Announcing New Unraid OS License Keys

[JonathanM]

9 minutes ago, Hastur said:

Actual PRO licence: 129$

https://unraid.net/pricing

Manufacturer Recertified Seagate Exos X14 12TB: 124$

https://serverpartdeals.com/collections/recertified-seagate-exos/products/seagate-exos-x14-st12000nm0538-12tb-7-2k-rpm-sata-6gb-s-512e-256mb-3-5-manufacturer-recertified-hdd

both equally trustworthy in use as sentence:

I was specifically replying to the Brazil economy question. What you linked appear to be USA pricing.

 

And yes, ALL LICENSES AVAILABLE AT THIS EXACT MOMENT IN TIME, this sentence absolutely applies. 

11 minutes ago, Hastur said:

Buy Once, Use for Life.

No subscription. No hidden fees.

The NEW licenses, you know, the ones not even available for purchase yet, have different tiers. When those are available for purchase, that sentence WILL STILL APPLY to a subset of those offerings. Lifetime licenses will still be available.

 

Additionally, there will be the option to purchase more limited licenses at a lower cost, and the terms of those licenses WILL BE PROMINENTLY DISPLAYED. No bait and switch, if you purchase one of the new licenses when it eventually becomes available the terms will be clear.

[Hastur]

13 minutes ago, Frank1940 said:

 

Are you expecting that this drive will be guaranteed with full replacement forever????

No, becouse nobody sell drives with this words:

Quote

Buy Once, Use for Life.

Never to be broken, no hidden quirks

Anyway, my whole butthurt is becouse of one reason:

When I decide to build a DIY NAS six months ago I've made some reserch, try OMV, Truenas and bunch other solutions, then I find Unraid, I've tested it and think "Ok, maybe it's not free but as far I read its one time payment and predictible licence upgrade cost"

After that I buy really cheap hardware - old HP 800G3 tower for around 40$ and old stock WD RED 4TB again for around 45$ per disk plus some basic licence and it was really cheap and more than I need sollution.

And now what? Licencencing switch from perpetual to subscription (i know, only for new users not for me) and licence upgrade cost will be increased up to X. Which actually affect me if I plan to upgrade licence in future (so i buy pro licence to not pay PRO+n $ cost)

Maybe if I use this software for 8 years I feel different in this situation.

Nobody likes to feel like a donkey.

[Doktor-X]

Answer to this question is for me problematic

"Will Basic>Plus>Pro upgrades be the same price as it was before the changes?"

No. Legacy upgrade pricing will be changing alongside the new license tiers. 

 

Why on one hand users that have Basic Plus and Pro

Will have all future upgrades of software free per original lets say "promise" but on another hand per same "promise" will not get option to upgrade from lower tier licence for that upgrade price when you made original buy

 

 

Edited February 29 by Doktor-X

[enJOyIT]

41 minutes ago, Hastur said:

No, becouse nobody sell drives with this words:

Anyway, my whole butthurt is becouse of one reason:

When I decide to build a DIY NAS six months ago I've made some reserch, try OMV, Truenas and bunch other solutions, then I find Unraid, I've tested it and think "Ok, maybe it's not free but as far I read its one time payment and predictible licence upgrade cost"

After that I buy really cheap hardware - old HP 800G3 tower for around 40$ and old stock WD RED 4TB again for around 45$ per disk plus some basic licence and it was really cheap and more than I need sollution.

And now what? Licencencing switch from perpetual to subscription (i know, only for new users not for me) and licence upgrade cost will be increased up to X. Which actually affect me if I plan to upgrade licence in future (so i buy pro licence to not pay PRO+n $ cost)

Maybe if I use this software for 8 years I feel different in this situation.

Nobody likes to feel like a donkey.

 

Sorry you are talking b******

 

Buy your licence now and you will receive updates forever und free as they are currently advertised.

 

The news is out for a week now and you can still buy the old licence for the old price. What's the point to wait? For what? To complain afterwards, that the lifetime licence is now more expensive?!

[SpencerJ]

5 minutes ago, Doktor-X said:

but on another hand per same "promise" will not get option to upgrade from lower tier licence for that upgrade price when you made original buy

 

There has never been a promise that prices would remain fixed forever. The prices for nearly everything has gone up. We are not immune to that. But, you do have a chance to buy now and be immune from these prices changes. 

[Doktor-X]

11 minutes ago, SpencerJ said:

 

There has never been a promise that prices would remain fixed forever. The prices for nearly everything has gone up. We are not immune to that. But, you do have a chance to buy now and be immune from these prices changes. 

Maybe upgrade price is not fixed thing, but i still think that you need to allow old licenses to be upgraded, maybe not at the old price but at least under the old conditions. Someone may not need the 12 discs offered by the Pro right now, but if they do in a year or two need 8 disks now what. I know you say buy licence now but not all users have that money right now, and maybe not buy if thay not need it right now. Its your company and your software and you have right to do what you want no question ask.

 

And one more question, why not count only data drives towards the limit and not include parity to that limit

[SpencerJ]

Just now, Doktor-X said:

Maybe upgrade price is not fixed thing, but i still think that you need to allow old licenses to be upgraded, maybe not at the old price but at least under the old conditions.

 

This will still be possible. You will still be able to upgrade your Basic or Plus licenses under that (soon to be) old system.

[Doktor-X]

Just now, SpencerJ said:

 

This will still be possible. You will still be able to upgrade your Basic or Plus licenses under that (soon to be) old system.

Then this is OK, I got the impression that this will not be possible and that you will have to switch to a new licence system if you want to upgrade number of supported disks

[Hastur]

1 hour ago, enJOyIT said:

 

Sorry you are talking b******

 

Buy your licence now and you will receive updates forever und free as they are currently advertised.

 

The news is out for a week now and you can still buy the old licence for the old price. What's the point to wait? For what? To complain afterwards, that the lifetime licence is now more expensive?!

Point of view depends on the point of sitting/circumstances alter cases.

I'm sorry to bother you or anyone else with my perspective.

[isvein]

4 hours ago, Hastur said:

No, becouse nobody sell drives with this words:

Anyway, my whole butthurt is becouse of one reason:

When I decide to build a DIY NAS six months ago I've made some reserch, try OMV, Truenas and bunch other solutions, then I find Unraid, I've tested it and think "Ok, maybe it's not free but as far I read its one time payment and predictible licence upgrade cost"

After that I buy really cheap hardware - old HP 800G3 tower for around 40$ and old stock WD RED 4TB again for around 45$ per disk plus some basic licence and it was really cheap and more than I need sollution.

And now what? Licencencing switch from perpetual to subscription (i know, only for new users not for me) and licence upgrade cost will be increased up to X. Which actually affect me if I plan to upgrade licence in future (so i buy pro licence to not pay PRO+n $ cost)

Maybe if I use this software for 8 years I feel different in this situation.

Nobody likes to feel like a donkey.

If I hear the word "subscription" used to describe the changes for Unraid one more time, I gonna scream!😣

Edited February 29 by isvein

[Yoitan]

I'll need to upgrade the license for my main server to a Pro license soon, especially with the upcoming price increase. I'm also planning to build a backup server later on, but I need to give some thought to how I'll go about it.

[1812]

(chuckling at the irony of some of these people who illegally download movies they didn't pay for, complaining that software they already own that isn't changing, but new purchases will incur potential recurring fees to support further development of the platform they love, use, and, again, already own and will continue to receive the benefits of using at no additional cost.)

 

Seriously folks, it's a standard, common sense practice for mature software to have recurring fees to sustain continued development. If it didn't, once you hit a market saturation point for your product, you essentially can only cover maintenance but no other development (or get in the business of harvesting your existing user base's personal information to sell to third parties.) Some of you complaining would be shocked to learn that there are many of us that pay hundreds every year for updates to other software companies we use and need. From audio and video editing, to network licensing. I do. I just did 2 weeks ago! But I evaluate if the new features in that next version are worth it, or skip a generation.

 

Now, with all that said, I will honestly admit that the little cheapskate in me doesn't like any increase on anything ever! Even if I can rationally justify it. And that's because nobody really wants to gleefully pay more for anything. I hear you. I feel you. I started out like some folks cobbling together hardware and sketchy drives to make my first server. Many of you are probably still in this stage. But 8 years later, and after numerous sever interactions, I run 4 licenses now on solid hardware with solid drives [knock on wood.] If their newly announced model was implemented when I first looked around 8 years ago, it would have given me the same pause to consider it versus alternatives. I would have still tried all the other free operating systems like I did. But I think in the end, I would have still picked Unraid for its ease of use, ability to run on a wide range of hardware, and community support.

 

I think that it's ridiculously generous that Unraid has stated that they will grandfather previously sold licenses to have continued updates. Some of my licenses are 7 or 8 years old, and I'm still getting new features, new patches, and more. There is no other software that I own that has done that beyond a few years. This is why I have recommended this os, and will continue to do so. I'll just tell people to suck it up and buy the lifetime upfront, as it'll pay for itself over time, and give the dev's the ability to do more sooner.

 

---

 

as a postscript, don't reply to me with nonsensical arguments or how it "costs a month's worth of food" replies. I'll just ignore them. This software is a luxury, not a necessity. If you are having to make the decision between eating versus storing more data than the average pc can do, then the solution is simple; go use a completely free os and stop making irrelevant arguments.

 

[lelejau]

On 2/29/2024 at 12:30 PM, JonathanM said:

How does the cost of the license compare to an 8TB hard drive?

 

There is something called payment installments. AFAIK buying the license does not provide that option. This one difference, major I'd say for some. hard drive price can be diluted over time. When I bought, I didn't see any choice of doing the same for the license. Maybe because thats international payment, I don't know. I used paypal. Not an expert in bank transactions. But yeah, that is a major difference.

Edited March 1 by lelejau

[BM118]

9 hours ago, lelejau said:

 

There is something called payment installments.

This is an option through PayPal, it’s how I personally purchased my license with fortnightly payments. If your country doesn’t support this inside PayPal, then that’s a problem between you and PayPal. Most countries support an option for something similar outside of that using a bank of your choosing, I recommend you investigate your options there.

 

I know where you are coming from though, cash flow is a real problem, not necessarily the total cost. The irony here is that is exactly the same problem Limetech are trying to fix and has been proven to be the most reliable and preferred option for businesses to deliver on cashflow. They need cashflow to continue innovating and developing the product, not just revenue.

[BM118]

Limetech have actually surprised me here, and in no way, shape or form did I ever expect to see a move like this.

 

The licenses that are already out there will continue to work and are not being forced into a conversion/migration.

You will still be able to transfer an existing license to a new flash drive if required.

You will continue to receive exactly what you have already purchased, no matter what tier you have today, so there are no broken promises.

You will continue to receive an option to upgrade across tiers after the new model comes into place if you need more drives.

 

If, in future, you decide to purchase a “new model” license that has upgrade entitlements, you get the option to decide if the current features and capabilities are sufficient for your needs when your included entitlements comes to an end. If they are, don’t pay the fee for the upgrade entitlements and stick with what you have. If you find in a few months/years down the track that you want some fancy new features then pay for your entitlement at that point. You don’t even have to backpay for the previous years.

 

In no way is this a subscription. If a subscription is not paid before it expires, then that product/service stops working/being accessible until it is paid. This is not what is happening.

 

But on top of all of this, for those users who know they will be using the product for years to come, or have large array requirements, they are still offering a lifetime usage and entitlements license, or if you just don’t want small recurring fees for the entitlements.

 

I personally think this is a great outcome for limetech and myself as a user. I always understand the hesitation in paying more for a product, but it is literally the whole point of comparing solutions against each of your own personal requirements.

 

If you don’t want or need future updates, and you are on a new tier that requires entitlements, then don’t pay for the update entitlements, and stay on the version you are on. If you need/want the updates then pay the small fee for that.

 

For all the people complaining about this being a different situation because it’s an OS, just stop. You either don’t know what are actually talking about (e.g. don’t allow direct inbound connections to UnRAID from the internet), or you actually do know what you are talking about and have determined that your requirement is that you need continual security updates, in which point the answer is quite clear, either find a product that better suits your needs or pay the small fee.

[LSG501]

Not exactly the first post I thought I would make but figured I might as well chime in here as a new user of unraid, partly for feedback to Limetech and maybe give the perspective of a new users considering making a server/nas for home use. 

 

I'll be blunt... I HATE subscription models for software with a passion and while I appreciate that Limetech needs money I'm not sure that subscriptions on the lowest tiers are really the best way to go about it.   I actively sought out alternatives when adobe went that way for example...  I do appreciate the fact that Limetch are going to honour existing licences though and not stop us using the software after the subscription has been stopped. 

 

I decided to buy Unraid Pro when I built my server because I knew what my potential long term plans (basically file backups, media server, maybe vms) are for it.  However I built my server with potentially using truenas or even windows if I didn't like unraid after the trial.  There's also the LTT invested NAS software coming at some point....he's not exactly an unknown Youtuber....

 

I did my homework and from the most simplistic stand point (I'm sure there is other deeper stuff different) there were literally only 2 real reasons why I picked unraid.  One was for the way that the storage pools can be expanded drive by drive (even though they'll all be the same size), essentially a cost consideration so I could spread the storage costs a little more and the other was the fact that only the active drive would spin up, essentially power usage and hard drive wear considerations. 

 

Every other thing I was considering doing I can basically do on a normal linux distro, truenas or even windows, maybe with a little more learning curve but lets be honest most people building a home server are a bit more tech minded. 

 

For me £110 (after conversion to UK currency) for unlimited drives is kind of the sweet spot of being a 'no big loss if I don't like it long term' and being too expensive to even consider it when there are highly regarded free alternatives albeit with a slightly different approach, or even windows for around the same (yes I know not the ideal OS but it would work for my use case).

 

Now in respect to the new pricing model...

It's all very well saying that the new prices for the 'lower tiers' will be cheaper but long term they likely won't be when you throw in the average lifespan of a home server, yes I know this is part of the reason for the change but I am coming from a customer perspective.   I'd argue that a fair number of users with 2-4 drives are likely more budget minded in their servers as well as their software. 

 

Higher price for the unlocked option, it really does depend on pricing but I'd say you need to be careful not to put people off due to the price. 

 

I do not like the wording relating to buying now at current prices and upgrade later but there's not a guarantee on upgrade pricing (I'm guessing it would be the difference to the full cost of the new 'pro version') so if we buy a lower tier key and then upgrade it could ultimately cost us more than just buying pro now. 

 

Little side note:

I'm also looking at building a second server to back up my main one.... I might end up buying another license now, like many others, and get grandfathered in when it's built.  There's a side of me that can see Limetch getting a quick influx of cash in one go and then actually getting less long term due to the changes being proposed....

[itimpi]

I think the terminology should be changed from Subscription pricing to Update pricing as it better reflects what is being proposed and has less negative connotations for most people

[isvein]

6 hours ago, LSG501 said:

I'll be blunt... I HATE subscription models for software with a passion and while I appreciate that Limetech needs money I'm not sure that subscriptions on the lowest tiers are really the best way to go about it.   I actively sought out alternatives when adobe went that way for example...  I do appreciate the fact that Limetch are going to honour existing licences though and not stop us using the software after the subscription has been stopped.

Don`t come and say I did not warn ya!

 

[Jur]

seems fair

[LSG501]

2 hours ago, isvein said:

Don`t come and say I did not warn ya!

 

Whether we use the term subscription, maintenance fee, support fee, held hostage or whatever you choose to call it, it is an ongoing cost to keep the os secure and up to date.... if I need to keep paying for something that is basically a subscription in my eyes. (I want a different scream this time 😜)

 

I'd be fine with it be a subscription to get feature updates, or even a more modular approach where you can add 'extras' (not sure what exactly, or how much extra), but this doesn't just block you from getting features, it stops you from getting updates for security of the OS and we all know how fun it was for some nas owners who got hit by ransomware attacks...

Edited March 2 by LSG501
extra context

[eras]

I'll be honest, this does not look good at all. I moved my NAS from OMV to Unraid a couple of years ago because I decided to opt for a paid license in return for more stability and reliability. Short story: I became a father and my time budget for NAS maintenance went from generous to barely existent. Initially, Unraid just worked exactly like I wanted: a reliable environment that did what it was supposed to with an investment of 10 minutes or less per week for keeping things upgraded and properly configured. Unraid licenses were never cheap, but at the time, they were worth the money.
Over the last year or so, my system broke twice during upgrades, despite me doing everything by the book, just like before. It's barely functional now, Docker is a steaming mess, and even with Docker completely disabled, the NAS never shuts down cleanly and data access feels sluggish. I did not make any changes to the software I am running on Unraid, just did the upgrades. Ran the combability checker on every system upgrade and did follow all recommendations before upgrading.
With OMV, you would have the occasional bug, but never something like that. I recommended Unraid to a friend who is now facing similar issues on his NAS. So my user experience isn't great to say the least. I am currently planning to do a complete reinstall in light of the multiple issues, since this is predictably less time-consuming than lengthy diagnostics and bug fixing. Judging by the forums, my friend and me aren't an isolated case.
And now this announcement. When a company like LT switches to subscription in the middle of what can only be described as a bumpy ride in terms of stability and reliability, it looks a lot like a failing business chasing money down the drain. The way in which this was announced isn't helping either. In addition, making users who just bought a license for not much less than with the old pricing model already pay for updates after just a single year sounds excessive and unattractive from a consumer POV. If I pay a larger license fee, I would expect a longer period of support until support extension fees kick in. Paying only slightly less than full price initially and then being asked to shell out annual subscription fees on top simply sounds not fair to the end user.
The combination of the stability issues with several recent upgrades and of the new pricing model makes Unraid basically unrecommendable. The calculation for a NAS is obviously one spanning over 4-5 years at least. In the absence of facts, my guts tell me that with the new pricing model, a starter user would have probably paid the equivalent of a pro-license when those 4-5 years have passed.
And even though my current license will be grandfathered, the idea that LT may be in financial trouble (and yes: if it weren't, there would obviously be no need for additional fees put on the community) does make me consider other options for the primary NAS. As initially stated, I have next to no time-budget for maintaining this NAS and if I can not rely on Limetech staying in business and providing a stable base, it just isn't for me.
I am not mad, btw. I get that this is a tough market, that everything gets more expensive, and that Limetech needs to make money to pay the bills. And as far as I am concerned, the initial years with Unraid were fine and worth the cost of the license I bought. But the doubts I had about the future of this system were amplified by the announcement of the new pricing structure--simply because my feeling is that it makes the system significantly less attractive for new users, thus probably hurting sales in the mid- to longer-term and putting the future of Unraid in doubt.
From my point of view, it would have been a better idea to tap into the market of people like me, people who are short on time and who would likely pay for less hands-on maintenance. Like a platform that allows the user to set up a docker with several containers with a lot less configuration work. Basically a click, select, and run installer and configurator for common setup options. Or a service that provides a secure front-end for internet-facing services.
Charging users more money--and forcing them to pay continuously for as long as they want to use the system with up-to-date patches (which--lets be honest here--isn't optional on anything connected to a network) while not providing them with any significant improvement in return is very unlikely to succeed.

[Cessquill]

28 minutes ago, eras said:

Judging by the forums, my friend and me aren't an isolated case.

The forums are a place for people with issues to seek help -  you're going to find similar incidents.  If you could compare that with the amount of people where it runs just fine, you'd likely get a much better outlook.

 

You really ought to use the help available on these forums to sort your server out as there's no way it's that unreliable.  I've leaned on them several times where I've come unstuck and they've helped enormously.

[isvein]

13 hours ago, LSG501 said:

Whether we use the term subscription, maintenance fee, support fee, held hostage or whatever you choose to call it, it is an ongoing cost to keep the os secure and up to date.... if I need to keep paying for something that is basically a subscription in my eyes. (I want a different scream this time 😜)

 

I'd be fine with it be a subscription to get feature updates, or even a more modular approach where you can add 'extras' (not sure what exactly, or how much extra), but this doesn't just block you from getting features, it stops you from getting updates for security of the OS and we all know how fun it was for some nas owners who got hit by ransomware attacks...

Even Topaz, who basically had the EXACT same model (beside they screwed us customers over by releasing an new version where our old licence was not valid) does NOT call it an "subscription" (because it is not)
https://www.topazlabs.com/pricing

 

Also:

Also this is like this skit:

 

[eras]

49 minutes ago, Cessquill said:

The forums are a place for people with issues to seek help -  you're going to find similar incidents.  If you could compare that with the amount of people where it runs just fine, you'd likely get a much better outlook.

 

I think you might have missed the part where I wrote that I moved to Unraid because I have no time budget to browse through forums and try out suggested solutions. I moved in anticipation that a for-pay system would put stability first and new experimental features second. I am not running a complex and complicated system, just basic storage and a few docker containers. No VMs, no transcoding, no fancy stuff. The system was running stable after I set it up, and it ran that way for a while.
If a configuration is running stable and a system update breaks it, forcing me to go on a bugfixing hunt (which is almost always time-consuming), that basically ruins the deal for me. At the absolute minimum, I would expect a clear warning prior to the upgrade that new functions are introduced and that they break stuff / require maintenance work. Ideally, I would expect a separate, optional security-update-only path and maybe an update profile that you can select which will delay all updates until they have been found to be stable on all tested systems. That would allow me to avoid a situation where I have to invest time I do not have to fix something that was broken by a change in code I did not introduce. For me, the most important thing in servers is stability and reliability. New features are nice, but only if they do not impact those two things negatively.
The new pricing model just adds more issues to that. From the scarce details we were provided, there is another big problem I see: the non-existent synchronization in terms of versioning and licensing. If I understood it right, a user that pays for a license of let's say version 7.xx gets updates during the first year. The problem I see is if there are bugs in one of the versions he updates to towards the end of the year that will only be fixed after the year has expired. I mean, generally speaking, the idea that "you don't have to pay the subscription, you can just run your current version forever" is already unviable when one cares about security. But the idea that you could end up with a broken system that you need to pay to fix is making things worse. 
It would be much better to have a model where you get support until EOL for the version you buy, so basically paying for a license when version 7 is out gives me all updates until version 8 comes out. That would give the user at least the choice to stay with a stable and final release or to upgrade for a new version and new features based on a subscription model. I might have missed that this is actually what they plan but from what I have read, they do not.

Edited March 3 by eras

[LSG501]

7 hours ago, isvein said:

Even Topaz, who basically had the EXACT same model (beside they screwed us customers over by releasing an new version where our old licence was not valid) does NOT call it an "subscription" (because it is not)
https://www.topazlabs.com/pricing

 

 

To be fair it's slightly different being locked out of video editor update versus locked out of a server OS update because you haven't paid for the 'yearly update fee'. 

 

IF the video editor doesn't work you'll lose some time or it will crash etc but if a server OS is left in a bad way due to a poor update or the update to fix a major security issue comes outside of your renewal date you have no recourse but to pay for the update to keep your data safe (assuming open to internet etc and that you have to keep using it in the exact same fashion).  If it's not open to the internet then of course you could go vlans and block external access etc.

 

Essentially it's all boiling down to semantics at this moment in time, I and many others will call the need to pay yearly to continue getting even the most basic things such as security updates a subscription, others will call it a maintenance fee or as Topaz calls it it's an 'upgrade license'.  However, like I said before, it doesn't matter what the name is, unraid is changing to a model where you need to pay on a regular basis to ensure you are 100% secure, if it was purely feature updates then I would say it is closer to the update license term that Topaz is using but at the moment unraids is also includes security/bug fixes.....

 

And while yes you could skip a few updates here and there if you want to but no one really recommends running an OS with out of date security/bug fixes these days do they.... it's not like unraid has been bug free or had no issues with excessive writes to drives or anything.