5 ms·

Microsoft is retiring TechNet subscriptions

54 points by miles 13y ago

incision 13y ago
Not terribly surprising. MSDN subscriptions are still around and a good option for anyone who makes a living on via MS software.
- trotsky 13y ago
  I agree, TechNet had already been gutted. It's worth noting that BizSpark appears to be very, very easy to qualify for and includes free MSDN + $150/mo of azure credits for three years.
- velodrome 13y ago
  It's still a short-sighted move by Microsoft. People who train using this software will find it really annoying to reload every 180 days. If a college grad wants to learn new skills, will he/she: 1) reload the whole stack (Server, SQL, etc) every few months or 2) not be bothered with stupid notices and just learn Linux, OSS. Technet was great program for learning. I am not willing to spend $6k on a MSDN subscription for learning to use Microsoft products. Instead, I will use this opportunity to learn more OSS software. Thanks Microsoft!
  - gebe 13y ago
    Well doesn't most IT-students qualify for a free MSDN subscription or at least Dreamspark (which has Windows Server, SQL, VS and so on for free for any student)? My experience with Microsoft is that they are very generous with their software in regards to students since they have a lot to gain and really nothing to lose by letting soon-to-be-professional-developers get comfortable with their stack.
    - rmk2 13y ago
      You don't even have to be an IT-student to qualify for Dreamspark, the only thing that matters is whether your university is a member.
  - incision 13y ago
    >If a college grad wants to learn new skills, will he/she: 1) reload the whole stack (Server, SQL, etc) every few months or 2) not be bothered with stupid notices and just learn Linux, OSS." Or... 3) Spin the stuff up on EC2 as needed and likely spend less than the TechNet sub + power. While I'm sure there are exceptions, my anecdotal experience says the typical TechNet subscriber wasn't in it to "learn new skills" they were directly or indirectly selling keys. This is surely why MS went through several rounds of reducing key allowances prior to this.
- eli 13y ago
  And hopefully all the startups here are aware they can get a free 3 year MSDN subscription via BizSpark, provided they meet some requirements.
venomsnake 13y ago
That actually makes sense. Developers developers developers in no longer the MS mantra. Visual Studio is stagnating, Servers are very cheap for evaluation on Azure and with the majority of the toolchains being open source there is non trivial amount of developers using mainly linux. So the world now is not the world technet was created.
- chokolad 13y ago
  Developers, Developers, Developers, Developers - use MSDN, not TechNet.
  - zokier 13y ago
    MSDN seems significantly more expensive than what I remember TechNet being, $1200 if you need SQL server, $6200(!) if you need Office. And WTF are "Tech support incidents"? Are they billing for bug reports?
    - yuhong 13y ago
      They generally refund if they confirm that it is a real bug.
    - AjithAntony 13y ago
      There is a new "MSDN Operating systems" subscription for $700(+ $500/yr) to get the server software part that would otherwise be in MSDN premium. Edit: Nevermind. The OS subscription doesn't include the server software like SQL and exchange.
    - eli 13y ago
      Tech Support Incidents ain't exactly new; that's how it worked under TechNet too.
    - pjmlp 13y ago
      Billing for bug reports is a common practice in the commercial software world to avoid overflow of bogus reports.
ckozlowski 13y ago
I'm rather saddened by this. As an infrastructure engineer, TechNet has been perfect for building demo labs and proof-of-concepts. In my home virtualization environment, I love the ability to throw up a domain today, a SQL cluster tomorrow, wipe it all out the next day and build it all back up again. Losing that flexibility will be rough. Getting eval keys from say, VMware, with their 30-60 day timers means picking and choosing what I want to try playing with when, and feeling SOL if some interruption comes about in which I'm not able to use the time to the fullest. I'm pressured to their schedule, and not my own, and damned if I want to revisit something or simply learn at my own pace. It was a great way to simply buy into the Microsoft ecosystem and familiarize ones self with a whole range of products with no fuss. MSDN is a much more expensive proposition, and while ideal for the development community, not geared for those of us who's experience is in deploying solutions and performing integration. I suspect this was a move to help close a loophole in which technet licenses were used in production environment, and that's a fair assertion to make. But being forced to eval in a sterile "Free Lab" is no substitute. I really think this is a unnecessary move to close what has been one of Microsoft's best programs at promoting adoption.
- toyg 13y ago
  Same here. Today, I can build a test image with version X of software Y in preparation for an engagement, then archive the image; 18 months later, when customers come back with an issue, I can fire up that image and figure out fairly quickly what "fabulous customization" they've done that broke my setup. In the cloud, this exercise would likely cost me $$$ every month, since I'd have to keep around hundreds of GB of virtual volumes. Clearly I have to rethink my workflow, or I could go back to piracy, like I used to when I was a penniless minion. Microsoft: finding more ways to be hated and irrelevant since 2003.
  - incision 13y ago
    >In the cloud, this exercise would likely cost me $$$ every month, since I'd have to keep around hundreds of GB of virtual volumes. Personally, I'd rather pay some cloud provider a few dozen dollars per month to hang on to a bunch of volumes and snapshots that I can access/redeploy trivially from anywhere than maintain all the same in my home.
wluu 13y ago
A little sad to hear. I've been a TechNet subscriber for a number of years now. I probably don't utilise it as much as I could.
McGlockenshire 13y ago
Okay, I could get used to the whole time-limited eval thing, but the real killer here is removing the back catalog. It's going to be even harder to do comparability testing now.
- josteink 13y ago
  You still have time to download the shitload (it should only be a 2-3 digit amount of gigabytes if you only pick the stuff you actually need) and generate enough keys to get by once the service closes down. That said, I have to agree. Where else in this world can you get MS-DOS 6.22 and Windows For Workgroups 3.11 these days?
  - zokier 13y ago
    > That said, I have to agree. Where else in this world can you get MS-DOS 6.22 and Windows For Workgroups 3.11 these days? I hope some enterprising fellow would archive significant portion of what is available from TechNet. It might be the last moment many of the software there is available for public.
  - ethomson 13y ago
    MSDN.
- velodrome 13y ago
  A lot of enterprises have really old Microsoft products still in product. If they remove the back catalog, it will be really difficult to diagnose rare issues in a sandbox. It's not like you can buy a license for the software either.
deleted 13y ago
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deleted 13y ago
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AjithAntony 13y ago
You would need an MSDN Premium subscription to get access to all the Operating systems. There is a new "MSDN Operating Systems" subscription http://www.microsoftstore.com/store/msusa/en_US/pdp/productID.254639900 http://www.microsoftstore.com/store/msusa/en_US/pdp/productI...
- toyg 13y ago
  That's a whopping 400% increase from my Technet sub. EDIT: and of course it doesn't include SQL Server.

54 points by miles 13y ago

Not terribly surprising. MSDN subscriptions are still around and a good option for anyone who makes a living on via MS software.

trotsky 13y ago
I agree, TechNet had already been gutted. It's worth noting that BizSpark appears to be very, very easy to qualify for and includes free MSDN + $150/mo of azure credits for three years.
velodrome 13y ago
It's still a short-sighted move by Microsoft. People who train using this software will find it really annoying to reload every 180 days. If a college grad wants to learn new skills, will he/she: 1) reload the whole stack (Server, SQL, etc) every few months or 2) not be bothered with stupid notices and just learn Linux, OSS. Technet was great program for learning. I am not willing to spend $6k on a MSDN subscription for learning to use Microsoft products. Instead, I will use this opportunity to learn more OSS software. Thanks Microsoft!
- gebe 13y ago
  Well doesn't most IT-students qualify for a free MSDN subscription or at least Dreamspark (which has Windows Server, SQL, VS and so on for free for any student)? My experience with Microsoft is that they are very generous with their software in regards to students since they have a lot to gain and really nothing to lose by letting soon-to-be-professional-developers get comfortable with their stack.
  - rmk2 13y ago
    You don't even have to be an IT-student to qualify for Dreamspark, the only thing that matters is whether your university is a member.
- incision 13y ago
  >If a college grad wants to learn new skills, will he/she: 1) reload the whole stack (Server, SQL, etc) every few months or 2) not be bothered with stupid notices and just learn Linux, OSS." Or... 3) Spin the stuff up on EC2 as needed and likely spend less than the TechNet sub + power. While I'm sure there are exceptions, my anecdotal experience says the typical TechNet subscriber wasn't in it to "learn new skills" they were directly or indirectly selling keys. This is surely why MS went through several rounds of reducing key allowances prior to this.
eli 13y ago
And hopefully all the startups here are aware they can get a free 3 year MSDN subscription via BizSpark, provided they meet some requirements.

venomsnake 13y ago

That actually makes sense. Developers developers developers in no longer the MS mantra. Visual Studio is stagnating, Servers are very cheap for evaluation on Azure and with the majority of the toolchains being open source there is non trivial amount of developers using mainly linux. So the world now is not the world technet was created.

chokolad 13y ago
Developers, Developers, Developers, Developers - use MSDN, not TechNet.
- zokier 13y ago
  MSDN seems significantly more expensive than what I remember TechNet being, $1200 if you need SQL server, $6200(!) if you need Office. And WTF are "Tech support incidents"? Are they billing for bug reports?
  - yuhong 13y ago
    They generally refund if they confirm that it is a real bug.
  - AjithAntony 13y ago
    There is a new "MSDN Operating systems" subscription for $700(+ $500/yr) to get the server software part that would otherwise be in MSDN premium. Edit: Nevermind. The OS subscription doesn't include the server software like SQL and exchange.
  - eli 13y ago
    Tech Support Incidents ain't exactly new; that's how it worked under TechNet too.
  - pjmlp 13y ago
    Billing for bug reports is a common practice in the commercial software world to avoid overflow of bogus reports.

ckozlowski 13y ago

I'm rather saddened by this. As an infrastructure engineer, TechNet has been perfect for building demo labs and proof-of-concepts. In my home virtualization environment, I love the ability to throw up a domain today, a SQL cluster tomorrow, wipe it all out the next day and build it all back up again. Losing that flexibility will be rough. Getting eval keys from say, VMware, with their 30-60 day timers means picking and choosing what I want to try playing with when, and feeling SOL if some interruption comes about in which I'm not able to use the time to the fullest. I'm pressured to their schedule, and not my own, and damned if I want to revisit something or simply learn at my own pace. It was a great way to simply buy into the Microsoft ecosystem and familiarize ones self with a whole range of products with no fuss. MSDN is a much more expensive proposition, and while ideal for the development community, not geared for those of us who's experience is in deploying solutions and performing integration. I suspect this was a move to help close a loophole in which technet licenses were used in production environment, and that's a fair assertion to make. But being forced to eval in a sterile "Free Lab" is no substitute. I really think this is a unnecessary move to close what has been one of Microsoft's best programs at promoting adoption.

toyg 13y ago
Same here. Today, I can build a test image with version X of software Y in preparation for an engagement, then archive the image; 18 months later, when customers come back with an issue, I can fire up that image and figure out fairly quickly what "fabulous customization" they've done that broke my setup. In the cloud, this exercise would likely cost me $$$ every month, since I'd have to keep around hundreds of GB of virtual volumes. Clearly I have to rethink my workflow, or I could go back to piracy, like I used to when I was a penniless minion. Microsoft: finding more ways to be hated and irrelevant since 2003.
- incision 13y ago
  >In the cloud, this exercise would likely cost me $$$ every month, since I'd have to keep around hundreds of GB of virtual volumes. Personally, I'd rather pay some cloud provider a few dozen dollars per month to hang on to a bunch of volumes and snapshots that I can access/redeploy trivially from anywhere than maintain all the same in my home.

wluu 13y ago

A little sad to hear. I've been a TechNet subscriber for a number of years now. I probably don't utilise it as much as I could.

McGlockenshire 13y ago

Okay, I could get used to the whole time-limited eval thing, but the real killer here is removing the back catalog. It's going to be even harder to do comparability testing now.

josteink 13y ago
You still have time to download the shitload (it should only be a 2-3 digit amount of gigabytes if you only pick the stuff you actually need) and generate enough keys to get by once the service closes down. That said, I have to agree. Where else in this world can you get MS-DOS 6.22 and Windows For Workgroups 3.11 these days?
- zokier 13y ago
  > That said, I have to agree. Where else in this world can you get MS-DOS 6.22 and Windows For Workgroups 3.11 these days? I hope some enterprising fellow would archive significant portion of what is available from TechNet. It might be the last moment many of the software there is available for public.
- ethomson 13y ago
  MSDN.
velodrome 13y ago
A lot of enterprises have really old Microsoft products still in product. If they remove the back catalog, it will be really difficult to diagnose rare issues in a sandbox. It's not like you can buy a license for the software either.

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

AjithAntony 13y ago

You would need an MSDN Premium subscription to get access to all the Operating systems. There is a new "MSDN Operating Systems" subscription http://www.microsoftstore.com/store/msusa/en_US/pdp/productID.254639900 http://www.microsoftstore.com/store/msusa/en_US/pdp/productI...

toyg 13y ago
That's a whopping 400% increase from my Technet sub. EDIT: and of course it doesn't include SQL Server.