Snapz Pro X for Mac

1.0 stars

"Agree with all the Cons everybody has listed"

October 21, 2011  |   By bartbrown

Version: Snapz Pro X 2.3.2

Pros

It looks nice

Cons

Have come to expect MUCH better from Ambrosia -- maybe this is the beginning of their slide into the vapor. Static screen grab no better than Command-Shift-3 or Grab; streaming video buggy, incredibly lossy, dark, prone to crash; Flash grabs (like YouTube) just as bad, and not even remotely in the same league of even so simple and inexpensive a program as ClipGrab (or Screenium).

CUSTOMER SERVICE: Simply the worst, and it used to be be very good. My guess is that over many years and many apps, Ambrosia has built up a core following of people who think anything with the Ambrosia label HAS to be good, they'll DL an Ambrosia app, and put its poor performance and bugginess down to their OWN ineptness, or their System's. Ambrosia's now coasting on their past reputation -- and I do mean "Past" -- they put out updates no better than the hogwash they're updating, and charge up the wazoo and/or make the update process so onerous you'd rather hang yourself than suffer through it.

Summary

How anybody thinks this turkey rates nearly 4 stars -- let alone 5! -- is beyond me. Streaming video capture is my main need, and there are dozens of other apps that do it FAR better than SnapzPro (in fact, SnapzPro hardly does it at all, except in the most rudimentary and low-res way), at a FAR lower price, or free, that I don't know why anyone would put up with this insult to everyone's intelligence and buying perspicacity.

It's not like Ambrosia's not capable: WireTap Studio is a very good product, to which I was able to upgrade at a fairly reasonable price, back when there were TWO WireTaps: the lesser (and less expensive) WireTap and the more capable (and MORE expensive) WireTap Pro, so if you just wanted to do casual stuff, you could go with regular WireTap. It is my very strong conviction that once Ambrosia got people hooked on WireTap, They then contrived to provide only ONE update path: WireTap Studio. Now, however, WireTap Studio is $70.00. It's worth it to me, but the "casual" user is left with the "old" regular WireTap, which, like most Mac Apps, will become less and less able to handle regular OS X updates, let alone whole new environments like Lion.

And again, like many "shot-in-the-dark" companies, when Ambrosia was making its reputation putting out simple products -- God, Maelstrom's been around since the US had a budget surplus -- at reasonable prices, their Customer Support would practically send someone to your house to help you out.

No more.

Ambrosia apparently thinks it's hit the Adobe-level big time, and figure they no longer have to give a rat's about customer problems with their -- in this case, especially -- very flawed product. Pride goeth before a fall, and I think Ambrosia is about due for one... SnapzProX will go a long way towards insuring that fall will be rapid and painful. I believe their management REALLY needs to do some soul-searching.

Hmmmm.... maybe that's it: maybe Ambrosia's under new, predatory management. It certainly SEEMS like an entirely different company, in every bad way possible, than what it used to be.

Pity.

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1.0 stars

"BAD BAD BAD"

October 17, 2011  |   By PC_Magazin

Version: Snapz Pro X 2.3.1

Pros

their advertisment...it really makes you believe it is a great app

Cons

the screen video grab loss is massif in their so called proprietary compression. i wonder if they ever actually tried it themselves

go and play back 4 little windows of quicktime movies at the same time, and do a screen-grab of those 4 windows....you will see ,even at the best settings (4444 codec) their screen-grab loss is 50% from the 100% showing (when you play back all 4 quicktime movies at the same time).
and it doesn't matter how big or small these 4 quicktime windows are when you play them back,....hence my graphic card has no play in this like they like to claim, but only their programming decision to compress at the capture moment already with a 50% loss factor.

so if you are in for some movie grabbing,....it will be a disappointment like nothing before

on top of it their export will darken your footage by about 1.5 stops...thats massif

i used quicktime 7 and the new 10.0 (131) as well.... both show clearly gamma changes up to 1.5 stops darker...

Summary

there is free quicktime 10 screen grabbing (under File-> new screenrecording) , and it much better than this very expensive app

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1.0 stars

"Too expensive $$$"

April 17, 2011  |   By msoucie

Version: Snapz Pro X 2.2.3

Pros

looks great, simplistic and easy to use

Cons

absolutely hated the registration process - this was the clincher for me...the idea that I need to renew the password (and over and over again in perpetuity) even after buying the software left me cold.

Summary

avoid, there are other choices out there like Screenium for less than half the price.

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3.0 stars

"Sound so expensive"

February 22, 2011  |   By shark_sprite

Version: Snapz Pro X 2.2.3

Pros

Try dawnark screen recorder. the capture function is free.

Cons

too expensive indeed

Summary

Try Dawnark Screen Recorder both windows and Mac can found at dawnark.com. The capture function is free. And a registered one is not too expensive

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2.0 stars

"Not outstanding from other similar software"

January 4, 2011  |   By pitiwong

Version: Snapz Pro X 2.2.3

Pros

user interface is clear enough to understand at once

Cons

I can't use it effectively on Mac, don't feel any advantage over other similar software.
I partly blame my mac for it's lack of flash support

Summary

Not a bad software, but don't see any great benefit. use your judgment,
in fact I think DownloadHelper add-on in Firefox seem more easily-to-the-point.

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1.0 stars

"Good program, lousy customer relations. Program stops"

September 13, 2010  |   By rives3

Version: Snapz Pro X 2.2.3

Pros

Snap-Z pro works fine, except for the way Ambrosia protects their product by having automatic renewals of your purchase code. When the code expires, for no apparent reason, you have to have it renewed by Ambrosia, who is closed on weekends. Dead.

Cons

Ambrosia's automatic code renewal does not work seamlessly. When Snap-Z expires, which it will after some time with no notice, you have to get the code renewed by Ambrosia, supposedly automatically, but it doesn't work that way.

Summary

There is no way to contact Ambrosia on the weekend for technical support if their code expires for this program. Purchasing the program does not mean that you have full use of the program. It means that you have use of the program until it expires, with no notice, and have to have your purchase code renewed. This happened to me on a Friday night when I wanted to make a Skype call and record it, Snap-Z decided at that moment to expire. I was asked to automatically renew it, which I did, and Snap-Z Pro still did not have any functionality. No amount of trying to revive the programs, including updates and reinstalls, brought it back to functionality. Ambrosia values the money they get for their program more than customer convenience. I would not recommend this program to anyone who is considering using it in any professional way, as it is not dependable for this type of use. This is the third problem I have had with Snap-Z Pro. My last issue was when I was recording another Skype call, and the hard drive filled up while recording the session. Evidently I closed the file too late. Even though the video was visible when saving the file to disc (I tried several times with back-up copies of the file) I was unable to capture it because the file was not closed in time. I called Ambrosia, and was told that there was nothing I could do to recover the file, even when I told them that I could view the file in low resolution during the save. Supposedly they have fixed this problem with the latest update, but I have to say that it is beginning to be too little, too late from Ambrosia with this program. If they would just think out what they are doing in terms of the customer's use of the program rather than throwing some code at the wall to see if it sticks, they might create a good usable program. Instead they charge customers to do their beta testing on a program that they say is out of beta. Before purchasing this program, I recommend that you demand that the automatic update of purchase code feature be turned off. If Ambrosia won't or can't do this, I don't recommend a purchase of this program, as it will fail you.

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4.0 stars

"Reliable utility"

May 5, 2010  |   By mekbus

Version: Snapz Pro X 2.2.2

Pros

Easy to use

Cons

None so far.....

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4.0 stars

"Great for capturing short movies"

December 19, 2009  |   By tfrohl

Version: Snapz Pro X 2.2.1

Pros

Often the only way to capture video for other (legal) uses

Cons

Files are too large (would be great to have alternative kinds of files that take up less room) and it is hard to just get a screen for preferences for example. Would be nice if it showed up in the dock.

Summary

I use it a lot and like it but wish it were even easier and that its files did not clutter my hard drive. Still, overall, a good program and worth the money.

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2.0 stars

"Too expensive and little more than Apple's default"

December 12, 2009  |   By Eerk

Version: Snapz Pro X 2.2.2

Pros

Snapz Pro does what it promises: making snapshots. If you pay for the movie option it makes easy work of creating instruction videos.

Cons

The product has not seen any major improvement in years. No way of taking a timed screenshot, a request made by users as early as its OS 9 version...

Summary

Years back, when I bought my first version of Snapz, it was a real life saver when creating manuals and picking just that screen portion needed for an e-mail. But it's 2009 and Ambrosia has not taking any steps to improve on the original premise of it's product in years. The only reason to fire it up now, is making a screen movie, which it does without problems. Apart from this option there is no real reason to buy it anymore since Apple upgraded it's out of the box screenshot option significantly.

I would like to suggest Ambrosia to take a good look at the competition or retire Snapz as a far cheaper bargain box utility.

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