Maya licensing question ...

[stzaske]

Good question.

Actually AW does a POOR job of explaining your options. For such expensive software, you'd expect better customer support.

The documentation continually explains that as a Maya Unlimited user, you can create a Maya License server and run your one copy from multiple machines, but it does not mention if you can do the same thing with Maya Complete.

You'll have to ask AW, but when you do, make sure you ask if you can install Complete as a license server, and how the process works.

Good luck.

[mattwood]

I'm almost certain that floating licenses are no longer available for Maya Complete. Also bear in mind that floating licenses are much more expensive to purchase and to support.

It may still be possible to get Maya licensed with a dongle (for a small extra fee) in which case, multiple installations should be possible.

[somlor]

Thanks for the help guys. Hopefully AW pre-sales will get back to me soon on the latest details.

BTW, stzaske, nice avatar. Hertzfeldt's films are a riot. :D

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[alexx]

it is true, that maya complete does not come with a floating license anymore. (i am certain about that).

the "small" fee for a dongle was 200$ when i asked for one about a year ago. (which would be 10% of maya complete price!)

cheers

alexx

[somlor]

Here is AW's response:


Hello Sean,

You can purchase a Dongle at an extra cost. The software license gets encrypted to this Dongle and will allow you to install on any supported Windows platform. When you purchase software you buy platform specific you cannot switch. If you have any further question please contact me at the number below.


Regards,


I really didn't want to have to firmly decide on a platform.

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[JasonA]

When I asked a sales rep before I bought Complete, he told me the hardware lock (dongle) option cost the same as if you had to relicense your network card -- $150.

What bites is that going the "normal" route, the software gets licensed to your network card. If it ever fails and has to be replaced, you have to re-license which means paying A|W another $150!! frankly I find that very annoying and a cheap way to wring more money out of the customer...

[plotz]

It seems like A|W just doesn't get it. They seem to think all they had to do to increase their market share was lower the price.

They don't seem able to look at what their competition offers.

There are products like Electricimage and Lightwave where you can pay $99 for a dongle that lets you run the software on the platform you choose. I believe Cinema4D and Max forgo the dongle, but allow you to easily transport your license codes to different machines at no charge.

The small companies they need to court in the new 3-D economy look at things like this very carefully.

It's funny that a company that produces such flexible software doesn't have any flexibility when it comes to licensing.

[mattwood]

Relicensing is free if you are on support. Not sure if that works cross-platform though.

[somlor]

It seems strange to me also. It's not like I'm asking for the source code. ;) I just want the freedom to choose which system to run the software I paid good money for. At a company I worked at a couple of years ago I remember seeing the Maya install CD's for NT, Irix and Linux. Not sure if we had the licensing to run on all 3 platforms (we used Irix). But I don't see how complicated it can be to just send two or three extra CD's and arrange a better licensing scheme. I probably wouldn't even complain too much about having to shell out an extra $200-300 bucks for this option. I just can't believe they make this impossible. So if an artist wants to design on win2k and netrender on a linux farm they have to buy two copies of Maya? Uggggh.... :annoyed:

This has seriously swayed my decision.

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[alexx]

Originally posted by somlor
...So if an artist wants to design on win2k and netrender on a linux farm they have to buy two copies of Maya? Uggggh.... :annoyed:
(s)

emm.. NO.

i think here is a small misunderstanding:
if you would install NT and LINUX on one machine (dual boot) you can use them both with the same license information. if it would be possible installing irix and mac os on the same computer it would work as well..
but of course alias wont give you 3 licenses for 3 different computers - they usualy only do that if you pay 3 times :)

concerning the network render:
if you have a valid license on one computer it will server the renderlicenses through the network.. so even a linux or mac os render machine will be able to render!
the thing that wont work is using the maya GUI mode on the other machines.
but that is not true anymore, if you buy an unlimited and have a floating license.. then you can use any machine in the network.

the point i dont understand is why they dont sell complete floating licenses anymore.. that does not make too much sense to me.. maybe because the flexLM license is too expensive for alias themselves - who knows..

hope that helped

cheers

alexx

[somlor]

Thanks for the response alexx. That makes sense. I guess the standard licensing just locks to your ethernet MAC so whatever OS you are using on that machine will verify. But the problem is, I don't think AW is going to send me the Linux,Irix,OSX versions of Maya if I order the win2k one. So the fact that I could do this if I had those versions is kind of moot, right?

Unless they still send you all the disks. Does anyone know?

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[tropistic]

hey alexx - what you said sounds good, and I wish it were true, but having just bought my first license of Maya Complete 4.5 for Windows, I can tell you that a Windows CD is *all* that I got. So while I might be able to run it with the same license on a windows/linux dual boot machine, I don't have the linux install CD. And I betcha A|W would charge me a pretty penny ($2k?) for it too :annoyed:

Jay

[alexx]

damn sorry guys.. i was not aware of that one...
i am stuck with maya 4 since my company is a bit short on money..
but all the CDs that i remembered had irix + nt and i think even the linux renderer on them..

honestly: i would ask your dealer.
i dont think alias will charge you more than the CDs, if you have a dongle or a floating license..
i have a very nice and cooperative reseller on my hand (ok.. of course the reseller is pissed on alias, since they got to know about the radical price drop from a customer who read it in the internet and not from alias).. but nevertheless.. i can ask.

btw.. would it be illegal sending around the CDs from maya??
because then it would be easy sharing different OS versions - as long as one has a valid license that is limited by a dongle or floating license all should be perfect legal - or am i wrong?

cheers

alexx

[-=InQ=-]

Btw, people, it's very interesting topic.

Here in post-soviet countries, we didn't have a proper copyright law for a long time and it's still easy to buy any soft in Russia on the streets and in subways for 3$. But once you want to use software for commercial purpose you must buy a license. So, once i have a 2k$ license for Maya Complete, am I allowed to use pirate CD copy without all these licensing and os-dependent stuff? Who's going to come to my home and check whether I installed Maya from A|W CD? I'll show my license to client and A|W support team and everyone will be happy, willn't they?

[BrainFaucet]

I believe it would be legal to trade the CDs for different OSes (maybe even download them :surprised ) When you buy Maya you are buying the liscense (right?)

But A|W would probably prefer that you pay two or three times.

May want to email A|W about this. I was about to ask this same question as I have a Win/Linux dual boot and have almost saved enough to purchase Maya Complete. :applause:

[somlor]

So if I buy Maya Complete with the dongle, and can manage to get install CD's for Linux and OSX, what do you think the chances are of it working if I just stick the dongle on my Linux box or Mac laptop and fire up Maya?

And is this legal?

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[beaker]

As of maya 4.03, maya doesnt check for a license in command line renders.

>>So if I buy Maya Complete with the dongle, and can manage to get install CD's for Linux and OSX, what do you think the chances are of it working if I just stick the dongle on my Linux box or Mac laptop and fire up Maya?

I don't believe so because the license atleast in the past has been keyed to a specific operating system(says linux or sgi or nt in the lic). Shake is the only app out there that I know of that they gives you a floating license that can float to any platform.

[Modulok]

When I bought Maya 4.5 Unlimited they only gave me the win2k CD, no Linux or Irix Cd's I asked my rep about where the other CD's are because in the manual it says

The Maya shipment includes CDs for all products and operating systems. You must select the appropriate CDs for your purchase and Operating system.

One would think that this means that you get all CDs for all OSs...but unfortunately that isn't the case. In order to get the Linux or Irix CDs you have to shell out another $7k or so...I think A|W software is kick ass...but their customer support and license thing sucks a big one :thumbsdow

Just my 2cents
-Modulok-

[beaker]

>> In order to get the Linux or Irix CDs you have to shell out another $7k or so...I think A|W software is kick ass...but their customer support and license thing sucks a big one

If you just want to cross upgrade to another operating system it used to be 1k. No idea how much it costs these days.

Just curious, what other company other there in the graphics field actually gives you the cd's for all versions of the software on all operatings systems? Adobe doesnt, Macromedia doesnt, neither does Sidefx, Softimage or any others I know of. One exception would be Lightwave, it comes with cd's for both mac and pc and allows you to run on both, but Lightwave also runs on Sun, SGI(used too), Alpha and they never included the cd's for all those operating systems. Shake would be the other exception because thier license will drive the install for all operating systems.

So in conclusion, does that mean that All the lincenses for all software suck ass?

[plotz]

You wouldn't be able to run Maya on Mac or Linux with the dongle, as it only works under windows. At least that's what I've been told.

I think one of A|W's problems is that they went into their new mass market strategy without doing as much research on the market needs as they should have.

Any more someone purchasing a piece of 3D software is looking for several things A|W isn't offering:

- Free cross-platform rendering.
- License portability between multiple computers.
- Printed Manuals

Maybe they're working on this for Maya 5.

[Modulok]

@Beaker - Perhaps your right, it may not be in the "suck ass" catagory, I don't think its gotton quite that bad, but as plotz says

- Free cross-platform rendering.
- License portability between multiple computers.
- Printed Manuals

would be nice :beer:

I stand corrected
-Modulok-

[beaker]

>>- Free cross-platform rendering.

As I said earlier, the command line renderer doesnt need a license on any operating system. So it is free cross platform. What we haven't found out is how much a/w charges to get the media for the other operating systems. Another option is to just download the updates when a/w posts them on their site. They posted the full versions for download on their site when 4.01/4.02 came out.

>>- Printed Manuals

A/w used to ship full manuals with every license up untill maya 3.0, but got rid of shipping them standard. The html and pdf manuals are exactly the same as the printed ones. Most people at work werent even using the printed ones anymore, only the html docs. Anyways, you can request a copy of the printed books from a/w(don't know if it costs anything for them these days).

[Modulok]

That was fast! Beaker, do you live here? :p

[plotz]

Let's say you have the software installed on all the machines (Linux, OSX, and Windows) would all three platforms actually work together? (Not in a position to try it.)

On the manual situation it would be nice if they would at least include, or make available, the printed version of the Maya Basics "Essentials". This is one book people should be able to take home and read. (Read on the train home, etc.)

I've still got the slew of manuals that came with 2.0 when I bought it...and truthfully there's not much difference at all in the "using" guides. I don't mind those being PDF's.

[alexx]

Originally posted by beaker
>>>>- Printed Manuals

A/w used to ship full manuals with every license up untill maya 3.0, but got rid of shipping them standard. The html and pdf manuals are exactly the same as the printed ones. Most people at work werent even using the printed ones anymore, only the html docs. Anyways, you can request a copy of the printed books from a/w(don't know if it costs anything for them these days).

afaik it was for free before the price drop.. but what i feel it should still be free, since you pay for it (more or less :)

maybe we should someone from alias get to read this thread.. they could help a lt i think.
has anyone a valid support contract and can contact anyone?
not me unfortunately :(

would be kick ass

:beer:

alexx

[plotz]

At the very LEAST they should create non-password protected PDF files that can actually be printed!

My advice to Alias (like they listen:(

Include the following in printed manual form:

- Maya Basics (Essentials)
- Instant Maya

Leave these for PDFS:

- What's new in version x.x (Why the hell do they prints something that's only good for 1 version?)

- Using Maya Guides (Modeling, Animating, etc.)

This, at least, would allow someone to cuddle up with the most important manual whereverthey want. The other stuff is basically something you'd search for a specific thing in anyway.

[somlor]

I wrote a follow up to AW sales about at the very least rendering cross platform. Here is their response in case anyone is interested:


Hey Sean,

your only option is to purchase a Maya Unlimited Floating license which allows you to render cross platforms. but still the software must sit on a platform specific server. you can float Maya to different all supported platforms.

regards
Nelson


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