Do I need (or want) FCP X?

[dearcatastrophe]

i don't know if avid cares. they make quite a good deal of money from unity users, and it's a trickle down. if they have a big unity system, they are going to have a good number of MC or symphony seats, and between support and upgrade costs, they do pretty well.
they tried to please the indy community a few years back with the free version of they offered, scaled back and free.

i don't agree with you about a one stop shop. while, yes, vegas is a great solution since it offers good integration of audio and video, it took adobe up to this year to finally put audition into the mix for indies.
even most indy production still has separate audio post. i can't answer for wedding people, since they are even smaller and usually one person, but i'm not a big fan of total integration of audio and video. i think a good package should do one thing and do it well, and then work in hand with an audio software that does it well as well. vegas is a fluke in that department, i know a few people that use it instead of sound forge for audio production, which is awesome.

avid needs to rebrand pinnacle studio as avid media something, since they do love to rebrand, and find new love for it. i still have my pinnacle studio 8 disks laying around. i think ps8 was the pinnacle (pun intended) of that software.
the only problem is people outside of the video and film industry have no idea who avid is. sure, they have the inside well lubed, but outside of that, no one cares.

[Bob Sanders]

it took adobe up to this year to finally put audition into the mix for indies.

It's not even the REAL Adobe Audition. I have AA3 (not the CS version but the real one sold separately) and the CS version is a bit stripped down. Granted it's got all you'll need for audio production in the video field... but the REAL AA comes with things like 5.1 surround panner for WMA output, and quite a few more filters.

You're probably correct..... the difference here lies with Vegas. I can operate it as a video editor or a completely independent audio editor. And again correct.... there are quite a few pros out there who use Vegas strictly as an audio editor. I know Rod Stewart band uses it... YES did their 5.1 Album in Vegas..... so maybe it's just me... but I can't see the sense in a separate audio editor if it's not required.... and Vegas makes it easy in that department.

[blondandfun]

If you want to see a joke check out DVD Architect. The "menu buttons" look like something straight out of the 90's. Sony Vegas is great, but for authoring dvd's go down to your local corner shop and any number of consumer products are better than dvd architect's so called "professional" offering.