Help..! Bought 11R from Guitar Center, but had no software disks!

[OneStrat]

Unfortunately Avid appears to be using this great product that can stand tall on its own merit as a mere Trojan Horse for Pro Tools sales. Considering the competitive playing field, without a free downloadable stand alone editor, this product will be unsustainable over the long run.

[Random Dude]

Originally Posted by OneStrat

Unfortunately Avid appears to be using this great product that can stand tall on its own merit as a mere Trojan Horse for Pro Tools sales. Considering the competitive playing field, without a free downloadable stand alone editor, this product will be unsustainable over the long run.

Exactly why in my opinion they will never make a standalone editor.

But at the end of the day it's either two seperate items or it's not; you can't have it both ways. By preventing an important feature for the hardware like importing and exporting presets because of licensing of a seperate application makes them integrated as one unit.

They don't need to make a full blown editor if they could atleast create a way to import/export without ProTools. I mean you can do that with almost any device on the market now and the only reason they wouldn't is in order to do exactly what OneStrat said above.

It's a grey area at best.

[birdie_in_Texas]

Chris, I am confused by your post sir...

This GUI thing you speak of..what exactly will this do..?

Maybe more specifically what in my case, would it do for me with my current scenario?

[Darryl Ramm]

Originally Posted by birdie_in_Texas

Chris, I am confused by your post sir...

This GUI thing you speak of..what exactly will this do..?

Maybe more specifically what in my case, would it do for me with my current scenario?

Sorry this will not help you. Chris is talking about an updater that updates the Eleven Rack control panel in Pro Tools since this had been omitted in recent bundles.

Darryl

[Chris Townsend]

Sorry, again. I posted to the wrong thread.

[birdie_in_Texas]

yep, I saw this thread here: http://duc.avid.com/showthread.php?t=310040

and figured that is where you were trying to post..

Oh well, I was hopefull it was something that could help my scenario get resolved..but alas, it does not seem to be..

[zedhed]

Originally Posted by birdie_in_Texas

Avid can pretty much lick my sack.

Originally Posted by birdie_in_Texas

Now you 'elitists" pro tools snobs go back about your little everyday business and continue getting fleeced like the sheep you are.. Baaahhhh...!!!

And then you come back with;

Originally Posted by birdie_in_Texas

Oh well, I was hopefull it was something that could help my scenario get resolved..but alas, it does not seem to be..

Run along son, go save up some money and when you have some, then get into sound recording. It's not an industry that is kind to beggars & fools.

Alternatively continue tweeting in your little tree in Texas rather than chirping incessantly on here.

[birdie_in_Texas]

Originally Posted by zedhed

Run along son, go save up some money and when you have some, then get into sound recording. It's not an industry that is kind to beggars & fools.

Alternatively continue tweeting in your little tree in Texas rather than chirping incessantly on here.

hahahahaah..ok.. "son"..! hahahahahaha

I love foreigners..! hahahahahah

[moff]

I can't say that I agree with Birdie's approach, but I do appreciate the sentiment.

I do take issue with Chris's assertion that providing a download link to PT8LE to those who bought used but incomplete 11Rs would somehow "cost them money", or would be similar to shipping four wheels. "Cost" is cash out of pocket, NOT "revenues not earned" or "money we spend anyway". This is a misguided attitude that permeates all business today, not just Avid, and it's just plain incorrect. There is no ACTUAL cost to Avid: the software is already developed and supported with updates, so there's no R&D cost involved, because it's a download, there's no manufacturing, packaging, or shipping costs either. The only cash-out-of-pocket cost would be for bandwidth (again, something they pay for anyway). More truthfully, Avid believes that by doing so, they are POTENTIALLY losing sales of full-cost replacement versions. Potential revenue not generated is apparently what accountants now incorrectly call "cost".

What they fail to see is that used hardware will sit unsold, the reputation of Avid will decline due to poor customer support (and customers will move elsewhere), and because retailers can't move the used units, they won't likely order many new ones.

Avid continually misses the enormous benefits they could reap from the "good will" created by providing superior customer service, and the resulting increase in demand and revenues. But why can't they see it? Because, as with most business today, they are driven by accountant-types who are blind to everything but the bottom line on the General Leger. If something doesn't result in immediate revenue, it's discontinued, discouraged, or ignored. Modern business seems to be oblivious to the benefits and increased sales generated by the word of mouth from people who are exceptionally happy, and are similarly blind to the real cost of unhappy customers. Customer Support has been identified as a "cost center", so it's been get off-shored, downsized to bare minimum, or converted into a "profit center" by charging for support - sometimes all three. And because just about everyone has let CS and support go to hell, we as consumers have few choices. But if someone came along who excelled at CS, they could take over the market - people would migrate to them in droves.

Back to the issue at hand... How many 11Rs are there out there, really? Well, what percentage of the world's population plays guitar? Relatively few. And what percentage of them own an 11R? A tiny percentage (think of it this way - of your guitar-playing buddies, how many have an 11R?). Face it, as great as the 11R is, it's not the "must have" device of the decade, setting the world on fire. I'll venture a guess and say that no more than a few tens of thousands of units are out there. But even if it's a million, how many of those units actually need replacement software? A tiny percentage, I'll bet. What would providing even an outrageous number, like 5 thousand, downloads of PT8LE REALLY cost (as in real, cash-out-of-pocket COST)? Nothing. How many more sales would be generated by many happy customers raving about how great the 11R and Avid Support are? Probably few, but not as many as the number of sales that are lost due to public complaints by one or two dissatisfied ones. Remember, in terms of PR, it takes many, many times more positive comments to negate just 1 negative one... Does Avid really want to do THAT much work?

[birdie_in_Texas]

Originally Posted by moff

I can't say that I agree with Birdie's approach, but I do appreciate the sentiment.

You are probably right as to my "approach"..it certainly wasn't the "best" way to try and get help..but even had I been a bit more tactful, it would not have gotten me any farther to a favorable resolution.

I have now had MANY people both on this forum and others let me know that they feel the same exact way as you and me..that Avid is just pretty much garbage and only after $$$. But it seems that Pro Tools is "known" as the "Industry Standard", so I guess they feel like they can do anything they want, as they have a captive audience.


I took my unit back and have washed my hands of the issue. I will never do anything to support them, and I will always do my best to dissuade any others from using their products in the future.

I do not know if this Townsend guy (who seems very nice indeed) has the clout to change anything or even to help anyone out, but at least he was nice when he told me how screwed I was on this deal.