Noatikl FAQ
- Is there an upgrade from Noatikl 1 to Noatikl 2?
- Why are you changing to an "annual product cycle"?
- Will there be more coming in the Noatikl 2 product cycle?
- Where can I hear some example music created with Noatikl?
- How do I install Noatikl?
- I've downloaded the software, but when trying to install get a message saying the download has been corrupted?
- When I install Noatikl VSTi on Windows, why can't my host software find the plug-in?
- When I launch Noatikl on Mac either as standalone or as VST within a host and try to open a new file it quits (and forces the host to quit also)?
- I want to get started quickly - where are the video tutorials?
- Where is the manual / user guide?
- What Sequencers support interactive MIDI?
- Should I use the standalone or plugin version?
- I've got keyboard problems with Noatikl VSTi under Sonar 6...
- I've got timing problems with Noatikl VSTi under Sonar...
- Do you have a VST MIDI Effect for Cubase, or a DXi for Sonar/Cakewalk?
- Directing MIDI out
- I hear silence, help!
- Why can't I attach the Noatikl AU to my Logic track?
- Why isn't my Product Key accepted?
- Can I run Noatikl under Linux?
- Is there an upgrade from Noatikl 1 to Noatikl 2?
Special offer for customers who purchased Noatikl 1.x ON OR AFTER Nov 1st 2011: Windows user - we will provide you complimentary product licence keys for the Noatikl 2 Desktop Standalone / Audio Plugin versions; Mac user - we will provide you a complimentary product licence key for the Noatikl 2 Desktop Audio Plugin versions and a promo code for Noatikl 2 on the Mac App store. However, you must contact us by August 31st 2012 if you would like that, and provide your order details, country of residence and contact email address. Please allow us a few days to generate & send out the keys!
If you are an existing customer who purchased Noatikl 1.x before November 1st 2011 and want to know why we have changed our approach to upgrades, which means there is no special upgrade to Noatikl 2, then please read our rationale for a change to an annual product cycle. You have not lost your "loyalty bonus": we are just changing how it is delivered!
» top - Why are you changing to an "annual product cycle"?
We have always strived to deliver value for money with sensible, affordable pricing plus free updates. Unfortunately markets and models are changing ever faster, and we are trying our best to keep up with these.
In respect of software distribution there are significant changes happening (e.g. Apple Mac App Store [MAS] and Apple iOS App Store) which make it impossible to match customers with purchases. This spells the death knell for a paid for upgrade. Besides, even if we could match customers with purchases, there is simply no MAS/App Store upgrade mechanism. And, as yet, we have no idea what model Microsoft are going to run with with Windows8 and we don't want to penalise Mac users to the advantage of Windows users, or vice versa - a tricky balancing act . So, to recap, right now on the MAS / App Store the only way to release an upgrade that you want to charge for is to release a new product version and charge for that. There is no other option.
In addition, expectations from the mobile market is starting to impact the desktop software market. In mobile, it seems that many people expect more and more to be free or to cost less and less, and to have lots of free updates and feature extensions all for a purchase price which is the equivalent of a cup of coffee or two (or even nothing at all!). If you develop a big mass market game with lots of in-app purchases or advertising (the "freemium model") and have millions of customers and are venture capital funded(!) then maybe that can work for you. If, however, you develop *powerful* creativity tools like ours for a relatively small number of users and where development time is as costly as it has ever been, if not more so, then it just does not work if you only ever charge a little, and charge only once in the life of a product. We think that mobile tool developers who do continue to develop and extend them are now realising that you cannot rely on selling into an infinite market (just see how many apps rarely get any further work done on them). And, for tools like ours, in-app-purchase may not necessarily be the right or only route. Don't get us wrong, we love doing free updates and will continue to do so, but these do not help fund further development work or product extensions.
So, after a lot of thought/deliberation, and coinciding with the release of Noatikl 2, we have finally decided to bring into play a new, simpler annual product lifecycle model (we call it a "Fullgrade" model) that takes from both mobile and desktop worlds and bears some comparison to the release of a new film sequel. We are doing it because, simply put, if we don't change our commercial model, it makes it much harder for us to justify developing major new versions and features and that would not benefit those of you who enjoy our products.
In short, we will aim to bring our a new major version roughly every year and charge for that version as were it a new product. The price of the full product will be less than it would otherwise have been. You can skip major versions, it is up to you!.
The majority of existing Noatikl users are NOT losing the benefit of loyalty as they get the new version at, in effect, the previous upgrade price (see below)! It is just that new users get lucky - please be happy for them.
The main features of our new product/pricing model* are:- We are going to move to roughly an annual product cycle for major product versions of both mobile and desktop products, where updates during the product cycle will continue to be free, as now and as expected.
- If you buy a licence to use a particular major version, you can generally continue to use it for as long as you want to (this is called perpetual licensing). If you want to skip a product cycle or more, then that is up to you!
- Desktop Audio Plugins are being separated from Desktop Standalone versions (as we have already done with Mixtikl 5).
- This is primarily because Desktop Audio Plugins cannot be sold via the Mac App Store and we do not want to disadvantage Mac users when it comes to pricing.
- Major new desktop products will be priced at a discount to what we would otherwise have charged new users for them were we not to adopt our new model. The balancing factor is that there will then be no special upgrade pricing from previous major versions.
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Noatikl:
- In line with delivering value for money, over the years we gradually reduced the price of Noatikl V1 to $99 and with an upgrade price from plugin to standalone of $50. There had been many free updates up to and including Noatikl V1.8.
- We were going to have charged new users $70 for Noatikl 2 Desktop Standalone and $70 for the Noatikl 2 Desktop Audio Plugins, but these are instead now priced at $49.99 each. If you are an existing customer, then choose which version you want and get it at, in effect, what was the previous upgrade price (and if you are a Windows user you can buy both together at a discount, too).
- The majority of desktop users seem to use either a standalone version or an audio plugin version; few seem to use or require both. This change, therefore, should (compared to the previous model) be financially neutral for most existing users who wish to get (i.e. "upgrade to") Noatikl 2. If you are a user that does use both, get the one you use most often and see how you get on with it. If you find you like it a lot, you can then make the decision whether or not to get the other version at that time.
- A major benefit of this new model is (we hope!) that the lower initial price will encourage new users into the fold. The new approach also fits properly with the new mobile and desktop store (e.g. Apple's App Stores) models and it encourages development of new features and further major versions.
- So, the majority of existing Noatikl users are NOT losing the benefit of loyalty as they get the new version at, in effect, the previous upgrade price (see below)! It is just that new users get lucky, too.
-
- Major new mobile versions will be new products requiring purchase.
* We of course reserve the right to change our business model at any time, as circumstances dictate!
» top - We are going to move to roughly an annual product cycle for major product versions of both mobile and desktop products, where updates during the product cycle will continue to be free, as now and as expected.
- Will there be more coming in the Noatikl 2 product cycle?
Noatikl 2 represents a big and exciting step forward for Noatikl, and we will be adding further features during the V2 product cycle, as well as making further improvements.
We think that most, if not the vast majority of people, will find the changes we have already made in Noatikl 2 will make a big difference to the results they can get from Noatikl and the enjoyment they can have with it.
» top - Where can I hear some example music created with Noatikl?
See the examples page or the the tutorials page for how to find some great examples of Noatikl in action!
» top - How do I install Noatikl?
See the installing Noatikl page for how to install the various Noatikl variants on your system!
» top - I've downloaded the software, but when trying to install get a message saying the download has been corrupted?
In this sort of case, it almost certainly means that your Web Browser file cache is corrupted. You'll need to refresh/clear this cache, and try the download again.
» top - When I install Noatikl VSTi on Windows, why can't my host software find the plug-in?
Almost certainly, the issue is that you've not told your sequencer(s) to scan the appropriate folder for the Noatikl VSTi. The folder in question is (depending on your system):
- c:\Program Files\VSTPlugins (32-bit Noatikl VSTi: Windows XP, or 32-bit Windows 7/Vista)
- c:\Program Files (x86)\VSTPlugins (32-bit Noatikl VSTi: Windows XP, or 32-bit Windows 7/Vista)
- c:\Program Files\VSTPlugins (64-bit Noatikl VSTi: 64-bit Windows 7/Vista)
- When I launch Noatikl on Mac either as standalone or as VST within a host and try to open a new file it quits (and forces the host to quit also)?
This is the result of an oddity we've seen in some Macs. Please try the following simple steps.
- Try this first
- Go to "System Preferences"
- Select "Displays"
- Choose the "Color" Tab
- Uncheck the "Show profile for this display only"
- Select the "sRGB IEC61966-2.1" profile
- If the above doesn't work, then please try this:
- Select Options menu
- Select "Reset Column Widths"
- Try this first
- I want to get started quickly - where are the video tutorials?
See the tutorials page for a lot of video tutorials on using noatikl!
» top - Where is the manual / user guide?
- What Sequencers support interactive MIDI?
- Should I use the standalone or plugin version?
- I've got keyboard problems with Noatikl VSTi under Sonar 6...
Sonar 6 currently (as of Sonar 6.2) has buggy handling of keyboard events for VSTis and the Noatikl plug-ins are affected by this to some extent under Sonar 6!
The symptoms are that when using the Noatikl VSTi in Sonar 6.... various keys don't respond until you release them; and then also appear in UPPER CASE rather than lower case. These keys include the following: abcdefghiklmnopqstuvxz ...
We have logged this as a bug with Cakewalk. If it annoys you (and we're sure it will!), then do please feel free to ask Cakewalk when they'll get around to fixing the problem!
We think the reason is that historically not many plug-ins have great support for keyboard handling. We've worked hard to put great keyboard handling in Noatikl; and some operations such as naming Voices etc. of course rely on typing on your keyboard.
Note that in Sonar 6, the VST host window includes a new button on the top right of its toolbar, which says on the tooltip "Give all keystrokes to Plug-in". However, enabling this seems to make no difference at all to the plug-in behaviour...!
If you have problems where, for example, you want to name a Voice with lower case 'a' characters, but keeping seeing 'A' instead, then consider using the standalone version of Noatikl to change the name before re-opening in Noatikl VSTi under Sonar!
» top - I've got timing problems with Noatikl VSTi under Sonar...
Sonar's VSTi host adaptor implementation has (historically) a pretty sloppy interpretation of MIDI event times generated by VSTi plug-ins such as Noatikl. Current versions of Sonar may have addressed this, of course.
If you are experiencing this problem, consider sending MIDI data from Noatikl VSTi to Sonar via a MIDI Yoke port, rather than sending them directly through the MIDI sequencer pipeline. Believe it or not, this gives far better timing accuracy when you hear Noatikl's music render by your Sonar-hosted software synths!
» top - Do you have a VST MIDI Effect for Cubase, or a DXi for Sonar/Cakewalk?
No: You should use the VSTi plug-in.
» top - Directing MIDI out
If you want Noatikl to drive a MIDI output device with MIDI data, you will first need to specify the MIDI output device to which Noatikl sends its MIDI data.
If you are running within Cubase or other sequencers which do not support MIDI routing from one VST to another then, you must, select any value other than "Sequencer MIDI Pipeline" (otherwise you will just hear silence). If you are using Sonar, Reaper, or some other VSTi Host which allows MIDI data to be routed from one VSTi into another one, then you may select any of the available options though you are most likely to want to select the "Sequencer MIDI Pipeline" option.
Mac users using the Noatikl Audio Unit (AU) - you must route the output via an IAC port to a suitable synth device.
See the installing Noatikl page for how further information on how to configure the various Noatikl variants on your system!
» top - I hear silence, help!
See this entry in the Noatikl User Guide!
» top - Why can't I attach the Noatikl AU to my Logic track?
You need to attach the Noatikl AU to an instrument track, and NOT an audio track. If you try adding to an audio track, the Noatikl AU won't be listed!
» top - Why isn't my Product Key accepted?
If you purchased a licence to for a specific Noatikl plugin (e.g. Noatikl VST), then you have to enter your Product Key into that same Noatikl plugin as it will not be accepted by Noatikl Standalone. We have an upgrade available if you would like to move to Noatikl Full Product.
If you are entering your Product Key into a plugin on a Windows PC, then you might need to ensure that you are running the host software (e.g. Reaper 3) "as Administrator" in order to get the product key to stick.
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