To purchase or wait

**Michael Clease** · 05-02-2010, 01:53

I was wondering if its worth purchasing version 9 at the moment or waiting probably about 6-9 months until version 10 (my best guess looking at release periods).

I prefer the TB syntax very flexible and easly understood but the pure speed of PB is the main draw, even if I do purchase it I will still probably write my programs in TB then convert to PB for speed ( no offence Eros )

I know I can get PB 9 for approx £95 which is reasonable but not if I have to pay another £62 within a year.

I am posting here because I trust answers that will come from the people on this forum rather PB where I am not registered.

Perhaps if Bob reads this he can also answer.

Mike

**danbaron** · 05-02-2010, 05:46

You could also do this.

"Classic PowerBASIC" (PB for Windows Version 8 ), is now, $49 (£31).

You could buy it now, then, you could buy PB 10 when it comes out.

£95 plus £31, is better than, £95 plus £62.

I don't think there can be much of a speed difference between PB 8 and PB 9.

(I don't know how you can get PB 9 for £95 ($149). On the web site, the price is £126 ($199). And, the upgrade price from PB 8, is £63 ($99). If true, then, PB 9, now, plus PB 10, later this year, might equal, £126 plus £63. PB 8, now, plus, PB 10, later this year, might equal, £31 plus £126. (However, PB 10 may be priced at $250 (£159), who knows? In that case, PB 9, now, plus PB 10, later this year, might equal, £126 plus £79. PB 8, now, plus, PB 10, later this year, might equal, £31 plus £159.))

In the other hand, if you just wait for PB 10, you will probably pay, £126 - £159, total.

Dan

**Petr Schreiber** · 05-02-2010, 09:40

Hi Michael,

for me, the PB9 was really important release, as it introduced lot of comfort:

+=, -=, *=, /=, and its friends
This makes writing code more speedy, little detail, but makes difference.

assembler has SSE opcodes
No need for hacks to get this working.

#ALIGN for optimizations
Easy to use, the performance gain in my current programs is observable, not shocking, but usually brings improvement.

GLOBALMEM functions (alloc/realloc/size/free/...)
Could be substitued with Win32 of course, I do not use it very much, because they are made like statements, not as functions.

DDT has lot of commands
Could be substitued with Win32 of course, I do not use it very much, as 90% of my coding currently is OpenGL and OpenCL.

Object oriented programming
If you have no previous OOP experience, it is very nice. If you come from C# or C++, you might feel limited.
This is due to fact the OOP is tightly COM related. It took me long time to get used to it, but now I use it quite happily.

If you do not need any of the listed, you can purchase the "Classic".

I personaly do not go back to PB8 since then, the thing is José Rocas headers are created for PB9 currently, so I have more comfort with it.

But both compilers are very nice.

Hard to say when PB10 will come out, currently I have not much ideas where it could be expanded.
If it would bring full OOP, I would wait for it. In other case I would get 8 or 9, based on the necessity of features I listed above.

Petr

**Michael Clease** · 05-02-2010, 10:55

@Dan

Classic £31 ($49)
Upgrade £63 ($99)
= £94 ($14

I will probably order this today.

**Petr Schreiber** · 05-02-2010, 14:17

Hi Mike,

if I get correctly the info here: https://www.powerbasic.com/shop/

$99 is for upgrade when you go from version n-1 to n (8->9).

$129 seems to be the price for upgrade from n-2 or older to n (7->9).

Once 10 will be out, you would perform upgrade 8->10, so I presume this would cost $129.
... and it might be completely different, as 8 is now sold as Classic. Better to email the guys at sales.

Petr

**ErosOlmi** · 05-02-2010, 22:46

Michael,

differences from 8.x and 9.x are very very substantial.
It is not a matter of speed, all Power Basic compilers are famous for producing very optimized code.
As Petr already listed, PB9 has introduced a huge number of functionalities and especially it has introduced OOP.

I'm a fan of PB compilers so I'm not the perfect person to reply but in my opinion PB9 is worth all the money.

In any case, if you didn't already checked, check PB9 online help at http://www.powerbasic.com/support/help/pbwin/index.htm
and check under "Programming references\Objects and COM programming" for PB OOP.

Ciao
Eros

**Michael Clease** · 06-02-2010, 02:08

Thanks for our reply guys.

I purchased PB8 classic and upgrade earlier today but have downloaded yet (been out celebrating the birth of a friends new child, better stop there drink and typing dont mix

).

Its a shame Bob didnt reply even thought I saw he read this thread, but perhaps he is busy.