FusionPro vs Freeform Create...

[kdw75]

We have been using FP for many years, but the speed is a constant frustration. I am wondering if anyone has switched to EFI Freeform Create and if so, what their experience has been.

 

[tngcas]

We were using it consistently for about 2 months, then it randomly stopped working. I wasn't able to pinpoint any software changes that made this happen on either of the two machines we were using but it stopped working on both at the same time. Updating everything on both machines didn't fix the problem (listed below).

We'd send a file over and it would only print one record per sheet instead of 4-up (or whatever it was supposed to be) when imposed. The top corner would have one record and the other four corners would be blank.

It was a lot faster to process the job in the fiery which we loved but I couldn't get it working again. I haven't tried again since then (this was maybe 4 months ago).

 

[SoggyWinter]

Montax Imposer is worth looking at.

 

[prepressdork]

Hi kdw,

You mentioned speed issues with your FP software. I have FP running on model year 2012 Mac Pro with an SSD and it's nice and speedy. We started FP on Windows but found it to work considerably faster on a Mac.

Best regards,
pd

 

[Magnus59]

I tried out Freeform create, but found the interface was horrible, so still using HP Smartstream for now. We do have XMPie, which we use for our online store, but I haven't used it for VDP

 

[Craig]

PSL Pagebuilder will put Fusion Pro to shame when it comes to speed. I'm talking 1000's of records per second fast.

 

[Dmiller35]

I can't see anyone who thinks FP is slow going to Freeform Create. The interface is garbage and is nowhere near as powerful and flexible as FusionPro. I'm with prepressdork, I'm running FP 12.1.0 on a 2013 iMac with a non-SSD drive and 24GB of Ram. I don't really have any issues processing files.

 

[Craig]

Benefits | PSL by Jet Letter You really should try it and see how it puts Fusion Pro to shame.

 

[Ynot_UK]

Shame the Jetletter website isn't secure... in 2021 there's no excuse for any business not having sorted their https

 

[kdw75]

We are going to check out Jet Letter. It was time to upgrade FusionPro and it is now a subscription service of $1,500/Mo. for what we have. I asked if they offered any discounts or incentives for current Ricoh customers or FusionPro customers and the answer was NO. They said they had previously offered a discount for the first year, but no more. So I figured I would shop around.

 

[joshlindsay]

$1500 per mo. Hoooolllyyyy. I'd be shopping around too.

 

[prepressdork]

It's $1500/year.

pd

 

[kdw75]

LOL Oops. Yeah, it's per year.

I am really wanting to find out info about Jet Letter, but after emailing them 3 days ago, still haven't gotten a reply.

 

[prepressdork]

There's also DesignMerge. It's for InDesign only though.

pd

 

[kdw75]

I have spent years using FusionPro, so part of me hates to change, but I have heard so many good things about Jet Letter that I figured I should give it a look.

 

[spcink]

We used to use Fusion Pro and switched to FreeForm Create. I definitely prefer FF over FP because of just how easy imposing jobs are after they are sent to the Fiery. There are things that need to improve in FF, such as processing speed, but overall, I like it.

Oh and it's free.

 

[Dmiller35]

I think it really depends on what kind of variable work you're doing. FP is very powerful, but could be overkill if all you're using it for is simple addressing or letters with a salutation.
If your workflow already relies pretty heavily on Fiery, the FreeForm may be the okay option. Personally, I just found it way too clunky and slow.