New OS/Kontakt (etc) versions = total rebuild of old templates/projects?

[Vik]

I'm using Mac, so for me the question is "New MacOS/Kontakt (etc) versions means total rebuild of old templates/projects?", but I made the title OS neutral.

How do you guys deal with situations like eg. this one:

- You buy a new Mac, and that Mac is ARM based.
- For that and other reason(s), you need new versions of your sampler (Kontakt, Sine. Synchron Payer etc)
- However, your template(s), which may contain hundreds of tracks, may be risky to use, since these tracks contain older version sof your sampler.
- You may also find out that in order to use the new sampler versions, you also need a new operating system – since the new sampler versions require eg. Sonoma 14.1.1 in order to work properly.

Let's say template has, say, 600 tracks. You may need to replace the sampler version in all these tracks, and open the presets (whether they are saved or not) using the needed version of your sampler.

In other words, you may have to save a lot of template tracks (using eg. Kontakt 5 or 6), create new tracks next to them, and load those presets into your updated versions of your sampler.

Not only that, but you may also have to rebuild your project files. What's the best workflow for doing this?

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[KEM]

I just had to do this and I did it pretty much in the way you described, it wasn’t fun but it was necessary. I would create a Kontakt 7 instance under the old one, load everything up and make sure the new one matches up with the old one, and then delete the old one. Tedious and boring but oh well

 

[Calagan]

same here...
A nightmare.
I don't get why they need to update their plugins so often and give them a new name each time (especially when the changes are so minimal).
I think they could charge for the update but keep the same plugin ID...
Or at least give us some kind of migration tool.
Anyway, it's a PITA.

 

[Vik]

Or at least give us some kind of migration tool.

A tedious process like this (save preset using an unique name, close , open same preset with a user defined version of the sampler) should certainly be done by computers and not humans. Maybe a dedicated migration app isn't needed, but they should definitely come with a built in 'replace' functionality IMO.

I think they could charge for the update but keep the same plugin ID...

I guess it's easier to try out different versions and keep track of how they behave if they the various versions already have unique names?

 

[Calagan]

I guess it's easier to try out different versions and keep track of how they behave if they the various versions already have unique names?

Maybe, but anyway most of the NI plugins are bugged and don't work very well so it doesn't seem to be an amazing strategy.

Just as an exemple, DMG Audio's TrackComp was updated to 2.0 without changing the name, and was retro-compatible with the previous versions, while adding a lot of new features...
Same with Valhalla plugins.

But of course, it's more difficult to charge users for these new versions.