Running both Leopard and Windows XP via Bootcamp on an Intel MacPro.
I have fully licensed Adobe CS2 WINDOWS version.
When I went to purchase an UPGRADE to CS3 for Windows and a Crossgrade of CS3 Windows version to Mac Version, I was told I would have to purchase an entire full price new license for one or the other.
But most license agreements state that they are for use only on ONE machine at a time.
With Bootcamp I may be operating 2 different OS, but I am using the software on one machine (the same MacPro) and only on one OS at a time.
It appears to me that I should be able to merely purchase an upgrade from CS2 to CS3 and a Crossgrade from Windows to Mac version.
Re: Legal Question by Tim Wilson on Apr 28, 2008 at 3:14:33 pm
[John Richard]"I was told I would have to purchase an entire full price new license for one or the other."
The problem isn't running a different platform version in a PC partition. The problem is how Adobe handles crossgrades. The short version is, they don't do them.
To be precise, they sort of do them, but not in a way that will help you. You can upgrade from CS2 on one platform to CS3 on another, but only if you sign and fax a Letter of Destruction -- a promise that you'll torch your original platform.
Here's a good description from several people who went through it. Be sure to check the comments. Not much love to be found here.
THAT's why you have to buy a full version of one or the other -- you can upgrade your CS2 to CS3 on whichever platform you want....but the upgrade is good for THAT platform only. So if you want to upgrade your Win CS2 to Mac CS3, you'll need to buy a brand new CS3 for Win.
An easier solution is to look at VMware Fusion or Parallels Desktop. These are Mac applications that let you run Windows applications -- the whole Windows OS -- inside a Mac window, just like any Mac application.
That way you can upgrade your CS2 to CS3, staying on Windows...and then run it as a Mac application with Fusion or Desktop.
You could certainly choose one platform or the other as your home for CS3, but if you want to run on both Mac and Win, Fusion is the closest you can get.
Re: Legal Question - So do I buy Adobe Win or Mac? by Russell Lasson on May 1, 2008 at 5:32:56 pm
So I'm getting ready to buy an Adobe suite for a dual boot system. I guess I should buy the Windows version and then either boot into Windows or use a virtualization software.
My question is, how has performance been for people running Win AE through virtualization on a Mac?
Re: Legal Question - So do I buy Adobe Win or Mac? by John Richard on May 1, 2008 at 6:28:34 pm
Before you decide to go with the Windows version, be aware that Windows is still stuck with using a maximum of 2.5 gig of ram.
Whereas Mac, as it is my understanding, can use a full 8 gig or ram.
So with AE and it's preview/render functions using ram, if you have a lot of ram in your MacPro, you would get a lot more umph if you went with the Mac version.
I have been trying to read the EULA (snooze...) and it seems to always talk about 1 machine vs 1 operating system per license. Can someone provide a reference to 1 license per operating system.
Re: Legal Question - So do I buy Adobe Win or Mac? by Nick Righton on May 7, 2008 at 4:32:13 am
I run CS3 on my mac pro. I can only use 3 gigs ram of my 10gigs available in After Effects and Photoshop. CS3 is programed 32 bit. The next release will see a 64 bit version for windows but not for Mac :( We will have to wait because of Apples recent decision to move from Carbon to Cocoa in programing. Here is the link to validate my claims.
Re: Legal Question - So do I buy Adobe Win or Mac? by Jason Jenkins on May 7, 2008 at 4:51:56 am
[Nick Righton]"I run CS3 on my mac pro. I can only use 3 gigs ram of my 10gigs available in After Effects and Photoshop."
Right. But, with Multiprocessing turned on, AE will launch multiple instances of itself in the background and use up even more RAM to feed your CPU cores for preview and render. Each instance of AE could theoretically use 3 gigs of RAM. I just upped my RAM from 4 to 8 gigs and AE loves it! I love watching all the cores max out while rendering. It makes me feel like something is working right. (That and it's really fast).
Re: Legal Question - So do I buy Adobe Win or Mac? by Jason Jenkins on May 1, 2008 at 6:56:25 pm
I'm with John on this. If you use AE a lot, you want to run it natively on a 64 bit operating system like OSX so you can utilize more RAM. It would be nice if Adobe upgraded their license policy for dual-booters.
Re: Legal Question - So do I buy Adobe Win or Mac? by Tim Wilson on May 1, 2008 at 8:11:28 pm
[Jason Jenkins]"If you use AE a lot, you want to run it natively on a 64 bit operating system like OSX"
Or XP or Vista, which can use pretty much as much RAM as you can throw at them.
I say "pretty much" because Vista maxxes out at 128GB. I think we're safe for a while.
Virtual machines are reported to run about 5% slower. Can you really tell the difference between 1 second and .95 seconds? Or 10 seconds versus 9.5 seconds? On a 1 hour render we're still only talking about 3 minutes. So virtualization is fine.
As far as Mac and Win, head to head with the same amount of RAM, performance on both is just fine. This is thing is a little faster here, this one a little faster there....but you won't find many-- any?-- threads about this any more because the difference just isn't that big a deal.
I just deleted the 90% of the post after here, because it just offered more data points repeating what I already said.
Re: Legal Question - So do I buy Adobe Win or Mac? by John Richard on May 1, 2008 at 8:59:46 pm
The problem for us with converting over to Vista 64bit is that our main Windows NLE, Grass Valley Edius does not yet support Vista. And there are other odds and ends that are still quirky with Vista support.
And most folks I know have been reticent about jumping from XPSP2 to Vista - whether justified reasons or not - some like Vista as you do - others don't.
So if you've taken the Vista plunge, then Windows or Mac version of AE makes the same usage of ram as Tim points out. But if you are on XPSP2 32 bit as many still are due to Vista issues, then Mac is the better choice for it's ram usage.
Tim - how tough was your changeover to Vista - did you go the upgrade path; or the clean install and start over from scratch; or was it just an entire new workstation from the get-go. And which version of Vista do you recommend?
Re: Legal Question - So do I buy Adobe Win or Mac? by Tim Wilson on May 2, 2008 at 12:44:00 am
[John Richard]"Tim - how tough was your changeover to Vista - did you go the upgrade path; or the clean install and start over from scratch; or was it just an entire new workstation from the get-go. And which version of Vista do you recommend?"
Not having the software you need is the BEST reason not to change OSes. My recommendation to people with existing installations has always been NOT to upgrade before you need to. Good for you not getting sucked into the "it's new and I want it...even if it's a bad idea" fever that you see all around the Cow.
Whenever the name of a release changes -- Panther to Tiger, NT to XP -- a clean install is a really, really good idea. Back up, wipe the partition, start over. Most people don't, most of the time nothing bad happens....
...but for people who DO have trouble, this is one of the two most frequent reasons why. The other is older hardware. Even if it's powerful stuff, there are too many back-side inconsistencies for previous-generation hardware to work with next-gen software for long.
Which is why my working theory is that few people will have a better experience with Vista than Mac users who install it on a new Win partition on their Macs. :-) Been working for me, smooth as can be.
I'll step on my soapbox about anti-Vista hype another day -- short version: 2 million people on an 18-month public beta is going to kick up dust that'll settle down on its own....given that people pay attention to clean installs and fresh hardware.
There are plenty of charts and such that compare all the features, but the short version is that the Business edition is the sweet spot for most folks at the Cow. And I have Ultimate because I'm just that kind of guy. :-)
Re: Legal Question - So do I buy Adobe Win or Mac? by John Richard on May 14, 2008 at 4:27:33 pm
Well just an update.
A week has now gone by since I place an order for a Upgrade/Cross-grade from CS2 Windows to CS3 Mac and:
1. The order STILL has not gone thru
2. The first Letter of Destruction (LOD) which was faxed per the salesperson's instructions was not rec'ed. Our fax record shows it did go thru and the number was correct.
3. Got passed back and forth between Adobe Customer Service and Adobe Sales Dept multiple times.
4. After many calls, they figured out they lost the first LOD and asked me to again fill out and fax another LOD. I did this and put the Case # in large letters on top of the LOD and asked for a receipt confirmation call. No such receipt confirmation call was rec'ed.
5. I then emailed with the case # and all pertinent data re: the problems and got an email confirming Adobe did get the LOD and all was well.
6. This morning I get an email stating that Adobe can not process my "refund" because there is no serial # on the LOD !!!
I didn't ask for a refund - the LOD clearly shows that it was an order for a crossgrade/upgrade, the software involved, and the serial # that the sales dept told me to use. In fact there is an entirely different LOD for refunds - this was not the form used.
The point of this mess is, this clearly is not an easy process as Adobe people in the process chain don't understand it themselves. I have already deleted CS2 and thrown away the software - now I am SOL - yeah, I know I should have waited fro the new software to arrive - I had no idea Adobe was this messed up on the process. And trying to get someone at Adobe Sales to talk to someone at Adobe Customer Service to straighten their own mess out is impossible.
DON'T DELETE YOUR OLD SOFTWARE UNTIL YOU GET THE NEW SOFTWARE
Re: Legal Question - So do I buy Adobe Win or Mac? by Eric Berna on May 20, 2008 at 3:28:31 pm
My employer has 13 licenses for the Adobe Creative Suite Design Premium, and one license for Adobe After Effects. We purchase them through Adobe's TLP volume licensing program, and keep the maintenance agreement active. When we buy a new license, such as when we added After Effects, we got a platform specific serial number and DVD. But when we get the automatic upgrade through the maintenance agreement, we've always gotten new serial numbers and media for both Windows and Mac platforms. If I wanted to, although I've never wanted to, I could switch platforms by just grabbing the other media out of the drawer.
Another benefit of the TLP system is that you don't have to activate the software.
