Really? Installation takes HOURS?

[rotorav8r]

So I'm an old fart and have been "playing" since high school. My wife thought RS 2014 might be fun for me to take on my biz trips for those boring hotel evenings so she bought me a copy for my birthday. I popped the DVD into the machine and launched SETUP.EXE. Instantly I get an error from Steam telling me I have to connect to the internet Um, I *am* connected because I'm checking out the RS web page and uploading photos to Dropbox in the background.

♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ around with Windows settings for 15 mins (Win 7 Pro 64 bit btw) I get that issue resolved and get an account created and then wait. 10 minutes later, nothing happening so I launch SETUP.EXE again. "Setup.exe is already running." Not according to the process list in task manager.

Launch SETUP.EXE again.. Downloading a boatload of Steam content. Once that finishes, nothing gain. Launch SETUP.EXE again. OK, now we're getting somewhere.. Type in CD key. Wait 20 minutes for the installation to complete. It's now 11:30pm and I've been at this for almost 90 minutes. Getting irritated. Installation finishes.. Woo Hoo, let's plug in and play.

Cable plugged in, no bong tones from the machine, no "installing drivers" message, no nothing.. OK, maybe once I get into the game...

Launch Rocksmith.. WTF? UPlay? Fine, I'll play along.. 30 minutes later I've got a UPlay account.. Launch Rocksmith again... This is your validation key.... Copy to Clipboard.. Enter your validation key.. CTRL-V. Sorry, this key is invalid... WTF??? 4 tries later I finally realize the "Copy to Clipboard" is adding a trailing space to the key number. Delete that space and voila! I'm in!"

Annoying, overly long intro... Create a profile.. Done.. Ever played RS before? Nope. Select a difficulty level. I'll go with Intermediate for now.. Right handed, Lead Guitar, 3+3 headstock.. Cool, calibration.. (I'm a little over 2 hours in by this point) When we tell you, strum like a maniac...

"Sounds like your RealTone cable isn't plugged in..." Argh!! Unplugged the cable from the computer and plugged it in again. No tones, no messages.. Waited a couple minutes for drivers to maybe install. Nothing. 5 USB ports on the machine and all 4 on the powered hub later, still no joy. Can't reboot because I'm grinding out a simulation and it's going on day number 8 with probably 4 or 5 more days to go... Crap...

2 and a half hours in. I've got a glass of Whiskey and it's almost 1am. Cable still not working but now I'm getting a "could not install driver" message when I plug it in. I find what I *THINK* is the proper USB device entry in Device Manager and delete it then scan for hardware changes. Nothing... Unplug the cable and go back to the first port I tried. Bing-bong.. "Your new hardware is ready for use" Hey, 1:15am!

Fire up RS again.. Annoyingly long intro.. Choose my profile... Go through all the settings again.. Calibrate... WTF? Not working. No messages about the cable, but the things' not picking up the guitar. Tweak volume knobs, resinsert cable into 1/4" jack... Nothing. Visit various web pages to see what the issue might be.. Sound settings.. Ok, tweaked both input and output to recommended settings...

Start again. (It's now not quite 2am) Get through calibration ok.. Now we're on to tuning... Fresh strings on the guitar a couple days ago so I know they've stretched a bit and it'll be slightly out of tune. Grab the inline tuner I've got and plug in.. Not as bad as I thought it might be... Plug in to RS and try to tune the low E.. WTF? How the hell are you saying the pitch is way too high?? Ok, I'll play along.. Loosen, loosen, loosen... Bingo.. OK, now the low E sounds like Les Claypool's bass in Primus' "My Name Is Mud" and the fret rattle is causing the cat to freak out..

Let me start again... Retune the low E properly and go through the whole mess again... For giggles, I let the tuner tell me what to do and then strum the guitar... Umm.. no.. Not even close.

2:30 am.. I'm really annoyed. Almost 4 and a half hours in and it's not worth a damn. I'm beginning to think the 60-day challenge is for installation...

Is there a consolidated list of "gotchas" to make this thing work??

[rotorav8r]

2 more hours in this morning. Still can't tune the thing... Even tried plugging in my acoustic. Same issue.. Strings so loose they literally rest on the frets... WTF???

Oh, and the "Help" website? Invalid URL.

[Bogh]

I had problems with the tuning part also.
Check out the first answer here: http://www.reddit.com/r/rocksmith/wiki/faq#If_you_are_having_trouble_with_tuning_or_guitar_volume_in_Windows
It solved the problem for me, I set my recording level to 37.

[Riavan]

Yeah, right click the volume speaker in the right hand corner of windows, recording settings, recording tab, right click the 2-usb audio device, click properties, then in the level tab change it to over 80

[Bogh]

Riavan, have you found a solution to avoid doing it every single time you launch Rocksmith?

[Riavan]

Nope, but i've gotten pretty fast at it, lol.
I figured they would patch it, seems weird that they havnt yet.

[Bogh]

Yeah..

[rotorav8r]

I've been playing with volume levels on the PC side as well as volume, tone, pickup select etc on the guitars (Yes, two different ones) I'm usually a pretty patient person, but frankly, this thing sucks.

I'm going blind reading thread after thread looking for an answer. I can't imagine some kid getting this for Christmas and getting it working...

[Bogh]

Sorry if this is a stupid question, but did you pick the recording part and not playback on your PC/Windows?
Don't give up, PC gaming can be a ♥♥♥♥ sometimes. But this game is well worth the initial hassel and we're all here to help you!

[Restless Diesel]

That's a bummer. Most PC users are doing fine though, I think. I have a 2011 MacBook Pro; it installed in about 45 minutes, and has worked fine ever since. I was not successful in getting a uplay account, so I just play w/o it.

[rotorav8r]

Yes, I did tweak the recording levels, specifically the Real Tone device.

I'm not much of a gamer, but I used to be about 10 years ago. If this is what PC gaming has become, I'm glad I don't bother any more.

Just for giggles, I just spent the past couple hours restringing and setting up both guitars. Tuning and intonation are as good as I can get with my tuners (and they all agree with each other) and I'm still not getting past the tuning part.

Frustrated beyond belief, bordering on angry...

Assuming I get this working, is there a way to run this offline? (i.e. NOT having to check in with Steam or UPlay?)

[buzmeg]

It's not you. I can confirm that Rocksmith 2014 tuning is about 10-15 cents off on both Xbox 360 and PC with my Peterson. I can't believe that they broke something so fundamental (especially since it worked fine on the old Rocksmith).

I also found that you have to keep picking the string--generally close to the bridge. I have a guitar in which the magnitude of the third harmonic quickly outstrips the magnitude of the fundamental after the string is picked. This gives the Rocksmith 2014 tuner fits even *if* you mistune to what Rocksmith 2014 thinks is the correct frequency.

Oddly, I find that once you get past the tuner, you can then *retune* to the correct frequencies and things work fine. So, it doesn't appear to be the note detector that's the problem--just the tuner.

[rotorav8r]

I've tried reducing pitch by holding the whammy bar down and get through the first part of the tuning, but not the "confirmation" part. (Too hard to remember exactly where I had the bar held down for each string)

I think they should change the box to say "The Fastest Way To Learn To Hate Guitar Software"...

I would say this is borderline stupid, but we passed the borderline a couple hours ago...

[Marmalade Chainsaw]

Making your strings flop around certainly won't fix the software issues.

Have you tried adjusting the audio engine settings yet? After turning mine down to 3, the game's audio issues were fixed rather easily. It worked for other people as well.

Sure, it's frustrating when a game doesn't work perfectly right out of the box, but lots of ranting about the problems in walls of text also makes it harder for people to help solve the issue (which I assume would be better than continued frustration).

[surrealchemist]

If you used something like the tremolo bar to get past the tuner than you wouldn't be able to play the game cause it would think every note was off. I would run through the calibration in the tuner again with the volume knob set to something like 5.
Also make sure you aren't doing something like reading the strings backwards. The default is to have the low E at the top (The red one) unless you change it.

[Storm]

Originally posted by rotorav8r:

Yes, I did tweak the recording levels, specifically the Real Tone device.

I'm not much of a gamer, but I used to be about 10 years ago. If this is what PC gaming has become, I'm glad I don't bother any more.

Just for giggles, I just spent the past couple hours restringing and setting up both guitars. Tuning and intonation are as good as I can get with my tuners (and they all agree with each other) and I'm still not getting past the tuning part.

Frustrated beyond belief, bordering on angry...

Assuming I get this working, is there a way to run this offline? (i.e. NOT having to check in with Steam or UPlay?)

I'm not sure about uPlay, but Steam does have a offline mode (if you click the top left Steam text, should be a option under there)

Not sure why it's not working for you though, working okay here, does you have any other recording devices on your PC?