Over 500gigs, 24 bit samples, an instrument that seems to be as intuitive as we could hope for, automated articulation, light years ahead of the nearest competition, a company that takes giant leaps in a single bound, loads of free samples for users, and regular additions. In additiion to a pricing structure that has been fair, with generous discounts for users. And a sample library that you will be able to exploit almost to its entirety, with automation taken over most of the input work, giving us more time to write and earn more money? (If we're good enough).
And the likelyhood of the same generous additions in the future, no doubt with additional patches to come, more and more articulations.
On top of that you get a free symphonic organ as well!

The discount calculator isn't up yet, and many of you are already jumping to conclusions that may be wildly inaccurate, computationally wrong, and with no shadow of patience to wait and find out the facts.

I'm with DG on this one. Many of you have had much use and made money out of VSL, as i hope all of you will now and in the future. Would you get a new for new price in any product industry at any time? Seems premature and a case of wanting something for nothing to me.
Did Logic provide a free upgrade? Did Sibelius tell all those version 3 users they could have the next version for nothing?
I've seen any posts here commenting about the limitations of software, VST/AU, etc. Now you have a chance to get by most of that, and you want it for next to nothing?
Back to reality.

Alex.

I don't really care since I don't own anything but the Solo Strings. I can just imagine the heartburn many long time VSL users have. My friend was pretty miffed, and I understand, since there was basically no advantage to him giving VSL his money over the years. He's been a long time supporter and has every product but the Concert Guitar, and he doesn't get any benefit from it at all.

So, I'm just laying it out. They don't have to listen or care. Just know that not everyone is happy with the pricing structure, and I for one can understand since just about anyone can get a better deal on it than the long standing VSL users.

@Joseph Burrell said:

. there was basically no advantage to him giving VSL his money over the years. He's been a long time supporter and has every product but the Concert Guitar, and he doesn't get any benefit from it at all.

No consumer in the free market buys a product that has 'no advantage', except your friend who seems to have bought the collection.

He got exactly what he paid for on the day: the best product of its kind on the market.

Sorry to be so retaliatory Sir, and I understand, respect, and accept your POV as valid, but i'm finding all this criticism over the SC's prices unfair and a little hard to swallow.

As someone else said, "we'll have to agree to disagree."

I don't particularly care, I'm just seeing his side of the arguement. It just seemed to go against the policy of 'buy it now and you'll save in the end.'

@Joseph Burrell said:

As someone else said, "we'll have to agree to disagree."

On one hand, you're probably right [:)] .

on the other hand:

-cost of CSC to new user: e5,300
-cost of CSC to PE owner: e3,900

anyway, it's up to everyone how badly they want it! So for the sake of peace, i'll drop it.

I think First Edition should be un-discontinued and sold for 500 USD/EUR or so.

Some of us can afford 5000+ USD/EUR for VI? Good.

But if one can't, it makes no sense, to me, to negate him a "discontinued" orchestra. He will be out of the game anyway and VSL will take no profit from poorest musicians.

@Joseph Burrell said:

I don't really care since I don't own anything but the Solo Strings. I can just imagine the heartburn many long time VSL users have. My friend was pretty miffed, and I understand, since there was basically no advantage to him giving VSL his money over the years. He's been a long time supporter and has every product but the Concert Guitar, and he doesn't get any benefit from it at all.

So, I'm just laying it out. They don't have to listen or care. Just know that not everyone is happy with the pricing structure, and I for one can understand since just about anyone can get a better deal on it than the long standing VSL users.

For goodness sake, your friend does get an advantage; he get's the extended library for next to nothing. How much clearer can that be? [8-)]

DG

Only after dropping $13,000 dollars? That's free? When I can buy it for 11 grand? How's that a benefit to him? It isn't.

And anyway, you don't understand the point of the arguement at all.

The point is, he felt that by buying into VSL years ago and supporting them through all this time that he eventually would end up better off.

Adding up the cost of what he's paid in and what someone can come in off the street and pay, he ends up worse. That's his gripe and I understand it completely. It was said long ago that users buying in early would never pay more than new users. It appears that isn't true at all. Since new users can effectively buy the whole shooting match right now and save more than he can. I don't care about the extended library discount since when you add it all up, he still paid more in the end. That's the bottom line and that's the arguement.

I'm done with it.

@Joseph Burrell said:

And anyway, you don't understand the point of the arguement at all.

The point is, he felt that by buying into VSL years ago and supporting them through all this time that he eventually would end up better off.

Adding up the cost of what he's paid in and what someone can come in off the street and pay, he ends up worse. That's his gripe and I understand it completely. It was said long ago that users buying in early would never pay more than new users. It appears that isn't true at all. Since new users can effectively buy the whole shooting match right now and save more than he can. I don't care about the extended library discount since when you add it all up, he still paid more in the end. That's the bottom line and that's the arguement.

I'm done with it.

No, I'm afraid that you don't understand. Your friend still has the Pro Edition; you don't, even if you both buy the extended version. It's like still having the old car when you do the trade in for a new one. Having used the samples for years must have some financial implication. For example, I've been using Sibelius since 1993, so I'm bound to have paid more to the company than someone who has just bought Sibelius 4. So in effect I have paid well over £2000 for a product that is worth (to the new customer) £500.

However I will admit that if I was doing the pricing for VSL, I would have given existing customers a discount on the Standard content and less of a discount on the Extended content, but in the end it you buy it all it will probably make no difference.

DG

i own the pro edition and the epic horns.

i want the new VI. How much will it cost me for the upgrade?

that's all.

DG,

No, you have it wrong. This car metaphor is totally wrong when you think about it. The new car/software thing you refer to is flawed because:

This new package is supposed to replace the old one. Sure we can hold on to the old media. However, we don't pay for the media. We pay for the License to Use These Samples. Therefore, we shouldn't be charged twice for this license. PERIOD.

Sure the samples are at a new resolution. So what? We've already paid the licensing fees. So there is a new interface. So what? We've already paid for the license to use these sounds.

When I upgrade Logic I pay less than new buyers. When anyone upgrades anything they pay less than new buyers. PERIOD.

Clark

I am very much on clark's side. The samples by nature are a LICENSED product. If you pay to license a Britney Spears recording, you can use that segment of the song you license, or if it's the whole song, at any sample rate, sample format, bit rate or what not you choose. If we use her song in a movie we can play it back at 32 kbps audio for all they care, so long as it was properly licensed.

The issue that I agree with clark about is that we ALREADY licensed these samples. The fact that we have to pay the EXACT same price as others just opening the gate of VSL is, in all honesty, ridiculous. To expect that individuals who have already licensed the new material have to RE-LICENSE the EXACT SAME material is completely against the whole concept of licensing something. To expect past users to pay to acquire the 24 bit version of the samples along with some kind of other cost to integrate their old system with the new VI is in many ways a lot more reasonable to individuals who have been using the product for some time now.

With that said, it is a mere opinion on the situation. There are definitely greater forces that surround the project than your average junior member on the VSL forums, but I still do honestly hold Herb and every one of his team members in the highest respect, and simply reserve my right to hold my own opinion as far as what direction the project is now going.

-Tim

@DG said:

No, I'm afraid that you don't understand. Your friend still has the Pro Edition; you don't, even if you both buy the extended version. It's like still having the old car when you do the trade in for a new one. Having used the samples for years must have some financial implication. For example, I've been using Sibelius since 1993, so I'm bound to have paid more to the company than someone who has just bought Sibelius 4. So in effect I have paid well over £2000 for a product that is worth (to the new customer) £500.
DG

While I can see both sides of the argument well enough, the Sibelius example may not be the best illustration. If you paid, say £500 for Sibelius when you first bought it and £100 a year for an upgrade, that would be a lot different than paying over £500 for one single upgrade when you could save money by just buying a whole new license.

Likewise with the used car example, it doesn't make sense to trade in a car and see no net deduction for your trade if you are still paying the same or more for a new car as another person who did not have a vehicle to trade. Why bother trading when starting from scratch is cheaper?

Even if one sets aside thoughts of accumulated investments, loyal members really ought not pay *the same* as new customers for the single standard upgrade. Even Apple didn't force Logic users to pay $1000+ to upgrade to Pro 7. It was more than what Emagic used to charge, but it wasn't anywhere close to being the same as buying a new bundle outright.

It's clear, to me anyway, that SC is indeed largely a whole different ball of wax, but much about these price points and discounts is getting lost in translation. We really should wait until the Discount Calculator is up and running before drawing too many definite conclusions. There were similar issues with PE users when some of the Horizon series first appeared-- and that was resolved quite nicely, imho.

One thing of interest would be whether my PE would work with VI. I may in fact have all the samples I need for now, for PE is still serving me well. Having 24-bit is VERY nice but it may not be financially feasible for everyone without a project or enough projects to justify getting the whole SC right away. The early bird discounts are doing little to encourage me to make the leap immediately. I have no use, for example, for a pipe organ *right now*, but I'll need a great one "whenever the time comes"-- meaning: I can do with out the organ today.

But if PE were compatible with VI, I'd feel a lot better. I'd get VI first in a heartbeat right away if it were available as an Extension to PE as well as SC. Maybe this info is in the videos or the fine print on the VSL home page, but I've not had a chance to get through everything just yet. I'm dreaming, probably, and will have to live with Perf Tools at least until this whole SC-VIP matter gets sorted out.

Edit-- Well, I just sorted out that VI is an entirely different structure that will not read ESX24 format.

Now-- the word "convert" is suddenly very attractive...!! [[:|]]

@cm said:

this _is_ the truth, joseph
another example: if you have already the pro edition complete orchestral package and all related horizons (solo, chamber, harps, french oboe, woodwind ens, epic horns) you will only have to pay 320 EUR for the extended content additionally to the 3.900 EUR for the standard content. this results in an *overall upgrade price* of 4220 EUR to the complete symphonic cube
christian

That means for me, as a user of Chamber Strings. No upgrade patch to the standard edition? But a discount to the extended edition?
Hmm, I am just a hobby musician. No way to get just an upgrade to the standard edtition for a reasonalble fee? [[:|]]

tele

I'm afraid that I've thought about what I've said very hard. I agree that the car comparison is flawed; I was trying to put things in perspective about buying a new product, rather than an upgrade per se. However I've also calculated what I have spent (roughly) so far.
In the 2 years that I have used VSL (by the time than SC is released as far as announced plans go) I will have spent about £6000 give or take. A "new" user (who won't have the GS3 option and 16 bit samples) can have the same system as I do for about £200 less than this. So yes, they are paying less than my total amount spent, but I have had the use of ALL the VSL 16bit content for 2 years for a paltry £200. What a bargain [:)] I don't see that I've lost out at all and am certainly not envious of all those who now have the same as I do.
As I stated previously it might have been prudent to give a small discount on the Standard content, but nobody has to buy VI if they don't want to.

DG

@DG said:

However I will admit that if I was doing the pricing for VSL, I would have given existing customers a discount on the Standard content and less of a discount on the Extended content, but in the end it you buy it all it will probably make no difference.
DG

That is the missing part. NO possibility to upgrade to the standard edition. Many, many users are not top notch movie score writers and don't want or need the extended edition. Like me.

No upgrade path from VSL Chamber Strings to the Chamber Strings Stanard edition will result in me not purchasing anything at all.
There needs to be an upgrade patch to the standard edition. Hopefully VSL will reflect the topic.

Imagine Steinberg were to release Cubase SX and SL 4.0 today, but no upgrade patch from SL 3.0 to SL 4.0 for $150. Only upgrades from SL 3.0 to SX 4.0 for SL users or buy a complete new SL 4.0? That would be kind of strange.
Well it is not exactly the same thing, because one could say the original Chamber Strings were the SX version and I'm asking for an upgrade price from SX3 to SL4.

Bottom line is: If you want to take advantage of the new engine, you gotta pay the full price. From there you can upgrade to more samples for little money. Greast for those who want the extended version, bad for those who anly need the Standrard Edition.

tele

@DG said:

As I stated previously it might have been prudent to give a small discount on the Standard content, but nobody has to buy VI if they don't want to.

One could stop eating and save even more...

[:D]

@Another User said:

That means for me, as a user of Chamber Strings. No upgrade patch to the standard edition? But a discount to the extended edition?
Hmm, I am just a hobby musician. No way to get just an upgrade to the standard edtition for a reasonalble fee?

Discount is dedicated to the Extended version.
I've tried to explain the deskcion for splitting into Standard and Extended content here.
http://community.vsl.co.at/viewtopic.php?t=6774&start=0

However, evem if it would be possible to resell the products with different prices at our dealers (which is unfortenately not possible), a theoretically discount would be very low.

The calculation of the Standard price includes the margins, for distributors and resellers, the productions costs (DVD mastering, replication, packaging, manula printing), the developement of the software, the new sample content, the 24 Bit samples, and so on.
So a possible discount for the Standard library of the Chambers could be 10%.
Maybe possible for Chamber Strings collection, because here you only have one upgrade product. But absolutely not possible for the woodwinds for example, where the VIP price depends if you have Opus 1, Opus2, Opus 1/2 bundle, First Ed Woodwinds, First Ed Perf Set, First Ed COP, Pro Ed Woodwinds, Pro Ed Perf Set, Pro Ed COP, Hor .French Oboe, Hor. Woodwind ensemble, and all possible combinations.
So far up to 30 variants which would have a variable discount from 5 to 15%.

Also I'd like to add, that no owner of the Chamber Strings would work with the Standard collection. The standard collections do have new stuff, for example the fast legato performances, and of course some existing stuff.
But you would miss a lot of samples you already have on your Chamber Strings Horizon product. So you would be forced to use the Horizon Chamber Strings paralell with the Vienna Instrument Chamber Strings.

I don't have the exact figures here, but the Standard content includes 25% to 30% of all samples, and the extended content 70 to 75%.

best
Herb
[/quote]

@herb said:

Also I'd like to add, that no owner of the Chamber Strings would work with the Standard collection. The standard collections do have new stuff, for example the fast legato performances, and of course some existing stuff. But you would miss a lot of samples you already have on your Chamber Strings Horizon product. So you would be forced to use the Horizon Chamber Strings paralell with the Vienna Instrument Chamber Strings. I don't have the exact figures here, but the Standard content includes 25% to 30% of all samples, and the extended content 70 to 75%.

Pardon me, but I'm not sure I've undesrtood.

VI Chamber Strings include more new samples in Standard Edition than in Extended one?