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Originally Posted by billyo

i just found out about it too, and i read something like playing video files now only shows up on singers screen, i never had problems with 4.06 ,everything is in sync( video/audio ) that's why i'm hesitant to do the upgrade..i like to see the video showing on the viewer and preview screen..

In 4.06 in the Tools > Options we had a Video Switch: Old/New player. The Old did MUX and Key Change but no Preview Display. The New did Preview but no Mux or Key Change. We hired a contractor (used him for 13 years) to fix this and add Crossfade. Vista took a lot of everyone's time to make Hoster run reliably. When it was time for a final analysis of what he did, we scrapped much of it as it never went reliable.

The New Video (direct-x) player was causing Beta testers to crash. We removed it as the Old player has been our mainstay for years.

The on-screen Volume controller worked for some, but not for others who then blamed MTU. After tracking the problems down to how some audio cards/ports MODIFY Windows, we removed it also. If we can't make a feature work reliably, we won't knowingly ship it.

4.07 had a LOT of good fixes and upgrades over 4.06a that MANY users would benefit from. Thus, we cleaned it up and released 4.07.

Originally Posted by JNS02

What the heck, How long has 4.07 been out and why didn't I know about it, I'm on this site everyday and nothing says it was out. I just read it in a thread that there is a possible problem with it. Sorry, I see when it was released yesterday 2/23. Must have been posted after I left site.

We INTENTIONALLY don't want everyone to come get a new release at the same time. V4.07 is a perfect example of why. A few users in the early release is always a good idea so there are fewer users to "support" if something is found that was unexpected. We went through 17 Beta releases to get to 4.08 from 4.06a. That's a LOT of dedicated testing by qualified users (technical and non-technical) who can work together as a team.

We don't know what happened, but 4.07 Beta 15 was blessed for release, but rebuilding for final release changed the code!

I've NEVER seen this in my 40 years of managing excellent programmers. We are VERY meticulous and still have no idea how 2 lines of code in our SubVersion source code repository we build from were removed by rebuilding!

Originally Posted by JNS02

I updated to 4.07 this morning, I have been running a 'mock show' to see if I have any problems, so far so good. I also read on MTU site about the changes made and in one section they said "strongly recommend you replace your Vista with "Vista Premium with Downgrade to XP". Where do I get such an upgrade. I hate Vista or do I have to just do like I said in a diff post. Wipe out everything and install my copy of XP? I'm not having problems right now thanks to Dale, Madjim, and this forum I just want a stable system and XP seems to be the way.

Simply put, Vista was NOT designed to run a Professional A/V show like Karaoke requires. We have spent literally MANY hundreds of hours trying to discern what to "disable" in Vista to make it behave. We have a web page for XP and Vista you must agree you have reviewed before continuing installing Hoster. If you don't, you MAY have problems.

For example, Microsoft Acccess we use in the Songs Database WILL NOT access files on an external USB drive with Vista until you disable UAC.

For example, if you want to play video files locally (versus streaming - no Hoster doesn't support streaming), you have to make changes before WMP will play them. We THOUGHT by using WMP for playing videos, we would be safe as we THOUGHT Microsoft wouldn't shoot their OEM Developers... but they did!

Originally Posted by JNS02

Thanks Dale, I was REALLY AFRAID you would say that. So I will wait until 4.10 as we talked about before. Again, Thanks

We had to pull out some of the expected upgrades that our consultant never could make work. Thus, 4.10 was scrapped, and as President I decided it was really a "fix" of 4.06a... thus it was 4.07, then quickly 4.08. We are COMMITTED to making 4.08 stable and professional. If anything shows up, we'll fix it. If your livelihood depends on Hoster, I'd have a backup at least. Then, as other Pros do, install 4.08 on the backup (you can easily revert back to before installing it if needed), and test away. To help others as they are helping you, post here your successes as well as any problems you find. That way you are aiding the MTU.Community of Hoster users.

Originally Posted by Singsation

What is not professional is releasing a product that isn't fit for purpose then rather than fixing it, remove it's core components,

Product development is extremely difficult. After doing this as MY LIVELIHOOD for 40 years, I can say you can't please all the people all the time. MTU has for decades (read our Testimonials pages) answered the needs and even DESIRES of our customers. Sometimes we add a feature because ONE person asked for it.

We did everything professionally we could to get Video Mux, Key Change and Preview window all in our NEW Direct-X video player. After 12 months, we finally failed when our consultant didn't deliver reliable code that ran on XP and Vista. I wrote off the largest financial investment of my career last year.

We have TENS OF THOUSANDS of users who will benefit from 4.08 without the Preview Display, by allowing them to play the vocals at any point in the song if their singer is about to bolt from the stage. We ALWAYS take into consideration ALL of our customers. Our OLD Video player has worked with Mux and Key change for years. Very few of our customers "demanded" to see it in the Preview Display, but we tried to make this happen.

We will copy the image to the Preview display in a future version, with the timing based on how many users request it. We simply didn't have time to get it done and stabilize and release the massive number of other changes. I'm sorry we failed to meet this one demand that clearly is extremely important to you.

I assure you, Having Video in the preview display or not won't make or break your professionalism at running shows, but everything else we added into 4.08 WILL aid your professionalism. THAT... I have no doubt about, and I'm sure if you look at all the changes in 4.07/4.08 you will agree.

The new Show Display added in 4.00 and polished more every release is a massive upgrade to make your show look better, run smoother, be fully automated if you want so you can work your audience, fully integrate Karaoke - Audio - Video seamlessly... and allow less technical users to easily get this new SINGLE Display appearing on the 2nd Display/TV.

Our #1 goal was to make Hoster stable again... even on Vista.

Originally Posted by Singsation

Ford wouldn’t make a car and sell it with dodgy Turbo then remove it without warning, and leave you with a standard block.

Ford has a MUCH LARGER market place than we do. That alone allows doing things that are impossible in a small market. Ford also won't ever ask you what YOU want. They will do ONLY WHAT their market researchers tell them "the market" wants. Well, ALL the auto makers have missed the mark if you look at their losses. Even Honda laid off 20,000 workers last month. So, this is NOT a valid comparison to any company in the Karaoke market.

Originally Posted by Singsation

And a sure one size does not fit all as well do our shows differently and on a wide array on computers, but that’s what Beta testers are for.

I fully agree. My God-given Talents include being a product developer. I have done it for over 40 years now, releasing over 130 products. I have assembled engineering teams to build what I perceive as the MAJORITY of users want, and... leave hooks to add those "special features" smaller groups of users want. As to creating a PROFESSIONAL WORKSTATION on any PC, MTU has done this longer than any other company in the world! PERIOD. We were the first to do digital audio workstations. We were the first to load software into a microcomputer in the world in 1973. We PIONEERED the "open architecture" computer that even systems today don't equal what we were delivering in 1981. One size CAN fit all, but not all WINDOWS computers are qualified to run LARGE database shows, with audio, video and CDG karaoke. To think otherwise will end up being expensive.

Originally Posted by Singsation

As for equipment we can only go one the recommendations of Forums, we are already told to use XP and not to expect it to work on windows 7 until SP1.

Recommendations from the Forum? Excuse me? Why do you buy MTU products and yet ignore our computer recommendations? Have you read our manual section on the computer requirements? Yes, we are honored to have many great technical users posting in the MTU.Community Forums. However, from time to time they are wrong.

MTU has to deal with TODAY's support problems every day. The ONLY reason we continue to sell our Ruggedized Laptop is so we can keep up with what is being SHIPPED. We discontinued selling our LC Laptop because it took 45 minutes to totally disassemble it to replace the "standard" thinline DVD burner with one that will reliably import CDG format discs.

You can't buy a new computer today with XP only. And unless you follow MTU recommendations, you will have one that runs VISTA only. Starting with your feet already locked in concrete isn't going to get you very far in the race. Good luck with your hot new computer.

Originally Posted by Singsation

What we should remember this is a job and a living to some people and not a Hobby and real craftsmen rely on good tools.

Developing products that YOU MIGHT buy is far, far, far more risky for our livelihood. MTU families all survive on how well we do at:

1. Advancing the state of the art, which every other competitor is now using what MTU pioneered. They are standing on our shoulders. However, we're now pioneering the next generation.

2. Identifying what MOST users want for their shows and delivering a stable product with these wants/needs/desires. MTU has excelled at this for decades.

3. Providing one-on-one support with answers for every problem. We have the best support available, and more ways you can get answers without contacting MTU.

4. Listening to every user's desires. We have always excelled at this because it is our life-blood of new ideas, no matter how off-the-wall they may be.

Some users say Hoster 3.310 was our most stable. That was designed to run on "primitive" computers before XP SP2 and SP3; before Vista, before moving into Audio and Video in the same playlist. I truly, truly, truly regret that I ever decided for MTU to support Vista. VERY BAD DECISION!

MTU has never shipped a Vista system. We buy with Windows "Vista Premium with Downgrade to XP". Downgrade Microsoft calls it? Not so, it is saving their butts from a very grave mistake, and their coming out with Windows 7 so fast PROVES they KNOW it was a mistake. The sooner Vista is gone, the better!

We have Windows 7 beta at MTU and are testing already. This Beta code will automatically cease to function in August this year. I recently heard W7 MAY now be scheduled to release in September 2009. We are upgrading our development tools for Windows 7. We will fully support this, as XP is scheduled to be discontinued PERMANENTLY this July. W7 will be our ONLY hope for providing a PROFESSIONAL platform for PROFESSIONAL Karaoke Hosts.

If you think PC/DJ will meet ALL your PROFESSIONAL needs, have at it! Our Songverter will convert your KMA files to MP3G for their use.

They are a DJ company that as an afterthought added playing Karaoke songs onto their platform. We are a Karaoke Hosting company that also hung audio and video onto our platform. There is a difference, and many users who were DJs that migrated to KJ with audio/video songs between performance found Hoster vastly superior. I'd do a LOT more research before you shift.

READ THESE WORDS..... MTU EXPECTS to cease wasting any more time with Vista UPGRADES or Bug Fixes as soon as we have a Windows 7 release version. We will be sending out an email in March stating this to our Vista customers. Yes, we now finally work reliably on Vista IF our suggested changes are made. However, Vista will NEVER be stable for A/V Professionals. Why keep beating a dead horse? We'll just let Microsoft kill it as they should have done BEFORE it was ever released.

MTU is the FOUNDER of the Digital Audio Workstation market; in digital audio since 1968, shipping digital audio products since 1976, and shipping workstations since 1979. We shipped PROFESSIONAL grade A/D/A converters on DEC, SUN, APPLE, PC, PET, OSI, AIM-65, SYM-1 and KIM-1, and did it before anyone else.

We KNOW what it takes to have a stable audio workstation, and it just isn't possible with Vista. You can beat it into submission, but then it falls appart. Recently 2 of our betas found that Windows Updates... downloaded from MICROSOFT... modified their Windows and all of a sudden their systems didn't work any more for PROFESSIONAL use. Microsoft can do that, but you'll be one of the first to BLAME MTU for your woes. Heck the only reason you CAN blame us is we have a heart for our customers and listen to your complaints.

Hoster 4.08 is the best we can give right now. If any problems are posted, we'll fix them quickly as we did 4.07, and as we have done for 40 years.

We are NOW re-engineering for Hoster 5.0 and it MAY NOT run on Vista. We won't even test on it to know if it does or not. There will be NO SUPPORT for Vista. We'll make that clear so any one buying will know not to run on Vista. In fact, we can and will PREVENT installing on Vista so we NEVER have to waste our time with honest, unknowing users who have that piece of garbage.

You want a PROFESSIONAL WORKSTATION, listen to us. We know what to do and tell you. DUMP VISTA NOW... while you can still get "Vista Premium with Downgrade to XP". If you have a copy of XP, install it and upgrade it while you can. As Dale Douglass so correctly pointed out, Microsoft has NEVER released a reliable FIRST release. Windows 7 SR1 will be 4-6 months in coming. You want to stay in business running Professional shows? GET XP NOW!