one EXs on two Kronos / how ?

midinut · Post by **midinut** » Wed May 14, 2014 1:07 am

Korg themselves have had products that did carry over to another board. Look at the MOSS board, RADIAS board for the M3. Or the EXB cards for the Triton series (which also worked in the Karma as well). If you traded up or over you could pull your old boards out and use them in another product (or a second board) with no problems. So even Korg has experience with this side of marketing strategies. I only own one Kronos myself so it doesn't apply to me much either. I don't plan on a second board, but if something happened to mine and I was forced to replace it, I'd be pissed if I couldn't reinstall products that I owned and paid for. Just my opinion.

Sam CA · Post by **Sam CA** » Wed May 14, 2014 1:42 am

danmusician wrote:
I realize that I'm the one who said that. I'm just saying that if it isn't unreasonable to pay full price for two keyboards, perhaps it isn't unreasonable to pay for the sounds in each keyboard, either.

Try saying that to people (especially non-musicians) who paid for Kronos. Even most musician type K owners can not relate to this type of business practice in real life. People are used to the idea of paying for the Cable but watching TV in all 5 rooms type of deal. Bad example, but that's just how it is these days.
It never fails. Everytime people ask me for better Strings/Brass/Piano....I have to bring up the issue of how these libraries work. Even if they have no plans in buying another board or whatever, still they hesitate. Then, I make the second suggestions which is Kontakt plus Soft libraries. They like this better, because they're familiar with the business practice.

By the way, I've got you beat. I've been doing that for schools and churches for 30 years!

30 years? Nice! That's a lot of phone calls.

danmusician · Post by **danmusician** » Wed May 14, 2014 1:53 am

Sam,

I understand exactly what you're saying - and agree. I like buying an app once and putting it on my ipad, iPad mini and my wife's ipad. And I get that we've become accustomed to it.

I'm just not sure that Korg is really being unreasonable.

Dan

PS - I will also say that I have not purchased libraries that I might have paid for if they didn't have the copy restriction. They're not worth twice the price to me and I like to keep my instruments set up the same.

Corgy · Post by **Corgy** » Wed May 14, 2014 7:34 am

When I got my Kronos - now 1 and a half year ago - I had a close look to the extensions - and I liked them. But prior to the purchase - out of curiosity - I checked exactly the issue that the OP discusses.

I was surprised to learn about that policy. What about purchase a 61 first and upgrade later to 88 - or get a second board? What about replacement at all? Electronics is not undestructable.

This policy is - bluntly speaking - a very bad business idea - Korg put's an unflexible IPR protection mechanism over reasonable support of regular customers. The point is, there can be both - protection and support - if you look to MAC/PC audio software.

Understanding this, I decided, never to get any of those extensions at all, until this policy has been changend. Fortunately there is plenty audio material out there that can be transfered to the Kronos by each user - without this limitations - it's just costing some work and a "converter-utility" for the samples.

db1 · Post by **db1** » Thu May 15, 2014 11:11 am

Corgy wrote:When I got my Kronos - now 1 and a half year ago - I had a close look to the extensions - and I liked them. But prior to the purchase - out of curiosity - I checked exactly the issue that the OP discusses.

I was surprised to learn about that policy. What about purchase a 61 first and upgrade later to 88 - or get a second board? What about replacement at all? Electronics is not undestructable.

This policy is - bluntly speaking - a very bad business idea - Korg put's an unflexible IPR protection mechanism over reasonable support of regular customers. The point is, there can be both - protection and support - if you look to MAC/PC audio software.

Understanding this, I decided, never to get any of those extensions at all, until this policy has been changend. Fortunately there is plenty audio material out there that can be transfered to the Kronos by each user - without this limitations - it's just costing some work and a "converter-utility" for the samples.

I couldn't have said it better myself. That is precisely why I didn't purchase another Kronos. I would like to go from a 88 to a 61,but I can't since I already purchased 3 Ex's. What if my Kronos breaks,is stolen at a gig or gets damaged somehow? Because of that reason alone, I picked up a Motif instead. That policy really sucks & doesn't take into account all possible scenarios.

traveler · Post by **traveler** » Thu May 15, 2014 8:52 pm

Corgy wrote:When I got my Kronos - now 1 and a half year ago - I had a close look to the extensions - and I liked them. But prior to the purchase - out of curiosity - I checked exactly the issue that the OP discusses.

I was surprised to learn about that policy. What about purchase a 61 first and upgrade later to 88 - or get a second board? What about replacement at all? Electronics is not undestructable.

This policy is - bluntly speaking - a very bad business idea - Korg put's an unflexible IPR protection mechanism over reasonable support of regular customers. The point is, there can be both - protection and support - if you look to MAC/PC audio software.

Understanding this, I decided, never to get any of those extensions at all, until this policy has been changend. Fortunately there is plenty audio material out there that can be transfered to the Kronos by each user - without this limitations - it's just costing some work and a "converter-utility" for the samples.

+ 1000!

I've also owned a Kronos for a year and a half. And I decided early on: I will never buy an EX library until they change their unfair and outdated licensing policy!

Thanks for your eloquent post.

T.

vstkeys · Post by **vstkeys** » Fri May 16, 2014 5:53 pm

well, there are already a few working EX keygen on torrent sites. I knew this would happen one day. Well I won't be surprised with another os update to protect their dollar.

GregC · Post by **GregC** » Fri May 16, 2014 7:42 pm

vstkeys wrote:well, there are already a few working EX keygen on torrent sites. I knew this would happen one day. Well I won't be surprised with another os update to protect their dollar.

I don't think those torrent sites are a good solution.

Do you ?

vstkeys · Post by **vstkeys** » Sat May 17, 2014 2:45 am

Gregc
Whatever floats your boat man, I'm just saying that buying the same stuff which is highly overpriced twice is a rip off.
But anyway, it is a individual's own call what the solution is or not.

GregC · Post by **GregC** » Sat May 17, 2014 3:20 am

vstkeys wrote:Gregc
Whatever floats your boat man, I'm just saying that buying the same stuff which is highly overpriced twice is a rip off.
But anyway, it is a individual's own call what the solution is or not.

Talking about your thinking. Its not ' illegal " for a company to charge a high price. its public knowledge and understood and upfront.

But you posted about the torrent with the Exs. Which are free, right ? Wouldn't you know that ? Which is an obvious rip off.

Correct ?

vstkeys · Post by **vstkeys** » Sat May 17, 2014 6:24 am

Cregc
Sorry mate, theres no need to try teaching me morals in here. If you play music, keep practising & don't wast your time.
I just thought I would give my 50c as before having two kronos and one library was really an issue. And korg never bothering to address it. Anyway I only have one Kronos 61 which I really dislike the keybed, therefore no amount of torrent libraries will suit me. But anyway look, whatever thoughts and conclusions you found is fine with me.

EddyDeegan · Post by **EddyDeegan** » Mon May 19, 2014 11:30 pm

Kenny59 wrote:Kind of a sore subject with me. Search this topic and you will see that it has been addressed a few times. I am in the same situation. I generally have duplicates of all of the boards that I own for a couple of reasons. First, I like having a spare should a board fail, and number two, I like being able to program or sequence on the board without having to unload my trailer. This is the only board that I have that is a problem to loading sounds that I decide to purchase. What a major inconvenience. I have to by two separate banks of the same sound, what a joke. I would be happy if they could in some way have a USB dongle to plug in the board to authorize the sound, but by two separate EX soundbanks to use on two of the same keyboard. I just can't fathom this.

Every other board I own, I can purchase sounds and use them on my backup without any problems. Well, enough of a rant by me. I'm not really that bitter, but wish there were other options.

Kenny59

I've never ranted or mentioned this, didn't seem worth it, but I'll quietly add that this is the reason why I will never buy a sound library with such user-unfriendly DRM on it. I've got a roomful of workstations here, and the Kronos takes pride of place. I also have a healthy wallet. To buy a library that I cannot back up and restore to a replacement board in case of hardware failure would be (at least to me) a stupid decision.

Thus, I will never buy any libraries for the Kronos. I think over the years I've spent over 1000ukp on libraries for other synths (and I've never, ever shared any of them). I also have fully licensed versions of the entire Arturia collection, Propellerheads Reason, Omnisphere, Alchemy and more besides. My expenditure on software overall, certainly exceeds the price of the Kronos hardware I have.

I still think DRM is not a bad thing per se. I completely understand the problems sound designers face with piracy. It's just the implementation on the Kronos utterly fails to benefit the end user. What Korg SHOULD have done, in my humble opinon, is to provide a USB dongle with the Kronos, onto which additional licences could be installed. And then, you could use your purchased libraries on any Kronos that you plugged the dongle into. I have most of my software synths installed on both my Mac Pros, although I can only use whichever one has the dongle plugged in. Easy. No problem.

Sadly, Korg really missed a golden opportunity to do something great, and tragically, it was with the one synth that really had the chops (and the OS) to implement it sensibly.

But there you go. What do I know? I'm just the (middle-aged, decent income and most importantly, honest) end user who wants to protect his investment. Their decision to implement such an ugly policy has certainly deprived a number of sound designers from the benefit of my credit card. Am I alone in this stance? I don't care, it's not my problem and I certainly don't *need* the libraries. I'd certainly have bought a few by now though, so I guess that's more a vendor problem although in this case the vendor are the 3rd parties who create sound libraries for the Kronos. Nothing personal guys, I'd love to buy your product, but Korg have put a barrier up there that perhaps you need to address with them. Maybe you don't care either, in which case, good luck & all, sincerely. You do great things.

So, I've quietly voted with my wallet, in that I'm keeping it shut where the Kronos library market is concerned, and they can email me all they like with lots of cool offers, because I do not consider buying any of them a sane choice.

GregC · Post by **GregC** » Tue May 20, 2014 12:44 am

Reverse rant. I am likely the only person on the planet who sees it this way.

I used to sort of "had" a roomful of workstations plus a digital piano.

Every 2 or 3 years, I would spend $10,000 on the latest Motif, Roland this or that plus modules/SRX's , and of course the latest Korg workstation.
(I don't load up on a bunch of soft synths, the latest Arturia this/that).

All that Roland, Yamaha stuff hardware load up stopped with the Kronos.

I spent $3000 just 3 years ago on the Kronos.

Nothing, zilch, nada on Roland or Yamaha. Do they do some nice things ? Yeah. But not enough to overlap with what the Kronos does and its enormous capabilities.

So I don't see a big need to mega dump on Korg for the EXs policy towards a customer with 2 or more Kronos'. I do sympathize and get it, that its an additional $150 or $300 for those in that situation.

But I also think the Kronos has saved me a bunch of $$$ as I pointed out above.

Again, I am likely the only person on the planet, to rationalize that saving $7000 is better than potentially spending an additional $150-$300 on EXs.

GregC · Post by **GregC** » Tue May 20, 2014 1:53 am

GregC wrote:Reverse rant. I am likely the only person on the planet who sees it this way.

I used to sort of "had" a roomful of workstations plus a digital piano.

Every 2 or 3 years, I would spend $10,000 on the latest Motif, Roland this or that plus modules/SRX's , and of course the latest Korg workstation.
(I don't load up on a bunch of soft synths, the latest Arturia this/that).

All that Roland, Yamaha stuff hardware load up stopped with the Kronos.

I spent $3000 just 3 years ago on the Kronos.

Nothing, zilch, nada on Roland or Yamaha since then. Do they do some nice things ? Yeah. But not enough to overlap with what the Kronos does and its enormous capabilities.

So I don't see a big need to mega dump on Korg for the EXs policy towards a customer with 2 or more Kronos'. I do sympathize and get it, that its an additional $150 or $300 for those in that situation.

But I also think the Kronos has saved me a bunch of $$$ as I pointed out above.

Again, I am likely the only person on the planet, to rationalize that saving $7000 is better than potentially spending an additional $150-$300 on EXs.

Kenny59 · Post by **Kenny59** » Tue May 20, 2014 4:01 am

This has kind of gotten out of control. Let me explain my situation. I originally bought a Kronos 61. A friend of mine one up'd me and bought a Kronos 61X. He has since lost his job and his Kronos to me after I bought it from him rather cheap. No, I didn't want to take it from him, but if anyone was going to buy it, why not me. After all, if he really needs it back, I will sell it back to him or let him use it. This is the reason I have two Korg Kronos keyboards. The other boards that I have two of are for the aforementioned reasons in my other post. A dongle may not be the answer. The selling of additional licenses may or not be the answer, but there has to be a compromise.

The Kronos is a magnificent board that can do almost anything. I just don't think that it is fair to sell sounds that marry to one and only board. I get the piracy issue and am sympathetic to the creators, however not everyone is a thief.

With this, I will let the matter drop and if need be, buy a second EX or whatever for my second board should I need too.

Kenny59