Massive X is Out!

[Alex Fraser]

oh so we're down to that? We can't expect a non-AVX version because it speculatively would have delayed your AVX version. c'mon... Here's the cold hard business fact. NI ticked off some people, me one of them. They should have made it more clear before selling me K12 with huge big ads all over the place telling me it would include MassiveX due out in a few weeks. Its borderline false advertising. I say "borderline" only because they did include a one liner disclaimer in the middle of a longer document about specs and requirements, which most of us didn't read, but they covered their ass by sneaking that in there. Meanwhile 10x as much big bold marketing about how great MassiveX will be if you upgrade to K12 now.

And ads/warnings like that would have put a thorn in the side of the marketing campaign. There's that cold logic again.

I think we're all clear that you're upset about this. Have you contacted NI directly? What did they say?

 

[Dewdman42]

hmm, no not at all. All they had to do was say something along the lines of "announcing brand new synth utilizing state of the art AVX cpu technology to provide industry busting performance and next gen synth performance, bla bla, bla".

To not inform us reasonably, was a form of false advertising.

I have tried to contact as well as the vendor where I purchased it. No response. By the way, NI has a policy that once you register the serial, no refunds.

 

[Alex Fraser]

hmm, no not at all. All they had to do was say something along the lines of "announcing brand new synth utilizing state of the art AVX cpu technology to provide industry busting performance and next gen synth performance, bla bla, bla". To not inform us reasonably, was a form of false advertising..

Nah, no point in making a big marketing feature of something that the average user knows nothing about. I don't feel they false advertised at all. I fear we'll go around in circles on this and annoy everyone else in the thread, so let's agree to disagree.

Let us know if you hear from NI. Would be interesting to see if they have a position on it.

 

[Dewdman42]

They have supposedly recently published a letter about their position on it, presumably after they heard a lot of complaints. I don't know how to find it, but I've seen it quoted. They basically say they did a market analysis in 2016 and determined that only 10% of their users are running without AVX and that basically MassiveX needs the extra power because of per-note features that it has, and that everyone should have read the specs before purchasing. In other words, too bad for you if you're in the "10%". I do not expect a personal response from them. They don't care.

 

[Zero&One]

It's here... after reading the official response at the beginning, read the first post of page 3...

https://support.native-instruments....-compatible-processors-en-us-?page=1#comments

 

[gsilbers]

after seeing several of the massive x vieos in action. i still cannot see or hear the whole point w AVX. nothing is standing out as wow i really need that avx, i wish i had avx or actively look into it as a way to get a better sound/performance. its pretty much a cool reaktor ensemble. sound wise all the other wavetables synth and u-he stuff, which is famous for intense cpu algo's and great sound, is up to par with this new massive x release.
after reading NI response is still the same for me. if processing power was an issue, mac pros could still do it... or we could freeze tracks. and modern computers still could do it. or we can upgrade computer. that way WE decide. AVX is and was never a common thing for most musicians and producers. being fuked forced upgrade by apple is one thing.. but by NI its just not.
they say 90% of users data...ii doubt its such a nice round number on their argument favor. but who knows.
but if so many poeple are complaining then it was either the marketing not saying what AVX means and that its a HARD requirment or they are grossly misrepresenting how much cpu intensive and power the synth is.

 

[Dewdman42]

I believe it probably does run better on AVX. They are trying to do some things with different DSP on different polyphonic notes...maybe eventually we will see how cool that feature is and why a non-AVX computer wouldn't be able to handle it. Maybe. AVX basically just allows more efficient math to happen. But that effect a lot of things indirectly too. I'm quite sure its noticeably more efficient or else NI wouldn't have taken a chance on ticking off at least 10% of their customers. For the most part they shouldn't have to code anything differently, just compile it a certain way to take advantage of AVX.

I would have expected that kind of requirement for some kind of intense physically modeled thing, or something like that. But aside from a few little neato features in MassiveX, I don't see that its doing anything so remarkable either that AVX would need to be a hard requirement. But maybe it is. If so, then on my next machine I will look forward to being able to use it.

I'm much more annoyed with the way NI handled the sales and marketing of K12 with MassiveX. I don't mind if AVX users get something that I can't run, I don't even care really if it could work reasonably well enough on non-AVX so that maybe non-AVX users would probably not be able or interested in using that polyphonic DSP feature, but probably many other interesting things about it would have been a welcome update from the long overdue for update, Massive. But still I don't really care if they wanted to make it AVX only and skip 10% of their users out of it...fine. I have lots of great synths, I can live without MassiveX until a few years down the road. For me the simple truth is that they did not make it clear, I justified my K12 upgrade a lot by the existence of a Massive update, and was blind sided by the AVX requirement.

Without MassiveX, K12 was not a good value proposition for 10% of their users. If they informed us properly, maybe they would have lost 10% of K12 sales. (shrug). Or they could have added something more to make it worth it, but they didn't really, MassiveX was a major factor in the K12 valuation and their own sales and marketing efforts really focused on that too...while making the least amount of effort to let users know about the AVX requirement for that exciting new feature....

 

[Jaap]

I updated mainly for Massive X and did not see any special requirements when upgrading when they announced K12. For me it turned out ok, but really would not have liked it if it turned out that my computer would not have been working. This requirement should have been placed in bold letters in the requirements when K12 went live and Massive X was announced.

In regards to Massive X, really loving it so far despite some odd decisions with no numeric values at lfo's and other knobs, static images with the envelopes (or don't use images at all or make them dynamic). But soundwise I really enjoying it and you can make some really crazy and deep stuff with it!

 

[topaz]

Come on guys, trump is progress as is brexit and tax havens. get with the new program

 

[EvilDragon]

its pretty much a cool reaktor ensemble.

Except it's not.

AVX is and was never a common thing for most musicians and producers.

Completely incorrect supposition. or do you have an exact number of non-AVX computers sold to musicians and producers since MP 5,1 started selling? Of course you don't. But here's an educated guess: AVX CPUs showed up in 2011, and they are actually a lot more prominent pretty much everywhere, whereas 5,1s just aren't. Musicians aren't hauling 5,1s on the stage, they're hauling their MBPs or whatever - and MBPs as early as March 2011 had perfectly capable AVX CPUs.

Don't forget that there are studios out there that don't rely on Mac at all, they'd be having perfectly capable AVX CPUs for quite some time now. Or they upgraded eventually to the trashcan, or they have multiple machines they accumulate through time. AVX is everywhere by now.

they say 90% of users data...ii doubt its such a nice round number on their argument favor. but who knows.

You don't know, NI knows, they have the data, you don't.

but if so many poeple are complaining

Define "many". I see only a few voices on a few forums.

For the most part they shouldn't have to code anything differently, just compile it a certain way to take advantage of AVX.

Unless it's hand-written AVX code. Which is quite likely that it is, knowing how Mike Daliot and Max Zagler usually go about things.

This requirement should have been placed in bold letters in the requirements when K12 went live and Massive X was announced.

And it was mentioned, on Specifications page of K12 bundle. All the way back in Nov 2018. Well, the whole line was not in bold, so I give you that.

despite some odd decisions with no numeric values

This is staying exactly in line with original Massive which also didn't have numeric value displays for knobs etc.

 

[Dewdman42]

Unless it's hand-written AVX code. Which is quite likely that it is, knowing how Mike Daliot and Max Zagler usually go about things.

I would not expect that to be the case honestly from what I have read about AVX. its not adding features its only making math more efficient. If they did hand code a few DSP sections in order to make sure the math his happening better then they think the compiler can do it...alright...not an impossibility, but its not going to be such a big difference in code that a non-AVX version couldn't have been provided too, as many other plugin developers have done. Regardless, we are speculating.

Listen, I agree with you, if the non-AVX version really does run so much like a dog that there is no point in running it that way...then fine! But we have no evidence of that fact, only speculation. My real gripe is that they took my money without sufficiently letting us know about this requirement. I heard you the 12th time already that it was in the middle of the specifications text page. Now hear us for the 12th time, almost nobody read it and we had (until now) a perfectly reasonable expectation that NI stuff would run on our hardware. Its completely obvious that they kept that requirement as quiet as possible, with the exception of the one disclaimer you keep parroting, in order to get as many people to follow through with K12 purchase as possible, including 10% of their users that they already knew would not be able to run MassiveX.

 

[EvilDragon]

Well, I don't know about you, but checking out system requirements of any software before purchase should be second nature to anyone dealing with computers, in any branch of computer-related jobs.

For reference, and at least to my knowledge, system requirements of a promoted product were never a part of any promotional e-mails from NI. If you have proof that it was otherwise, do correct me. But otherwise, you always had to see the Specifications page of the product of interest to get the system requirements info. Buying things with "reasonable expectation" that it would work is your fault, not NI's.

I sure hope that in the future, you will spend the extra 30 seconds to check the specs and requirements of whatever you're purchasing...

 

[Dewdman42]

Thanks Dad..

Kind of like when a magician fakes out the audience by making you look this way while he/she quietly changes something else to fake everyone out?

Yes NI bears some responsibility here. I wish people would stop excusing big companies for this kind of abhorrent behavior. Its disgusting to me. NI will not get any more business from me any time soon that is the end result of their slight of hand trick here. Blame me all you want or call me stupid or say its all my fault because I didn't read down through a boring text document that didn't seem necessary based on everything else they put out there and past experience.

...I don't care, they lose my future business.

 

[Dewdman42]

this video cuts to the point about big company abhorrent behavior such as this.. Stop making excuses for it.

 

[Zero&One]

He'll always make excuses for it, and continues to do so. Have to wonder why... if it was such a dumb move by a few moaning forum users would he care?

"We started working on Massive back in 2016... We found that AVX allowed us to increase performance" 2016

So how about in 2016 release an email (to your "users" you profiled using data tracking!) stating Massive X (or a future plugin) is in development.
"Unless you have an AVX compatible CPU Massive X WILL NOT RUN. Please see forum for details of how to check your system"
Or release that in 2017
Or most of 2018.

Nah, let's post it on a forum in Novemeber 2018, then slip it onto the requirements. Be alright.

Well, I don't know about you, but checking out system requirements of any software before purchase should be second nature to anyone dealing with computers, in any branch of computer-related jobs

Especially when every other plugin they have released to date works with your system, on almost every machine on the planet. Yeah, I'll certainly be more wary of NI future releases you can be be sure of that!


I'm sorry, but they knew exactly what they were doing and it's not pretty. Any other Dev would be getting slaughtered for this. VSL still get hung for using a dongle ffs.

 

[EvilDragon]

Nah, let's post it on a forum in Novemeber 2018, then slip it onto the requirements.

It was the other way around. The requirements were put on the website first. The forum post is just the proof that they did so back then.

NI doesn't do "a new plugin is in development" type of thing, if you've noticed by now. They just don't do that. So not sure why an e-mail was in order as back as 2016, that's another faulty supposition.

Any other Dev would be getting slaughtered for this. VSL still get hung for using a dongle ffs.

Yeh, on forums, in real world, sales are being done and people are actually using all this stuff.

 

[Zero&One]

NI doesn't do "a new plugin is in development" type of thing, if you've noticed by now. They just don't do that. So not sure why an e-mail was in order as back as 2016, that's another faulty supposition.

I suggest they start then, especially when the outcome is game breaking. This is not a "It might not run well" situation. It won't even install.

They sat on this since 2016. Zero excuse, end of.

 

[EvilDragon]

Yeah don't expect that to happen, they aren't about to change how they announce products just because of a handful of forum voices (and if you ran a company of 600 employees, would you? Of course you wouldn't). Just read the system requirements when a new product happens, k?

 

[Zero&One]

Yeah don't expect that to happen, they aren't about to change how they announce products just because of a handful of forum voices (and if you ran a company of 600 employees, would you? Of course you wouldn't). Just read the system requirements when a new product happens, k?

But they have time to send emails with beach balls and surf boards?
Oh, and watch this video of a man using Maschine on a mountain.
And a Trutorials on my Jogwheels I don't even own.

But communication with users on a product that won't work. Nah... we have too many employees!
How does employees even factor into sending one email lol?

2016 k'

 

[brenneisen]

NI will not get any more business from me

lol, good luck with your libraries