Virtual Piano

[matto]

All of Eastwest's sample libraries run inside the same "Virtual Instrument" which they call "Play". Whether you buy their piano, orchestral libraries, choir, ethnic instruments like Ra or Silk, whatever...the "Play engine" is the instrument which contains them and is used to load them, play them etc. So yes it is both the interface as well as the "Virtual Instrument" you would load up in your DAW which streams the samples from disk...basically the "engine" that does all the work.

Many other sample developers use a third party "Virtual Instrument" called Kontakt made by Native Instruments...rather than develop their own, they license said "engine" from native Instruments and only develop the sample content.

[herminga123]

All of Eastwest's sample libraries run inside the same "Virtual Instrument" which they call "Play". Whether you buy their piano, orchestral libraries, choir, ethnic instruments like Ra or Silk, whatever...the "Play engine" is the instrument which contains them and is used to load them, play them etc. So yes it is both the interface as well as the "Virtual Instrument" you would load up in your DAW which streams the samples from disk...basically the "engine" that does all the work.

Many other sample developers use a third party "Virtual Instrument" called Kontakt made by Native Instruments...rather than develop their own, they license said "engine" from native Instruments and only develop the sample content.

Is the EW play engine a lot different from the others? Is it a big problem and a major reason a lot of users would be "turned off" from their products?

[mazz]

It's not a major problem and many folks use EW stuff happily because overall their sounds are very good to great depending on the library.

The issue is that Play is just not as user friendly or flexible as something like Kontakt. For people that need to work quickly, Play is just slow and cumbersome in the usability and setup department, which is frustrating and disappointing given the high quality of many of the sounds in their libraries.

[matto]

It *was* a major problem and turn-off in the past...I don't have any stats on how many people are still having real problems with the latest version, but my guess would be few.
It's just that my overall experience with Play has made me uncomfortable recommending anything that runs on Play without the caveat "assuming it runs well on your system"...and that there are many other options for piano that are as good as EW and run on platforms that have exhibited far fewer problems and are more resource efficient and faster to use...which may or may not matter to you.

That being said I would say chances are good it will work well for you...assuming you're not planning on accompanying your piano tracks with a whole symphony orchestra or other demanding applications on the computer you own now.

[herminga123]

Thanks everybody for all of your insight. It is absolutely priceless. You have been such a great help!!!!!!

[mojobone]

Thanks for the tweaks and the tutorial; I had to do the Microsoft Service Pack fandango....