Pro Tools FIRST question.....

[Bill Denton]

As I posted elsewhere...

Have you ever gone into a hard-core biker bar around 2 AM on a Sunday morning?

Nobody will tell you to leave, but they will sure as hell let you know they don't want you to be there...

Pro Tools | First

(think about it...)

[tmcd2009]

Good info.... THX!

[Darryl Ramm]

Originally Posted by albee1952

or Pro Tools [ tease.....My 2 cents, but I wish they never did all the bottom-tier stuff at all. Just do Native and HD versions(and offer an upgrade path to the HD software for all non-HD owners)

And Avid keeps admitting they make mistakes chasing the consumer market, provided poor usability and support for newbie/consumer users and repeatable dump/abandon products, and then goes chasing the same market segment again. I am not sure who the intended user is of First is... I doubt it will be very few people upgrading from say GarageBand.

HD as software only purchase is such an obvious long due need....

[JFreak]

Originally Posted by Darryl Ramm

I am not sure who the intended user is of First is...

Don't you still get it? Cloud Collaboration and Avid Marketplace is the thing and they need to have a product where "anyone" can collaborate in a project without buying the full software. Kind of like people with GarageBand sessions can send their "beats" to a LogicX studio, but this is a real thing instead of copying looped stuff over.

[Darryl Ramm]

Originally Posted by JFreak

Don't you still get it? Cloud Collaboration and Avid Marketplace is the thing and they need to have a product where "anyone" can collaborate in a project without buying the full software. Kind of like people with GarageBand sessions can send their "beats" to a LogicX studio, but this is a real thing instead of copying looped stuff over.

Oh well we'll see where that pesky reality stuff intercedes here.

So this "collaboration" platform Pro Tools | Crippleware can't read or write existing Pro Tools (or any other DAW) sessions. Uh great start.

Somebody collaborates with you (or visa versa) and oops suddenly you've got to buy a bunch of Pro Tools | Crippleware compatible plugins, even if you already own them from before.

I'm not sure if this, from the scant details available about Pro Tools | Crippleware, will actually be any more the "real thing" from a collaboration sense than say a Logic Pro user opening a GarageBand session, either directly of via a file sharing/collaboration service. And I'm not talking about a marketing "vision" description, but actually how will this actually work in practice.

And somebody in a Pro Tools or Pro Tools HD environment will have to subset or do what exactly to sessions to be usable by a Pro Tools | Crippleware user? Reduce track counts? And users on Pro Tools 10? 11? can they collaborate with clients etc. on Pro Tools | Crippleware? Lower sample rate from 192 kHz? Print tracks for missing plugins? (will Freeze try to handle that automatically?) How will it work? And then can stuff be round-tripped through the Pro Tools | Crippleware to real Pro Tools? If this does not work well in practice, it maybe just being easier to send audio or midi files.

Lower-end users are likely to come in with an expectation of a GarageBand like ease of use. For this to work well Avid is going to have to do a lot to help users of Pro Tools | Crippleware out there, and get the software to install and work more relatively on a wider range of hardware and OS releases than they do now. Significant effort and cost there in chasing a wider/broader/consumer market. Something that Avid has consistently failed at. And those "Garageband users" are used to really free (OK you need a Mac or iOS device) or very low cost software with no cloud lock-ins/storage costs and ease of sharing those sessions with Logic Pro, a very capable $199 DAW, again with no crazily complex support/subscription plans.

So yes while there will be appeal to some users, I'm really not convinced there is a huge need out there, not beyond what people can do now collaborating online. Now high-end users collaborating Pro Tools to Pro Tools , that would seem more interesting *if* done well, and works to support Avid's core market. Trying to do all at the same time, well hold on...

[gemada]

Darryl, I agree with you. I remember (from my own experience) protools essential...crippled and a lot of bugs with no support. Right after, protools se...even more crippled and no support. Now this "protools first" is being advertised as a free version but it seems to me nothing more than a crippled demo version of protools 12. Free in what world, if you can't even save your own projects to your hd? And you have to buy more sessions if you exceed 3??? This seems to me like some kind of extorsion...Can someone imagine cloud collaboration bug free for begginers with protools? Cause I can't. Well, just my 2 cents.

[Southsidemusic]

How can it be "extorsion" ? it is FREE and you don't have to use it! The Free version is for BEGINNERS who want to see what workflow PT has and how it works in general, those type of comments are rediculous and doesn't belong here. If you get a free carwash that has a 3rd of the options, is that extorsion aswell as your car doesn't get as clean as with the 5 Star option?

[gemada]

Originally Posted by Southsidemusic

How can it be "extorsion" ? it is FREE and you don't have to use it! The Free version is for BEGINNERS who want to see what workflow PT has and how it works in general, those type of comments are rediculous and doesn't belong here. If you get a free carwash that has a 3rd of the options, is that extorsion aswell as your car doesn't get as clean as with the 5 Star option?

I agree with you at some point: no one forces me to use it. Limiting tracks, effects, sends,i/o and things like that it's ok to me for a free product, but can you show me a free daw or any other free software that doesn't let you save your projects to your hard drive? Free of charge to try is not the same as free and calling it a free version of protools doesn't seem right to me. Once again just my 2 cents.

[Darryl Ramm]

Originally Posted by Southsidemusic

How can it be "extorsion" ? it is FREE and you don't have to use it! The Free version is for BEGINNERS who want to see what workflow PT has and how it works in general, those type of comments are rediculous and doesn't belong here. If you get a free carwash that has a 3rd of the options, is that extorsion aswell as your car doesn't get as clean as with the 5 Star option?

It's only free for pretty restricted use, but yes nobody is forcing anybody to use anything.

Of course this is not extortion, and Avid is not out to deliberately harm users, I do think they may be harming themselves, as they frequently do, but that is a longer discussion.

[gemada]

Of course, technically they're not committing "extortion". It was a metaphor to describe the way I feel about avid policy on protools first due to the fact that they will charge me if I want to save my projects. And I won't be able to save them in my hard drive unless I'll pay for it. Not quite the definition of a free product for me. :)