Subject:Beta Test Request

Posted by: stuffedspacedog

Date:3/19/2008 7:56:52 PM

I emailed Sony customer service to ask if I could be a beta tester for AP7. I figured I've been using the product for 5 years, have produced almost everything I've ever done on it, and earn my income from music... seems reasonable no?

Anyway, they suggested I try the forums, which seems like a really good way to not actually deal with the request or forward it on to someone who may actually help.

The same day I was also having terrible problems with Vegas 8 installation and the dreaded Microsoft .NET garbage, and for the first time I actually considered ditching all my Sony products and moving to Mac running Reaper!

Brighten my day Sony?

Subject:RE: Beta Test Request

Reply by: pwppch

Date:3/19/2008 8:01:10 PM

Did you try this?

[link]https://www.sonycreativesoftware.com/corporate/contact.asp?id=26

Get use to the .NET garbage. It is not going away.

Peter

Subject:RE: Beta Test Request

Reply by: stuffedspacedog

Date:3/19/2008 11:37:52 PM

Thanks Peter, will do.

After 67 "critical updates" to XP I now have a working Vegas 8 installation also... hurrah (I think!).

Subject:RE: Beta Test Request

Reply by: drew_

Date:3/23/2008 8:21:23 PM

First visit to the forum in ages. First thread I read... gloomy message. So different from the optimistic and enthusiastic tone of the past, Peter.

I think I'll go away again and leave you with your .NET!

Subject:RE: Beta Test Request

Reply by: pwppch

Date:3/24/2008 11:21:12 AM

No idea what you are trying to say so not really much I can say in response.

.NET is part of our solution. It is not garbage.

If this is gloomy, well, so be it.

Peter

Subject:RE: Beta Test Request

Reply by: Patrick@Denman

Date:3/25/2008 4:59:01 PM

Gotta stand with you there, Peter. I'm a .NET developer and a huge fan of the framework. Never going back to COM, that's for sure.

Subject:RE: Beta Test Request

Reply by: stuffedspacedog

Date:3/26/2008 4:46:53 AM

Sorry to be difficult, but the reason for developing software is to sell it to customers, so whether .NET makes the life of developers easier is kind of irrelevant.

As an end user, I had a bad experience installing software (one of many since Sony started requiring .NET). I don't blame Sony, I primarily blame Microsoft. However given the dependency of Sony software on .NET, Sony has to factor the entire user experience into account, not just the part it was responsible for developing.

I didn't want to install 67 updates to XP in order to get Vegas 8 running for example.

I'm sure Sony are getting fed up of complaints, but as a user I'm getting fed up with Sony. I was defending Acid strongly until only a week or so ago, I'm now starting to doubt my support, and "get used to it, it's not going away" isn't helpful.

I also duly filled in the beta test request form over 10 days ago and have heard absolutely nothing.

Sorry to be a moaner, but this forum seems to be going the way of the Cubase forums a few years back, with people getting increasingly unhappy as the developer refuses to properly address questions or concerns.

I've spent many thousands of dollars with Sony over the years, as I'm sure many here have, I should be a very easy customer to make happy. The only thing fuelling my discontent is the fact that Sony aren't dealing with it.

"If this is gloomy, so be it"... WTF? I'm starting to think that something is badly wrong with the management of Sony Creative Software since it acquired Sonic Foundry who were generally pretty nice, responsive and helpful.

I'm not blaming Peter personally, but generally the culture of a company comes through in the attitude of its' employees, and reading between the lines I'm guessing that life working for Sony sucks quite badly.

Subject:RE: Beta Test Request

Reply by: thenoizzbox

Date:3/26/2008 7:10:13 AM

FWIW, I've also sent an application for beta testing Acid several days ago. I had sent one also sometime in 2007. Heard nothing back yet both times.

Subject:RE: Beta Test Request

Reply by: pwppch

Date:3/26/2008 10:06:18 AM

I don't know what to say.

No, it does not suck to work for Sony - far from it.

.NET is part of the OS dev platform.

.NET is not going away. This is a fact. It is used more and more and we had to adapt to solve a broad range of problems, not just a single one. You would loose features if we gutted .NET.

What would you have us do? I want to know. Give me your ideal solution.

Don't mean to sound harsh, but everytime somebody here or elsewhere has "read between the lines" I have never seen even a close approximation of the reality. You are making assumptions that have no basis in reality, but just a perception based upon incomplete facts.

Bottom line, if the product doesn't work for you, then you need to let us know. We do everything we can to resolve problems.

We listen to all requests . Sometimes the answer can be no to any given request. This is a business reality, not some nefarious corporate plot. We want our users to be happy in the broadest sense. For every person that has a problem with things like .NET, there are hundreds or even thousands that do not.

Beta requests are just that: A request. There is no assurance that every application will be accepted or even responded to.

If you have any further questions/concerns, let me know. I will do my best to tell you the reality.

Peter

Subject:RE: Beta Test Request

Reply by: thenoizzbox

Date:3/26/2008 10:20:58 AM

Hi Peter,

I understand that not every beta tester application gets accepted. That's quite alright and I am quite familiar with the process having been a beta tester for Macromedia then Adobe for seveal years. But I would indeed have expected a reply, even one saying no. Thanks for clarifying Sony's policy on this though.

Subject:RE: Beta Test Request

Reply by: BradlyMusic

Date:3/26/2008 4:21:32 PM

I don't understand what all the fuss is about being a beta tester. Just wait for the next new release, download the demo and report in detail the bugs you found so that they will hopefully be fixed in an update.

In todays software age of development, we are all beta testers. There's really no special privilege there. I'm not just referring to Sony when I make that comment, but when is the last time you bought a new software release on a product you use often and have not found some kind of bug? Right down to the Windows OS we are beta testers if you buy the product early enough. People are now just feeling like Windows XP is a solid OS and we're already onto dealing with the Windows Vista bugs and updates and half the hardware we already own doesn't even have drivers released for the 64bit version. Sound Forge just released it's 9.0e update and v9.0 has been out for how long now?

I don't quite get the desire. I just hope that some of you who are beta testers for Sony do a better job on Acid 7.0 than was done on Acid 6.0. I purchased Acid 6.0 when it was first released and I felt like I was a beta testing until the 6.0c update was released. I believe I found 6 bugs within the 1st day of using the 1st released version, so hopefully I won't have to be a paying beta tester when I try out v7.0 the next time around.

Subject:RE: Beta Test Request

Reply by: alltheseworlds

Date:3/26/2008 5:59:45 PM

I beta tested a video/multimedia product about a year ago. It's hard work. And with the huge number of features in many products you can feel like you're on working on a tiny slither of the software. I installed quite a few different versions and spotted a few bugs, but it was tough work. So I have a lot of sympathy for beta testers.

That said, AP6 does have some very annoying bugs. It does crash for me quite often - usually once each major session. I just make sure I keep constantly saving. I find it's very twitchy about any changes when a song is running. The scroll-bar crash is probably the best known of these. (I using AP6 for several hours every day at the moment due to a new project)

So I'm hoping AP7 will concentrate on robust performance rather than bells & whistles. I know that this request is not the sort of thing that excites marketing departments, but it is something which does get widely reported by users over time. You certainly couldn't say "AP7, now much less buggy!" in a PR release, but that would be the main message which will be transferred by word of mouth. And word-of-mouth is far more powerful than a PR release.

Not that I think AP6 is all that buggy, just annoyingly delicate, whereas AP3 was extremely tough and tight. I don't want to have to hesitate before doing something because of some background fear that the app will crash.

AcidPro has had a strange ride these past few years. AP3 was very robust but quite audio-specific; AP4 brought some good changes but wasn't really much of an advance; AP5 I thought was the "kiddie release" full of useless glam that gave professional users nothing they really needed. That's when I left for Sonar. AP6 rounded things out again (and I came back from Sonar!).

I'm very excited to see what AP7 may bring.

Subject:RE: Beta Test Request

Reply by: jumbuk

Date:3/26/2008 6:18:27 PM

"I didn't want to install 67 updates to XP in order to get Vegas 8 running for example."

What I don't understand is, how come you had to install the updates? Surely you update XP regularly anyway?

Subject:RE: Beta Test Request

Reply by: Cheye

Date:3/26/2008 6:35:01 PM

THE BOTTOM LINE IS THAT AP7 MUST BE STABLE AND I HOPE SONY WILL WORK HARD AT THIS NEW FEATURE IN AP7.

CHEYE

Subject:RE: Beta Test Request

Reply by: stuffedspacedog

Date:3/26/2008 10:56:06 PM

No, once I got XP stable with SP2 I disabled automatic updates, I didn't trust MS to make each update an improvement! However just having XP SP2 should have been enough for Vegas 8.

Subject:RE: Beta Test Request

Reply by: drbam

Date:3/27/2008 6:57:32 AM

"No, once I got XP stable with SP2 I disabled automatic updates, I didn't trust MS to make each update an improvement! However just having XP SP2 should have been enough for Vegas 8."

+1 on this. Once stable, leave it alone – unless you are online with your computer (which I am not). I went for 3 years with XP SP1 without a single update and it was one of the most stable systems I ever had. Eventually some software upgrades forced me to move to SP2 but I think the point is clear.

Subject:RE: Beta Test Request

Reply by: stuffedspacedog

Date:3/27/2008 8:30:16 AM

Agree, and during the 67 updates, a few things got killed and I had to manually re-install... network connectivity, my graphics card, and my mouse!

Subject:RE: Beta Test Request

Reply by: thenoizzbox

Date:3/27/2008 8:48:38 AM

I routinely apply updates as they come in both XP and Vista and I never had anything like that happen to me.

Subject:RE: Beta Test Request

Reply by: Weevil

Date:3/27/2008 2:31:11 PM

Saying you have a problem with .NET is like saying you have a problem whit oxygen. It’s everywhere.

If your PC is connected to the internet and you disable updates you are certifiably insane.