It would be nice to have a node based editor in which EVERY parameter of EVERYTHING could be connected. This could replace the wire parameter editor and make things much more elusive.

Unify shortcuts from the standard to edit/editable poly and mesh (who wants M for meshsmooth??).

Its really annoying how the shortcuts are not consistent between different areas, why edit poly have to have different shortcuts from editable poly? And some bizarre ones like the "M" that always opened the material editor in max, I still can't believe someone decided to assign this shortcut to a destructive meshsmooth in editable poly... and this is just one example.

I would like the ability to interrupt or escape any command or process. For example, entering very large values into some input boxes (usually by mistake) can cause Max to try and complete requests which will eventually cause a crash. The ability to stop Max processing these functions would avoid a crash. At the moment, only some processes allow you to cancel them, I propose all commands/processes should be interruptible.

I like the way Max is going with its UI customisation but I'd like to see it go a lot further:

Everything; tools/buttons/viewports/stack panel/all bars to be customisable using a simple drag and drop technique.

All colours/sizes/fonts can be altered in a simple manner.

lot of modelling features are already there, but i m used too for command panel. just build modifier stack there (ribbon UI) and dispose command panel.

I always do some keyboard, GUI and preferences customization when I install 3ds Max, and they're usually the same ones each time I upgrade. It would be very nice if 3ds Max could see and optionally import preferences and GUI-settings from existing installations.

I lose hours every day because I have to keep moving my Material editor/ Render setup/Rendered Frame Window/ Scene explorer.
And PLEASE make it usable for multiple monitor setup

Add a real full screen mode with NOTHING but the viewport showing.

as the title says, we need an updated user interface, a fresh new look similar to maya & mudbox UI. (QT Based UI) without loosing the current layout

The enhanced user interface can make it more appealing to the eyes, Modern, cross platform, and adds more customizable workflow.

The dark ui scheme uses black text in areas were it should be white (command panel & named selection list for example). An effort should be made to correct this scheme and hook up all areas of max to be consistent with this scheme. It seems like a small thing to correct, but would make using this scheme much more preferable.

This feature is in serious need of an overhaul. The addition of a sample eye dropper tool was a good step in the right direction, but we need smoothing much more robust. I realize that there are some 3rd party plugins out there that do this, but it would be good to possibly license one of these or create a new color picker from scratch with user input of course.

I would like to see Max has ability to tear off menus, and not only that. It will be good to see that we can tear off specific rollout from e.g. editable poly or editable spline object. When not in use of these, they can just be grayed out. I know that would help me a lot in my workflow.

The ability to sort materials into groups, as in Composite; so for example you could create a coloured region in the Slate material editor and drop material and maps in to sort material in a logical order rather than having them scattered horizontally or vertically. This function should not be restricted to entire material trees, rather you should be able to created nested groups for just maps and be able to annotate them and give them different colours too.

It is very weird the way max handle/manage keyboard shortcuts, its a bit confusing. where you could have same shortcut key but in different window or different modifier. and its very hard to find which keys has been assigned to which action.

For exemple if we select some lights, for the same parameter if values are differents field could be empty but can be modify. The same if we select some objects with some modifiers, we could modify them directly in the Modifier stack, without use some script like Zorb Tool http://www.scriptspot.com/3ds-max/scripts/modifier-modifier-zorb

So many times I want to have a modifier or object instanced across a scene but want to have variation in one or two values whilst mainting an instanced link across the rest of the parameters. Currently I end up having to write scripts which do it. This should go for materials and anything instanceable.