Dave Smith Instruments SYNTHESIZERS

Hi all,

The team at SoundTower has spent the balance of this year on 
redevelopment plans that have involved looking at all of our 
existing programs with an eye for optimization, enhancement and 
cross-platform compatibility. Part of the process has been tested 
successfully in rebuilding our editor for Waldorf's Q, Roger Linn's 
Adren II and a new editor for M-Audio's BLACKBOX for Mac and PC 
platforms.

We are now reorganizing our resources to make the best use of our 
programmer's time over the next year. We plan on looking at each of 
our programs for conversion but we are only going to do this after 
getting as much input from users of our current programs.

In light of these developments we are putting out a call for input. 
We are hoping for more that just polite comment but concrete 
suggestions that we might be able to implement in our new structure.

Some of the small things we have started, and will continue to do, 
is re-packaging our existing programs in an installer which includes 
our licensing agreement and User Guide in PDF that will be installed 
on your OS for easier reference.

We have in development an help page that will have all of our FAQ's 
and User Guides linked, as well as websites for patches, organized 
for one stop resource if it has to deal with our programs.

This is part of our ongoing concern for our customers well being. I 
am fervent in my desire that move forward only with your imput.

The two main areas of endeavour that has consummed our time of late 
has been the rebuilding of our programs for use on both MAC and PC 
platforms and developing the ground work for VST plugin capability 
for our future editors.

So please send me any of your comments for improvement and wishes 
for software. I cannot promise the implementation of all of your 
ideas but I promise a considered review of anything you send to us. 
Much of our improvements over the years have been inspired by, if 
not outright suggested by, you.

Thanks for your time
Derek
soudntower_helpdesk@...
www.soundtower.com/

My two cents. 

I also own a Access Virus TI.  It took them for ever to get the the VST 
to work correctly.  It's no small undertaking and the pay-off may not 
be that great since you already have great software and a customer base 
that is happy with it.  I appreciate your vision in taking the company 
in a whole new direction.  But I would start with a NEW Synth 
altogether.  That way you can put a new product to market for an 
entirely different synth.  The Stand-Alone software you have is very 
good.  VST might be over-kill right now.  Plus, isn't another company 
(vyzor) building one?  Two VST interfaces for my PEK?  Hmmmm.  My other 
gear is very jealous.  I say go with another Synth for your first VST.  

Another synth will kill three birds with one stone, 1) develop MIDI to 
VST technology, 2) test the concept on a group of users who have 
nothing and would most likely eat it up with no expectations (i.e. 
Evolver users would want the same stability as your stand alone), 3) 
use the same proven methods to port your existing stand-alones in 2008. 

How many people are Analogue knob junkies like me vs. VST users that 
own a type of Evolver?  I vote, build a interface similar to what you 
have for the Alesis Andromeda A6, Jomox Synths, Studio Electronics, 
Akai MPC line, and half dozen other beat boxes, etc. etc. So much gear 
that needs it right now.  People would gobble it up.  You can sell 
those for $200 a pop and people would bite.  I would.  

I probably wouldn't understand the PEK they way I do without your 
software. Always good to create patches and multies. It's helped me 
learn the Synth.  


Like I said, it's just my 2 cents, probably 100 ways you can dismiss my 
aurgument, but I just thought I'd throw it out there.