Adobe count down

[swampy]

I guess I threw Adobe Inc into a tizzy yesterday. I "hit the wall" with something their programmers never anticipated. It seems that the security folks at Adobe that are responsible for writing the code for CS3 Activation put a limit on the number of times you can Activate/Deactivate your software. (I like to keep a deactivated copy on my backup in case my main drive fails so I don't lose one of my 2 activations)

I always try to remember to deactivate CS3 before making a SuperDuper backup so yesterday I tried to deactivate and got a big old dialog box telling me the Deactivation Failed - error 194:14 (I think it was) and to call Adobe tech support. After explaining what I was doing, they looked in my "records" (yes big brother keeps track) and said I had already deactivated CS3 21 times and that is the LIMIT.

Excuse me? Some programmer thought it would be good to put a limit on the number of times you can do this? Through the phone conversations, I got the feeling that this had never happened before and they weren't sure how to handle it. I got up to a level 6 tech support and Dan (very nice guy) said he would reset my activation counts, but I would have to completely erase CS3 using CS3Clean script at level 3 then reinstall. Arrrgh!!! All my brushes, tool presets, textures, styles. actions to reload.

I just want to thank the security programmers at Adobe for screwing up my day.

[M A V I C]

Wow, interesting. I'd backup all your brushes, presets... do the clean install, and copy them over.

I've dealt with their activation issues before (eg, your activation from using the migration assistant doesn't work) and they had me delete a few files on the HD to reset the activation.

[laarree]

[quote swampy]I always try to remember to deactivate CS3 before making a SuperDuper backup so yesterday I tried to deactivate and got a big old dialog box telling me the Deactivation Failed - error 194:14 (I think it was) and to call Adobe tech support. After explaining what I was doing, they looked in my "records" (yes big brother keeps track) and said I had already deactivated CS3 21 times and that is the LIMIT.
I think you're being far too zealous with your deactivating CS3 before SuperDuper backups,
and have caused yourself this problem in an effort to avoid a problem that may never occur.
Relax.

[M A V I C]

[quote laarree][quote swampy]I always try to remember to deactivate CS3 before making a SuperDuper backup so yesterday I tried to deactivate and got a big old dialog box telling me the Deactivation Failed - error 194:14 (I think it was) and to call Adobe tech support. After explaining what I was doing, they looked in my "records" (yes big brother keeps track) and said I had already deactivated CS3 21 times and that is the LIMIT.
I think you're being far too zealous with your deactivating CS3 before SuperDuper backups,
and have caused yourself this problem in an effort to avoid a problem that may never occur.
Relax.
Have you ever called Adobe to talk to them about this sort of issue? The first thing they ask is if you deactivated the copy. If you didn't, they flip you crap and act like they're not going to do anything for you because you didn't follow their instructions.

We had one computer stolen and Adobe gave us enough of an issue getting a new activation (had to give us a new key) that it's crossed my mind to deactivate every night.

[laarree]

[quote M A V I C]Have you ever called Adobe to talk to them about this sort of issue? The first thing they ask is if you deactivated the copy. If you didn't, they flip you crap and act like they're not going to do anything for you because you didn't follow their instructions.

We had one computer stolen and Adobe gave us enough of an issue getting a new activation (had to give us a new key) that it's crossed my mind to deactivate every night.
Duly noted. I've never had to call Adobe for any reason. It does sound like something
to complain to Adobe about. I wouldn't have expected that restoring a Mac from a
cloned backup would cause activation problems. If this is also the case with with Time
Machine, one could argue that this renders CS3 incompatible in an important way with
an important feature of Leopard.

Edit: I see that swampy has posted about this issue on Adobe's CS/Mac forum:
http://www.adobeforums.com/webx/.59b52fd5

It'll be interesting to read the replies there about this issue.

[mattkime]

sometimes its easier to find authentication cracks on the internet than it is to buy software

[swampy]

Yes, I did post it on the Adobe Forums, Richard. Bob Levine says my "renewed" limit is now 5 times.

My reply...

>>>It just seems that having any kind of limit is imposing restrictions on users. I'm not as concerned about restrictions on CS3 as I am about the restrictions it could place on a user's management of backups and general computer maintenance. I have my weekly backup routine that is automatically scheduled to clone to a second internal hard drive. I _also_ clone once a month to an external that is kept off site.

Activating/Deactivating CS3 is part of my maintenance workflow and I am trying to stay within Adobe's license agreement by not having more than two active installed copies and actually I prefer to only have one active copy at any given time.

So my question is this... If I stick to my usualy backup routine and deactivate before weekly clones, I get to backup 5 times and then I reach the limit again? That's unacceptable.

[blooz]

So what if we rounded up every CS3 user we know and got them to deactivate and reactivate at the same time, say 6 PM? Would it crash their system?

[Sam3]

Ah, yes, you, the paying customer are a thief and we need to protect ourselves from thieves.

Unfortunately, there is no competition to Adobe

Ideally trust me, the customer, but if you don't, give me a dongle instead, like Avid does.

[swampy]

LOL, Blooz!

Sam... Corel's Paint Show Pro and Gimp are both pretty close. I have many friends that use the alternatives and do wonderful stuff with them.