Eleven Rack II or Expansion Pack II ?

[SloeGin]

Originally Posted by ofp

Avid has to work on new hardware right now or give up the Guitar product market , because Line6 and FAS are just way more active in terms of communication and firmware releases to end users
If Avid do not speak out loud in 2013 they will be just obsoleted, out of the game.

couldn't agree more :)

[Darryl Ramm]

Originally Posted by SloeGin

couldn't agree more :)

While Avid should be working on new guitar hardware now in R&D (to deliver in longer timeframes) I dont' see Avid need to be delivering new *hardware* any time soon. But absolutely agree a lot of their problem may be just communication. They don't even need to be delivering expansion packs/firmware updates now, what they need to be doing is reassuring us the product has a future. Letting us know the product will stay at Avid and some of the team members are still there is a great start but it needs more than just those words. More questions remain than answers. Avid really needs to reassure us that the product really has a future, will get upgrades etc. and show that by more than words. Where is the team actually working on anything Eleven Rack related? Avid is horrible at communicating things, senior and fairly public team members disappear (esp. Chris Townsend) without explanation, people are pulled off to "work on other projects", then all this recent news of turmoil across Avid. I would hope Avid publicly commits to delivering another expansion pack, gets people visibly back to working on and supporting Eleven Rack (including participating on DUC) if done well that would help not hurt current product sales.

There are lots of things in the Eleven Rack hopefully could be done without new hardware (e.g. new amp and effect models, separation of speaker and amp, improving the "no cab" issues for folks using guitar cabs on stage, user cab impulses, etc.) and especially just deliver a damned stand alone editor. Seeing deep partnering with foot switch vendors would be great IMHO (not making some plastic crap). I'm not sure what new hardware would be needed for or offer (e.g. more DSP power (but is this really needed for major feature additions) more I/O interfaces, ADAT/SMUX support, better headphone amp, input gain control)?. Nothing there seems critical unless the current model DSP is so taxed that some of the compelling software features cannot be implemented.

But as far as the broader market is concerned Avid has to do something, its getting squeezed from the high end by the very nice Axe FX II and at the lower end by Line 6. Avid seems to have pretty weak support from retailers on this product. They need to re-up the overall marketing and field/channel marking if this product is going to come back from its current apparent slumber. Hopefully Avid has the resources and desire to do this.

Darryl

[Sorefingers]

http://cdn.stripersonline.com/0/07/5...it-926b06.jpeg

[derker]

*crickets*

Still no word, still no bugfixes.

I kept it short this time.

[zedhed]

Originally Posted by Darryl Ramm

While Avid should be working on new guitar hardware now in R&D (to deliver in longer timeframes) I dont' see Avid need to be delivering new *hardware* any time soon. But absolutely agree a lot of their problem may be just communication. They don't even need to be delivering expansion packs/firmware updates now, what they need to be doing is reassuring us the product has a future. Letting us know the product will stay at Avid and some of the team members are still there is a great start but it needs more than just those words. More questions remain than answers. Avid really needs to reassure us that the product really has a future, will get upgrades etc. and show that by more than words. Where is the team actually working on anything Eleven Rack related? Avid is horrible at communicating things, senior and fairly public team members disappear (esp. Chris Townsend) without explanation, people are pulled off to "work on other projects", then all this recent news of turmoil across Avid. I would hope Avid publicly commits to delivering another expansion pack, gets people visibly back to working on and supporting Eleven Rack (including participating on DUC) if done well that would help not hurt current product sales.

There are lots of things in the Eleven Rack hopefully could be done without new hardware (e.g. new amp and effect models, separation of speaker and amp, improving the "no cab" issues for folks using guitar cabs on stage, user cab impulses, etc.) and especially just deliver a damned stand alone editor. Seeing deep partnering with foot switch vendors would be great IMHO (not making some plastic crap). I'm not sure what new hardware would be needed for or offer (e.g. more DSP power (but is this really needed for major feature additions) more I/O interfaces, ADAT/SMUX support, better headphone amp, input gain control)?. Nothing there seems critical unless the current model DSP is so taxed that some of the compelling software features cannot be implemented.

But as far as the broader market is concerned Avid has to do something, its getting squeezed from the high end by the very nice Axe FX II and at the lower end by Line 6. Avid seems to have pretty weak support from retailers on this product. They need to re-up the overall marketing and field/channel marking if this product is going to come back from its current apparent slumber.

Very succinctly put and I totally agree.

Originally Posted by Darryl Ramm

Hopefully Avid has the resources and desire to do this.Darryl

At this point I believe they have the resources but IMHO I very much doubt they have the desire, their actions (or lack thereof) indicate this clearly.

[Vercingetorix]

Originally Posted by nst7

FWIW, the DSP chip in the Eleven Rack is the exact same Texas Instruments chip that's used on the new HDX cards. It's just that the HDX card has several and the 11R has one. Someone who knows about this stuff might be able to figure out what it's capable of.

I was under the impression that the 11R had dual DSP chips . Of course, I have never opened it up to find out.

[nst7]

That could be true. I don't remember them saying it was a dual chip, but they did say somewhere along the way that it was the same chip as HDX. So it could be two of them, or a dual version, etc.

[derker]

2 DSP's indeed

http://www.tonymckenzie.com/Site/ima...sp_chips_a.jpg

They might not be the same exact chips as the HDX's though, TI makes all sorts of chips. Ironically TI has just recently announced even faster DSP chips, ones that give TigerSHARC a run for its money.

Can we please have our Eleven Rack MkII Ultra+ Deluxe now?

[moff]

It's just following Moore's Law, which says that every 18 months, the power and capacity of CPUs will double. So far, it's been proven true. My guess is it's the same for on-board DSP.

[Vercingetorix]

Originally Posted by moff

It's just following Moore's Law, which says that every 18 months, the power and capacity of CPUs will double. So far, it's been proven true. My guess is it's the same for on-board DSP.

Well there was an 18 month period back a few years now where "Moore's Law" was actually exceeded The computer mags I was reading at the time kicked up a big fuss about it .