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Difference between Final Cut and Final Cut Academic?
So I just purchased (Aug. 2010) Final Cut Pro 7 Academic Version from my local university bookstore, and I wanted to know what the differences are between the Academic version and the Standard version, besides price. The academic version cost about 60% less than the standard version, but I’m wondering if there are some real reductions in capability or features that will limit what I can do with Final Cut.
One thing I noticed was a sticker that said “Not Eligible for Upgrades”. How important are upgrades? And is this the only limitation, or are their others?
This is my very first Final Cut Pro purchase…I used Final Cut when I worked in the digital media lab at my school but I know nothing about the upgrades because that was always handled by the Technology Services dept.
Any help with this would be greatly appreciated!
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4 Replies
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AFAIK, the ‘no upgrades’ bit is the only difference. If you plan to make a living out of editing after college, then chances are you either won’t have to buy another copy yourself, or can afford to buy the full version.
Keeping up to date with FCP is not important for everybody – professionals and post houses often have to, as they need to keep current so clients can transfer projects, and some editors love to run the latest versions (the clever ones wait until these people shake the bugs out).
Bottom line – the craft of editing changes little, only the ‘bells and whistles’ options alter – you could learn 95% of what you need to know on a copy of FCP1, so take your academic pricing and be content with it!
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Other then not being able to upgrade the ONLY difference is that the software license says that it can ONLY be used for academic purposes. This means that you can use it to learn the software, use it for class projects, or use it for other things associated with school. But you CANNOT use it to make money.
**Hindsight is always 1080p**
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Hi,
When you say no upgrades, you mean that i cant upgrade to FCP 8? or that i cant update FCP 7 also?In other words, would i be able to use apple system update to update my Academic FCP 7?
thank you.
MBP Intel i7, 4gb ram, 500gb.
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Yes – you will receive all point updates to FCP7 with academic. I believe when FCP 4 was made ‘HD’ by release 4.5 (the biggest update I can remember Apple offering by point release) this was also included in Academic.
I seem to remember that Academic used to not include a couple of features like XML export, but that may have changed since Express was released. Why not search on Google or Apple support for a definitive answer.
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