Opinions on Komplete 13 ?

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Reasonable man
Posts: 589
Joined: 14 Jul 2016

17 Sep 2020

No experience with Native instruments. I admit i dont fully understand how it works yet but Komplete 13 apparently will be available on october 1st and depending on where you are and exchage rates could cost as much as 550 euros.


Komplete 13

Session guitarist
Pro rig
Cuba
West africa
Middle East
India
Massive x
Reactor 6 (could take or leave..more interesed in reason's modular environment tbf)
Una corda
1 maybe 2 expansions packs ( of which there are 24! .....they seem similar to alot combinator refills to me)

These are the packs in it that i'm interested in unless there are other intruments/samples that people who have komplete already own and are insts/samples/effects etc that they completely cannot live without...i'd be insterested to know.

It seems pretty expesnive bundle just for the packs in it that im interested in.

I have some questions ..maybe someone might know these things.

1/Would Komplete 13 realisticaly need to be run off and external hardrive? ( i saw a guy's video on you tube who was a composer running kontakt libraries ...he had 4 external hardrives running different libraries at the same time on his home system! ...albiet one of them was a 4 terabyte backup drive)
2/ Could it be run off a laptop's internal drive? ... my mac has 2 usb ports .. the library altogether is about 300 gb which to me seems manageable
3/If i bought komplete and download everything i need on to an external drive would this mean if i only want to use the synth massive that i would always need this external drive connected? Can seperate ins/elements/packs be stored in different loacations?..i've read that is is tricky. Just interested in how others do this kind of thing.
4/ If i would buy Kontakt 6 instead (cheaper)........ are the libraries that are in Komplete 13 all available to buy seperatley for Kontakt 6? If so are those sample libaries alot more expensive to buy this way?

Sorry for all questions but i'm a noob when it comes to differnt eco-systems outside if reason.

Lastly ..i've been listening to alot of piano sample libraries (Youtube) and i'm not really not that impressed by the overall quality the native instruments piano libraries really.... but then i've kinda convinced myself that Keyscape is what i want in that regard........from what i've heard so far the realism of the yamaha C7 grand in keysacape is unrivaled to my ears!

Any inforamtion at all on komplete/kontakt in general would be a massive help thanks.

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Boombastix
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Location: Bay Area, CA

17 Sep 2020

Are you making music for children books, dubstep, orchestral compositions?
Anyone chiming in cannot really give you a good answer unless you explain what you try to do. (Pick on of the above :lol: )

Don't overlook original Massive, still blows most synths out of the water.
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WongoTheSane
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Location: Paris, France

18 Sep 2020

I can't answer for points 1 and 2, having a desktop computer with plenty of internal storage. I have K12 Ultimate, so that's over 150 products, a little under 500 GB. The VSTs (.dll and .vst3) are on the system SSD, and the rest is on another internal HD.

3) Indeed, Native Access (the equivalent of Authorizer in the NI world) insists on installing everything grouped together. The VSTs themselves are installed in your default VST folder; the apps are installed in an "Applications" folder, which you can put anywhere; and the content is installed in a "Content" folder, which again you can put anywhere, but you can't, for instance, install one of the apps and its content in some other folder, separate from the rest. Or part of the Apps folder on your internal HD, and the rest on the external one.

There is another folder, "User", which is where you'll store your presets (patches). It can reside anywhere, it's generally very small so I keep it on the internal SSD.

With Massive, for instance (and I agree with Boombastix' assessment, although I've switched to Massive X), there is no need for any of this to be available (it's self-contained, apart from the presets which you can save anywhere, and they're only a few bytes), so you wouldn't need to connect your external hard drive. But for the expansion packs, you would (if you set your "Content" folder to be on the external drive, of course).

Be aware that you can buy Komplete either as a download, or as a box, in which case you are sent a 500 GB hard drive, for no additional fee. Delivery takes a few days (as opposed to half a day if you download from a good line), but then you get an extra HD. This is the option I would have chosen if I hadn't been stupidly impatient. Hint: don't be like me and get the free HD.

4) Yes, all the libraries are available individually, and yes, they're more expensive this way.

On the content itself:
  • Yes, the expansion packs are similar to ReFills: they contain patches for several of the provided instruments, including sets for Battery, and wavs which you can use any other way. Top notch quality, too, imho.
  • Don't overlook Battery. It's become my sole drum sound provider. It's Kong on steroids, if the steroids themselves had taken steroids too.
  • All the devices you see in the list have a bunch of factory sounds (I suppose you've read the blurb, there are over 36.000 patches in the vanilla version) which, for the most part, are really good. Compared to what we have in Reason, it is skewed a bit more towards "natural" instruments, e.g. you'll find more of them, and of a better quality. Some of the instruments in the "World" series (India, Middle East, etc) are really stunning.
  • While you can use Reaktor as a DIY rack, you can also just use what's already available, as having Komplete entitles you to the User Library, which has thousands of devices, free of charge, doing pretty much anything you could think of. The most advanced generative sequencers, the most exotic oscillators, the most precise filters, it's all there. Indeed, some of the instruments in this bundle are Reaktor instruments (Super 8, Rounds, etc).
  • Reaktor isn't just for making music. It's also for wasting time. "Blocks" is like a Eurorack (rather similar to VCV, although more limited in terms of available modules atm), and quite similar to the cables in Reason too, so you'll find yourself in familiar territory from the get go.
  • The effects are good too. Raum (a reverb) is spectacular. It was introduced for free for a period, I hope you got the chance to grab it then. The rest of the effects is of the same quality.
  • I agree with your assessment of the pianos, I never use them. They all sound muffled somehow, I don't know why. And if you like the C7, you like bright pianos, so you won't like them either :D I have Pianoteq and RadicalPiano, so I'm set. I've heard good things about Keyscape too, but I can't vouch for it.
That's all I can think of at the moment!

EDIT: Boombastix' question is important. For instance, if you answered "orchestral", you need Ultimate for sure, as most of the orchestral instruments aren't provided in the other versions.

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stratatonic
Posts: 1507
Joined: 15 Jan 2015
Location: CANADA

18 Sep 2020

Every time a new version of Komplete comes out, or upgrade/crossgrades go on sale for 50% off (usually in the summer - sometimes BF: but not this BF as it's too close to launch), I pore over the Compare version chart at NI for a few days, and in the end decide that Komplete is just Komplete OverKill!
There's so much stuff, that I'd never get use out of over 75% of it in my lifetime. If you were a studio owner, maybe yeah...but, that's just me....Of course, you don't have to use EVERYTHING, but if you find value in the few things that you will definitely be using all the time, then it may be of value to you.

You can crossgrade or upgrade from Kontakt for cheaper, if you are interested in going that route.

I bought Kontakt for $124.50 - which it goes for every once in a while if you have eligible software. I got the free DrumMic'a and did the Kontakt crossgrade for 124.50.

(I also bought Kontakt over three years ago, and still haven't upgraded to Komplete. Yet. I'll pore over the Compare chart next summer and do it all over again.lol...)

I recently tried to get some Kontakt libraries working after not using Kontakt for a while and ended up in a circular f**king loop of shit just not being recognized in places where I wanted them to go. Big time waster of one day. I recall having difficulties at an earlier date as well. YRMV, some people seem to have no issues at all.

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Reasonable man
Posts: 589
Joined: 14 Jul 2016

18 Sep 2020

Thank you guys for the incredible info so far . Its been really really helpfull to me.
I'm at one of those crossroads where realisiticaly i 'm gonna have to surrender to one of these large corporate eco systems like Native instruments with the hope of still trying to mantain some 'Kontrol' (sorry for the pun!) over at least some small aspect of it all.

User avatar
Reasonable man
Posts: 589
Joined: 14 Jul 2016

18 Sep 2020

Boombastix wrote:
17 Sep 2020
Are you making music for children books, dubstep, orchestral compositions?
Anyone chiming in cannot really give you a good answer unless you explain what you try to do. (Pick on of the above :lol: )

Don't overlook original Massive, still blows most synths out of the water.
Its funny cause i've spent at least the last 12 months asking myself this very question . I guess i'm an indecisive person for better or worse in that i want to be able to write/jam/compose in all genres from classical to electronic ...and everything inbetween. This isn't good but ..my goal at the moment i guess is to try to access to some quality sampled real intruments libraries or world music libraries as i have nothing of real worth in that area.

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Reasonable man
Posts: 589
Joined: 14 Jul 2016

18 Sep 2020

WongoTheSane wrote:
18 Sep 2020
I can't answer for points 1 and 2, having a desktop computer with plenty of internal storage. I have K12 Ultimate, so that's over 150 products, a little under 500 GB. The VSTs (.dll and .vst3) are on the system SSD, and the rest is on another internal HD.

3) Indeed, Native Access (the equivalent of Authorizer in the NI world) insists on installing everything grouped together. The VSTs themselves are installed in your default VST folder; the apps are installed in an "Applications" folder, which you can put anywhere; and the content is installed in a "Content" folder, which again you can put anywhere, but you can't, for instance, install one of the apps and its content in some other folder, separate from the rest. Or part of the Apps folder on your internal HD, and the rest on the external one.

There is another folder, "User", which is where you'll store your presets (patches). It can reside anywhere, it's generally very small so I keep it on the internal SSD.

With Massive, for instance (and I agree with Boombastix' assessment, although I've switched to Massive X), there is no need for any of this to be available (it's self-contained, apart from the presets which you can save anywhere, and they're only a few bytes), so you wouldn't need to connect your external hard drive. But for the expansion packs, you would (if you set your "Content" folder to be on the external drive, of course).

Be aware that you can buy Komplete either as a download, or as a box, in which case you are sent a 500 GB hard drive, for no additional fee. Delivery takes a few days (as opposed to half a day if you download from a good line), but then you get an extra HD. This is the option I would have chosen if I hadn't been stupidly impatient. Hint: don't be like me and get the free HD.

4) Yes, all the libraries are available individually, and yes, they're more expensive this way.

On the content itself:
  • Yes, the expansion packs are similar to ReFills: they contain patches for several of the provided instruments, including sets for Battery, and wavs which you can use any other way. Top notch quality, too, imho.
  • Don't overlook Battery. It's become my sole drum sound provider. It's Kong on steroids, if the steroids themselves had taken steroids too.
  • All the devices you see in the list have a bunch of factory sounds (I suppose you've read the blurb, there are over 36.000 patches in the vanilla version) which, for the most part, are really good. Compared to what we have in Reason, it is skewed a bit more towards "natural" instruments, e.g. you'll find more of them, and of a better quality. Some of the instruments in the "World" series (India, Middle East, etc) are really stunning.
  • While you can use Reaktor as a DIY rack, you can also just use what's already available, as having Komplete entitles you to the User Library, which has thousands of devices, free of charge, doing pretty much anything you could think of. The most advanced generative sequencers, the most exotic oscillators, the most precise filters, it's all there. Indeed, some of the instruments in this bundle are Reaktor instruments (Super 8, Rounds, etc).
  • Reaktor isn't just for making music. It's also for wasting time. "Blocks" is like a Eurorack (rather similar to VCV, although more limited in terms of available modules atm), and quite similar to the cables in Reason too, so you'll find yourself in familiar territory from the get go.
  • The effects are good too. Raum (a reverb) is spectacular. It was introduced for free for a period, I hope you got the chance to grab it then. The rest of the effects is of the same quality.
  • I agree with your assessment of the pianos, I never use them. They all sound muffled somehow, I don't know why. And if you like the C7, you like bright pianos, so you won't like them either :D I have Pianoteq and RadicalPiano, so I'm set. I've heard good things about Keyscape too, but I can't vouch for it.
That's all I can think of at the moment!

EDIT: Boombastix' question is important. For instance, if you answered "orchestral", you need Ultimate for sure, as most of the orchestral instruments aren't provided in the other versions.
Thanks for the detailed reply. I didn't know about the 'user' folder. Sorry for asking this.. but are you for eg able to run your native instruments vst's without connecting and external hardrive? Its the dreaded content folder that i'm worried about at the moment ..maybe vst's can run without access to this folder?

I took a second look at battery ..and yes it looks like an absoulte beast. I have the two Umph reason samplers and bought microtonic (which never goes on sale!) last year initailly thought that if i were to purchase komplete that i would give the battery download a miss but it looks and sounds great from the demos.

Since Komplete comes with Kontakt (proper version) i was thinking about the possible solution of skiping the standatrd orchestral stull that comes with the standard komplete package with the view to purchasing some of the indpendent spitfire libraries (that cost a fortune) somewhere a year or 3 down the line if there was some sort of sale (like spitfire chamber or spitfire symphonic strings ..that i dont think come with komplete ultumate) but its all very confusing to me . Komplete ultimate looks like the kind of ordeal that i dont think i cope with ,,,,,even from a dowloading viewpoint!

On a side note Pianotek looks and sounds cool with no big sample library involved. Looking at Kescape its a 80gig minimum download maybe even 130g uncompressed .. that would be difficult in a live performance environment.
Thanks for helpfull advice.

User avatar
Reasonable man
Posts: 589
Joined: 14 Jul 2016

18 Sep 2020

stratatonic wrote:
18 Sep 2020
Every time a new version of Komplete comes out, or upgrade/crossgrades go on sale for 50% off (usually in the summer - sometimes BF: but not this BF as it's too close to launch), I pore over the Compare version chart at NI for a few days, and in the end decide that Komplete is just Komplete OverKill!
There's so much stuff, that I'd never get use out of over 75% of it in my lifetime. If you were a studio owner, maybe yeah...but, that's just me....Of course, you don't have to use EVERYTHING, but if you find value in the few things that you will definitely be using all the time, then it may be of value to you.

You can crossgrade or upgrade from Kontakt for cheaper, if you are interested in going that route.

I bought Kontakt for $124.50 - which it goes for every once in a while if you have eligible software. I got the free DrumMic'a and did the Kontakt crossgrade for 124.50.

(I also bought Kontakt over three years ago, and still haven't upgraded to Komplete. Yet. I'll pore over the Compare chart next summer and do it all over again.lol...)

I recently tried to get some Kontakt libraries working after not using Kontakt for a while and ended up in a circular f**king loop of shit just not being recognized in places where I wanted them to go. Big time waster of one day. I recall having difficulties at an earlier date as well. YRMV, some people seem to have no issues at all.
Thanks. i was the past 3 months without a computer(laptop) as i had to replace the motherboard eventually as the repair guy intially botched a repair job . i say a repair guy it was more like 3 seperate repair guys and i swear i knew more than they did about laptops ..and i know nothing!
Anyway ... ha ha the point being i've had to fresh install and re-download everything again this last week with alot of stuff not playing well with catalina so i know about stuff not being recognised or invalid,,,, and error code '8062'... its soul destroying.
This is why i still havn't ruled out just buying the Knotakt player and picking and choosing stuff without the need to have or download stuff that i'm never going open never mind use and that could be awkard to to find/locate or even delete later on.
Kontakt a more expensive route overall though i think .... by my calulations it probably works out about 50% cheaper to go a package route and try and block/not downlaod the stuff that's not wanted. i have at the moment 1.5 terabytes free space on my internal ssd ..would love to keep everything in one place.

User avatar
Boombastix
Competition Winner
Posts: 1929
Joined: 18 May 2018
Location: Bay Area, CA

19 Sep 2020

Reasonable man wrote:
18 Sep 2020
Boombastix wrote:
17 Sep 2020
Are you making music for children books, dubstep, orchestral compositions?
Anyone chiming in cannot really give you a good answer unless you explain what you try to do. (Pick on of the above :lol: )

Don't overlook original Massive, still blows most synths out of the water.
Its funny cause i've spent at least the last 12 months asking myself this very question . I guess i'm an indecisive person for better or worse in that i want to be able to write/jam/compose in all genres from classical to electronic ...and everything inbetween. This isn't good but ..my goal at the moment i guess is to try to access to some quality sampled real intruments libraries or world music libraries as i have nothing of real worth in that area.
You might wanna consider NI hardware, if you need it, as you get an entry level Komplete and cheap upgrade path (especially at 50% sale), that's what I did.
FM8/Massive/Massive X, all good super synths.
Pianos: for pop you just have process, add an exciter + high shelf EQ and they get as bright as you want.
10% off at Waves with link: https://www.waves.com/r/6gh2b0
Disclaimer - I get 10% as well.

WongoTheSane
Moderator
Posts: 1851
Joined: 14 Sep 2015
Location: Paris, France

22 Sep 2020

Reasonable man wrote:
18 Sep 2020
are you for eg able to run your native instruments vst's without connecting and external hardrive? Its the dreaded content folder that i'm worried about at the moment ..maybe vst's can run without access to this folder?
It depends. Some effects, for instance, don't use the "Content" folder because the VST is self-contained. Some instruments make heavy use of them, Kontakt being the main culprit: all the samples are stored in this folder, and all Kontact Instrument files too, including the Factory Library. I haven't tried launching them without the Content folder, because the HD on which it resides is internal (not the system disk, but still internal), so I can't, but I doubt it works: for example, the "Previews" folder that is in the "Content" folder holds the sound previews that are used in Kontrol and other parts of the software to quickly preview a sound in the browser. If it wasn't available, at least this part wouldn't function properly.

Modules for Reaktor are there too, as are all Reaktor-based instruments (Polyplex, Razor...) and the Play series instruments.

While you might think that Ultimate is full of fluff, it is still a worthy alternative to the Spitfire libs, as it offers a wealth of orchestral tools. It's probably not as good as Spitfire's, but it's not as expensive, so you may want to consider it.

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Reasonable man
Posts: 589
Joined: 14 Jul 2016

23 Sep 2020

Thanks guys. I took the plunge today and pre- ordered K13 ..the hardrive version (thanks for the advice on that Wongo).
I did have to borrow a few quid to to it but for me it's worth the risk and i see it as a solid future investment. Pro rig, Noire and Una corde alone are worth the extra £100 over Kontakt. Reason/Komplete sounds i think can compliment each other very well. Good luck to anyone else thinking of taking the plunge like me! ...really excited.

WongoTheSane
Moderator
Posts: 1851
Joined: 14 Sep 2015
Location: Paris, France

24 Sep 2020

I bet in the end the devices you're gonna use the most aren't gonna be those. I was surprised myself, I almost never used the instruments I bought the bundle for, and I constantly use others I originally discarded as fluff. Anyway, I hope you have fun!

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