I have the M&S renewal due here in 6 days. I’m sure others are looking at this as well.
I was completely “under-whelmed” by the 2019 Pro version. As were many; particularly after how long it took to arrive.
I’m curious what others are thinking? Who’s planning to renew? It’s a real question for me - I may just decide to be happy with 2019 for awhile. It’s hard for me to say that the $120 was worth the “upgrade” from 2018 to 2019. I think that money may be more useful being paid to the great plugin developers out there.
On a side note, many of the extensions are “free” and noted so in many places by many people. I do my best to provide at least some compensation to plugin developers for their “free” work. I’d sure like to see the various folks doing great SU and extension vids on YouTube encourage their viewers to visit the Paypal etc pages of those developers. Just my 2 ¢
If you plan to continue to use Sketchup the upgrade is the more economical way to go as you already have the license. While the 2019 release had few improvements, keeping your M&S going will keep you in the loop for further upgrades that may/will come in time. If you don’t and later on decide to opt in when there are future improvements you will have to go the more costly subscription route, or you will otherwise still have the 2018 version for eternity. That’s as far as my understanding goes.
And yes, support for plugin developers is essential, without which SU would not be as viable of a modelling tool.
As their support is due to renew in a few days they will already have a 2019 license. What you say is true, but for them it would the 2019 version they keep using forever.
We just got the invoice for the 2019-2020 period. I have 15 users in my team but many haven’t even bothered to upgrade to 2019 (for various reasons) so we are also considering what to do.
I upgraded with the M&S to get 2019 but haven’t used it, for the additional feature it’s not worth the hassle of updating all the plugins etc…so will wait for next one. I can open 2019 files with Eneroth’s plugin if I have to ( not sure why that feature isn’t native SU).
Being the cynic that I am, I picture something along these lines:
A number of people / firms decide not to renew the M&S for 2020, because of the lackluster 2019 release. Trimble then “decides” (if not already decided) that there isn’t enough demand for the stand-alone desktop version and drops it, citing lack of demand (that they created!). And there you go, you business now uses subscription software! And guess where the annual price of that goes.
Options, options - anybody know anything about FormZ?
I use FormZ and it’s very similar to sketchup but with most of the more complex tools as standard and not plugins. It does support plugins but for most modeling purposes its all there. It is a NURBS modeler and has built in controls for more organic shapes. It takes a bit of getting used to from sketchup, even though it is very much alike in many ways. They have a lot of very good instructional videos, so it would be worth going through them to get a good feel for what it can do. It also has its own renderer built in, and animation.
I’d like to believe your cynicism isn’t true, but it’s a sneaky strategy if it is, although for many people, if they’re smart, would continue with the M&S just in case as its a relatively small price to pay to stay in the game…
But just think, if 2020 has some further improvements that you cant live without it’s going to cost double that! Admittedly you will be in credit 150 for not having spent it this year, plus the following year’s 150, so it would be the same expense, but after that it will be 299/year instead of the 120/year.
I renewed my “maintenance” last year, just because the 3rd skipped year was running out. But i still haven’t upgraded my installation from v2015. If 2020 is (unexpectedly) really worth the upgrade, then you can still renew the plan at release time and you will still be on the plus side (if they are not releasing much earlier this time). And i can say for me, that if they really break their promise and remove the maintenance plan (or increase the price towards subcription level), i’m out anyway. I will not rent my software!
Blender is developing very nicely and very fast (!) and i think i only need the right push to jump the ship. So if they really force me to rent SU, i’m done. It’s already enough that there is no real progress for years now and i think it will be great to switch to some modeler with developers that are really interested in improving their software…
I suppose this is relatively straight forward and depeds on your strategy. If you plan to rely on SU and to use it in future - makes sense to have an active M&S. Just compare different cash-flow scenarios in excel/google sheet to see what works for you.
(have over 50 users, many of them are still on 2018, some on 2017. In my case main srumbling point is not amount of new features in SU2019, but extremely strange difference between Pro and Pro Classic)
Hi Colin, thanks for the quick response. My maintenance is current and in place (expires towards the end of November 2019).
Then I’m a little confused, when going to plans & pricing I get redirected to my local reseller who then charges US $140 excl. VAT (locally 15%) thus coming to a grand total of US $161, a whole $41 (34-odd %) more than the actual price retailing internationally.
I first purchased SketchUp (international version) either at V6 or V7 (many moons ago) and have had maintenance in place since and have always renewed my maintenance & support on the international server. Now I can’t but get redirected and is expected to pay a 34% premium to deal with local reseller?! Honestly, as a long time user I won’t need support (I haven’t in years), and on the off chance that I do chances are that I will find an answer here or at SketchUcation.
So can you hook me up with maintenance renewal at US $120 or not?
The maintenance on SketchUp is less than what most firms charge for 2 hours of drafting time. Maybe it’s just me but when I look at It I see value big time compared to the alternatives.
Yeah, well I’ve always only been charged $120 (or whatever full advertised maintenance used to be at the time) and only ever had to pay that. Still doesn’t explain the extra $20 (excl. taxes)…
Have you reached out to your reseller and asked? Unfortunately, there is not much that Colin, John or I can do directly (none of us are in sales and none of us work directly with your reseller). I would be interested in hearing what your reseller says, though.
