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Old 09-26-2020, 07:37 PM   #1
eq1
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Default Trying to use old 2006 E-MU Proteus Vst

I have an old "Proteus X2 software sound module" CD that came with my old E-MU 1212m audio interface. I've never used it. Documentation says it works on Windows 2000 and XP. I'm running Windows 7. It's supposed to be a stand alone program + a VST plug-in.

I was hoping to get the VST plug-in part working...

I can go through the installation process without any problems, but after restarting computer, none of it works. Reaper seemed to recognize a new VST for an instant - I saw a brief flash of a pop-up box that had the E-MU plugin name, when starting Reaper. But then, I don't see anything in the plug-in lists.

The stand alone program doesn't work either - just won't open. I tried opening it in compatibility mode, but that didn't work...

Wondering if anyone knows of an easy fix/trick to make this work?


edit: Here's a link to a succinct article at wikipedia about 'Proteus': https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-mu_Proteus_X

Here's a couple of the most pertinent bits from article, there's not much more to it:

"While they [Proteus X2, Emulator, etc.] work for most people on Windows 2000, Windows XP, and Windows Vista 32-bit, all but Emulator X3 are only tested and currently supported for Windows XP. Only Emulator X3 is tested and officially supported for both XP & Vista and is the only version that works as a VSTi in x64 and DAW software."

"User must also have a qualifying E-MU hardware such as a E-MU digital audio interface...connected, powered on and installed correctly as the E-MU hardware also acts as a software copy protection dongle for the protected software. Not having all of these things in order often results in the failed launch of the program or the Streaming engine error message."

I think it's looking pretty hopeless for me. I do have the, or "a," E-MU audio interface, pretty sure I had it ON when I tried running Proteus. But it's also a slightly newer version than the one the Proteus CD came with. The description of the failure above sounds just like what I'm seeing - a "failed launch"...

And on top of this I've got Windows 7.

Last edited by eq1; 09-27-2020 at 12:28 AM.
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Old 09-27-2020, 12:32 AM   #2
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I used to use this when I had a 1212m & as far as I can remember it still worked fine when I switched cards to an RME and windows 7. It also carried on working when I switched to Windows 10 but I finally lost it when I had a catastrophic Windows 10 update-induced crash.

I suspect that your problem may be due to the non-existence of the old Emu software registration site.

Did you try looking on the Creative obsolete hardware/software section?

I just did & found a link to a freeware version of the proteus VX. Worth a try....

I am now wondering about seeing if I still ahve the original lying around on one of my many old drives.

I just went to Waybackmachine & downloaded the Proteus VX and it installed & ran as a standalone but said that the ebx sound file wasnt valid. same for the vsti, which did at least run bridged on my Win10 64 bit system. I am going to see if I can find the original CD too.... I used to really like this version of the proteus, having worked with a keyboard player who used the original hardware version.

EDIT: A thought. IF you still have the emu CD with the original soundbank file(s) on it, try downloading the Proteus VX & if it comes up with the same ebx file error, load the original one in off your cd.
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Old 09-27-2020, 01:54 AM   #3
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I have the screenshot I got trying to use the standalone version but not sure of the easiest way to upload it on here... May use dropbox.

And it is still showing the .ebx file as not correct, although I did get a number of the control buttons to respond.

Also, on initialisation it said my WASAPI audio system was not working, so I will try it on my studio machine with a "proper" audio interface later. Although I switched my alliegasnce to oberheim vsts and similar, I would like to get proteus going again.
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Old 09-27-2020, 06:19 PM   #4
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ivansc View Post
I used to use this when I had a 1212m & as far as I can remember it still worked fine when I switched cards to an RME and windows 7. It also carried on working when I switched to Windows 10 but I finally lost it when I had a catastrophic Windows 10 update-induced crash.
Interesting. That's more or less what I would've expected - that it'd at least sort of work. I think half my software of whatever kind is old, from the 'XP' era, and I still use it without problems. I still use a few old VSTs that need bridging - but they work. So I was a bit surprised when I got nothing...

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Originally Posted by ivansc View Post
I suspect that your problem may be due to the non-existence of the old Emu software registration site.
May-be. But the registration pop-up (that loads and works) doesn't seem tied to the actual operation of the software - registering is presented as optional, for instance. Maybe there's a secondary online check or something that is effected, however...

Quote:
Originally Posted by ivansc View Post
Did you try looking on the Creative obsolete hardware/software section?
I used a search engine and landed on some links that took me to the Creative website, some old Proteus-related pages. I couldn't navigate to anything relevant from within those pages though...

Quote:
Originally Posted by ivansc View Post
I just did & found a link to a freeware version of the proteus VX. Worth a try...
Do you have a link? I'll look at Creative again, but I'm not hopeful. I tried looking for your 'Waybackmachine' but I'm not sure what that is, and when I found something that looked liked it, searched 'Proteus', I only got a couple of not useful hits...

Quote:
Originally Posted by ivansc View Post
EDIT: A thought. IF you still have the emu CD with the original soundbank file(s) on it, try downloading the Proteus VX & if it comes up with the same ebx file error, load the original one in off your cd.
I'm not sure what exactly I have. When I bought an older old EMU PCI 1212/1616, it came with a bunch of CDs**, such as Cubase, Abelton Live lite 4, etc. on one 'production bundle' CD, and about 4 others with sound stuff: Proteus X2 software sound module," EMU "ESC (E-MU Sound Central) Beat Shop One Installation" CD, "ESC Studio Grand" CD, and something called "The Waldorf Edition, LE Version, D-Pole Filter Module, PPV wave 2.V"... This was all with a second-hand 1212/1616 I bought, 'in the box'.

Later, I bought a brand new PCIe 1010 card (as I recall, 1010 is the main PCIe card, 1212 is with 'daughter' card, and 1616 is main card with external '1616m' breakout interface), and that came with the same or similar production bundle CD...

Basically, the only major relevant thing here I think is the Proteus CD, and I'm not sure what's actually ON the CD, whether there's soundbanks or if the soundbanks come on a separate CD/s that I don't have...



All-in-all, this isn't a super critical issue. I was actually trying to find/decide what to do to get a Korg M1 VST on my machine. I have the hardware synth, it can just be a little cumbersome to drag out, plug in and get going when I just need to experiment with a particular patch for an old song (it takes up like half my bedroom studio - and then I have to stow it away at bedtime!). I started realizing that vintage sound modules/VSTs aren't as readily and cheaply available as I had imagined they'd be. So, I remembered I had that old Proteus CD and thought it'd be worth trying to get it going... I also realized that I don't have the patience for 'sound sculpting' that I once had... I've got some VST synths, but I don't want to spend the time trying to craft 'the right' sounds from them; I'd rather just have some stock sounds, do a bit of tweaking, and that's that. The 'Proteus' thing sounded like it might fit the bill...

** Here's an image:



edit: I was able to find the Proteus VX software. Installation seemed to work fine, opening the stand alone program worked fine, but I didn't have the sound setup. I went to Reaper and inserted it as a plug-in, and thus far I haven't been able to make any sound... It seems to 'work', just no sound. I can't seem to get the 'stuff on the left' to register in the graphical interface at right (see pict)... I'll have to dig in a little tomorrow. If I can get this to work it seems like it'd be a pretty hefty source of patches - the sound bank that comes with this is pretty huge.

Screen shot:



(Some minutes later...) Hey, I was able to get some sound. No clue what I did differently from earlier, because I did try this earlier. But now when I right click on a name of a patch at left and select "audition sound," I'm able to play the virtual midi keyboard or the virtual keyboard in Proteus and hear the patch; the patch name also transfers to the graphical user interface. That seems like progress...

(and a few more minutes later...) OK, this seems to work! It's just gonna take a little fiddling to figure out the work flow. It looks like you load banks and presets from hard drive into the 'left' side, then you can audition them one at a time by right-clicking - and you kind of have to have the graphical user interface open at the same time by pressing a tool bar button first or something (it disappears if you simply left-click on a patch name at left, you have to right click). Then that patch is transferred temporarily to the graphical side; the other choice on the right click context menu is "merge" - if you click "merge," that patch will populate the GUI, such as becoming patch 1, if you do another it will become patch 2, and so on. I'm guessing you'd then be able to save those as a new bank or something. Not bad.
Attached Images
File Type: jpg Proteus_etc_CDs_with_EMU1212.jpg (54.6 KB, 3024 views)
File Type: jpg ProteusVX_in_Reaper.jpg (54.9 KB, 3104 views)

Last edited by eq1; 09-29-2020 at 02:09 PM.
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Old 09-28-2020, 01:05 AM   #5
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Now I am jealous! Any chance you could do a copy of that old CD for me? Since it IS officially freeware now, I don`t see this as being a naughty thing to do & it would be nice to get the Proteus back again.
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Old 09-28-2020, 04:32 AM   #6
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having seen this thread, i got curious and downloaded this to test out

https://web.archive.org/web/20130317...emu/proteusvx/

works fine for me, not really my sort of sounds - kind of 90s sounding - loads of presets though.
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Old 09-28-2020, 03:35 PM   #7
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^ Funny - I think it goes beyond being "kind of 90s sounding," it's like the quintessential 90s sounds. I flipped through a few presets and was like, 'Oh hey, the "Doogie Howser" theme piano sound, as well as a few other familiars...

Unfortunately I don't think the VX version allows any editing. It seems to be all about programming midi controls. I'm thinking the X2 version though had a lot of editing capability. The raw sound quality seems really good; if I could get a bit of editing going I'd think I'd be able to get a lot of use out of it...

Quote:
Originally Posted by ivansc View Post
Now I am jealous! Any chance you could do a copy of that old CD for me?
I can do that. Do you think you'd need a CD image or just a regular ole copy? I tried to image the CD but for some reason it's not working... I'll try again shortly...

My image burning software crashed my computer, so I don't want to try that again at the moment. I just copied the CD, zipped it, and uploaded here:
https://1drv.ms/u/s!AskciUu3eSuSgQ3-...9srdR?e=EXUUw7

Be sure to report back if you get this stuff working, or in general keep us posted. I'd like to figure out how to get the editing capability of what I presume X2 can do...

(later...) FYI, I'm looking at the various files I have for 'Proteus', perusing the manual, etc., and I just noticed that "ProteusVX" is available on the "E-MU Production Tools Software Bundle Installation DVD-ROM." I mentioned earlier that originally I bought an EMU1616 second hand and it came with a bunch of discs, including this 'production bundle', and then later I ended up buying a new 1010 PCIe card - and it too came with the same 'production bundle' CD/DVD. I'm looking at the files on one of them and it has a folder labeled "PxVX" - it has the same files in it that are in the VX version that I downloaded at the link that Domzy posted...

The point? If you're having problems getting Proteus VX going, like ivansc has, and you have this CD/DVD, maybe trying to load it from that CD would help?...


(later...) I'm pretty excited here. The Proteus VX plug-in works pretty well and has opened up a huge range of new sounds for me to use. There's also some editing/tweaking that can be done. The VX comes with about 1100 sounds of its own. But what's really cool is this: 1) I have a couple CDs with EMU sound banks that work with this - a Grand Piano one and a 'Beat Shop'. But even cooler, 2) when I loaded the Proteus X2 software, apparently some of it worked. There's an auxiliary program called "Emulator X Converter," and that can convert a few different file formats into the .exb format that Proteus VX and X2 uses.

I had a few old sound font files so I gave it a try, just dragged and dropped the fonts into the converter window and, poof, they were converted into banks that can be loaded into the VX VST loaded in Reaper! That seems like a potential goldmine of sounds...

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Old 09-29-2020, 12:23 AM   #8
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I am having another go at downloading the original VX install file. Let`s hope this time that ebx file is legible.

I really want to get this going again if I can...
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Old 09-29-2020, 01:34 AM   #9
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So you saying this junk I had bundled with E-mu keyboard ages ago can still be used? I said bye to Proteus when moving on to Windows 7 (I think authorization driver didn't work anymore), thought it was for good.

We'll that might be a way to have sounds so cliched they're original again. I have a soft spot for 90s sound.

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Old 09-29-2020, 02:00 PM   #10
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^ If my experience is representative, then probably, or at least some of it...

I think the procedures are something like this:

-install Proteus VX, available at that link domzy posted a few posts up (or you might have it already on one of those 'production' CDs, look for a "PxVX" folder). That should load a standalone Proteus VX, plus a VST that works in reaper (bridged), plus a 1100 sound 'composer' sound bank.

-then I'd guess you could simply install those other sound-related CDs and they'd probably install sound bank files that work with the VX, they'd probably be placed in an "E-MU Sound Central" folder in the installation folder, they're ".exb" files...

-there's an "Emulator converter" application in the Proteus X2 CD I linked to, not sure what you'd need to do to install that; for me, installing the whole CD successfully installed the converter app, but not the rest of X2. This converter app allows you to convert various file types into a sound bank that VX can use, I've done it with a few different soundfonts that I had laying around.


I wouldn't mind getting a hold of those 3 'colored' CDs if you feel like uploading those... Or, I'd bet you could just copy the .exb folders once you get them installed and upload those in a single zipped archive...
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Old 09-29-2020, 04:13 PM   #11
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I don't want to go off on a tangent here, but maybe someone has a few words to say about this:

I'm "excited" about this Proteus VX and the sounds it opens up for me, but maybe that's just a sign of my green-ness dealing with this stuff?. I see on ebay that there's this for sale, only ~$10, "E-MU Loaded Rackmount Kits/Drum WAV Samples & Sounds Library." https://www.ebay.com/itm/E-MU-Loaded...wAAOSwgu9bPUi-

It's like 4000 samples from most of E-MU's rackmount gear. I'm thinking that, in a quest for a big library of sounds, developed over time, gradually, maybe it'd be better/best to 'drill-down' a layer and deal with samples plus some good sample player/editor plug-in? Not sure what the latter would be...

Is that what people do? Seems like ultimately you'd really want a huge sample library (for these kinds of vintage patches), from all sorts of vintage gear, and you'd use some sample player/editor to deal with those...
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Old 09-29-2020, 06:38 PM   #12
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Back to Proteus VX...

I mentioned that I was able to convert some soundfonts into the .exb format that Proteus uses. What I'm not able to yet is tweak them.

In the screen shot below you can see there's parameters called "initial controller amounts," that control things such as attack and decay, filter resonance, etc. With the banks/presets I've loaded from EMU CDs, I'm able to change these values and they change the sound. They don't seem to have any effect on the converted soundfonts though. I can add 'preset FX' (A and B) and those work. The global volume control works, master tuning. But not these other controls...

Not sure if I'm just not seeing some setting or if that's a weakness of this setup. If anyone has ideas I'm all ears...

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Old 09-30-2020, 05:25 AM   #13
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Quote:
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I wouldn't mind getting a hold of those 3 'colored' CDs if you feel like uploading those... Or, I'd bet you could just copy the .exb folders once you get them installed and upload those in a single zipped archive...
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Old 09-30-2020, 02:55 PM   #14
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So you saying this junk I had bundled with E-mu keyboard ages ago can still be used?
I tried those cds and though they seem to install fine, I get this error message when I try to load a bank into VX, standalone or in Reaper:

"One or more sample link files could not be found.
An error occurred while opening one or more sample link files from the SamplePool folder. These may have been removed or renamed, or the files could be invalid."

After this, the GUI is populated, but I get no sound...

Have you tried installing/loading anything yet?


In any event, overall I'm still floored by just the VX 'composer bank' that comes with the VX install. I clicked through the 1000+ presets yesterday, tweaked a parameter and FX here and there, and there's just a ton that can be done with this. It seems way beyond just getting some vintage '90s sounds' to me.
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Old 09-30-2020, 04:11 PM   #15
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fyi, it looks like one of the major differences between Proteus VX, the free version, and Proteus X2, the one I originally tried to load from my old CD, is that X2 allows you to drill down and actually manipulate the organization of samples into "voices."** Seems like VX is more of a 'high level' unit, while X2 is 'lower level'. Also, for what it's worth, I now gather that Proteus itself is more of a higher level organizational tool, while "Emulator" is the big kahuna sampler. I'm just starting to understand the hierarchy of these tools.

One great thing is that the documentation for this stuff is pretty fantastic, especially relative to what you see 'these days'. The Proteus VX manual is like ~150 pages; the X2 manual is like ~250 pages...

** Here's an excerpt describing the "voice" thing:
"Each preset contains voices. A voice houses a sample, or multiple samples, and can cover an individual key, or a range of keys. The Voices and Zones window [something VX doesn't have] allows you full control over the parameters for each voice, including levels, tuning, keyboard range, crossfading, looping, region, and more. The Voices and Zones window is divided into tabs, each with its own set of controls. Certain controls, such as Volume and Pan appear in each window."
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Old 09-30-2020, 05:44 PM   #16
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I am having another go at downloading the original VX install file. Let`s hope this time that ebx file is legible. I really want to get this going again if I can...
fyi, I'm experimenting with my VX and X2 installs. I uninstalled X2. I tried using VX as a plug-in in Reaper and now it doesn't work - I get this message when I try to open the 'composer' .exb bank file: "The file [location] is not a valid EOS or Emulator X bank file."

Sounds similar to what you might have gotten... I'm gonna try uninstalling and re-installing VX, to see if the VX was working only because I had already installed X2, or if uninstalling X2 somehow corrupted the successful install of VX...

Overall, seeing what X2 can do above and beyond VX, it seems worth some hours of experimentation to see if I can get it to work.


(later...) Looks like uninstalling the X2 corrupted the VX install - uninstalling and re-installing VX has it working again.

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Old 10-01-2020, 04:59 AM   #17
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Quote:
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Have you tried installing/loading anything yet?
Tried to run the VX but it feels pretty clunky (weird habit of opening dialogs underneath the main window) and didn't manage to make any sounds of it yet.

I used Proteus X2 with Protean Drums library in my early Reaper experiments (around version 2.x, so it was like 2009). Funny how it was many kits in 32MB, while now I have like 50 gigs of drumkits on my disk and I bet I'm on the modest side of this forum

https://soundcloud.com/zeekat/wutttt.../s-7DLRSSJN6lA
https://soundcloud.com/zeekat/hdas15-0-9

I remember it being clunky even on a "certified" system (Windows XP) - I think it was impossible to do an offline render with it, I had to bounce the track live.
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Old 10-01-2020, 07:20 AM   #18
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Re-tried VX & it is still whining about the .ebx file...

Busy sorting out the lady who is buying our house in Rochefort en Terre this week but & will see if I can improve on this later...
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Old 10-01-2020, 03:27 PM   #19
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Tried to run the VX but it feels pretty clunky (weird habit of opening dialogs underneath the main window) and didn't manage to make any sounds of it yet.
Yeah, I've noticed that too - the clunk, opening dialog boxes. But I don't have much to compare it to, haven't worked with a lot of...sound module VSTs.

VX seems useful if one were looking for some cool vintage sounds, on a tight budget, a beginner, it seems. But even I want to dig deeper than the program allows, I'd need to be able to manipulate the voices - what the X version allows. And then, I spent some time searching for Emulator X3 - because creating your own samples and presets seems like something you'd want to do at some point, if only once in a while... Plus, Emulator X3 is supposed to work with 64 bit out of the box and doesn't require an E-MU audio interface.

I don't know, still trying to figure out just what people use these days, sounds like "Kontakt" and a couple others are the go-to "ROMplers," just that that's the thing, I keep reading that Emulator X3 goes beyond that, being a real sampler, very powerful...

Etc etc...

Quote:
Originally Posted by zeekat View Post
I used Proteus X2 with Protean Drums library in my early Reaper experiments...
The drums/programming sounds great in your sample post, the first one. Thanks for sharing that.

Last edited by eq1; 10-01-2020 at 03:32 PM.
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Old 10-01-2020, 04:51 PM   #20
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Here's a link to a thread on KVR, an old one, that has some useful observations about Proteus X2, X2 on Windows 7, VX in general, interchangability of sound banks/CDs with whatever module, etc.:
https://www.kvraudio.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=280365

I especially like this comment:
"I'll never buy another software instrument with shitty copy protection again."



Here's a nice, succinct summary of one type of problem trying to load banks into Proteus VX, on Windows 7, might be relevant to 10 as well:

"The ESC [E-MU Sound Central] libraries use Macrovision disc protection when loaded in ProteusVX, ProteusX v1 or 2, or EmulatorX v1 or 2. EmulatorX3 does not use this disc protection anymore and will simply load the ESC commercial libraries (it uses challenge-reponse). Windows 7 does not work with Macrovison disc protection, therefore if you are running any version of ProteusX or an earlier version of EmulatorX under Windows 7 you will not be able to load the commercial libraries."



Here's a link to a short webpage that talks about problems loading E-MU banks into Proteus VX - and a solution. Unfortunately, the link to the fix 'utility' described isn't there.** But this sounds like the problem I had trying to load, say, the Mo Phatt soundbank into Proteus VX: https://bestlinebeach.web.fc2.com/fr...und-banks.html

Excerpt: "This video [there's no video there] shows you how to convert your old E-MU Sound Central sound banks so that they will work in Proteus VX. I had bought my E-MU Xboard midi controller keyboard sometime around 2001, and it came with Proteus X2 and a number of E-MU Sound Central sound banks. Proteus X2 is now so old that it doesn't install on Windows 10, and three of the sound banks (Planet Earth, Mo' Phatt and Protean Drums) don't play. However Proteus VX, a freely available, stripped down version of Proteus X2, does work on Windows 10. If you own Proteus X2 and these three sound banks, then you can use a small utility I wrote to convert them into a format that will work in Proteus VX. Only sound banks that have a single EBL file in their SamplePool subfolder will require conversion."

This "single EBL file" thing is what I have of those CD soundbanks, whereas other banks, like the stock 'composer', are divided into multiple files, in the "SamplePool" folder...

**...OK, I found the video and the tool, but it looks like you need to have a working Proteus X2 to begin with. In any event, here's a link to that vid: https://youtu.be/GuAMDeP9Tu4

Last edited by eq1; 10-01-2020 at 05:34 PM.
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Old 10-02-2020, 06:28 AM   #21
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Anybody bought this? I am tempted...

https://www.digitalsoundfactory.com/...-proteus-rack/
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Old 10-03-2020, 05:13 PM   #22
eq1
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^ Given what I've discovered in the process of trying to use Proteus X2 and VX, I'd say one would be much better off just buying that package of sounds and a new ROMpler, I think like Kontakt, or even a free Kontakt player, than fussing with the old E-MU stuff. $100 for all those sounds, no fuss, seems like a good buy.

If one has old E-MU CDs on hand, in most cases it'd probably be worth downloading Proteus VX - most of it should work, like ~3GB of sounds. Even the single, 1100 sound soundbank that comes with VX would be cool for a beginner to tinker with, get feet wet. But there's some 'clunk', and a range of potential hiccups depending on your system, what you're trying to do, etc. And then there's no way to drill down, limitations, VX is crippled...


Anyhow, thought I'd try to summarize some 'findings', following-up on my last post. I decided to go whole-hog and ended up loading Proteus X2 on an old laptop I have with Windows XP, which meant I had to install the E-MU carbus and audio system on that computer first. That turned out to be a major pain in itself - but ultimately I got it all to work. (Note: If you ever try to install one of these carbus adpaters/E-MU 1616 systems on an old computer, forget the installation CD and just download the driver packages and work with those)...

X2 looks like a really cool program. It's a shame there's no updated version, of that or Emulator X3...

So, OK, where to start? First off, one reason I installed X2 on the Windows XP machine was because I wanted to try that converter program to try to get the 'colored' CDs to work. The bottom line there was that these were copies, and the "commercial" CDs, like Mo Phatt, Planet X or whatever, use the "Macrovision" copy protection. If you have those CDs, then great, it should work fine. But if you're trying to use someone else's copies of those CDs, no good. E-MU seriously covered its bases trying to protect its intellectual property - in more ways than just this even.

This brings me to that "junk" that zeekat posted an image of. Most of that is the same stuff I have, except for Mo Phatt, etc. It's called the "X2 Production Set." All of those CDs have soundbanks on them. If I get a chance I'll make a list of all the sounds on those banks and post it as an attachment (you can do this with X2).

All of it works with Proteus VX on my Windows 7 machine, stand alone or as a VST in Reaper (standalone uses some serious CPU though, for some reason). I loaded most of those from the installation CDs, but then as an experiment I just copied one of the soundbank folders over from the X2 installation on my Windows XP machine - and it worked just fine. So it looks like you don't even need to install the 'X2 production set' soundbanks from installation CDs; you can just copy the soundbanks to harddrive and load them from that location into VX...

^This stuff seems contrary to what I quoted earlier about "Macrovision" - the X2 Production Set works with VX in Windows 7, this set is part of the "E-MU Sound Central" stuff, so not all ESC stuff fails to work on Windows 7 with VX...

One caveat here, though I doubt it's actually coming into play, is that I do have an E-MU sound card/audio interface. One form of protection for 'this stuff' is that the hardware is used as a juncture for protection - if you have the hardware it'll work. So I can use the X2 Production Set on my Windows 7 machine, for instance - is it because I also have an E-MU audio interface, and if you have a different audio interface it won't work for you? I kind of doubt it, but I just can't tell for sure... At various times trying to say load X2 on this machine, it was never able to detect that I actually do have E-MU hardware - so I doubt hardware detection is a factor in my ability to use the 'Production set' in VX now...

Another caveat is that I haven't really done much with VX besides loading soundbanks, tweaking a few parameters, playing the sounds - simply making sure it works in a gross sense. This says nothing about how it will actually work in practice, such as a plug-in in Reaper, used in a mix. I imagine there would be a lot of clunk...

I never got Proteus X2 to work on my Windows 7 machine: I conclude with much confidence that that's simply not possible. It installed and worked fine on my XP machine with an E-MU 1616 (or 0202) old-school PCMCIA cardbus adapter, no internet connection.

I guess that's about it, or surely enough. I guess I'll open my Windows XP machine with Proteus X2, make a list of all the soundbanks and presets that come on all those E-MU 'junk' CDs, post it here and put an end to this foray into the 2006 Proteus X2 software.
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Old 10-03-2020, 06:13 PM   #23
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Many many moons ago, I just gave up and converted the exb to sfz via ESC (acronym overload!)

That was from the freebie one. About 40mb of sample data, at 16/44.1.

I then load the patches into sfz player, or whatever, and go nuts.
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Old 10-04-2020, 01:36 AM   #24
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^ That looks worth looking into. Thanks for the tip...

I've attached a pdf list of all the presets available on those 'junk' E-MU CDs zeekat posted an image of. Not sure how useful this might be - I was thinking it'd be nice to have a print-out of all the presets, but after all's said and done, my list is 56 pages long. Afraid that will just have to remain digital. But, it's nice to see all that's available - it's a TON of stuff.

Here's a list of the soundbanks on those CDs:
Attached Images
File Type: jpg E-MU_X2_Prod_set_CD+_banklist.jpg (48.8 KB, 2801 views)
Attached Files
File Type: pdf E-MU X2 Production Set List of Presets.pdf (200.3 KB, 2495 views)
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Old 10-04-2020, 02:46 AM   #25
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I just got XP running in a virtual machine (VirtualBox) on Windows 10, so that I can use my Roland RS-70 patch editor and librarian. Could be a way forward for a lot of older gear.
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Old 10-06-2020, 11:58 AM   #26
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I dont use any E-MU software. I'm not going to answer any messages about this, but in case its useful to anyone, here's some text from an .nfo for information purposes only...

"About E-MU Emulator X3 :

Legit version have following problem :

* User need to run outdated version of FLEXnet service which is released
before the first version of Windows 7. All those reports "Emulator X3 does
not run anymore!" things are protection related issue.
* Original installer put the value to wrong registry key for 64bit. FX can't
be loaded in 64bit version due to this issue.


Here is the R2R version :

* Runs on Windows 10 without any protection related issue.
* Proper registry installation. No 64bit FX issue.
* FLEXnet is completely removed. FLEXnet service will not be installed.
FLEXnet DLL will not be loaded into memory. Stabler, faster, lighter.
* Other garbage (like customer registration tool) are not included.


You can still buy legit EMU library from here!
https://www.digitalsoundfactory.com/...at/e-mu-ex-px/

We hope our work will accelerate the sales of the legacy library "

Last edited by maxdembo; 10-06-2020 at 12:24 PM.
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Old 10-07-2020, 12:28 AM   #27
eq1
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For what it's worth, thought I'd throw this observation into this thread, for comparison...

I just bought a Korg M1 plug-in from Korg's older "Legacy Collection." As you may recall, that was the main reason I got hung up delving into Proteus - thinking I might replace the original M1 sound in the song I'm working with with a Proteus one. But anyway, this version of the plug-in has all the sounds from the original M1 sound ROM cards - like 3000 presets or something like that.

I was thinking how awesome that would be - I always wanted extra cards for my hardware M1 but never got past the factory presets...

Well, I'm flipping through all these cards, these presets on this M1 plug-in - and they really kind of suck! They all sound the same, like they're just tweaks on the same factory presets, the same samples.

THAT is not at all what the Proteus stuff is like. All the presets I have now for the Proteus VX, mostly from E-MU's "X2 Production Set," are widely varied. There's just a ton of stuff there, many many different samples...

Maybe that makes sense, since the Proteus probably has at least a decade on the Korg M1. I just never really thought about that, thinking there'd be a lot more variety from 'all those' ROM cards... It's not a big deal or anything, I didn't buy the M1 plug-in to make great new sounds, or thinking I'd have some mondo sound library. I just needed it for a few patches, save my back from having to drag out the hardware synth from the closet every time I need to tinker with M1...
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Old 11-08-2020, 04:38 PM   #28
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Wow, it's cool to see people are using Proteus/Emulator X. I've tried both. Not legit version to be perfectly honest. I don't feel so bad since as far as I know legit versions no longer exist. I wish EMU would release some newer software/hardware based on this engine and sound libraries. I almost bought a PK-6 but it was busted and had to be returned. I'm not a fan of using a computer, but I don't know any other better assortment of sounds.

One issue I've had with both VSTs is that if I make any changes to a sound and move focus out of the window, it prompts me to save. It's not a huge deal, but certainly annoying. Has anyone run into this? Have a solution? Saving takes a long time, not to mention that I work with the original banks, so I don't want to save over them anyway.
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Old 11-09-2020, 01:45 PM   #29
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^ I ran into a handful of problems like that, I think most of them just an artifact of working with the 32-bit Proteus Vst in a 64-bit bridged configuration. Beyond the experimentation I was doing in this thread, I haven't touched the Proteus since...
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