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<?xml-stylesheet type="text/xsl" href="https://communities.bentley.com/cfs-file/__key/system/syndication/rss.xsl" media="screen"?><rss version="2.0" xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/" xmlns:slash="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/slash/" xmlns:wfw="http://wellformedweb.org/CommentAPI/"><channel><title>Powerdraft end of life v migration to Connect</title><link>https://communities.bentley.com/communities/other_communities/licensing_cloud_and_web_services/f/forum/221593/powerdraft-end-of-life-v-migration-to-connect</link><description>How do users feel about the end of Powerdraft and the upgrade terms to Microstation Connect Edition? We are a SME and have 6 Powerdraft lciences. We have tried Connect software previously but even on new high end workstations there is a fair lag when</description><dc:language>en-US</dc:language><generator>Telligent Community 12</generator><item><title>RE: Powerdraft end of life v migration to Connect</title><link>https://communities.bentley.com/thread/682813?ContentTypeID=1</link><pubDate>Wed, 17 Nov 2021 15:14:59 GMT</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">6dad98f5-dbc9-4c4d-a9ba-e9da8dc6aa8e:992c38ea-46e5-4253-a8ba-8a34a39cf048</guid><dc:creator>Keith C</dc:creator><description>&lt;p&gt;Hi Peter, a few replies now with similar sentiments. My original enquiries about the 25% and the one off payments were met initially with the repeat of the offer. Will see how things go moving forward. We only just renewed our Select subs just a few weeks prior to this announcement. Had we known we may have done something differently. So for your situation, if you don&amp;#39;t need 3D functionality, you don&amp;#39;t exactly gain much from this &amp;#39;upgrade&amp;#39;. We may also have to replace our hardware as even 2-3 year old PCs with decent hardware seem to find any Connect software hanging, especially when going between files. Thanks for taking the time to reply.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;div style="clear:both;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</description></item><item><title>RE: Powerdraft end of life v migration to Connect</title><link>https://communities.bentley.com/thread/682812?ContentTypeID=1</link><pubDate>Wed, 17 Nov 2021 15:10:31 GMT</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">6dad98f5-dbc9-4c4d-a9ba-e9da8dc6aa8e:ab922292-41f9-4f8c-a6f8-69c4206cdfa6</guid><dc:creator>Keith C</dc:creator><description>&lt;p&gt;We do some 3D work from time to time and that&amp;#39;s where we use the Microstation licences. We did have multiple software instances on PCs but removed them back to one per PC after the licencing overage issues we experienced!&amp;nbsp; We all work away happily on our mix of MicroStation and Powerdraft, and to be forced into this change is not what we wanted to have to do. And being trumpeted as a free upgrade is not the case when you have to shell out for the one off payments of over a grand, is not as attractive as it is meant to be.&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Select upgrades are a big benefit, but the less than seamless way we have to upgrade is not ideal, as I said elsewhere, not everyone is an expert software configurator and the saving of interfaces never seems to work every time forcing a fresh set up. I do all the configuring of Bentley software in the office, and know enough to keep things moving. The Bentley CRM I have had meetings with took note of my feedback and it would be good to see if any part of this proposal changes. Not sure how larger companies than us will feel who have multiple licences of Powerdraft will feel about having to shell out tens of thousands of pounds for something they basically already have. If you are a PD user and don&amp;#39;t need 3D functionality, where is your benefit?&lt;/p&gt;&lt;div style="clear:both;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</description></item><item><title>RE: Powerdraft end of life v migration to Connect</title><link>https://communities.bentley.com/thread/682806?ContentTypeID=1</link><pubDate>Wed, 17 Nov 2021 15:01:26 GMT</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">6dad98f5-dbc9-4c4d-a9ba-e9da8dc6aa8e:a17120b4-0204-4d81-8d55-95114501e26f</guid><dc:creator>Keith C</dc:creator><description>&lt;p&gt;Yes Bob, we went through that process in 2011 when we had to drop out of select altogether as we were in a deep recession. It was quite the hit coming back on!&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;div style="clear:both;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</description></item><item><title>RE: Powerdraft end of life v migration to Connect</title><link>https://communities.bentley.com/thread/682780?ContentTypeID=1</link><pubDate>Wed, 17 Nov 2021 13:10:25 GMT</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">6dad98f5-dbc9-4c4d-a9ba-e9da8dc6aa8e:338eadf9-0b65-49d5-b188-fbfd0f73ac41</guid><dc:creator>Peter Sargent</dc:creator><description>&lt;p&gt;Yes...pretty miffed really...we had to upgrade software to Powerdraft Connect Edition in 2020 (at a substantial Capital Cost) when our V8 package bought in 2007 was discontinued (without much support for the process).&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;I submitted a specific question about the principle of the &amp;#39;free upgrade&amp;#39; from Powerdraft to Microstation in a Webinar arranged by our reseller / Bentley this morning...specifically about future licensing /subscriptions costs but didn&amp;#39;t get an answer.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;I&amp;#39;m not even currently aware of how the &amp;#39;upgrade&amp;#39; is being managed let alone any future costs / subscriptions.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;As other contributors...ours is a micro business and we have never had the need for a 3D application...let alone the budget to afford 3D drafting or hire external consultants for the inevitable IT management that comes with developing 3D &amp;#39;cells&amp;#39; for doors and the like, let alone the time for learning additional feature, etc.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;I agree that businesses need to be apprised of the full picture on costs...as it may have been prudent for our business to consider alternatives in 2020 had we known that our upgrade to Powerdraft Connect was going to be so short lived!&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;div style="clear:both;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</description></item><item><title>RE: Powerdraft end of life v migration to Connect</title><link>https://communities.bentley.com/thread/682635?ContentTypeID=1</link><pubDate>Wed, 17 Nov 2021 02:06:42 GMT</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">6dad98f5-dbc9-4c4d-a9ba-e9da8dc6aa8e:bcb901b5-723c-430b-997b-15b3a56e5a8d</guid><dc:creator>Tuan Le</dc:creator><description>&lt;p&gt;Regarding being able to use a software you&amp;#39;ve got perpetual license for past 2022, from my opinion, you should be able to. It just that when the select licence server is switched off, you&amp;#39;ll have to revert node lock licence (checked out / PC bound) mechanism, if I remember correctly.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;This issue had been brought up before when Bentley threatened to turn off their SS activation server.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;div style="clear:both;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</description></item><item><title>RE: Powerdraft end of life v migration to Connect</title><link>https://communities.bentley.com/thread/682613?ContentTypeID=1</link><pubDate>Tue, 16 Nov 2021 22:44:14 GMT</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">6dad98f5-dbc9-4c4d-a9ba-e9da8dc6aa8e:eab6874b-5ff3-4daf-9929-0595922102ba</guid><dc:creator>RobertArnold</dc:creator><description>&lt;p&gt;Hi,&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;We have several Microstation licenses and a couple PowerDraft licenses.&amp;nbsp; We use very few features found in Microstation that are not in PowerDraft.&amp;nbsp; One of the biggest features would be &amp;quot;batch&amp;quot; processes, but I now have a VBA routine to do that with our own customized options.&amp;nbsp; So we could really downgrade all our licenses to PowerDraft, if we wanted to.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;In our case, we expect PowerDraft and Microstation to be on the same version, so our customizations &amp;amp; VBA routines will work the same for both products.&amp;nbsp; So if we want to keep doing stuff like we have been, we have to upgrade our PowerDraft licenses to Microstation.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;As you are considering, please remember that the Select Subscription provides for several things.&amp;nbsp; Yes, support and upgrades.&amp;nbsp; But also the ability to easily move licenses from machine to machine.&amp;nbsp; Also to have licenses based on number of users at any given time, instead of licenses based on number of machines.&amp;nbsp; (We currently have Microstation/PowerDraft installed on everyone&amp;#39;s computer in the office and everyone&amp;#39;s computer at home, partially because we were working from home with Covid.)&amp;nbsp; Personally, I currently have four computers with Microstation (work, home, laptop, and virtual computer).&amp;nbsp; Without the Select Subscription, I would have to have four licenses to do that.&amp;nbsp; Being that I&amp;#39;m not using all four at the same time, it&amp;#39;s not an issue with Select.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;--Robert&lt;/p&gt;&lt;div style="clear:both;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</description></item><item><title>RE: Powerdraft end of life v migration to Connect</title><link>https://communities.bentley.com/thread/682611?ContentTypeID=1</link><pubDate>Tue, 16 Nov 2021 22:28:09 GMT</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">6dad98f5-dbc9-4c4d-a9ba-e9da8dc6aa8e:2036ec03-ae9d-4c63-a024-c3e3d1033fc7</guid><dc:creator>Bob Rayner</dc:creator><description>&lt;p&gt;Well I would think you would be able to use the software you purchased, though you&amp;#39;ll have no support (guessing you don&amp;#39;t need it anyway). If you drop the Select Service, you&amp;#39;ll save some money, but if you ever need to acquire new software, you&amp;#39;ll pay full price. Don&amp;#39;t we all just love our software provider. So you should be fine, but only for a while.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;div style="clear:both;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</description></item><item><title>RE: Powerdraft end of life v migration to Connect</title><link>https://communities.bentley.com/thread/682480?ContentTypeID=1</link><pubDate>Tue, 16 Nov 2021 09:59:43 GMT</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">6dad98f5-dbc9-4c4d-a9ba-e9da8dc6aa8e:653ec4d6-0035-4411-baec-1febd612dcd4</guid><dc:creator>Keith C</dc:creator><description>&lt;p&gt;Hi Robert I agree with you and did suggest this in my call with Bentley&amp;#39;s Customer Success Manager who took a more middle ground approach when discussing my concerns. Powerdraft was always an attractive proposition, especially for smaller firms like ours, we substantially use this a a 2D draughting tool, and use about 50-60% of it&amp;#39;s full capability. Change to Microstation and we would probably drop to 30% for a lot more outlay. I did stress what I considered a crucial point to the CSM, that not all architects are expert CAD configurators and the hassle of upgrading software in Bentley&amp;#39;s less than seamless way, [unless you really get the hang of saving interfaces and configurations which I have tried before with varying degrees of success]&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;And not all architects can afford to have an IT manager whose sole task is dealing with IT so I suspect there will be large amounts of users still many versions behind like us.&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;For too long as I also told the CRM, we have never felt that the Bentley relationship is the usual supplier/customer situation, especially when you consider the previous punitive licensing overage costs. Don&amp;#39;t get me started again on the 25% subs uplift either!&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;My hope is that we upgrade to the latest versions of Powerdaft Connect right at the end and that we are basically entitled to retain them with perpetual licences so that we can choose when to upgrade, and fork out thousands of pounds, not&amp;nbsp;being forced into it.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Thanks for taking the time to reply&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;regards&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Keith&lt;/p&gt;&lt;div style="clear:both;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</description></item><item><title>RE: Powerdraft end of life v migration to Connect</title><link>https://communities.bentley.com/thread/682477?ContentTypeID=1</link><pubDate>Tue, 16 Nov 2021 09:47:56 GMT</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">6dad98f5-dbc9-4c4d-a9ba-e9da8dc6aa8e:636be789-acd8-455e-8e95-20d3e59a1745</guid><dc:creator>Keith C</dc:creator><description>&lt;p&gt;Hi and thanks for replying. I had a long call with Bentley&amp;#39;s Customer Success Manager and raised my concerns and also this particular point. To be honest, still not sure that we would still be able to use Powerdraft after the end of 2022. Waiting to have this clarified. As a business, we would prefer to decide when we need to upgrade software, not the other way round.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;regards&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Keith&lt;/p&gt;&lt;div style="clear:both;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</description></item><item><title>RE: Powerdraft end of life v migration to Connect</title><link>https://communities.bentley.com/thread/682393?ContentTypeID=1</link><pubDate>Mon, 15 Nov 2021 22:30:59 GMT</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">6dad98f5-dbc9-4c4d-a9ba-e9da8dc6aa8e:558b002b-30d9-40c7-9b14-7ad911a907de</guid><dc:creator>Tuan Le</dc:creator><description>&lt;p&gt;Hope I&amp;#39;ve got this right.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;You have perpetual licenses for PD and also paying Select Subscription fees. Since PD is&amp;nbsp;going to be dropped by Bentley, it makes no sense to continue paying SS fee.&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;A perpetual license should entitle you to continue using&amp;nbsp;PD as is. Just that you won&amp;#39;t see any further fixes/development in the software.&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;div style="clear:both;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</description></item><item><title>RE: Powerdraft end of life v migration to Connect</title><link>https://communities.bentley.com/thread/682386?ContentTypeID=1</link><pubDate>Mon, 15 Nov 2021 21:21:50 GMT</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">6dad98f5-dbc9-4c4d-a9ba-e9da8dc6aa8e:6749002e-d5f9-45bd-9e27-670ded91cb11</guid><dc:creator>RobertArnold</dc:creator><description>&lt;p&gt;Hi Keith,&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Killing PowerDraft sounds like a short-term gain for Bentley.&amp;nbsp; It&amp;#39;s less work for them (not downgrading Microstation to PowerDraft) and higher subscription fees.&amp;nbsp; So right off hand, it sounds like this is a profitable move for Bentley (not their users).&amp;nbsp; In the long term, Bentley may start to loose more customers and may not get potential customers due to the price of Microstation.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;--Robert&lt;/p&gt;&lt;div style="clear:both;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</description></item><item><title>RE: Powerdraft end of life v migration to Connect</title><link>https://communities.bentley.com/thread/680160?ContentTypeID=1</link><pubDate>Wed, 03 Nov 2021 05:42:49 GMT</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">6dad98f5-dbc9-4c4d-a9ba-e9da8dc6aa8e:b2adc33f-f302-46ba-8c56-8a810f346326</guid><dc:creator>Mikail Al-Aidroos</dc:creator><description>&lt;p&gt;Hello Keith,&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Thank you for sharing your feedback. Of course, it is not the feedback we hoped to hear on launching this program, in particular from such a long-time Bentley user. I asked Svetlana, a Bentley User Success Manager on my team, to reach out to you directly and ensure you have all the information needed to inform your migration decision. I also want to ensure we receive all your feedback about the impact of the migration on your business.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Twenty-eight years of your company choosing to work with Bentley is an honor for us, and I look forward to at least 28 more.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&amp;nbsp;&lt;span style="font-family:inherit;"&gt;Best regards,&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Mikail Al-Aidroos&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Sr. Director, Bentley User Success&lt;/p&gt;&lt;div style="clear:both;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</description></item></channel></rss>