Are Digidesign TRYING to lose their customers??

[uz3r]

Ive posted in several threads about the ridiculous time it has taken for Digi to accommodate for Windows 7 and 64 bit OS users and how it shows that the 'industry leader' is falling behind the eight ball. They still do not officially support it which continues to amaze me but at least recently they gave some users a BETA option to play with in the version 8 update.

Being a 7.4LE user I emailed Digi support to ask if there will be an update to this version to cater for Windows 7/x64. I received a response informing me that no updates will be released for 7.4 and I was told I would have to purchase the version 8 updgrade for $150.

What sort of company leaves its customers in the dark for months on end waiting for them to provide news on an update then turns around and tells them that if they dont want their hardware to turn into a brick they will have to fork $150 more on top of the already steep price that was originally paid just so they can use it on a mainstream operating system??

Pathetic.

[therecordinghouse]

uh, them telling you to upgrade to 8 for Windows 7 support seems perfectly reasonable to me.

[filosofem]

Originally Posted by therecordinghouse

uh, them telling you to upgrade to 8 for Windows 7 support seems perfectly reasonable to me.

I agree! One day Digi is going to EOSS Windows XP. What gives me the right to delay development of future support by not upgrading and asking for continued support for XP? If you want the support and functionality keep up.

filosofem

[The Weed]

Doesn't bother me either.

"What sort of company leaves its customers in the dark for months on end waiting for them to provide news on an update then turns around and tells them that if they dont want their hardware to turn into a brick they will have to fork $150 more on top of the already steep price that was originally paid..."

Apple comes to mind

Happy New Year!

[pianosound]

1st off,, we are all anxious for W7, a lot of cool new options and oppertunities available to us!! But PT's is worth the wait, and it won't be that much longer.
And do you have any other professional software that doesn't have an upgrade every year or so that costs between 100.00 and 200.00??? I know that I don't, and that 150.00 probably doesn't even cover a PT's tech salary for much more than an hour!!??? (Or 2??)
Mike (And for a P.S.,,,,,, it still beats paying what we used to per hour in a professional studio,,,,,,,,, FWIW!!)

[JonnyGinese]

anyone remember that you needed to upgrade to 7 to get dual-core support? i felt a little ripped that i had to buy it when my 002r came with 6.4... but then again.. it was a big improvement and totally worth it. and version 8 is totally worth it.

and +1 to The Weed(user not plant)... apple charges for .X versions... they don't even wait till they have full versions to charge $100 for the "new Version"

[filosofem]

Originally Posted by JonnyGinese

anyone remember that you needed to upgrade to 7 to get dual-core support?

Sure did. It opened the door to 1st gen Quadzillas. Where are we now.

filosofem

[filosofem]

$150 USD from the Avid Store.

filosofem

[LockeClone]

Originally Posted by therecordinghouse

uh, them telling you to upgrade to 8 for Windows 7 support seems perfectly reasonable to me.

I disagree. Forcing the user to upgrade because he has no choice is not a good way to do business, especially in our current economic situation. I know many (now former) pro tools users who unwittingly went to windows 7 (using a cheap academic license) and can't afford to upgrade pro tools. They aren't saving up, they're learning to work around pro tools.

These people are students now, but later when they're professionals they might be inclined to go with the company that didn't leave them out in the cold when they needed it. Digidesign will get a lot of people paying the $150 for the upgrade now because they have to, but the unwealthy LE customers they loose now might very well translate into lost HD customers down the line.

A user should upgrade because he/she wants the next version for it's functionality, period. and 7.4 is far from obsolete.

[Ludia]

Even if and when full 64 W7 support would come out and turns out to be an upgrade from 8 to 9 for example and they would charge me for it, I would be happy to do so. Mind you, I'm not making money with the tools and is purely a hobby. In my case my PT came with the hardware and luckely I bought it at the time right before PT8 came out so I was free of charge to upgrade towards 8. I think in many cases a PT license came with the hardware in the first places (could be totally wrong of course).

Did you ever compared the prices of the software? I recently did and what I found out was that PT comes for about 100 to 150 euros cheaper then some other major daw's. This is talking about the costs of host software, what about VI's and plugs then ? These are expensive and could be a little cheaper if you ask me. And even then I want to pay for quality products like I did for MPTK2, Spectrasonics OmniSphere (and waiting on my shipment of EWQL CCC ).

Nothing comes for free, only the sun each morning (hmmm that ain't true either, its pooring here). And in this high tech world it is a fact that technology just goes as fast as the demanding of the humans driving the wheels. Talking of wheels... (I try to get a dutch fraise I have in my mind to get translated in english now) When you have an old duck (you know that very old citroen car) with its 2 horse power engine and want that new rolls royce bodywork on it. Be sure you need to go push the car.

Happy new year