My Take on Pro Tools HD 10 so Far - Garbage.

[chonchball]

Pro Tools 10 HD has been nothing but trouble for me. I run a professional studio. It is my full time career. I was excited to upgrade from Pro Tools 7.3 HD using Legacy on a G5 to Pro Tools 10 on an Intel (a powerful Intel at that) I was initially upset to find that Avid basically has duped everyone who ever bought into HD initially from owning an LE system (I was a DIGI 002 user before upgrading to HD with 192s) The main selling point was 0 latency monitoring and delay compensation. That was fine and dandy, and I use the 0 latency input path when tracking ALWAYS. The buffer setting in HD using TDM and Legacy cards has no relation to the input path, and that's perfect when recording. But now, I'm sitting here with a new HD card installed, and this has been confirmed by an Avid rep on the phone, the behavior for input monitoring is not handled on the card in Pro Tools 10 "HD", and therefore you must toggle "Low Latency Monitoring" again... wow that seems strikingly similar to my old LE system! So wait, there must be a trade off here, right? My plugins should work better since everything is Native. Wow, I should have cut myself off before even typing THAT sentence. So what I'm stuck with is a card that doesn't handle plugin processing NOR does it handle the input path, and I'm stuck with a system that is either latent... or MORE latent.

I won't complain too much about how 3rd party plugins are awful at this point, because with any upgrade (*cough cough*) yes I said "upgrade" I expect some growing pains. But WOW... Knotakt 5 is virtually unusable even with multicore turned off, ReWire does not load properly... so goodbye Reason and Melodyne, etc for now. My Steven Slate plugins are either unusable or laggy until they resolve those issues (which I've been told will come later this month finally) Sorry... said i wouldn't complain TOO much.

MIDI editing in Pro Tools 10 is a joke. The Smart Tool has become the Idiot tool. The grabber never knows if it should be a hand, it slices MIDI notes even when its not set to be a slice tool... turning on TCE while using elastic audio back and forth between trimming regions or TCE'ing regions is an AWFUL workflow. Still no short cut for toggling triplets in grid mode. Clip gain is an excellent feature. I'm glad Cubase had that years ago... Nice catching up!

I have a myriad of complaints about the way the software AND hardware function, but I'd like to reiterate that Pro Tools HD, as previously described to those of us who made the switch years ago, is definitely a smoke and mirrors trick and I advise anyone thinking of purchasing it for the first time to go another route. I advise anyone thinking of upgrading from Legacy to stick to where you're at if 0 latency monitoring is a priority. You will be DOWNGRADING completely and your sessions will suffer.

Also, if anyone still really wants to run Pro Tools 10, as a side note, DO NOT upgrade to Mac OSX Lion. It is so bloated that it uses about 2g of RAM just for the op system. Your plugins choke out IMMEDIATELY even if you're buffer is set high and you have 4+ gigs of RAM installed. Unfortunately, OSX 10.6.8 is also quite bloated and it is the lowest system requirement available for 10. In a perfect world, many of the intel based plugins would work on G5s where the op system was not quite as filled with unnecessary bells and whistles for those of us who just want to run our recording software... not integrate our entire lives into our desktop computer.

End rant... Back to the grind.

[amost]

But now, I'm sitting here with a new HD card installed, and this has been confirmed by an Avid rep on the phone, the behavior for input monitoring is not handled on the card in Pro Tools 10 "HD", and therefore you must toggle "Low Latency Monitoring" again...

I didn't know HD had a "Low Latency" option in the menu?

[otobianki74]

perhaps he is referring to HD native (which I am quite enjoying).

[mirrorboy]

I'm on Pro Tools 10 Native (not HD) on a Mac Pro and must say I've had the exact opposite experience.

All the plugs you mentioned (Kontakt, Melodyne, Slate, etc) as well as multi-threading are all working great.

Again, I'm not on HD (but will be upgrading to HD Native next month) so maybe that's where the issue lies?


Strange.


Scott

P.S. By the way, Pro Tools 10 Native (Not HD) does have Low Latency Monitoring as an option....not sure if HD does, though.

[otobianki74]

I believe it does. I'm on an HD native system and believe I've seen it.

correct me if I'm wrong (anybody)...

[amost]

I'm on 10 HD/TDM(the demo) and it doesn't have LLM. 9HD doesn't have it either...at least i haven't found it. And when you switch engines and use either of those without the TDM cards it doesn't have it either...not that it needs it but maybe he does indeed mean Native HD...never tried it.

[drumster]

As someone who is currently using HD Native on a 6 Core Westmere Mac Pro, the majority of these errors are plugin related. The only time you should have to use the LLM path is if you're at the end of a busy mix and need to record a last minute overdub. Presumably, in this case, your buffer would be too high to monitor through the software.

I understand the original poster's frustration as I've been there myself, but since I've determined which plugins are suspect the system behaves in a professional fashion. Common culprits are Lexicon PCM Native Reverb, Auto Tune 7, Kontakt 4 and Kontakt 5. These plugins will cause -9092 and -9094 errors even at higher buffers. They'll do the same thing even if you're running PT 10 regular, so it's a software or Lion issue.

The best tracking experience on HD Native can be had when you run the right plugins in the session. In my experience Waves SSL, Waves CLA, Avid Channel Strip, D Verb, and Valhalla Room all allow you to build fairly complex mixes while keeping the hardware comfortably at either 32 or 64 samples depending on how big your session is. This is much closer to the experience of being on a TDM system.

[psycho_monkey]

I think the vast majority of this post is user error.

[RoundBadge]

liking pt 10 hd here.
worth the 600 bucks upgrade/support plan bullsh*t?
no

[jjnssn]

Originally Posted by drumster

As someone who is currently using HD Native on a 6 Core Westmere Mac Pro, the majority of these errors are plugin related. The only time you should have to use the LLM path is if you're at the end of a busy mix and need to record a last minute overdub. Presumably, in this case, your buffer would be too high to monitor through the software.

I understand the original poster's frustration as I've been there myself, but since I've determined which plugins are suspect the system behaves in a professional fashion. Common culprits are Lexicon PCM Native Reverb, Auto Tune 7, Kontakt 4 and Kontakt 5. These plugins will cause -9092 and -9094 errors even at higher buffers. They'll do the same thing even if you're running PT 10 regular, so it's a software or Lion issue.

The best tracking experience on HD Native can be had when you run the right plugins in the session. In my experience Waves SSL, Waves CLA, Avid Channel Strip, D Verb, and Valhalla Room all allow you to build fairly complex mixes while keeping the hardware comfortably at either 32 or 64 samples depending on how big your session is. This is much closer to the experience of being on a TDM system.

I have the same experience running HD Native. I send out through an 8x8x8 to a hear back running @ 32 samples. The pluggins make the biggest difference for latency when tracking. I switch back and forth between LLM and for me if there is a difference it is not practical.

Sent from my DROID BIONIC using Gearslutz.com

[eddierodriguez]

Originally Posted by RoundBadge

worth the 600 bucks upgrade/support plan bullsh*t?
no

+1

we had to upgrade 3 HD systems as more and more pt10 projects come in.

pt9 should have had these features

[RoundBadge]

Originally Posted by eddierodriguez

+1

we had to upgrade 3 HD systems as more and more pt10 projects come in.

pt9 should have had these features

yeah theres a few cool new features[ram cache helps things run smoothly] but does not remotely feel like a 1k upgrade!

[Trailmix]

+1 Couldn't agree more. Avid are you listening???

[RoundBadge]

it feels like pt 9 w some nice new features.
NOT a big breakthrough "wow this amazing" 600 dollar plus deal.
it was really "meh" moment when I first booted it up and played with it.

maybe the post guys are benefiting more?

in hindsight I probably should've waited for the demo and tried it first.

[amost]

Originally Posted by amost

I'm on 10 HD/TDM(the demo) and it doesn't have LLM. 9HD doesn't have it either...at least i haven't found it. And when you switch engines and use either of those without the TDM cards it doesn't have it either...not that it needs it but maybe he does indeed mean Native HD...never tried it.

Ooopss...okay so when you don't use the TDM engine LLM does show up in the menu. Guess I missed it.

Anyway I'm just on the demo...I like it okay. Channel Strip is a real nice plug and Clip Gain is definitely very cool but I still think $600 for the TDM upgrade where you get less functionality than non TDM and you pay more is pretty bogus. Digi, I mean AVID wins....I'll probably get it eventually but I'm staying TDM for ahwile.

[rectifried]

Originally Posted by RoundBadge

it feels like pt 9 w some nice new features.
NOT a big breakthrough "wow this amazing" 600 dollar plus deal.
it was really "meh" moment when I first booted it up and played with it.

maybe the post guys are benefiting more?

in hindsight I probably should've waited for the demo and tried it first.

+1

[Firechild]

PT HD10 is working PERFECT here.
Best PT version so far. The disc cache feature just kills the competition.
I guess you guys with trouble just don´t read the manual too often.

PCIe HD2.

[rectifried]

I jumped from HD3 pci to HDN back in the spring... so in someways I have [one] of the latest systems.. 09 8 core 2x2.26 mac pro 14gig ram..
still not as stable as it should be
Im on a clean install of PT on a clean install partiotion of Os lion
no dif than 9...unfortunatly so far
Im on the trial version...def not worth the 600... not enough difference
not garbage but... whatever

[elambo]

Originally Posted by Firechild

The disc cache feature just kills the competition.

Sadly, that's the only feature about which that could be said, and I don't know other DAWs well enough to know if even that statement is true. "Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to 2008... introducing ProTools 10!"

I've been testing 10 for a few days now. It comes nowhere even close to earning my $1,000.

[AcoosticZoo]

what protools system are we ranting on about anyway? PT 10 Native HD, or PT 10 Native with CTPK?

[Firechild]

Originally Posted by AcoosticZoo

what protools system are we ranting on about anyway? PT 10 Native HD, or PT 10 Native with CTPK?

I´m talking about PT HD 10 ( TDM)...

[T_R_S]

Depends on your needs 100% worth it for me...
Lots of new feature that are not immediately apparent until you dive in.
30 day trial

-Increased possible number of voiceable audio tracks to 768 (at 48 kHZ)
-Increased possible number of Auxiliary In- put tracks to 512
-New Maximum setting for Automatic Delay Compensation
-Low Latency Monitoring with Core Audio and ASIO hardware with Pro Tools and Pro Tools HD
- New clip group file format
-Support for 32-bit floating point audio files
-Support for mixed audio file formats
-Support for interleaved audio files
-Support for WAVE Extensible audio file for- mat
-Support for RF64 files
-Ability to change session settings in the Session Setup window for newly recorded, processed, and imported audio

Export Selected Tracks as New Session • Save Session Copy options • Import Session Data options • Add to iTunes library
• Share with SoundCloud using Bounce to Disk or Export Selected Clips as Files commands

-Real-time fades
-Overlapping Crossfades view
-Clip-based Gain
-Clip List Reveal In Finder/Explorer Right-click command
-24-hour Timeline
-Field Recorder workflow improvements (Pro Tools HD and Pro Tools with Complete Production Toolkit only)

-Solo and Mute status indicators in the Edit window
-Automation Follows Edit indicator in the Edit window
-Sync status indicators in the Edit window (Pro Tools HD with a SYNC Peripheral only)
-Bus interrogation
-Support for up to 12 systems with Satellite Link (Pro Tools|HD and HD Native systems only)
D-Command Multimode (Pro Tools HD and Pro Tools with Complete Production Toolkit only)
- Enhanced EUCON support
- New Avid Channel Strip Plug-In • New Avid Down Mixer Plug-In • New Avid Mod Delay III Plug-In
AudioSuite Enhancements:
-Ability to open multiple AudioSuite win- dows simultaneously
- Fades preserved with AudioSuite rendering
- Clip metadata preserved with AudioSuite rendering
- AudioSuite handles
- Reverse command for Delay and Reverb AudioSuite plug-ins
- New Disk Engine
- New Disk Cache settings
- Enhanced support for Network-attached stor- age
- Enhanced Support for Avid Unity Media Net-work and ISIS shared storage, including in- creased track counts, and Mac streaming

- New AAF and OMF import and export features
- Pro Tools Avid Interplay enhancements (Pro Tools HD only)
- 64 Bit Mix Bus!!

[dualflip]

Originally Posted by T_R_S

Depends on you needs 100% worth it for me...
Lots of new feature that are not immediately apparent until you dive in.
30 day trail

-Increased possible number of voiceable audio tracks to 768 (at 48 kHZ)
-Increased possible number of Auxiliary In- put tracks to 512
-New Maximum setting for Automatic Delay Compensation
-Low Latency Monitoring with Core Audio and ASIO hardware with Pro Tools and Pro Tools HD
- New clip group file format
-Support for 32-bit floating point audio files
-Support for mixed audio file formats
-Support for interleaved audio files
-Support for WAVE Extensible audio file for- mat
-Support for RF64 files
-Ability to change session settings in the Session Setup window for newly recorded, processed, and imported audio

Export Selected Tracks as New Session • Save Session Copy options • Import Session Data options • Add to iTunes library
• Share with SoundCloud using Bounce to Disk or Export Selected Clips as Files commands

-Real-time fades
-Overlapping Crossfades view
-Clip-based Gain
-Clip List Reveal In Finder/Explorer Right-click command
-24-hour Timeline
-Field Recorder workflow improvements (Pro Tools HD and Pro Tools with Complete Production Toolkit only)

-Solo and Mute status indicators in the Edit window
-Automation Follows Edit indicator in the Edit window
-Sync status indicators in the Edit window (Pro Tools HD with a SYNC Peripheral only)
-Bus interrogation
-Support for up to 12 systems with Satellite Link (Pro Tools|HD and HD Native systems only)
D-Command Multimode (Pro Tools HD and Pro Tools with Complete Production Toolkit only)
- Enhanced EUCON support
- New Avid Channel Strip Plug-In • New Avid Down Mixer Plug-In • New Avid Mod Delay III Plug-In
AudioSuite Enhancements:
-Ability to open multiple AudioSuite win- dows simultaneously
- Fades preserved with AudioSuite rendering
- Clip metadata preserved with AudioSuite rendering
- AudioSuite handles
- Reverse command for Delay and Reverb AudioSuite plug-ins
- New Disk Engine
- New Disk Cache settings
- Enhanced support for Network-attached stor- age
- Enhanced Support for Avid Unity Media Net-work and ISIS shared storage, including in- creased track counts, and Mac streaming

- New AAF and OMF import and export features
- Pro Tools Avid Interplay enhancements (Pro Tools HD only)
- 64 Bit Mix Bus!!

You forgot to insert a link in red letters to your AVID e-bay store.... ooops my bad, its in your sig....

[T_R_S]

Just trying to help people who may not be aware of what's new in the new version...

[elambo]

Originally Posted by T_R_S

Just trying to help people who may not be aware of what's new in the new version...

And I appreciate that.

I'd read 95% of those bullet points on Avid's site, and I've actually used many of the new features since installing the trial a few days ago. Knowing all that helps justify the price tag, but only by a very small margin. For me, it's still priced far, far too high. And if I upgrade at home the stone begins to roll and I'd need to upgrade a total of 5 systems to maintain compatibility. That's $5,000.

[superwack]

ZERO issues with my transition to PT HD 10 on a mac... none. Loving the new features, seems faster. Happy overall but would have been happier for $249 instead of $599...

also, there is a whole thread on LLM somewhere with Avid chiming in. I haven't had any problem with using "regular" low buffer cue sends, even with some plugs on them. I think the point of the LLM on HD was when you need to overdub on a nearly complete mix and are taxing your system - most people I've read commenting here with real-world situations don't seem to have any issue with a low buffer size. Sure, you can certainly add enough plugs to the channel to make the latency unusable but it's pretty easy not to.

[Funkster]

The fact that Kontakt 5 was mentioned seems like a red flag to me.

[eddierodriguez]

we had a loss of audiofiles using pt10hd on a ssd! the project was saved and closed. opened again and all recorded data was gone! we´re using standard harddisks now, what a shame.

disk-cache can´t deal with big sessions that exceed the timeline-cache. man, pro tools never was slower...

we´re on 24GB ram...

[trepbale]

Originally Posted by eddierodriguez

we had a loss of audiofiles using pt10hd on a ssd! the project was saved and closed. opened again and all recorded data was gone! we´re using standard harddisks now, what a shame.

disk-cache can´t deal with big sessions that exceed the timeline-cache. man, pro tools never was slower...

we´re on 24GB ram...

Honestly couldn't disagree more. OS on a SSD, Active Sessions disk is a WD Raptor, 12GB of memory set for Disk Cache...PT just flies. Sucks that it's not working out for you, but even without the disk cache I wouldn't say PT is any slower than it was before (esp. never been slower), at least not in my experience...

[elambo]

Originally Posted by trepbale

Honestly couldn't disagree more.

He wasn't stating an opinion, those things actually happened to him.