Hello
I just checked out xara.com but I can't find any links to Xara Designer Pro.
What is going on - Has Xara stopped developing XDP?
J
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Hello
I just checked out xara.com but I can't find any links to Xara Designer Pro.
What is going on - Has Xara stopped developing XDP?
J
go down to the bottom of the page a click on the desktop link for product
Ah yes I do see it now.Quote:
Originally Posted by handrawn
But let's be honest, it is almost completely hidden. Even on my high res screen (4K) I am having to scroll down about 10,000 pixels.
Attachment 126460
Not exactly reassuring for any prospective customers. Even if sales are now being handled by magix.com, I find it mind-blowing that they haven't even given a link to it in the top menu.
J
PS I am thinking of upgrading my XDP X10 at some point, even though it remains crippled by its failure to be compatible with high res screens (e.g. 4K). However I am not in any rush so I was planning to sign up for their newsletter and sit tight waiting to see if they give us a decent discount code at some point.
What is remarkable is the attitude Xara has about this in that it thinks the revenues are good enough. A clear sight of a Cash Cow. Good enough de facto means Xara could do better.Quote:
Originally Posted by shiphen
Do hold off until version 17.1 is released. Don't jump into v17.0 as it is now clear that Xara has little intention of ensuring bug or patch releases are available.
Acorn
it isn't just sales that magix handles, it is marketing too as far as the desktop goes, which is probably why xara's site is all cloud
that is not to say I disagree about the cash-cow, far from it...
Maybe the answer is that Xara Cloud is a revenue earner for Xara, while Xara desktop is a revenue earner for Magix?
I have a feeling Xara only makes money from Xara desktop because of a maintenance and development contract with Xara gmbh/Migix, so there's no incentive for direct sales on the Xara site ( besides some commission, maybe).
We talk as though Xara desktop belongs to Xara UK, but I don't think that's the case.
Do correct me if I'm wrong.
Are any of you folks here old enough to remember Corel/CorelDraw taking over the "marketing" of Xara?
My memory was as follows: It was a car-crash. Xara was a VASTLY better product than CorelDraw, but Corel sat on Xara and thereby stopped it from eating the lunch of CorelDraw. Eventually, after c. 5 years of this, Xara escaped.
And frankly, Xara has never really recovered momentum ever since.
Talk to any professional graphic designer and it is 99% likely they even HEARD of Xara. It seems they all just use the vastly over-priced, but industry standard Adobe suite, including Adobe Illustrator.
And what about 'non-professionals'? Well somehow, Xara has never managed to attract them in significant numbers either. In truth I don't quite know how Xara have managed to achieve this! Partly it has probably always been just a little bit too expensive.
But also, IMHO, the UI has some 'silly' aspects that make for a steeper learning curve. We long-time users are all used to it of course, but new users don't find XDP as easy as it should be.
e.g. Right now, simply because I am used to Xara, I am using it to do some engineering diagrams. I am using the snapping to grid a lot. All works fine until you accidentally click "Scale Line Widths" at which point instead of snapping to the centre of each line, XDP now suddenly starts snapping to the EDGE of each line. Now, I can see that the user should be allowed to choose... but what an idiotic name! In fact why can't the actual scaling of line widths (when an object's size is change) be kept separate from snapping quirks? I moaned about this c. 10 years ago but... nothing.
e.g. Who would ever guess that is you create a rectangular shape by drawing it line by line, that you have created something completely different from a rectangular shape created by using the Rectangle Tool? And that you need to go Arrange ==> Convert to Editable shapes in order to have permission to move the shape's points individually?
And which newbie would ever guess that you have to be in the Shape Tool in order to do so?
And even if you ARE in Shape Tool mode, who would have guessed that you need have SELECTED the object in question before you can do so.
I could go on.
Ooops there goes my day! But, IMHO, Xara remains a fabulous product, but the basics simply aren't obvious enough to the newbie.
And now the marketing is back in the hands of geniuses....
J
PS Fwiw, I just signed up for the Magix newsletter and they sent me a "£10 off" voucher. But it guess what? It doesn't work for either new or Upgraded XDP.
@pauland
the current incarnation of xara is Xara GmbH based in Berlin - this is a venture capital company - it is the cloud app company
the old xara group ltd wasbased at Gaddesden Place, it would appear xara still have a base there that does development for desktop
Charles Moir is in on record as saying [in blog] that he sold a software company to a german company - though what exactly that means is not clear [to me]
so it may be more than just an M&D, but there again it may not
Rob is also on record as saying 'they' [R&D ? ] have to get the go ahead to incorporate changes to the program from higher up [Magix ?] for the desktop
....
Yes, I've seen it and unless someone says anything different, I'd be inclined to assume that is Xara as we have always known it (the desktop).Quote:
Originally Posted by handrawn
If that's so, Magix (I assume they are the German company, one way or another) calls the shots when it comes to the desktop software.
@ shiphen
'vastly overpriced' is a relative term - I use Toon Boom Premium, no cheaper [but at least you can buy a perpetual licence; not cheap but you can]... and Maya is no better.... you pay for the R&D, you pay for the support
xara wizzed off with some very good ideas, but the R&D stalled [desktop], support too - reason ? money would be my best guess - overpriced is a relative term.. you get what you pay for... and in a team environment that is even more so
Magix themselves produce DAW, audio and video editing software, the rest they just aquired the titles and then sell on...
@pauland
my assumption too...
As far a over price concerns,
For a while now Magix has had Designer Pro as a new purchase for $159.00 (US) with Panorama Studio. If you want to upgrade Designer Pro it is $129.00 (US) with ASEOPS11. In my opinion, get rid of the ASEOPS11 and give us a decent discount on the upgrade price.
I have been watching the price for a few weeks and Magic just keeps moving the date out a week when they say the offer is going to expire. So effectively Magix is saying the value of Pro is only $159.00.
Typically there has been updates to Designer Pro in March/May and around October. Once in a while bug fixes come out in between. Around July is usually a revision update. Rob was saying they expect an update in a few weeks which would be in keeping with the past cycles.
Ray
Ray.
Ray, Magix has always done this. Remove the spurious offers of its software and remove the pointless M service (http protocol only / no cPanel / no email / ...) and the upgrade cost could be reduces substantially. 35% of new is fair. Over 50%, just park for a yearQuote:
Originally Posted by RKissane
In passing I have Posted https://www.talkgraphics.com/showthr...ation-Versions.
It tries to show releases and patches (fixes) in a time context so you can predict when a new release might appear. sadly, not if it has any merit.
My suggested strategy for v17.0 is if the Update Service is about to expire, let it and buy back in at v17.1. Make sure you have used Download all to get all the on-line content onto your machine.
If you ignore the first major release and all its ensuring patches, v15 & v16 effectively had one or two feature additions in a year. Dig a little deeper and you see you are paying for a lot of Templates.
Acorn
Re pricing, I would be genuinely interested to see who Xara/Magix think that their customer is (and is not) for XDP.
e.g.
Graphic designers?
Are they serious about poaching Graphic Designers? Given that no graphic designers I speak to ever seem to have even heard of XDP, and given Xara's failure to upgrade the UI for high res screens... Presumably not.
Engineering Designers?
If you get the grid set up sensibily, and particularly with the "snap to object" turned or from time to time, XDP can be made to make quite a good fist of engineering design, once you've learned it's quirks. BUT which engineer would ever tolerate lines with arrow heads where if you want arrow heads, they terminate boyond the end of the line?! So, not engineers, then.
Professional web designers?
I don't know if I am typical or not, but I have used XDP only in fits and starts. When I was a web designer, I used to use it for creating graphics (e.g. buttons) when I did web design. But I never used it to create web pages - the loss of control was way too great.
General Management - diagrams?
Then as I then moved away from the coal-face, more into general management I would still use it occasionally for random graphics. However over time PowerPoint seems to have become more & more what is used by general management, particularly in larger corporates, to create shapes & diagrams for their documents and presentations.
General Managment - text / DTP document
Clearly Xara is no competitor for msWord. Nor InDesign / QuarkExpress. Apart from anything else, the indexing/spidering of text by the likes of X1 Search is hopeless.
Casual Dabblers?
For the casual dabbler anything over $100 is way too much, no matter how good the product. Lets not forget that we live in an age where even $20 seems like quite a lot for a mobile phone app.
Honestly! Who is Xara supposed to be for?
Rich, (ageing) masochists?Quote:
Originally Posted by shiphen
I resent that. I'm not rich!Quote:
Originally Posted by iamtheblues
Forgive me for saying so, but your post is very one-sided, and you have left out a whole sector of users that fit between 'management' and 'dabblers' who probably are the core users, and i would say always were, though on the forum they have become more 'website' than 'pure' graphics...Quote:
Originally Posted by shiphen
I am the first to point out the things i don't like, but I am also well aware of the great strengths of the program[s] - you have not even considered any of these in this post... still in your previous post you say it is a fabulous product, so you must be aware of them
answer to your question ? 'whoever finds it useful' ;)
depending how you choose to define the first and last of those terms they might apply to me - the middle term applies to everyone for whom the process has not yet terminated >:)Quote:
Originally Posted by iamtheblues
if you mean rich as in 'has more money than they need[can use]' then nah, 'faid not....
and by definition, anyone who spends a lot of time here on TG is a masochist.... :p
It remains a serious question. Who *IS* Xara DP for?Quote:
Originally Posted by handrawn
Xara seems to have evolved towards web design.... but clearly it can't be targetting graphic designers because
A) almost all of them would be on much higher resolution devices
B) probably the majority would be on Apple OS or using Adobe Illustrator
The problem with the "dabblers" market is that an increasing number of them will have high resolution screens and Xara will increasingly not work for them. But Xara is too expensive for the casual dabbler...
Yes there still are many strengths to Xara - although I fear those of us who are now old enough to remember the likes of the Xara Studio incarnation, may not have tried much of the competition.
I suppose it is exactly because of those many and various strengths of Xara that I find myself drawn back here every few months to (in effect) publicly hold my head in my hands and weep at Xara's apparent total loss of direction.
J
PS Anyone feeling rich? Maybe Xara just needs a change of management and I bet you could buy the whole company for a song...
I have tried plenty of the competition, and use them.Quote:
Originally Posted by shiphen
Nothing has ever replicated the thrill of discovering Xara Studio 1.0 at a stall in a design-oriented exhibition in Islington, London, back in the day. I may even have been sold Xara Studio by Kate Moss..
Just by Xara's stand was a product that turned images into paintings. That impressed me no end, but I didn't buy it because the usage rights in the license put me off - I wanted to process home movies turning them into paintings. My PC would have been on fire!
I think not.Quote:
I bet you could buy the whole company for a song...
Quote:
Originally Posted by shiphen
xara is now Xara GmbH, a startup company using venture capital, and based in Berlin - it's focus is on the cloud based app which is focused on 'creating documents' be they web as in websites, or print - they have just launched a new package whereby you can subscribe to the desktop as well as the cloud app as one
I do not think that Xara's focus was ever on the kind of graphic designer you seem to be talking about - sure some did use it, some swear by it, but Xara are on record as saying they never intended to compete with Illustator - you have sort of answered you own question here:
yes exactly and in respect of B) it was always the case, no one seriously pretended otherwise, although it did no harm to push the capabilities of the program as far as they would go in the advertisingQuote:
A) almost all of them would be on much higher resolution devices
B) probably the majority would be on Apple OS or using Adobe Illustrator
I think that is worth repeating: Xara is not and never was targeted at high end graphics designers [except maybe in the very early days when things were less windows/mac] - I am sure MEB365 will come back on this if I am wrong - if it had been so targeted it would have been on apple
You are not going to get your 4K resolution upgrade any time soon because the target demographic do not need it [yet]
so everyone who dabbles is poor - is that what you are saying ? ... come on....Quote:
But Xara is too expensive for the casual dabbler...
It just had one of those, what it needs is lots of take up on the cloud + desktop app package by those who it is targeted for, and anyone else who finds it useful... then it will have money to growQuote:
Maybe Xara just needs a change of management....
agree with Paul - if you look at what Xara now is, as opposed to what it was, they may just have got their act together and I hope they haveQuote:
...and I bet you could buy the whole company for a song...
Look, I've used Adobe's Illustrator and it's nothing special. Like all the Adobe software, the only thing that is special is the price. £238.42.... PER YEAR.
Yes, that's cheap if it is absolutely central to your job, otherwise forget it.
Now "per year" might suit the accountants in large corporates... but as an SME/entrepreneur for me it's the absolute kiss of death. I have no ****ing idea whether I will still have an on-going need to use Illustrator regularly in say 2 or 3 years time, but I sure as heck don't went to be suddenly told I can't open & edit my on files. And no way do I want to have to pay that sort of money for something that I use intensely for a couple of weeks and then barely at all for months.
> I think that is worth repeating: Xara is not and never was targeted at high end graphics designers
You are probably correct. However I think it's tragic.
> You are not going to get your 4K resolution upgrade any time soon because the target demographic do not need it [yet]
I think that's just pathetic.
Xara is the only application I know of that hasn't kept up.
> so everyone who dabbles is poor - is that what you are saing ? ... come on....
Not "everyone" but it makes little or no rational sense to buy something very expensive and then barely ever use it.
Indeed the only reason for buying something more expensive that you can't financially justify is to acquire the skills for your future career. Either that or it's just a sort of indulgance.
In my case, my main such "indulgance" has been to buy MindManager. It has never given me a penny of revenue, but it is probably the best mind mapping software out there. Rationally I know it was a waste of money, but I enjoy using it. Pure indulgance!
Fwiw, I have tried the online Xara, and in my experience it is absolutely diabolical. Very limited functionality... which kept crashing. So far, at least.
> agree with Paul - if you look at what Xara now is, as opposed to what it was, they may just have got their act together and I hope they have
I'm happy to hope, however I see not the slightest sign as yet....
you said casual dabbler - casual does not mean infrequent, at least not when I went to school [admittedly a while ago]; it means in a relaxed way, as in unhurried and not dictated by a set regime.. or irregular, which again does not mean infrequent it means not to a set timetabled requirementQuote:
> so everyone who dabbles is poor - is that what you are saing ? ... come on....
Not "everyone" but it makes little or no rational sense to buy something very expensive and then barely ever use it.
the online xara is not for the sort of work you do [as i understand it] that was sort of my point....
oops, I forgot to add - dabbling also does not mean infrequent [ask any duck they do it all the time] - it means only going in as far as is necessary to get what you need, be that pleasure, a sense of acheivement [or in the case of a duck, food]
Great discussion. I’d like to add the Xara Cloud might attract Mac OS as well.
I use both systems, and find that I’m designing more in XDP and sending a designed header to MAC. I do find that when designing small posters for color printing is use XDP.
The advantage of Xara for myself is the all in one capability. I don’t have to have multiple programs as I do for Mac.
In the IOS I’m using Sparkle, then Affinity designer, photo and Publisher. For my PC it’s Xara.
I’m going to do some exploring with Xara Cloud to see if my Mac likes it, but will not pay a monthly.
~Bill