iZotope Drops: Iris 2, BreakTweaker, and Trash 2

[stubbsonic]

Just got this notice that they've stopped selling these titles (Iris 2, BreakTweaker, and Trash 2), and will cease support in 12 months.

I won't miss Iris 2 as I never really got with that one, seems cool though. Trash 2, I won't miss, as there are plenty of other ways to get good distortion/OD.

The news about BreakTweaker was especially disappointing. BT is many ways a diamond in the rough. It has amazing sounds, and some truly unique features, as well as a fascinating selection of factory content. The GUI is a little awkward-- mainly in that it shows 6 beats, so you have to page back & forth if you have an 8 beat pattern, and there's no window size scaling; and I wish it had a few more step rate options. However, the "MicroEdit" features are really cool and have some serious mojo. I kept hoping iZotope would see the artistic value in that plugin/instrument and keep allowing it to grow. But it was not to be.

OTOH, I probably shouldn't complain too loudly, as I got BreakTweaker along with a bunch of expansion packs for a super cheap sale price. Still, I'm sad to see it officially abandoned.

[cuttime]

I knew the writing was on the wall with Iris 2 a few years ago, since it was constantly on sale at a blowout price. I think I got it for something like $9 about four years ago. I liked it though, but I ditched it when it became apparent it would never be updated, certainly not for Apple Silicon.

[stubbsonic]

I hear ya. It currently runs fine in Rosetta 2; and it runs great on my 2012 MBP (which is still working fine, after I recently put a new battery in it).

I was also pleased that the sounds that came with it (which are excellent-- though not designed to be velocity layered) are "accessible" (non-proprietary) for use in other situations-- e.g., I can use those sounds in metronomics or other sampler/drum machine.

[James Steele]

I knew the writing was on the wall with Iris 2 a few years ago, since it was constantly on sale at a blowout price. I think I got it for something like $9 about four years ago. I liked it though, but I ditched it when it became apparent it would never be updated, certainly not for Apple Silicon.

Yep... also got another email from iZotope that they are discontinuing their line of Exponential Audio reverbs. I'm pretty sure I own R2, R4, PhoenixVerb, and Excalibur One good thing is I won't have to be popping by THAT web page anymore to see if there's an update!

I sort of figured this was going to happen when I saw how cheap they were "dumping" them. Might as well squeeze a little more revenue out of them before the end. I guess how long they will be useful will depend on how long it will be before Apple decides enough is enough and removes Rosetta 2 from some future version of MacOS. I imagine another year or two at least?

izotopedropsreverbs.jpg (288.26 KiB) Viewed 1505 times

[nk_e]

I’m really going to miss BreakTweaker. As weird as it was, I came up with stuff that I have not figured out how to do elsewhere. It wasn’t always the main rhythmic element, but it add some supporting elements and “spice and interest” that was really unique.

I really loved Iris2 also. Could never figure out why it didn’t get more attention. It can create some lovely sounds and it makes using spectral editing techniques a breeze.

There’s a process for uploading the meat of the presets from the discontinued reverbs into the remaining two supported ones. (Presets from Excalibur are excluded from this.) It looks a bit tedious if you have lots of presets you want to “save”, but I have not tried it.

Gonna miss BreakTweaker though…

[stubbsonic]

Gonna miss BreakTweaker though…

Would have loved for iZotope to pledge to invest development resources to make BreakTweaker a proper modern/super-artistic drum machine (and AS native) but as drum machines ( and synths) aren't the main thrust of the brand, and it would perhaps not make them any money, I can see why they made the choice. I'm with you though, it's a bummer.

Better than letting it rot on the vine.

[James Steele]

I've mentioned this elsewhere. It's not exactly cheap, but it does a LOT of things... very powerful beyond what I use it for which is a "shell" to load problem plug-ins in DP. I can run the old DrumCore 4 and El Clapo, for example, flawlessly inside DP running in native mode if I run it inside Blue Cat Audio PatchWork. It's a plug that comes in all the various formats. I installed the AS-native AU. There are actually two plug ins: PatchWork and PatchWork Synth. The former works for FX plugs, the latter will be seen as VI in DP so you can load it into an Instrument Track, and then in turn load an old VI that doesn't normally work directly into DP. Again, this is how I managed to amazingly have full functionality for DrumCore 4 which is now defunct. Last I heard, the developer, Sonoma Wireworks, was going out of business and trying to sell their intellectual property including DrumCore to another company, but don't know if that's ever going to happen.

Here's a link to PatchWork:

https://www.bluecataudio.com/Products/P ... PatchWork/

[stubbsonic]

Good call, James. I bought Patchwork a few months ago and was having the same thought about being able to extend the live-span of some abandonware by using it as a shell. I'm not quite sure how it will all work in terms of which plugs/VIs will require Rosetta 2-- behind Patchwork, but as you say, it might allow some semi-broken things to become whole for a while.

[James Steele]

Good call, James. I bought Patchwork a few months ago and was having the same thought about being able to extend the live-span of some abandonware by using it as a shell. I'm not quite sure how it will all work in terms of which plugs/VIs will require Rosetta 2-- behind Patchwork, but as you say, it might allow some semi-broken things to become whole for a while.

The latest version is really good. Prior to that, it wouldn't launch properly in DP but they fixed that and so now it's my goto for problematic plugs. Some people use Komplete Kontrol, but if the plug you're using doesn't have a VST2 version, it won't work.

Another cool use for PatchWork is you can use their AAX plug in Pro Tools, and then any AU or VST, etc. in Pro Tools. Before I got the Mac Studio and was on the MacPro5,1, as sort of a "proof of concept" I was actually able to use my old Focusrite LiquidMix in Pro Tools, with the combination of 32 Lives and PatchWork.

[mhschmieder]

I didn't get the notice. Instead, they told me about dropping most of the Exponential Audio products.

[Michael Canavan]

I'm starting to etch out a diagram in my mind of plug in developers that have a desire to keep old software running and ones that do not.

Basically two categories roughly:

1. Companies like iZotope, NI, all of the InMusic brands etc. that always have blow out sales, that constantly release "new" plug ins etc. These companies have either been bought out by investment firms, or other types of parent companies that require profits etc. to be consistent, so little time for fixing up older programs, releasing new versions of plug ins that are not currently big sellers etc.

then
2. Companies like U-He, DMG, Fabfilter, PSP, Waves, IK etc. who keep their back catalog alive. Now of course, Waves and IK have some update/upgrade weirdness, Waves with their WUP and IK with their genuinely confusing and annoying Jam Points, Gear Credits, and upgrade requirements; not to mention their ridiculous sales. The thing is though, all mentioned developers keep plug ins in circulation from years ago.

So I'm trying to make my choices on what to buy based partially on this. I like many of us cannot do without Kontakt, and I own Production Suite 4 from iZotope, but I'm just kinda done with feeding the beasts. I'll update NI and iZotope when Kontakt stops working on Mac OS and iZotope might just stay on the old Mac Pro here.

It should be noted that Breaktweaker works in Rosetta on the Air here, it's a CPU pig, but it works. My other irreplaceable iZ product is Tonal Balance Control, I love the whole bands of reference frequencies approach it does, and it's been a big help in mixing for sure. The other elephant in the room I think it's safe to do some conjecture on is developers leaving and huge technical debt. Companies like iZoptope, NI and even MOTU end up with plug ins that were developed by someone who no longer works at the organization, this makes it much harder to update a plug in that was coded with maybe even weird workarounds to get GUI functionality in Catalina etc. etc. So sometimes you have to concede that it's not entirely the companies fault that compatibility with modern OS's is not happening and the product is end of life. I think that's plainly obvious with MOTU for example with Volta, Unisyn, BPM, and all the instruments that seem to have ties to UVI like Ethno etc. that have stopped being updated years ago.

[James Steele]

2. Companies like U-He, DMG, Fabfilter, PSP, Waves, IK etc. who keep their back catalog alive. Now of course, Waves and IK have some update/upgrade weirdness, Waves with their WUP and IK with their genuinely confusing and annoying Jam Points, Gear Credits, and upgrade requirements; not to mention their ridiculous sales. The thing is though, all mentioned developers keep plug ins in circulation from years ago.

Speaking of IK, I run their IK Product Manager daily hoping to see a AS native version of ARC3... to no avail. I see they're selling a line of studio monitors now with that tech built in, but I was bowled over by the pricing. I'll have to sit that out.

[Michael Canavan]

2. Companies like U-He, DMG, Fabfilter, PSP, Waves, IK etc. who keep their back catalog alive. Now of course, Waves and IK have some update/upgrade weirdness, Waves with their WUP and IK with their genuinely confusing and annoying Jam Points, Gear Credits, and upgrade requirements; not to mention their ridiculous sales. The thing is though, all mentioned developers keep plug ins in circulation from years ago.

Speaking of IK, I run their IK Product Manager daily hoping to see a AS native version of ARC3... to no avail. I see they're selling a line of studio monitors now with that tech built in, but I was bowled over by the pricing. I'll have to sit that out.

The way I run ARC is through Audio Hijack. For a couple reasons, one I never have to remember to disable it because it's not on the Master track in DP, and two because it's not on the master track taking CPU resources. Anyway point being running it that way means it's any significant advantage to it being native here.

Oh and yeah IK are being annoying with AS support, they had a run with Amplitube, Sample Tank, Mixbox etc. then they just dried up. T-Racks and ARC are long overdue at this point.

[coolbass]

I can run the old DrumCore 4

Thanks James. You inspired me to install Drumcore4 on my M1. Great, it works!