What is meant by Native Apple Silicon? I have an apple with M1 chip and DSP presets work fine. Is this for integration with the Quad Cortex?
Also, I am brand new to DSP. I have the Rabae, Henson, and Gojira packages. I am excited about having metronome and transpose in all packages. When the updates are released, how do we find them?
Ahh yes. This is something else that I donât feel like was actually stated in the communication. Obviously neural is a highly in demand product and what I would assume to be a successful company, but I saw no mention of growth, expanding the business, or expanding the dev team. All of which is an enormous bottleneck in software development. Take it from a pro software dev 
All to say I hope in the long run they are investing in their dev team and listening to their customers. I donât need neural to keep churning out singleton amp sim plugins. I want an interface similar to all the other companies that figured out successful software UI models like helix, fractal, BIAS, amplitube, THU, and even POD farm for Christ sake. What good is an algorithm when I canât EASILY use all of my purchased components together in a single window?
This is the kind of quality of life UX that will continue to win my business because as far as Iâm concerned I donât need any more amp sims and cabs. Iâm covered. What Iâm looking for is a better workflow and Iâd like to think neural can deliver. I guess itâs just a matter of will they listen and if so will they deliver before the next big thing?
I very much appreciate the update.
I donât expect any sort of actual timeline, since that just sets up possible disappointment, but I am glad to hear how they are prioritizing things. FWIW, I do work full-time in the studio, and having the flexibility to work with tones at all stages of the process, on multiple tracks in a tune is very necessary to my workflow. While I do work in Rosetta mode in Pro Tools currently, there will come a day (likely sometime this year) when it doesnât make sense to give up the performance gains of Native Silicon workflow. I would prefer to be able to keep the Neural tools in my toolkit during this transition. (I would love to be able to track with Neural plug-ins, but Iâm all on the AAX-DSP train now for recording, which gives me no discernible latency, and I donât expect Neural to devote coding time to that niche)
First, I appreciate the transparency. This post demonstrably shows me that Neural is taking feedback from community members like me who want to better understand what we should expect in the coming quarters. I know that itâs super hard to share updates because thereâs a high likelihood someone will be disappointed. Or, that your own plans might change and youâll have to issue some amendments and reset expectations! I think itâs super commendable that Neural is writing and sharing this update with the greatest possible audience. I did not have to hunt for it either. This news came to me via email. THANK YOU for inviting me in. I am a big fan and honored to know what youâre up to and what I can expect as a QC customer.
Second, Iâd be lying if I didnât also say I am one of those that is bummed out by the news. Surely, you know what % of your biz is plugin based and running Apple Silcon so I trust this makes biz sense. Further, I imagine the margins on plugins are better and keeping them stable impacts your cash flow. I want Neural to succeed and last and I trust this is the fastest way your company has right now to ensure you can drive more revenue to make that happen. I imagine that the total addressable market for $99 plugins is way bigger than the TAM for $2000 h/w purchases. And, I bet plugins are gateways to hardware purchases! I am also not convinced it works the other way around. I doubt QC owners are super likely to buy plugins right now when they have a fancy modeler. And, why would I buy a plugin that doesnât even run on my modeler?! Hopefully, the value prop for QC owners buying your plugins will be more enticing when your plugins can run on the QC. For me, as a QC owner who owns zero neural plugins, this effort just doesnât speak to me. In fact, I canât help but wonder why porting plugins matters that much since I trust all the old ones work in Rosetta and itâs not that big of a deal to run a DAW in rosetta. But, alas your plugins not running on apple silicon certainly doesnât assist with sales to potential buyers. And, if youâre trying to integrate your plugins with the QC and generate revenue I get itâŚI just wish there was more focus on adding more value to the QC. In fact, I wish part of this roadmap alluded to whether or not finishing this work would mean they run on the QC. I assume thatâs additional work. Which just makes all of this a bummer for me. I have waited years for many audio plugins to update to Apple Silicon and itâs just not been a big deal as a customer. But, I suspect this is all about missed revenue and focusing on shoring that up sooner vs later. I dunno how much an editor is holding back purchases of the QC but itâs clear users have been asking for it loudly. Hopefully, that work is continuing? And, hopefully that work is being done thoughtfully so a single code base runs cross surface on Android, iOS, iPadOS and Desktop so it can satisfy the largest number of people who work in different ways (without maintaining OS specific target builds for the editor.)
Anyways, I appreciate the update. While this work doesnât speak to me I hope it speaks to others. And, I hope this results in lots of revenue that can sustain Neural to keep innovating. I also hope I can run your plugins on my device sometime this year cuz the cloud captures/presets are pretty darn hit and miss. Iâd love way more high quality models whether you deliver as plugins or presets. I know folks are hungry for quality sounds on the QC so getting a few folks to crank out more dynamic content would be awesome but alas I trust that is distracting in and of itself. Iâve obv said more than enough. I will close on saying that I am worried that youâre putting so many resources into what is effectively maintenance vs innovation.
Thank you for sharing, for listening and mostly for MAKING AWESOME PRODUCTS PEOPLE LOVE ENOUGH THEY SHARE LONG POSTS WITH YOU.
Wouldnât they need to use the existing Plugin editor as the QC editor, if/ when the plugins are eventually to synch in with the QC (similar to what Tonex have done) ?
How would that work having a different editor in the Neural DSP plugins vs QC Editor ?
Thanks for the update on your direction. Your goals are important, both Apple Native (M1/2) and the QuadCortex. I respect your openness and appreciate your direction. Being a Plugin owner running a Mac M1, I know how important this is. Running the plugin in Rosette makes it a bit of a hog and I tend to have 6-10 instances running between my rhythms and my buddies lead tracks, so thank you very much!
I will continue to support future development by purchasing more amp plugins, just for your honesty alone. I do feel for QC owners. I read their comments. Now that they are now behind Apple updates, it must feel pretty crummy, but I do understand. Could you offer them some plugin models to offset this issue?
Please, would you also consider making all of the Cabs transferable across the different plugins models that we purchase? I mean, if I own a Fortin, Gogira rig, a Soldano, and a Henson rig, I should be able to mix and match the amps with any cab from any modeled plugin I own without having to make an IR file of each. You already have the IR files made. So, if I buy it, I would prefer the cab be unlocked for use with a different amp.
Example: Hensons Amp with Fortinâs Cab, Gogiraâs Cab, or Soldanoâs Cab, not just Henson Cab.
Actually, for me ,the plugin porting is irrelevant. For me is more important to have more usefull tools for live perfomances. I bought QC because of its size and power but I am still using my Helix live.
To much beadroom players in here!!
To clarify on some questions/concerns that have arisen:
Neural DSP consists of several continuously-expanding teams. The synergy between them is crucial for everything we do. For example, our algorithm research department will develop a new device which might be used in a plugin or to update QCâs library, and both the embedded DSP and plugin DSP teams need to be aware of what the next steps are with the code. Different challenges might present themselves on each of the platforms and the teams need to be in constant communication to ensure the best outcome.
Plugin compatibility also requires a lot of resources from the design and embedded UI teams, as well as the cloud and mobile teams, where we have also made additional hires to ensure none of our development lines are compromised.
QC development is by no means stopping. Several updates are planned for the rest of the year and Cortex Control is in a very exciting state. Plugin updates and Plugin Compatibility is going at full speed and we have made several hires on both teams to guarantee we pick up the pace.
To reassure you: none of our product lines are being compromised and none of them are slowing down; on the contrary, we have expanded the teams aggressively to deliver our community the features they want as fast as we possibly can.
A large portion of our development and QA teams will halt work on other projects to expedite this, and we hope to deliver the updates within the next couple of months.
To clarify this point in the original post, we will be allocating a large portion of the remaining resources that would be focusing on new products to prioritise Native Apple Silicon support, but this will not affect the rate at which we continue to work on Quad Cortex or Plugin Compatibility.
Thank you!
Thanks! So, âCortex Controlâ is the official desktop editor name?
This kind of communication is very much appreciated. Thank you.
Thanks Dan,
I was very concerned by the recent news, and as a lot of people, I thought it would mean âQC is not our priorityâ , but your post really ressures me !
After the long delay for the 1.4 firmware (due to âthe variations in hardware componentsâ) and the even longer delay for the 2.0 firmware (coz the âFile Management redesignâ) , NDSP said multiple times that subsequent updates would be delivered much faster, as promised at launch (the now famous 'agressive update paceâ) if I read you correctly, this is still the case because NDSP expands its team ?
Thanks for the ongoing clarity! For projects youâre willing to share (like this) it might make sense to post upcoming product specific roadmaps. It might make it easier for some of us who are only concerned about a specific SKU (eg QC) to understand things relevant to us if there was a little more context. Regardless, I gotta commend the communication again. Thanks for doing this. Youâre all becoming actual rockstars!
I was in a similar boat with the Helix use and needing an editor to navigate the Helix. Trust me when I say the QC isnât the Helix. Iâve found that with the pair of QCs I have, itâs easier to update the one in my home studio and then send my patches via the cloud backup to the one at the practice space. Itâs changed my workflow immensely⌠no doubt that Iâll use the editor when it comes to do things like name presets, but as of now itâs unnecessary since Iâm free of needing a computer to use the tactile feel and parts to create my patches.
Good point about the cloud updates.
Thatâs the jape right there man. It changed my life in terms of tweaking when I got the second one. Previous it was sort of an annoying ordeal to bring the Helix home to update it. Now itâs a breeze. I just tether them to my phone and it makes life easy.
we have expanded the teams aggressively to deliver our community the features they want as fast as we possibly can
As a longtime software engineer, I will say that this strategy is the most common way for management to address a delay, and also the most common way to completely tank a project. Every experienced engineer knows that the team productivity tends to decrease in proportion to the team size. Itâs not a production line and treating it as such has never worked.
Hi, new here. When can we expect the transpose and doubler functions to be available for the plugins? And have you thought about porting the plugins to iPadOS? That would be a game changer. 
SOON, seriously I donât believe NDSP has indicated when those updates can be expected.