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Author Topic: Outrageous Upgrade  (Read 20072 times)

Manoli

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Outrageous Upgrade
« on: March 10, 2015, 03:56:29 am »

Nice article, Michael.
The only problem is that, as the saying goes, "you've jumped from the frying pan into the fire" !

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michael

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Re: Outrageous Upgrade
« Reply #1 on: March 10, 2015, 06:54:42 am »

Well, if that's the case then I'll have fuel for another rant.

M
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Rory

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Re: Outrageous Upgrade
« Reply #2 on: March 10, 2015, 09:13:20 pm »

I love the rants and the way you and Kevin are not pulling any punches.  Good luck with the SpyderStudio.
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digitaldog

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Re: Outrageous Upgrade
« Reply #3 on: March 10, 2015, 09:41:31 pm »

I don't understand reason for the upgrade, why?

And indeed, good luck with SpyderStudio....
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Wayne Fox

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Re: Outrageous Upgrade
« Reply #4 on: March 10, 2015, 11:10:41 pm »

I thought i1Profiler recognized the i1Pro as a dongle if it was licensed to make profiles.  I thought I had one that works this way, although it's been a while, been  using the iSis for some time.
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digitaldog

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Re: Outrageous Upgrade
« Reply #5 on: March 11, 2015, 12:09:36 pm »

I thought i1Profiler recognized the i1Pro as a dongle if it was licensed to make profiles.  I thought I had one that works this way, although it's been a while, been  using the iSis for some time.
It will IF you've paid for an upgrade and the device has been programed as such. I believe this is the case and I'm waiting on Michael to clarify exactly the bkgnd of this issue. I suspect this is what happened: he was using ProfileMaker of which the i1 hardware was programed to use as a dongle. That software will not run on Mac OS past 10.6. So you have the option of not upgrading the OS or paying through the nose (I fully agree with him), hundreds of dollars for i1Profiler. It's not worth that price! No way, not based on a lot of lost functionality we had with the older product (ProfileMaker Pro), the stupid bkgnd processing going on (XRD) and too many bugs. I1P does make a better profile, the color engine is superior to PMP and MonacoPROFILER. The target generation is better and post optimization is sometimes useful. IF I were running X-rite, the upgrade would be maybe $150. It's worth that amount for a product with the above better functionality and able to run on a modern OS (within reason  ::)).

But, I think Michael goes way overboard stating his expensive device is now plastic junk. It will (should) still run with the older software and this hardware is supported by a good deal of 3rd party products. For a fraction of the upgrade price, probably even less than the money he spent on new and inferior hardware, he could do as I did and buy an old MacBook on eBay that would run 10.6 and be back in business.

X-rite makes great hardware and they have provided plenty of evidence over the last 4-5 years they don't have a clue about writing software let alone pricing upgrades. Michael's correct to be pissed at this ridiculous price! Don't give them the money but don't throw the baby (Spectrophotometer) out with the bath water.

His article is necessary if anything to light a fire under X-rite to behave as they did before the messy merger with GMB, provide reasonable upgrade pricing and produce software that isn't largely a joke in terms of features gone missing rather than being improved.
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AlterEgo

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Re: Outrageous Upgrade
« Reply #6 on: March 11, 2015, 12:31:56 pm »

to proper "light the fire" it shall be published how to use their hardware with a 3rd party or rather totally free software alternatives... a well published guide shall make at least somewhat harm to x-rite bottom line in their upgrades department and they do deserve to incur as much money loss as possible... that is the only language any business ultimately understands
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Chuck at work

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Re: Outrageous Upgrade
« Reply #7 on: March 16, 2015, 08:36:09 am »

I certainly agree that the price, if you have in vested in hardware, is above what it should be.
My experience with XRite/Monaco has been that they may write software that has excellent output,
_but_ due to their miserable tech writing (on a guess translated from German/Swiss to Japanese to English??) getting to that result is a painful chore.
And at least some of their hardware is maybe problematic? as I recall the Gen 1 sensors had less than stellar reviews.
My experiance reaches back to when we were a wet lab and used densitometers - the first XRite instruments we got, for all the hype they recieved, were amazingly imprecise.
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martinplant

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Re: Outrageous Upgrade
« Reply #8 on: March 16, 2015, 09:10:26 am »

I'd be happy to pay a modest fee to get my bundled i1Match software working on my current O/S but not the crazy fee they are asking.
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digitaldog

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Re: Outrageous Upgrade
« Reply #9 on: March 16, 2015, 10:52:21 am »

I'd be happy to pay a modest fee to get my bundled i1Match software working on my current O/S but not the crazy fee they are asking.
Well that's not going to happen. That's a dead product. You can upgrade which IMHO isn't worth it, or just use an older machine/OS and use that older product. X-rite can't even get their flagship product (that they believe you should spend too much money to upgrade) updated as it should be so forget i1Match. Best we can do is either embarrass them on a ridiculous upgrade fee and/or for the lack of functionality they've provided in the newer so called flagship expensive product we lost when then abandoned their last expensive flagship software product. There is other competition to examine namely ColorLogic who have some good former X-rite/GMB folks there. Copra makes a very good profile, ColorAnt is MeasureTool on steroids, just too bad the prices are rather expensive. Maybe THEY would offer a side-grade from X-rite customers! Now we'd be getting somewhere.
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rmyers

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Re: Outrageous Upgrade
« Reply #10 on: March 16, 2015, 10:28:58 pm »

Andrew, or anyone else with knowledge of Copra, If I wanted to start making my own profiles from my Epson 3880 and R1900, would Copra be a good way to start, or would I be better off with a complete system that included hardware?

I have not made profiles as of yet and have no gear for it.
« Last Edit: March 16, 2015, 10:53:32 pm by rmyers »
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Robert-Peter Westphal

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Re: Outrageous Upgrade
« Reply #11 on: May 11, 2015, 12:07:04 pm »

Hello Michael,

do you have some experiences with your new Spyder Studio ompared to your former XRite solution ? How does it perform creating profiles for printer ? Have you also used it to create profiles for the new Espon SC series printer, of which you as far as I remember had one for testing purposes.

BR Robert
« Last Edit: May 11, 2015, 12:57:09 pm by Robert-Peter Westphal »
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digitaldog

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Re: Outrageous Upgrade
« Reply #12 on: May 11, 2015, 12:40:24 pm »

Copra makes a very good RGB output profiles. Their new update to ColorAnt makes targets and supports a number of instruments.
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MHMG

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Re: Outrageous Upgrade
« Reply #13 on: May 18, 2015, 05:24:36 pm »

Michael,

The SpyderStudio kit's "spectrocolorimeter" hardware and software is indeed capable of making good ICC profiles. For the kit's pricepoint, I think it's a good value, but the devil is in some of the details. For example, forget about the primitive "scan mode" feature. It's a joke that does very little if anything to speed up data collection.  Use the device in patch reading mode, and you will get far fewer measurement errors (and these errors can and should be verified, isolated, and corrected before generating the proflles, all of which can be taken care of in a couple of extra steps DataColor doesn't tell its users about).

Contact me if you'd like to learn more about the SpyderPrint pro hardware/software idiosyncrasies which need to be overcome by the enduser in order to get the best results. Hopefully, what I learned through the school of hard knocks with the Spyerprint Pro device will spare you from yet another rant.. ;)

best,
Mark
http://www.aardenburg-imaging.com
« Last Edit: May 18, 2015, 05:28:56 pm by MHMG »
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Ghibby

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Re: Outrageous Upgrade
« Reply #14 on: May 21, 2015, 08:45:56 am »

The price of the upgrade demanded by X-Rite is truly outrageous. Unfortunately the colour calibration market for print and screen is not exactly one that is over flowing with choice.  I have used print profiles generated by the Spyder 4 studio kit at work and they seem good but I have not tested them on enough papers to be totally confident of their consistency. I have recently moved from Spyder 4 to Eye1 pro for my monitor calibration though and there is a considerable improvement in colour accuracy, especially in the shadow areas where the Spyder 4 profiles simply did not look good. The shadows look very blocky and unrefined in comparison the i1 pro. Be interesting to see what Michael's experiences are.
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