Project5 update

[Igor 4000]

Does anyone know what the new features and improvements are? I don't see any news on the Cakewalk site.

[whyterabbyt]

ANybody that knows will be under NDA until cakewalk say otherwise. Wait for CW to say themselves.

[torhan]

Nope. Too early, I guess, considering they say it'll be ready Q1-07.

[Igor 4000]

Thank you, fellas.

[original flipper]

HI

It is interesting though, that they say they will be developing P5 on a more regular or concerted basis: perhaps they (finaly) realise they have a potential winner on their hads?

Flipper.

[sgx]

Yeah hopefully P5 will be paid more attention to by the Cake developers. It's great software and a great company, just missing some features and functions that could make it amazing. Though apparently the price is $199 now...that's pretty awesome, especially considering the 2.5 upgrade will be free and you can then upgrade to Dimension Pro for $99.

[EnzymeX]

HI

It is interesting though, that they say they will be developing P5 on a more regular or concerted basis: perhaps they (finaly) realise they have a potential winner on their hads?

Flipper.

Perhaps. Or maybe the buzz from Devs that are quicker to respond to the online community (like Justin at Cockos) has them worried about their reputation as big, corporate, and slow.

IMO, P5 does have the potential to trump the competition, but Cakewalk needs to get over the fear of making it "too good" and thereby impacting Sonar sales.

[mumpcake]

HI

It is interesting though, that they say they will be developing P5 on a more regular or concerted basis: perhaps they (finaly) realise they have a potential winner on their hads?

Flipper.

Perhaps. Or maybe the buzz from Devs that are quicker to respond to the online community (like Justin at Cockos) has them worried about their reputation as big, corporate, and slow.

IMO, P5 does have the potential to trump the competition, but Cakewalk needs to get over the fear of making it "too good" and thereby impacting Sonar sales.

I'm not sure about them fearing P5 will impact Sonar sales. I think a lot of the issues were resources and the perception that P5 was a side project or was going away.

[EnzymeX]

HI

It is interesting though, that they say they will be developing P5 on a more regular or concerted basis: perhaps they (finaly) realise they have a potential winner on their hads?

Flipper.

Perhaps. Or maybe the buzz from Devs that are quicker to respond to the online community (like Justin at Cockos) has them worried about their reputation as big, corporate, and slow.

IMO, P5 does have the potential to trump the competition, but Cakewalk needs to get over the fear of making it "too good" and thereby impacting Sonar sales.

I'm not sure about them fearing P5 will impact Sonar sales. I think a lot of the issues were resources and the perception that P5 was a side project or was going away.

I'm not sure either, but the obviously crippled audio in P5 was way out of step with market trends at the time of P5v2 introduction. I don't think it is that far fetched to conclude that Cakewalk wanted to cross sell Sonar, and chose to leave control surface support and multitrack audio in their flagship product only as a marketing strategy.

Whatever their rationale was, one thing is clear: It cost them some momentum in the marketplace. But, if Cakewalk is willing to redeem themselves with the community by repositioning P5 as a full featured audio/midi workstation, that could be a real win-win.

[wrench45us]

Cakewalk's marketing strategy and basic plan for P5 has been a source of endless speculation on the P5 forum almost since day one, or at least v1.0.

We've been told that as much as P5 users concern themselves with the 'holding back' of features to support the flagship Sonar project, that that has never been a concern at Cakewalk.[Hence the endless speculation since that doesn't fit with appearance/perception.]
Well then it comes down to a matter of resources and focus and there it is more clear that Sonar as a flagship project has consumed the majority of development resources. Just look at the number of features added and the release schedules between the two. But to make things even more interesting you have to include the Kinetic product and Home Studio etc..

Then look at how much Rene/rgc:audio has released as a so-called one man responsive developer since joining Cakewalk. This may have actually pulled some resources, but well worth it for short and long term benefits.
My big wishlist is for Cakewalk to enlist more independent developers like Rene in loose affiliations that preserve the responsiveness and creativity. So they could be big and light at the same time.
And when you look around there's hardly any entity as big as Cakewalk that maintains as close contact and response with their users. So a committment to ongoing and timely P5 development may get really lively. We just have to wait for Q1 2007 for that to start.

[aMUSEd]

They did a big survey of Project 5 users a few months back asking for opinions on features so I suspect and hope they have made good use of that. Personally I hope they will implement more than one audio in/out at once amongst other things.

[EnzymeX]

My big wishlist is for Cakewalk to enlist more independent developers like Rene in loose affiliations that preserve the responsiveness and creativity. So they could be big and light at the same time.

Agreed. Also, Cakewalk should be commended for hosting one of the most useful and friendly forums, and for keeping restrictive copy protection out of their products. I own Sonar 4, P5v2, Dimension Pro and other RGC synths from the pre merger days, and the value for money is great.

As much as I push Cakewalk hard on the forums to keep pace, I still have a lot of respect for the company.

[mumpcake]

Well then it comes down to a matter of resources and focus and there it is more clear that Sonar as a flagship project has consumed the majority of development resources. Just look at the number of features added and the release schedules between the two. But to make things even more interesting you have to include the Kinetic product and Home Studio etc..

Since HS2002, the Home Studio line has been a cut down version of Sonar. I don't think a lot of resources went into that line that hadn't already gone into the another version of Sonar. Kinetic is also heavily indebted to P5, although not as much. In either case, these lines do function to lure customers into picking up their big brothers.

Then look at how much Rene/rgc:audio has released as a so-called one man responsive developer since joining Cakewalk. This may have actually pulled some resources, but well worth it for short and long term benefits.

From looking at the credits of Dimension Pro 1.2, I see 17 names listed. Cakewalk is supposed to have around 70 employees, so that is definitely pulling resources.[/quote]

[der_gary]

My big wishlist is for Cakewalk to enlist more independent developers like Rene in loose affiliations that preserve the responsiveness and creativity. So they could be big and light at the same time.

Agreed. Also, Cakewalk should be commended for hosting one of the most useful and friendly forums, and for keeping restrictive copy protection out of their products. I own Sonar 4, P5v2, Dimension Pro and other RGC synths from the pre merger days, and the value for money is great.

As much as I push Cakewalk hard on the forums to keep pace, I still have a lot of respect for the company.

... Indeed. Cakewalk is nobodies fool, and they are not likely to lag 'behind' long, on anything. It's difficult at times, for many of the "instant gratification" generation, to grasp what "overhead", strategy, and priorities (and market pressure) can mean in hard terms, but it isn't going to matter once the product hits the shelves... It's all moot - then. The machine rolls...or it ceases. They (cake) DO 'listen' and approach the demands/requests of their "family" very seriously.

P5v.3 should be quite interesting.

best.