I was just about to purchase Dorico and thought I would check out the forum first, I must say I’m glad I did…Not one person has anything good to say about it, Im glad I checked this forum - I won’t be buying it. If a garage was trying to sell you a car as a good runner’ but it has no engine and no wheels would you still buy it?
It sounds like a bad beta trial (gone wrong). I would expect software of this price not only to work but to have features on it similar to Sibelius etc…
I think you’re being a little unfair, Andy. Don’t forget that in general people are much more vocal about problems they are having rather than when everything is fine, so a forum like this in the days following a release will always skew towards showing the people who are having a bad experience. There are certainly plenty of people on the forum who are having problems, and we are working hard to figure out how to solve those problems, but there are already hundreds of other people using Dorico and not having these kinds of major issues, but they don’t post here because they’re off composing!
That said, of course I respect your decision not to buy into Dorico at this time. The team continues to work very hard on the software and I suggest you stay in touch with our progress to decide when you are comfortable with hopping on board.
I am often required to do ‘lead sheets’ for pop songs etc… (for guitarists etc) will this be possible in Dorico?
To be honest, I don’t think I am being unfair when the price asked for this software is well over £400.
It is brand new software, actually hot, you can burn yourself by using it 
But, seriously, this is the initial release and Daniel communicated from early on that a lot of features will be available later on. So don’t know why a lot of people are surprised (and even worse, just buying something without knowing what they are going to buy).
If you considered buying it but not sure anymore, come back later in a month or so when the first update is available.
By then it should be easier to decide.
I’ve seen many positive comments on this forum.
I think that I, like many others, expected Dorico to be just like Sibelius. After all it’s basically the same programmers creating it.
However it’s very different, but once you allow your self to become accustomed to the differences you will find that Dorico is able to achieve far more in almost every aspect than Sibelius can.
Admittedly there are still gaps in functionality, but these will quickly be filled, and I’m convinced that Dorico will emerge as the world beater it sets out to be.
But inevitably as programs have more settings and controls they will be harder to learn in the first instance, because there are so many things that they can do once you’ve worked out how.
Compare Sibelius 1.0 (I bought it) with Sibelius 8 and the latter is far harder to get to grips with because of all its functionality and enhancements.
Stick with Dorico. Very, very soon you won’t regret it.
I am often required to do ‘lead sheets’ for pop songs etc… (for guitarists etc) will this be possible in Dorico? To be honest, I don’t think I am being unfair when the price asked for this software is well over £400.
The main feature you will be missing for lead sheets is chord symbols, which Dorico doesn’t yet have. However, if you really only need notation software to produce lead sheets, then Dorico is probably not the best product for you to buy anyway, as you can use any one of many other less expensive programs to produce lead sheets. Dorico will absolutely be capable of producing excellent lead sheets once we have added chord symbols, but it is probably overkill for your needs.
I have good things to say about it – I think it’s going to be a great piece of notation software but since it is only version 1.0 it is still in its infancy and is lacking a lot which the developers are currently working on. That’s the same with every piece of software in its 1.0 release. The problem for many people is that they’ve never owned a piece of version 1.0 software before and so had no idea of what they were really buying.
Messages on any developer’s forum are always heavily loaded with complaint posts – the satisfied people are busy using the software and aren’t complaining about things. Read the official Sibelius and Finale and Notion forums and you’ll find lots of complaints and “I can’t believe the program won’t . . .” messages, yet many thousands of people around the world are getting great results from those programs every day.
It’s been decades since there was a Sibelius version 1.0 or a Finale version 1.0 and the people who are currently using Sibelius and Finale expect to simply step over to Dorico 1.0 and find exactly the same functionality but with a different workflow, and that’s just not possible.
Daniel has constantly made it clear what is and what is not included in this initial release of Dorico, so anybody who is complaining about things not being implemented yet shouldn’t be surprised by what’s not there. And given Daniel’s history when he was head of development at Sibelius I have every confidence that the updates which will continually add the missing features and functionality will be coming regularly in the months to come.
I purchased Dorico in full knowledge of what was lacking and I knew that I would not be using it for any major projects for quite a while – I’ve already got Sibelius and Finale for those so I’m not worried in the least. My ability to produce completed projects for myself or for clients is not diminished in any way by what Dorico may be lacking.
The crashes that people are reporting are frustrating for them, and if you read the responses from the Dorico team members they are being attended to as quickly as possible. It’s simply not possible for any software developer to test a new product on every conceivable combination of hardware, operating system and concurrently running software. Every user of every piece of software is in effect a beta-tester and always has been and always will be, since every user has a unique combination of hardware and software.
So don’t avoid Dorico because of complaints you read here – buy it or don’t based on your reaction to the potential of the software and your confidence in the development team. My point of view is that Dorico is a product which offers great promise. I remember when I started with Finale (version 3.5) the program got it’s printing data from the video card so if the video card driver wasn’t up to date, the printing was messed up. I remember when I started with Sibelius (version 2.11 for Windows) playback couldn’t handle D.S. or D.C. Those issues and many many more were eventually cleared up as each of those programs continued their development to the point where now they are very mature programs. It’s pointless to compare Dorico 1.0 with Finale 25 or Sibelius 7 (or 8).
I just thought I would add a more positive viewpoint – I really like what I’ve seen so far in Dorico (admittedly I haven’t spent nearly as much time with it so far as I plan to in the coming weeks) and I’m confident that what is currently lacking will be attended to and improved in the coming months and years.
I think it is unfair just to judge based on what you read here.
I would download the demo as soon as it is available, then give it a try and then judge.
I was a bit shocked to learn how many things aren’t yet implemented, but slowly I am learning that this official release is like a small kid that needs to be fed and educated.
Yes, Steinberg should have told us about everything that is missing before we buy it, they called it the gold standard, one of the reasons why I hit the pay button.
Well, things go wrong sometimes, but I will wait patiently because I see how passionate and eager the team is to make this a game changer.It will be, hopefully soon.
One of the main problems here (IMHO) is not the lack of capabilities (we was more or less aware of that), or the crashes (to be fair I never got a crash in Dorico, for me it appears rock solid). One of the main problems is that the system is very slow, even with tiny projects, so it seems impossible to work with professional orchestral scores.
It is VERY difficult for me to believe that there is someone out there able to work with an orchestral score and that he is not incredibly frustrated experiencing speed problems. I know that this survey is not very large but I’ve talked with 2 friends that bought Dorico, and they are experiencing the same slowness.
So, Daniel, I may be wrong, but I’m convinced that there isn’t ANYONE out there composing with Dorico a medium-large score (unless he has a 64-core machine and 256gb ram or something like that). Hopefully I’m wrong and this speed problem happens only to a few people. But until I watch in youtube some user using it with a large score, I simply can’t believe that it is possible right now. Let’s wait until the first patch and we’ll see…
Said that, I really would love someone slap in my face and show me that he’s working in a large orchestral score smoothly with Dorico. That would mean that the problem is not that bad.
Haste makes waste.
The point made in a hurry, not always successful, often the results of its cause laughter.
I just loaded a rather large (romantic orchestra) into Dorico (score through xml) and it works without any issues, well playback is awful, but I just wanted to test it.I am on a 32GB Ram machine, 8 cores and many open apps( audio).Well, it doesn’t respond very fast in general, but this doesn’t depend on the size of the score.
I am working on a large orchestral score at the moment and have already reached bar 178.
Well i guess i am a minority here,i am a Steinberg addict and waited patiently for the company to release a professional scoring program (i do all my scoring in Cubase)…I am a musician/composer i don’t do heavy scoring.So i bought Dorico cross-grading from Notion.
Let’s be honest:Dorico is full of potential but not mature yet.I can’t understand why they released it with such a high price tag and make people rightly complain now.Let’s only hope bugs get ironed and missing basic features get implemented soon without asking us (early adopters) to pay again.Also a detailed manual and more tutorials are needed.
As a Cubase Pro user i hope for Dorico’s close integration with Cubase or a smoother understanding between the two programs of midi and xml files…
Well, as I said, slap in my face. I’m glad that there is people able to use it for large projects. Hopefully the problems then will be fixed soon.
I purchased this product understanding there will issues , so i took advantage to cross grade, now just to wait till the bugs and improvements are fixed, the layout i like and the ease of use, so while the fixes are happening i still have other notation programs to fall onto, costly yes but at the end still a purchase,
and by the way your statement of being unfair urks me it’s a business its about the product , which you must admit Dorico has issues, so when you purchase an umbrella with holes can’t be happy
in conclusion its a fresh start which will be a strong notation also if a manual was provided maybe less issues posted as mine with the midi issue, I had no idea how to fix until i was told
What I want to tell anyone who does not know how long it takes to develop good music software: be patient! 25 years ago I startet with an Atari of 4MB RAM and 40 MB HD (I payed 2000 Euro!) and I used the first notation programs and also Cubase and Notator! It was horrible, believe me!! But I was one of those who gave his money more for the development than for a perfect ready product.
So I was waiting for a software like Dorico my whole composers life and what I can say about it is that finally my dreams will come true - thank You Daniel!
Everybody knows that there are still many tasks on the whiteboard but: the way Doric “thinks” is perfect for me. I switched programs several time and I used two of the most well known programs for huge orchestral scores and one that is for free now I use for teaching. I can tell You that these programs are ready and they fulfill perfectly what they promise - everybody just has to find out what is right for her/him.
For me it is really simple: I want to start a composition for real instruments/ensemble/orchestra, be able to play it back in VEPro with the wonderful collection of sample Libraries I have and finally print a perfect score that looks as beautiful as possible and if someone wants a mockup - I want to “print” it too, perfectly sound-designed. This will be Dorico for me - if You only want to notate lead sheets I would recommend to write it down with a nice pencil on a piece of paper. 
I think that’s a bit harsh. But seriously, if you only want to make simple lead sheets, free software like MuseScore will probably do everything you need.
The UI and workflow of this software are nothing short of revolutionary. Like many buyers, I jumped in with eyes wide opened as they were very transparent about what would be missing. I took a day off to familiarise myself and yes, I am already working on professional work with it. I know what it can handle and what it can’t, and I know that the latter will decrease as the former increases. No one is forced to buy, but one has to be careful not to jump to negative conclusions upon the release of a 1.0 piece of highly complex software built on a million lines of fresh code. The user base will keep engaging with the dev team. They’re good at listening.
I did not mean it ironically - I know it would be faster and beautiful to write it down…and Your recommendation with the free product is also a fine possibility.