Nik Collection 3 -> 5 worth the upgrade ?

[didier]

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Dear all,

I bought Nik Collection (v3) about a year ago. I use Silver Efex quite a lot as a LR plugin.

Since I moved to macOS Ventura, I find the use of Silver Efex Pro is getting annoyingly slower. Will it work better with the latest version (now DxO sells the v5) ?

Any other improvements with v5 ?

Thanks for sharing your experience.

Didier

[250swb]

I can't vouch for how it works on a Mac but the newer version only has a couple more features and presets, and since DxO got hold of it they keep on introducing annoying bugs. That said I think it is still the best all round package.

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[Ouroboros]

On 12/16/2022 at 9:15 PM, didier said:

Dear all,

I bought Nik Collection (v3) about a year ago. I use Silver Efex quite a lot as a LR plugin.

Since I moved to macOS Ventura, I find the use of Silver Efex Pro is getting annoyingly slower. Will it work better with the latest version (now DxO sells the v5) ?

Any other improvements with v5 ?

Thanks for sharing your experience.

Didier

I don’t know about v3, I was still using the original free Nik Collection until recently when I bought a new iMac running on Ventura. I bought Nik v5 on a DxO Black Friday offer, installed it and it works fine for my purpose, which is mainly confined to SFX & CFX, very occasionally DFine and even less occasionally I add a touch of Viveza.

Whatever the new v5 features are over v3, they might not be too significant as v5 isn’t vastly different from my old original Nik.  The UI is a bit better, though.

I’d try to find out why v3 is slowing down on your Mac first before paying for the upgrade. Might be worth contacting DxO, but I’m sure they’d be happy to advise you to upgrade!

[Le Chef]

Since I’m on the subscription for CFX and SFX I update when a new version is announced. Subjectively they both feel a little faster than before, but the keyword is “subjectively”.

[Luke_Miller]

On 12/16/2022 at 4:15 PM, didier said:

Since I moved to macOS Ventura, I find the use of Silver Efex Pro is getting annoyingly slower. Will it work better with the latest version (now DxO sells the v5) ?

When DXO releases a new version of the NIK Collection not all programs are updated.  I believe Silver Efex Pro is still version 3 in the current release. In my case version 5 has updates to the programs I don't use.  YMMV.

[didier]

I finally got an answer from DxO, and a quite disappointing one : I had to go through tests and send them data from the software I had to install for the test, and 3 weeks later they came back to me… to tell me Nik Collection I bought 1 year ago is not compatible with MacOS Ventura… and they advised me not to upgrade now and wait June because they will release a new version…

[Tom R]

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5 hours ago, didier said:

I finally got an answer from DxO, and a quite disappointing one : I had to go through tests and send them data from the software I had to install for the test, and 3 weeks later they came back to me… to tell me Nik Collection I bought 1 year ago is not compatible with MacOS Ventura… and they advised me not to upgrade now and wait June because they will release a new version…

One would think that DxO would have tested their software against MacOS Ventura as a matter of common practice. Certainly, other software houses post compatibility information on their websites to avoid precisely the situation that the OP has described. (Yes, I am aware that software houses have been using their customers as beta testers from some time now ... .)

I also use their software and have always been reluctant to upgrade unless and until sufficient time has elapsed to expose lurking incompatibilities between versions; but, I don't need a lot from what these plugs are offering. More important than "features" is stability--at least for my workflow.