"interested skeptic" needs some feedback on Xara pros/cons

[gary]

First of all a big hello to the Xara Discussion Group!

After reading the glowing remarks from many professional graphic designers on the i-us Xara pages, I have become interested in the software.

Here's my question: If this software's so great (and also cheap), then why is it not prominently used in every design studio? Why are Tools like Corel Draw, Illustrator or Freehand used more? Where's "the hook"? Or is it really simply a "well kept secret"?

Thanks in advance for any and all feedback!
Gary Vey

p.s. i now use photoshop and corel draw (corel since ver. 2)...

[imagination is more important than knowledge - a.einstein]

[gary]

First of all a big hello to the Xara Discussion Group!

After reading the glowing remarks from many professional graphic designers on the i-us Xara pages, I have become interested in the software.

Here's my question: If this software's so great (and also cheap), then why is it not prominently used in every design studio? Why are Tools like Corel Draw, Illustrator or Freehand used more? Where's "the hook"? Or is it really simply a "well kept secret"?

Thanks in advance for any and all feedback!
Gary Vey

p.s. i now use photoshop and corel draw (corel since ver. 2)...

[imagination is more important than knowledge - a.einstein]

[doobs]

welcome to xara world gary...
yes it's the graphic world best kept secret but if you promise to tell all your friends about it we'll let you in!
i once was a skeptic too till about a week after downloading my first corelxara2 demo.
the best thing about xara is it's sheer intuitiveness which i have not found anywhere else as far as graphic software is concerned....and i have tried quiet few!..add speed ...a great supportive xaran community ...all this reasonably priced...(i've just happily upgraded this evening).
if you need any convincing download the beta...tutorials and movies available.
but best of all i've lost 22kgs the first month of using xara.
cheers.
philippe [img]/infopop/emoticons/icon_smile.gif[/img]

[dk_art]

I think big companies get into a groove and can't get out easily even if they wanted too (just a theory). They've been using Photoshop, Corel Draw or whatever for years and it would be very hard to just all of a sudden switch to a different program (even if it did have better features or better user interface) and learn that and lose money in the learning time process. Just my thought anyway and I don't base a program's actual merit upon how popular it is since sometimes the most popular things have problems ... I judge pretty much on the use of the demo.

I think the demo is absolutely essential... I won't buy a program without a trial version. My web editor I bought had a 45 day trial period... time enough to become dependant on it :-). Although the 15 day trial for XaraX is alright, I think 30 days is the least amount of time any demo should be for. Of course some companies (cough *Corel* cough) apparently don't believe in downloadable trial versions and I think are foolish for being so restrictive.

Of course feedback from the software company about any bugs discovered is good. There have been several bug complaints about XaraX recently and the Xara team has always written replies to this board and often said that these things were fixed for the next download. So this info is comforting too.

DK

[dk_art]

you wrote "best of all i've lost 22kgs the first month of using xara"

I assume the reason for this is that XaraX is so fun and addictive to use that it greatly cuts back on the trips to the fridge for snacks :-).

The user interface of XaraX is so well designed that there is less actual mouse movement and clicking to find commands than in other programs(unlike apps which rely heavily on palettes and menu lists). So this being the case , XaraX actually reduces the amount of exercise one gets from using it. So this cannot be the contributing factor to your incredible Xara induced weight loss.

Perhaps Xara would consider having an alternate 'diet version' with all commands buried within complicated menus and pop up windows to promote more intensive clicking routines. Just a suggestion to keep us graphics users in shape a bit :-D

DK

[jclements]

Hi Gary,

Gross Gut.

Part of the reason Xara's presence is not what you might expect it to be has to do with its past. Until recently, Corel Corp., had distribution rights to Xara2 in North America; hence the name CorelXara 2. My understanding is that this really hamstrung Xara Ltd., because decisions as to marketing (which were virtually null) and how and when software upgrades were released were not fully in their control.

That should all change now that Xara Ltd. has control of their own destiny.

[doobs]

dk
about the weigth loss thingy..well i use xara x "lite" but seriously it was just some outrageous claim to confuse our new skeptic mate gary even more.
come to think of it i do have many more friends and my bank balance has increased tenfolds since i started using xara... [img]/infopop/emoticons/icon_smile.gif[/img]
philippe

[xrenex]

Xara is more artistic and CorelDraw has more prefabricated stuff aboard.

Xara once advertised with: Less is more.
Believe me with Xara this is true [img]/infopop/emoticons/icon_smile.gif[/img]

[rs]

Here's my question: If this software's so great (and also cheap), then why is it not prominently used in every design studio? Why are Tools like Corel Draw, Illustrator or Freehand used more? Where's "the hook"? Or is it really simply a "well kept secret"?

easy:
1: No CMYK export.
2. Bad Text formating.
3. To cheap. (I tried to promote this soft, but
no one believes that a 1 Million DM company
works with a unknown soft for ~DM 140.-.

Anyhow in my opinion Xara should work on printing functions than animated gif's.

U are not alone...

PS.: Schön mal jemanden aus Deutschland hier zu haben, soweit ich das hier gesehen habe bin ich heir seit jahren der einzige...

rs

[gnurf]

Interresting that no one mentioned the downsides with Xara (hello Klaus, where are you? I thought you would be the first to comment :-).

If we compare Xara with other heavyweighters like CorelDraw, Freehand and Illustrator, we have some (minor) issues:

1) Xara (still) doesn't support multiple pages

2) You (still) can't export bitmaps in CMYK format (and the Tif LZW compression sucks)

3) Xara is quite poor when coming to text related things.

But on the other hand Xara is a superb complement to other programs (Photoshop and CorelDraw) - or is it the other way around.

Personally I do the main work in Xara and finish it up in Photoshop or CorelDraw (depending on if it is a vector or bitmap job).

-Paul