Hello all, I 'm hoping someone can fill me in on what has gone on with the Halion sonic line. I’m picking up Cubase after a few years away. I have Halion Sonic 2, and it seems there’s a Halion Sonic 3, somewhere, but i can’t see it for sale by Steinberg, just Halion 7? And Halion Sonic SE? So what’s the scoop, anyone. Thanks.
Halion Sonic 7 is a free plug-in which replaces both Halion Sonic SE 3 and Halion Sonic 3. You can download it from here:
This includes no content out of the box, but it’s able to load the Halion Sonic SE libraries included with Cubase, as well as libraries from the full version of Halion Sonic for as long as you have the purchased the appropriate licenses. A couple of free libraries are also available from Steinberg’s site.
The content that used to be included with the full version of Halion Sonic is now called the Halion Sonic 7 Collection. This gives you access to the Halion 7 factory libraries at a lower price, including everything you missed from Halion Sonic 3.
If you have a license for the full version of Halion Sonic 2 (NOT Halion Sonic SE 2), you can also purchase an update to the Halion Sonic 7 Collection by clicking the links above.
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Great information. Awesome, Thanks. 2 follow-up question then. I am installing all my products on a new PC. The former PC is still working fine with C5 (just old and slow), and I have installed C12 successfully on the new PC. Would I need to install (my fully licenced copy of) HS2 on my new PC first, or go straight to installing H7 + libraries (with the old elicencer plugged in)? And secondly, do you know if by chance the mappings are the same, meaning my projects will open in the new Halion with the same instrument patches?
Does anybody know if my Halion Sonic 2 content (library) can be brought into Halion Sonic 7? I have a lot of projects using those patches. And I am assuming (maybe wrongly) that HS7 does NOT include all the patches from HS2. ??
Halion Sonic 7 is backwards compatible with previous versions. No content has been removed, but please note that the Halion Sonic SE content that’s included with Cubase must be downloaded separately by clicking the icon for your Cubase version in the Steinberg Download Assistant.
In your case, if you don’t want/cant purchase the upgrade to the Halion Sonic 7 Collection, you can just install Halion Sonic 2 using the full installer, then install the free Halion Sonic 7 plug-in on top of it. Run the Steinberg Download Assistant again after installing HS7 to check if there’s any updates available for your HS2 libraries (they’ll show at the top, above “My product downloads”).
I believe this should give you access to all of your HS2 content in HS7. If doesn’t, you can simply uninstall HS7 and then reinstall HS2.
So, does/should the HS2 content come up inside HS7?
Yes, if you have a USB-eLicenser with a Halion Sonic 2 license connected to your computer.