Customer support... Positive experiences

Steinberg Lounge
#1

Thought i’d start this one as a lot of people on here have had to contact customer support depts of various companies for various reasons at one time or another… generally it’s only the negative that makes its way onto forums such as this.

I purchased a controller from Novation about ten years ago now and got a copy of the Bass Station plugin thrown in as part of the deal. I’ve always been a big fan of that plugin as it sounds great and is incredibly fast, simple and effective to use so was a bit miffed when i decided to let it go as it just used too much ASIO resources when bridging in 64bit.
I noticed the other day that they’ve now updated it to V2 so i thought i’d install it and see if my serial code would work with it or if i could do an ‘over the top’ update… nope didn’t work so i contacted their CS expecting to be told that V2 was a new version and i would have to pay to upgrade (not a huge issue as it’s actually not particularly expensive), so i was really pleasantly surprised this morning to get an email from Jack on their support team apologising for my trouble and giving me a new registration key which has worked perfectly… i now have the 64bit version running happily on my system :smiley:

It might not seem a major deal but for a company to do that with a plugin i kind of got for free over ten years ago is a pretty rare occurrence these days. I always did rate Novation but this has just put them up another notch in my estimation…

Anyone else got any good stories about QUALITY customer support?

#2

About Novation?

They are amazing.

A long time ago, my supernova was broken… I could call em up for a normal rate (not a 1900 number premium fee) and we fixed it over the phone (unscrewed the box etc)

The emails get answered promptly, and they now have lifelong support on their gear (talk about ownership)

They were so nice that i made a (unofficial) web forum for them years ago in the transition from yahoo user groups to a better solution.

Class act.

Period.

Other places where i have had to contact support lately (most recent) and get my issue resolved in less than a day:
AAS and Fabfilter and Celemony, rob papen…

Arturia was kinda nice too… Korg too;)
IK is trying…
Heck i dont know of anyone who wasnt really on their game… Cant really fault any audio company… They all pull it off nicely really…
some past experiences-> NI has good support (except for the douche at the front desk in berlin)
Ableton is very cool too… (Shout out to fina who really pulled it off and made me feel very welcome(in berlin)

I am ITB now, but even yamaha was very quick when it came to supporting my old 02r96v2 (which had been catching dust in my legacy room, but i thought it would be time to fix it…

99% of the support i have dealt with in the audioworld are simply the best.


Prolly missed a bunch of ya, but u know who you are;)

So, thx :slight_smile:

\

Other side of the coin

-of course there are some companies (non-audio) , which i will not mention here, - you would think you are talking to underdeveloved robots, always having to repeat your issues from step to step or so - making me think that they shouldnt be there etc…
-or companies that make it hard to have direct contact too… As if they are hiding something,… Or really just like pulling the old “im a corporation and im gonna fuck you over” kinda attitude…

#3

Just went on what looks like an insane shopping spree but really is more of a flood of well planned purchases. I havn’t bought anything at all for some time now so damn that felt goodl!!!

:sunglasses: :mrgreen: :laughing: :sunglasses: :bulb: :mrgreen: :sunglasses: :sunglasses: :laughing:

One of the things I bought was a Nektar Panorama P6 and and another a new computer that is being put together and tested this week with a 3 years warranty which makes me sleep well hehe. Until the computer arrives as usual I can’t see gear lying idle in their boxes so I tried to connect the P6 to my old computer. It just didn’t want to show up the right way in Cubase so I had an email exchange with the good folks at Nektar and we tried a few things that did not work so they offered a phone support session. Then I realized that I was really going to use it only on the new computer so I declined but the support from Nektar was very professional. Great with a company in this day and age that acts like all companies should act.

About the Nektar Panorama P6 which I really bought because it’s integration with Cubase I can also say that I really like the keyboard! I’m not entirely sure why and I’m merely a guitarist who happen to own some keyboards, not a pianist in any stretch, but it seems to me that the way the keys stop when they hit the keybed and the timing of the note makes sense to MY ears and fingers. I loaded up A1(!) because it’s small and I usually use it for tests and instead of scrolling through the presets like I normally do I really just played and played and played and only went through a handful of presets. It was like I didn’t recognize the sounds so the A1 felt like a new plugin for me now haha! The old keyboard was an EMU XBoard 61 which wasn’t bad it seems but over time I’ve kind of stopped “PLAYING” it for the fun of it. It was just a tool to place MIDI notes in the right spot in Cubase. The P6 I like playing.

At the moment I’m surrounded by boxes and packaging material but when I’m done reconnecting everything hopefully all VSTi synths and whatnot will respond the same way … ?
Oh, one more about Nektar. First responder tried but we couldn’t figure something out so the case was responded to by someone else who knew exatly what to do, even though I changed my mind :blush: . So now you know if you try Nektar products, there is support if you need it! :sunglasses:

#4

That’s really good to know Ulf, i’ve been considering a P6 for some time now and was wondering if it’s as good as the advertising blurrb… would be really interested to hear how you’re doing with it in a couple of months time actually… i was thinking about getting one fairly soon but my Waves are out of WUP at the moment and there’s 2 days left on a 25% off offer, the £ is also rallying against the $ at the moment too so even though i resent it i could really do with getting that out of the way first…

I DO like the look and idea of the P6 though… seems like a VERY tasty bit of kit… How heavy is it and how’s the build quality if you don’t mind me asking?

Pleased for you mate! :smiley:

#5

It feels like a solid piece of gear which include some weight too. It’s not flimsy and it It’s not bulky. It weighs about as much as it looks to weigh when you see it. It’s at least half way to be built like a tank but it’s not something for the road probably . It’s a studio keyboard controller with a high gloss surface that looks good so if you take care of it it’s a good controller. The rotary encoders don’t feel like joysticks (!) as someone pointed out, which is a good thing! No corners where cut in making a good controller but on the other hand they didn’t add anything spectacular on the surface either. Maybe that kept the price from going through the roof? From what I know now it’s just what I wanted, and I haven’t even started using it as a Cubase controller. It’s a good keyboard controller for me!

#6

Cheers again Ulf!

I’ve heard A LOT of good things about them and this sounds encouraging again… gonna have to wait a little while now though cos Waves just screwed me for £150 or so and i’ve just had another unexpected expense… will check back with you in a couple of months if that’s ok to see how you’re getting on…

#7

Nektar Panorama P6 now officially works on the new computer!!! This time it almost installed itself :laughing:
Life is goooood! :sunglasses: