Question for DigiCS

[ckevperry]

Has the fallout from the announcement of a delayed 5.1 release caused any change in mindset for PC development? Let me explain further...

I love Protools. In my post "jumping ship," you'll note I don't resort to "digi sucks," as I think Digi is the leader in DAW's. This is just an unfortunate development, as I am sure Digi agrees.

Obviously you can see the discontent on this newsgroup and hopefully you have gotten many calls about this too. Just so you are in touch with your customers. And obviously this is a speed bump for plugin developers (Waves 3.0? McDSP? Many others who aren't budging...) who aren't keeping up developing.

I guess I am asking if the mindset at Digi is "Wow we knew it would be bad...but this is worse than we thought" or if this is all right on course.

I understand you guys don't answer "rant threads" much, but I hope you can offer an answer here as I ask with only curiosity and respect.

Even if all you say is "Everything is going exactly according to plan."




------------------
Kevin Perry
Chameleon Music

[AvidCS]

Hi Kevin,

I appreciate your concern, and we at Digidesign understand that this is a difficult decision that is very frustrating for our NT users. Nobody likes product delays. Unfortunately, the challenges we face have not changed and our position on the release of Pro Tools 5.1 TDM for the PC remains as originally presented;

Pro Tools TDM 5.1 – Support for Windows NT Delayed:

The Windows market is extremely important to us and we're committed to it. For example, we're just about to release Pro Tools LE v5.1 on both the Macintosh and Windows 98... and that's a big Windows commitment. Unfortunately, we won’t be ready to release a final version of PT TDM v5.1 for NT with the main PT5.1 release. Alhough we have a policy of not promising final release dates, the NT version is approaching Beta quality, and should be available for as a generalized beta release in early 2001. This will let Pro Tools NT customers check out what it's like to work with the new v5.1 features as we move towards our next steps with TDM Windows. While we hope to provide the final release during 2001, we cannot provide an exact release date at this time.
Why is this? The OS landscape on the PC presents a large challenge, Windows NT is being obsoleted as the general install option on new machines, and so a significant number of customers are asking for support of Windows 98, Windows Millennium Edition and Windows 2000. Adding to the challenge, Microsoft has announced Whistler for release in the second half of 2001, which is intended to consolidate all Windows users onto a single OS. We are currently in the process of determining the best migration path for Pro Tools/NT customers. It is possible that "Whistler", will help streamline Windows development greatly.

As much as we'd like to keep to a goal of simultaneous cross platform releases with identical feature sets, this is sometimes not practical. For example, a small but important problem on one platform can unnecessarily hold up shipment of both platforms, or, certain features which are easy to implement on one platform may be difficult or time-consuming on the other. In these instances, we want to avoid forcing all users to wait for important products and features while parity is achieved. For this reason going forward, it is likely that the Mac and PC versions of a Pro Tools TDM release will be on different timetables, with potentially different feature sets at release. Though we still aim to make these Mac and PC versions as similar as is reasonably possible, there could be significant differences on an ongoing basis, depending on the time or effort involved. Currently, Pro Tools v5.0.1/NT version lacks a few items, such as QuickTime and AVoption|XL support

While we may come out with releases for different platforms or operating systems at different times, we will continue to develop the Pro Tools product family using a cross-platform codebase, and we're working hard to find ways to provide users with faster, richer, and more reliable releases, regardless of platform.

Bob Langlie
Director of Customer Service
Digidesign

[Road_Hogs]

Bob,

Thank you for your reply! It brings the situation into a better perspective.

Cheers,
Toby Gray

[yestour]

Thanks, I've been a Windows/Digidesign customer since Session 8. I now have Avid Express & Pro-Tools on NT platforms. I have just ordered the latest AVID NT upgrade w/Mega SCSI's to boot. I would hope that the company supports ALL of it's products, and this problem will only be a slight delay.