What happens if Xara goes out of business re-activation?

[Tumbarumba]

Hello folks,

Xsite pro closed their doors, for reasons understood, but users could no longer activate their software, as their activation server no longer existed. Hundreds of people were stranded with software that would not activate.

If Xara, for any reason goes out of business, would we get a registration key to activate our software, especially when reinstalling to a new computer?

I have been caught once and not favouring this happening again!

Cheers - Rod

[gwpriester]

Welcome to TalkGraphics Rod

I don't have any inside knowledge but I do know that Xara has been creating one version or another of their product since the 80s http://www.xara.com/us/about/

They were acquired by German software company Magix who have been in the business for over 20 years.

Cheers

[mwenz]

When Adobe shut down the activation servers for CS2 and prior, they provided a universal serial number for their customers. I would hope Xara/Magix would do the same.

Mike

[Acorn]

What won't happen is any of the on-line services staying up - big loss.

Acorn

[behzad]

Life today is about change and risk. Simply look at the world and you will notice nothing lately is assured 100% lifetime. Just do what you can at the moment and when tomorrow comes you will deal with it. Try to have more tools in your box so if one fails you can work with another.

[iamtheblues]

This is an extremely relevant thread and I am astounded that the replies to it have been so complacent.
I would have thought that someone from Xara/Magix would have replied here before now to reassure members and contributors to allay any fears that have been voiced.
The only conclusion one can reach is that there is no reassurance because nobody has any idea what the vision for the future of the company might be.

That is a very worrying aspect of the state of affairs. It is troubling because nobody in control has appeared here to allay the fears of current owners of the software.

It makes Xara/Magix look like a company that has no interest in the investment made by its customers and they could not give a monkey's toss about customer concerns.

Please do not think that I am here to just cavil and moan, I have been a regular contributing member of Talk Graphics for more than 10 years and I have supported Xara for most of this time.
But it is time for the company to do more than take the money, but pay more attention to the concerns voiced. Since the association with Magix things have gone downhill rapidly.
I do hope that somebody with a conscience will offer up a vision for which way it is all heading. If it is all going down the pan, then someone should stand up and say so.

I don't want to witness the demise of Xara, but I am prepared to invest my time and money in transferring my allegiance to the Serif alternative of the Affinity range of products, and I think I can assume that I am not alone in subscribing to this point of view. None of us has to continue in this vein, we all have the option of cutting our losses and keeping what we have already paid for rather than hoping for jam tomorrow.

[mwenz]

Bob, at least for my part, I don't see my response as being complacent. But rather, mustering my best Doris Day imitation, What ever will be, will be...

I can, realistically, hope that Xara does what I consider right and good for their/Magix customers should the plug ever be pulled. Nothing I write will ever change their decisions should that happen.

Because I have and have always used more than one application for Vector work, I wouldn't be left out in the cold, so to speak. But at the same time, XDP is my tool of choice and will continue to either use whatever the current version is, or roll back to a previous version that is not dependent upon a nanny-like protection scheme. I have such a version installed for just in case the servers go away. Even so, I think most of the current versions...maybe even way back to version 6 from when I began using XDP are reliant upon activation servers. If so, if the activation servers are gone, a reinstall would be impossible unless Xara provided a universal key not dependent upon a server connection.

I prefer to think of this as being realistic.

[iamtheblues]

Hi Mike, I have Xtreme 5 and I re-installed it at my last Windows re-installation about 6 months ago and that was dependent upon connecting to the internet and entering the correct serial number. But a universal key for registered users would be an equable solution.

I recently bought the Affinity Designer Workbook so I can bone up on that, so as to be free from the vagaries of Xara/Magix, Corel and Adobe software. No bad thing to exercise the old brain cells, such as they are.

[starfields23]

The idea that Xara disappears (one day? soon?) frankly terrifies me. We have literally thousands, if not tens of thousands, of core diagrams and technical drawings in .xar format - whatever would we do???

[behzad]

Even if they do, but they won't you can still use xara forever. Don't worry.