Elektron, please stay focused on making awesome stand-alone deep hardware. Bring back the days of the Machinedrum. Physical individual outs will always be better than a USB substitute. If you need to keep the size and manufacturing costs down, how about 8-channel optical ADAT? Resist the urge to virtualise everything!
Yes, you can do a lot with the DAW and fancy graphics on a big screen but that’s not why we buy the hardware.
If we wanted to use plug-ins to make music, we’d use the vast amounts of quality plugs already available, and which sonically destroy every single piece of Elektron gear - IMO.
We’re in a situation now that newer Elektron gear is more unstable than the silver boxes, and the culprit seems to be Overbridge.
Maybe I’m wrong but I’m not a newbie and I know why I invested in Elektron gear. It’s for the hardware and the sequencer. I have 16 analogue inputs to feed into my computer with a couple of decent quality and affordable Firewire audio interfaces. Why would I want to go through USB?
When Overbridge was first announced myself and many other long term Elektron users feared that it could impact the development of the hardware, and I’m sorry to say it does seem that these concerns were justified.
But as Elektron have stated on this forum, Overbridge is here to stay, and it does seem that steps are being taken to improve the development by hiring more staff and so on. I hope that they can pull it off, even though it is doubtful that I will ever use Overbridge myself, unless the standalone version will run on my computer, mainly just for patch management only though, not at all interested in the audio side - that is why I use hardware.
Once they have finished overbridge they’ll then need to constantly update for various os revisions on Mac and pc into the future.
I prefer gear that I can fire up in 10 years time and have the full functionality of the day I bought it. Relying on computers, that is probably not going to happen.
ADAT out is an excellent idea indeed. I would definitely like to see more of that as a solution.
What does this have got to do with OB? OB isn’t your regular plugin which produces sound, it actually makes sense as opposed to just a librarian/editor vst. Individual outs are already there, sure there could be more on some machines, but nobody pushes you to use OB.
I would argue that the culprit is older boxes have had more OS development time.
I would expect new boxes to be less refined.
Also, the new boxes seems to be suffering from hardware QC, more than software, I dont see OB causing that either.
That’s exactly because the silver boxes have been around much longer. Elektron is one of the very few electronic music hardware companies who takes the trouble to keep improving their firmware until most of the issues have been ironed out.
8 physical outputs on the digitakts would be pretty much impossible while keeping it the size it is I recon. OB on the digitakt will be great for recording tracks live into a DAW and being able to mix them properly.
Then there is the backup functionality and librarian…
To me working in a hybrid environment as apposed to fully working in the box, has been great so far and being able to connect elektron hardware in that way will open up a very quick workflow while keeping the benefits of hardware workflow intact.
OVB is fundamental to me. I would have never bought any elektron gear without OVB. I love integrating hardware machines in my DAW projects, and OVB is the only viable way to do that easily.
That’s my reason to pay much more money for a decent hardware device, compared to maybe €150,- for plug-ins. And let’s not talk about 10 years, let’s have it 30 and options for repair!
A lot of great arguments here for different takes on the matter. I for one agree that it would be nice to have multiple physical outs for future gear, but I’m not keen on spending cash for more gear right now
Perhaps since Elektron has already committed themselves to getting Overbridge out there, I wouldn’t mind having partial/incremental integration over time. As many have stated on this forum, functions like a project/sample librarian and 8-track USB interfacing would be top pick. Then later on we can have more UI features for better DAW integration
I always find the argument funny that a physical hardware product with hundreds of breakable parts that will probably need repair, is a smarter and safer long term investment than a virtual instrument
Virtual instruments are no exception. I find myself constantly having to NOT update my OS just to avoid compatibility issues. Still on Yosemite here and I really want to update already but can’t
That has always been the case. Unless really nesecary, don’t update Mac OSX ;). I would always be 2 years behind with updates and that worked well for me.
Of course now I switched to windows and that problem has completely vanished ;). The only thing I miss is Logic with its great standard plugins. Can’t have it all.
I would say: Include USB file transfer, or some SD card into your boxes, then include a record to this media - this way, there would be files of your recording available without timing issues.
If Overbridge should work, please be specific about the needed hardware environment on the user side. USB 2.0 is near to be discontinued, the future is already Thunderbolt. Why develop a technology that is soon to be broken anyways. Intel did bug out the USB driver for sound streaming on USB 3.0 Interfaces. I don’t say its Elektrons fault, that this is now a mess - its also the great cooperations breaking the established standards.
In my opinion Overbridge should have been a standalone software with the followings:
Sample Management and Transfers for relevant products (OS updates too)
Sound editor
Sound pool and KIT management with previews and drag n drop UI
Project management with total recall and automatic backup on ONEDRIVE or DROPBOX
Chain and Song editor addressing several machines (set up which pattern plays on each machine creating a global pattern scene and then chain and arrange into songs these pattern global scenes, this would be very useful for machines using different pattern managements (digitakt paired with analog4, for example)
In other words just a “data logistic tool” to avoid the most tedious stuffs and boost the creativity, no audio, no daw bullshit, just few things on a clever UI/GUI.
A mere plus could be:
a sample recorder: something to easily record a sample from an hardware synth or from a virtual audio IN (could be a VST in a DAW audio out or an iPad Synth App audio out through the lightening cable)
develop the thing in an iPad app format too
I am not sure the upcoming standalone version of overbridge is gonna be like this.
