Pro's and Con's of MX 2004

[J_Paul]

Do you have any pros and cons of using MX 2004?

Let us know about it.

[dugfresh33]

Yes...I can't afford the upgrade! Yikes! That's kind of a steep price, don't you think? I just finished upgrading to MX, only to be informed that the clunky Freehand 10 is now integrated into MX - in the form of MX Plus! Now there's MX 2004 and MX 2004 with Flash Pro! I understand the whole concept of ROI and "what's $400 when you'll turn around and crank out sites for $2000," but I also understand that, in addition to being a freelancer now (from about 7:30pm to 10:30pm - hey, I got a family now!), all of the other software I use has its own set of upgrades...

I always like to have a glass of WHINE during the day, so there it was. Sorry, but I was just a little shocked at the Level 2 price, that's all.

[animalstudios]

Hi,

Well, I had expected Macromedia to come up with several improvements over the previous versions of Flash and my reactions to their latest edition are mixed. Let's look at some of the pros first:

1. Fantastic interface, which is very flexible and quite easy to use if you are familiar with Flash MX.

2. Support for various video formats.

3. Integration possible with non-Flash stuff like Web Services, Java, etc.

4. Quite a few nice components added (but... refer to cons below)

5.ActionScript 2 improves upon the abilities of ActionScript 1 (but... refer to cons below)

6. If you are a programmer and you are thinking of how to use more Flash in your applications, then Flash MX 2004 Professional should be a blessing for you.

And now the cons:

1. Flash MX 2004 is a resources hogger of the highest order. You need a really hi-tech box to run it along with other applications. This would probably be one of the biggest disappointments. Performance of the tool has been greatly reduced.

2. While AS 2 may be able to do things AS 1 couldn't, the flip side of the story is that due to changes in the syntax of AS2, that is, all lower case, it does not allow you to use AS1 code in Flash MX 2004.

3. Also, the NORMAL option in the AS editor has been removed, which will cause some trouble to those who are not familiar with scripting syntax.

4. Documentation is as PATHETIC as it could possibly be. There is negligible help for the components. The usage guidelines are useless if you are new to Flash. This is one area where Macromedia really needs to pull up its socks.

5. Virtually unchanged built-in libraries. The same set of buttons and other stuff. As useless as ever I guess!

In a nutshell, this is one upgrade I wouldn't recommend if you are not into programming. For the usual designer, you would find it more worthwhile to stick to Flash MX and not Flash MX 2004.

Regards,

Ani.

[timphughes]

I downloaded the trial version of flash mx 2004 Pro and was very impressed... I'm not so much a designer however and i will agree with ani, that this is an upgrade for developers. the new version has finally integrated more of the developer side of flash... That's pretty much all it did though. If you are designing small sites... this upgade means very little, but if you are a developer, This is very good upgrade. I've been developing web applications for several years and once flash mx came out i started using it. it was nice, but it lacked quite a bit in the programming aspect. mx 2004 has made up for that i think.

for developers the only real benefit i have seen is that you can anti-alias fonts. This has been a thorn in most designers side since flash began.

The only problem is that the trial has already died... I think it only worked for like two days, I will be upgrading as soon as i can figure out a way to make it sound like i can't live without it, to the upper management.

[zbatia]

All upgrades are always welcome. However, too often upgrades make our lives more difficult. Our students get frustrated, the learning curve is much longer, the employers have difficulties to choose the right version because the lock of qualified developers..., more.
We have to re-develop the course content, labs, spend another $4K-6K per upgrade (the software upgrade is overpriced), wait for 2 months after to get the permission on a course upgrade from Higer Education Commission... Just imagine.

[jcpatrick]

By training I don't mean just the student side. I'm almost finished with the studio mx course that I plan to sell on www.howtobeawebmaster.com and now I have to start a new course for studio mx 2003.

I'm just getting started with this business and I have to purchase all this software so that I can have up to date courses. So I've decided to take the big plunge and subscribe to Macromedia's devnet for $599. That way I know what to expect to pay each year, and I'm up to date with all of Macromedia's software.

John Patrick
www.howtobeawebmaster.com

[mikev]

Flash MX 2004 and the Pro version cost too much money. Macromedia is over the top on that. One version for less $$ would have been better.

I agree with previous posts that the docs suck. My purchased copy of Flash MX 2004 only had a CD in the box! After installing it on a slow machine at home and a fast machine at work I decided to upgrade my OS on my fast home machine so I could install it ONLY to learn that you are allowed 2 installs. Write that one on the box or somewhere next time! In their defense, Macromedia did resolve this for me but it took a phone call and some hold time.

All that said, the new interface is great and Dreamweaver MX 2004 is also quite nice. Its hard to imagine the web or web design today without both - hence the seemingly outrageous pricing and continuously new upgrades.

[Markll]

I do a lot of sharing between movies and work on several at a time. The tabs between movies is a great time saver.

[jondeaux]

I am trying to decide if I should upgrade myself. I am fairly new to flash and have MX now. I started on flash 5, but had to leave it for a while and know we have MX and MX04 and MX04pro. whew..

I am just starting to learn AS1 and wonder should I just go ahead and focus on AS2. Can you script AS2 in MX. What conflicts will that create if any.

Great topic, thanks

Jon

[voodooboy]

The only real con I can think of is with the Professional version. While adding some additional options, it does take away the user-friendly actionscript interface. In v5 and MX the interface for implementing simple actionscripts was extremely easy to understand. It even had a simple and advanced switch option. Now I don't know about the standard version of MX 2004, but the pro version took it away completely. You have basics within a tree interface. But it is not nearly as easy to use as the older versions. I can code actionscript by hand, but it was so much easier with the old interface.

[zbatia]

I want to add the following.
If you ever used Homesite 4.5 in the DESIGN mode, you might copied and pasted the test with images right from any web page. It saved the page with all the images and text. Then, you could edit the page as you want and save it with images. With the Dreamweaver, this luxury is gone, too. Homesite+ (the latest version of the best HTML editor) that is built-into the program has no DESIGN mode. The Dreamweaver's DESIGN mode saves no images but rather only the text when you copy and paste the page.
I have to keep both copies of the programs...

[southplatte]

I honestly haven't tried the MX 2004 yet....I may not either. I started using dreamweaver on version 3 and flash on version 4 -- then went to flash 5, then to MX. Whew!

One question for clarification though, I hear that MS 2004 does more for compatibility on exporting movies to various formats and using them in a flash presentation as well. Any one know for sure?

Here's what I do, I use Flash to create online items, but my main focus is that to be used offline, such as interactive cd-roms, presentations and even some broadcast work. Is the upgrade going to help in terms of export video formats supported, and levels of quality on the exports?

[J_Paul]

I'm too lazy to type em out today, so here is a screenshot to see the publish options for Flash MX 2004

http://images.ientrymail.com/flashnewz/publishsettings1.gif

[southplatte]

J-Paul,

Thanks, looks the same as plain MX. What I was looking for was the export options though, over the publish options. When you go to file|export movie, you actually get more options such as windows avi, the quicktime mov, future splash spl and so on.

Does MX 2004 install any extra codecs (say for windows avi files?) specifically for use with it? right now I do not use codecs in flash, I just export a full frame uncompressed avi file and then take it into premiere to compress it (using the same codec/compression that flash says I can use) and get much better quality video. For some reason MX didn't export well with many codecs windows systems use.

[J_Paul]

Ahh, you mean these?


http://images.ientrymail.com/flashnewz/exports.gif