New Pro Tools HD Interfaces

oops, hi for SSL guys with their MADI, by the way, ssl's madi is not so expensive

Biggest improvement for PT HD is to be host based
 
I can see how this is a "fail" to L.E. users who want to get all the HD features for minimal cost. Unfortunately I don't think that's going to happen anytime soon.... it seems like they're actually targeting the "pro" side with these updates rather than trying to include the hobbyists. Maybe that's a smart move... there are tons of pro studios and producers who have spent a lot on HD systems. Keeping them happy and loyal is probably better than compromising their entire hardware/software line just to attract the weekend warriors.

HD I/O: a supposedly significant improvement on the 192 which is already an industry standard... why not? I can see selling my 192 and 96i/o to grab the HD i/o 16x16
OMNI... not really sure what to think of it. Only thing I'd get it for is the monitoring section, but only if it had a remote. price seems a little too steep for that though.

Most excited about HEAT. Analog/tape sim built right into the mixer... awesome! Stoked to try it out, especially with the maker of Phoenix behind it. Listened to the A/B demo and it sounds promising.

The only thing I'm disappointed about is no mention of the rumored unlimited voices in HD. Really could have used that...


The Omni is where I'm most confused about their intentions.

It is $3k which doesn't seem like that much money for what it is, but, it's only $3k to someone who already has an HD Core card. Why does ANYBODY who already has an HD system need this unit? Whatever system they have now is already more powerful and even if they wanted to sell their 192 and downgrade, they wouldn't get any money out of the deal.

If someone is just getting in to HD, than the Omni is a $10,000 commitment because of the price of the HD card system that is necessary to go along with it. Now, at that price point, why would someone drop $10k on an Omni system when they could pick up a used HD2 system with a 192 for the same price or less?

I dunno, it's pretty baffling.

I don't see how introducing a mid level entry into HD that used Firewire or something hurts the current Pros using the DSP system. If you have a DSP based HD system, you obviously bought it because you wanted the advantages of DSP, so how does something being introduced with no DSP affect your purchase at all?

Seriously, HD Omni with Firewire that had say 18 i/o and only had the bare minimal DSP on board in the interface to use HD features like input monitoring and ADC for $3k would have been a huge game changer, and all the real HD guys wouldn't have been affected by it at all, because they would still have far more i/o options, TDM for zero latency plugins when tracking, etc.

Most pro studios are happy with their stable and reliable HD systems, they don't care about what new systems Avid releases because it would be a huge investment to have to switch over. That's why all of those guys are still running 7.4. Avid doesn't need to do anything to keep those guys happy because they are happy as it is without even upgrading to the newest version of the software, let alone reconfiguring their entire studio with another $20k worth of new Avid gear.

If anything, not touching the HD lineup at all is a better move because it says to the current HD owners, "HD is already the best in the world and you have already made that investment and have the best. We aren't going to continually release improved versions and make you bitter about your purchase while we try and convince you to take out another mortgage to upgrade to our new hardware."
 
I can see how this is a "fail" to L.E. users who want to get all the HD features for minimal cost.

I don't want the HD features for minimal cost. It's the fact that the HD cards are ancient technology. Give me HD native that costs ten grand or a PT|HD Firewire-interface that makes the the whole expansion card scheme obsolete and costs ten grand and I'll buy it.
 
@ jval

Its more of a major fail that they're not really bringing anything new to the table and acting like its still 1997.
The pro market is collapsing rapidly, and the pros that remain are already doing fine with the 192s they shelled already out a fortune on.
I can't see the new unit actually sounding that much better that it will have the old guard queuing up to buy them.

the new stuff would be pretty attractive to the guys who have been GASing over a HD rig for the past while, but realistically what sort of market is that?
 
I guess I can see how a mid-level setup like that would make sense for a lot of people. I'm not sure why they aren't doing it.

The fact is that half of Avid's market with PT is post production. Studios that have multiple, huge HD systems linked together... someone on GS was talking about how a lot of post studios might have an HD8 system dedicated solely to handling reverbs in a 5.1/7.1 mix setup. Maybe native systems are catching up (or some would argue have caught up) in the music would but it seems that in the post world, which is bigger than the music industry, the HD cards are definitely not "ancient technology".
anyways I guess that's a bit of a tangent... off to buy snow leopard...
 
Fucking facepalm. Looks like I'm using Logic forever, only thing that would have convinced me to make the switch is a even remotely native HD.
 
I thought I saw somewhere that more products were supposed to be announced this week? I may have misread something though.

I think the new interfaces are cool, especially the I/O and the MADI. The thing that would have made me go wow would have been if they had new core & accel cards to go along with the new interfaces. Give the users more power on one card. But that would be counter productive to their business model because people would not have to buy as many.

Oh Avid.
 
What are you all talking about? You all (almost all) live in the US. Don't you know a thing called EBAY? HD CORE cards are 1000$-1500$ of maximum there and 10 bucks for delivery. I live in Ukraine and all equipment I have in my studio was bought on ebay but it cost me extra 40% to deliver everything to this f*cking country. You all can get PT HD for 3000$-4000$ Is it too expensive for a pro standart? And logic users STFUP Your Mac PRO costs the same just to be able to load logic.
 
What are you all talking about? You all (almost all) live in the US. Don't you know a thing called EBAY? HD CORE cards are 1000$-1500$ of maximum there and 10 bucks for delivery. I live in Ukraine and all equipment I have in my studio was bought on ebay but it cost me extra 40% to deliver everything to this f*cking country. You all can get PT HD for 3000$-4000$ Is it too expensive for a pro standart? And logic users STFUP Your Mac PRO costs the same just to be able to load logic.

I doubt you're gonna find a PCIe Core Card for 1000$ eben on Ebay USA.
if that would be the case I'd just trade my PCIX for PCIe with no loss.
 
For what it's worth, it DOES look like there will be new cards coming - The interfaces all use a different-sized primary port and ship with an adapter cable to fit the current PTHD cards. Looks like the new cards will have a smaller port.
 
These units aren't so much aimed at the smaller studio market. The new stuff has some KILLER features for broadcasters and networks. Avid also one-upped some pretty high end converters they compete with.

Long story short, it's for the high end market, and it's going to make some big waves there.
 
It sounds to me like the HEAT thing might be completely identical to the "Triode" and "Pentode" knobs on the Crane Song HEDD...

EDIT: Well, not "completely" identical, but essentially the same basic harmonic excitement in a slightly different control format.