I have the 2010.5 version Audiophile and wouldn't trade the uncompressed waves for anything ... BiaB 32-bit browser samples drag and drop into 64bit Sonar without a hitch ... for multiple takes of instruments.

As per GuitarHacker, the stereo-16-bit uncompressed pedal steel takes are worth top dollar, IMHO ... as BB has mastered the art of pedal steel (to my peculiar ears).

But BB is this chord-progressionist's utopia: all the Real stuff, Real Drums, Guitars, etc. are recorded/generated into pristine stereo or double-mono 16-bit (uncompressed) wave files ... for seemless drag and drop into Sonar.

Try drag and dropping an Audiophile "Real-Drums" groove into Sonar and compare it to say Superior Drummer 2 MIDI performances.  My ears prefer the BB grooves (with low reverb) ... a no-brainer.

Like with Beatscape and purchaseable acid-loops, there's no looking back to garage MIDI performances (for me).

Unfortunately, the BiaB HD casings break down repeatedly for me.
Fortunately, BB had rushed to help me ... and tech and chat support is 10/10 top notch.

Today I spoke with sales on the new Audiophile:

1) It is $215 for the upgrade (which I bought ... incl HD and shipping).

2) It is < 1TByte due to a revamped BB engine that allows tempo variations up to about 40bpm ... to sound 'natural'.

3) It contains a few more pedal steel and gypsy styles or such ... nothing metal or hiphop though.

4) The HD may be removed/transfered into an E-Sata enclosure or removed for a 'naked' HD spot in your/my computer

Beagle

fwrend


Haha - yeah, looks like I just might resurrect my BIAB as well.  It's been years since I've upgraded and this looks like a good time.  Thanks Beaj (& please don't tell the wife)

Yeah, Mesh - but what's really funny about this is that I know his wife so I could actually tell her.
 
 
but I won't!

LOL - careful Beagle, your spelunking days might be numbered.

fwrend

Beagle

fwrend


Haha - yeah, looks like I just might resurrect my BIAB as well.  It's been years since I've upgraded and this looks like a good time.  Thanks Beaj (& please don't tell the wife)

Yeah, Mesh - but what's really funny about this is that I know his wife so I could actually tell her.


but I won't!

LOL - careful Beagle, your spelunking days might be numbered.

musicman100

Beagle


BIAB is stand alone only, it's not available as a VST.

but you can drag and drop directly from BIAB and Real Band directly into Sonar tracks.

I said that already

yes, I know.  and herb said AFTER you posted that he thought it was usable as a vst and I was just agreeing with you.

Well, I bit the bullet and ordered last night (my wife asked me what I wanted for Christmas so there you go ).  I really hope I can get some momentum behind it this time.  I bought it many years ago and quickly got overwhelmed.  I bought the EverythingPAK which comes with some tutorials and training so hopefully this will help.

kurrykid


Well, I bit the bullet and ordered last night (my wife asked me what I wanted for Christmas so there you go ).  I really hope I can get some momentum behind it this time.  I bought it many years ago and quickly got overwhelmed.  I bought the EverythingPAK which comes with some tutorials and training so hopefully this will help.

Just ask for some help.... I use it, I know Beagle and Robo use it and a few others I can't recall off hand.... just ask if you get stuck. I don't use all the features, just the ones that allow me to do what I do.

glad to help out!

Jonbouy

Although if somebody was tempted to dip their toe in the water for the first time and wasn't too interested in the audio 'Realtracks', I'd recommend the Megapak for $199 as it has all the style sets, melodists etc.

Actually, the Megapak includes 70 "RealTracks" according to this. Is this a good entry level package? I'm not going to pay $200 for midi files. This "pak" seems to cover the styles I'm interested in. I have some real world experience using elastique pro with Ableton Live and it can be very convincing, depending on how meticulously the audio files are sliced.
These must be 16 bit WMA's to fit into 7.1 GB, right? How good do they sound when you drag them into your host? Do they appear as WMA's or are they rendered to WAV? I've never used WMA in a DAW. I feel the need to bite on this one. Somebody please talk me out of it! There must be some downside (besides the money!).

Beagle


Sure, I would think that's a great entry level package!  the new audio stretching algorithm is VERY nice.  watch the video on the website about the new version and it gives a direct comparison of last year's stretching vs this year's stretching - it's night and day difference in quality!

yes, the files are WMAs.  I think they sound great when used in my projects.  if you want an example of what they sound like - here's one of my projects:  http://soundclick.com/share.cfm?id=9538520

see if you can tell me which instruments are MIDI driven samples, which are audio recordings and which are BIAB Real Tracks?

when you drag the WMA's (or import, either way) into sonar then sonar converts them into waves.

Yes, I've seen the video. Very compelling. And one also gets a feel of how busy the interface is. I suppose it's a fair price to pay. We can't have everyone turning into a wild gypsy jazz fiddler.


So, you run BB alongside Sonar(?) and sketch something out and then import each track into a corresponding track in Sonar. How do you capture the chord progressions?

Answer... the drums. Was the acoustic guitar BB? btw-Nice track! Pretty much seamless.

Anubis

Beagle


Sure, I would think that's a great entry level package!  the new audio stretching algorithm is VERY nice.  watch the video on the website about the new version and it gives a direct comparison of last year's stretching vs this year's stretching - it's night and day difference in quality!

yes, the files are WMAs.  I think they sound great when used in my projects.  if you want an example of what they sound like - here's one of my projects:  http://soundclick.com/share.cfm?id=9538520

see if you can tell me which instruments are MIDI driven samples, which are audio recordings and which are BIAB Real Tracks?

when you drag the WMA's (or import, either way) into sonar then sonar converts them into waves.

Yes, I've seen the video. Very compelling. And one also gets a feel of how busy the interface is. I suppose it's a fair price to pay. We can't have everyone turning into a wild gypsy jazz fiddler.


So, you run BB alongside Sonar(?) and sketch something out and then import each track into a corresponding track in Sonar. How do you capture the chord progressions?

Answer... the drums. Was the acoustic guitar BB? btw-Nice track! Pretty much seamless.

yes, I run it "alongside" sonar (for lack of a better word).  I use BIAB to help me create the chord structure from a melody, then I'll use it to create backing tracks for instruments I can't play, export those, both MIDI and real tracks, then import those into sonar.
 
In the example song:
 
Drums:  MIDI generated by BIAB and triggered sounds from Superior Drummer 2
Acoustic Guitar 1 (strummed):  BIAB Real Tracks
Acoustic Guitar 2 (fingerpicked):  BIAB Real Tracks
Bass:  BIAB Real Tracks
Electric Rhythm: BIAB Real Tracks
Organ:  played by me on yamaha motif xs, recorded midi, edited mistakes, sent back to motif and recorded audio out.
Choir:  sampled sounds from Kontakt
Vocals: the only true recorded Audio track.

I have not found that it does that with my exported MIDI tracks, but I admit that I've never exported a tuba track.  I'll look at BIAB when I get home tonite  that is - if the emporer doesn't have other things I am required to do tonight .  I'll see if there's a setting for making the velocity static or something that you may need to change.

also - consider posting this on the PG music forum.  they might be able to get you an answer right away.  they're not quite as active as the cake forums, but they are knowledgable.

http://www.pgmusic.com/ click on FORUMS

that is very interesting!  now you've got me really curious!  I'll have to go check out my previous midi tracks.

Honestly I don't use the MIDI output from BIAB that much any more.  sometimes I'll use the drum tracks and run them thru Superior, but mostly I use the real tracks when they're available, so it's been a while since I've used the MIDI tracks.

Ok.  This is the thread I started on the PG music forum.  If you get beyond the Tuba jokes, I think that they are saying "no **** sherlock" to the velocity question.

http://www.pgmusic.com/forums/showflat.php?Cat=0&Number=302760&an=0&page=0&gonew=1#UNREAD

Beagle.  Can you help me with why you use Real Band.  I thought that it was a sequencer.  I dont understand how it can intelligently assign the right velocity to music.  Should that not happen at the composition stage within BIAB or be done manually by the listener?  Not sure I understand why it would be better than velocity assigning plugins within Sonar.  I have avoided these because they cannot surely figure out which notes should be aggressive and which should not.

That said, I have been working on a Dixieland track and imported a midi tuba track into Sonar. That is where I noticed that within a given Verse or Chrous all notes have the same velocity. The only difference is that the Chorus parts have a higher velocity than verses where playing is louder. Otherwise all notes in the verses for example had an 87 velocity.

It depends on the underlying style you are using that you are basing your composition on, some 'Styles' are better than others and have more variance in velocity and other midi variables, it does actually support quite a few standard midi features.

What I often do is just create the phrasing I'm trying to achieve with nice velocity variations in a known scale then set it up in 'convert midi to style' and either add the result to an existing style or create a new one.  Then I can impose whatever chord progression I like on it. 

It works great on horn and string phrases as you can define the intervals used on your own section.

As a creation tool it really is limitless there's a lot of cheesy stuff included in the bundles though and I've found that feeding BIAB some killer 2-4 and 8 bar phrases this way can give you a lot more flexibility scope and originality, and it's far easier to do than it is to explain.

Realband too used with it as has already been mentioned is really handy for knocking the basic layout into shape before taking it all further down the line.