I have used 3ds Max since release 1 and Autodesk/Kinetix 3D Studio for DOS prior to that and the new release has just been released and shown at NAB 2015. The new Autodesk 3ds Max 2016 release has many new great features – and no doubt the best release yet.

To see a description of many of the new features checkout this blog post on The Area blog The Max Makers by Eddie Perlberg.

Introducing 3ds Max 2016
http://area.autodesk.com/blogs/max/introducing-3ds-max-2016

There is a free 30 day full product trial available.
http://www.autodesk.com/products/3ds-max/free-trial#

If you are a school, teacher, or student you can get this and many other Autodesk products for 3 years.
http://students.autodesk.com

Cheers,
Shaan