Blackmagic Forum

Looking at buying Fusion Studio but don't like the idea of using a dongle all the time. I have a 2017 MacBook Pro and am concerned about having a dongle sticking out the side. How large is the dongle? Is there a version for an single license not to have a dongle?
If not can the dongle be removed after the software starts or does it have to remain in the USB port?

Thank you

At the moment the Fusion Studio 9 dongle is required at all times. It's a smallish thingee, the size of a small USB flash drive.

davidlarg wrote:Looking at buying Fusion Studio but don't like the idea of using a dongle all the time. I have a 2017 MacBook Pro and am concerned about having a dongle sticking out the side. How large is the dongle?

The dongle is a heavy black iron ball chained to your MacBook by some police officer and really everybody can see it ... no, seriously, it is like a small memory stick. I also did not like this dongle idea but one readily becomes used to it. Think of it as the key to a truly exclusive product. From the negative experience I made with various weird activation and licensing processes I am happy to have a solid key that survives when the system seriously crashes or previous deactivations failed. And the dongle now runs also Resolve Studio 15 (even the final release).

Yeah, a benefit is it works without internet connection, a downside is it's susceptible to physical and electrical damage.

I would not be surprised if the next version didn't need one, though. At this price point the cost of the dongle including logistics is not trivial.

Thanks everyone for the replies. I am going to go for it for I already have to mocha plugin that works with it.

Having a dongle that was only needed for program launch would kinda defeat the purpose.
What would stop users from launching 5 versions of the software, all using the same dongle, one after the other?

I don't know of a dongle based program that allows that. (Certainly not Avid, or Resolve or Fusion)

I used to use a USB extension cable for my dongle on my laptop, to minimize the risk of it getting hung up on my couch and breaking off if i was working in front of the TV or any non desk situation.

actually a few back in the day allowed you to remove the dongle. Some would check during batch render or something requiring an obvious license check. Outside of that, quite a few years ago cracked and dongled versions of Lightwave were tested on the forums and found the cracked version to be faster in both interaction and rendering. I guess based on the number of times the dongle gets checked, it can slow down a software although probably pretty minimally.

So it really depends on the developer and the software they're using, eg hasp, flex and so on. Best bet is to check it yourself. Open Fusion with the dongle, remove dongle, play. See what happens. The dongles aren't that big, although I know Apple has told the world thinner is better in spite of speed, power and throttling.