'Bad for consumers [and] bad for the planet,' PIRG says of Microsoft's decision to end support for Windows 10 in 2025, even though an estimated 1 billion PCs can't upgrade to Windows 11.
I’ve recently had to pretty much stop playing games due to repetitive stress injuries so that isn’t even relevant anymore. The only thing keeping me on Windows these days is 3ds Max.
No, Blender is not an alternative for what I do, don’t even start.
From a personal workflow perspective, modeling is slow as shit. Keep in mind that I have extensive experience with Max, Maya, C4D, Softimage (I go WAY back), Modo, Lightwave, and probably a dozen other packages. Nothing is as unintuitive as Blender. Except Lightwave, which is kind of an oddball in some ways but really fucking cool in others. Blender modes are wonky, selection is wonky, navigation, everything about it feels like it was developed by programmers with little to no input from artists. Because that’s the case. I’ve used Blender since back when it was the only free-ish thing in town (late 90’s/early 2000’s when NaN still owned it) and it has always been clunky as shit. Max has the fastest workflow for me so I use it whenever I have the choice. C4D is quite nice for certain things too. Blender is just never good.
The interface is still NOT GOOD kaboom. A lot of things are buried and not in places that make sense. This is true of a LOT of software in this realm though, so I don’t harp on it too much but sometimes Blender’s way of doing things is not compatible with industry expectation. Again, this is usually minor shit but all of these minor things add up to clunk and jank.
And the biggest one is compatibility. I haven’t done any freelance work for anyone that uses Blender. It’s always Max. “But you can just export…” SLAP You can’t use Max plugins in Blender, and the custom export tool for Random Company Engine is only available in Max because that’s what their internal artists use. This is quite common.
So yeah, not an option in multiple ways. Blender isn’t godawful anymore but it’s still not where it needs to be.
Yeah I do archviz and bim work and I’ve tried my hardest for years now to switch primarily to blender but even with all the plugins in the world I still can’t use it as a primary replacement. And don’t even get me started on some people’s insistence that FOSSCADs are anywhere near feature parity for any in depth workflow with autodesk’s suite.
I don’t use Windows/Mac over Linux because I love them, I use them because a computer is a toolkit and I need specific tools.
Given the amount of progress on getting 3D games to work well under wine/proton lately, I wonder if it’s possible/practical to run 3ds Max under it yet? The only test results I can find for it are ancient.
Absofuckinglutely not unless your hobby is CBT via software. You don’t have time to fuck around with inane shit like running software on the wrong operating system when you’re working on a project, and who the hell actually wants to even bother with it when you’re not? Software like this uses so many different system hooks dating back so far that I don’t even know if Wine can handle the level of backwards compatibility Max would need.
Persistent rumor is that a lot of the core code is holdover from 3D Studio DOS days. That’s so fucking old even I haven’t used it.
Don’t really care. Once this PC can’t run Windows 10 anymore, it’s getting Mint.
I’ve recently come to realize all of the games I actually like to play, run just fine on Linux. YMMV, of course.
My next computer will be Mint and open source programs.
I’ve recently had to pretty much stop playing games due to repetitive stress injuries so that isn’t even relevant anymore. The only thing keeping me on Windows these days is 3ds Max.
No, Blender is not an alternative for what I do, don’t even start.
I know you said don’t even start, but I’m curious lol.
I’ve used blender a lot, I’ve never used 3DS Max though. What would you say are the biggest issues with Blender in your scenario?
From a personal workflow perspective, modeling is slow as shit. Keep in mind that I have extensive experience with Max, Maya, C4D, Softimage (I go WAY back), Modo, Lightwave, and probably a dozen other packages. Nothing is as unintuitive as Blender. Except Lightwave, which is kind of an oddball in some ways but really fucking cool in others. Blender modes are wonky, selection is wonky, navigation, everything about it feels like it was developed by programmers with little to no input from artists. Because that’s the case. I’ve used Blender since back when it was the only free-ish thing in town (late 90’s/early 2000’s when NaN still owned it) and it has always been clunky as shit. Max has the fastest workflow for me so I use it whenever I have the choice. C4D is quite nice for certain things too. Blender is just never good.
The interface is still NOT GOOD kaboom. A lot of things are buried and not in places that make sense. This is true of a LOT of software in this realm though, so I don’t harp on it too much but sometimes Blender’s way of doing things is not compatible with industry expectation. Again, this is usually minor shit but all of these minor things add up to clunk and jank.
And the biggest one is compatibility. I haven’t done any freelance work for anyone that uses Blender. It’s always Max. “But you can just export…” SLAP You can’t use Max plugins in Blender, and the custom export tool for Random Company Engine is only available in Max because that’s what their internal artists use. This is quite common.
So yeah, not an option in multiple ways. Blender isn’t godawful anymore but it’s still not where it needs to be.
TIL - Thank you for the insight!
Yeah I do archviz and bim work and I’ve tried my hardest for years now to switch primarily to blender but even with all the plugins in the world I still can’t use it as a primary replacement. And don’t even get me started on some people’s insistence that FOSSCADs are anywhere near feature parity for any in depth workflow with autodesk’s suite.
I don’t use Windows/Mac over Linux because I love them, I use them because a computer is a toolkit and I need specific tools.
But… but… FreeCAD is just like Solidworks!
Given the amount of progress on getting 3D games to work well under wine/proton lately, I wonder if it’s possible/practical to run 3ds Max under it yet? The only test results I can find for it are ancient.
Absofuckinglutely not unless your hobby is CBT via software. You don’t have time to fuck around with inane shit like running software on the wrong operating system when you’re working on a project, and who the hell actually wants to even bother with it when you’re not? Software like this uses so many different system hooks dating back so far that I don’t even know if Wine can handle the level of backwards compatibility Max would need.
Persistent rumor is that a lot of the core code is holdover from 3D Studio DOS days. That’s so fucking old even I haven’t used it.
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