Photo Mechanic has been deactivated two times

[Kirk Baker]

I will contact each of you privately, please check your "My Messages"

-Kirk

[jwvaughn]

NIC? What was I thinking?  You are correct MAC is the correct name. 

As far as connecting to an AP with MAC filtering - that is what bit me in the but with my wife's Android tablet. It was working then failed to connect.  A few quick tests showed they MAC was being reset on every cold start. Up until then I was under the impression that the MAC was assigned do a device and that was it.  Guess not anymore!!

Sorry that it did not help, it was just a possibility 

Jerry

[robert s.]

Hy Kirk,

as I also wrote you by PM, since I eliminated "Avira Free" and replaced it by "Avast Free" the problem has not occured.

[Tony Fiorda]

Hello Kirk et all!

I too am having an issue with PM deactivating on my Surface Pro 3.  Last night alone, after reading this thread, I tested a few times and it deactivated 3 out of 5 times I started it up.  Whether I was running it as Administrator or not seemed to not have any effect.

Since I am almost running the same software on my SPro 3 that I am on my desktop, including Windows 10 on both I cannot come up with a major difference.

I have noticed that when I go to my studio, I am on a different wifi network and I usually have to reactivate there.  This is really the first times I've tested at home as I usually just move the files over to the desktop and work from that.  Also, it seems to happen after a Windows update to the OS.

You mentioned that PM looks for a hardware signature.  The only thing I can think of on my SP 3 is that I am using BitLocker on it and encrypting the data on the disk.  I was wondering if this may be changing the signature PM is looking for.

I'd be willing to assist your support folks and supply any data that may be needed. 

To get around not having to go the Camerabits website when this happens, internet access isn't always available, I've copied the registration to a text file and keep it on the hard drive so I can do a copy/paste and continue.

Any thoughts or suggestions?

Tony...
di Sogno Photography

[Kirk Baker]

Tony,

I too am having an issue with PM deactivating on my Surface Pro 3.  Last night alone, after reading this thread, I tested a few times and it deactivated 3 out of 5 times I started it up.  Whether I was running it as Administrator or not seemed to not have any effect.

Since I am almost running the same software on my SPro 3 that I am on my desktop, including Windows 10 on both I cannot come up with a major difference.

I have noticed that when I go to my studio, I am on a different wifi network and I usually have to reactivate there.  This is really the first times I've tested at home as I usually just move the files over to the desktop and work from that.  Also, it seems to happen after a Windows update to the OS.

You mentioned that PM looks for a hardware signature.  The only thing I can think of on my SP 3 is that I am using BitLocker on it and encrypting the data on the disk.  I was wondering if this may be changing the signature PM is looking for.

I'd be willing to assist your support folks and supply any data that may be needed. 

To get around not having to go the Camerabits website when this happens, internet access isn't always available, I've copied the registration to a text file and keep it on the hard drive so I can do a copy/paste and continue.

Any thoughts or suggestions?

The activation file is stored in the following location:

C:\ProgramData\Camera Bits, Inc\Photo Mechanic\com.camerabits.PhotoMechanic5.activation

If that file is modified or re-created in any way then PM will reject the file.  If BitLocker is modifying the file then this will definitely cause problems.  Is it possible to tell BitLocker to leave specific files/folders alone?

-Kirk

[Tony Fiorda]

hi kirk,

it looks as though there is not.  BitLocker is drive level and EFS is folder/file level.  In the meantime, I created an override today for my AV (Webroot) to see if by chance that was causing a problem in modifying the file w/o telling me.  I did this to test the resolution of the previous poster.

I'll continue to monitor and let you know.

Thanks,

Tony...