Need VDP Software Advice...

M

mattf-BCDDirect

Member
The company I work for is going to be migrating from windows based vdp (PrintShop Mail 7) to a Macintosh system using Adobe CC. I need a reasonably priced VDP plugin for InDesign that can handle basic variable data, IMB, QR Codes, etc. And by reasonably priced I mean under $3,000.00. I would like to stay away from having to buy credits or "records" as PSM calls them, since the recurring charges are annoying and silly at best.

This would be a good chance for all you salesmen to pitch your best... I promise I am actually in the market for this and not just goofing around.

Thanks in advance,

Broke Mac User :(
 
Not sure if this helps, but HP has a plug-in called Smartstream that has pretty powerful VD capabilities. Last i checked it sold for approx $500. It comes with their Indigo digital presses. However, I can't say for sure if you can only buy the plug-in if you own an Indigo. I use this plug-in for all my impositions (large and small format) as well as variable data files
 
Using a plugin to InDesign regardless of the price is still going to be limiting. The plugin requires InDesign to render each and every file. This can be a very slow process and can cause other problems. If you are looking to grow your business it may not be your best choice.

A product that will work with InDesign or any other design application would give you much greater flexibility as well as capability. PSL PageBuilder from Jet Letter LLC will deliver what you need now and as you grow. PageBuilder Light is within your budget and will provide you with many tools not found in a plugin no matter the price. You can seamlessly upgrade as required. There are no additional usage charges. While annual support is available it is not required for continued use.

Live one on one web demos are available. We also make our solutions available at no charge for 30 days providing a fully functional working copy of the product.

Good luck, Thomas Bougher
 
Using a plugin to InDesign regardless of the price is still going to be limiting. The plugin requires InDesign to render each and every file. This can be a very slow process and can cause other problems. If you are looking to grow your business it may not be your best choice.

A product that will work with InDesign or any other design application would give you much greater flexibility as well as capability. PSL PageBuilder from Jet Letter LLC will deliver what you need now and as you grow. PageBuilder Light is within your budget and will provide you with many tools not found in a plugin no matter the price. You can seamlessly upgrade as required. There are no additional usage charges. While annual support is available it is not required for continued use.

Live one on one web demos are available. We also make our solutions available at no charge for 30 days providing a fully functional working copy of the product.

Good luck, Thomas Bougher
 
Thanks for the information. I have looked at both Smartstream and Pagebuilder. Smartstream was a nice choice, but I was under the impression that it was only for the Indigo... I could be wrong.

Pagebuilder starts at $6,000 according to the website, so that is out of our price range. I have been seriously considering Fusion Pro, since it is a reasonable price ($800.00) and seems to have all of the capabilities that we are going to need. XMPie and DesignMerge are both too pricey for our needs and to avoid the credit system you have to buy the "unlimited" package which is at least $5,000.

If anyone has knowledge of Fusion Pro please reply. I need to know if there are any recurring charges involved (i.e. tech support package, credits, etc.). I could not find anything on the website about these topics, and I am still waiting for a call back from their sales department.
 
Matt:

PageBuilder Light is priced at $2,495. It is not yet in full release which is why the info is not updated on the website. PageBuilder is priced at $5995.

One year of support is included with the purchase price. PageBuilder Light offers many advantages over Fusion PRO and any other plugin type application.
 
FusionPro does not have any ongoing costs with it. Aside from the major version upgrades. I'm not sure on the technical support costs. I've never needed any help with that. Their forums can provide you with help with almost any situation you might be stuck with.

I haven't looked into PageBuilder, but it doesn't look like it can import any layout information from InDesign or other applications. Everything needs to be recreated in their application. I might be wrong on that point. But, in our workflow where we receive almost all of our art in InDesign format. To have to recreate all of that in another program would take hours per day.

We did look at DesignMerge. However it was not able to do some of the functions that we need on a day to day basis.
 
Having used FusionPro, I can tell you that you get a lot of bang for your buck. A license is about $800 and the plugin will work with Acrobat and InDesign. I haven't used it with InDesign so I'm not sure if you still need Acrobat (other than for viewing composed content) when using the plugin with InDesign.

It will do variable text/graphics/pie charts and several bar code formats including IMB and QR codes. There's also an app that comes with the plugin for doing impositions.

pd
 
PageBuilder works with any page design or layout application. Static content can be simply imported into PageBuilder. There is no need to "recreate" anything.

The advantage is that you are not limited to static images. Anything and everything can become a variable within PageBuilder.
 
Digital Press Guy, will PageBuilder bring in text or image frames from InDesign that need to be variable?
 
I've used both FusionPro and SmartStream Designer extensively.

FP - you can set some things in InDesign with the plugin, but it still needs to be finished off in Acrobat for rules and final data merging (it can impose, too). It helps if you know JavaScript. If you know JS, then you can do almost anything you can imagine but overall FP is not very user-friendly. It is an excellent value, though.

SSD - much more user-friendly, but you are limited to working within InDesign rather than on any old PDF. It is a little pricey (I think that price someone mentioned in a previous post might be an upgrade price). You don't need an Indigo, as you can merge your data to a PDF or any of several other formats as required by your output device.

The shop I'm at now has both, with SSD being our preferred VDP solution moving forward (and we do some pretty complex jobs).

Either will be well under your budget and can do what you need it to plus more.
 
I like Fusion Pro. The InDesign plug-in portion of Fusion Pro simply lets you build templates with predetermined variables; the rules, merging etc is all handled in Acrobat. I've used it for 2D barcodes, variable pie charts, variable images, and the interface for defining rules has gotten way better than it used to be. Simple if/then statements are a breeze.

Data merge within InDesign will handle variable images as well and has handy features like suppressing empty fields, but is definitely limited. We have an Indigo and the operator uses Smartstream on a PC. I like the interface and the ability to easily do impositions (such as cut stacks) in conjunction with the merge, but I had issues with crashing when I installed the Mac version. Perhaps that was due to a recent OS upgrade and that issue would be fixed now.

I've never used PageBuilder so I don't know what advantages it offers over the other examples. You mention your needs are basic, so you may not even need all that Fusion Pro can do; InDesign data merge can handle what you listed, then you just impose the PDF using Quite Imposing or the like. But if you want more, I think you can download a Fusion Pro demo from the PTI website. And the forum and community around Fusion Pro has been quite helpful and responsive, I've gone to it several times.
 
VDP Software Advice

VDP Software Advice

seratne said:
Digital Press Guy, will PageBuilder bring in text or image frames from InDesign that need to be variable?
Click to expand...

The short answer is, yes.

With PageBuilder anything and everything can be a variable should you choose. Because PageBuilder is not relying on InDesign to render images it can quickly handle large number of variables in text and graphics. It can also create its own charts and graphs without need to import them after being created within Excel.
 
Hey, Matt, it's Dwight. Lots of our customers use FusionPro and they seem to like it pretty well. I never hear bad things from them. It think it may be your best bet due to your budget and you'll have a lot of money left on the table for other things as you guys transition. There was a comment I think about file size and efficiency with DesignMerge and that is definitely true. The nature of any ID plugin like that makes it slow to create and spool output files. DM VPS and PS files can be large and slow to RIP as well. If you are doing PDF out of PSM you would probably see the same spooling and RIP speeds with FusionPro.

****One issue I'm not sure of with FusionPro**** Maybe someone will chime in on this. At least one of our customers seems to have file size issues with PDF--they are not optimized and I don't believe he's gotten a good answer from support. He was sending record chunks of maybe 2000 relatively basic VDP postcards and the file would end up at the Creo at about 15MB, but after it RIP'd it was a whopping 65GB! These tended to crash the server of course, or they would RIP but fail in the print Q. My only advice to him was to make the chunks smaller at 500 records and use the Gallop feature so the file would start to print before it was done ripping. When he does these files I also have him format the image disks every day. Ask them specifically about PDF optimization and see if they will give you a test file for the Creo to see what happens. Good luck!
 
Dwight & All,

When considering issues of speed and VDP there are actually two areas to consider. Merge speed and RIP speed. The VDP solution must first merge static and dynamic data and graphics and then send those files to the RIP for processing. Solutions such as Fusion PRO rely on other page layout applications, in their case InDesign, to image each data record. That in itself slows down the process considerably. It can also result in very large files being sent to the RIP.

While your suggestion to your client to use the gallop feature available in the Creo this can present its own set of issues. In order for any VDP solution to deal with errors or omissions in data it must first completely process and merge the job. Should you begin printing a job that is not fully merged and an error occurs you could very well crash the job and potentially loose all the work that has been printed.

The Creo RIP, in my opinion, is an excellent choice for running VDP work. But the complete workflow needs to be addressed and optimized. That being said, your advice is well taken, try a real life job on the system you'll be running to get the best answer as to performance and suitability.
 
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