Hardware decoding should be in the free version

I feel like hardware decoding should be in the free version of Davinci Resolve.
I fully support the decisions to keep some of the more advanced features and filters behind a paywall, but in the case of hardware decoding, it feels more like you are artificially limiting the user's own hardware. Even moreso since it appears that hardware decoding IS actually free for Mac OS users, but not for windows users.

It is also a poor decision because when people try out the free version for the first time, it gives them the impression that your software is just slow and unresponsive. The people who are most likely to use the free version, such as hobbyists, are also the most likely to be using footage that would benefit from the hardware decoding.

Finally, it's not a feature that I would even want to risk spending $300 on, because I don't actually know what I'm getting. Will I really get better performance at all with the studio version? Will it just improve a little bit? I have no way of knowing. So in that sense, its also a poor way to entice a purchase.

265 license costs money. Microsoft had to start charging $1. I can't believe that was an attempt to make money on their part. They likely were forbidden from giving it away for free.

265 license costs money. Microsoft had to start charging $1. I can't believe that was an attempt to make money on their part. They likely were forbidden from giving it away for free.

While I am not terribly knowledgeable about these license fees, I would assume that they are already in play if DaVinci is offering support for these codecs through software.
In fact, according to an article I found, when it comes to hardware decoding, the burden of the license fee is pushed onto the hardware vendor: https://helgeklein.com/blog/browser-vid ... eleration/

MP4 containers with H.265 video (HEVC), on the other hand, are only supported in Edge and Internet Explorer, and only on devices that can decode H.265 in hardware. The reason is simple: Edge and IE do not decode H.265 by themselves, so Microsoft does not have to pay licensing fees. Edge/IE pass the video stream for decoding to the OS which in turn sends it to the GPU. Licensing costs are paid by the GPU vendor.

It also depends on what you want to decode and what PC hardware you have. There are limits on what AMD /NVIDIA can do compared to Intel QS and the M1 Mac's. Personally $300 is not a lot for what you get. You likely spent many times more on your camera gear and PC.

I think it would be fair to give hardware acceleration to Free users.
It's true that a license is not a lot of money for what the software offers. But for a hobbyist it can be. Not every Free version user also has a camera and bought his computer specifically for Resolve. You can argue that those cost a lot of money too but so did plenty of other things not directly or fully related to the hobby. You would either need to be very enthusiastic or a professional to make a license worth.

I think it would be fair to give hardware acceleration to Free users.
It's true that a license is not a lot of money for what the software offers. But for a hobbyist it can be. Not every Free version user also has a camera and bought his computer specifically for Resolve. You can argue that those cost a lot of money too but so did plenty of other things not directly or fully related to the hobby. You would either need to be very enthusiastic or a professional to make a license worth.

Any computer that will run Resolve is a lot more expensive than $300. Nothing in this life is free. If you want the functionality then save up and pay for it.

If someone needs something specific to do their work, they will find a way to get it.

Every single thing between the free version and the studio version is "artificially limited". It's a choice made by BMD. If you want to see a change, you need compelling arguments for it. If BMD was listening to the last 3 feature requests I saw, Resolve Free would be Resolve Studio in no time.

Thousands of people use the free version and do crazy things with it, and some of them switched to Studio to get more out of their hardware. But the majority don't because the software works totally fine.

There are so many other way to use the free version and have the same punch as the Studio version. Proxies, transcoding to an easy to read video format. Wait, Resolve can do that automatically already

And for the question about : Is the hardware acceleration beneficial - The response is yes. It always is if we compare with no hardware acceleration.

it gives them the impression that your software is just slow and unresponsive

That's not totally true, it depends on the specs of the computer used. The first time I used the free version, I didn't see it as slow and unresponsive.

The software is only $300. And nobody needs to buy it to do everything we can do with the Studio version (other dedicated free applications or web services can fill the gaps of some of the missing tools).

It's just my opinion but I don't think it's even a feature request (same with the posts asking for other tools to be in the free version). If we think about it, the studio version is the "main" Davinci Resolve version. Transferring something to the free version adds or change nothing to the software.

I have to agree with Maxwell. You would class me as a hobbyist. I used the free version for 4.5 years on a computer not bought specially for it, in fact the computer I still use for Resolve and a lot of other things as well. It was never slow or unresponsive , renders being the only thing that took time.
I bought the Studio version when I was tempted by the offer of the Speed Editor being included for free and have never regretted it. £245.00 was a small price to pay.

Any computer that will run Resolve is a lot more expensive than $300. Nothing in this life is free. If you want the functionality then save up and pay for it.

The price of a computer or laptop shouldn't serve as metric to whether anyone should be capable of buying Resolve.

Every single thing between the free version and the studio version is "artificially limited". It's a choice made by BMD. If you want to see a change, you need compelling arguments for it. If BMD was listening to the last 3 feature requests I saw, Resolve Free would be Resolve Studio in no time.

That's very true ofcourse. BMD is totally free in how they want to limit it. But gimping performance feels odd. Imagine a free version of Cinema4D but you can only render on CPU with a single core.

To me their free version serves partially an incentive to get people interested and potentially buying it in the future, but also offer less wealthy people a great tool to do video work, be it hobby or professionally. Why offer help but not help them utilize their likely less powerful machines. If it's really only for potential sales they might as well just offer trials for Studio version only but that doesn't sound like BMD to me.

I think it's totally okay to not have noise reduction and beauty tools and all other stuff that's reserved for Studio. Just not this. Not from the perspective of entitlement for something that is given for free but from the reason of providing it for free.

This doesn't add any new capabilities to the software.

I vote no.

The price of a computer or laptop shouldn't serve as metric to whether anyone should be capable of buying Resolve.

Why not ? It is an indication of the persons capability to pay and their willingness to spend on technology especially if the computer is 10 to 15 times the cost of the Studio version. A computer is useless without software to run on it. Buying appropriate software should be viewed as part of the cost of the computer purchase. Sorry I think you are very lucking to get the free version that is more capable than a lot of software one has to pay for in this field. BM makes money to provide this free software by selling hardware. Buy one of their pieces of hardware and you may get the Studio version free too. I bought the Studio version and got another copy when I got the Speed Editor.

This is clearly a business decision, not a technical one. The discussion may be interesting to BMD and might possibly bring up things they may not have considered - but in the end we sure don’t get a vote on this one.

I guess we don’t really get a vote on any decisions but we super don’t get a vote on this one!


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[Peter Chamberlain]

There is a license fee involved so its not in the free version.
There are other codecs like this too.

There is a license fee involved so its not in the free version.
There are other codecs like this too.

Thanks Peter, I guess that settles it.