Bitten by Snow Leopard?

So on October 7th at 10:30pm, I decided to take the plunge and upgrade to Snow Leopard.

Now there was no uber-compelling reason to do this. Granted I was curious about the reports of “snappier” system response times (true), and really curious about Grand Central, but there was no “gotta have” things in the new system that couldn’t wait a couple of months.

But I did it anyway. I took some precautions: upgraded software where I could, cleaned up the hard drives, etc. As far as software goes, things went pretty smoothly. Of the 350+ AU plug-ins I have only 14 did not pass AU validation with LOGIC. (And no, I am not insane; a number of those are demos and freeware…Ah who am I kidding.) Updating key software apps like CarbonCopyCloner really helped to keep things smooth. Yep. This upgrade stuff was pretty easy…

Surprised by Sonnet?

Except that none of my external SATA drives (you know, the ones with my samples, sounds, and patches) would mount on the desktop.

After MUCH investigation, I figured out that Sonnet’s Tempo SATA E2P card is NOT Snow Leopard compatible.

From an Op-Ed piece in the NYTimes. Not sure I agree with his analysis, but the graphic below is really interesting.

‘Course I note the source and am immediately suspect…

I’m participating in the RECORD Betas and wanted to post a few thoughts. Note that the NDA prevents me from discussing any details or juicy stuff, but head over to Propellerheads‘ beta sign up site and get a copy for yourself.

My initial impressions were not what I would call “over the top” with enthusiasm. I actually found the interface a bit confusing at first: The screen is JAM PACKED with stuff (nothing you can’t figure out from the screenshots and micro-tutorials on the Prop’s site). On a 13″ macbook screen (my main machine was in the shop the first time I fired RECORD up), it is just too much (although the function key based focus switches help.) Anyway, I am talking about my first impressions here and my first impression was that there is a disconnect between what I was looking at on the screen (a LOT of stuff) and the product’s marketing (”stripped down recording simplicity”).

My next mental hurdle was due to my being familiar with REASON. (Note I said ‘familiar’ and not ‘expert’.) There are enough similarities in the interfaces and many methods of doing things that – as a prior user of REASON – I tend to forget that I’m not IN REASON.

I’ve been offline for a few days due to the “unexpected”. Fortunately the story turns out well in the end….

1. So. I start up my nice (relatively) new 8-Core MacPro and no wireless network. Nada. Zip. Zilch.
2. Says “No Airport Card Installed”. Odd because it was there yesterday….
3. I pop the case, reseat the airport card. Nothing.
4. I zap the P-RAM. Bupkus.
5. I reinstall the 10.5.7 Combo Update.  Nothing.
6. I boot from the OS CD. (If it is a software issue, booting from the CD will let you know ’cause if suddenly it works some file or set of files on your boot HD must have been corrupted and you will need to reinstall the operating system.) Still, “No Airport Card Installed”.
7. Everything else is fine. Computer works great. Can’t figure it out.
8. I take it to MacMedics. Nice guys. They put it through a battery of diagnostics. Nothing flags as broken on their tests, but the damn thing doesn’t work.
9. They order a new airport card and have it overnighted from Apple. Pop it in. Still no wireless.

At that point ($200 down and counting), they suggest replacing the logic board. Much more money than I want to (or can) spend…

…considering the fact that good alternatives exist….

…for a hundred bucks….

Have you ever gone back to an old tape or file of a piece you wrote YEARS ago (like say 15 years), put it on, then immediately remember the composition within a few seconds? What is that?

I mean, you remember where the piece goes, when the key change happens, where the toms come in and how they were panned left or right (or whatever). The level of detail is amazing. Imagine if you remembered conversations and events that way…Very few memories come back that quickly and with that much clarity after such a long period of time (at least for me).

What is that?

I get to sit near the front.

An interesting word don’t you think? ‘Pro’ meaning “denoting motion forward, out, or away” and ‘motion’ meaning “the action or process of moving or being moved”.

About a month ago there were changes at work that amounted essentially to a promotion. Between the new responsibilities and recent project work, my butt has been in the office 4 of the last 4 weekends and the already tiny time windows I have for things like piano practice, blogging, jogging, whatever (5 – 7 am weekdays usually), have been completely consumed. My dear wife has been a real champ playing single parent on the weekends this past month.

So essentially my day job is kickin’ my a$$ right now. My hope is that this is a period of “adjustment”, cause in the long term this is not desireable. I’ve got some real hard thinking to do if this is still going on down the road…

Oh. And this is why you have not seen an update recently. That changes starting this weekend. Stay tuned!