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Kontakt 5.6.8 - still a concern or issue?

Still have Native Access v1.3.1 on my system.
I had Kontakt v5.5 and v5.6.6 installed and working fine together
I just updated Kontakt to 5.6.8, renamed it to K5.6.8 and then copied again the v5.5 (from the backup folder) as the main K5 dll.
Now I have three Kontakt 5 working at the same time.
Just noticed the standalone K5.6.8 was very slow loading Wave Alchemy Revolution patch (and it also crashed once while trying other libraries), while inside VEPRO standalone (both 32 and 64 bit) loaded it quickly.
Have to check its behaviour inside Cubase and connected VEPRO servers yet.
 
Do we have to manually download and install each update? As far as I can tell, NA doesn't "self update" like Service Centre did, and there's no notification about a new version either.

My copy of Native Access just updated itself automatically. But it updated to 1.3.1 (R56) -- not to 1.4. Why is that?
 
Man, there's been so much conflicting info about this update, I'm scared to mess with my rig and risk the nightmare of some "ancient" libraries not working anymore - especially stuff like EWQLSO Platinum, StormDrum 1 and others of that era that I still use daily. Reading reports of people having to re-download content despite already having it, etc. - what the?!? That's just not a realistic option for some of those...

Is anyone using those old gems with 5.6.8 without issue?
 
NA does do the self-update. Could be v1.4 wasn't pushed yet, then. But it WAS mentioned by NI that it's the current release now, released on Sep 11th:

https://www.native-instruments.com/...tus-native-access-current-version-1-4.313999/


Mine did self-update.

1.4 was released on September 11. My self-update to 1.3.1 happened on September 13 -- more than 24 hours (and possibly more than 48 hours) later.

EDIT -- after writing this, I started Native Access and it auto-updated to 1.4.1, which was released today.
 
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Man, there's been so much conflicting info about this update, I'm scared to mess with my rig and risk the nightmare of some "ancient" libraries not working anymore - especially stuff like EWQLSO Platinum, StormDrum 1 and others of that era that I still use daily. Reading reports of people having to re-download content despite already having it, etc. - what the?!? That's just not a realistic option for some of those...

Is anyone using those old gems with 5.6.8 without issue?
I don't have an answer, but it's like standing on the edge of a large body of ice cold water. You know it's cold, but you don't know it's shark infested and if you'll get eaten alive or not... Realistically, everyone who doesn't want to give up the platform is going to have to dive in eventually and simply go with the flow. It's NI's world and we just live in it...

But looking at this:

yLy5bY.jpg


If there is no truly pressing need, I would wait until they work out the installer archive/change location issues in such a way that they're known to be stable and satisfactory. Though I've decided to jump in, I am definitely waiting until this particular chapter of NI's devolution recedes into the past, and Native Access's performance becomes at least predictable in terms of doing whatever the hell it's supposed to be doing...
 
there is no truly pressing need, I
I think this rule should be taken with all updates, if NI kontakt is working fine, solid why bother, even if the updates ok why waist your time.

In saying that if you are wanting to purchase any thing from NI like that new percussion symphony, then you have a real big problem hahaha.

But jokes aside, a smooth running system is far better.
 
Native Access 1.4.1 + Kontakt 5.6.8 running fine here. Up to date I have 56 libs installed through Native Acces without a problem.
 
Tempted to give it a shot due to some new library purchases, but I'm wondering if it's easy to roll back if things aren't cool? I would think it's just a matter of dragging in the previous Kontakt app, pref files, and the Kontakt AU plugin component from a backup drive? Or does the new Native Access thing screw things up on a deep level that prevents an easy roll back?
 
Yeah. Of course, if you have any DAW projects created with 5.6.8, they will not work after that fact.
Yep, to be expected on that front. But it would be pretty easy to test the standalone version first to make sure everything makes the transition...

Thanks for the reply!
 
... Thus I have a stable machine that just works, frozen in time as it were. Just because a computer can be a communications device that interconnects with the global village doesn't mean it must be. With Native Access, NI ended a longstanding policy to allow people like me to exist in an entirely offline environment, porting over new libraries from a web-connected computer and conducting an offline C/R. The system was simple to use, rock-solidly reliable and hassle free.

For me it's as simple as this:
Would you buy a computer if the machine wouldn't run any anything at all unless you were online? Or one that locked you out of it if you disconnected it from a web connection? :sneaky:

Developers always make the claim that it's to improve user experience. I understand the claim; by anonymously gathering info you can profile what's useful and what isn't, what's popular what isn't etc...

The downside to this, (from my perspective), involves is a previously favorite developer of mine that did the same, made assumptions of what was useful/what wasn't by collecting data. The net result was them removing tons of features that were hugely popular, unique to the product, and ultimately pissing a lot of users off; many of whom either moved on to something else or stuck with the legacy, (which I use some 4 years later..) No matter how good their data collection was, the analytics were wrong because someone wound up having to interpret the data to satisfy a boardroom meeting and the product today is nothing like the one I fell in love with a decade ago...

Even if NI has the capacity to gather tons more info, the reality is that decisions are still made based on pouring over data and making assumptions about the data... (This past year being a good example of what NI's decision making looks like based on said assumptions...)

It's this scenario where it's easy for me to imagine NI looking at their ledgers and seeing Maschine and the 'EDM crowd' being the main drivers of their economy and move toward tailoring Kontakt toward a younger EDM-centric crowd... (This is obviously a completely imaginary scenario... I'm not projecting here, just doing a thought experiment...) That said the past year of NI's decision making has to at least make you ask yourself if some version of this might not make it on the radar somewhere down the line...

Hopefully I eat these words. I'd love nothing more than Kontakt to remain the faithful workhorse it is... But I'm skeptical of the intentions...
 
For me it's as simple as this:
Would you buy a computer if the machine wouldn't run any anything at all unless you were online? Or one that locked you out of it if you disconnected it from a web connection? :sneaky:

Developers always make the claim that it's to improve user experience. I understand the claim; by anonymously gathering info you can profile what's useful and what isn't, what's popular what isn't etc...

The downside to this, (from my perspective), involves is a previously favorite developer of mine that did the same, made assumptions of what was useful/what wasn't by collecting data. The net result was them removing tons of features that were hugely popular, unique to the product, and ultimately pissing a lot of users off; many of whom either moved on to something else or stuck with the legacy, (which I use some 4 years later..) No matter how good their data collection was, the analytics were wrong because someone wound up having to interpret the data to satisfy a boardroom meeting and the product today is nothing like the one I fell in love with a decade ago...

Even if NI has the capacity to gather tons more info, the reality is that decisions are still made based on pouring over data and making assumptions about the data... (This past year being a good example of what NI's decision making looks like based on said assumptions...)

It's this scenario where it's easy for me to imagine NI looking at their ledgers and seeing Maschine and the 'EDM crowd' being the main drivers of their economy and move toward tailoring Kontakt toward a younger EDM-centric crowd... (This is obviously a completely imaginary scenario... I'm not projecting here, just doing a thought experiment...) That said the past year of NI's decision making has to at least make you ask yourself if some version of this might not make it on the radar somewhere down the line...

Hopefully I eat these words. I'd love nothing more than Kontakt to remain the faithful workhorse it is... But I'm skeptical of the intentions...
Nice post. You allude to one of the major epistemological problems, IMHO, of the information age in general: a predisposition to believe that the technological ability to efficiently aggregate massive amounts of quantitative data somehow magically improves one's qualitative interpretive skills, when of course it does nothing of the kind.

I have no idea what NI's long-term intentions are, but - given their callous & cavalier willingness to drop offline activation support as though it were a trivial thing hardly worth mentioning - nothing would surprise me. Follow the money and all of that... If the money is perceived to be in the EDM crowd, it seems naive to suppose they wouldn't move to accommodate that, and if the numbers show that requiring a continuous online connection won't piss enough people off to counterbalance a perceived economic benefit, it wouldn't surprise me if they eventually did that too.

Perhaps it's not dissimilar to Apple deciding that the $$$ was in iOS and deprecating their MacOS products to the point where the only choices are obscenely overpriced glued-down monstrosities for which you're supposed to buy Apple Care so you can use it under warranty for three years until it's time to buy another one...

... I continue to believe that something akin to a "consumer rights" movement is sorely needed in the still emerging area of 21st century software and the EULAs under which commercial products are disseminated.
 
Nice post. You allude to one of the major epistemological problems, IMHO, of the information age in general: a predisposition to believe that the technological ability to efficiently aggregate massive amounts of quantitative data somehow magically improves one's qualitative interpretive skills, when of course it does nothing of the kind.

I have no idea what NI's long-term intentions are, but - given their callous & cavalier willingness to drop offline activation support as though it were a trivial thing hardly worth mentioning - nothing would surprise me. Follow the money and all of that... If the money is perceived to be in the EDM crowd, it seems naive to suppose they wouldn't move to accommodate that, and if the numbers show that requiring a continuous online connection won't piss enough people off to counterbalance a perceived economic benefit, it wouldn't surprise me if they eventually did that too.

Perhaps it's not dissimilar to Apple deciding that the $$$ was in iOS and deprecating their MacOS products to the point where the only choices are obscenely overpriced glued-down monstrosities for which you're supposed to buy Apple Care so you can use it under warranty for three years until it's time to buy another one...

... I continue to believe that something akin to a "consumer rights" movement is sorely needed in the still emerging area of 21st century software and the EULAs under which commercial products are disseminated.

Over a 45 year music career, I cannot remember a single successful class action suit or "consumer movement" that changed the policy of a major developer. I've certainly read a lot of talk, though :)
 
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