Price of MSDN subscription?

itm2

Can anyone advise on how best to purchase a 3-user MSDN subscription, and what I might expect to pay?? The obvious route is to go direct to Microsoft, but I was wondering if this type of thing was discounted anywhere??

Conor_3

If you're doing it to put software on a daily used PC, you're using it against the terms of the licence.

Also, AFAIK, you need someone in your organisation who has at least a MCP in order to apply as you need to enter a MCP number (which is on the certificate/plastic card) on the application.

Re-sellers sell it at exactly the same price as MS.

itm2

Conor wrote: »

If you're doing it to put software on a daily used PC, you're using it against the terms of the licence.

If I were more sensitive I would take serious offence at your inference there Conor. I'm actually looking to renew some MSDN licences for a development team at my new company, and the quote from the supplier seemed a little high (£1,740 per user for a VSTS subscription).

From what you are saying, £1,740 would also be the Microsoft price?

isofa

I don't think you'll get a better price, obviously it depends on the option of Visual Studio, I think you can have a professional and premium subscription, then options for team, developer etc.

You might want to check out the Direct Access Pack, or whatever they've renamed it today, it was only available for smaller companies / IT Pros, but an option was Visual Studio, and therefore MDSN would be an available option. (Login to the Partner section to review the options at the MS site, there might be discounts to be had there).

http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-gb/subscriptions/aa700832.aspx

You can take out a new subscription without being an MCP according to their website.

Going through the options to buy a Visual Studio Professional Edition with MSDN Professional Western European DVD - New Subscription comes up with £945.46 inc VAT.

Conor_3

There's the Microsoft Action Pack Subscription which is £200 + VAT a year but there's no access to development releases and you do have to have someone in your Partner profile registered as MCP or higher.

itm2 wrote:

If I were more sensitive I would take serious offence at your inference there Conor.

You're a southerner aren't you?

isofa

Conor wrote: »

There's the Microsoft Action Pack Subscription which is £200 + VAT a year but there's no access to development releases and you do have to have someone in your Partner profile registered as MCP or higher.
You're a southerner aren't you?

You do not have to have someone in your Partner Profile registered as an MCP or higher to qualify for the Action Pack (Which used to be called the Direct Access or Direct Action Pack, as I referred to earlier.)

You simply need to be a member of the partner programme, so need to have some specialism covered by the requirements:

"Registered Members are organisations with any level of expertise in Microsoft technologies who are interested in aligning themselves more closely with Microsoft.
At this level, you have easy access to the resources you need to help your business succeed, stay current with the latest Microsoft technology, serve customers more effectively and grow in market impact."

https://partner.microsoft.com/UK/program/managemembership/actionpack/mapslicensing

itm2

Conor wrote: »

You're a southerner aren't you?

You're a northerner, aren't you?

itm2

Thanks for the Action Pack recommendations. Unfortunately my company wouldn't qualify as it's an end-user organisation rather than a solution provider/reseller etc.

This is the first time that I've looked into MSDN subs for years and the pricing baffles me. For example, I checked the price of Visual Studio Team Suite with MSDN Premium on the Microsoft site and it quoted in excess of £8k. This makes our annual renewal quote of £1,740 per user look quite good, but is alot higher than I was expecting.

Is anyone else on here a Team Suite/MSDN Premium Subscriber, and if so do you remember how much you paid??

isofa

Give Microsoft a ring and talk through the options, you may qualify for a different option, it is pretty expensive I agree.

Conor_3

itm2 wrote: »

You're a northerner, aren't you?

Yeah. You can tell us by the stronger backbone, the lack of the fake "kiss kiss" greeting, not taking offence at something we think was there (even though it wasn't) and being direct instead of skirting round the issue just in case we may upset the other person.

Oh, and we drink proper beer too.