I’ll try to keep this brief, but I feel I’m struggling to come to a new Melodyne process after rebuiling my crashed PC. I’m reinstalling much but not all of my previous audio tools, trying to be a little leaner and cleaner. Meanwhile, I did take advantage of the Acoustic Black Friday deal for Mixcraft 8 Pro Studio … not that I need another DAW as I use Reaper the majority of the time, but I had demo’d it sometime back and was pretty impressed.
It turns out (and I think Dave @Chordwainer had mentioned this before) that this version of Mixcraft comes with Melodyne 4. I’m not sure yet if it’s Essentials or what, but Mixcraft touts a more streamlined process with Melodyne that bypasses the need for the audio transfers and whatnot - seemless integration into the DAW is what it sounded like. I have not tried it yet, but may give that a shot before trying the other route … which leads to the next part.
The dilemma is that I had Melodyne Editor 2.x - an older version but more functionality (most likely, compared to the bundled one with Mixcraft). Celemony is telling me I cannot have BOTH installed like I had asked about and was hoping would be possible. I have license keys for both, but they seem to think this will goober things up.
I figured that Melodyne 4 would be best for Mixcraft since they have designed a special process around it (and an older version of Melodyne may not work that way?), but also wanted to use Melodyne Editor 2.x in Reaper.
Is there any way to make this work? I have what looks like the standalone install files for Melodyne 4 in both Program Files/Celemony/Melodyne 4 and Program Files (x86)/Celemony/Melodyne 4, and the VST2/3 plugins in my standard folders (which installed into their own Melodyne 4 folders in the VST2 plugin folders, Melodyne folders in VST3). I have not activated the Melodyne 4 for Mixcraft yet, unless Mixcraft automatically did that for me.
I won’t know for sure how Melodyne Editor 2.x will install until I try it. I don’t recall the exact configuration from before.
I wish I had a more helpful answer Stan, but I feel like an audio retard sometimes when it comes to all these different programs and companies that I’ve never heard of. Please forgive me for my ignorance.
Stan, first up, happy to hear you’re giving Mixcraft a spin. I hope it continues to impress you so that I can get another fellow Mixcraftian around here!
Here’s all I know that may be at all relevant. You’re right that I’d mentioned that MC integrates Melodyne 4 into v8 Pro Studio. But I’d had the Editor version of Melodyne for some time already, and had kept it up to date, prior to MC8’s release, using it in MC7 and prior as a plugin/insert in the usual way. I do believe I recall AJ saying that the integrated version of Melodyne was the Essentials; however, I’m pretty sure that MC8 has integrated the Editor version on my rig because I had that already installed when MC8 was installed. I will double-check next time I’m on the music rig to be sure, but I don’t recall any tools being missing and suchlike that a “lite” version would manifest, it is precisely the same as the full up plugin version with which I have grown very familiar.
If that’s true, then I would guess that there are registry entries and/or other “wrapper” type setup reflecting which version(s) of Melodyne are installed and that MC8 is interfacing with those entries in some way, making use of Melodyne resources in whatever way it’s coded to do. This would account for the support guys advising that you not attempt to run both versions at once, especially with such a big difference in versions, it would be hard to avoid compatibility problems.
Maybe the Melodyne folks would cut you a deal on an Editor version of v4? I find it to be extremely powerful, and it may be worth the price to you. I’ll try to double check my setup asap and let you know what I find-- should be easy to tell, I can check for the polyphonic options, present in Editor but not in Essentials. Stay tuned… (see what I did there?)
Thanks! Yes that could be fun. I guess I was mainly impressed with the Virtual Instruments in Mixcraft, especially since Reaper doesn’t have many … and those it has are okay I suppose but haven’t grabbed me. And I was hoping, and it looks like this may work, that I can use those VSTi’s in Reaper as well! I was able to load many of them up in Reaper, with a few exceptions (that didn’t seem to like it or translate).
Upgrade from Editor 2 to Editor 4 is $99. I did fish on my last support email response if there was a better deal. They recommended I uninstall Melodyne 4 and install my Editor 2 and see if it works properly in Mixcraft.
Thanks! I believe polyphonic (or maybe it’s multiple tracks?) is offered in Melodyne Studio, but I have to admit I haven’t delved into everything Melodyne can do.
Yes. I have taken note of your sharp powers of punnery and they are on a scale that reaches a high bar.
UPDATE: So I also checked with Acoustica (Mixcraft) on this situation, and they suggested that my older version of Melodyne Editor (2.1.2) should probably work fine so I can try that, and if it all goes to crap … well I can uninstall that and reinstall (the Mixcraft supplied) Melodyne 4 Essentials.
I uninstalled Melodyne 4 Essentials and installed Melodyne Editor 2.
So I gave it a shot. Melodyne Editor 2 actually loaded okay and seemed to work fine in Mixcraft, but when I went to close Mixcraft it crashed! The dump file pointed right at the 64-bit Melodyne VST3 as the problem, some kind of Access Violation.
It’s one of their demo song sessions, so it’s all their own plugins on the tracks.
But Mixcraft is supposed to be a 64-bit DAW! It installs in the Program Files folder on Windows 7/64.
When I loaded Melodyne Editor 2, I only installed the 64-bit plugins, VST2/3. I wonder if Mixcraft checks all the folders where plugins might be, but really requires a 32-bit plugin to use? Maybe that accounts for the crash?
One thing I have noticed is that MC doesn’t handle VST3 plugs consistently well. I’ve had enough glitches that I just stick to using the VST2 versions of everything even though I’m running the 64-bit version of the overall program. In my reading on the subject, I don’t see exactly what the upside is to VST3 anyway, except for maybe a slightly smaller resource footprint. That’s not been of concern to me because even my densest projects never cause the total amount of resources to exceed about 25% of what’s available in the system (the little readout in the lower-right corner updates in real time).
You might try that, just use VST2 versions (should be present in just about everything). The DAW still runs in native 64 (I assume you are running a 64-bit install of Windows?), gaining those benefits. Hope that’s helpful…
The response I got from Acoustica Support stated “Be sure to install the VST3 version” in regard to Melodyne, so I assume there is a reason for that. They didn’t specify 32-bit or 64-bit VST3 though. I ran the installer again and put the 32-bit Melodyne plugins for Editor 2 in place, hoping that might help. I also notice that Melodyne identifies itself as a 32-bit (standalone) application, but that may be due to me having that older version of Editor.
Yes, I’m running Windows 7/64. I can try the VST2’s instead, maybe that will even help with Melodyne, though going against Acoustica’s advice (but they don’t seem to really know if Editor 2 will work or not anyway).
I have explored Mixcraft’s Plugin Manager, I do kind of like it. The only path in there right now is an invalid one (app default) as I put my VST2’s in a custom location. Still, it seems to look in the default VST3 locations (which I do use) even though it doesn’t list that path in Plugin Manager. So right now I just have in the plugin list the Mixcraft stock plugins (which seem to reside in C:\Program Files\Acoustica Mixcraft 8\VST), and the VST3’s that are in my default folders (except EZ Drummer2 for some reason).
I’m trying to keep my new setup (after PC crash) a bit more simple and streamlined, but my multi-potentialite habits are creeping back in and it looks like I’m becoming a “2 DAW guy” again. I went through this when going from Pro Tools to Reaper in that I was trying to use both over a long period of time. I hope this is a little different, but already it seems to add layers of complexity. I tried out some of the Mixcraft plugins (VST) in Reaper by adding them to Reaper’s plugin scan list. It looks like I’ll be doing something similar in Mixcraft if I try to use VST2’s as it will show everything in that (somewhat voluminous) directory. I don’t know how Jonathan runs multiple different DAWs and keeps up with it - 2 is challenging enough.
According to Greg at Acoustica Support, if I run the VST2 it will only be an “effect” and I would lose “ARA integration”. As I understand it, ARA integration only works with VST3, so that’s one potential benefit. ARA means, at least for Melodyne, you don’t have to do “audio transfers” out of the DAW and back in which is one messy thing I have never liked about Melodyne. It is also coming to Reaper very soon, they say. ARA allows that handy little Sound window in Mixcraft, so bypassing VST3/ARA I guess it would have to be an FX on the audio track.
I think it’s cool that Mixcraft did the ARA integration, but I don’t know if they thought through potential upgrades to their inclusion of Melodyne 4 Essentials. Again, it may be that my older version of Editor is not compatible and that Editor 4 would work just fine. Celemony even prompted me toward this, though I’m skeptical whether they know that much about how it works either (in Mixcraft).
Well, I don’t know that it doesn’t, I’m just going on what they told me. I’m not sure they know everything. They informed me they (Acoustica Support) are trying to get a copy of Melodyne Editor 4 to test this out for me. So they apparently haven’t explored every avenue. I had the impression that VST3 was ideal for ARA, but I can’t find anything that says it’s required. I’d guess they only tested Mixcraft previously with Essentials 4 since that’s what comes in their bundle. In my queries to Celemony when I mentioned the Mixcraft integration, they didn’t seem familiar with that, so I don’t know there has been collaboration there, just ARA implementation.
I have taken note of your sharp powers of punnery and they are on a scale that reaches a high bar.
