Where are the pros .. ?

[Rectifried]

Sounds crazy because all I seem to do is rant on this forum… But after a while I and most professionals I deal with here in LA are having so many hard times with Protools these days ..from the graphics being sluggish and weird to stuff freezing all the time

Used to be that this form was full of professionals usually dealing with TDM systems and I have to say I got a lot of great info from it… But these days it seems like all the professionals are going into their bunkers and solving their own problems
I am not a computer genius but somehow I’ve learned more than most of my Engineer friends so they come to me for questions and honestly these days I don’t know what to say Protools is taking a few steps backwards

There’s great new features but those have been overshadowed the last couple of revisions with things like tab to transient being broken or intermittent.

I really don’t know what to say other than gear sluts space.. took a lot of energy that used to be on this site and yet the avid gearslut area is pretty barren.

I have to say it’s kind of a void when it comes to all these bugs most people have just throwing up their hands if they have problems I’d like to go in the past when digidesign approved a computer it was pretty rocksolid…

But seeing as they’ve had Big Sur on their site up to 11.5 I think I can’t say it that’s working very well

but I don’t really want to go back to Mojave or Catalina

Most people here probably have perpetual licenses if you’re a professional ,..since we’ve been spending thousands of dollars on this company



I like the workflow I like Protools I want them to succeed… But breakKing average features like graphics turning into molasses,.. and CPU overloads with minimal plug-ins all I can say is: I don’t know what to say lol

It’s just a void out there of professionals that are solving these problems probably because they’re unsolvable except by the Eastern European programmers that digi is now Probably using…



I don’t have a support plan since I paid for updates only as telephone support was next to useless over the 20 years I’ve been doing this if that’s changed someone let me know because I really don’t believe in it and the few people I’ve talked to who have paid for a call said it was comical… Or perhaps tragical


Like a bad marriage I just think each point revision will solve a host of problems but somehow I cannot believe how bizarre and random Protools has become on a daily basis
rant over

[albee1952]

Hmmm, not really sure what you mean. I know dozens of pros that use PT to make their living and have no intention of changing platforms. Many incorporate other DAW's in their work(like Logic for some midi composition or Abelton Live for beats and loops), but none of them have made any noise about leaving Pro Tools. Its more likely that their systems simply work without much fuss. I know I have very few problems with PT these days, and that's on a fairly old system(in signature). As for the Tab to Transient issue, I just went back one version and went back to work. No big deal for me, but I always have a backup plan in place. Anyone that doesn't.........well, 'nuff said

[Rectifried]

Great thx for the reply… I put this in the mac forum for mac users.. is x79 a mac thing?


I don’t think I ever said pros are leaving Protools I’ve seen enough of those threads in 20 years to know it’s BS… Most people say we’re all going to "fill in the blank" and they never do ...I wouldn’t…


Protools is great as I stated above I am a fan

I like Protools I want it to work I think the latest versions are not working and there is a lack of dialogue about the problems there and I would say: "oh maybe I’m the only one with the problem… "
Except for the fact that I have people daily calling me why does it Do this in that or is this working for you? So they are having problems they’re just not talking about it on this form or any form
it looks like that’s the point of my post
I guess they gave up posting about problems
For instants somewhere buried in this web sight somebody said uncheck optimize performance in the playback engine and you’ll get less errors I did that and it did it worked… That is not written anywhere else and I couldn’t even find that post if I tried now…
Maybe that doesn’t work for everybody the point is these kind of exchanges are less and less and more about; how much is a subscription, or how do I update my Protools from 5.0
but no I’m not saying professionals are leaving Protools so let’s just get that out-of-the-way

[albee1952]

Sorry, but your post made me think something other than you meant. Most of the pros I know are running Macs(of the 30-40 I have regular contact with, only maybe 4 run windows machines). I'll back off now and let Mac users offer their insight

[musicman691]

Originally Posted by albee1952

Sorry, but your post made me think something other than you meant. Most of the pros I know are running Macs(of the 30-40 I have regular contact with, only maybe 4 run windows machines). I'll back off now and let Mac users offer their insight

Mac user here. PT 2021.6 has been running just fine in an unsupported OSX 10.13.6 on the 2012 cheesegrater that's in my profile page. As to things not working (tab to transient for example) that doesn't bother me as I don't do the kind of work that needs that. MIDI work has been good as well. I don't do beatz.


Run a fairly tight system here - no free s/w, nothing from unknown or little known developers. Sure I might be missing something that someone thinks is neat or cool but then again I don't suffer the kinds of maladies those that use such do. Most of the time that I have a problem is because of pilot error.


Like a lot of others I tried another program - Digital Performer. The learning was steep and very little that I know how to do in PT translated over to DP. No true instrument tracks in DP that contain both the MIDI and vi. Clunky & cluttered gui. Integration with VEPro 6 is a nightmare. Two things in DP's favor - it runs on minimal systems and handles video better than PT. But the only time I deal with video in PT is forensics.


I think a lot comes down to keeping your system tight once you have it working as you need it. And don't forget to make clones on a regular basis - do NOT rely on Time Machine.

[Rectifried]

After 2021.7 was so weird I rolled back to 2021.6… But unfortunately I am on Big Sur I think the last great working situation that I can remember and again it’s the fog of war of having done this for decades was probably 2021.1 or .3 with Mojave… However rolling back that far to a computer OS would be a major undertaking on the Mac side… All the professionals I talk to in LA seem to remember that as being a decent build Mojave in 2021.3 or whatever

What I was trying to do was to get my computer as close to the newest OS because even though they were selling these in 2019 I have believe they will be hey ending for the software upgrade and I just would like to freeze this computer closer to the current

Honestly yes I should’ve had a full mirror of Mojave with Protools somewhere… But I have these things in the past and I have never gone backwards… I checked digits website to make sure Big Sur was qualified

In the past getting qualified by digit design or approval was a slow process and most people were already ahead of where they officially would recommend

I waited quite a while maybe a year into Big Sur before upgrading.

There’s a Lotta new things going on under the hood. And there are improvements with each revision I’ll give them that I enjoy a lot of the things they finally did and when they finally did them they did them very well their folders are great they got rid of the track limit not that that matters to me small things like that that makes it more sane if I choose to keep on paying for this program… But unfortunately there is something quite large not working

I think the weirdest one might be all the video problem some people have and of course the graphics bug I have which is weird since Avid is a video editor at its heart

[Ben Jenssen]

Here's a theory for you:
They left because of all the ranting and raving.

[Rectifried]

Well that seems like a clever wrapup lol
unfortunately this form kind of dried up a bit ..still great to have
I’m not sure people are really ranting on here as much as just not bothering to do anything In a contributing way ..rant or otherwise


What I remember was more of a “this is frustrating “and someone would say try this and someone say I tried that and it would go around

now people just don’t bother posting their problems… Perhaps they have less problems? Back in the TDM days it was a roller coaster of changes and then the end of our rtas
And then the byzantine way they were selling different systems and upgrades… I suppose that came with a few rants

But in general it just seems like people shrugged and moved on these days I don’t see a lot of ranting and bitterness .. besides me

[Cheesehead]

I kind of agree with the Op.
There doesn't seem to be as much going on in the DUC these days.
Maybe its because people are distracted with all the more important stuff going on in the world, or maybe its 'controversially' because most of the time Pro Tools just runs really well.
Certainly since I got my new Mac Pro and running the latest version of PT, massive sessions run with no problems at all and I just get on with mixing and designing rather than posting.
People at the bleeding edge running Big Sur are going to have issues, but Pros can't afford to risk that.
Anyhow, the only place you get any response from a company representative to a potential rant is in the HDX or Pro mixing forums, so its not worth bothering anywhere else

[Rectifried]

it looks like your running 10.15.. Big Sur
no problems?