New EAGLE licensing

[jorge_garcia]

Hello Everyone,

In this post we will be briefly describing how the new subscription model for EAGLE works.

Firstly, the Autodesk licensing model is subscription based and the EAGLE paid license will require that you install the SW and then generate an account on accounts.autodesk.com to retrieve your license entitlement.   

If you lose your network connection, the SW has a 14-day heartbeat that will enable you to work offline for 14 days.

All of your data is stored locally, so you are in complete control of your data.

We will continue to provide the freeware version of EAGLE. In order to use it you will still need to register an account with Autodesk.

In an upcoming release we will be adjusting the software so in the worst case scenario, where internet is unavailable past 14 days, the software will revert to free mode. That way you can always review your designs.

You can review the current EAGLE pricing by visiting this page.

[Anonymous]

skrodahl is right, indeed the promo code is not working even for a 2 year subscription.

This is just another bit of evidence that Autodesk stickts to its strategy of misinforming and misleading existing users while ignoring any clear questions (such as why there is a price penalty for European users).

BTW I installed CircuitStudio this weekend and while I have not spent much time with it yet, in many ways it looks far more professional than Eagle and at the current price level (<1000 USD/EUR) I get an infinite license for less than what I'd have to pay for 2 years of Eagle ...

[skrodahl]

Criticism where it belongs is okay, but there really is no price penalty for European users. It's just that 25% VAT is included in the price. Sales tax is also added on the checkout for US customers, since it varies between the different states.

[Anonymous]

My remark was not based on VAT: as far as I can see, the US net price is USD 500, the German net price was initially EUR 550 and seems to have been lowered to EUR 545.

EUR 545 currently translate to USD 587, i.e. the EUR price is 17.5% higher - I'd call that a penalty (and would not have a problem paying in USD).

[Anonymous]

Maybe the conversion rate was applied in the wrong direction. It get 500 € = US$ 536, which is close to 545 € regarding the plain value.

[skrodahl]

Ah, you might be right.

Autodesk.eu/store shows €545, VAT excluded.

Yes, then it's really a price penalty!

[jorge_garcia]

Hello Rc,

There have been a lot of questions on the forums recently if we missed something please let me know and I'll do my best to get you and the other users here an answer.

As far as the 50% off promotion is concerned, it only applies to one year subscriptions. I'm aware of the price question and I'm still investigating it, I got a response but Im not satisfied with it(in the sense that I didn't get enough info) so I'm digging deeper. Once I have something clear I'll post about it.

Let me know if there's anything else I can do for you.

Best Regards,

[Anonymous]

Yes, the CS looks quite well, I am going to install the trial after my holiday. I have now read the UPDATE_en.txt from the "new" 8.0.0 version of Eagle before I try Altium and... - can anyone tell me why to pay for this "upgrade", even with 50% old-user discount???

I will choose between some good ways ( Altium, DipTrace ... ) but I am pretty sure Eagle is dead for me.

[sales9N4ZY]

Honestly I would just go full circuit studio.  That is my plan.  The upfront cost is ~1k but the license is perpetual.  You can opt to update each year for $150 as the price stands.  CS is just baby altium designer.  Bonus I just tried the conversion and it imported my eagle board designs from version 7.  Its gonna be a pain to re-build libraries, but if you pick up library expert from pcb libraries you'll save a ton of time.  

I've been a huge Eagle supporter for years, but this has killed the program for me.  I look forward to using the mcad integration and the push pull routing.  I'm almost glad Autodesk screwed the pooch at this point. 

[gnalven]

Has anyone tried Target 3001?

[Anonymous]

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@sales9N4ZY wrote:

Honestly I would just go full circuit studio.

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sound like an Altium salesperson

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@sales9N4ZY wrote:

CS is just baby altium designer.

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your own experience or hearsay?

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[sales9N4ZY]

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@Anonymous wrote:

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@sales9N4ZY wrote:

Honestly I would just go full circuit studio.

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sound like an Altium salesperson

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@sales9N4ZY wrote:

CS is just baby altium designer.

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your own experience or hearsay?

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I don't really have any loyalty to Altium, I'm just pissed at this situation.  I've been running a CS trial since this whole thing went down, but I have several friends that use AD on a regular basis and love it.  I don't like having to switch tools especially since I've spent several thousand dollars on Eagle (I have 3 v7 pro licenses), but based on what I have seen/tried CS is the best solution for my company moving forward.  It took a while for me to get used to the design rules organization, and the major differences in the UI, but CS has a lot more functionality than Eagle.  

The only thing that was really annoying is that my eagle libraries all have footprints including keepout layers.  When you import these into CS the keepout layer is not used for mechanical overlap, but electrical.  So you either have to change the layer in your libraries or delete the keepout.  It turns out though that if you use a silkscreen border around your components CS does a mechanical keepout based on that, coupled with a dimension you set in your design rules. 

As for the latter part where I said CS is just baby AD that is the whole point of the software.  Its AD without all the bells and whistles.  AD for instance has a built in IPC footprint wizard, while CS does not.  So in my case that means I have to either build footprints by hand, or utilize a 3rd party tool such as PCB libraries.  This is an example of the give and take between the mid level and top tier tools Altium offers.  From what I have seen CS does everything Eagle does and then some.  The kicker for me is the push pull router with live DRC checking. I've started doing BGA and very high density designs.  So its painstaking in Eagle to get all the traces as close as the DRC allows because you have to make the traces then check later.  in CS the router is easily configurable to push/pull or cling to other traces to maximize the routeable area.

[ChrisJGWBH]

Yanno - like most have stated here, I was upset that the perpetual licensing was going away. But today I wanted to see what the uproar was really about myself so I opted to look at the subscription. At first I gave some serious thought to the 15.00 monthly fee (simply because I'm a fairly cheap) then I thought, Ok - lets have a break down of the 100.00 fee per year. Like most things in life you get a price break when you put up a few dollars more opposed to having it spread out over time. 

Again, since I'm a cheap kinda guy to begin with, I did the math. The 100.00 a year breaks down to 8.33 a month. Believe me, I'm no fan of subscription software (Hello Adobe) but really? 8 bucks a month?!?! Ok, Ok - I get the valid points that many bring up about the layers, the possible size restrictions, and the E.T. phone home every 14 days. I get it! But really?? 8 bucks a month? 

Look, I'm not convinced yet that Autodesk owning Eagle is the best move for us (time will tell of course) but in the end, we all may have to face the reality the we may never see perpetual again. So here's what I'm getting at - the trade off seems to be that we're being told to pay for a "maintenance contract" and in all reality, most software packages pretty much want you to do that anyways. 

Again, I'm not a fan of loosing what I had but the reality is that Autodesk has made it very affordable for us compared to what other vendors are doing.

So - in the mean time, I own both, and ready to switch back to my previous version should something hideous happen. I can only think of one thing that will prevent me from making a full crossover to 8.x And that is, if I modify a 7.7 schem/board in 8.x and save it, will it still be usable should I need to go back to 7.7 - That is the real question for me (as I have not yet tried this). 

Cheers

Chris

[Anonymous]

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@skrodahl wrote:

Ah, you might be right.

Autodesk.eu/store shows €545, VAT excluded.

Yes, then it's really a price penalty!

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Was there any result in checking the European pricing compared to the US one?

[Anonymous]

I've been using Eagle for 8 years, upgraded only twice.

The subscription is really a bad deal for me !

I will keep my current release forever and design new projects under kicad or any software not trying to get a subscription.

When customers wants to buy, why trying to lease ?

[Anonymous]

Adding to the debate, here's my thoughts...

I'm a huge Eagle fan. I introduced it to the College where I worked and to the Students over MultiSim and EasyPCB.

I went to work at another establishment where I was forced (and I mean forced!) to use Orcad\Allegro\Cadence.

I hated this, much for the same reasons I like Eagle. It seemed as though (and presumably it was) it was a combination of two individual programs, one for the schematic capture, another for PCB design. These two programs had separate keystrokes and commands for the same operation, 'D' to delete in one part, 'BackSpace' in another. Eagle is much more integrated, the two halves share a set of commands, icons have similar functions on the schematic capture as they do in the PCB design.

When I moved to my current employment, I requested a copy of Eagle. We spent nearly €1000.00 purchasing V7. We're happy with V7. I like V7.

Now we have V8. It has one or two minor things that I'd quite like to see, but not enough to warrant the expense of an ongoing payment of €400+ per year, every year. Our copy of V7 cost €1000 and we've owned it for twenty nine months. That works out at about €35 per month. In another years time, that expenditure will have come down to €25 per month and so the cost will effectively fall as we use it, and use it we will, until V7 can no longer run on our iMac.

Sadly, once V7 can no longer be used, I don't see us moving to a subscription model. I guess I'll end up trying to learn how to use one of the 'freemium' design suites. This is a pity as I do seriously like Eagle.

Had V8 had some compelling features that I *had* to have, we might (repeat, might) have considered upgrading for a one off payment of something like €250. But I can't justify asking for an annual subscription of €400+ just for a better mitre tool, I really can't.

Sorry.

[jorge_garcia]

Hi @ChrisJGWBH,

Just to answer your question, at this point in time the file formats in V7 and Autodesk EAGLE are pretty much identical. As far as I know we haven't added any new structures that V7 would be unaware of. So the files should be compatible.

With that said, as Autodesk EAGLE improves and features are introduced there is the possibility that a new type of structure may be added to EAGLE's XML file format. If you use that new feature, then V7 won't know what to do with it and it won't be able to process the file.

As of right now, you should be able to switch forwards and backwards without issue since no new structures have been added.

Let me know if there's anything else I can do for you.

Best Regards,

[jorge_garcia]

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@Anonymous wrote:

Had V8 had some compelling features that I *had* to have, we might (repeat, might) have considered upgrading for a one off payment of something like €250. But I can't justify asking for an annual subscription of €400+ just for a better mitre tool, I really can't.

Sorry.

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Hi @Anonymous,

Thank you for your honesty and participation, there's nothing to be sorry about. It sounds like right now V8 doesn't have the features you want to see. I'm happy to hear this, now it falls on us to earn your business to improve EAGLE and to add features that will may have you considering it.

This is our goal, to earn your business and provide value for you, so that you feel the subscription is justified.

Time to get to work

Best Regards,

[jorge_garcia]

@Anonymous @skrodahl

Hi Guys,

Thanks for your participation. I have been informed that international pricing is handled by a different department here at Autodesk and that any questions about it need to through them. You can contact that team by going here.

That's all the information I have about the pricing.

Let me know if there's anything else I can do for you.

Best Regards,

[Anonymous]

No need to re-build libraries......  in Circuitstudio  you can open them directly.

[Anonymous]

I bought 7.7 license in december. New license policy is just terrible. Cadsoft Computer promised me one-time payment and now they are gone... I feel cheated