Circuit Studio Dead? (again!)

[EEVblog]

It seems at least some of the people that were working on it are from Ukraine...

One of the original PCB team was from the Ukraine and he recruited a whole bunch of top notch programmers over there and they had a dedicated team over there. That was 10 years ago though...

[EEVblog]

Because it can be better than the free one. A good recent example is with the Kicad upgrades - once you've opened your designs or libraries with the new version the previous version can't touch them. OK for single devs perhaps, but if you're sharing with several people it can be problematic - just one person upgrades and then stuffs all the others. Altium (and presumably CS) in contrast doesn't suffer that. The 09 will happily open 23 files and tell you what it can't figure out that's new. That can be worth paying for.

Backward and Forward file compatibility has always been a huge feature of Altium Designer.
Internally we used to use the bug ridden daily builds, and never once did we lose a file because of even broken versions of the software. Quite amazing actually.

[EEVblog]

how much does AD cost nowadays? i found online it is about 4000-5000$ one time purchase. certainly not worth it for many many people out there... but for CS of about < 500$ kinda makes sense to some. especially that eagle is not in the scene as it were.

In Australia there are only two options now. AU$475/month, or $15,895 for lifetime perpetual.

[negativ3]

Just got an offer "as one of the valued CircuitStudio customers" for an upgrade to AD for USD $1,485/year..

That might seem okay to the seller wanting profit, but its waaay above the price this hobbyist can pay.

$495 plus yearly subs at $150 seemed like a sweet spot for good but basic schematic and PCB software without all the bells & whistles.

[VEGETA]

Just got an offer "as one of the valued CircuitStudio customers" for an upgrade to AD for USD $1,485/year..

That might seem okay to the seller wanting profit, but its waaay above the price this hobbyist can pay.

$495 plus yearly subs at $150 seemed like a sweet spot for good but basic schematic and PCB software without all the bells & whistles.

well, I highly recommend kicad for you. right now it has gotten really good, doubt there is something important needed and does not exist with it.

[EEVblog]

Just got an offer "as one of the valued CircuitStudio customers" for an upgrade to AD for USD $1,485/year..

I bet that's only $1485 for the firts year, after that (when you can't do without the tool now) you pay the same price as everyone else.
Ask them if they'll agree to a contract in writing that that price won't change for X years. Bet they won't.

[EEVblog]

how much does AD cost nowadays? i found online it is about 4000-5000$ one time purchase. certainly not worth it for many many people out there... but for CS of about < 500$ kinda makes sense to some. especially that eagle is not in the scene as it were.

In Australia there are only two options now. AU$475/month, or $15,895 for lifetime perpetual.

I updated this in another thread, but there is now a third option:
https://www.altium.com/altium-designer/licensing/individual
AUD 2,625/year for small businesses.

[voltsandjolts]

I updated this in another thread, but there is now a third option:
https://www.altium.com/altium-designer/licensing/individual
AUD 2,625/year for small businesses.

That is an option, if you're insane.
Altium's pricing strategy is based on a random number generator. I have no trust that they will operate in good faith going forward. Those yearly subs will increase way beyond inflation.

I'm off subscription now thanks to the latest crazy renewal pricing. I plan on running my '22 perpetual for at least the next decade. Or until the next Altium panic sale, like they did during covid.

[EEVblog]

I'm off subscription now thanks to the latest crazy renewal pricing. I plan on running my '22 perpetual for at least the next decade. Or until the next Altium panic sale, like they did during covid.

When I worked there in 2010 sales were always complaining that customers were still using Protel 99SE from a decade before, and they had a hard time getting them to pay for an upgrade.
I'm sure that still exists a lot today.

[H.O]

I keep getting these ridiculous (to me) offers too. And offers about training courses, seminars and what not.
A few weeks ago I responded to such an offer saying that as an hobbyist the only Altium product I'm interested in is Circuit Studio and asked for an honest answer about the state of its development. If one such answer could not be provided they no longer needed to offer me anything.

Needless to say no such answer has been provided but more "offers" have been coming.

[Simon]

Just got an offer "as one of the valued CircuitStudio customers" for an upgrade to AD for USD $1,485/year..

I bet that's only $1485 for the firts year, after that (when you can't do without the tool now) you pay the same price as everyone else.
Ask them if they'll agree to a contract in writing that that price won't change for X years. Bet they won't.

It is the first year only, they are desperate. I had a serious conversation with them years ago. They were offering cheaper licenses to businesses that had just started up but basically the shafted you with the difference in years to come.

I am totally self taught and have used ECAD in stand alone mode but KiCAD has come to offer all that I want.

[DarkMode]

We know how to make sales and I'm not in Sales. I was in general electronics decades ago. There are good products out there and if Altium wanted to be on top, well there is a plethora of feedback from the hobbyists, that would fork out money and would increase their sales 100x fold. The best examples of Hobbyists software vs Commerical software is to limit Pins, kind of like the Target3001 and Drip-Trace models.

With Target3001, I really like its Search feature and the Push-Pull routing (something shared with Proteus at 1/10th the cost).
Dip-Trace is a good program, it falls apart for Component Searching, importing is a pain.
KiCad - best user 4K interface (for free), even Target and DipTrace look clunky next to it.

CircuitStudio at $700 USD it's a little steep for my pockets and is similar to Proteus at this price point.

I might just end up with EasyEDA  at this point, as I'm looking to get my ESP32-C3-Mini-1 modules up and running. I found that this component is a good test to see what libraries are up to date. The Target3001 found and imported it Easily, the Dip-Trace found it, but getting it imported wasn't that easy. 

[PlainName]

I found that this component is a good test to see what libraries are up to date.

If you do anything serious (even 'hobby' serious) you'll make your own components, otherwise you won't be able to use that cool thing that no-one's created an importable component for. Availability of downloadable components is the last thing you want to use to choose a package, and the ease of creating your own should be very, very high on the list.

[VEGETA]

I found that this component is a good test to see what libraries are up to date.

If you do anything serious (even 'hobby' serious) you'll make your own components, otherwise you won't be able to use that cool thing that no-one's created an importable component for. Availability of downloadable components is the last thing you want to use to choose a package, and the ease of creating your own should be very, very high on the list.

I find myself making my own components at least 10-30% of total components. sometimes footprint exists but schematic symbol does not.

kicad is easy in this regard

[Kasper]

I'm getting the altium ad on CS homescreen now too.  I think you guys have missed something big here, if we switch to altium, we can do board layout, manufacturing outputs and fabrication drawings! [/sarcasm]

And we get to have phone calls from marketing.  Are they going to call us next year to tell us for the low price of $10k, we can keep altium and they'll even let us do board layout?

What a bunch of goofs.  Old CS is fine but I would have been slightly better off if I stuck with KiCAD.  I went CS to be more employable but none of my employers or clients have cared what I use and I ended up needing to use KiCAD anyways to take over someone else's project.

[EE-digger]

Talk about price gouging, post-Covid pricing and brass balls, I just took a quick look at Altium's coverage of Circuit Studio and ended up in the AD pricing section.

$5495 for one fricking year !

I recall when you could pick it up, as a developer, for around $3000 and maybe a bit less. and that for a permanent license.

I ran Altium for 3 years recently and in that time frame, not once did they ever address a bug that we reported.  We were very conservative in our reporting and fixes were indeed needed but never came. 

For 8 years prior I ran Cadence (Orcad) with database, alongside Allegro.  While we generally had to go through EMA, we did get support.

Altium CircuitMaker Pro will NEVER see the light of day with their pricing of AD.  It would be like showing up selling $2 cups of coffee to workers while you have a $1 million per year food and beverage contract with the company as a whole.

While Kicad is looking pretty good at 7.0, just having spent a week with it, it's no Circuit Studio (view of an AD user).  But Altium pricing has me so angry I don't know if I can go back to their orphaned CS product.

Just semi retired recently but Kicad will be seeing some $$ shortly as a show of support.  I've done mostly 6 to 12 layer boards and have no feel for the joy or pain attempting these with Kicad.  Probably will not be going above DDR4 and that without SI tools.

[EE-digger]

I've tried repeatedly to convince Altium of the wisdom of offering the entry level product, even if it is a greatly scaled down version of the full AD.  It always feels like they are missing out on budding, future AD users but this may be old fart thinking.  The kids can buy their student versions for either free(??) or cheap.  So they can still get their Altium fix before hitting the real world.

But regardless of several approaches and suggestions from one seasoned in the field (I didn't mention 20 years prior with Pads), I feel that Altium is like my 13 year old Golden Retriever who passed recently.  Stone cold deaf and we never realized it for 6 months.  She responded so well to our hand commands throughout life that we never realized she wasn't hearing until her vet pointed it out.

So in the spirit of "Ginger" our girl, here's my hand signal to Altium.  Actually it's sort of arm and hand and Italian in heritage.  I don't see an emoji for it but will try a few ...         

[Smokey]

I recently had a long chat with an Altium sales rep explaining why we won't be renewing AD.  Broke down all the reasons, and why CS would be a much better fit for what we do but it's hard to commit to an abandoned product....  Sales rep lady said she understood and that she would pass along my feedback.


Then a about a month later I got a call from another sales rep asking if we were going to renew our AD license.  I asked him to review the notes from my last call and he said.... there were no notes.  HA!  I wondering if the first sales rep was actually physically making the wanking hand motion as she said she was taking notes.

That was mildly frustrating

[Warhawk]

I recently had a long chat with an Altium sales rep explaining why we won't be renewing AD.  Broke down all the reasons, and why CS would be a much better fit for what we do but it's hard to commit to an abandoned product....  Sales rep lady said she understood and that she would pass along my feedback.


Then a about a month later I got a call from another sales rep asking if we were going to renew our AD license.  I asked him o review the notes from my last call and he said.... there were no notes.  HA!  I wondering if the first sales rep was actually physically making the wanking hand motion as she said she was taking notes.

That was mildly frustrating

Or maybe the first sales rep quit after finding our that his company is centered around a single product that reached such maturity that there's not much to do about it except fixing bugs .

[VEGETA]

I recently had a long chat with an Altium sales rep explaining why we won't be renewing AD.  Broke down all the reasons, and why CS would be a much better fit for what we do but it's hard to commit to an abandoned product....  Sales rep lady said she understood and that she would pass along my feedback.


Then a about a month later I got a call from another sales rep asking if we were going to renew our AD license.  I asked him o review the notes from my last call and he said.... there were no notes.  HA!  I wondering if the first sales rep was actually physically making the wanking hand motion as she said she was taking notes.

That was mildly frustrating

Or maybe the first sales rep quit after finding our that his company is centered around a single product that reached such maturity that there's not much to do about it except fixing bugs .

what I always find bizarre with Altium is that they seem like they don't care about money and further customer base.

Like, CS can get a very big market if it has licenses very versatile like 100$ up to 500$ or so. they could have got lots of customers if they put real work on it.

[Smokey]

I recently had a long chat with an Altium sales rep explaining why we won't be renewing AD.  Broke down all the reasons, and why CS would be a much better fit for what we do but it's hard to commit to an abandoned product....  Sales rep lady said she understood and that she would pass along my feedback.


Then a about a month later I got a call from another sales rep asking if we were going to renew our AD license.  I asked him o review the notes from my last call and he said.... there were no notes.  HA!  I wondering if the first sales rep was actually physically making the wanking hand motion as she said she was taking notes.

That was mildly frustrating

Or maybe the first sales rep quit after finding our that his company is centered around a single product that reached such maturity that there's not much to do about it except fixing bugs .

what I always find bizarre with Altium is that they seem like they don't care about money and further customer base.

Like, CS can get a very big market if it has licenses very versatile like 100$ up to 500$ or so. they could have got lots of customers if they put real work on it.

.... and real upgrade paths to AD! 
Even if CS was just a stripped down AD, which you would hope would be easier to support/maintain/build on than a separate product codebase.

[VEGETA]

I recently had a long chat with an Altium sales rep explaining why we won't be renewing AD.  Broke down all the reasons, and why CS would be a much better fit for what we do but it's hard to commit to an abandoned product....  Sales rep lady said she understood and that she would pass along my feedback.


Then a about a month later I got a call from another sales rep asking if we were going to renew our AD license.  I asked him o review the notes from my last call and he said.... there were no notes.  HA!  I wondering if the first sales rep was actually physically making the wanking hand motion as she said she was taking notes.

That was mildly frustrating

Or maybe the first sales rep quit after finding our that his company is centered around a single product that reached such maturity that there's not much to do about it except fixing bugs .

what I always find bizarre with Altium is that they seem like they don't care about money and further customer base.

Like, CS can get a very big market if it has licenses very versatile like 100$ up to 500$ or so. they could have got lots of customers if they put real work on it.

.... and real upgrade paths to AD! 
Even if CS was just a stripped down AD, which you would hope would be easier to support/maintain/build on than a separate product codebase.

I think they should be doing this while they can since KiCAD is making real threatening improvements so that it took and will continue to take thousands of customers in the low to mid end.

But as you all agree, Altium is a weird company which does not fit into any category 

[johnboxall]

My suggestion to Altium was to offer AD with a limit of two layers at 160 x 100mm (sound familiar?) for US$499 a year. That would have mopped up a lot, a lot of people. Response: crickets.

[VEGETA]

My suggestion to Altium was to offer AD with a limit of two layers at 160 x 100mm (sound familiar?) for US$499 a year. That would have mopped up a lot, a lot of people. Response: crickets.

I really hate subscription based... anything! let alone design software!

people need to pay for the software once, then keep using it. maybe offer some updates later on for support like keeping free updates for version 2 until it reaches version 3 and then pay small price and so on.

[Doctorandus_P]

people need to pay for the software once, then keep using it. maybe offer some updates later on for support like keeping free updates for version 2 until it reaches version 3 and then pay small price and so on.

An alternative method is to use Open Source software "for free", and then donate to the project, based on your financial situation, and how important the project is to you.  For example a small donation for hobbyists, and a part of revenue if you use it for commercial projects. For example both Aisler and Oshpark are quite big sponsors of the KiCad project.

Donations are a part of what keeps Open Source projects alive, and just showing that you are interested in a project in this way helps motivating developers to keep improving an Open Source project.

From what I gather of Circuit Studio, it is not "dead again", but it has been dead for 5 or more years already.
Many Open Source projects also die or limp along on very small contributions. I am for example interested in libopencm3 but I am hesitant because it also seems to be mostly dead for about 8 years.