First, allow me to appologise if you think this is the wrong place to bring up an issue with  e-on. If you already have Vue7 infinite or if you have or intend to get complete and think you will never want infinite, please ignore this thread.  But if you have the slightest interest in a possible v7comp->v7inf upgrade please read on and add your comment.
I have been trying for weeks to get a descent answer from e-on why such a path doesnt exist with no success. (The best(ha ha...) offer they had was 'returning' complete with the lose of the upgrade privileges, which means getting inf then would cost $500. )
The answers to my question why is there no upgrade path wereto repeat  that there is no path but not why. The latest one-liner is 'We have decided to split our product line, due to the results of our market analysis'
I find this very unsatisfactory and wondered if others feel similarly. I would direct you to my ticket but apparantly e-on thinks tickets are of no interest to the rest of the comunity and dont always allow public accsess. So here is my latest post. If you agree with any of it post here and I'll copy/paste your comments to my ticket. Perhaps public pressure could help?

Selina,
Well, I understand very well by now that you dont want to answer my question. Either that or you are assuming I'm a retarded/ignorant person. My inteligence is at least average and my education is higher than average, so stop feeding me meaningless one-liners.
My question isnt why you if or why you introduced two lines of products. The specific questions are
-Why isnt there a way to move from the top of the artists line to the pro line. It isnt a weird or novel suggestion, you yourself use this philosophy in the rest of your products. Did your market research include this point?
Did it show that there is no demand to such option -I know that isnt true from posts in vue forums.
Did your market research show you will lose money by enabling such a transfer? -that cant be true because customers will have to pay an additional amount for the upgrade, they dont expect it for free.
Did your market research show that customers will be intimidated into buying infinite directly? - not in the current economy. More likely that they wont get any version.
Did your market research show that if someone changes their mind about upgrading to complete they should lose their upgrade priviledges? if they 'returned' complete they have NOT upgraded, they should be able to upgrade to something else. It isnt like you need to restock anything or put the electrons back on the shelves, is it?
Did your market research show that the best way to treat a customer who has a valid query is to ignore them? What a shame. In my experience companies that use 'The customer is always right' philosophy gain more respect and more business.

I've asked before and I'll ask again - if you dont know or dont have the authority to answer, forward the question to your superiors. I'll be happy with an informative and respectful answer here, by e-mail, on a forum, in a newsletter, by phone or any way you cant think of.

Thanks

Please add your comment  and thanks for your time

So how much is complete, and what do you think a "fair" upgrade price on it to V7I would be?

Attached Link: Full Price List

So you need to pay $300 more to upgrade to inf rather than comp. I would expect them to want a bit more if you dont go directly to infinite, as is their policy for other upgrades. So if I paid $99 for complete and then I want to change to infinite I would say anywhere between $300-350 would be fair.
But definitely not more then $395 which would have been the upgrade price if I didnt already pay them some for complete.
As I said their idea of 'fair' at the moment is to pay an  $400 IN ADDITIOn to the $99 I already paid.

But by your post above, isn't Infinite already almost $300 more then complete? I'm not clear on what you actually bought, what you upgraded to, and what you want to upgrade to?

From your last post, it looks like you paid only $99, and want to only pay $395 for v7I, when it's retail is $900, and that looks unreasonable to me, unless I'm reading it wrong.

I shouldnt have given the full price, it's irrelevant.
I have v6inf, If I upgrade to v7complete it costs $99. If I upgrade to v7inf it costs $395.
What I'm saying is if I upgrade first to complete and then decide I want infinite instead of complete, I expect to add the difference (approx $300) and a bit more(maybe $50) because I didnt get it directly. In total I would pay $450 to upgrade from 6inf to 7inf. It is an upgrade so I shouldnt pay the full price of $900.
(It is analogous to upgrading  the lower versions of the artist line. You can get from esprit to complete by buying the modules, it is more expensive than buying complete directly, but not as expensive as paying for esprit and then paying full price for complete).

It is definitely a bad idea not to offer an upgrade path from Complete to Infinite. I for one have not bought ANY upgrade till now because of this, as I do not want to be stuck with a product that is not sufficient for my needs.

But e-on has already given in over a couple of other things recently, notably the decision not to include multiple undos in thr 32-bit version of Complete, so I hold out hope that an upgrade path from Complete to Infinite might appear if demand is sufficient.

Maybe the trial version of Complete will help settle things.

I would think if you did it in a reasonable period of time, day 30 days or so. But after a few months, or a year that wouldn't make much sense for eon, since people might be playing "sale" games trying to take advantage of them in that fashion.

And I do believe the retail price IS relevant. the bottom line to both the consumer and to Eon is how much you are paying for the product.

For instance, if you payed say, $100 for something and then paid $300 more to upgrade to a $900 application, people who purchased it at full price wouldn't be treated fairly.

Many customers (and I'm not pointing fingers at all) play sales tactic games all the time trying to save a few dollers, or scam a deal whenever they get the oppertunity.

I think in Eon's case, it's more them moving up to the prosumer users, and not wanting to deal with regualr consumers anymore, since they typically have far more service issues, and eon makes far less money on them. Other companies have done the same thing, and we're seeing a general shift "upward" in price on all 3d applications, and many companies find that while they sell bigger numbers with lower priced product, they also have a TON more support for that same reason.

Look just a few years back.. most 3d applications were $1000 or less. Today many have moved up MUCH higher in price.

BUT also look back about 10 years or so ago.. you couldn't touch professional 3d applications for less then $1500.. I remembe rlightwacve costing almost $2000 a t   one point.. yet the dollar;s value has also decreased over the years as well.

Basiacally, many pro companies tested the consumer waters, found they couldn't make enough to cover very high developement costs, and much higher support costs, so they are moving back up into the more profitable professional markets, little by little.

While this doesn't have much bearing on upgrade costs, it does possibly indicate a lessened desire to work with the lower end consumer markets.

 I side-graded from 6 Infinite to 7 Complete and am so far very happy with the product. I took this path for the simple reason that I can't currently afford the upgrade from 6 Inf to 7 Inf. However, had I known that I would become locked out of a furure upgrade to 7 Infinite then I would most certainly not have made any purchase at all. I can't say I am happy with the situation because I wanted to upgrade from Complete to Infinite as funds became available but that now seems to be impossible. I started out with 5 esprit, then 6 esprit, added the modules one by one until I eventually had 6 Pro studio and then made the jump from there to 6 Infinite. The release of Vue 7 caught me a bit by surprise and very low on funds, so I decided to take take the cheaper option and use Complete for a while as I saved up for the upgrade to Infinite. Big mistake apparently.

Quote -

For instance, if you payed say, $100 for something and then paid $300 more to upgrade to a $900 application, people who purchased it at full price wouldn't be treated fairly.

The $100 price for Complete is the Vue 6 Infinite upgrade price, so it's $400 + what you have paid for Vue up to that point.

In E-on's defence, they DID put up a comparison list between Complete and Infinite, so you would have known before buying what features you may have had in 6Inf and lost by 'downgrading' to Complete.

I think also you have always only been allowed to upgrade to one version of the program. I looked over both complete and infinite carefully, before deciding on infinite.

Me too.
My bank balance told me to buy complete but I knew I'd miss too many features if I went with it.

I do think this time around though that the upgrade price for Infinite was very steep
:b_upset:

I dunno.. when I look at how much everything else costs, it seems like its gone up pretty much the same.

My electric bills are about 50% higher then they were a year ago, and I'm sure Eon's are as well. I'm just glad the prices on everything else haven't caught up yet.

I'm so glad we took the protected fuel prices.  Funny enough, our gas and electricity is supplied by Eon !!

BUT I'm going wildly off topic now so I'll shut me gob

Before you do, what are protected fuel prices?

Something else I thought of.. it could be that eon can't cancel a complete upgrade, which would mean it could be resold if someone upgraded to infinite from it in the same version.

Thier licenses are on the dodgy side.

Most fuel companies do a deal where you sign up and your prices are frozen for x years.  I think my deal was 4 years.  They're static till 2010.  Which means I'm paying now what I was paying around 3 years ago.

I think I had to pay a one off fee or something like that.  Long time ago...brain getting on in years....

You take the gamble because if prices go down, you still pay the higher rate. At the time prices were pretty stable but as they've gone up so much we were lucky.

As for the licencing thing.....I've never read up on reselling old versions. Something I wouldn't think of doing.
 

Ok,  I'll try again and clarify what exactly is the issue I have a problem with.
Perhaps I'll first say what I  am not arguing about.

• E-on can decide on whatever pricing scheme they like. Perhaps they will make a killing, perhaps they will price themselves out of the market. Their business.
• E-on does not have to lower the prices to fit the customers pockets if it means they will not be able to make a descent profit. They are not a charity, they are in it to make money. Not only is it their right and duty to their investors, owners, workers - it is their duty to their customers. If they go bust there will be no programs for us to use.
• E-on can chose to cater to whichever customer base they chose. If they only want to cater to professional studios, not to ordinary artists or small studios, that's up to them. But They havnt decided that (yet?). They are promoting the artist line. They are making a big fuss about 'pioneer' and the ability to start with a free application and upgrade it whenever the customer sees fit. So, it is their phylosophy - you can start with a cheap program with few tools and upgrade to a more powerfull version whenever you want/can (not only within 30 days).
  I agree that this is a wise policy the flexibility is good for  the customer, allowing him to adapt his tools to his ability, and good for the company because it enlarges their customer base well beyond those who would have gone for the fully blown version directly. (Gateway drug so to speak)

My point is why stop this policy when you get to complete and not enable upgrade to infinite?

• E-on  will not lose any money, they will get extra money. In fact they will get more than they got from customers who purchased inf directly
• Customers who bought infinite directly will not (contrary to Gareee's claim) lose anything comparatively.
  Let me spell it out with an example:
  John and Jane have V6inf. John paid $395 and got v7inf. Jane  made an informed decision(examining the comparison list)  to upgrade to v7complete and payed $99. After a while -whatever length of time- Jane's circumstances changed. She  upgraded to v7infinite and paid an extra $350, They both now have only V7infinite. John paid in total $395. Jane paid in total $449.
  How was John adversely affected? why is it unfair to him? he still paid less than her.
  How was e-on adversly affected? they made more money from Jane's purchase than from John's purchase. No doubt it covers the 'restocking' cost?
  On the other hand if the transition is not possible, either they would have only made $99 from Jane, or maybe no money at all if she thought that upgrading to complete is a dead end and didnt buy at all?

So how is a v7comp-> v7Inf not a win/win path?

PS  Curious that vendors percieve customers as thieves and crooks first and formost- I havnt encountered this attitude since I left England:) Gareee, you can point as many fingers (and toes) as you like, but I dont see how on earth the scenario I suggested for the complete->infinite change can be seen as taking advantage of e-on. I would still pay more than if I went for 7inf directly, e-on would make more money. What kind of useless crook am I than?

PPS Thanks Richard, Rids and some others who PM'ed me for your contribution!

"PS  Curious that vendors percieve customers as thieves and crooks first and formost"

I never said that at all.. thieves would simple go the warez route, and not even bother registering with eon.

But time and again, we DO see people in the forums here trying to resell products they are not allowed to resell, per their Eula.

Money is tight everywhere, everyone is on edge, and many people will do whatever they can to save a buck or two, legitimately or not.

But my point you missed, is that when you upgrade from 6xxx to 7xxx, you've done your upgrade. Eon considers your 6.xxx license no longer valid, which is in the paperwork that comes with Vue. So once you've upgraded to 7.xxx whatever, that's the one you chose, period.

Personally, I do agree with you.. there's no good reason I can think of not to allow a sidegrade from 7.xxx to 7.xxx, BUT if eon can't cancel an activated 7.xxx license, then it WOULD make sense.. then a customer would have both a valid complete and a valid infinite license, which they do not permit.

If it were me, I wouldn't have emailed them, I'd have called them on the phone. I did when I had issues activating and installing V7I.. the wait was minimal, and not only did they actually call me back twice to make sure I had what I needed within 48 hours, they also followed up via email to make sure that my install went through properly.

Its pretty easy to ignore an email, but much tougher to ignore someone you are speaking to on the phone.
 
At any rate, I DO wish you luck getting a sidegrade.

The people at e-on are nuts for all these crippled versions of vue.  What waste of time.

I think the entire price of this upgrade is wrong.

But let's face it...  Vue has really reached it's limits and it's time is short.    But the render times are terribly long...

I hope some new software comes along and takes its place soon.

Quote - But my point you missed, is that when you upgrade from 6xxx to 7xxx, you've done your upgrade. Eon considers your 6.xxx license no longer valid, which is in the paperwork that comes with Vue. So once you've upgraded to 7.xxx whatever, that's the one you chose, period.

Personally, I do agree with you.. there's no good reason I can think of not to allow a sidegrade from 7.xxx to 7.xxx, BUT if eon can't cancel an activated 7.xxx license, then it WOULD make sense.. then a customer would have both a valid complete and a valid infinite license, which they do not permit.

I know that once I sidegraded from 6 Inf to Complete my upgrade has been used up. If it wasn't I wouldn't have a problem, I could just upgrade again from 6 Inf to 7 Inf as my funds allowed. What this whole thread is about is e-on's decision to penalise those who took the sidegrade option and remove any further upgrade options. I have still paid e-on more money than anyone who just bought 6 Infinite outright (cost of 5 esprit, uprade 5 esprit to 6, cost of all modules, upgrade from PS to Infinite plus sidegrade to 7 Complete) so why should I be treated as less of a customer than someone who just wants to upgrade from 6 Inf to 7 Inf?

I don't see why there should be any technical reasons why people using the "Artist" products should not be able to upgrade to the "Professional" series, its just moving data around in a database and that really is not that hard. Personally I think they are purposely trying to create a two tier system so they can charge outlandish prices for Inf and Xstream in the future. With that in mind, I might just have taken the best route for me already by purchasing Complete, otherwise I may have ended up locked into an upgrade system that simply becomes unaffordable for the hobbyist. Time will tell but either way, they obviously don't want any more of my money.

Quote - - E-on can chose to cater to whichever customer base they chose. If they only want to cater to professional studios, not to ordinary artists or small studios, that's up to them. But They havnt decided that (yet?).

To an extent I think they have made that decision, and that's the real reason for the absent upgrade path (and why you aren't getting a straight answer). It seems to me that eon would really like to associate their product with major pro studios - as high end apps such as Max, Maya, etc. are. Their link with ILM was obviously very successful for them. The problem they have is that before the link with ILM, Vue was seen as a hobbyist app. This puts it in the same camp as, say, Poser - not highly regarded by pro studios (and the ability to import Poser scenes probably didn't help, reinforcing that hobbyist feel).

To get away from that hobbyist label, the obvious approach is to have one line for the pros and one for everyone else. Sure, they'll sell anyone the top-of-the-range version if you have the money. But it may be that they've taken a decision that v7complete is for hobbyists and v7infinite is for pros, and to allow upgrades from one to the other is blurring that distinction.

I'm not sure I agree with the thinking behind that, and I do feel that you should be able to upgrade in the way you want, but eon's long term plans are not known to us, and this may be the way they've decided to go. If so, look for even higher upgrade prices for v7i to v8i (and will there be a path for v7 complete to v8i?) and maybe the dropping of features unwanted by the pros, particularly Poser support, which must be quite an additional development burden anyway.

First, I would like to dissociate myself and my  opinions from Vue/e-on bashers like Cobraeye.
If I thought Vue was a horrible product and e-on people are monsters I just wouldnt buy the  product  and wouldnt come to this forum. Nobody is forcing anyone to buy vue. It is because I love vue 6, (and even vue 7complete  which is still riddled with bugs) that I'm trying to sort out issues I think are wrong.
I have been treated courteousely by the e-on staff both in tickets and by phone. Bug reports are answered quickly and most of those I reported were fixed quickly ( although they didnt make it to the latest update). However, with respect to the complete->infinite subject I get no real response. Politeness should not be confused with helpfulness...
Gareee:
"Personally, I do agree with you.. there's no good reason I can think of not to allow a sidegrade from 7.xxx to 7.xxx, BUT if eon can't cancel an activated 7.xxx license, then it WOULD make sense.. then a customer would have both a valid complete and a valid infinite license, which they do not permit."
I'm glad that once you understood my point you agree with me about the principle. Excellent. The technical issue of a license is not relevant. They dont claim its an issue and in fact they agreed that I could 'return'  V7c even after a month and get a (too-small) discount on getting V7i.   So they are not bothered by me having first a liscence for complete and than for infinite. Even if there was a problem, they are capable of solving it. They managed it with Esprit->complete upgrades they could manage it with Complete->inf upgrades. You give their abilities too little credit.
Rids:
"Personally I think they are purposely trying to create a two tier system so they can charge outlandish prices for Inf and Xstream in the future"
Spedler:
"To get away from that hobbyist label, the obvious approach is to have one line for the pros and one for everyone else....and to allow upgrades from one to the other is blurring that distinction."

I dont see anything wrong with having distinct artist &pro lines, it just should be possible to move from one to the other.
E-on may well have a hidden agenda they would prefer not to talk about, but users/potential users
dont have to assist them in keeping it secret. That is  why I am not letting the issue drop, and why I started this thread. I'm putting to them a clear question and I want a clear answer -  I think I and other users deserve one. I'll do all I can to get one.
 It is a matter of principle.
In fact, I do not  want at the moment to upgrade  from complete to infinite. But I would like to have the option to do so in the future if circumstances change.

Thinking way back, I first bought 4 D'Esprit and sidegraded to Pro.

Then with 5 - I upgraded from 4 Pro to 5 Esprit, then sidegraded to 5 Infinite and kept with Inf ever since.

I think I ended up paying more than I would have done had I gone straight from 4Pro to 5 Inf

What i can see, when i look at the Vue price list, is one simple error from e-on's side ...

E-onsoftware should've never allowed an upgrade from Vue 6 Infinite to the Vue 7 Complete version at all !! Well (my opinion) for an owner of an "Infinite" version it just doesn't make sense anymore to upgrade or sidegrade from the "pro" version to any lower ranked version anymore, even it's being a product with the version 7  !?

For me as an owner of Vue 6 Infinite and being used to it's options and possibilities, even being trained to use those functions in my graphics, it never ever came to my mind, to go any lower again - it was just a matter of "WHEN" - when there was enough money spared, to be able to purchase the newest Infinite version upgrade ... !

And since i was able to check the available upgrade/sidegrade options in the released price list it was clear from the beginning, how my next purchase will look like ...

That's why i say, from a certain point of view, the availability of a 7 Complete to 7 Infinite Version doesn't need to be there - but with the sidegrade option from Vue 6 Infinite to Vue 7 Complete E-onsoftware is asking for trouble ...
 

Quote - Well (my opinion) for an owner of an "Infinite" version it just doesn't make sense anymore to upgrade or sidegrade from the "pro" version to any lower ranked version anymore, even it's being a product with the version 7  !?

That's true in the sense that everyone with v6i who wanted to upgrade at all would surely have wanted to upgrade to v7i. The problem for those who didn't was probably the price - eon set the upgrade price from 6i to 7i very high (IMO) and I also took a good hard look at 7complete before hitting the credit card for 7i. Eon could have simply reduced the cost of the upgrade to 7i on the basis that they would get more sales, but they chose not to. Since that must have been a deliberate decision, you have to ask why... and one possibiity is the intention, over the next couple of versions, to split the product line in two.

Quote - That's why i say, from a certain point of view, the availability of a 7 Complete to 7 Infinite Version doesn't need to be there - but with the sidegrade option from Vue 6 Infinite to Vue 7 Complete E-onsoftware is asking for trouble ...

Yes, agreed - potential trouble ahead. As I said earlier, it'll be interesting to see, since you apparently cannot do a straight upgrade from 7complete to 7infinite now, whether those owners of 7complete will have an upgrade path to 8infinite when it appears. If they can't... standby for a lot of complaints.
 

Gill,
So from your experience of starting with a low version and being able to upgrade to the top version,
was it good to have the option to "grow" gradually? or do you regret not  going for the top version from the word go? I started with V6inf and I knew the lower versions were missing important features for me. Luckily I had the funds at the time. But if I didnt, I would have been happy to be able to learn some of the features while I'm saving for what I really wanted. That isnt the case for comp vs. inf.
The new features I wanted were the new clouds, the water editor and painting ecos from any directions. I'm happy to pay the upgrade price to complete for these features. At the moment I dont miss any of the extra's in inf, but maybe I will in the future. Thus I want to have to option to get inf.
Arraxxon,
Sorry, I cant follow your arguments even though I read your post several times.
Maybe for those whom money isnt an issue the route is obvious - buy the top product. Otherwise it depends what extras you get for the extra money. If you (or anyone) check the comparison list and decide complete isnt sufficient  - by all means get infinite, I never claimed you should be made to go through all the versions in-between.  7Complete isnt inferior to 6inf, there are many advances, and those where enough for me at the moment. I may never want the extars of inf, but why shouldnt I have the option to purchase those in the future?
Why are you saying it was an error to allow v6inf->v7comp? who was it bad for? I'm happy. I wouldnt have bought 7inf. And what about those that didnt have 6inf and are coming up the artist line, why shouldnt they be able to move from complete to inf ?
Spedler
I agree that what happens in the future when v8 comes out is a very interesting point. I would think there should be a v8complete and ability to move to inf, I hope it isnt a dead end. I'll bring that point up too in my next communication with e-on. Thanks for pointing it out.

I started with the low thinking it'd be enough then upgraded to Pro (I think at that point they'd added the plant editor to Pro)

In hindsight, I should have gone 4 Pro to 5 Infinite.  It would have saved me money.

Talking of....money is an issue for me but I have the 'luxury' of being a vendor and had been squirreling bits of my earnings away since the last upgrade specifically to pay for the next one because I knew when it came out - I'd want it.
I'm doing the same thing now for 8 

Quote by spedler - "That's true in the sense that everyone with v6i who wanted to upgrade at all would surely have wanted to upgrade to v7i. The problem for those who didn't was probably the price - eon set the upgrade price from 6i to 7i very high (IMO) and I also took a good hard look at 7complete before hitting the credit card for 7i. Eon could have simply reduced the cost of the upgrade to 7i on the basis that they would get more sales, but they chose not to. Since that must have been a deliberate decision, you have to ask why... and one possibiity is the intention, over the next couple of versions, to split the product line in two."

Spedler ... okay, you've got a point there - i must agree on that ...

 I agree with this too and if the upgrade price had have been in line with previous years then I wouldn't have thought twice about it and just waited another month before purchasing. However, I do now expect the $400 upgrade price to become the norm for Infinite for future upgrades, so maybe I made the right decision after all.

ArtPearl - i just wanted to point out, that i was able to view the available upgrade/sidegrade options in the released pricelist and calculating on how long it would take me, to put the money aside to be able to pay for this upgrade from Vue6i to Vue7i ...
I could figure out rightaway, that there isn't any upgrade option from 7 Complete to 7 Infinite, so why should i even bother to buy a Complete version - even if i would have to wait a longer time, to be able to purchase Vue7i.
I don't say, it was a good decision from Eon to allow certain up-/sidegrades and others not - but the decision was made and the pricelist told me the fixed and only options.

I guess, there will be always problems coming up with programs, which exist in many different forms and to hook them up to those upgrades/sidegrades with a reasonable pricing system ... even counting in the date of purchase of older versions - far in the past or just right before the newest release ... not easy and for sure not satisfiable for each customer ...

Maybe E-onsoftware will be able to change their pricing policies with next Vue versions, after noticing, that customers have trouble with the existing upgrading/sidegrading system - but i'm not sure, if they will be able to change something in the existing pricing and upgrading style of Vue 7 now, since this could raise even more trouble with other buyers.

But, as always, they can't satisfy each and every customer.
Last time from Vue5i to Vue6i they for sure gave away bigger earnings by the decision, to hand out Vue6i for free, for updating or buying Vue5i close to release of Vue6i - surely hoping and trying to gain from this step, by having more Vue users on the "pro" Vue side (the more profitable...) in the future - but i guess that's the intention for all businesses all over the world ...

ArtPearl - i have to agree, if not for Vue 7 anymore, but then at least for a hopefully coming next version Vue 8 (who knows with the present sitiuation of the worlds economy being in trouble ...), they should consider a reworked pricing system and allow a Vue 7 Complete upgrade and a Vue 8 Complete sidegrade to Vue 8 Infinite at reasonable and fitting prices ...

Admitedly, I made a mistake, I looked at the cost of upgrading to 7 Inf and complete, scanned the feature differences and decided that I could live with Complete until I could afford to move back to the Infinite platform. I didn't even look to see if there was an upgrade path from Complete to Infinite, I just assumed there would be because there was always a path in the past. The new system though has totally isolated the artistic and professional series as there is no longer any upgrade path between the two, so if you don't already have 6 Infinite (and haven't already used up your upgrade rights) there is no way of getting 7 Infinite without paying the full price.

I completely agree (parodn the pun :P).
It's atrocious that there's no upgrade path there.

But as I've often said, I think they have made a mess, with far too many versions of Vue that are confusing for the user!
IMHO, Vue Pioneer should be free or just enough to cover their server / maintenance / bandwidth for it, to encourage wide uptake...or$50, I know they want ot make money but what is absolutley crucial, is USE RBASE. He who has widest use rbase (and are sitll happy with product) is King.

THen there should be Esprit, for about $150, and that would be the current "Pro" version.
Infinite should be $400, current price is bloody crazy!
And Xstream $700.

They are confusing users, and cutting into limited pockets far too much.

CobraEye,

Quote - The people at e-on are nuts for all these crippled versions of vue.  What waste of time.

I think the entire price of this upgrade is wrong.

But let's face it...  Vue has really reached it's limits and it's time is short.    But the render times are terribly long...

I hope some new software comes along and takes its place soon.

Well there are ot many versiosn of Vue for too high a price at upper end.

I agree prices have been too high this time aorund.

Limits? what are you talking about? Vue's one of the best mid-range apps there is, for goodness sake.
Uh, no they aren't least not in Version 7. Even MAX etc can't jus thit a button and give you a rende rin 5 seconds.
Caveat, rela time rendering IS coming, but at moment it's INCREDIBLY expensive and cannot do complex scenes you cna make in Vue.

Oh great, cut your nose off to spite your face!
I don't use Bryce any more, but I sure as heck wouldn't be pleased if it was discontinued. A healthy market requires competition...you may have missed that bit, and I gain no pleasure from having folk who love an app or item, having it ruined for them.

"Do you think it's right not to have a 'complete'->'infinite' upgrade path"

I think it's wrong they even offer a Complete.

Quote - Infinite should be $400, current price is bloody crazy!
And Xstream $700.

With the current economy, I wonder how well Vue 7I and X are selling.

Quote - "Do you think it's right not to have a 'complete'->'infinite' upgrade path"

I think it's wrong they even offer a Complete.

And why is that? do you think that inf should be much cheaper so there would be no need for complete? do you think eveevery one should buy 7inf at their current price, and if they cant afford that, they dont deserve anything?

They should have stuck with Pro just as with previous versions.  By raising I's price, they could make room for Complete to have a selling price.  E-on is dividing and conquering itself without necessity.  They already had the market (Bryce was selling for $6).  So why trash on their existing/loyal customers?  Anyway, what goes up has to come down.  Microsoft is letting people and products go.  So if they are hurting, much smaller companies are feeling the squeeze.

It's more like what limits am I not talking about.  There are too many to list.  I feel that vue is old software doing it the old software way.    I can't spend $1500 for a new spectral cloud system that takes way longer to render and is grainy, flickering, and causing weird shadow anomalies. Did I mention the constant crashes if you don't have the perfect workflow.

In fact I've spent more time trying to come up with workflows for this software,so it doesn't crash more than I've spent in creating scenes.

I am at my end with e-on.

And what's with the names like Pro and Complete and Infinite, etc when bump mapping doesn't work and normal mapping doesn't exist?

Please, please, please, can you stay focused on the issue I've raised - with the situation as it is, with the versions as e-on has for sale, do you think there should be a path offered for an upgrade complete->infinite?
If you have other issues - you hate vue, you dont agree with  the naming scheme, you're upset with bugs - all valid issues, start another thread, it's easy enough. I intend to use the content of this thread to continue my discussions with e-on, so the more to the point it is the easier it will be to present.
Thanks for your understading.

 Should thre be an upgrade path from Complete to Infinite?

Definitely YES

Pnina,

Interesting thread you've started. FWIW-- here's my thinking on the situation.

First of all, you are correct. Any good marketing/sales person worth their salt would allow for an upgrade path from Complete to Infinite-- it just makes sense-- for now.

I believe there are possibly three reasons-- or a combination of the three-  for not allowing it at this time:

1. There are some sort of shell game dynamics where allowing such an upgrade gives a certain group a distinct advantage over another group. I don't know what those groups could be, but I do know e-on gave away a free version of Vue Infinite 5 to Lightwave users who purchased a full version of Lightwave awhile back. If there is a scenario by which a 'workaround' can get someone a new version of Vue 7 Infinite for just the cost of an upgrade, I'm sure e-on would not want to share these 'shell game dynamics' with you or any other user.

2. There are significant serialization and licensing technical issues. Though I think this is a poor excuse, and could be remedied in time.

3 (my guess). It's clear e-on now wishes to create a professional line of products, one which is different from it's standard line-up of mostly small studio/artist type products. To do this, they need to change their business model-- make it very different from the past. They would like to create a product line which they can charge a premium price for, as it will be used by Hollywood FX houses and major animation studios. For these customers, price is not a big deal-- but service is. Thus the new service and upgrade policies. These customers, once they like your product, order dozens of seats at a time. Big business. Big dollars. Allowing them to start at a smaller product line (Esprit) and upgrade all the way to Infinite, might in fact cost them. For instance, 2 seats of Esprit for layout, 1 seat of Infinite for EcoSystem work, etc..

Now, think of Adobe Photoshop vs Adobe Elements. Of course there is no upgrade path from Adobe Elements to Adobe Photoshop-- but in fact Adobe Elements is mostly just a subset of Photoshop functionality. Similar problem.

So, e-on is trying to create a category centric focus for their product line, but they haven't done a good job in understanding their customer, thus the issue. Because, unlike Elements vs Photoshop, Complete and Infinite are very close in functionality-- and e-on supposed the standard users would not need the very few differences in features between the two. That was a mistake. But, they couldn't name Complete "Infinite" and Infinite "Vue Master Studios Only" because the fact is...Vue 7 Complete actually is missing a few features which Vue 6 Infinite has. So, thus a conundrum.

I suspect after taking a bit of time to reflect, e-on will do the right thing and provide an upgrade path.

All that said I have to ask why exactly are you interested in this issue at this time? Are you looking to upgrade right now Complete to Infinite? If so, my suggestion is you contact e-on in a personal way and see if they can't work with you.

Years ago, I wanted to purchase SketchUp, but didn't want to spend the whole $500 for the PC product and then another $500 for the Mac version-- so I called the company directly. Had a very pleasant chat with the head of sales, and he cut me quite a nice deal at the time for both products on the condition I didn't 'spread the word.' Course now, they're owned by Google and the product is free.

So, my advice is to keep a reasonable amount of pressure on this issue-- as you're doing now. If you're archiving these threads, please remove the loons (cobraeye and such) and I believe it will create a very nice case for an upgrade path-- which we should have :-)

Thank you chipp - well thought out and well presented arguments.  Of course what I like best is your basic statement "Any good marketing/sales person worth their salt would allow for an upgrade path from Complete to Infinite" :)
As for your suggestions for why they did what they did

1. I dont care what games they are playing -their prerogative. But, they should still have a rational approach for their general policy for regular customers.  I dont have to accept their argument 'trust us we know what we're doing'. As presented publically it makes no sense and I have questions about it. (Of course they can chose to continue to ignore my questions...)
2. Licensing is a technical question I know nothing about. It is supperficially a good excuse but doesnt stand up to scrutiny. They found a way with the rest of the upgrades in the 'artist line', they can find a solution here. It's a matter of policy and they can adapt the technology to serve the policy and not the other way around. (but you sort of agreed already it isnt a strong argument.
3. This is in essence what they keep saying - 'we have different lines now'. But why is it reasonable to assume that once you are in the 'artist' line you(or your pocket) will never grow enough to want to use the 'pro' ? and how can they lose by allowing the switch?

You asked why I'm interested in the issue - well, I was trying to decide which version (if any) I would like. It was clear almost from the begining I cant justify getting inf and there are sufficient new features in complete compared to v6inf for me to want to upgrade.
However there remained 2 issues - (1) if I try complete and it turns out I was wrong and I really need the extra features, can I move to infinite (2) if complete is OK for now but my needs and my funds change in the future, can I switch then.
After direct correspondence -via tickets and several phone calls- the first issue was resolved - within a month I can 'return' complete get my money back (minus $15 restocking fee) and get inf at the regular v6inf->v7inf price.
But after the first month, their 'best offer' is to give me a $400 voucher for buying v7inf. This means I'll have to pay $500 and if you add the $100 I already paid for complete it's a total of $600.
(compared to $400 if I didnt go for complete first). I'm sorry, that isnt an 'offer', it is a deterant.
 I did try approaching them. I was very polite and fairly patient but it didnt yield any results
 (They have just repeated this 'offer' this morning).
What I want is a reasonable way to move to infinite in the future, and to ensure I'm not stuck in a side line which doesnt get developed and there is no way out of.
I'm not really that hopeful, but I'll try to try all I can. In a day or two I'll collect/summarize the opinions expressed here and present them to e-on. 
Wish me (and other customers ) luck.
Thanks for contributing everyone.

Quote - But after the first month, their 'best offer' is to give me a $400 voucher for buying v7inf. This means I'll have to pay $500 and if you add the $100 I already paid for complete it's a total of $600.

I don't understand. What voucher are you talking about? Are you saying there does exist an upgrade path, but it's just not priced correctly?

Here's my understanding based upon what's been said and what I read on e-on's website.

e-on allows you to either: a) update Vue 6 Inf to Vue 7 Complete or; b) update Vue 6 Inf to Vue 7 Inf.

In either case, you've used up your update. But, they allow you to switch your update pref from Complete to Infinite within 30 days of purchasing Complete.

After 30 days, you are now a 'Vue 7 Complete' owner-- just as if you've purchased it from e-on. As a Complete owner, there currently is no posted update path to Vue 7 Infinite.

The retail difference between Complete and Infinite is $296-$336 depending on download vs boxed. It's clear to me it wouldn't be a good strategy for e-on to upgrade for the difference-- you want to reward your users for picking the right package the first time, or else most will always choose the lower cost version.  Any marketing person knows this.

So, the question becomes, how much difference does one charge? 

You say:

Quote - their 'best offer' is to give me a $400 voucher for buying v7inf. This means I'll have to pay $500 and if you add the $100 I already paid for complete it's a total of $600.

Now, I'm assuming what you're saying is you can purchase a brand new copy of Vue 7 Infinte AND keep your Vue 7 Complete as well. But you'll have to pay the full price for Infinite minus the $400 voucher-- costing you $499. So, this is somewhere around a $200 difference between the retail difference between the two. Perhaps a bit steep.

Now that you're a Complete owner, (and given a grace period to switch)-- so, in e-on's mind it's not necessary to consider your $99 previous upgrade fee. I'm sure they are thinking they should have only one Vue 7 Complete to Vue 7 Infinite upgrade (now called 'voucher') fee and not have to deal with 'an upgrade from an upgrade.' I'm sure you can understand that.

So, if I'm reading this right, e-on has told you they will honor a $500 fee for moving from a purchased copy of Vue 7 Complete to Infinite. And, you get to keep Complete? If this is the case, then I believe $499 is perhaps a bit more than I would charge (actually $50-100 more), but not a completely unreasonable fee considering the facts above. Perhaps the reason for the higher price, is you still own a seat of Vue 7 Complete, which can be used-- and would be used in a studio environment.

best, Chipp

I didnt see it publicly anywhere. It seems to be their response to 'awkward' customers like me who ask about it explicitly. I know about at least one more person (I think it was Richard-craftycurate) . That got offered this deal.
If you upgraded to v7complete you immediately and forever lost your upgrade privileges. If you decide you want to move to v7 infinite anyhow they will give you a voucher worth $400 towards the purchase of a new (not upgrade) v7inf. So instead of paying the full $900 for v7inf you will pay 'only'
$500.  As I said if you add the $100 you already paid for the complete version of v7 moving up v6->v7 will cost you $600 rather than $400 that anyone else paid to move up to v7inf directly.
This seems way over the top to me. I can accept their 'restocking' fee of $15 if you return complete, I can even accept double that, but an extra $200... it is not a serious offer.

(and the fact they dont  say that this is their general arrangement in any official list/publication, also seems...well, underhanded?)

EDIT: I didnt see your latest post while I was writing this one.  I dont want to purchase another version of v7. I only need ONE, I only asked for one.When you upgrade any of the other stages in the artist line they dont tell you to keep the version you have and pay for a completely new one (even with discount). Why should not  the same policy apply to the complete-> infinite switch?
That was my original question, and it still is.

Pnina,

Quote - (and the fact they dont  say that this is their general arrangement in any official list/publication, also seems...well, underhanded?)

Seems like good business practice to me to provide a solution for a customer who asks. See my post above about SketchUp. That said, I imagine they will have to at some time provide an upgrade path. I suspect they're waiting for a next version of Vue. I imagine they do not now, as it would certainly inflame those, like you, who disagree with the pricing.

As I said previously, they have provided you a path, just not one you are happy with. My guess is after 30 days, they consider you the same as a Vue 7 Complete purchaser, and do not worry about your $99-- especially since you did have a very generous grace period offer as well.

Certainly there's room in this discussion for varying points of view. As I said, I would like to see the voucher to be $50-100 more than it is. Assuming that, it seems fair to me.

best, Chipp

If the deal after a month is that they will simply give Complete owners a voucher for $400 towards the cost of a separate full copy of Infinite, then that means the customer is left with a copy of Complete for which they have no use and basically would then own TWO copies of Vue. That could be seen as generous on the part of e-on but also a sizeable waste of money for the Customer. Why they can't just charge an extra $350 and then cancel the Complete licence is beyond me.

Quote - If the deal after a month is that they will simply give Complete owners a voucher for $400 towards the cost of a separate full copy of Infinite, then that means the customer is left with a copy of Complete for which they have no use and basically would then own TWO copies of Vue.

While that may be true for you, it's not necessarily true of others. For instance, a small graphics studio.

Quote - That could be seen as generous on the part of e-on but also a sizeable waste of money for the Customer. Why they can't just charge an extra $350 and then cancel the Complete licence is beyond me.

Probably for the same reason Adobe doesn't allow upgrades from Elements to Photoshop. IOW, they're trying to build a distinction between the Pro line and the Artists line. I'm not saying it's correct, but I believe that is their reasoning.

 Just so I'm clear. I don't see a good reason why e-on should should not provide an upgrade path to Vue Infinite from Complete. I think they haven't thought this through well enough at this time, but I believe they will at some time in the future see there is money to be made allowing Complete users to move to Infinite.

My stated points above are based upon trying to look at this situation from e-on's perspective.

Chipp, I think our opinions are very close actually. I do not see either why there shouldnt be a sidegrade from comp to inf, not only from the consumers pov but from e-on's. If they want to do better deals for larger companies they can offer discounts for quantity or even just for being a commercial company.  I'm just comparing what I, an ordinary customer, could get. I could upgrade to inf for $400.  and to comp for $100. Why wouldnt they want me to pay them the $300 differnce (or even $350) to get the sidegrade when I want to?
One of my main points is that it is their business model even now, you get what you can/want and then you go up the ladder to better versions.Just look how they push Pioneer to get people to start the climb. So why doesnt their logic apply to the top of the range?
I dont know much about photoshop's history - if it was never their concept or if they declared they are stopping it - I have nothing against them. e-on hasnt stopped. They are just  inconsistent in applying their overall policy.
I just found out to my very big surprise that it does NOT cost more to buy the bottom version (esprit) and gradually work up to complete compared to buying complete directly. At least for the download version. Esprit, pro and complete cost $200,400,600 respectively (minus 1dollar). upgrading one level is $200 and esprit to complete is $400.  I dont know why people keep claiming it is more expensive to do it in stages. So - by the same logic I should only pay $300 for complete->infinite.
I was willing to pay a bit more. But certainly not $500...

 Depends how you got there... When I bought esprit 5 it was more than the current $199 and then bought all the modules separately...

Vue 5 esprit = 250
Lightune = 40
Upgrade to esprit 6 = 80
Deep Access = 40
Botanica = 40
Ecosystems = 100
HyperVue = 40 (Final plugin changed status to Pro Studio)
Upgrade to 6 Infinite = 300
Sidegrade to Complete = 100

Total = $990

So to get back to Infinite from here would mean a total paid of almost $1500 for a $900 piece of software.