Max 2011 vs. 2012 ?

Eric Chadwick · Dec 2011

Our studio is at the right place in our schedule to upgrade Max. We've been using 2009, but we need at least 2010 so we can use the latest FBX (2009 iasn't supported any more).

I'm curious about others' experiences with the latest release. 2012 is on its 2nd service pack... does it seem fairly solid, or is it worse than 2011? Any major bugs? Any popular third-party tools that don't run in 2012?

Thanks for any input!

Oniram · Dec 2011

i use 2011 at work.. 2012 at home. i cant stand 2011.. i never used it too much aside from at work, before i just stuck with 2010 for personal use. my big issue with it was the caddy option box which just jumps around the screen all the time. and still there were some minor hickups causing crashes (the infamous undo crash).

when 2012 came out it felt so much better. ive become accustomed to the caddy option box (even though scrolling is a nightmare), and the addition of nitrous is amazing! some really cool new graphite tools for retop as well. i never did have any graphics issues as some people have claimed in 2012.. only small thing i did notice is when i switched my monitor from DVI to VGA input (needed dvi slot for ps3. XD ) i did get some small flickering on the viewcube.. but i just turned it off so its fine.

id definitely say 2012 is the way to go.

Eric Chadwick · Dec 2011

This is helpful, thanks!

Will Faucher · Dec 2011

The only thing that bugs me quite a lot is the darn caddy, which is why I stuck with 2009 for so long. I cannot get used to the new caddy. There was nothing wrong with the old one and it worked better, not to mention the fact that it wasn't transparent, so I never had a hard time finding it. Sometimes the new caddy just jumps around, and you never know where the heck it is.

Apart from that, 2012 is great.

mLichy · Dec 2011

2012 is MUCH faster for many objects in the scene vs. 2010-2011. I didn't think it was that big of a difference, but after testing a script I made creating/deleting many objects rapidly, it was a huge difference, like 2-3x faster if not more sometimes.

divi · Dec 2011

2012 is 2011 in stable. i dont think ive had it crash on me even once and it can handle a lot more polies. if you have to pick one of the 2 then definitely 2012.

cptSwing · Dec 2011

yeah, a properly patched up 2012 is nice to work with (discounting that you'll need to switch off nitrous to use proper realtime viewport display).

megalmn2000 · Dec 2011

2012 is good for viewport performance since it's multi-thread.
Only problem, it's about DirectX shaders, they don't work well with Nitrous (new viewport engine). So Xoliul & 3Point doesn't work well for me. Anyways, some good new tools with the graphite modeling tool.

Rick Stirling · Dec 2011

2012 for me. The nitrous viewport alone is worth the upgrade for NON shader related work.

Mio · Dec 2011

i rather like to stay with max 2009

if have to make a pick from 2011 and 2012...

2012 is the one

Crash · Dec 2011

2011 is a pos. I use it at work every day and its the buggiest pos max ever.

Billabong · Dec 2011

The viewport in 2012 works great, but the unwrap editor has gone to go hell in a handbasket. Very sluggish.

Rick Stirling · Dec 2011

Billabong - have you had the service packs? They fixed the UV issues as I recall.

Billabong · Dec 2011

Rick Stirling wrote: »

Billabong - have you had the service packs? They fixed the UV issues as I recall.

Yep and I have turned off Aero, but still no luck, also this isn't just me that still has this problem, there are quite a few other people that are still getting it as well.

Mark Dygert · Dec 2011

2012 all the way, now that they've fixed all of the major bugs like the UVW editor lagging out.
Like everyone else, I really like nitrous and I love the retopo tools PhysX is pretty awesome too and is set up in a way to actually help game artists instead of past physics systems (looking at you reactor).

However there are still things that need to be worked on (graph editors) and it needs some feature upgrades (uv editor as a mode not a modifier) but for the most part its the best version of max yet. I really wouldn't want to take a step back and use 2011 unless I really had to.

tekmatic · Dec 2011

This is really good feedback as am debating to get the educational license of Max 2012.

Does anyone here use it and if so, do you get a banner inserted in your renders? I read somewhere that the educational version (3 year license) does that.....:poly122:

cptSwing · Dec 2011

UV as a mode.. oh yes please. that was the single hardest thing to get used to coming from softimage.

Billabong: Have you tried disabling 'auto update viewport' (or something to that effect) in the UV preferences?

tekmatic: no banners as far as i know

Eric Chadwick · Dec 2011

tekmatic wrote: »

do you get a banner inserted in your renders?

Apparently not
http://area.autodesk.com/forum/autodesk-3ds-max/autodesk-3ds-max--3ds-max-design-2010/max-2010-water-mark-on-education-version

SpeCter · Dec 2011

I have bought the Student Version of 2010(Max,Maya,XSI and so on) and the downloadable ones of 2012 you can get at students.autodesk neither has watermarks.

Max 2011 vs. 2012 ?

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