Presonus Studio One 2.5 new features exclusive preview

[B-San]

Love Studio One.. about a month a way from the 1 yr anniversary of it becoming my main DAW..

I'm a big-time UAD user as well tho... and have to point out that I still have issues with the Massive Passive causing CPU spiking when loading more than 1 instance per session...

Sometimes the Lexicon 224 will cause this as well..

I even got an additional UAD-2 Quad hoping that I could at least get a couple more instances before the CPU spiking occurs, but to no avail..

The feedback on PreSonus' forums seems to indicate this may be a Windows-only bug.

I guess I'll find out when I start building a new dual-boot Hackintosh / Win 7 system next week..

I managed to hollar at them during Winter-NAMM and they've been aware of the issue so hopefully it gets addressed soon!

[TAFKAT]

New feature snippets look cool.

Now if they could address the inane shortfall of no MIDI faders being available in the mixer , then they will be getting closer to giving the more established a nudge.

And before anyone wants to chime in that they are not necessary, explain how you manage multiple multi-timre virtual instruments in regards to volume/pan in a tangible manner , not to mention any external instruments.

It is the lack of this is one "feature" that has me scratching my head how Captain Obvious missed it ?

[Lawrence]

Originally Posted by TAFKAT

And before anyone wants to chime in that they are not necessary ... not to mention any external instruments.

Agree. (...and I'm a full time S1 user so... yeah... no bias here...)

Midi faders in the mixer would be very useful indeed for people who use midi hardware synths in particular. Both S1 and Reaper missed the boat on that a little bit to varying degrees, and both are also (not coincidentally) also relatively weak in the midi hardware synth department in general.

It can be managed from arrange in S1 (I won't get into the methods or details here, that's irrelevant to the point) but it's clearly not as good as it would be having actual midi channels in the console.

This seems (to me) to be kind of a bad pattern in general for a lot of new DAWs, not taking external midi hardware all that seriously. Not sure why. I suppose they all think everyone will mostly be using VI's in the future, dunno.

[oceantracks]

Should be easy enough to route to an AUX and do it there.

I NEVER leave midi as midi, it's always burned to audio.

Sometime when you are asked to go back to a project that is two years old and no longer have the instrument because of whatever reason (happened to me with Stylus years back, was no longer compatible with Intel Machines for almost a year).....you will thank yourself.

TH

[Lawrence]

Yeah, there are other situations though.

Sometimes you might want to remotely mix a track with CC's, fully inside a keyboard workstation that you'll use for backing tracks in a live performance or something. There are potential situations like that where nothing ever gets printed to audio and none of the audio from the external synth even passes through the DAW.

I used to produce entire tracks totally inside my Proteus sound module that way, mixing it all with CC's from the DAW and never printing anything but a stereo mix of it's outputs. That kind of thing isn't all that easy in Studio One. With a bigger keyboard workstation you might just save the midi file and import it into the workstation so you can play the track from there directly standalone. The only reason for doing it in the computer sequencer in that case is because it's easier than doing it all on the workstation front panel... since most of them have their own sequencers.

In those cases, it's acting like a pure midi sequencer, like from 1990, so having faders and pans for midi CC's and sends for CC 91 & 92, helps a lot. It feels just like audio mixing.

So... it's somewhat valid in those cases ... the gripe. Granted, the new generation probably isn't doing much of that kinda thing.

Thanks.

[TAFKAT]

Originally Posted by Lawrence

Agree. (...and I'm a full time S1 user so... yeah... no bias here...)

Midi faders in the mixer would be very useful indeed for people who use midi hardware synths in particular. Both S1 and Reaper missed the boat on that a little bit to varying degrees, and both are also (not coincidentally) also relatively weak in the midi hardware synth department in general.

Hey Lawrence,

Its not only external MIDI tho, perfect example are multi part/timbre capable virtual instruments as I noted, which are the staple of any composer. I was oblivious to the issue until I ported one of DAWbench VI benchmark sessions across , 6 x instances of Kontakt with 16 parts in each , total of 96 individual MIDI tracks of data that required volume/pan . In any other DAW ( including Reaper ) there is a dedicated fader/control per MIDI track that interacts directly to the respective part in the assigned VI, as it should. In S1 the only option is to set those in the individual part of the VI. If I am not mistaken Presonus even boast about the lack of MIDI faders in the manual as if its a feature. They obviously did not take multipart VI capability into consideration.

It can be managed from arrange in S1 (I won't get into the methods or details here, that's irrelevant to the point) but it's clearly not as good as it would be having actual midi channels in the console.

I have read a few so called work arounds , absolute workflow killers IMO.

This seems (to me) to be kind of a bad pattern in general for a lot of new DAWs, not taking external midi hardware all that seriously. Not sure why. I suppose they all think everyone will mostly be using VI's in the future, dunno.

External MIDI is certainly less of a consideration and its getting harder for us dinosaur types who still love and use their older hardware. Name one DAW that offers a simple librarian for patches anymore, doesn't even have to be an editor, just simple librarian like what Cubase had in VST ( Studio Module ).

I Digress,

I can understand the focus away from external quite easily tho, the target demographic would be 98% virtual now , and thats cool, still doesn't explain the lack of MIDI faders in S1.

Originally Posted by oceantracks

I NEVER leave midi as midi, it's always burned to audio.

With external hardware synths, sure I agree to a point if the unit is not a permanent fixture, but not VI's.

I can just see orchestral composers using huge VSL/Kontakt templates for mockups, sometimes number in the 100's of tracks/instruments , rendering all their tracks to audio.., it aint going to happen.. :-)

[apoclypse]

Originally Posted by TAFKAT

Hey Lawrence,

Its not only external MIDI tho, perfect example are multi part/timbre capable virtual instruments as I noted, which are the staple of any composer. I was oblivious to the issue until I ported one of DAWbench VI benchmark sessions across , 6 x instances of Kontakt with 16 parts in each , total of 96 individual MIDI tracks of data that required volume/pan . In any other DAW ( including Reaper ) there is a dedicated fader/control per MIDI track that interacts directly to the respective part in the assigned VI, as it should. In S1 the only option is to set those in the individual part of the VI. If I am not mistaken Presonus even boast about the lack of MIDI faders in the manual as if its a feature. They obviously did not take multipart VI capability into consideration.



I have read a few so called work arounds , absolute workflow killers IMO.



External MIDI is certainly less of a consideration and its getting harder for us dinosaur types who still love and use their older hardware. Name one DAW that offers a simple librarian for patches anymore, doesn't even have to be an editor, just simple librarian like what Cubase had in VST ( Studio Module ).

I Digress,

I can understand the focus away from external quite easily tho, the target demographic would be 98% virtual now , and thats cool, still doesn't explain the lack of MIDI faders in S1.



With external hardware synths, sure I agree to a point if the unit is not a permanent fixture, but not VI's.

I can just see orchestral composers using huge VSL/Kontakt templates for mockups, sometimes number in the 100's of tracks/instruments , rendering all their tracks to audio.., it aint going to happen.. :-)

Maybe i don't understand what you mean but wouldn't you assign each instrument inside of Kontakt to their own outs? In S1 those outs are definitely easy to use and manipulate.

[Lawrence]

Yeah, there's actually two things going on there in the architecture for midi.

1. Internally they don't use "midi" but another higher resolution protocol or something or other. That's my understanding anyway. It translates to/from midi messages obviously, but the manual reference ... "Look Ma! No Midi!" ... was a reference to that I think, not really the midi fader thing.. I'm not clear on what that all entails, but that's the general idea. A lot of people were apparently confused by that reference. Some read it and thought S1 didn't have midi at all.

2. Studio One's midi clips (in a song) contain no midi channel information by themselves, afaict. I mean, every part for a multitimbral synth has to be on it's own track in arrange anyway. Being that they are that way, you can have horizontal sliders on the arrange panels for cc midi volume, pan, etc.

Anyway, it's clearly not as good (imo) as midi channels in the mixer for CC's.

P. S. You also can mix midi CCs directly using an S1 external device panel with 16 channel faders, pans, and fx knobs. I built one for a user last week or so.

But yeah, not the best case.

Hey, I love using S1 but I'm fully aware of (and don't excuse) it's relative shortcomings. External hardware midi sequencing is one of it's biggest shortcomings.

VI's are not really an issue though since the individual audio channels from the instrument are usually in the mixer anyway and you can directly link any arrange midi track to any audio mixer channel in the inspector.

[TAFKAT]

Originally Posted by apoclypse

Maybe i don't understand what you mean but wouldn't you assign each instrument inside of Kontakt to their own outs? In S1 those outs are definitely easy to use and manipulate.

Originally Posted by Lawrence

VI's are not really an issue though since the individual audio channels from the instrument are usually in the mixer anyway and you can directly link any arrange midi track to any audio mixer channel in the inspector.

It has nothing to do with assignable audio outs.

Lets take Kontakt 4 for example , the VST2 version will allow 4 x 16 part multi operation, total 64 individual instrument instances per single VI , in every other DAW each part is controllable via a fadar/pan facility in the Mixer. K4 has max 16 output configuration , 5 x stereo , 6 x mono - that will not cover the 64 instruments let alone even 16 stereo instruments that I used in each instance in my test session.

Studio One's midi clips contain no midi channel information to speak of. I mean, every part for a multitimbral synth has to be on it's own track anyway. Being that they are, you can have horizontal sliders on the arrange panels for cc midi volume, pan, etc.

If they are available there , then there is absolutely no reason why they cannot be included in the Mixer Console IMO.

Anyway, it's clearly not as good (imo) as midi channels in the mixer for CC's.

You also can mix midi CCs directly using an S1 external device panel with 16 channel faders, pans, and fx knobs.

I have seen that work around explained, its an unnecessary extra step that should not be required on a modern professional DAW application.. IMO.

P.S - just remembered I missed mentioning solo/mute as a few little handy options when you are in front of a mixer console.. :-)

[MarkyGoldstein]

I hope to see more hybrid processing, stemming, mixing, mastering features, and more inter-project/song management features too.

It's a great DAW! and I hope it will go beyond tape machine style with 3.0

[ACIM]

My hopes are on a solution that ends the "VST space bar stealing" problem.

[hello people]

People seem not to like the S1v2 colour scheme...what's up with that?

I think it's great

[dotcom12161984]

eucon support PLEASE!!! that is all.

[jdizzy]

This update looks great. In the future I would love to see better midi support (external sync, ability to easily set the midi channel per track).

[nIGhT-SoN]

Maybe if the arrange page would be white would be better in rest it's awesome. About the new features, I love them. I like the fact that you can record the output of a bus channel. I hope to see some performance improvements. any idea when will it be released?

Sent from the moon.

[NAO]

the color-scheme is ok for me.
this update could be really awasome.

[lukasbrooklyn]

i'm a cubendo user but very curious as S1 is recieving praise all-round! my current workflow is very fast and heavily dependent on macros in cubase, so i'm wondering if S1

--allows macro programming;
--has something akin to the logical editor in cubendo and
--how well mapping to MIDI controllers is implemented (can you have one physical knob mapped to multiple vst/daw parameters at once, controlling them in varying / inverted ranges)?

thank you!

[Lawrence]

Originally Posted by lukasbrooklyn

--allows macro programming

Yes, it has macros.

S1's macro toobar system is fundamentally a better design than Cubase's as relates to how it works, how accessible it is, and what it's functionally capable of within the scope of the application's actions.

Cubase's macro system is arguably a good bit more powerful in some ways due the functions that are available to it re: it's logical editor, which is (as you know) a very powerful editor.

So basically, the S1 macro system is (imo) a much more clever and useful and user friendly design in many ways, standard actions have arguments, macros flow through file renders, etc, but the Cubase macro system has direct access to it's much more powerful logical editor functions.

Given the above, I'd call it a general "wash" overall, subject to individual needs or preferences. They're both better at some things than the other.

Hope that helps.

[stanjones]

Originally Posted by cwig

Presonus Studio One 2.5 new features exclusive preview - YouTube

Looks like a nice update.

Studio One 2.5 is awesome. We are actually working on developing some new products for compatibility with it. Currently we are compatible with Pro Tools, Logic, and some other DAWs, but Studio One 2.5 is definitely on our list. More and more people are starting to ask us about that, so we figure it's a good move. Feel free to check us out when you get some time at RHODES Premier - Premium Software Instruments & Samples. Not sure of the date when our products will be compatibile with Studio One 2.5, but we are definitely working on it. It's already been cleared with their company and it is in development as we speak.