Spitifre LABS Cassette Synth

[Starship Krupa]

On 11/30/2022 at 2:27 AM, JoeGBradford said:

Interesting re Air - I have several of theirs including XPand2 which I like very much so hope I don't have the same issue!

You won't: just make sure to deauthorize your licenses via iLok Manager while your old system is still accessible and they'll be instantly available on the new system.

The only time there's a hassle with iLok and/or Waves is when your licenses are machine-authorized and then that machine becomes inaccessible. This can happen even if the system doesn't even go offline, sometimes all you have to do to trigger it is install a new drive, and that can somehow break iLok and/or Waves' system fingerprint. I had this happen on my secondary (portable) system several months back.

Had to use my Waves get-out-of-jail-free card and then contact the manufacturers of the iLok machine-authorized plug-ins for license resets.

I tried doing the license resets through iLok Manager; all it does is send the emails for you, to whatever email address the manufacturer has registered with iLok. In the case of AIR and SONIVOX, I eventually had to contact them myself via their web support form, which added an extra 24 hours to the recovery process.

I will say this: if you have more than a handful of iLok-licensed products, and being without any of them for 24 hours would cause a hardship, just pry open your wallet and get a physical iLok. Figure the cost spread out across however many iLok'd plug-ins you have and it's a bargain. If all your iLok'd licenses are for AIR and SONIVOX, you can even get a cheap original iLok that will work with those. I have one in the bottom of a drawer in my studio room.

The only plug-ins I have that do require an iLok 2 are of course the ones that are most important to me, my Exponential reverbs. ? (I mean, really, there's some kind of tech built into the newer dongle that their plug-ins can't do without?)

Moving your Waves licenses to a removable drive is a great use for an old 64 Meg thumb drive or SD card.

[JoeGBradford]

Thanks - the old PC will hopefully still be working by the time I get my new one so should be straight forward. Is the process for the Cloud licenses the same? I appear to have three of those

[antler]

6 hours ago, Starship Krupa said:

I will say this: if you have more than a handful of iLok-licensed products, and being without any of them for 24 hours would cause a hardship, just pry open your wallet and get a physical iLok.

Don't you also have to pay an annual ZDT fee as well?

[Starship Krupa]

4 hours ago, antler said:

Don't you also have to pay an annual ZDT fee as well?

What I meant was that the physical iLok will survive system rebuilds and the issue of hardware changes causing the system to be considered “offline” by iLok.

It’s only if you want protection against the loss or destruction of the iLok dongle, that’s when you get the ZDT.

[Doug Steinschneider]

Historically I've not been a fan of the various license protection systems but the version of iLok where you login and then license the computer has been working well. I've been moving a few licenses I have only one copy of between machines on a regular basis  (Air Velvet for example - did just pick up another copy for $10 finally) and the iLok system has been working flawlessly. 

BTW, I highly recommend Macrium Reflect Free to image your OS drive,  2.5 SATA drives are cheap these days, get one equal to your OS drive and a USB dongle to connect it and backup.  If something happens you can spin the image up and move the licenses. 

Edited December 8, 2022 by Doug Steinschneider

[abacab]

16 hours ago, Doug Steinschneider said:

BTW, I highly recommend Macrium Reflect Free to image your OS drive,  2.5 SATA drives are cheap these days, get one equal to your OS drive and a USB dongle to connect it and backup.  If something happens you can spin the image up and move the licenses. 

That's a good idea that I never thought of! I use Macrium Reflect to image my OS drive.

How are you loading the image, as a VM?

I have this, but have not attempted it yet... https://www.macrium.com/viboot

Edited December 8, 2022 by abacab

[Doug Steinschneider]

I have several identical Dell Optiplex 7020's I got from an office that went to remote only. My test restore was to a second computer but like you, I have Viboot on a computer that has Hyper-V and I'm going to try it. I've been using Hyper-v for years on servers. VM's for both servers and workstations.  Hyper-V can be added to any Windows 10 or 11 Pro. If you're using Windows 10/11 home VirtualBox works well.

Just perusing threads of people having problems with the newer software based iLok after hardware changes. At least if the hard drive is replaced and then the OS restored you should be OK 

Edited December 8, 2022 by Doug Steinschneider

[abacab]

13 minutes ago, Doug Steinschneider said:

I have several identical Dell Optiplex 7020's I got from an office that went to remote only. My test restore was to a second computer but like you, I have Viboot on a computer that has Hyper-V and I'm going to try it. I've been using Hyper-v for years on servers. VM's for both servers and workstations.  Hyper-V can be added to any Windows 10 or 11 Pro. If you're using Windows 10/11 home VirtualBox works well.

Just perusing threads of people having problems with the newer software based iLok after hardware changes. At least if the hard drive is replaced and then the OS restored you should be OK 

I'm a VirtualBox user, so will have to make some time to test Macrium viBoot.

That would have solved my last incident where my motherboard died, and with it the machine ID that my soft iLok was tied to. So I was unable to self-deactivate those software licenses from the original machine they were activated on.

I would like to see if an image booted as a VM retains the original disk ID in the image. iLok would either confirm or deny a request to deactivate a license.

Hopefully it should work since the image is really just a clone of the original disk, unless somehow VirtualBox overrides that with a virtual ID. If it works, that certainly would be a slick solution for deactivating any machine locked license!

[Bad Penguin]

@JoeGBradford

@Brian Lawler

@abacab

I almost exclusively hang-out in the Deals sub-forum, so this thread seems the closest to what I want to ask. If improper, please disregard and kindly advise proper forum.

So, apologies in advance for necro'ing and continuing the slightly ot discussion of iLok options.

I am a hobbyist, so whenever I have the option, I choose a Cloud activation. I don't care if I lose access to plug-ins for an hour, day or week, so long as I still own them and eventually will have access to them without having to repurchase.

When the choice is between only Machine or USB, I don't know which is "better," as both are susceptible to theft, malfunction and physical damage. And, potentially the need to repurchase some plug-ins.

The question I have is: Can I use (repeatedly) the activate/deactivate function of the Machine activation to "simulate" a Cloud activation?

Can I select Machine activation, use the plug-in, when done using the plug-in, deactivate the plug-in so the activation count in the online iLok Manager shows zero activations currently being utilized. And then the next time I need that specific plug-in, then activate it (again) to Machine, and when done deactivate (again) the plug-in so the activation count in the online iLok Manager shows zero activations currently being utilized.

Rinse and repeat.

Or, is there some type of iLok (universal) or publisher (plug-in specific) limit to the number of times I would be able to repeatedly activate/deactivate the license to Machine from the online iLok Manager?

Really wish all publishers using iLok would offer a Cloud activation option, but when that is not a choice, would what I am thinking be a realistic possibility to get around this limitation?

Thanks!

Edited January 24, 2023 by Bad Penguin

[abacab]

17 minutes ago, Bad Penguin said:

Or, is there some type of iLok (universal) or publisher (plug-in specific) limit to the number of times I would be able to repeatedly activate/deactivate the license to Machine from the online iLok Manager?

No limit that I'm aware of to iLok activations/de-activations.  In fact that is what one should do anytime a major system change is about to occur if you are using iLok machine activations.

Edited January 24, 2023 by abacab

[Brian Lawler]

I'm afraid I have no idea.  I use a PC and a laptop, neither that I upgrade very often (like >5 years).  I don't install nearly as many libraries on my laptop, so the limit really does not affect me.  Only two of my iLok libs have a one machine limit.

[Starship Krupa]

2 hours ago, Bad Penguin said:

is there some type of iLok (universal) or publisher (plug-in specific) limit to the number of times I would be able to repeatedly activate/deactivate the license to Machine from the online iLok Manager?

Not in my experience, and I've moved many machine-registered iLok licenses around.

And since a big part of PACE/iLok's whole schtick is how it helps handle the issue of using one license on multiple systems, I'd be very surprised if they ever put a limit on numbers of activations/installations.

As I understand it, back when iLok was physical-only, a selling point was that you could travel to different studios with your iLok and be able to access your favorite plug-ins. And a selling point for developers was that there was no longer a need for them to maintain a licensing server, the mechanics of end-user licensing was all handled by PACE. Sell the user an iLok license then you're out of the support loop.

They have tried to make it easier on the user with the Cloud approach, but not enough developers have bought into that.

[JoeGBradford]

Just an update on my ilok experience on moving to my new PC as this thread has resurfaced. Absolutely seamless. Deactivated on old PC and reactivated on new without a hitch on all 15 instruments. Thanks for the help on this.

I wish I could say the same about the Steinberg elicencer - nightmare until I found some thing buried in their website saying - 'if your new elicencer doesn't have a number download the elicencer helper programme which will reinstall elicencer'. Until I found that I was tearing my hair out!