Michael Novo

Pause and cancel are essentially the same but pause will auto restart. Everything saves the same.

base2 

I, for one, think that Zwift is definitely 16% better than it was several years ago. Better enough that I had to get a new computer because the frame rate on my old 2012 Intel Mac with 16 gigs of RAM had slowed to single digits at times....And, of course a year later the new Mac Mini M2 trainer cave needed a brand new 62 inch OLED television to enjoy all the greatly improved graphics and realism in it's full 4k glory.

I might get an M3 Mac Mini if/when that ever gets made. The current M2 processor is at 50% load and in group riding the screen gets the slightest fringe of detectible choppiness, upon dropping into a world the scenery elements take several seconds to load and those that don't render in full detail while in game, fail gracefully favoring immediate foreground elements. Clearly the game is getting more intensive in it's graphics resource demands. Development and investment is happening on the back end. Marshalling resources, prioritizing elements, adding detail, depth, etc...All for an improved game play experience. Good. For context: I am absolutely not a video game guy. But I recognize a good product requires continued investment if it is to remain viable, relevant.

I can't imagine the fall out of random incremental 30¢, 50¢, 12¢ price increases every few months. Death of a thousand cuts, that would be. $20 is a nice even round number. Let it be.

unterhausen

When I think about the improvements they have made, the one that's most important to me is that you don't have to upgrade before you ride. I see them churning the software and I'm having trouble thinking of things that are as important as that to me. They also don't make me log in nearly as often after an upgrade now. Logging in every week used to make me irrationally angry. But in my setup, it's a real pain to log in, I need to go get glasses, and there is no gain in security to anyone. Now I only have to log in every few months. The one upgrade they seem to be reluctant to make is letting you easily ride whatever route you want. You can do it, but it's too much effort for me and it annoys me that they don't just implement it for everyone.

I'll preface this part by saying graphics isn't that important to me. I follow the FB group where everyone is really into that, and I usually just skim the posts. But I am not sure zwift really improved the graphics much, at least not in the released versions. If you have a upper middle of the road graphics card in an obsolete PC, you can get whatever it is they call their best graphics. But I will admit that's pretty good. My computer only takes half-height cards, so right now I can't get ultra graphics on zwift. I have seen announcements of half height cards that are good enough for that. Would be pretty funny to have their best graphics on a $25 pc. But it also would be pretty funny to me to have a $300 graphics card in a $25 PC. Because I'm cheap. Also, I would need to replace my power supply.

In the end, they probably have to consider their user base that uses an Apple TV, so pretty limited hardware. I'm not sure how easy it is to support the graphics and computing capabilities of both an Apple TV and a high-end gaming PC.

PeteHski

Supporting your $25 PC is probably a bigger challenge.

prj71

LOL. You just better hide indoors where it's safe so that dangerous world outside doesn't eat you alive.

unterhausen

It's not though, that's just not how pc programming works. It's pretty amazing the wide variety of platforms that are encompassed by the label "PC." I'm sure they don't care about me, but my computer has better graphics than what you get on most apple tv's. I had a discussion about my system with Dave Higgins of the Ultimate Guide https://zwiftinsider.com/zwift-pc-guide-2/ and he told me it should work fine with middle of the road graphics. It seems like he's going to quit zwift because of the price hike though. I have to admit that people are selling systems like mine on ebay for 10x more than I paid for it, so the $25 might be a little misleading.

Sy Reene

In my mind it's only an effective 11% increase, as it should be for anyone who has been on the platform for a while and who uses the platform for Training (mentioned previously). From 2017 thru 2023, annual cost of Zwift was $15 x 12 months = $180.
Now an annual cost is $200 (+~11%). And, I got a 1 year great deal for 2024 so that these 12 months are only costing me $150

PeteHski

I never considered Zwift to be very hardware intensive. It ran fine on a 10 year old iMac a couple of steps down on graphics. I run it now on a 2020 M1 Macbook Air, which runs smoothly in 4k. Updates have always been quick too, less than a minute with most patches.

unterhausen

I think they did some work on their upgrades. They have been taking a lot less time recently, even the big ones. I have been left wondering if an upgrade was applied. I also found out that exiting vs. clicking on the red x makes quitting much quicker. So my zwift complaints have all disappeared. I'm not in the habit of riding in big groups though, that apparently is where my computer's limitations would show up.

I have often wondered if they will obsolete my computer. It won't run win11, so maybe they'll take advantage of that? That might give me the motivation to quit, but OTOH, it's not a lot of money to get a pc that will run zwift at max graphics, so I'll probably do that instead.

himespau 

None of the PCs in my house will run Windows 11, so it looks Iike I'm going to have to do some upgrading soon. Bummer, because I have lots of RAM in all of them (32+ GB bought for other purposes back before bitcoin mining drove the prices up) that are of an old pin design that won't work in more recent motherboards.

unterhausen

I think it might be worth it to me to pay for their security upgrades. They always wanted to turn windows into a subscription service, I think they may have done it.

Zoxe

I'm late to this party but just recently got back on Zwift.

Between the annual subscription option and cancelling other monthly subscriptions (streaming), I'm net down for the moment.

I want the platform to stay around and want them to stay solvent. Sure, I'd prefer they keep the price the same but when me and the Mrs. go to the local mexican place for Taco Thursday, and it's roughly double what it was just a few years ago, I can manage the additional $5 for Zwift.

Bald Paul

I think the last time I upgraded my computer, I bought the latest and greatest thing available within my budget.
I got home and opened the box and found a flyer introducing the unit that will be replacing what I just bought.

PeteHski

I’m finding that modern computers require far less frequent upgrades than they did say 20 or 30 years ago. I remember a time when I was changing them out every couple of years because they were too slow, but now they seem to last me up to 10 years and I don’t even bother with the highest spec. I also don’t notice such dramatic improvements on each upgrade.

spelger

the dramatic improvements are in the manufacturer's wallets.

PeteHski

Well yeah, but they are much cheaper now in real terms and you don’t need a mega-spec for most apps, especially not Zwift. I’m currently running it on a stock build 4 year old MacBook Air M1. But even that is overkill really.

zacster

I was running 4k on a 2015 iMac with a higher end for the time graphics processor. It worked there too. When I moved the pain cave upstairs I put the M1 MBA with the cracked screen to use with a 4k monitor. Flawless.

PeteHski

Yep, my ancient 2012 iMac ran Zwift smoothly one step down from 4K.

unterhausen

The newest high-end computers can run AI locally, and so they will probably be making snide comments about our riding on zwift before long.
The fact that openAI probably trained chatgpt with content from bikeforums is scary. If it ever tells me I'm too fat for this sport, I'll know. They weren't really asking permission until recently and just scraped the entire internet.

I am tempted to get a better graphics card for my zwift computer, if I can get one cheap enough. I have a pc it will work on, I think. Need to check the psu. OTOH, the monitor I run zwift on isn't that great, so maybe there is no need.