MakeMusic, Inc. has announced they are taking Pre-Orders now for Finale 2008.  Please visit www.finale.com to upgrade your copy or to purchase a new copy.  There is also a preview of what is going to be included.  Expected release date July 2007.

Man they really busted butt to get out in time to compete w/ Sibelius 5.

All in all it looks like a pretty menial upgrade--I guess that's the only problem with year-branded releases.  Of course I've been a Finale convert since Sib 3 so I might be out of the loop. :P

I have yet to get my upgrade to Sibelius yet (ordering this weekend), but im curious to see it since there are a lot of additions that are being included so that it has some of the features Finale has had for 20 years.  I am interested to see my upgrade  of Sib 5 when I get it.

The annual Finale tax is here... 

[quote author=drumcat link=topic=1826.msg9013#msg9013 date=1183337050]
The annual Finale tax is here... 
[/quote]

This might just be the post OF THE YEAR! 

SOOOOOOOOOOOO true!

But you know, they've fixed a bunch of bugs.

What I think is crazy is that one of the highlighted features for 2008 is ";New & Expanded Documentation";.

Seriously.

Buy our product; our help program is [i]killer...[/i] 

[quote author=drumcat link=topic=1826.msg9017#msg9017 date=1183342772]
But you know, they've fixed a bunch of bugs.

What I think is crazy is that one of the highlighted features for 2008 is ";New & Expanded Documentation";.

Seriously.

Buy our product; our help program is [i]killer...[/i] 
[/quote]

For what it's worth, I've always felt Finale has great documentation. With programs of this depth, it's crucial to make it easy to find quick answers, and their system has always seemed pretty detailed to me.

That's very true.  I'm tied into Sonar, and they do the same annual thing.

Don't take that the wrong way...  Finale is a good program, but I think it's in desperate need for them to do a full 24 month cycle on it.  As it is, the incremental just piles on and piles on that same 1988 program.  That said, yes, they have good documentation.  I just think you're grasping a bit when that's a ";feature";.

That's software marketing though.  It works...

[quote author=drumcat link=topic=1826.msg9022#msg9022 date=1183352033]
That's software marketing though.�� It works...
[/quote]

I agree.  I think Finale has great documentation.  I just seem to have grown a ";taste"; if you will for Sibelius.  I used Finale for close to 15 years before making the switch.  Both are great programs, I just happen to like the workflow of Sib a little more now.

Yeah I was a die-hard Finale fan back in the day, of course there weren't a lot of alternatives (noteworthy composer and the like).  I think the competition from Sibelius has been good for Finale, as it's now miles and miles more usable and feature complete than it was back in the 9x and before years.  It was always funny to actually listen to yourself when someone asked how you did something, and your answer sounded like ";hit this key combination, go to this hidden preference panel and select this random option, now copy all your music to another score, change this setting, copy it back but only every other measure, etc etc.";

It's kind of interesting to imagine where notation will go next--at this point the workflow of everything is pretty wonderful (live playback, competent note entry, useful tools and utilities) and it's hard for me to imagine things changing too drastically.

And yeah I'll agree about Finale doc--always a lot more detailed than the old Sibelius RTFM approach.

[quote author=drumcat link=topic=1826.msg9022#msg9022 date=1183352033]
That's very true.�� I'm tied into Sonar, and they do the same annual thing.

Don't take that the wrong way...�� Finale is a good program, but I think it's in desperate need for them to do a full 24 month cycle on it.�� As it is, the incremental just piles on and piles on that same 1988 program.�� That said, yes, they have good documentation.�� I just think you're grasping a bit when that's a ";feature";.

That's software marketing though.�� It works...
[/quote]

Not grasping - pointing it out because of user complaints with the usual PDF method.  I think it points to the fact they are trying to make it known that they have made it easier.

That makes sense to me Scott.