Well of course. That’s why I put it in quotes. It is a similie: in SaaS applications you pay a regular fee and you get a service, stop paying and your service goes away - you are renting the application not owning it. As I understand it, that’s also how this new version of Audirvana will work - each year you pay approx 2/3 of what used to be the cost a permanent license for 3.5 and in exchange you get access to the software which presumably stops working if you stop paying (otherwise why do the subscription? If you can stop the subscription and keep fully functioning software, smart people would just pay for the first month then cancel the subscription and have very cheap software).
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There was a previous post with feedback from users about going subscription model. Could not find it.
So I will say it now.
It saddens me to see Audirvana going to subscription model.
I live on a fixed income and one can have only so many monthly, yearly fees.
I bought it around February and now it’s a wait an see when a System Update renders it unusable.
I will continue using A 3.5 bugs and all.
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This absurd licence model. Why should i pay a monthly or a yearly fee to play my music collections. Im not even interested in this online radio or other HD Streaming services . As a consumer i should have option to pick and choose what i buy . In my opinion Audirvana should offer a standalone (One time pay and done) version and studio . Also Studio is bit dodgy i have use other HDD to play all my songs and i constantly sync my HDD with master HDD using the sync tools i can see studio is updating the metatda in my Local HDD and every time Sync tool update the entire 16K songs instead of delta … Also performance of studio is dodgy eating more memory and hangs at times.
I feel your pain my friend. I ALMOST bought the last version, only a month ago but thought I’d wait.
Glad I didn’t purchase now. Kind of felt like a new version was around the corner. I did download a trial. It’s good. Not as good as Roon but for the price and IF you’re able to connect your computer directly to your system it works well. I’m not sure thats a long term solution for me though.
Now I’ve seen they are going after the subscription model, I’m not interested at all. I pay the Roon subs but only because the functionality is superior to Audirvana. I was looking into Audirvana because Roon is a subs model and Audirvana wasn’t. Now that’s ruined.
I’ll stick with Roon and wait to see what Apple Music morphs into.
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I’m in the same boat. This Studio fiasco and the lack of a remote have been the nail in the coffin for me. I was going to stop my Roon subscription and go Audirvana as IT WAS a reasonable price and sounded great on my system.
After much thought I’m going to go with Apple Music Family plan once the HiRes stuff rolls out and bin off Qobuz Family plan. As neither Roon or Audirvana support Apple Music I’m also sacking off Roon, pity as it works well for me. As a plus side I also save some £££ too.
Yeah, it seems as though I arrived just a tad too late to the Audirvana party. Thinking about it, perhaps I should’ve purchased 3.5. At least I could have used it until it stopped working. But then I’d be annoyed about using a piece of potentially redundant software.
My Roon annual subscription is due in June. I’m going to renew for 1 more year as Apple will most likely take a while to sort their s*** out and may well keep it too closed off from my audio setup.
I just hate subscription models. I do use them, obviously. But I have to perceive I am getting value from them. IF Audirvana supported Apple Music and handled streaming over ethernet to my Audio equipment I’d consider it. But I prefer a one-off payment for a few years any day.
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Since Roon has a lifetime subscription, why can’t AS offer the same?
Roon and Audirvana are provided by different suppliers/developers.
You are at liberty to pick and choose what you buy/subscribe to.
“As long as it continues to work fine”…It’s no longer a lifetime license with future updates/upgrades removed from the picture. I can no longer anticipate there will be no issue with the next major Mac upgrade or Windows upgrade - and in the past I wouldn’t even have to consider it because the promise was in the future compatibility upgrades, which apparently won’t happen now. Personally, I detest subscriptions that force monthly fees that would otherwise not exist (I’m a designer who gave up Adobe apps, too, for this very reason) on users. Some users will find it appropriate but others like myself who don’t bother with paying streaming services to play music they already own, won’t. I’m disappointed - I researched players a lot last year and was fine paying $96 US Dollars for it. Mac users are going to have a major OS update this year and Audirvana isn’t going to be fixing 3.5.xx when that happens. Microsoft is promising the same with a massively upgraded Windows OS in the next year. I’m shopping now for something else to play my 85,000 HD tracks. I figure I have until this Fall’s MacOS version is released and I install it. It will be a death by a thousand tiny cuts, as some features work and others stop, as the years progress. It would be appropriate, as it has always been in the past with most software makers, for Audirvana to maintain their app for as long as they’ve promised, even if they’ve created a new product. They could if they chose to, but they’ve chosen to eventually cut off the 3.5.xx owners who don’t upgrade. I’ve never heard of a company telling their customers “it will continue to work” when they actually have no idea just how long that time period really is. I wish them good luck but I can see I’m essentially on my own now and will have to act accordingly.
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Time to find another player…… BitPerfect.
I own and use jriver mediacenter, audirvana 3.5 and roon. I upgrade jriver frequently, which is about USD 20 and bought a lifetime of roon early on. Upgrading jriver for me is a way to say thank you to the developers, and I did that happily for the last ten or twelve years. I bought a roon at the very beginning to help them right at the start.
jriver and roon are still adding massive functionality from release to release. Both add tremendous value doing so.
Why did I buy audirvana? I liked the way they integrate VST3 plugins and I thought, why not give it a try. I do not use it any more more days, actually never really did, because it does does not work (well?) with larger libraries. Does not seem to be designed to with these in mind.
Looking at the added features of Studio I do not see any reason to upgrade / switch to a subscrition. I do not see the value roon has to offer (Metadata enhancement, powerful multiroom, powerful dsp, great autoplay/radio function, great presentation, great remote control, lots of natively supported devices plus great sound.
I will not give Studio another look. I believe the subscription is far too expensive given the functionality, and I do not see the problems I have with 3.5 will be solved, because large libraries do not seem to be in focus anytime soon.
I think I would have upgraded to Version 4, would that have been offered at a fair price. Maybe 40 Euros incl. VAT.
I’m 3.5 owner and love the product and would be happy living with it as-is; although I’m still on the fence about subscribing to Studio. The problem is not if but when Microsoft puts out an OS update that breaks Audirvana 3.5 we are dead in the water. I’m afraid we may just be delaying the inevitable if you want to continue using their products.
I have bought the 3.5 in March, will continue to use it as long as it works on my PC & Mac, currently mainly with qobuz sublime. if 3.5 stops to work, i’ll likely use Qobuz app/software.
Except for content providers (qobuz, newspapers etc) i have no subscriptions.
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How do I start it without entering administrator mode? since it does not let me use the online services
That really doesn’t make any difference.
The difference is different manufacturers offer different products.
I suggest asking Damien if he would consider a hybrid purchase/update-fee.
This gives us ownership plus the advantage of keeping it updated if we choose to have latest developments.
Minor updates and fixes included in purchase. Major advances and added features cost.
Studio is obviously copying Roon. It is merely a suggestion on my part. Also, Damien and his staff are reading the forums. It’s a suggestion.
I don’t know what happens it always opens in administrator mode
An update to version 3.5 bringing it to 3.5.46 was recently released out of goodwill. If an OS update breaks version version 3.5, I expect that you would see a fix from Audirvana provided out of goodwill, so long as the fix doesn’t require major programming resources. This sort of goodwill is good for business and I think Audirvana understands that.
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