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**wall** · 28 April 2007, 01:54 PM

Like remi, I too believe it's a clever stragegy for Magix. But XXPro is supposedly different from the rest of the extremely low-end products that Magix is good at selling. While the upgrade-every-6-month works for those stuff that got put on every shelf all over the world, I doubt that will work for a software product that costs more than $150 and with a more specialized user group.

It's up to Xara to decide how they want to position XXP. Personally speaking, they will lose me if they go for the Magix model, unless they cut the price of XXP to as low as the normal $20 Magix products...

Photo Clinic is a good news though, becuase XPE doesn't work well here on my machine. (the mysterious progress bar issue)

And for the record, based on the softwares that I'm familiar with, when a software/company is acquired by a new one, they usually would try to ease their existing loyal users' mind by providing some bonus first, instead of trying to charge them for an upgrade in a few month.

**Darwin** · 28 April 2007, 03:03 PM

It's early days yet and the newsletter is so vague about what is going to be added to XX Pro and what an upgrade will cost that I am hesitant to comment. However, I do think that coming to customers with an outstretched hand within 6 months of release is a bit rich, particularly given that by my count we've only had one point release (January 17) since Pro was released in December. If Magix really wants to hook me on their other product lines, they should be wooing me by offering me free licences to their products that naturally dovetail into the Xara products that I own, like the bitmap editor , so that instead of thinking "WTF? I'm being asked to pay for an update to a product I bought less than six months ago?!" I'll be thinking "Wow, Magix is the best thing that ever happened to Xara and to me. This bitmap editor that they gave me is the bee's knees and extends Xtreme Pro's functionality in ways that I never could have imagined. I really need a DVD authoring tool and I know where I'm going to look first before I spend my money!". Of course, if the product is not particularly noteworthy compared to the competition and doesn't offer any significant advance beyond XPE (I'll be downloading a trial after making this post), maybe it's smarter to just force me to pay for it under the guise of a "must-have, so many improvements that you'll wonder how we can make this available to you so cheaply" update to a different product in their line...

Paranoid ranting aside, note the first line in this post - we don't actually know what is being planned and, as noted by calmer, more rational people than me, no one is holding a gun to my, or any other Xtreme user's, head to force us to update when the time comes.

Right, back to your regular programming.

**w00dy** · 28 April 2007, 03:25 PM

Before Magix took over Xara, I'll put my hand up, I hadn't heard of them but since then, I frequently have a look around their site out of curiousity and installed Movie Edit Pro to have a play with. I love Xtreme, it's quick and does everything I need and XPE is great for doing some quick cropping and resizing before sending stuff over to the local paper. I've always upgraded X1/Xtreme because it generally offers something new and out of a sense of loyalty really but I'd really have gripe if I had to to pay out big bucks only six months after the initial release. I don't for a minute think Magix are stupid, they're good at marketing and driving away "top end" users (XXP people) would not be to their advantage, so I'd be reasonably confident that XXP users will get an advantageous upgrade deal.

Over the years, I've been involved in some biggish company/institutional takeovers and I have to say, at the end of the day, the guys taking over get their way, have no doubt of that... simply how business works. I'm sure that Charles will always fight Xara's corner and we know nothing of the terms of the deal but, in my humble opinion, it's Magix's baby and they'll do what they will!

**Xhris** · 28 April 2007, 03:28 PM

According to the April Outsider it will be a new integrated Photo Editor, based on an updated Magix Photo Clinic. Who knows what UI optimisations and feature changes have been made to MPC v6. People appear so far to have been assuming it will just be MPC tacked on.

**Darwin** · 28 April 2007, 06:04 PM

According to the April Outsider it will be a new integrated Photo Editor, based on an updated Magix Photo Clinic. Who knows what UI optimisations and feature changes have been made to MPC v6. People appear so far to have been assuming it will just be MPC tacked on.

Good point/fair comment. I was hyperventilating so much when I wrote the above that this point didn't make it in, even though I had intended to make it. I've had a chance to try MPC and am neither impressed nor unimpressed with it... It's a lot heavier than XPE, though, and I certainly hope that it is tweaked before shipping as part of Xara Xtreme...

**ankhor** · 29 April 2007, 10:41 AM

Originally Posted by Millertime

I think it should be a free upgrade for anyone who upgraded or purchased Pro in the beginning of the year. Especiallly since I purchased Xtreme near the end of '06 and upgraded to Pro in Dec '06 received in Jan. 07 and now expected to pay again!! (That is of course if I choose too upgrade.) I little sympathy for my wallet please.(Don't have a endless supply of Money)

Yep I got a good deal then for ordering soon.
It seems they might take it away again now because
I ordered soon. The ones ordering now, get a free upgrade.

**behzad** · 30 April 2007, 03:19 PM

I didn't know my initial question would raise such big interest.

**samrc** · 30 April 2007, 04:37 PM

- Improved import / export filters including RTF, EMF/WMF and more - Copy / paste to / from Microsoft Word includes all style and font information

These additions to XXP sound nice and would be very welcome!

However, when I mentioned to my boss that we may need to upgrade again very shortly, she was SHOCKED since we just upgraded my home and office copies. She is used to me telling her of upgrades every year or so. The idea of paying for another upgrade so soon was not well received, especially since we had to wait so long for shipment to actually arrive and the full functions (PDF export improvements) were not available until the disks came in. In her view (and a bit of my own too) to be asked to pay for an upgrade so soon is difficult to swallow. Really like XXP and hope the upgrade schedule will not make it difficult to keep up!

**behzad** · 30 April 2007, 04:48 PM

Really no one needs to upgrade, do it as you wish. If you have the funds and want to upgrade then do it, if not wait for the next upgrade. I know many people who own software and skip on upgrades.

The company can do as it pleases and that can be making upgrades they have to make money, but you are not forced to purchase every upgrade.

**ankhor** · 01 May 2007, 08:18 AM

Originally Posted by behzad

Really no one needs to upgrade, do it as you wish. If you have the funds and want to upgrade then do it, if not wait for the next upgrade. I know many people who own software and skip on upgrades.

The company can do as it pleases and that can be making upgrades they have to make money, but you are not forced to purchase every upgrade.

If it fixes bugs from former versions, what choice do you have?
Unless bugfixes are given seperately too.
I have no problem paying for serious upgrades, but not if I very recently
purchased the newest version.