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Path: utzoo!mnetor!seismo!rutgers!ames!oliveb!pyramid!batcomputer!chow
From: chow@batcomputer.tn.cornell.edu (Christopher Chow)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac
Subject: Re: DMCS
Message-ID: <714@batcomputer.tn.cornell.edu>
Date: Thu, 16-Apr-87 09:40:18 EST
Article-I.D.: batcompu.714
Posted: Thu Apr 16 09:40:18 1987
Date-Received: Sun, 19-Apr-87 10:03:47 EST
References: <566@entropy.ms.washington.edu>
Reply-To: chow@tcgould.tn.cornell.edu.UUCP (Christopher Chow)
Organization: Theory Center, Cornell University, Ithaca NY
Lines: 59
Keywords: Upgrade?

In article <566@entropy.ms.washington.edu> peter@entropy.ms.washington.edu (Peter Guttorp) writes:
>I keep seeing the Deluxe Music Construction Set version 2.0 advertised.
>Being a registered owner, I had expected to see an upgrade notice.

DMCS 2.0 has been out for quite some time.  Electronic Arts is pretty bad at
sending upgrade notices...the one I received was part of a generic
Electronic Arts mailing.  You basicly have to send in the front cover of
your version 1.0 manual along with an upgrade fee (I think $50, but I
forget).

>For those of you who have got it (if it is out), has it fixed any of the
>two major annoyances (to me) with earlier versions:
>
>	No ritardando or other smooth tempo change
		Not that I'm aware of, but then I don't use DMCS for
playback. (I use it with Opcode's sequencer to make transcriptions)

>	No graceful way of ending a manuscript
		DMCS 2.0 has the Adobe Sonata font (scrren version) built
it.  The last measure in your composition has the double-bar on the end.
Like the old DMCS, a bar appears after that one, but if it has nothing it
won't be printed.

>I would be grateful for facts or opinions by mail or through news.

Version 2.0 is a vast improvement from 1.0.  The Sonata font make a big
difference in the program's appearence.  I always thought DMCS 1.0 
scores looked pretty non-musical - not true with 2.0 though.  2.0 still
dosen't have all the features Prof. Comp has, but if you can live with its
subset it is much faster.  MIDI input is nice, but it is seriously buggy.
(Try entering chords instead of single notes in midi input mode...)

<< flame on >>
Copy protection is pretty obnoxious.  As you recall, version 1.0 had a
pretty stupid CP in that it caused the Mac to bomb if the master disk wasn't
the internal drive upon startup.  That was no problem because MacBackup will
remove the CP automaticly and the program behaved fine afterwards.

Well 2.0 isn't stupid - it'll ask for the master disk.  You can install I
believe 2 copies onto your hard disk.  Unfortunately, it also uses the
same CP that Opcode and Digidesign uses.  I.e., it disables the
microdebugger upon entry and dosen't restore it; it resets the Mac if you
have any debugger loaded; it uses encrypted CODE resources so that even if
you have it on a hard disk it takes a long time to load because its too busy
translating the CODE resources as it reads it into memory...

<< flame off >>

BTW, does anyone know if Electronic Arts ever made any updates to 2.0
(especially to fix the midi input problems...)

Christopher Chow
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