Rack Extensions and M1

[dstoliker]

I know native M1 support for Reason is coming, but what does that mean for rack extensions? From Reason's M1 compatibility statement, as they are not specifically mentioned, I get the impression that rack extensions will just continue to work, and not require anything special to get them working on a different CPU architecture. Does anyone have a definitive answer?

I'm thinking back to when 32-bit support was dropped in macOS and 32-bit VSTs couldn't be used anymore. If/when Apple drops Rosetta 2 support at some point in the future, will rack extensions keep working?

[Loque]

The RE should still work. A big advantage over VSTs.

[fieldframe]

The key difference is that unlike VSTs, which are compiled by the developer, REs are all compiled by Reason Studios. So when Reason for M1 is available, RS will add M1 as a compile target for the RE build server and M1 versions of all your REs will be generated automatically. You’ll probably just have to update them like you did for hi-res.

I’m glossing over a lot of behind-the-scenes complexity here, but this is, in a nutshell, why end users won’t need to worry.

[dstoliker]

The key difference is that unlike VSTs, which are compiled by the developer, REs are all compiled by Reason Studios. So when Reason for M1 is available, RS will add M1 as a compile target for the RE build server and M1 versions of all your REs will be generated automatically. You’ll probably just have to update them like you did for hi-res.

I’m glossing over a lot of behind-the-scenes complexity here, but this is, in a nutshell, why end users won’t need to worry.

Ah, that makes sense. I was wondering how compiling worked for different platforms in the Reason ecosystem. I was worried about some of my rack extensions that are no longer sold - the A-List guitarist extensions, for example. Reason Studios did publish hi-res versions of those after they stopped selling them. So, hopefully that trend will continue.

[theshoemaker]

They are compiling on LLVM which can cross-compile for all different platforms, and as the SDK is very strict about what you can use they control everything which is platform dependend.

I still hope there will be a reason running on an iPad (don't say Compact ... that's a toy)