Creo is NOT Creo/Elements Pro

[DamianCastillo]

I am creating this post due to my frustration with the confusion caused by PTC with their naming changes recently.

Creo/Elements Pro 5 = Pro/ENGINEER

Creo = Creo

I see many people are still confused by calling Pro/ENGINEER Wildfire 5, Creo. Pro/ENGINEER Wildfire 5 was renamed Creo/Elements Pro 5. Creo/Elements Pro 5 is not the same as PTC's new CAD suite called Creo. They are two completely different things.

Many people when asking questions about Creo, get responses on Creo/Elements Pro 5 which is like asking someone a question about Lexus vehicle and they give you an answer based on a Toyota.

I also find Youtube videos claiming to show something realted to Creo and when I open the video it's actually Creo/Elements Pro 5 which is NOT Creo.

This is not the end users fault and more PTC's fault for rebranding Pro/ENGINEER as Creo/Elements Pro and not allowing it to retire with any respect for it's original name that it held for 25 years.

Creo/Elements Pro is Pro/ENGINEER Wildfire with a new name. I refuse to call Pro/ENGINEER Wildfire, Creo/Elements Pro.

Creo on the other hand is PTC's new CAD software that is based on the same Kernel as Pro/ENGINEER (Creo/Elements Pro), but it's a completely new software.

This is why Creo started back at Number 1 for it's version.

Creo 1.0 is NOT Creo/Elements Pro 5.

OK.

I feel better now.

I don't blame the end users for the confusion, but just wanted to get this off my chest.

LOL

"Too many people walk around like Clark Kent, because they don't realize they can Fly like Superman"

[akelly]

My last company just added some additional Pro/E licenses. There were some lengthy discussions about feature sets and package names.

Bottom line is that existing licenses will maintain most (if not all) of their functionality with Creo. The Flexible Modeling extension is included with new Creo licenses. If you want to use the Flexible Modeling extension with your existing licenses, you can't - you have to upgrade them to new Creo licenses. If you don't care about Flexible Modeling, you're all set.

In another interesting twist for SMBs, the new Creo II licenses and above don't come with Pro/Intralink. They come with PDM/Link instead. Pro/Intralink used concurrent access licensing, so you need the same number of Pro/Intralink licenses as Pro/E licenses. PDM/Link uses named-user licensing. So, if you have more Pro/E users than Pro/E licenses, you will have to buy additional PDM/Link licenses to cover every user listed in the LDAP, regardless of whether or not they are actually able to acquire a Pro/E license. I could not get a straight answer about how you manage a mixture of concurrent access and named-user licenses 😉

Andrew Kelly, P.E.
Design Engineer
Honeywell Sensing and Control
2080 Arlingate Lane
Columbus, OH 43228
Office: 614-850-7818
Toll Free: 800-848-6564
Fax: 614-850-1111
andrew.kelly@honeywell.com<">mailto:andrew.kelly@honeywell.com>

[dgallup]

This is a totally different scenario than what you first told us. You have lapsed maintenance & want additional functionality. In this case i would wait a little longer (just to make the cost/benefit ratio better) then buy complete new licenses. With the high cost of maintenance, the fact that it does not buy you any new functionality and decreasing new license costs it only takes about 4 years with out maintenance to come out ahead.

As a long time (20+ years) user, I have always been extremely pissed off about PTC maintenance and licensing policies. We refuese to pay maintenance on packages they bundled in at the time of sale that we did not need or want. Every year I have to re-negotiate our maintenance as they continue to bill us for everything. Then they have the gall to say they are giving us a "discount" when those unused & unwanted options are not in our license codes. There is no discount, we are just paying for what we use. We continue to soldier on without the new functionalities bundled in with new licenses that sell for a fraction of what we paid years ago.

Don't cave & pay back maintenance, just tough it out until you can justify buying new.

In Reply to Steve Cooke:

Michael

Was there an upgrade cost?

I have asked this specific question and this was the answer from my VAR
(Only one in South Africa so I don't have much choice!)

Quoting:
"To answer the second part. on upgrades:
We can upgrade from Creo Foundation to Creo Parametric, it sells for R20,000
(based on USD of R 😎 and requires that your maintenance be up to date on
the package before we can upgrade it."
End quote

In spite of the above he also is quick to explain that there is no such
thing as Creo Foundation to buy as a new user. But any functionality missing
from your ProEngineer foundation license will be missing in Creo if you move
on to Creo without paying the upgrade fee detailed above.

Examples of this would be the Design Animation module and Surface which are
now included in Creo. It is not in my foundation license because we bought
in at Version 19. I have not paid maintenance since WF2, but even if I had
the additional functionality in Creo Parametric would still not be available
unless I upgrade.

Depending on when you bought your foundation licenses you might not even
notice any loss of functionality.

The issue of legacy as PTC re-bundles things is a sore point for me. When
we bought, I was forced to buy Pro/WEDM and Pro/Turn in the Pro/NC MFG
bundle even though I knew I would never use either of them. I pleaded
unsuccessfully to buy NC/Mill stand alone. Later on NC/Mill was sold stand
alone, with additional features we did not have access to and this after
years of me paying maintenance (at the higher cost) for software I have
never touched. When I moaned I was told to buy a new seat of NC Mill and
abandon my NC/MFG license, then I could enjoy the benefits of the additional
features!! IT was at that point that I stopped paying maintenance!! Leaves
a bitter taste and played a part in recently abandoning the NC Mfg License
and buying a machining package from a different supplier.

Their reasoning is apparently that the additional functionality has an R&D
cost and I should have to pay my share of that if I want the additional
functionality. There was no suitable answer given when I asked what portion
of my maintenance paid faithfully over many years went towards their R&D,
nor why I had paid a higher price for a less effective product than was now
being offered at a lower price! This is not a good example of how to reward
your loyal customers. (Note that having not paid maintenance since WF2, I no
longer count myself as a loyal customer!)

This upgrade cost to Creo Parametric is simply more of the same strategy but
surely a better way to develop loyal customers would be to offer maintenance
paying customers what ever is in the new package when they re-bundle the
software to match what ever they have to do to compete in the current
market.

Regards



Steve

[ptc-1932745]

Doesn't PTC penalize you even if you try to buy new licenses? Unless
you were increasing you total license count, I thought the only way they
would sell you 'new' licenses was for you to pay back all maintenance on
the expired licenses you had owned in the past.



Example, 10 years ago you had 100 licenses of pro-e

You don't pay maintenance on 20 seats as you let these expire for 8
years bringing your total to 80 licenses.

You want 5 'new' licenses, bringing your new total to 85, PTC will tell
you to upgrade 5 of the expired licenses and pay all back maintenance
for 8 years.





Christopher F. Gosnell



FPD Company

124 Hidden Valley Road

McMurray, PA 15317