Here's what I've found so far:


PROGRAM

‘Bugs’ in the program:

Style Picker Window:

1. The ability to change the instruments for the Melody Patch and the Soloist Patch doesn’t work.

You can select, and tick, a fresh instrument on the drop down menu but it doesn’t then select it or correctly report the selection on the screen. It either reverts to the original or selects a random one. (confirmed by pgsupport).
(Workaround: Audition the basic styles in the style picker window, but return to the main screen to change the instruments

2. The link from the Help selection “View Band in a Box Manual” is incorrectly programmed. It refers to a file that is no longer present, and not the ones that are there now. (confirmed by other user experience).
(Workaround: Open the location “Applications/Band-in-aBox/Manuals” ...um... manually.


Unconfirmed bugs (still possibly user error, or other conflict/problem)

1. On a couple of occasions I have arrived at the desired arrangement and ‘frozen’ all the tracks and then saved and exited. When I later reloaded the song most of the tracks were now silent, with only one still producing any sound.

2. When I rebuild the styles list (at the style picker window) after an install a box pops up that reports 8,015 styles, which is 4 times the number that actually show up on the style picker list. When I select “All Styles” it displays a list of just over 1800 styles. However, there are many more files than that in the “Band-in-a-Box/Styles” sub-folder? Finder reports the number as 8,389 - different again. Why the variation in numbers? Shouldn't they all show when “All” is selected, or what….?



MANUAL ERRORS

1. The manual(s) supplied on the disc don’t match the printed one supplied with the same shipment. This means that the information is not the same and the page numbers and general layout are completely different. It would be greatly preferable if they all matched the most current version.

2. Some of the files referred to in the instructions don’t actually exist on my installation. Given that I have the Megapak, it’s probably safe to assume that they don’t exist on the basic Pro installation either. This makes working through examples frustrating and confusing to new users. Alternative choices are not always obvious (if they were we probably wouldn't be needing to work through the examples) and having to skip chunks of instruction is not good.

e.g.

a) The printed manual tells me that that I should be able to find some useful demos "from folders with names like Applications/Band-in-a-Box/RealTracks - Demos/RealTracks102 Demos" but no such useful sub-folders exist. Instead, 300 files, many with weird names are all lumped under RealTracks-Demos. I had no way of knowing whether the lack of the indicated sub-folders were some kind of installation error. The files were also a mixture of clearly named sound samples and what seem to be style related files with nothing to help decode the various odd and unfamiliar methods of naming them.

b) On page 11 of the Mac upgrade manual it says:

"Choose #1323, a Medley of Sax, Trombone, Trumpet, and Clarinet. It will change instruments every 8 bars."

But when I followed the instructions exactly there is no #1323 on the list. Indeed the only medleys there are 4 bars. there are none for 8 bars at all. I have the Megapak version, which should surely have the required file, plus more similar ones.  So that made me wonder if I had a dodgy download in some way, or if the original file had some errors in it?  So I downloaded a fresh BiaB file and installed it all again. Same result. Total waste of my time and bandwidth. Not good. Support confirmed lack of #1323 to be pgmusic mistake.



GENERAL ISSUES:

1. TAB. On page 117, the printed manual says:

Quote:

RealGuitar charts: If a track has RealChart, and is a guitar track with accurate tab and on-screen guitar fretboard display, then it is green and underlined with a long line.



I have no trouble following the selection instructions in the manual, and getting the green word with the line underline, but I can't seem to get it to show any more than a fretboard display, which is not the same as TAB. Is the manual being overly optimistic?

The blurb for some of the track sets for Macs on sale at this site also mentions TAB.

Quote:


RealTracks Set 118: Brent Mason Country Soloing
Swing the lead with RealTracks Set 118! This set includes four Electric Guitar Country soloing styles played by award winning Nashville legend Brent Mason. Whether you are shufflin', train-pickin', waltzin', or just wanna boogie, Brent's delicious Guitar sound and how-DOES-he-do-it string picking will blow you away! And if that is not enough, Band-in-a-Box's RealCharts allow you to watch how these solos are played in notation, TAB , or on the on-screen guitar fretboard.



This seems to be at odds with Peter Gannon’s assertion on another thread there is no TAB for Mac.

So what sort of TAB is referred to in the quotes above? They are both from Mac specific information.

--------------------------------------------


Well, that’s start. Any comments, additions, similar experiences, corrections or clarifications would be most welcome.

Cheers,

Chris