespread difficulties that folks have been having around the world with the PLAY interface.

Dave Stewart is Nick Phoenix. (That can't be his real name, surely? He should be directing S.H.I.E.L.D, not poncing around with sample libraries)

Quote reid:

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Dave Stewart is Nick Phoenix. (That can't be his real name, surely? He should be directing S.H.I.E.L.D, not poncing around with sample libraries)

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interesting thread..

as a distributor I am always interested in making sure the products I represent get as good a review as possible and there have been a number of occasions where SoS haven't been the kindest - but it's always in everyone's interests to see honest reviews where possible and you can always read between the lines.

and regarding EW PLAY - I was going to write a few things but after thinking about it, the comments above are plenty..

Steve Parker
Music Technology Manager
Arbiter Group

My QLSO Platinum Complete Upgrade is still gathering dust, waiting to installed. Sounds like I won't be doing this for some time... if ever.

I had no idea Play wasn't recommended (or indeed, not designed) for use with 32bit Win XP systems. Niiice!

I am, sort of, tempted to install it anyway... if simply out of curiousity!

P

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Composer, Producer, Sound Designer
www.universal-sound-design.com

There's a 20 page (and counting) thread on this very issue on the Northern Sounds forum. I cannot see how EW can recover after this fiasco. If their entire business model has now shifted to PLAY, and the majority of people find that PLAY does not work, it's game over for them.

Two things are unforgiveable:

1. Advertising PLAY without warning that it will only work on a full 64 bit system (I can see false advertising lawsuits looming); and

2. Deleting all posts (and banning posters) on their forums which appear to criticise PLAY in general.

Goodbye EW - I'll continue to use (and love) my EWQL Gold on Kontakt, but that's the last time I'm spending money with you.

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www.youtube.com/leonardngmusic

Quote Stephen Parker:

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and regarding EW PLAY - I was going to write a few things but after thinking about it, the comments above are plenty...

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ouch!

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hourglass | random thoughts | doubledotdash!? collective

Quote Len:

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1. Advertising PLAY without warning that it will only work on a full 64 bit system (I can see false advertising lawsuits looming)

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They seem to make a habit of that. The issue I had was with a sale item that was not as advertised, and I was accused of all sorts of things when I pointed this out.

They're also listing past clients of Cello Studio as if they were clients of the current studio.

Seems like a case of megalomania to me...

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madtheory creations
Synths and pianos for Kontakt

Quote Len:

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1. Advertising PLAY without warning that it will only work on a full 64 bit system (I can see false advertising lawsuits looming)

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Mine works (albeit after much hassle - see above) on XP 32 bit. They do say it will on their site.

I think one of my overriding frustrations was that it was buggy on day one, which in this day and age is understandable - after all, rare indeed is the product that just works out of the box on every possible software/hardware combo, so for that they can be forgiven. However, many raised issues with support, or on the EW forum, or on other forums, to which the standard answer was "it's your system" or "it's your hardware", or "it's your problem"...

Yet with successive updates over the last 18 months it has slowly become more stable and potentially even usable for more than 4 minutes without crashing, and will actually play back sounds.... without any changes to hardware or software configurations....

Now I'm not a software designer, but six or more updates over that period (I've long since lost count), and many of the issues which I was assured were entirely my problem and down to me having an "inadequate" system (after all, a Q6700, 4Gb, multiple HDs and so on is just poo), have been resolved, which surely would imply it might just have a teensy-weensy bit to do with the Play plugin, and be nothing to do with my puny DAW?

Extremely frustrating.

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Ars longa, vita brevis, occasio praeceps, experimentum periculosum, iudicium difficile.