Motu Mach Five - Anybody Using It? Is It Our Yet?, MOTU Mach Five sampler Options

[Javier Calderon]

Hi all. I think I'm going to be getting DP 4 soon. Should I get Mach 5 along with it? or should I get Reason? Which of the two ancillary apps would you recommend?

Does anyone know how the piano sounds are in either? I've been doing some research and listened to pretty much all of the sample files that Propellerheads has on their site as it relates to Reason (I dug some of them), and then I went to check out MOTU's Mach 5 . . . the sound library seemed pretty big (2Gigs verses Mach 5s 500mgs library) . . . but, again, I was wondering about the piano in Mach 5 (the Bosendorfer samples).

Anyway, any help on comparison/contrast between the two apps and which one you would recommend would be very highly appreciated.

Thanks!
Javier

[krisg]

I'll put another one in - kotakt. The three are quite different in the way they work. Firstly Reason, is a whole studio package, with two synthsiser modules (sybstractive and granular), two samplers, loop player, drum machine and a host of different effects. Very powerful in my opinion. But the samplers handle only one instrument at a time, which means that doing any serious orchestral work is out of the question. You would need stacks of NN-XT...no keyswitching but very nice zone layering passible.

MachFive is a 16 part sampler so it is more suited for multi instrument support, but it has no DFD (direct from disk) support (although that is comnig in april from what I hear) and no keyswitching, so importing a massive giga piano is a no way. has a built-in analyzer and a tuner. Great for fixing certain orchestral libraries, notorious for having bad tuning.

Finally Kontakt - very powerful too, keyswitching and DFD insluded. Very nice for setting up elaborate string instruments etc, witih all the different playing techniques under one instrument. Giga files are well recognized. Quite good processor handling.

I would recommend Reason AND a Sampler for big, key-switched files.

[sbolinger]

I'm currently using MachFive in ProTools LE 6.1.1, under OS 10.2.8.

I've used hardware samplers for over a decade, and previously used digidesign's soft samplecell before migrating to OS X.

I've run into numerous issues with MachFive, in particular with the Effects (e.g. the "effect sync mode" function locks to 120 bpm, rather than to the ProTools tempo). Also, accidental renaming or moving of sample folders can result in an application crash.

I'm dissapointed, as I felt that I made an educated purchashing decision (I checked out most of the available software sampler demos before buying). The MOTU online tech support thus far has been less than satisfactory. I'm going to give the phone support a shot soon.

[stratology]

Bought this about a week ago, now I consider returning it. The hardware copy protection (iKey dongle) makes the software almost unusable on a PowerBook: you have to carry the dongle around, everytime you launch an app that understands Audio Units, MachFive searches for the dongle, no matter if you want to use the sampler (say, in Garage Band) or not. Wrote an AppleScript to activate/deactivate the plug in - messy. MOTU makes it more convenient to use a pirated version than a purchased copy - not smart. The Pace copy protection messes with the system - it installs a kernel extension (!!!) and startup items in system/library (not home/library!!). Overall performance and startup time of the PowerBook have suffered since installing MachFive. All of the samples that come with the app are quite conservative (GM sounds, pianos, organs...), only a handful of them sound really good. Using more than one sound at a time results in regular processor spikes (-> drop outs, distortion), even after optimising all recommended settings (buffer, number of voices etc.). Loading presets is buggy. The EQs are unintuitive. Poor manual. No information about the sample format used (tags etc).
Not recommended.

1GHz 12" PowerBook G4
768 MB RAM
DP4 as host app

[jklimeck]

You are totally right, Mach 5 on a Power Book 1Ghz or lower or any G4 for that matter is simply disastrous.

I was searching for a software sampler and got Mach Five, you basically have to use a G5 to get any work done, and eventually it taxes the G5, fans go on etc.

You notice Logic, Reason and Kontakt have no problem on the G4 or G5, it does not bring the G4 or G5 to its knees.

This is just lousy programming on MOTU's part, and I can't believe QA at MOTU didn't catch these things, or they did and said ship it anyway.

MOTU better get their programming / QA heads out of their asses and give us timely updates and fixes, I for one being a pro
musician/engineer/ producer am not going to stand for it much longer, nor would I think many others in my position, people will switch to Logic, Kontakt and/or Reason.

What does this tell you, Mach Five was released way too early, probably pressure from Reason and Kontakt.

And what is the deal with DP4, this is MOTU's first implementation of an OS X app, and frankly I am a bit pissed. Long time MOTU user, used to work for Apple on Final Cut Pro QA, I know how an OS X NLE for audio / video should respond, and DP 4 /Mach 5 performance sucks, needs an update like yesterday, spinning beach balls galore.

You notice the Windows version of Mach 5 is now shipping, and if you go to Sweetwater.com (Not MOTU's site) it says the Windows version has:

Disk Streaming (DFD)
Rex 1 and 2 support
Kontakt support

What the heck is going on, the Windows version gets what the Mac version should have have last year when Mach Five was released.

Mach 5 for Mac needs these feature as well as the following:

Get rid of the iLok and use what Kontakt uses, which is basically fool proof, no original CD, you cant run it.

Stand Alone, not all people have a host DA software, need one or use one (plus is should speed up the sampler efficiency / performance, etc.)

Much more speed and less spinning beach balls and delays.

Much better integration with DP 4, one would almost think, M5 and DP 4 was not developed by the same company, this should actually be embarrassing to MOTU.

Some sort of Librarian or easy way to search/access commonly samples, an easier way to create custom drum kits or custom samples/instruments.

An a damn easier way to export (bus?) the audio outputs to DP audio tracks.

You practically need a Ph D to figure this out and it seems there are several ways to do it, all of which suck and are non-intuitive, I want to highlight instruments , click One button that sends the outputs to DP4 and automatically new tracks are created in the sequence timeline.

Anyway here is to hoping we get ALL of these things I mentioned and Mach 5 (version) 1.5 or 2.0 whatever the will call it with DFD, etc. in a few days, they have said April and April is almost over.

Maybe the Windoze version being released is a clue.

[Dave Bourke]

I don't own Mach 5, but I just thought I'd point out that even though it is sold by Motu and bears the Motu logo, it was actually developed by Plugsound, not Motu.

'Nuff said :-)

This post has been edited by Dave Bourke: Fri 30 Apr 2004, 12:16

[stratology]

jklimeck, do you think the poor performance (processor spikes) is caused by the UVI engine? I'm interested in Spectrasonic's Atmosphere, but it uses the same engine...

About MachFive - I sent it back to the reseller, they will refund me - very kind!

Since I uninstalled everything (partly manually, the Pace and Motu uninstallers don't remove all files...), overall performance of the PowerBook is back to normal again.

(I completely agree with your previous post. The best way I found to export MachFive sounds is to select one Midi track and the MachFive instrument track, freeze it, and move the frozen track to a new stereo track; repeat for each Midi track. Clumsy.)


Frank

[jklimeck]

I am not sure this is related to the UVI engine, I woudl be interested to see hear about performance of Mach Fiive for Windows with disk streaming.


I do think this is related to no DFD( disk sreaming) on the Mac.

you go to load a sound bank with bunch of samples and you get this little speaker icon thing, and for all purposes your frozen and getting no work done, does Kontakt do this, Reason? No, not even on a G4.

MOTU has got to get on the ball something needs to be optimized with Mach Five, something is severely wrong with it on the Mac right now and I believe MOTU knows this and may explain MOTU's total silence or no mention of a Mac Update and DFD etc.

This post has been edited by jklimeck: Fri 7 May 2004, 01:03

[stratology]

Dave, do you have any information about the new Motu MX4 software synth - is this one developed by Motu or a third party?

Thanks,

Frank

[Dave Bourke]

I don't know about this one, Frank.

Sorry :-(