Huge improvement over version Pro X2
920022
This version does live up to its claim of MUCH faster rendering by utilizing the speed of the i7 processor on my Dell Studio XPS with Windows 7.
853141
We've been happily using the 2.0 version for year, and this 3.0 version is a very worthwhile upgrade. Super for backing up / upgrading 2.5" drives, and the software is a breeze.
1946030
Went from a version 1.x to this 3.x and it improved throughput dramatically.  Smart TV's are really showing the biggest improvement.  Hopefully I'll have this one 10 years like the last one.
3123695
Improved version of an excellent product - all formats including 4k
2340083
It took me a few months, but I finally stopped complaining that they'd screwed up XPress. Version 4.1 is light years beyond version 3.3. And, it's a whole lot better than 4.0. The new features make this program a pleasure to work with. The user interface is more intuitive than ever. And, it still beats PageMaker and InDesign by a mile.
4385091
PaintShop Pro has a great feature set but the UI is clunky (still way better than Gimp's UI, though). There are some bugs, but after convincing offshore tech support of the bugs, they seem to take me seriously and log them. I now have version X6 and it gets the same review.
4381076
I liked X6 quite a bit for making animations, slide show videos and editing videos because it was clear and intuitive. This version has a few more bells and whistles, but it's mostly the same program. Except it's a lot faster.

What I like about VideoStudio is that it's somewhere between being absolutely a beginner's video editing program and a full featured pro editing software. It's more than enough for the types of videos that I make- mostly instructional craft videos or simple animations and slideshows. Putting in subtitles, or timing the animation frames is easy to do. Adjusting a slideshow to fit the music I'm setting it to is also easy.

It does use a lot of memory still, but as long as I'm not trying to work with huge graphics in my graphics suite at the same time I'm editing a video- it hasn't frozen or crashed my system. So it seems very stable.

I like the speed, and still like how easy it is to use. It installs easily. My only complaint is that you have to download a user's manual.
4223675
AUDIENCE:
If you are a long-time fan of Corel VideoStudio (VS) and are trying to decide whether you should upgrade your VS to this latest version of Ultimate X8.5 or not, this review is for you.
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BACKGROUND:
I have used VS since its version 12 (X2). I loved it in many ways (especially its special effects), and I kept buying every upgrade of its "Ultimate" versions which came with extra contents, templates, and special effect plugins. Concerning for my existing installed plugins that I have accumulated over the years in my PC, I communicated with Corel representatives via the chat popups on Corel website, and I was told that Ultimate X7 and Ultimate X8 could coexist on the PC. So, I purchased Corel VS Ultimate X8 on August 11, 2015, and installed it while leaving my existing installation of VS Ultimate X7 intact.
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PROBLEMS:
The installation froze up (crashed) near the end, during its plugin installations. The content library (the listing of shortcuts to your media files inside VS) was messed up... After I reset the library, things seemed to work normally, but when I applied some proDAD Vitascene FX filters and attempted to make some customized settings, VS complained about the "Vitascene license" and prevented me from using the effects. I contacted Corel Tech Support via email and received an automatic canned reply on August 15, and the message reminded me that I could PAY to get a quicker response. On August 20, I received an email saying,
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"This is a known issue for VideoStudio X8.5 - ProDAD Mercalli. Our Development team is working with ProDad at the moment to solve the issue. Once we have a fix, it will be added to a patch or update so that your software will be able to automatically detect it and install."
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Today is August 28, 2015, and I have not heard anything from Corel.
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CONCLUSION:
This version of Corel VideoStudio Ultimate X8.5 is not ready as a release yet! Believe other similar negative reviews: both the installation and the VS program crash left and right. Corel technical support is extremely poor now (although it was very good and responsive in the past). Do not let the discounts and their short due dates tempt you to purchase it as I did. Keep your VS Ultimate X7 for now.
590780
I've alternated between using Adobe Premier Elements 1 and Ulead Video Studio Version 7 and Version 9 over the last few years. If I occasionally needed to do something fancy, with a lot of picture-in-picture compositing and /or  key-frame-based effects, I used Premiere -- although its interface was so annoying that for more normal projects I used Ulead, which I found to be a bit lacking in effects quality but overall extremely solid and easy to use.

I downloaded a trial version of Pro X2 and gave it a cursory test. The new effects looked great and overall I was pleased, so I bought it. I am now VERY sorry I didn't give it a more thorough test.

Post-purchase, I used Pro X2 to open one of my older Ulead 9 projects -- a pretty simple one, about 4 minutes long, consisting of about 12 short pre-rendered AVI files, 2-3 transition effects, and one audio track. In Pro X2 I  made a very minor change, only adding a credits slide at the end. Nothing cutting edge.

When previewing the project, everything looked great. Then I rendered it as an AVI file.

I first became suspicious, however, that it took around 30 minutes to render (on a new, dual Pentium laptop with 2 gb of RAM, running XP3), whereas the original project had taken only around 15 minutes on an older machine running Ulead 9.

Then I saw that the resultant AVI file from Pro 2X was around 300 mb, vs 100 mb for the Ulead 9 project -- very strange since the two clips, burned to identical formats, differed from each other in length by only about 5 seconds.

But the really bad news came when I watched the resultant AVI file. The timing was WAY out of sync -- up to 7-8 seconds in some places. This completely ruined the project, which had been a tightly-timed music video. I tried re-rendering 4 times -- twice more to AVI, and twice to MPEG3 -- with same result.

All the great features in the world are irrelevant of you have no control over your final video.

I consulted the help file, which said nothing about this problem. I did notice that under the Troubleshooting section they did offer the generic advice that if Pro X2 isn't working properly, it might need repair, available by clicking Add/ Remove programs in Windows Control Panel, and then selecting the option to repair. Problem was, there was no option to repair -- only the option to remove the program or not. Why on earth give such fictitious advice? What were they thinking?

I refuse to pay Corel the required fee for tech support -- charging for help with something so flawed is a scam in my opinion. I will be seeking a refund.

By the way, just to be sure the problem wasn't with my new machine, I arranged the clips, music and title slide in the 5 year old Adobe Premier 1 which I installed on the new machine. It rendered perfectly.
2523513
I put together a lot of rather large ProShow Gold programs (150 or more 2.4 MB TIFF slides plus music files that exceed 10 MB) and had many of the problems mentioned by others here. I found out that ProShow Gold - at least up to Version 2.6 - will not run on Intel boards with Hyperthreading unless one of the CPU cycles is turned off. I have brought this to the attention of Photodex since they had been unaware of the problem and I hope this will be fixed in their next version. Dual processor boards are now coming on the market and I don't think ProShow will work on these, either, because of the same reason.

Fortunately, assuming you are using Windows XP or XP Pro, The solution is fairly simple. Open ProShow Gold and then open the Windows Task Manager (Ctrl-Alt-Del) and click on the Processes tab. Mouse down to Proshow.exe and do a right click on it and then click on Set Affinity. CPU 0 and CPU 1 will be checked. Uncheck one of them (it doesn't make any difference which) and exit Task Manager. ProShow will now work just fine.

Unfortunately, this has to be done each time you use ProShow. There is a way to patch the program so that it always uses just one CPU cycle, but I don't think a review here is the appropriate venue. If you contact me off-line I can tell you how it is done. It is not hard and anyone can do it.
3651852
Plugged it in and updated the firmware to version 2.7 via ethernet connection and man this thing works wonders. Upconversion is excellent and HD DVD playback is superb.

The unit and the remote control are also built like tanks! Those who own an XA2 know exactly what I mean.
33224
I can only compare this product with a previous edition, Ulead VideoStudio 10 and the free Windows programs for making and editing videos. Corel bought Ulead. I have used VideoStudio 10 extensively while I have used VS ProX4 only sparingly at this point. I use VideoStudio mainly to make music videos and for simple editing of video that I burn to disk. I bought VS ProX4 mainly because VS10 would not work on Windows 7. Also, VS 10 was becoming more unstable and tended to lock up/free up more frequently on my Windows XP partition.

Compared to VS 10, VS ProX4 is more stable. It has not locked up nor frozen up so far. VS ProX4 has more available tracks and Effects(FXs) to play around with. As for the Transitions, there are some that I prefer in VS10 but other than those few, the Transitions in VS ProX4 are adequate. I inquired via email about importing the Transitions and Effects from VS10 and was told that it was not possible.

I have yet to burn a DVD but I have made 1 music video which I posted on Youtube. Creating and editing the music videos is no different with VS 10 or VS ProX4.

The user manual is not always helpful but the video tutorials both with this product and also on Youtube are very helpful in using VS ProX4. That is a definite plus over VS 10. I prefer the layout and the color of the user interface of the editing screen with VS 10 to that of VS ProX4. I do not like the black background of the interface in VS ProX4 because I find it harder to see things on that editing screen compared to VS 10.

As for customer support, phone support is virtually non-existent. When I initially installed the program, a message popped up indicating there was an update. The update program refused to install itself, and after several attempts I called the customer support number. After being on hold for over 30 minutes, I hung up. I was eventually able to get the update to install but every now and then I still receive that update message even though theVS ProX4 program indicates that I have the most recent update.

I have to say that email customer support is excellent. I asked about importing some transitions from VS 10 and if I could install VS ProX4 on my XP partition which also has my VS 10. The next day I received an email response which completely answered my questions.

Overall, VS ProX4 is an excellent program and improved in those areas that needed it. It is stable and easy enough to use. I have used the free Windows programs for making videos; VS 10 and VS ProX4 are definitely better. Both were easier and offer more options in editing and making videos than their free Windows counterpart.
4523439
If you liked an older version of WordPerfect Office, you'll like X7 with added new features, even better. Of special note are the improved PDF features.
3970994
I've been a pro photographer and studio owner for 30 years.  [...].
This is the most incredible thing I've ever used.  I had their previous (.jpg only) version and it was a novelty. Tried it - and it worked, but not really ready for pro's.

It needed raw support.  The new PRO card (this one) supports RAW and movies. My shots are uploaded to my computer as I shoot them in my studio.  My Canon 1D MKII raw files are about 6.5mb and each one transfers to the computer through the air in 10 seconds.  When I shoot outdoors behind the studio, I do my session shots and when I come in range of the router (network) the outdoor files are then uploaded as well.

Amazing that it fits all this network support in a SD card.  Company is great for addressing/resolving support problems. This item has now been around a while and appears most all the bugs are out.  I'm thrilled.
Ron - [...].
253773
I strongly regret upgrading from X2. In X3, I have to save after every move or I run the risk of the program crashing and losing everything (that's happened several times). The upgrade from X2 doesn't offer much at all and the Organizer goes back to the first photo every time you close the photo you're working on. In X2, it goes back to where you left off. I almost always take upwards of 60 photos every time I go to the lake or woods and it becomes tiresome to have to scroll across all the photos to get to the next photo to work on. When I emailed Corel support, I gave them all of the information: My operating system and verbatim what the error message(s) were when it crashed (says different things, different times). The response I received was "Corel PSP X3 is compatible with Windows 7. See our website for a list of compatible operating systems". Since that didn't even address the issue, I just said "forget it". A few days later received an email that they considered the issue resolved since I didn't follow up with another email. They didn't even act like they were paying attention in the first place, so why bother to keep emailing? I've learned to work "handicapped" with X3 and am waiting for Corel come up with another upgrade to eliminate the issues from their last.
1304076
I used PD10 Ultra first and was happy with the features, although it was a bit sluggish on large videos and had audio sync issues, the overall experience got me away from Sony movie studio platinum.

I decided I wanted to upgrade to the new version since they addressed those issues and had many other features to offer.
I also wanted more audio editing features and color/motion control, so I opted for the Ultimate suite upgrade.
The fact that they added multicam editing feature is a nice bonus as well.

Highly recommend this product and this is a good price.
920224
this version is much improved over the Mk1.. far more intuitive layout and simplified workflow. Some compromises have been made (e.g. defaults to 4 hot-cue points instead of 8) but overall the changes make it a much better and simpler device for deck control