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Anyone have any thoughts on the new versions of each program?

http://www.finalemusic.com/

http://www.sibelius.com/home/index_flash.html

First I've heard. I haven't gotten the update email yet. Can't wait to get it. The automatic revisions/version will be worth it to me. Last week I saved garbage on top of my best score and had to redo it. 3 hours down the drain.

the elephant wrote:The only things about Finale that have seemed compelling to me since 2004 have been bug fixes. I will probably pony up the dough for 2010, however. *sigh* Maybe some old issues will have finally been fixed. Maybe it will come in a form that is close to bug-free and not erase things on my hard drive when it is installed. Maybe it will have new features that work properly. Maybe not.

And then, Sibelius is still Sibelius, so that is completely out for me. Heh, heh, heh. I love Finale. I love to whine about Finale, too. Bring back the leadership from Coda! MakeMusic bites!!!

Simply put, if the new features in Sibelius work I will no longer be using Finale. Like Elephant, I like to bicth about FInale but since they don't listen to their customer base...

Elephant: I would highly recommend going up from 2004. They have introduced lots of new bugs, but their are many improvements which outweigh the bugs!

Precisely why I continue to use Finale 2004. I'm very fast with it, and I can do anything and everything I would ever want with it. I frequent the Finale forums and listen to the praises of all the "cool" new things in the latest versions and always think the same thing...why?

I, too, have experimented with Sibelius and found it lacking. There is no substitute for the amount of control the user has over the output with Finale.

the elephant wrote:Would you like one forwarded to you?

I appreciate your offer, but now that I know about it I can just go to the update site. I'll bet they wound up in my junk drawer. My SPAM catcher has been overly active lately.

Is either of the programs linux compatible yet? I have been using lilypond + svn + a random gui for a while and am looking at other options.

I'm a little disgusted with Finale. Apparently the latest version of Finale won't import the latest version of Encore. It used to import Encore.

TubaTinker wrote:I'm a little disgusted with Finale. Apparently the latest version of Finale won't import the latest version of Encore. It used to import Encore.

Neither will Sibelius. I fear my old Encore files are gone, bone, gone. Not that there is anything worth retrieving.

the elephant wrote: Anyway, I have been using F2K9 for a while now and it is one bloated SOB! Why can't they release a pure engraving package with basic GM SoftSynth playback and stop forcing me to buy all this GPO RAM-sucking garbage and this video nonsense? Why all the stupid "paper" backgrounds? Do they make my music sound better? Do they make my experience WORKING in the Finale environment more "fun"? No. They suck up RAM and CPU cycles and make viewing my content more difficult. (Wrinkly-looking "parchment"?????? Please… )

Wade, keep it up and I'll put nasty notes in your account!

OK, I won't. Promise

Just so you know, you can offer recommendations on the web site. I guarantee the R&D people actually read those. We're always working to make our customers' needs and wants met.

dtemp wrote:
Just so you know, you can offer recommendations on the web site. I guarantee the R&D people actually read those. We're always working to make our customers' needs and wants met.

Well....I don't visit feedback sites; what I do is bitch in public like everyone else. There are two reasons why I don't upgrade Finale; the primary one is that you have to buy a later version to get the bugs in the old version fixed, and then you simply have paid money for new bugs. I don't spend my money that way. Bug fixes for a version should be FREE because you alread PAID FOR that version.

The second reason is the ridiculous rule that you have to call them up and get "approved" or something to install Finale on a computer. Two computers max, no matter if you had one stolen or whatever. It is the ATTITUDE of MM that is causing me to not upgrade Finale. I guess MM doesn't need my paltry money. Because my 2005 is such a headache on my mac, I'm getting ready to go back to my 2000 version, which I can still install on every new computer I buy without having to get permission. It printed just fine and it played back at least as well.

The other thing MM should do is what (Rick?) said: why force me to buy a bunch of stuff that I neither want nor need? kind of like those recording devices that are full of guitar effects. I don't record guitars, I don't record rock music, I don't want those features. Similarly with Finale....it needs to be presented in what they call Cafeteria style, where for a set sum of money you choose the features you want. The people who want the bells and whistles should be the ones paying for them. Me....I want user-friendly default engraving, reasonable playback sounds, and not 137 different kinds of stuff that clog my hard drive and slow down my computer. Have you ever asked Finale to play back four same-pitch quarter notes with lines under them? Finale is too stupid to play that. Much of my brass music is written with lines under the notes to encourage the amateurs who play it to not play staccato. Finale playback regurgitates on that simple notation. In addition, the only instrument I can select that results in a reasonable playback sound is all clarinets.

Ok, rant done.

MA

the elephant wrote:
I use a pseudonym on the Finale Forum.

You mean "the elephant" is your real name? A new found respect has just been found!!

the elephant wrote: I like your posts, even when you seem to be stressed about some issue with the app. I really am getting to dislike Wiggy. He is such an apologist for MM, and half the time he is wrong, smugly wrong.

Oh no, someone is watching me over there! I just try to keep my posts honest and straight forward. They are not the easiest thing to read sometimes, but I do believe they are factual.

Like you, I had a relationship with the previous CEO. I emailed him many times and he always emailed back the same day. He even set up a meeting with 5 programmers and myself. That was quite a fun meeting! My posts over there are really just trying to get them to see the big picture (and the small one). They used to be the fatcat, but the cat has been shrinking and I, as a person who needs and counts on Finale everyday, am hoping they see any picture at all because I need them.

the elephant wrote:MA has it nailed. As we both said, bug fixes - ALL of them - 100% of them - 100% of the time - NEED TO BE FREE TO THE USER! Sure, you offer two or three major updaters between new versions, but many bug fixes are only available on the PAID new version.

Plus, the entire idea of attaching the program to a year is ludicrous. This started after Finale 3.7 or so. This forces the company to deliver half-baked software on some sort of artificial timeline and seems to make the company culture believe that we want fabulous, new features (bloatware exercises, performance evaluation crap, GPO, etc.) EVERY YEAR! How about this? Dump the stupid year-based releases. Release bug fixes first until you have reached the finalized version where no new bug fixes will be offered. THEN offer new features. ONLY then. NO new features until everything else is working properly FIRST. Then, whenever that happens to be (certainly not annually on a schedule) offer fully de-bugged versions for retail sale that include new features.

So, you want Finale to be handled like WIndoze??

I def. agree with Wade on the extra crap weighted on these new programs. These new programs shouldn't be like new video games. You should be able to run the new program just as easily, hardware-wise, as its predecessor. Sibelius 4 works fine for me, but Sibelius 5 crashed within a few minutes. What's up with that?

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The Jackson wrote:I def. agree with Wade on the extra crap weighted on these new programs. These new programs shouldn't be like new video games. You should be able to run the new program just as easily, hardware-wise, as its predecessor. Sibelius 4 works fine for me, but Sibelius 5 crashed within a few minutes. What's up with that?

Maybe it is an even number issue?

MA said, "Me....I want user-friendly default engraving, reasonable playback sounds, and not 137 different kinds of stuff that clog my hard drive and slow down my computer."

Exactly! That's why I'm still using Finale 2001. Not perfect -- but does mostly what I want.

It's interesting here in the Philippines. There is quite a successful Macintosh store at the Limketkai Mall near my house. Most of the people who buy a Mac for the first time are impressed with how the Macintosh Leopard handles Windows XP and Vista. When they use the Mac OS X system, they can't believe how simple it works... they think something is wrong.

I've had a problem here trying to get one of my computers to run either OS 10.3 or 10.4. The store here won't sell anything EXCEPT 10.5, which requires AT LEAST a G4 processor. My old iBook is a G3 I had repaired when I lived in Vietnam and I need it diagnosed for some problems it's having (I think they put in a CD drive instead of a DVD drive but no one will say... I want either a ComboDrive or a SuperDrive). They keep trying to sell me a Mac Book Air, thinking this will solve all my problems. (I'm also trying to save some money to start my language school/cultural museum in Lugait and my house there.)

I like either Panther (10.3) or Tiger (10.4) on the G3 because I can also use Classic (9.2.2) alone. Maybe that's a little too nostalgic of me, but that's the way I like it. Besides the iBook only has a 10 GB hard drive and Leopard (10.5) requires 9 GB (as well as the proper processor and everything else I don't have...)