Dude, if you don't have a software budget EVERY year. Get out of the business.

My first year in the business, B&C. And even if I was making money by the fistful, I would want to spend it on other things besides updates. Like, beer and chips, for instance. Rique, did you get a discount to update from 4 to 5 via SONY? Since this is my 1st year with V5, no discount for me. B&H photo price for the V5+DVDA suite was $679.95. Come to find out DVDA2 is one of the few software programs without dual burner capability. But hey, it just might be in V6-DVDA3, that is, for more of your money.

"I would want to spend it on other things besides updates. Like, beer and chips, for instance."

-LOL LOL LOL LOL. I definitely agree 1,000% with you, WedVidMan. Yesterday, I was reading around here that people are waiting for Photoshop CS2, Vegas 6 and DVDA3. I've just bought my PS CS and now there are people waiting for version CS2...They must be very, very rich. I rather spend my money travelling to the northen shores of our State of Saint Paul in Southeastern Brazil where there are nothing more than 300 islands and pristine beaches. You are invited. Let's dive overthere, there are plenty of dolphins, sun and the Atlantic Forest....Let's leave'em waiting for Photoshop CS2.....LOL

$150 to upgrade to Photoshop CS2 and hopefully around the same thing to upgrade to Vegas 6... if you own a business, and rely on those two programs to run it, those prices are nothing. If you are a fair weather editor, then sure, I guess one could whine about the prices. lol

"If you are a fair weather editor, then sure, I guess one could whine about the prices. lol"
- Very funny - lol lol

More of the moutain and outback kind of guy,cunhambebe, but thanks. No, Arks00, I try to rely on good camera techniques than editing to correct the bad. Vegas is a good if not great program, but there are probably 10 of good if not great programs out there. Whine? Yep, I whine about companies that update frequently, instead of upgrading the mistakes out of their programs on THEIR dime. Much like paying $2.40 a gallon of gas when there is an abundance of gas in the US. But, hey, better than $2.40 a liter, right?

Dang, lost the thread. Don't ya just hate it when that happens??

gas prices are horrible, and thats a whole different topic. lol. I never mentioned anything about correcting bad camera footage, I agree that cinematography should be mastered first. Heck, for wedding videography, Vegas 5 works great; no need for fancy effects and transistions for those edits. If thats all you work on, there is no need to think about getting vegas 6. (not making fun of you, i see your point now; I just didnt get the complaining ;p)

Wedvidman - I don't know why no-one has said this, but when you upgrade, you don't have to buy a whole new box etc... You just buy an upgrade from sony, and no - it doesn't augment your existing program, it's an entirely new one - usually for about 199-299 depending on whether you're adding on DVDA or not. Appearently Last year Sony even lowered the price for the first month to those that would upgrade right away. - No $700 dollar upgrades here. Just a couple hundered or so at most.

You may not even need it though, so I'd suggest testing it - to see if there are things that make it worth your money - It may end up that it can do something that you do - so much faster or better that it will easily pay for its self in no time. The whole new version vs. update discussion has happened, and happened again, and so on. It's an issue with some, and not for others. But it won't be 700 bucks.

Dave

Hey, Ho....I forgot to say that there are mountains overthere....Mountains + beaches....lol - that's true.
Now, I'm serious....I agree with you. Sometimes I think people live for upgrading and upgrading and upgrading. If I have a dozen or more applications and I have to upgrade all the time, then what I'm going to do? Upgrading all the time? Today is Photoshop, tomorrow Vegas, the day after tomorrow DVDA....and so on. Nah.....

The bad part is, I love V5. (Well, not love,but you know.) A whole different world than Pinnacle's Studio 8 I came from. But the upgrade to V6, even at $300 or less, is a catch-up to other programs like Avid or Adobe, when Sony should be passing those programs. When was the last time they added to their themes page, even? (Yes, I do my own, to include backgrounds,music,to whole shebang, but I'm always on the lookout for new ideas) Again, the nasty dual layer thing. Limited event audio editing - has to almost be a track encompassing thing. I'm just wanting my dollar to go further. Another thing I like to see is SONY come out with a Firewire converter (like ADVC) for connecting an external monitor instead of telling us to run it through our camera. I'd rather put hours on my camera by filming. JMHO. Sorry about the loud whines keeping you all awake. :)

Thanks Dave. Its just that...I can see myself going to the wife, and telling her,hey hon, guess what I need ...again. out of the gutters, guys. ;) My credit card can be wrapped around a pencil its so hot.

shouldn't be putting any hours on your cam just to use the passthrough. Either way - you'll only pay 199 or maybe even less if you upgrade with in the first month - assuming they do it like last time. As for your dollar stretching - don't we all, but that's got to have a substantial dose of reality in it for us to be fair. I'd rather pay a little more often to support a company than pay less, and kill em. Either way - there will never be an A/D (analog / digital) converter that comes with them - assuming here - just simply because there are A/D coverters in so many cams, and from so many companies. - I'd rather pay 699 for Vegas w/o one than pay 799 or even 899 to get it with one - for two reasons, I'd have to be stuck with whatever they gave me for that money, and two - maybe I don't need one. It only makes sense to me that there should be no A/D converter - but sure - I wouldn't protest getting one for the same price ;)

Dave

Well,
depending on what Avid system you're comparing vegas to the upgrade prices on their 'systems' can run into millions. Just for comparison, to add HDV capability to PP will set you back 4 or 5 times more than what you can get it for Vegas for.
As I mostly work on the post side of things then I generally need the latest and greatest so I can handle as many formats as possible, it's a business decision. Same goes for all the other things I use in my business, of all the things I use, Vegas would be about the cheapest both in initial purchase costs and the ongoings as well. Spare a thought for the poor FCP users, they're pretty much forced to buy a new computer as well as pay for the upgrades to their software and then upgrade the OS and find out half their old apps don't work and have to be upgraded.

I don't know why you're worried about hours on your camera, it's head hours that matter, using it for pass through doesn't wear it out in anyway whatsoever. But in any case how would Sony making and A<->D converter change anything, Canopus et al do a fine job of that already. Well wait, you can buy a Sony monitor that's got a 1394 port, the 1394 option board is at least 3 times the price of Vegas, I don't imagine that's what you want to pay.

So you make your living doing wedding videos, something which your clients would like to last quite a while. Do you offer to 'upgrade' their videos from VHS to DVD for nothing, will you do the same when BluRay comes along?

You can in theory keep using your Vegas licence until hell freezes over and beyond, apart from computer software I've yet to find anything with such a planned life expectancy. Hard to imagine I know but even software engineers need to eat, I'll admit I'm biased as I'm one and I can tell you it can be pretty slim pickings.

Bob.

Bob, I guess there is two sides to every wallet. As for the A<>D thing, am I mistaken in thinking the camera has to be on to provide power for the convertion? Every time you flick that little "ON" switch on your camera, you hope its MB doesn't give up the ghost. I'd much rather have a converter box die than a $3K camera. And since SONY offers the external option, one would think SONY would have a box to run the option. Why have to go to a different vender? Again, MHO. As for the weddings, if the VHS or DVD is bad or doesn't work properly, or something is left out, I do correct my errors. And if I'm still around when BlueRay gets popular, maybe I will. Since my business is by-word-of-mouth, I'll keep as many of my customers as happy as I can, since their word produces my next customers.

(Ron, back away.. slowly..from the nest) :)

If your camera costs $US 3K, I'd certainly buy a converter, not because you're going to wear the thing out and the risk of it going bad switching it on and off is nothing compared to the risks you put it under in the field. Don't take this the wrong way but I work for a hire company and wedding guys are the ones most likely to damage gear, not their fault, just the time pressure mostly. Problem I had with using the camera was the risk of tripping over all the leads or damaging a connector, that's why I bought the ADVC-300. Pretty well every NLE manufacturer recommends using an external monitor and none of them makes one, Sony don't make tripods either, well they do and they're junk mostly. I say let them focus on what they're good at. Of course if you've got a Sony deck you can use that, much more robust, ideally you shouldn't be playing tapes out in your camera either so there's another reason to buy a deck, for my money the DSR-11 is hard to beat.

Ah, just realised, Sony WILL market an A<->D converter, the SD Connect from Convergent, pretty pricey though, just under USD 2000. Great box, we bought 2 but probably overkill for what you're doing.

But either way, I'm still at a loss as to where the benefit comes from Sony making their own converter. For openers Sony Pictures Digital has next to no connection to the division of Sony who would be likely to build it and there's already so many various models available elsewhere. At the same time there's plenty of other Sony gear that'll do pass thru apart from their cameras and decks, I think even their set top DVD burners will do it, at least the ones with firewire ports will.
Bob.

Rique, did you get a discount to update from 4 to 5 via SONY? Since this is my 1st year with V5, no discount for me.

Yes. They usually offer a lower upgrade price for the first 30 days or so. I paid $199 for the upgrade from V4 to V5 with DVDA. I think they charged $299 later on. You usually have to wait for an email from Sony with the special lower price offer.

Bob, I can't see why SONY wouldn't want a piece of that A/D conversion. They are already into the rest of the shebang...cams, cameras, tripods, mics, recorders, players, and on, and on, an on. Take an inexpensive camera with FireWire and knock its lens off. Viola. converter. Since I have Sony camcorders and software, it would have been nice to have the option to buy a SONY converter...or not. And as for other various models on the market, that hasn't stop others for seeking to grab a piece of that pie. And I'll check out the DSR-11. But that may be out of my budget for awhile. Trying to comply with copyright laws against other wedding videographers who don't care, has already cost me a couple of jobs this month. (Separate OT, there) Jobs I was counting on.. And as for my previous threads...I expect updates and eagerly await them as the next guy....I was just hoping for a few more upgrades between them. :(

SONY DVMC-DA2 D<->A converter:

Ebay 7505536514 currently at $150, 0 bids
Ebay 7506086994 currently at $80.85, 3 bids
Ebay 7505788560 buy it now $300

I've got one of these units and it's fantastic. I use it almost daily, both for capturing analog and real-time previewing on a TV. It only handles NTSC though. I got mine new for $295. Sadly, SONY seems to have discontinued it. Maybe they'll introduce a new model that uses the Madison DV codec.

Speaking of converters, I rememeber having read a test comaparing 3 or 4 models and was very surprised to learn that they can affect the image quality when you capture, ain't it?
It was DSE that wrote this review...

Then do what I do: upgrade every couple years. I still use V4 that I got two years ago. I'm upgrading to V6+DVDA3 now because I want the features of V5 & DVDA 3. Heck I even have a duel layer burner but don't use duel layer disks for anyone because I don't think they are worth it now (to expensive).

I wouldn't even worry about upgrading until you need to. I used Win98 from '98 to '00, then I got Win2k. I haven't upgraded that since. It works perfectly fine for me. I just upgrade my AMD XP machine because the MB blew out & it would take 3 weeks for the warenty repair & 2 days for a new machine over nighted. :)

So don't even fret. And hey, when I got V4 I didn't even pay the "full price." I upgrade from V3 LE to V4 for $300 (durring the $100 off period). I got the V3LE + book a couple months before V4 came out for $50, then when V4 came out I upgraded. Very sweet deal.