Anyone received Notion3 yet?

Re:Anyone received Notion3 yet? (ducatibruce2)

Sat, 21 Nov 2009 01:57:06 GMT

You got a Sonar project into Notion 3? What hoops did you have to jump through?

In Sonar save as midi file,
In Notion import midi file, convert from sequencer format to notation format, insert all VSTs used in Sonar into Notion tracks/staffs, rename Notion tracks/staffs back to what they were when in Sonar , re edit all midi note data to correct timing errors during conversion, reinsert all midi CCs lost during import.
Return to Sonar, mute all tracks copied to Notion (to avoid duplication and annoying timing error induced stutters) hit play in transport & wonder why it sounds so totally different to before it left Sonar.

Seamless integration indeed.

AFAIK you can't use the Notion instruments in Sonar as they're not VSTs but inbuilt to Notion & Notion doesnt support midi over ReWire.

Re:Anyone received Notion3 yet? (Crg)

Fri, 20 Nov 2009 20:53:46 GMT

ducatibruce2

From Cakewalk's promo email "Elite Packs for Composers" rec'd today

Notion 3 integrates seamlessly with SONAR via ReWire so you will not have to feel that you are having to maintain two separate projects in order to have both your sequence and your printed notation.
(my emphasis added)

Given the hoops that you have to jump through to get a Sonar project into Notion and that you have to, in fact, maintain two distinct projects it is certainly not "seamless" and you would have to be delusional to feel you weren't maintaining two separate projects - I feel the promo is very misleading - I have emailed Cake about it - but do really feel disappointed that they dont even seem to have tried the product(or asked the developers any questions) before writting such misleading copy and taking people's money.

I know that there's at least one disgruntled Sonar user who has asked Cake for their money back & been refused (http://forum.notionmusic.com/viewtopic.php?p=1436#p1436)

Me, I've given up on Notion for now & will wait to see what future updates bring (& reaffirm the "don't commit to buy as yet unreleased software" no matter how trustworthy you think the seller may be" mantra)

You got a Sonar project into Notion 3? What hoops did you have to jump through? Did you record with the Notion 3 instrument installed in Sonar? Give us the skinny Bruce.

Re:Anyone received Notion3 yet? (Crg)

Fri, 20 Nov 2009 20:49:22 GMT

Susan G

Hi Bruce-

Me, I've given up on Notion for now & will wait to see what future updates bring

Thanks for that report. I'll say again, "Ouch!". It's hard to imagine CW didn't try it before offering a Notion3 bundle, but then again it wasn't released at that point and maybe they jumped the gun based on a beta. Who knows, but that's disappointing.

OTOH, if N3 doesn't fill the gap adequately, maybe that'll encourage CW to step up development on their native notation? Wishful thinking? Yes!

Thanks again-

-Susan

I haven't contacted Cakewalk yet but from Bruces post it doesn't sound like they have any answers either. Notion support didn't have a clue as to what interface I was using, the V700R, and didn't seem to have a clue about whether the ASIO drivers for Sonar worked with Notion 3. Nor did they answer me when I asked them if their Demo scores output Midi to the Notion instrument installed in Sonar. While I'm just getting started with Notion 3 and haven't had time lately to try entering my own Midi and recording using the instrument , and actually using the editing features in Notion 3, these are simple questions I have asked Notion 3 related to the functionality of the product in use with Sonar. I bought it in the hopes it would rewire to Sonar in both directions. Maybe it's my computer and OS, but the ball ain't bouncing here. Who dropped the ball?

Re:Anyone received Notion3 yet? (Susan G)

Fri, 20 Nov 2009 16:35:02 GMT

Hi Bruce-

Me, I've given up on Notion for now & will wait to see what future updates bring

Thanks for that report. I'll say again, "Ouch!". It's hard to imagine CW didn't try it before offering a Notion3 bundle, but then again it wasn't released at that point and maybe they jumped the gun based on a beta. Who knows, but that's disappointing.

OTOH, if N3 doesn't fill the gap adequately, maybe that'll encourage CW to step up development on their native notation? Wishful thinking? Yes!

Thanks again-

-Susan

Re:Anyone received Notion3 yet? (ducatibruce2)

Fri, 20 Nov 2009 16:01:14 GMT

From Cakewalk's promo email "Elite Packs for Composers" rec'd today

Notion 3 integrates seamlessly with SONAR via ReWire so you will not have to feel that you are having to maintain two separate projects in order to have both your sequence and your printed notation.

(my emphasis added)

Given the hoops that you have to jump through to get a Sonar project into Notion and that you have to, in fact, maintain two distinct projects it is certainly not "seamless" and you would have to be delusional to feel you weren't maintaining two separate projects - I feel the promo is very misleading - I have emailed Cake about it - but do really feel disappointed that they dont even seem to have tried the product(or asked the developers any questions) before writting such misleading copy and taking people's money.

I know that there's at least one disgruntled Sonar user who has asked Cake for their money back & been refused (http://forum.notionmusic.com/viewtopic.php?p=1436#p1436)

Me, I've given up on Notion for now & will wait to see what future updates bring (& reaffirm the "don't commit to buy as yet unreleased software" no matter how trustworthy you think the seller may be" mantra)

Re:Anyone received Notion3 yet? (Crg)

Wed, 11 Nov 2009 21:10:50 GMT

Well, I've installed Notion 3 and I am having some problems. When Notion is run in standalone, the Notion outputs don't match the outputs on the V700R. Notion outputs 5-6 output to V700R outputs 1-2, Notion outputs 7-8 output to V700R 3-4 and so on to the Notion 11-12 to V700R 7-8.
When trying to play back a demo score with the Notion Instrument installed in Sonar 8.5, I get a red lined Meter in Notion upon opening Notion as the slave and bursts of sound when play is pressed in Notion. I can get rid of the red lined meter in Notion 3 by muting certain tracks in the arrangement and double clicking the meter for that specific track-send or the main. As a Rewire plugin, Notion doesn't seem to send Midi to the Notion Instrument in Sonar when playing a demo score.
Any thoughts or solutions to this problem?
I started a Notion thread in the Software category if anyone would like to post there.

Re:Anyone received Notion3 yet? (ducatibruce2)

Wed, 11 Nov 2009 07:21:34 GMT

@dave4761- I haven't seen the issue with Notion refusing to die. About the onl;y suggestion I can make is to try power cycling the interface & see if Notion dies.

@everyone else - we're now up to Notion 3.03. On the copy protection front Notion staff are reluctant to discuss the copy protection scheme & refer most enquiries about how it works to the scheme's authors Nalpeiron. There was a Notion staff post on their forum that said that the copy protection will not prevent a disk clone copy being written but that reloading that clone may require a reauthorisation. I can't find the post now - but don't read too much into it the search function is about as reliable as here.

Here's a response I rec'd from Notion's tech support after asking various questions.

1. As far as things go with Kontact, we have tested on version 4 since it is the latest. We have not had the opportunity to test on older versions of Kontact.

2. I am not aware of a limit to the amount of VST's that NOTION can display.

3. Right now it is not possible for customer's to modify or develop additional presets

4. Right now it is not possible to route MIDI date to another program via ReWire, only audio data.

5. It is not possible to modify the default templates in NOTION 3

6. You can create your own templates by setting up a blank score exactly how you want it and saving it.

7. MIDI import as well as MIDI entry are currently being worked on and should be implemented in an update very soon.

8. Since Nalpeiron is a security company, their secrets are very well kept. We can't even be 100 percent sure that they do anything to the MBR. I have spoken to people who have worked for other security companies and almost all of them alter the MBR in some way. Here is a scenario: You put NOTION 3 on your computer and the 14 day demo expires. You uninstall NOTION 3 as well as any Nalpeiron components and reinstall the software. The demo is still expired. I have seen some companies have their security set to where you reformat a machine and you still cannot get back into demo mode.

9. The astsrv.exe service is part of the Nalpeiron security. It is set to "automatic" so it does run at logon. You are welcome to start and stop the service manually if you would like. The only problem is that if you install another program that has an older version of the Nalpeiron security on it and the service is not running, the older version will over-right the newer and you will not be able to open NOTION 3 unless you remove the service and run an update. If the service is running, nothing can over-right the file and you should not run into any problems.

Let me know if the questions I was asking arent clear ;)

Re:Anyone received Notion3 yet? (dave4761)

Thu, 05 Nov 2009 09:52:45 GMT

I just downloaded the Notion 3 demo yesterday. I am presently using Overture, which is likely a dead product at this point and looking to move on. Though Overture is a little bit clunky to set up, the workflow was very easy and intuitive for me and when I bought it provided the VST integration that I was looking for.

Perhaps, it's the Notion 3 demo that's a problem, but I've had lots of problems with the program just in the 12 hours I've been trying it. Perhaps it is also my system, but I run Sonar 8.5, FL Studio 9, over ture and a whole host of new VST's without major problems.

First, a big one. When I shut the program off it doesn't turn off the ASIO driver to my M audio sound card. The driver is locked up for any program looking to use the driver and requires a reboot to free it. The notion3.exe program always stays functioning in the background and will not shut. Anybody has an easy fix?

Secondly, it sets up staffs very quickly with my Garritan Aria, however, if you want to directly choose the samples you wish to use, it is just as much, if not more, of a pain in the butt than overture to do. If you want to access the vst menu directly, again, not as easy as you'd like.

Thirdly, I've had lots of problems with the feature I'd been looking most forward to trying and that's the undocked entry palette. I find I lost access to the undocked palate with the typical right click, particularly at the top end of the score, requiring me to dock it through the view menu to gain access and then to undock. This occurred when trying to edit and add markings at the top of the score, as well. This seems to be a trouble area.. I also had problems when locking the palette, again towards the upper end of the score page, where it completely locked and I could no longer get rid of it. Then I thought if I docked it, it would disappear and i ended up with two entry palettes on the page and one stuck in position.

There have been several other minor irritations, but only in the few hours that I'd used it.

If I am doing something wrong, quite possible, I'd love for somebody to let me know so that I can continue to evaluate this program for purchase.

Dave

Re:Anyone received Notion3 yet? (Susan G)

Wed, 21 Oct 2009 08:56:52 GMT

Hi Bruce-

ducatibruce2

Hi Susan,

Notion's Rewire seems to support transport control & audio out of Notion & into Sonar but not midi in or out. I have posted a question at Notion's forum & am waiting clarification.

Using Notion to replace Sonar's Staff View involves - save as midi in Sonar, import midi file in Notion (which opens in "Sequencer View" (very similar to to PRV) then convert to notation in Notion.

The midi import in Notion introduces some timing discrepancies (apparently, from their forums, Notion is working on this) and the convert to Notation (which seems to apply quantising and imposes a "granularity" as the "as played" midi is converted resulting in further timing discrepancies. Getting it back into Sonar is a save as midi in Notion & import midi in Sonar excercise (though I haven't got this far yet).

Using Rewire in Sonar to control play of the original track & the same Notion track simultaneously (using the same soft synth & patch) at various points in the conversion process reveals timing wandering around to varying degrees.

Because Notion doesn't (seem to) support midi in or out via Rewire you have to insert VSTs or external synths (max 4 ports) inside Notion, doing this changes the Staff name (& the track name when midi is imported back to Sonar) automatically to the synths name (eg Dimension Pro) rather than the probably meaningful name it had when it left Sonar (eg Piano). You can manually change the names in Notion but the default auto change is a pain & extra work.

There's some Notion tutorial vids here http://www.notionmusic.com/support/tutorials.html (mainly Rewire setup) & a copy of Notion's help file/manual pdf here http://www.notionmusic.com/support/pdfs/Help.pdf

HTH

edit for typos

Ouch! Export/Import .mid files? I can do that with Finale already. That's no kind of integration! I'll be interested to hear what you get back from the forum on your Rewire MIDI question.

Thanks, and I'll check out those videos.

-Susan

Re:Anyone received Notion3 yet? (vicsant)

Wed, 21 Oct 2009 08:00:11 GMT

I have to wonder though why this thread got moved to here?
jackn2mpu

a coverup....perhaps?

Re:Anyone received Notion3 yet? (jackn2mpu)

Wed, 21 Oct 2009 07:57:01 GMT

ducatibruce:
Thanks for your efforts in keeping us up to date on this. I have to wonder though why this thread got moved to here?

Re:Anyone received Notion3 yet? (ducatibruce2)

Tue, 20 Oct 2009 20:27:40 GMT

Hi Susan,

Notion's Rewire seems to support transport control & audio out of Notion & into Sonar but not midi in or out. I have posted a question at Notion's forum & am waiting clarification.

Using Notion to replace Sonar's Staff View involves - save as midi in Sonar, import midi file in Notion (which opens in "Sequencer View" (very similar to to PRV) then convert to notation in Notion.

The midi import in Notion introduces some timing discrepancies (apparently, from their forums, Notion is working on this) and the convert to Notation (which seems to apply quantising and imposes a "granularity" as the "as played" midi is converted resulting in further timing discrepancies. Getting it back into Sonar is a save as midi in Notion & import midi in Sonar excercise (though I haven't got this far yet).

Using Rewire in Sonar to control play of the original track & the same Notion track simultaneously (using the same soft synth & patch) at various points in the conversion process reveals timing wandering around to varying degrees.

Because Notion doesn't (seem to) support midi in or out via Rewire you have to insert VSTs or external synths (max 4 ports) inside Notion, doing this changes the Staff name (& the track name when midi is imported back to Sonar) automatically to the synths name (eg Dimension Pro) rather than the probably meaningful name it had when it left Sonar (eg Piano). You can manually change the names in Notion but the default auto change is a pain & extra work.

There's some Notion tutorial vids here http://www.notionmusic.com/support/tutorials.html (mainly Rewire setup) & a copy of Notion's help file/manual pdf here http://www.notionmusic.com/support/pdfs/Help.pdf

HTH

edit for typos

Re:Anyone received Notion3 yet? (Susan G)

Tue, 20 Oct 2009 12:02:56 GMT

Hi Bruce-

It's not even close to being "within Sonar".

Can you expand on that a bit? With Notion rewired, you don't get instant updates regardless of where you make changes, or do you but there's more to it than that?

I wish there was a video of this combo in use...

Thanks-

-Susan

Re:Anyone received Notion3 yet? (ducatibruce2)

Tue, 20 Oct 2009 11:40:18 GMT

vicsant

Ok, for those of you who now have the "Notion" option within Sonar.....are you happy with it?

...is there still a need for Cakewalk to improve staff/notation within Sonar itself?

A resounding no & yes, respectively.

It's not even close to being "within Sonar".

edit to add: Hmm, I see we've been moved to the Estore forum.

Re:Anyone received Notion3 yet? (funkycornwall)

Sun, 18 Oct 2009 05:47:22 GMT

Yes I would say if you are serious about printing music out then Sibelius is the way to go. With Sibelius you also have a generous selection of quality sounds included - orchestral and pop/jazz. You also have the rewire capability although only rewiring as slave whereas Notion 3 can rewire slave and host. Sibelius is a very mature application and is very intuitive to use. The best thing is to try out the demo and if you have an exisiting notation package they may be able to offer a cross-grade deal if you enquire.

Re:Anyone received Notion3 yet? (Nick P)

Sat, 17 Oct 2009 20:30:25 GMT

funkycornwall

I have been trying Notion 3 on its own and rewiring. Printing-wise it cannot compare to something like Sibelius (or Finale) so if professional level printing is required then you are better advised to purchase Sibelius. Sibelius also offers rewire and can be used with all your vst instruments but is a lot more expensive. I tried the realtime recording functions in Notion 3 and in notation mode I found the results disappointing. If you play some music in then you obviously want it to be played back exactly as you recorded it. However there were all kinds of timing glitches from Notion 3. I then tried it using 'sequencer-staff' mode and this was slightly better but still not an accurate portrayal of what I had recorded. I tried changing my buffer-size but it made little difference. Obviously if you put your notes in step-time either with computer keyboard or midi keyboard then it plays back fine and as you place the dynamic markings these are also played back accurately. What many people want is to be able to swap seamlessly between piano-roll editing and notation editing with an always faithful playback of your timing and I don't think Notion 3 offers this at present. The holy grail for notation users is to be able to do all their editing of music with all its timing subtleties within a notation view and unfortunately this is still out of reach. I suppose Cubase has something approaching it. SONAR still needs to address this shortcoming rather than rely on another program.

So you would recommend Sibelius over Notion, price not taken in to consideration?

Re:Anyone received Notion3 yet? (funkycornwall)

Sat, 17 Oct 2009 05:44:14 GMT

I have been trying Notion 3 on its own and rewiring. Printing-wise it cannot compare to something like Sibelius (or Finale) so if professional level printing is required then you are better advised to purchase Sibelius. Sibelius also offers rewire and can be used with all your vst instruments but is a lot more expensive. I tried the realtime recording functions in Notion 3 and in notation mode I found the results disappointing. If you play some music in then you obviously want it to be played back exactly as you recorded it. However there were all kinds of timing glitches from Notion 3. I then tried it using 'sequencer-staff' mode and this was slightly better but still not an accurate portrayal of what I had recorded. I tried changing my buffer-size but it made little difference. Obviously if you put your notes in step-time either with computer keyboard or midi keyboard then it plays back fine and as you place the dynamic markings these are also played back accurately. What many people want is to be able to swap seamlessly between piano-roll editing and notation editing with an always faithful playback of your timing and I don't think Notion 3 offers this at present. The holy grail for notation users is to be able to do all their editing of music with all its timing subtleties within a notation view and unfortunately this is still out of reach. I suppose Cubase has something approaching it. SONAR still needs to address this shortcoming rather than rely on another program.

Re:Anyone received Notion3 yet? (vicsant)

Sat, 17 Oct 2009 00:59:08 GMT

Ok, for those of you who now have the "Notion" option within Sonar.....are you happy with it?

...is there still a need for Cakewalk to improve staff/notation within Sonar itself?

Re:Anyone received Notion3 yet? (pbognar)

Fri, 16 Oct 2009 17:25:24 GMT

vicsant

Is Notion Cakewalk's answer to all our previous staff/notation requests?

My gut tells me that is the answer for at least the next year.

The Notion solution addresses the needs of those who wanted better print output and those who compose primarily using notation (although, there is some bouncing back and forth between Notion and Sonar).

However, the Notion package does nothing for those who want more accurate integrated MIDI notation editing (yeah - that's me...).

My gut also tells me that Cakewalk are a proud bunch and would like to address this at some point, whether it's in version 9 (or whatever they decide to call it) or in the successor to Sonar.

If the staff editor is so ingrained into the existing code base, perhaps the only way is to include better notation in the next generation product...

Re:Anyone received Notion3 yet? (jackn2mpu)

Fri, 16 Oct 2009 06:49:44 GMT

Bruce:
The feeling I got from reading the cites you mentioned was that one could make a drive image but it's in the restoration that things would not work. I guess things would depend on how actually the drive imaging software works - if it makes a true sector-for-sector copy or what.

Vicsant:
I would have to say yes. After all, why put any effort into something when somebody else is doing the work? Of course, the less sarcastic answer would be: if one doesn't have the expertise to fix a problem, have an outside source provide a solution (sort of like th way these forums work). And it's become obvious that reading between the lines of what Cake people have said they don't have the expertise to fix/correct the notation code. They say it's too deep in the code to fix, but come on- they rewrote a huge chunk of Sonar for version 8.0 with the reworking of the audio engine.

Re:Anyone received Notion3 yet? (vicsant)

Fri, 16 Oct 2009 01:37:04 GMT

Is Notion Cakewalk's answer to all our previous staff/notation requests?

Re:Anyone received Notion3 yet? (ducatibruce2)

Thu, 15 Oct 2009 21:08:55 GMT

jackn2mpu - I downloaded the trial of Acronis Home 2010 & it seems to make a drive image OK - though the test is to reinstall it successfully (something I'm not keen to test just to see)

Re:Anyone received Notion3 yet? (jackn2mpu)

Thu, 15 Oct 2009 17:40:11 GMT

ducatibruce:
Thank you for the heads up. I (and I'm sure many others do as well) depend on Norton Ghost to backup my Windows machines. Really sad - as bad as a dongle. I read the cites you mention and wow - talk about paranoia!

Re:Anyone received Notion3 yet? (ducatibruce2)

Thu, 15 Oct 2009 12:48:15 GMT

Just a heads up - it appears that Notion's copy protection (Nalpeiron Highend Service) modifies the Windows MasterBootRecord at install - this may cause issues with some bootloaders (see http://forum.notionmusic.com/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=249 ) and may have some implications for disk imaging backups & vitrual machine users (see http://www.internetactivation.com/HelpDocs/NalpeironDocumentation/default.aspx?pageid=The_use_of_Ghost-blocking_and_limitations & http://www.internetactivation.com/HelpDocs/NalpeironDocumentation/default.aspx?pageid=The_use_of_VMware-blocking_and_limitations )

Re:Anyone received Notion3 yet? (Mitch_I)

Thu, 08 Oct 2009 14:10:55 GMT

WT,
Thanks. That's helpful information.

I'm assuming that with the Rewire connection to Sonar, you play a few notes and they appear in Sonar as well as in Notion, while the integration between Sonar and PrintMusic would be through import/export. I'm trying to figure out how much the Rewire integration is worth to my workflow.

Mitch I.

Re:Anyone received Notion3 yet? (ducatibruce2)

Thu, 08 Oct 2009 10:33:53 GMT

regedit provided no solutions to my "issues" & the atvserv.exe service is definitely a registration/copy protection process - disable it & Notion considers itself to be unregistered. The process does a little I/O each time a Notion project is opened but otherwise consumes very little resources (but it's still a process & I dont like permanent processes hanging around waiting for me to use whatever it is they're there for.)

I guess I'm off to Notion support :)

Re:Anyone received Notion3 yet? (jackn2mpu)

Thu, 08 Oct 2009 08:37:15 GMT

Still no demo version up at Notion's site. I wonder if the demo will have the same issues Ducatibruce found?

Re:Anyone received Notion3 yet? (WT)

Thu, 08 Oct 2009 02:23:50 GMT

I am a long time Finale user and I recommended PrintMusic for a friend of mine. Recently I had a chance to work with PM 2009 one afternoon in his office, putting together a worship aid for his church. PrintMusic is the most popular product in MakeMusic's notation line and it was easy to see why. The new version (2010) has the most important features from Finale. Unless one is doing professional engraving of orchestral scores or creating worksheets for students, it will probably be enough for the majority of users.

One thing it does not have, however, is the Rewire capabilities of Notion 3. If that is not a deal breaker, I would recommend you download the fully functional demo of PrintMusic 10 and see how you like it. Here is a link for the software: http://finalemusic.com/PrintMusic/ Be sure to check the "Compare Features" to see what it has and what it does not compared to the other notation products the company sells.

I hope this information is helpful.

Re:Anyone received Notion3 yet? (Mitch_I)

Wed, 07 Oct 2009 20:30:39 GMT

Before Cakewalk announced the Notion deal, I was just about to buy PrintMusic, the $99 version of Finale. It seems to have everything I need, whereas Notion seems to be a huge overlap with Sonar and my soft synths, which include GPO. But since I'm new to software notation, maybe

by far the best work-flow of any notation program I ever worked with

is the most important factor. If a notation program is too much hassle to learn and use, I probably won't get into it.

Has anybody used PrintMusic? Any thoughts on this decision?

Mitch I.

Re:Anyone received Notion3 yet? (Susan G)

Wed, 07 Oct 2009 20:10:27 GMT

BTW, I already mentioned this somewhere, but Notion also offers crossgrades for $99.00: "Qualifying competitive products include Finale (2007 or later); Sibelius (4 or later); Encore (5 or later); or Overture (4 or later)." See http://www.notionmusic.co..pport/upgrade_home.html

I can't afford anything right now, but I'll be interested to try the demo when it comes out.

-Susan