Unable to install Etude Elements

I recently updated to Dorico 6. When I launch it I receive the following message:

‘An essential component used by Dorico for playback has not been found.

Please run the Steinberg Download Assistant and install the following:

Etude Elements’

I have been able to download Steinberg Download Assistant but it will not launch on my MacBook Air running Tahoe 26.1. I managed to download Etude Elements from the downloads page but when I click on the file nothing happens. I have been waiting for over a week for a response from Steinberg to my support request. Can anyone help?

John,

welcome to the forum.

Are you sure, your downloads did complete?

You should probably get a .dmg file of many Mb in size. How big is your download?

Select the file and cmd-I to get information about the file size.

Also, if you right-click (ctrl-click) onto the .dmg file, will you see options „Open with…“.

Hi @John_O_Neill, continuing on what k_b wrote:
DMG images you normally open with the DiskImageMounter utility program. After you did that the DMG file will appear in Mac OS as a virtual disk drive that you can access like any other hard disk (be it internal or external).
The virtual disk drive shall then show at least 2 vstsound files. Double click on one of them and automatically the Steinberg Library Manager should run and install the sound library Etude Elements to the default location (/Library/Application Support/Steinberg/Content).
If you double click one vstsound file and nothing happens, do a right click and choose
Open With… and tell it to use the Steinberg Library Manager.

Do you get some feedback then?

Also to mention, Etude Elements is only a sound library, but has no own Player. So you load the Etude Elements sounds into HALion Sonic and that one then can play the Etude sounds.

Are you totally confused now or do understand better?

Edit: And one more imporant point. You need to run the Steinberg Activation Manager to update the Dorico license, because the license for Etude Elements is contained in the Dorico license. So in the Activation Manager at the right top of the window is a refresh button. But before clicking on that refresh button, hold down the Control key on your computer keyboard (the key on the bottom left of your keyboard). After that you can launch Dorico and in the HALion Sonic editor window open/load the Etude Elements sounds.

Hi Ulf,

Thank for your rapid response.

I downloaded the Steinberg Download Assistant and installed it in the normal way via DiskImageMounter. It appears in my applications as ‘Steinberg Download Assistant.app.’ However, when I click on it it does not open and I get the multicoloured ‘circle of doom’ and have to force it to quit. So I do not understand what you say about it appearing as a ‘virtual disk drive’.

Etude Elements appears in my downloads as ‘Etude_Elements.iso’. When I click on it nothing happens. I don’t understand how I load this into HALion Sonic.

When I run Steinberg Activation Manager and click the refresh button something seems to respond at the bottom of the screen but if I hold down the control key while clicking refresh nothing happens.

Of course all of this would probably be less complicated is I could get the Steinberg Download Manager to work, but it never has on my Mac, so I couldn’t for example use it when I made the transition from Finale to Dorico 5. So far, paying for an upgrade has resulted in hours of frustration, and I’m beginning to wish I hadn’t!

I appreciate your trying to help but I am indeed more confused than ever!

If you hold down Shift key while clicking the refresh button on the Steinberg Activation Manager and after that start Dorico, does it work then?

For macos 26 Tahoe, try to download the Steinberg Download Assistant separately from this page:

Hi @John_O_Neill ,

I don’t know why your installed Download ASsistant does not work, but that is also not so important now. Important is the disk image

So in your downloads somewhere there is the Etude iso file, so you need to mount that with the previously mentioned DiskImageMounter. Once done you see several vstsound files. Double click on one of them and the Steinberg Library Manager will copy the file into the final destination location.
If you then start Dorico, HALion Sonic will find the files and you can load the presets into the HALion Sonic slots.

Hi Ulf

It worked! Etude Elements is now installed.

Thank you for your patience and kind assistance.

John

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Hi hannuala

Thank you for responding.

I downloaded the Steinberg Download Assistant from that page as you suggested but it still does not open. So that’s still a bit of a mystery.

However, the good news is that I managed to install Etude Elements using Ulf’s suggestions (see elsewhere in this thread).

John