I just had to finish a complex, very important project with several single sound design tasks, music composing and mastering all this. WaveLab Pro 9.5 was practically unusable for concentrated and fast work. The main problems are in the area of plug in handling. No matter what I use, after chaining several plug ins in the Master Section WL starts to act strange, lagging graphics are the main problem. Plug ins become unusable, changing parameters takes seconds and so on. It makes no sense for me to use WL in this state for any crucial work. I had a mastering chain with Softube, TDR and McDSP and had to save the settings and redo everything in Nuendo. Nuendo 8.2 is also fine for mastering, 64bit mixer and all that. The plug ins which make problems in WL are running just fine, smooth and fast in Nuendo, while WL ist constantly giving problems. Nuendo is a jewel for audio work, WL a troublemaker on the same machine with the same VST problems - no contest.
An all too common report. Whether it’s from plugin developers not properly coding for VST spec and testing in WaveLab, or if WaveLab is just different or extra sensitive to 3rd party plugins…we will probably never know. Probably somewhere in between.
“not properly coding for VST spec and testing in WaveLab” - what does mean “correct” under this circumstances? The aforementioned plug ins run fine under Nuendo, often with even more processings (side chains) and many, many instances at once. If these plug ins doesn’t break the functionalities in these hosts from the company, which is setting the VST standard, then they can’t be so “incorrect”. It is constantly WL causing problems and sluggish performance with just a few plug ins on a very capable Mac Pro. Something is wrong in this picture and I assume it is not Nuendo by supporting non correct VST plug ins.
What are the precise names of the plugins are you are referring to? Are you using the latest VST3 versions of these plugins?
I’m always updating constantly the VST plug ins. I named TDR, Weiss by Softube and McDSP - but that was only an example which I just experienced and forced me to stop working with WL within that project. I played several times the game “which plug ins”, " are they current ones" etc. It is not user fault here and I now have licenses for around thousand plug ins here I payed for and want to use many of them regularly. Which is not a problem at all in other Steinberg and non-Steinberg apps. It is ALWAYS WL giving me problems. I use plug ins since Waves gave L1 to me when they started. I have betatested many programs and plug ins over the decades. I’m not a newbie and I can assure you I have a well maintained system here and know what I’m doing. But I refuse to hop thru all the rings again if all the plug ins I have problems with are no troublemakers in other apps. And I work fast and concentrated, changing plug in orders and plug ins ‘on the fly’ in dozens of combinations daily. I won’t be so stupid to note down all the combinations and incidents just because something is wrong in ONE application. I have more important things to do and totally fed up with this. Wavelab on OSX is a disgrace to Steinberg, who makes great programs like Nuendo, Cubase, Halion etc.
You need to provide more accurate information. What plugin is exactly causing a problem (please don’t answer “all plugins”). Used where (Master Section? Clip? Montage track, Montage Output?)
The full VST spec includes functions which are not used by all DAWs, and so there may be alternative ways of achieving the same required result. There have certainly been instances in which the failure of a VST in WaveLab has been because WaveLab has happened to use a function that other DAWs did not use, and it turned out not to be correctly implemented. So the fact that a VST works in some or even many DAWs is not in itself proof that there is nothing wrong with it.
Paul
I’m not going to test this for you and instead of your betatesters again and again. Single plug ins are usually not the problem, multiple plug ins are. The behaviour is like this: changing some parameters, switching between several plug ins, changing parameters again and the whole thing becomes unresponsive quite quickly. Knobs/sliders don’t move anymore and jump a few seconds later. This makes handling unusable. I know from a friend, that she has similar problems with WL Pro on Windows. The last time I experienced it with ML8000 or AE600 from McDSP in combination with Weiss MM-1 and TDR Limiter GE. But I know from the last months it can also show up in combination with Waves and what not. I would have to note down every combination I used in the last weeks/months as a full time job - the problems never went away. I always have the most recent versions with WL and plug ins. I started to make templates for Nuendo to take over the tasks I expected to do with WL. And to be clear: I’m not going to write here reports and describing all the problems in details again and again - it is your duty with your betatesters to sort these things out. I did this in the past (remember the plug in thread) and nothing basically changed. Pointing to user error or plug in makers is getting nowhere. Plug in makers are annoyed if you ask them about WL and compatibility. There is something fundamentally wrong IMO with WL plug in handling. I can experience it, but not pointing a finger to a certain combination or whatever. Feel free to think I’m trolling or a complete moron - it won’t help either. I assume others are not always reporting frankly for two reasons: 1) mixture of illegal and licensed plug ins they cannot report, 2) can’t point directly to a certain combination either.
Ahhh yes … the mysterious functions WL uses exclusively rightful and WL is functioning correctly! The others are doing it wrong, even if it just works all th time. Of course - even the parent company of the VST standard is not using these mysterious functions in their flag ship product. Therefore plug ins work fine in Nuendo, because they use a crippled amount of functions there in comparison to WL? You believe that?
I think the consensus certainly is that Wavelab has its share of issues with certain plugins. Wavelab would indeed appear to be more sensitive than other hosts. However, it is debateable as to where the fault lies with regards to any particular issue. It has often been shown to be on the plugin side. I do not agree at all that there have not been improvements on the Wavelab side. And I do not agree at all that other hosts do not also have problems with certain plugins. Nuendo, for example, has recently suffered serious issues with Izotope RX plugins. This turned out to be on the plugin side but I believe Nuendo also had to be modified.
One thing is certain. There can be no discussion/improvement here without precision about the issues you suffer. Unfortunately, this can only be done if others know precisely what plugins you use and the details of the issue that occurs.
nkf, you said Softube Weiss DS1, TDR (which one?), McDSP (which one?), chained in the Master Section, badly sluggish performance when changing parameters on the plugins on a Mac, because of seemingly lagging graphics. You’re adjusting parameters while playing program material, right? If it happens using any TDR and McDSP plugs in the chain, pick an example. Then it sounds like PG would test.
Where is the plugin chain placed in Nuendo that works fine? On a track? The mixer? What Mac OS version?
@nkf I don’t really see the point of this topic, other than venting frustration - which is perfectly legit, don’t get me wrong.
But without a proper description of problems noone will be able to troubleshoot or even get an insight of what went wrong. People are trying to help and it seems you don’t want help. Again, perfectly fine, but let’s stop wasting each other’s time.
Don’t try to patronise me, it won’t work. If you don’t understand my points, it is your problem - step aside.
I made my points very clear and I’m sure the right people will get the message. It wasn’t meant for random forum guys to solve or comment with phrases. Steinberg has to resolve the situation concerning the lack of quality control for WL and plug ins. Other users are annoyed, plug ins makers are annoyed, I’m totally annoyed. There were enough attempts to report these problems since version 9 and these problems are NOT with the other products Steinberg has released. I have bought many licenses from Steinberg and never regretted anything, I even recommend Nuendo, Cubase and Halion to others all the time. But WL is problematic and I spent enough time reporting issues with clear descriptions, just to see it popping up later with other plug in combinations. Ask DMG for example what they think about this …
only Master Section - I don’t even dare to use Montage for crucial work right now with plug ins - did it once and it worked. But I don’t trust WL in its current state.
Then make a formal complaint to Steinberg support. In it include sufficient detail for them to reproduce your problem. It’s no use ranting: “there are lots of problems, they’re so obvious I’m not going to tell you what they are” because they are not obvious unless you give specifics - after all, there are also vast numbers of people using this software without these problems.
For instance, I could say “Montage output plugin handling doesn’t work, fix it”. But instead I explained what I was doing, linked to a specific plugin that showed the problem, and acknowledged that the problem might not have been checked for because I am using WaveLab for multichannel processing in a way that it’s barely meant to handle at present. As a result PG has been able to acknowledge my issue and give me an indication of when it will get fixed.
They say “God helps those who help themselves” - well, at our more mundane level, PG is like that too!
Paul
Agree. But since it was posted in a forum, I would think somebody here with a Mac and the plugins could probably try to reproduce it. If the TDR and McDSP are specified.
Same problems here plus annoing dropouts when rendering on a dual xeon Win 10 machine and many computers before.
I´m a WL user since over 15 years and I really love the workflow for editing and montages but it definitely is the most unreliable program i´ve ever owned.
There are numerous plugin combinations that causes lagging, dropouts etc.
They´re even inconsitent and all of a sudden plugins that worked before can cause problems.
Here´s a list of plugins that cause trouble in my case:
Xynaptic adaptiverb
Barrat audio equavescent3
Balance analog Magpha eq
UAD Sony oxford dynamic eq
Klanghelm VUMT Deluxe
Oek Sound Soothe/Spiff
Newfangled Elevate
and some more in different combinations.
None of these cause problems in Reaper, S1 or Ableton on the same computer.
I made a short video which shows the typical behaviour. I just updated from el Capitan to Sierra. You can see how I try to move the EQ dots (of course I held the mouse button pressed). Some jump, some don’t move at all. Then I leave the mouse alone, you can see the non moving cursor. Suddenly parameters start to jump and EQ curves are build. That is what I mean as unusable and sluggish - that is not acceptable.
There are UAD and Sonible plug ins visible but it doesn’t matter - the problem occurs very quickly when using randomly several plug ins at once, from two to six on. I reproduced several times the same plug in chains in Nuendo 8 on the same machine and DSP meter barely moves and is always low. The Mac Pro is very capable and runs hundreds of plug ins in other apps without a problem.
Video link:
https://nsonics.com/div/sluggishWL.mp4
Yes, of course, the behaviour is impossible to work with. Just for the record, I have SSL X-EQ and no issues here on PC. That could be a Mac only issue. Perhaps someone here with a Mac can test it.