Dongles FAQ

[3d-wizard]

@3D-Wizard - read Vlado's post above.

Should have seen that!!! Sorry and Thanks
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[WWX]

This sure is a lively debate and although coming in very late I would like to add my contribution. Yes some of it has been said before, but it does not seems to have struck home.

1) Its been argued that the possibility of a dongle breaking or causing some other conflicting issues is one of the major dislikes by those who is opposing the implementation of the dongle. The counter argument is that these dongles is estimated to be 25 times more reliable than hard drives.

I think the important fact is that a device is being added which could possibly fail which was not previously part of the equation. I participate in one or two life critical sports/hobbies and when setting up ones gear the need/contribution of any piece of equipment is always tested against its role in the overall system and whether or it is adding a possible failure point. Needless to say that objects which can cause failure is eliminated to the bare minimum. I find this analysis to be of real value in all spheres of my live and think it would have been a good one to entertain when brain storming the implementation of the dongle.

2) Its been stated that a lengthy in house debate preceded the Chaos team's decision before giving the dongle the green light. It’s also been said that preventing piracy was not the main reason for opting for the dongle. It would seem to me that the main benefit to users would be the easy transfer of license(s) between workstations. But if I may ask, what was the deciding factor from Chaos point of view which gave the dongle the green light.

3) Some people think its pity to moan about $30, but then looking at where they live I have too ask myself if they really understand what its like to live in a third world country. Telecommunications transport (shipping) and import duties are all very expensive. Some of us even have to deal with corrupt officials and the time it takes to run through these processes takes up very valuable time as Visions also pointed out. So for us, it is guaranteed that the final figure will be way higher than $30. The sad thing is that it does not end once I received the dongle, because now I have another item to worry about in case it breaks and I will firstly need to ship it back to Chaos and then pay for the new one with all the other costs thrown in for good measure.

Its all good to say that temporary licenses will be available in case of breakage. If I were to ship a broken dongle to my nearest agent, which I guest would be in England, a 4 week period before I have the new dongle would by no means be a conservative estimate. Not a great deal of people have ADSL over here so that means dial-up net access which is also very expensive and best to limit it after hours when it’s a bit cheaper. So if I have to be logged on the whole time in order for the temporary license to work, it would simply mean no VRay usage for the period with out a dongle as it would simply be to expensive to even consider.

The dongle will not spot piracy but this move may just as well serve as a motivation of legal users to rather run cracked versions and not have to deal with the added costs of ownership of VRay is now bringing.

4) As for the arguments that VRay still costs a great deal less than MAX and RenderMan. Well firstly it is a plug-in renderer and although I truly like it, to compare it to MAX is surely not comparing apples with apples. As for RenderMan, well why do you think I bought VRay, its because I could afford it, because I liked the business model which was implemented at that time, because of the great user group found with in these forums and because I thought it was a good product.

I realise that all this is a waist of time or at least feels like it since it’s been stated that the dongle will be implemented. But hopefully the team has taken note of the negative response to their action and rather stick to making their promises happen, instead of throwing us a curve ball.

[BlueShift]

I completely agree with you. I live in Dubai - its going to cost another 150-200AED (40-55USD) to have this dongle shipped out to me via FedEx.

Snail mail is no good here as the stupid farts in the local mail office have a tendency to open and keep all interesting items that may come in the mail (inbound or outbound). I remember having been mailed FreeBSD cds from the US, all I got was an empty envelope. I bet the person that kept them didn't even know what FreeBSD was.

Yes the fact that VRay is cheaper than renderman is what earns it a lot of customers, as it does many other raytracers.

This dongle will undoubtedly end up being a pain for a few end users - nothing can be done about that, Chaos has made its decision. All we can do now is hope that its reliable and very hard to lose/misplace, and also that it is thin enough to only occupy the one USB port its been attached to - unlike many other dongles.


/BlueShift

[percydaman]

I completely agree with you. I live in Dubai - its going to cost another 150-200AED (40-55USD) to have this dongle shipped out to me via FedEx.

Snail mail is no good here as the stupid farts in the local mail office have a tendency to open and keep all interesting items that may come in the mail (inbound or outbound). I remember having been mailed FreeBSD cds from the US, all I got was an empty envelope. I bet the person that kept them didn't even know what FreeBSD was.

Yes the fact that VRay is cheaper than renderman is what earns it a lot of customers, as it does many other raytracers.

This dongle will undoubtedly end up being a pain for a few end users - nothing can be done about that, Chaos has made its decision. All we can do now is hope that its reliable and very hard to lose/misplace, and also that it is thin enough to only occupy the one USB port its been attached to - unlike many other dongles.


/BlueShift

if i wasn't so shocked about your local postal service, I might have laughed. What happened to thieves in arab countries losing a hand? Okay, I suppose that custom was always a little harsh, but based on what you say, it appears they pilfer with impunity...

[BlueShift]

The law here is Colonial British law, and its better it be that since only 40% of the local population here is Arab.

As a matter of fact Urdu and English is spoken here just as much, if not more than Arabic.


/BlueShift

[cpnichols]

I feel bad for you guys having so much trouble with your local post office and corruption. But, and I am trying to be understanding here, why is it Chaos's responsibility that you have corruption where you live? I think the corruption is a bigger problem than the dongle.

[visions]

We are just informing Chaos that their decision to move to dongles would have a greater impact than US$30/- on several people that live in countries other than the US, GB and Europe and an acceptable solution should be discussed keeping everyones concerns in mind. After all Chaos has sold Vray to people in these countries.

If i was to purchase Vray today with the Dongle information in place i probably will not be expressing my opinion here, since i would have factored in all this issues before making the decision to purchase.

Vivek

[WWX]

hi cpnichols, I don't think that any of us blamed Chaos for the situations in our countries.

I share the same sediments as visions, if I knew about the dongle at time of purchase I would have made a decision on whether or not I would like to take the risk and costs involved and lived with it. \

I and I think others in the same situation as me, just feel that not all possible scenarios where considered by Chaos when opting for the dongle and as such I feel that a possible problem causing entity has been added to the equation and that in my opinion is not the best way in how to get to a solution.

[jujubee]

How do you guys get anything into your country? Is everything a download there?

[visions]

India:
Textures and Models are downloads. Stuff only available on CD's will probably not find their way here unless there is a relative staying abroad.....
All major Software like Max, maya, LW, Adobe, MS...practically everyone is here and is available officially in every city

Plugins and renderers...most of the digimation stuff is sourced by the Local max dealers....Brazil, FR vray...no representation.

We pay around uS$3225/- for Max and around the same for Autocad

Books can be easily purchased and shipped without any hassle...when there is Software along with hardware in the form of USB keys or Parallel port locks: the stuff gets flagged and several visits to the Post office or Airport customs or Clearing agents becoms mandatory, unless you have so much of money that a phone call is enough to get your work done.

thats the way it is and its been that way since the 80's and part of it is related to smuggling and terrorism.

Hope this clears up the air a bit.
Cheers
Vivek

[WWX]

Hi jujubee,

Nope not everything is downloaded, but it is the prefered method. As I explained it just takes more planing, money and risk bringing stuff in otherwise. In which case you weigh the pros and cos and decide if you would like to take the risk, is it worth it and can you afford it with all the added costs.

Simple isn't it

[BlueShift]

It isn't really that bad. The truth is we have censorship here, under that umbrella the local post has the right to open anything they might find suspicious. Once you allow low paid workers to do that, things will go missing - I am sure its the same in US and other countries too. As a result we have many courier services now; apart from FedEx, UPS and DHL. I was by no means implying that its Chaos fault/job, I am just saying that it will end up being a problem for some people who live in some countries.

I think the Dongle would be a good idea in the long run as long as it doesn't fail. I had problems with authorizing VRay (1.45.750) for at least 2 months starting in July of 2004, turns out VRay was accessing some hardware that was "turned off" and that stopped it from generating an auth request code. Luckily I only use VRay for personal work.

I am neutral on the subject of having dongle based license. I can see how this could be really good, and how it could be really bad too. Are you guys who are advocating this so staunchly seriously telling me you can't see the bad side to this too?


/BlueShift

[jujubee]

I am sure its the same in US and other countries too

Yeah they have a term for that - 'Falling off the truck.' I've been approached by people in the car stereo department at Best Buy stores and approached by a van on the street trying to sell expensive stereo equipment. Generally, people here go after the larger stuff.

US Postal Service is great, widely used, and I think many people don't bother stealing/inspecting the smaller items. The infrastructure is vast. There's still corruption but it's not seen often on the lower levels - it's too easy for someone to get in trouble here. We have FBI watching the Police who watch other people...

[pshupe68]

That was a huge reason I bought the software as well. In the past I have purchased CDs and the courier company charged me a 20% brokerage fee based on the cost of the items purchased. The company wasn't smart enough to declare a value of just the media the software was on so I paid a ridiculous amount for brokerage, and then there was duties and taxes. Not to mention a high courier fee because apparently some american companies don't know that Canada is so close to the US??

I have had quotes for shipping to me of say US$30 for something valued at US$20. If I ship it to Niagara Falls NY it is US$5?? I'm only about 50km away.

You never know what you are going to pay and sometimes it doesn't show up for a couple of weeks. No tracking across the boarder unless you pay courier big bucks.

This isn't Dubai this is CANADA!!!

Regards Peter.

[cpnichols]

hi cpnichols, I don't think that any of us blamed Chaos for the situations in our countries.

I share the same sediments as visions, if I knew about the dongle at time of purchase I would have made a decision on whether or not I would like to take the risk and costs involved and lived with it. \

I and I think others in the same situation as me, just feel that not all possible scenarios where considered by Chaos when opting for the dongle and as such I feel that a possible problem causing entity has been added to the equation and that in my opinion is not the best way in how to get to a solution.

Man that sucks for you guys. It must be frustrating to do business at all for you guys.

On the other hand, I see the dongle as something that is very useful for a many others. No need to reauth things if your hardware fails, or you want to upgrade your hardware. You can take your copy of Vray on the go with your laptop. You can still have a network server. You can even set up a network server in http for outside the office, in case you want to keep yur licenses available in the office and have one roaming license. So you get the ability of a powerful network server like flexlm, and you get the portability of a dongle.

For Chaos, it probably is an advantage as well, as I bet they spend a lot of time dealing with auth codes, and this would cut that down a lot.

I don't know... If I was in ther position, I may have made the same choice.