Really Netgate, Really!??! Because of A NIC Change....

I've been running a custom PC with pfSense for about four years. When Netgate moved to a paid model for pfSense Plus, I decided to subscribe for a year and then look for alternatives. Well, here I am in year two, still on Plus.

Recently, I had to replace a NIC. After swapping it out, I ran into issues with the new card, so I decided to take a backup and do a clean reinstall. During the reinstall, I got hit with a message saying my device didn't have Plus. I figured maybe it would work once everything was installed and running again.

After getting back into the dashboard, I checked for updates, but there was no Plus option. I dug through my emails, found my activation token, entered it, and expected to see the option for the 24.11 release since it confirmed my activation. Nope—there is still only the CE version.

I emailed Netgate, provided my order number, and got a surprising response:

"Normally, subscriptions are non-transferable, but we are able to offer a one-time courtesy transfer. Also, please note that the subscription is tied to the NDI, which is calculated based on the MAC addresses of all installed NICs."

Wait, what? I always thought the NDI was tied to the motherboard—that's what I last heard.

So, Netgate, what gives? NICs fail, they get upgraded, and now you're saying that if I replace any NIC, I lose my Plus subscription?

This is how you push customers away faster than you bring them in.