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There's a big difference between "Free" and demo versions. I've personally found that most music software makers always have an angle or strategy to up-sell whe

There's a big difference between "Free" and demo versions. I've personally found that most music software makers always have an angle or strategy to up-sell when they say their tools are free, and that's simply NOT free. Now even demo versions of software give you no accurate indication of what happens behind the scenes. Free plug-ins often install additional software, security tools (digital dongles) and drivers that can cause problems even once they are installed, especially if you don't purchase the full version. They also often don't uninstall correctly as well. I tried Vital months ago and found the free version to be limited in many subtle ways and processor intensive, which likely is not as much the case in the full version. I am very cautious now about plug-ins and other software offered online as "Free" because after trying out the free version of Fresh Air by Slate digital a few months ago, it never managed to run and my DAW and computer experienced total failure and data corruption caused by their licensing tool, which cost me a lot more than the full version cost, but it also cost the company me, as a potential customer. Luckily I routinely make backups, I can't afford to lose my work and data by trying dodgy apps... No exceptions.

kylenoteboom 5y ago
I'm curious to know what you found limiting about Vital's free (as in beer) offering. Other than fewer wave tables, presets and a limited number of text to wave table usages per (Day? Week? I'm not sure what the timeframe is) I am certain there is no difference compared to any of the paid offerings. If you're interested in soft synths that are FOSS, you might want to check out these as well: Vitalium (a completely FOSS fork of Vital, in a similar vein as Chromium compared to Google Chrome Helm (developed by Matt Tytel as well, just like Vital) Surge (XT) Zyn-Fusion (a FOSS additive synth)
digitalslr 5y ago
You may have a point regarding some plugins, but complaining about it here isn't very fair to Vital: >additional software, security tools (digital dongles) and drivers Vital appears to install/require none of these things. >found the free version to be limited in many subtle ways Subtle how? It's all listed on their home page: there are less presets (you can make your own) and there are less wavetables (you can import your own). The only functional limitation is on using the "text-to-wavetable" feature to generate wavetables. Otherwise, you have all the same modulation, filtering, wavetable morphing, & FX that the paid version does. If you choose to pay for it, you're basically just buying more presets.
kragen 5y ago
This is one of the most important benefits of open-source software ("free software" in the FSF sense): the source code gives you an accurate indication of what happens behind the scenes, and if it contains "licensing tools" or other malware you can remove it, or run a sanitized version prepared by a trustworthy person. Vital seems to have been open-source for less than 13 months, following years of dithering: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30622014 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30622014
mortenjorck 5y ago
In a world of iLok and countless other bloated license managers, your caution is warranted. But Tytel is one of the good ones. Vital's freemium model is based almost entirely on presets, with the core synth engine being free and open-source (the only thing other than presets is access to the cloud-based text-to-wavetable service).

kylenoteboom 5y ago

I'm curious to know what you found limiting about Vital's free (as in beer) offering. Other than fewer wave tables, presets and a limited number of text to wave table usages per (Day? Week? I'm not sure what the timeframe is) I am certain there is no difference compared to any of the paid offerings. If you're interested in soft synths that are FOSS, you might want to check out these as well: Vitalium (a completely FOSS fork of Vital, in a similar vein as Chromium compared to Google Chrome Helm (developed by Matt Tytel as well, just like Vital) Surge (XT) Zyn-Fusion (a FOSS additive synth)

digitalslr 5y ago

You may have a point regarding some plugins, but complaining about it here isn't very fair to Vital: >additional software, security tools (digital dongles) and drivers Vital appears to install/require none of these things. >found the free version to be limited in many subtle ways Subtle how? It's all listed on their home page: there are less presets (you can make your own) and there are less wavetables (you can import your own). The only functional limitation is on using the "text-to-wavetable" feature to generate wavetables. Otherwise, you have all the same modulation, filtering, wavetable morphing, & FX that the paid version does. If you choose to pay for it, you're basically just buying more presets.

kragen 5y ago

This is one of the most important benefits of open-source software ("free software" in the FSF sense): the source code gives you an accurate indication of what happens behind the scenes, and if it contains "licensing tools" or other malware you can remove it, or run a sanitized version prepared by a trustworthy person. Vital seems to have been open-source for less than 13 months, following years of dithering: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30622014 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30622014

mortenjorck 5y ago

In a world of iLok and countless other bloated license managers, your caution is warranted. But Tytel is one of the good ones. Vital's freemium model is based almost entirely on presets, with the core synth engine being free and open-source (the only thing other than presets is access to the cloud-based text-to-wavetable service).