Harrison Mixbus now for Windows, free demo

[Gerk]

Steffen:

You can do exactly what you mentioned, that's a big part of the design of Mixbus is that you CAN use it as just a "mixer" from any other DAW.  The version I'm using for this project has been very stable (one crash in 30+ hours of working in it AND it recovered right back to the last adjustment that I did when I re-launched the DAW).

As for the subscription option you don't have to go that route -- but if you do the math on it it's cheaper if you plan on continuing to use it and you can cancel your subscription at any time after 3 months.  I actually think the sbuscription option is brilliant and that's what I did for my own uses.

Lastly as for the DAW I think you need to try version 2 -- you seem to have tried version 1.  It has some features that most other DAWs don't have that I'm really loving.  I'd take this over anything steinberg has made in the last decade to be honest.  Snapshot saving and the FULL history reverting options alone is worth the price of admission.  But each to their own.  If you insist on hating it I won't be able to convince you otherwise.

CD:
There's much more to mixbus than a simple analog strip plugin and the whole app is less than a single Waves plugin.  The GUI stuff that gives you access to the important plugin controls without having to open all kinds of plugin windows is brilliant.  The summing is so far above any DAW I've tried it's unreal.

For me it's my current favorite sounding DAW I've ever used (and I've been using them since early Commodore/Atari days) and I'd like to think I'm pretty fussy when it comes to that stuff.  I've also worked with Harrison consoles in the past and this setup is the closest thing I've seen to getting "that" sound.

[Era]

Originally i was just curious, nowadays I am liking it more and more... I use Logic my main DAW (because of the midi) but when I want a warm sounding acoustic project it is a Mixbus call for sure.. There is something magic in it

[Gerk]

Yep agreed, it does have some magic in it   I'll probably still use Digital Performer as my main (again I do need MIDI sometimes) but I will likely almost always mix through MixBus even when I use DP.

[stoman]

I tried version 2 - I think that was the first Windows version anyway. It felt very buggy, incomplete, extremely ugly and terribly slow. Loading a couple of audio files took years.

So you can link your DAW's arranger view to the mixer and control the respective tracks from there just like with the built-in mixer? I could not find a way to do that (and using Ardour definitely is no option and will never be). What have I done wrong?

I MUST be able to access the DAWs automatization features, all the VST plugins, and the usual stuff. Is that really possible? If not, Mixbus is not usable for me. I don't need the channel strip features, and I don't need another DAW (I have three already) - I'd be interested in the sound, nothing else.

But I'm with CD: I think you can achieve exactly the same sound using some good VST plugins. It's all just bits and bytes.

For me it would be interesting if they'd collaborate with Cockos, Presonus or Steinberg to build the mixer into their DAWs. But I'm afraid that will never happen. As a standalone product I cannot see the value of Mixbus. I may be too demanding though - I am definitely not a purist.

Regards,
  Steffen

[Gerk]

You can link the mixer on the OSX and Linux versions for sure, I didn't try the windows one first hand but they are supposed to have all the same features.  On OSX it uses the utility "Jack" to do this ... which works very much like the stuff in reason does called Rewire (giving you OS level busses).  So you assign all your DAW of choice outputs to the appropriate busses in Jack and then you set the inputs in the Mixbus mixer to those inputs.

To me I see it like this ... saying that a plugin will give you everything you need is like saying that a guitar pedal will give you everything you need (even if you're using a crappy guitar amp and everything else).  The plugin portion of things/channel strip is only a piece of the puzzle.  But at the end of the day jamming a whole bunch of guitar pedals into the chain doesn't resolve having a crappy sounding amplifier   Mixbus is like the best guitar amplifier you ever heard   (or at least it is to me).  It may all just be bits and bytes, but the way it is all summed together is where the magic happens and most DAWs have terrible summing busses -- Mixbus has the best I've ever heard.

Mixbus is an incredibly accurate representation of a hundred thousand dollar harrison console and the audio engine portion is designed by the same engineers that make the super expensive harrison consoles -- if you have no interest in that sort of "sound" overall then it probably doesn't so much for you.  Personally that's a very important part of the whole process to me.

[Era]

I can really understand Steffen having an bad experience in Windows. The first one seemed to be awfully buggy. There are some bugs still in OSX too, but MB has been worth of every euro.. I am not so pro anyway, but working in mixbus has given me a great learning too.. I mean studying is always an good idea...and the MB way has brought me a lot of information and understanding about the mixing process thats gold

[stoman]

Jack does not run on my 64 bit Windows system, Mixbus does not support 64 bit (nor VST3 or Rewire) ... and they no longer offer a demo version to try out their product. You have to buy the pig in a poke.

I guess that disqualifies it for me. I'll keep an eye on it - maybe it matures with time. As of now it is simply not usable. This may be different on OSX.

Regards,
  Steffen

[Gerk]

From what I just read the problem with Mixbus on 64bit windows is only when you're using 32bit ASIO drivers on your system (and mixing and matching 32bit drivers in 64bit windows is never a good idea!) so it sounds like this might have been the problem for you.

About the only people I know (professionally) that run windows 64 bit are people doing CAD and 3D design work because they need the extra accessibility to memory and they have lots of problems with it -- everyone else I know that uses windows seriously avoids the 64bit stuff because of all of these types of issues.

I'm very happy with Mixbus on OSX so I'll stick with it and see what happens

[stoman]

Mark, you cannot use 32 bit drivers on a 64 bit (Windows) system.

You can use 32 bit user applications (they'll be bridged to 64 bit), but my system is completely 64 bit. I avoid 32 bit applications wherever I can, especially with respect to audio stuff.

32 bit systems are stoneage, really. Nowadays there is no excuse to stay on a 32 bit Windows system. There was a time when you had to use Windows XP for audio which was completely useless in 64 bit (no drivers, incompatibilities, instabilities), but those days are gone. Windows 7 64 bit is a completely stable system, and only some exotic audio applications don't run in 64 bit natively. But those can still be bridged (JBridge is a great little tool for that as far as VST-plugins are concerned).

As for myself: A 32 bit OS for audio would make absolutely no sense at all because I need A LOT of RAM. My computer has 16 GB of RAM, and that's actually less than it may seem. I use a lot of sample libraries and other stuff that is very memory consuming.

You may not need 64 bit for pure mixing (although I would recommend it for that purpose too), but definitely for production, unless you work with outboard gear only.

Regards,
  Steffen

[Gerk]

You can use 32bit drivers on 64bit windows and in fact I pretty much guarantee that your system has some running right now -- pretty much any of the early 32/64bit drivers are a 32bit driver with a compatibility wrapper on it and re-passed through a compiler (microsoft supplies quite a lot right in windows 7 64bit that are done like this)!  This was a problem with a lot of early audio drivers (as the companies needed to pump out 64bit compatible drivers quickly) ... Also with some software if you're running a 32bit application within windows 64bit the vendors require that you run a 32bit driver along with the app as they can't properly access 64bit drivers from 32bit applications without some nasty workarounds (another well documented issue with windows 64bit -- check out some windows dev forums and see all the bitching about this).

That said this is ALL a problem with Windows, end of story.  The ram limitation, the mixing and matching of 32/64bit drivers and apps, etc.  Linux and OSX don't have the same issues -- they could access more memory than windows even in 32bit land and you can mix and match 32/64bit quite easily -- in the case of OSX 100% seamlessly in fact.  As for RAM laptop has 16G of RAM, my desktop/audio machine has 24G and my main server has 64G.  I run 32bit applications on all of them all day long and they don't run into any ram limitations or problems with compatibility, etc ... the caveat?  None of them run Windows (well actually they do but inside virtual machines and I only use them to test with web browsers mostly)

Nowadays there is no excuse to stay on a 32 bit Windows system.

We'll have to agree to disagree on this comment.  There are a lot of good reasons to avoid 64bit windows if you don't need it (and the majority of users do not need it).  64bit is not better than 32bit because it's twice as big.  For your needs with lots of virtual instruments I would say that's a valid reason to need 64bit windows -- but why would someone running microsoft office, a web browser and a PDF reader need to run Windows 7 64bit?  Those users cover probably 80% or more of the installed windows user base ...

Windows 7 64 bit is a completely stable system...

LMAO.  Really?  I honestly don't think Microsoft has ever made a completely stable system...

I'll stop now so we don't get into OS wars.  I'm an avid OSX user and spent years as a Linux developer (doing OS work) and have also spent many, many years supporting windows (starting with windows 3.1).

[stoman]

I was referring to audio applications, Mark! Of yourse there is no need for 64 bit if the user merely runs office, a brower and an e-mail client.

As for the driver thing: I think you are a bit nit-picking there. It is NOT possible to run 32 bit drivers natively on Windows, that's what I was saying. Yes, there may be compatibility wrappers used at the development stage, to add an API layer on top of a 32 bit implementation - but that's just for old stuff. I only use native 64 bit drivers - my system is optimized for audio as that is the only reason why I have Windows at all.

Windows XP 32 bit was extremely stable. Vista was indeed useless crap. Windows 7 64 bit is as stable as can be. I'm a Linux user (and a professional Linux developer) too, and I can confirm that Windows 7 is no less stable than Linux. And I'm not a big Microsoft fan, that much I can tell you. But they have indeed done a great job concerning stability and usability with Windows 7.

I'd still prefer to do everything with Linux, if only I could. Unfortunately there is no serious audio market for Linux, and I'm afraid that will never change. Linux is great for everything else though (and my Linux system is 64 bit too ).

BTW: I used to be thinking about getting a Mac - but ever since I had to work with a Mac for a couple of months (to write an application for the iPad) I no longer want one. Matter of taste, it's just not for me. But if I'm not mistaken you have to install Jack manually on the Mac, if you intend to use Mixbus. That's another reason why I think the number of potential Mixbus users will remain small: There is too much hassle to get it working. On Windows you usually start the installer, and the application installs competely.  Most users have neither the knowledge nor the motivation and/or time to install additional software and configure it manually to get Mixbus up and running.

I still had the demo copy in my download folder (the stopped providing demos now) and wanted to see what Mixbus feels like when rewired (or rather jacked) to Cubase, Studio One or REAPER - but I could not get it working, and I am a developer and someone who spends every day at the computer.

But I think everything has been said now. Good that it works for you, and pity that it doesn't for me. But it's no biggie for me as I still don't think I need it.

Regards,
  Steffen

[Gerk]

Fair enough.  There are still a LOT of drivers that are 32bit drivers with wrappers on them, microsoft even includes them in win7.  We'll have to agree to disagree on the statement that windows 7 is stable   Did you install Jack on your windows setup?  If you didn't that's why you can't do the routing from your DAW to Mixbus -- it's required.

Installing Jack on OSX is very painless and I don't think it stops any users from trying things out -- the appropriate versions come bundled directly with the Mixbus install.  Here's what the disk image looks like when you mount it in OSX, I don't think it gets much easier than this personally:

[stoman]

Yes, I tried to install the full version of JACK on Windows because I wanted to try the rewiring feature in my DAWs. It did install but does not run. I gave up - it would take too much time to investigate.

As for stability: It did take two or three automatic fixes after Windows 7 came out, but since then it has never crashed on me, and I use it permanently. Cubase crashes often (as it always has - well known bugs that probably will never get fixed), but it never affects the running OS. REAPER, which I use daily too, has never crashed yet.

I think it always depends who you ask and what you do with your system. I know a lot of Mac users (lots of colleagues of mine) - some are hardcore fans and some are just realistic users. The realistic ones say their Mac is just as stable as their Windows PC - or vice versa. If you really want, you can make either system crash (and Linux too, btw). So it is just like or dislike and has nothing to do with the actual quality of the operating system.

Regards,
  Steffen

[CosmicDolphin]

I have both PC's & Macs

They both crash 

The Mac tends to crash more politely than the old Win XP machine, but the Win7 machine crashes nicely too now.

CD

[Gerk]

Maybe windows just hates me   I still don't have great luck with Win 7.  I install almost nothing into it (Chrome and Firefox) and it crashes on me every other day or so and all I'm doing is testing web pages with it.

OSX crashes too, don't get me wrong.  I'm not one of these "Macs never crash" kind of guys, but unless there's something seriously funky I restart my main mac workstation maybe once a month whether it needs it or not.