Maintenance Fee increase

[MIL-TFP-41]

Can I ask the folks here how much annual maintenance for MC is? (I don't use MC; I'm using TopSolid).

All depends on what products you are using. Rough numbers....maintenance on Mill 3D is north of $2000. Multiaxis adds another $1000. Mill-Turn, another $1000. Products like Mill or Wire or Lathe would be less.

Losing a multi-seat discount is gonna hurt, bad.

[Brian]

All depends on what products you are using. Rough numbers....maintenance on Mill 3D is north of $2000. Multiaxis adds another $1000. Mill-Turn, another $1000. Products like Mill or Wire or Lathe would be less.

Losing a multi-seat discount is gonna hurt, bad.

Thanks for the input. But is this 10%, 20%, whatever?...I don't know what those particular licenses cost.

If you don't do maintenance can you still get support from your VAR?

Although I don't use Solidworks much anymore, I've still got a number of customers who like that I'll just work from their native files. Maintenance on our basic license used to be $1295 annually, and I think it went up to $1600 this year. (The rule of thumb was that it's 25% of purchase price annually!). I kinda held my nose this year, but am wondering if I'll continue next year, although I've been saying that for some time now...ugh.

[gcode]

Can I ask the folks here how much annual maintenance for MC is?

My personal seat on a USB Hasp
3D Mill, Lathe (not mill turn)  Multiaxis

Last year was $3400
I should be getting a quote any day now for the new year

[gcode]

Hi gcode, can you PM me the info on that please.

Just open a solid model in 2024 and make a drill toolpath by selecting holes in the solid
now try it in 2025... grrrr

then try "analyze distance" picking solid edges or hole centers
when I tried it this morning is was completely broken.
I may as well been analyzing distances on a blank screen 

[Thee Byte]

Just open a solid model in 2024 and make a drill toolpath by selecting holes in the solid
now try it in 2025... grrrr

then try "analyze distance" picking solid edges or hole centers
when I tried it this morning is was completely broken.
I may as well been analyzing distances on a blank screen 

Okay, I'm going to go look now

[Thee Byte]

A drill tool path.. lathe, mill, mt?

[Thee Byte]

I tried the milk update, was fine, maybe I need a newer update?

[gcode]

I'm using mill , running the initial release of MC2025

[Zoffen]

This is making it alot easier to switch to topsolid next year...

[Brian]

This is making it alot easier to switch to topsolid next year...

I *do* like the program, but it wasn't my intention to stir the pot or anything like that regarding CAM s/w. I really am interested in these sorts of things.

And I try to remember what Warren Buffett (I think it was him) said: "...price is what you pay, value is what you get."

Sometimes I have to remind myself that most things these days cost more than they did a couple of years ago, so how can I be surprised when something *I* have to buy costs more? I quote jobs higher than a couple of years ago, too....I'd have to.

I'll try to remember to come back to this thread when I get my quote for maintenance on my license of TS-stay tuned.

[neurosis]

when I get my quote for maintenance on my license of TS-stay tuned.

We paid a 3 year advanced so I can't find the info without digging.  If ours comes back up I'll pm you.

[Zoffen]

"...price is what you pay, value is what you get."

Exactly. With mastercam i have lost hope that they will ever do what is required to bring the software into the future. Just add more features so you can say you are "improving" the software (RA RA SALES!!! RA RA NEW USERS!!!) but never address the underlying issues with the software. Guess its learning french for me!

[Brian]

Exactly. With mastercam i have lost hope that they will ever do what is required to bring the software into the future. Just add more features so you can say you are "improving" the software (RA RA SALES!!! RA RA NEW USERS!!!) but never address the underlying issues with the software. Guess its learning french for me!

Not speaking about MC here as I don't use it, but it's gotta be a challenge for s/w companies to decide when to keep adding onto an older product and when to start anew with a clean slate!

I had used Topsolid (V6.Xx) for probably 10+ years before starting to switch to 7 around 7.10 or 7.12. While there were certainly concepts that were common to both, V7 is a from-the-ground-up rewrite!

No, you won't have to learn to read/speak French if you switch, but there's probably lots to learn nonetheless. It will help if you're already familiar with parametric assembly modeling (SWX, NX, Creo, OnShape, Inventor, etc), but aside from that I don't think the CAM is too hard to pickup.

I started to use it (fumble my way thru it, self-teaching at first) when it slowed down at year's end and I wasn't running balls out...I'd never recommend changing horses in the middle of the stream as they say!

[Brian]

I looked at last years quote (for V7.17) and it was about $5300....2X,3X,4X,5X milling, turning, Boost milling, posts for the above, and PDM server, and the modeler of course (I think it's called the Design Pro license....all of the part libraries and sheet metal).

I've got a second dongle, but haven't kept that on maintenance (it's still on 7.12) since my helper retired, and it had fewer modules and was therefore cheaper.

I've been told that their policy on maintenance is that you'll get nicked for either 2 or 3 releases if you're off maintenance....so I *think* when I went from 7.12 to 7.17 I paid for two...so I guess I did save a little money.

[neurosis]

I looked at last years quote (for V7.17) and it was about $5300....2X,3X,4X,5X milling, turning, Boost milling, posts for the above, and PDM server, and the modeler of course (I think it's called the Design Pro license....all of the part libraries and sheet metal).

I wont give an exact number, but as of right now, we pay about half that for 1 full seat up to 5x (dynamic is just part of the package and not an extra charge). We also have 1 seat of design which can pick up a network license for mill or lathe if we drop it from the other seat.

No PDM available in Mastercam.  I really do like the PDM in TS but had some growing pains with it.

We don't have the millturn module with mastercam which is just baked in to the cake in TS.  And its much better in TS. 

All of our posts for MC were modified free versions of MPMaster. We've never payed for a single post in Mastercam. IF TS could figure out how to make that work, free posts for 3 axis mills + indexer (or Horizontal) and 2 axis lathes, they'd probably have a recipe to grow.