Pro Tools 11 has been out in the wild for couple of months now, so I’ve had time to give it a spin around the block on real projects.
Here are 5 things I love about it and, in the name of balance, 5 things I hate.
The Things I Love - In No Particular Order
- Avid Audio Engine - Performance.
Use it and you’ll notice Pro Tools 11 has more firepower than any previous version, it takes your current computer and makes it feel like a new machine - I’d even dare to suggest ‘exponentially’ more power than previous versions (Literalists - off you go in the comments). Not having to figure out the compromise between endless buffer errors and latency when using VIs is a gift. The old DAE drove me crazy and sapped any creative spark I had when it decided to throw a hissy fit during tracking … a thing of the past. Most of the time if I find myself running a 256 sample buffer, then I must be doing something big. - Double Click To Create Tracks.
A small but very useful feature that I miss a lot every time I go back to Pro Tools 10. - Offline Bounce.
We asked for it and we got it; it has some odd moments, like the other day when I did an offline bounce and it ended up at 0.5 times the speed, go figure! However, it’s a gift and can also be used to freeze/render tracks. However, because of the performance improvements, I hardly bother freezing (unless of course my mother is coming to stay and it’s a large lasagne). - The Metering.
Who would have thought the new metering would make any tangible difference? However, it makes a serious amount of difference when setting input levels and also when having to deliver to different specs (HD only). - Shipping Pro Tools 11 and 10 Together.
Of course it makes sense to ship Pro Tools 10 and 11 together, so we can use both (especially during the AAX transition), but Avid haven’t always done things this smart - this was one of their smarter ideas.
The Things I Hate - In No Particular Order
- Missing Plug-ins.
The thing on most of our minds: where are my AAX plug-ins? This includes the stuff Avid dropped to get Pro Tools 11 out the door on time. We need vendors to ship third-party plug-ins and Avid to put back the stuff we all love and miss. - Psycho Click.
If you have yet to experience it, the Click plug-in has moments of madness; in fact, a mind of its own where it doesn’t play during playback and continues playing when you press stop. Please fix, Avid. - Drag and Drop From Timeline Dragged and Dropped!
Drag and drop from timeline to Structure and Transfuser is currently broke. Avid have promised it’s coming back … it’s not the end of the world, but the sooner the better. - Workspace Still Needs Work.
Workspace has had some work done on it, but it’s still not brilliant and it’s only slightly less unusable than before. We need a loop and sample browser in the main edit window, not as some separate window you have to chase around the desktop. It’s all a good start, but more work is needed to make this even close to the loop browser in Logic (or Garageband for that matter)! - Multiple Bounce In HD Only
I’m a HD user and I get there have to be some things that HD users get for putting out more cash, but not offering the multiple offline bounce option to Native users seems a little tight-assed to me. Problem is, ask someone which HD feature they want in Pro Tools Vanilla and you get a different reply every time, so I’m glad I’m not the accountant at Avid making that call.
So, as you can see some big wins and misses. We know that 11.0 is just the start and that it’s a building block for more stuff, so we hope the Avid Pro Tools product team add some of these to their to-do list.
What are your wins and misses? Discuss.