Adobe Installation and Licensing

Here's a novel idea. Stop treating your paying customers like criminals and make your products work. It seems like Adobe spends more time and money trying to copy protect their products than they do on actually improving and fix them. I believe that the whole mess with your crappy installers also stems from this position as well.

I purchased Creative Suite CS4 one the 20th of Sept. 09 and ran into the "Licensing for this product has expired". Then I discovered this site thinking "ah here's the solution" but then discovered that there isn't any information here that can currently help me...
)= not good =(

Try this knowledge base article:

http://kb2.adobe.com/cps/494/cpsid_49485.html

If that doesn't work, feel free to email me directly (ewilde@adobe.com) and I'll set you up with a customer care representative.

In our next version ...

Duh!

This is a good idea, to allow the user to do something about the expired license rather than just quit and leave them at the desktop.

One situation I've seen this error crop up, and it would be good if the apps could detect that this is the case and identify it appropriately, is if you are using Fast User Switching on Mac OS X.

If you're logged in as one user, and launch an Adobe app, and then switch to another user - if you then try to launch any Creative Suite app, you get this error.

I'm assuming it's because the licensing database is locked by the first user, but being told that the license has expired, rather than being given a more informative error message does cause some confusion.

How and why should a license expire?

This worries my becuase I've read various reports that indicate that there is a 20 activation limit after which the license expires. I can't understand the reasoning behind this. I frequently reinstall my OS every few months or so, so theoretically I will eventually make my copy of CS4 unusable?

All of this seems like nonsense and it seems Adobe needs to be more transparent about these issues.

As I said earlier, I don't understand the reasoning behind this. Burdening your customers with these inconveniences only pushes people to pirate the software but on top of that it does nothing to stop pirates. People bent on stealing your software will continue to do so unabated while you annoy your paying customers to death.

Only specific licenses expire. For example, some public beta releases or prerelease builds have serial numbers that expire on specific dates. Also, event serial numbers (such as for press demo events) will also expire. Retail or volume serial numbers of a purchased product do not expire for any shipping Adobe products.

This worries my becuase I've read various reports that indicate that there is a 20 activation limit after which the license expires. I can't understand the reasoning behind this. I frequently reinstall my OS every few months or so, so theoretically I will eventually make my copy of CS4 unusable?

This is a valid worry, although a different issue from expiring serial numbers.

We do have a business rule that states there is a 20 time limit to the number of deactivations/reactivations any serial number can perform. So you may very well hit this limit. If you do, you can call customer care or visit the customer care web site to ask for an extension. Extensions are done on a case-by-case basis. Note that just restoring a disk image does not necessarily require a deactivation/reactivation. If the hardware is identical then you'll likely be OK without a deactivation/reactivation.

As I said earlier, I don't understand the reasoning behind this. Burdening your customers with these inconveniences only pushes people to pirate the software but on top of that it does nothing to stop pirates. People bent on stealing your software will continue to do so unabated while you annoy your paying customers to death.

There is a valid case to be made around not having activation at all. This is indeed a contentious issue. However, activation is shown to prevent casual piracy; which is our main goal with activation. We realize that hackers will break through just about any protection imaginable given enough desire and time.

Just got the 6.0.4 InDesign update and although it seems to work fine on 10.5 mac's the licensing breaks on 10.4. I really need this fixed as there are bunch of bugs that should be fixed in this that my users need (all 600 of them). Can you please assist

I'll respond to you in email so that we can move more quickly.

I have seen a similar, but different problem. We have a volume license for our studio. Sometimes we will launch adobe apps and get a message saying "licensing has stopped working for this product". Uninstall/Reinstall does nothing. I found that deleting /Library/Preferences/FLEXnet Publisher fixes the problem. Still painful that this comes up in the first place.

I bought AI CS4 , I install it and I have an error message: "License for this product has expired". Where can I get a new license?. I tried the way in this article

http://kb2.adobe.com/cps/494/cpsid_49485.html

but it doesn't work at all.
Please help! Thanks

Tracey

Outside of making sure that someone isn't buying one package of Photoshop or whatever and installing that on 50 different computers the number of times I install/uninstall or activate/deactivate a product that I paid for is not of your freaking business.

There is absolutely not legitimate reason to have this limit other than you are indeed treating paying customers like crooks.

If I want to sit down and spend the next 2 years of my life installing and uninstalling the copy of Photoshop CS4 that I just bought from Adobe.com that is my business not yours. Plain and simple.

A time when come when people will get fed up with this a big enough stink will be raised and laws will be enacted to deal with this bull.

I have no problem Adobe trying to minimize piracy. But this 20 install/uninstall/activate/deactivate limit does nothing for that. It only causes problems for paying customers.

Tracey, I'll follow up with you in direct email.

Robert,

I agree with you. In fact, we've just completed the changes necessary to remove the deactivatoin limit for our upcoming products. Currently shipping products will still have the deactivation limit; but, starting with the next version of the Adobe Creative Suite there should be no deactivation limits.

5NrAGG I bookmarked this link. Thank you for good job!

That is very good to here. A good step in the right direction. It is important to strike a balance between preventing piracy and totally cheesing off your paying customers. You don't want the paying ones to go pirate.

In fact, we've just completed the changes necessary to remove the deactivatoin limit for our upcoming products. Currently shipping products will still have the deactivation limit;

So what about the existing CS4 versions? Do these users have to upgrade for thousands of Dollars to get the extension of the 20 activation cycles?
Or will customer service reactivate any CS4, regardless of the number of activations in the past? (Which would still be an inconvenience, since you always have to contact customer service, but at least you cannot get stuck with a useless bunch of software not installable anymore)

Referencing my last post I have another question.
Is the 20 activations limit coded on the customer's side or on Adobe's server side?
What if I have got 25 activations in the past (20 normal and further 5 extended by customer service), but a totally clean and new Windows installation where I install CS4 for the 26. time?
Will it activate or not?

If it does, this wouldn't be the best possible solution, but it would at least provide a method not to end up with worthless software after the maximum of activations.

The current 20 limit is on deactivations. So the 26th activation should work assuming you don't already have 2 activations currently live.

Also, due to the cost of testing we've limited the implementation to deactivations on future products. So removing the deactivation limit wouldn't affect CS4 products. Not ideal, but a reality given the resources we have available on the team.

Also, you can interact with customer support online rather than making a phone call. You have to have registered your product, though:

https://www.adobe.com/cfusion/support/index.cfm?event=membership&returnURL=%2Fcfusion%2Fsupport%2Findex%2Ecfm%3Fevent%3Dportal%26loc%3Den%5Fus&loc=en_us

Sorry, I don't get it. If I have used up all activations/deactivations, how should it then be possible to further activate CS4?
And how is customer support reacting in this case?

Regarding the testing issue: Maybe the development team should first focus on already sold products rather than on new ones. There was a time in software development in the nineties where updates rather than upgrades were in the focus of developers and existing customers were seen as the real capital of a company...

Anyway, thanks for your detailed answers!

I posted about this on the Adobe forums almost a year ago, and it's STILL not working? Incredible.

I've had to uninstall and reinstall twice now, and in March when I called Customer Support about this they refused to help me - I bought CS3 in August 2008, and their (quite snarky) answer was to upgrade! Hah! Some help!

I paid almost $2000 for your product and they tell me six months later to upgrade? No updates work any longer for CS3, I get "Updater did not worked," messages constantly - which is great, being insulted in bad English, no less - and the product is a year old. The license keeps "expiring," and I have to do all sorts of crazy things to make it work again.

And you know what? A friend of mine has a pirated copy - AND IT WORKS PERFECTLY.

Thank god you're not building houses, or cars, or heck, even computers, they'd fall apart after six months!

I am seriously considering never buying your software again. Ever. I've been shoveling money into your company loyally for 12 years now, and I'm done. I might keep using the software illegally, but I'm not giving Adobe another cent until they wise up.

There are two limits with CS4 regarding activation.

For retail serial numbers products are limited to two live activations at any one time. If you install and activate on two different machines, a third install is against the terms of the license agreement and we programatically prohibit the third activation (and further use of the product.)

It is possible to deactivate a product on a system. That would reduce the number of live activations by one. You can then reactivate the product on the same or a different system, thus increasing the activation count again by one.

There is another limit around the number of deactivations that can be done for the lifetime of the product. For CS4 that limit is 20. The previous comment made the entirely reasonable case that there really is no good business reason to have a deactivation limit of 20. For products going forward this deactivation limit has been removed entirely.

Perfect work!,

I bookmarked this link. Thank you for good job!,

I've been enjoying my cs3 for 2 years now-only had 1 issue last winter that stumped even the tech- yesterday I worked with it for several hours, shut the computer down, went back that night to work on some more pictures and up popped "licensing for this product has stopped working" The comp is telling me to uninstalling and then reinstalling. Fine but the last time I uninstalled the program ( on a different computer) it screwed up Adobe Reader, and we can't get it to work right to this day. I do not want that issue to pop up on this computer b/c then i'll be in big trouble with my husband. Does anyone have any suggestions before a mrs becomes a miss ( hahah :)

oh i also forgot to mention another person i know that uses adobe photoshop ( not cs3 though) said his stopped working as well yesterday.. concidence or something going on with adobe???

Leslie,

We've been seeing this error for a number of years now and traced it to a third-party vendor component that was included in our software since CS3. We've found workarounds that are detailed in the following Knowledge Base articles:

http://kb2.adobe.com/cps/401/kb401528.html

Also, for the next version of the Adobe Creative Suite we have provided what we think is a permanent solution.

How does one deactivate Photoshop CS4 on a PC after the hard drive with the OS on it dies?

My 9 yr old HD had a boot issue. The shop reinstalled Win XP, I had to install all programs etc. That drive died a few months later and a different shop put in a new HD, reinstalled Win XP then I installed all programs etc.

Now CS4 thinks it is the 3rd install & activation yet all 3 are on the same physical PC. I didn't put CS4 on a different physical PC so I figured all was OK. In any case there was never an opportunity to deactivate since the program was in the bit bucket.

Advice? Thanks in advance,

Bill Smith

Bill,

This is a serious weak point in our workflow today. Unfortunatly, the only way to resolve the situation is to log a customer support case. You can do that either by phone or, if you've registered the product, online here:

http://www.adobe.com/support/contact/

Click on "customer support portal".

We have a couple of long term solutions on the drawing board; but, won't get to them for a little while due to focusing on higher priority problems.

Thanks,
--Eric

Hi Eric,

I contacted customer support thru 1-800-833-6687 and got the issue fixed in a matter of minutes and painlessly too.

A big thanks to customer care and I owe someone a beer!

Thanks,
Bill

I agree with many of the comments above...it seems like Adobe is treating its paying customers like the bandits they are supposedly trying to stop from illegally using their software.

Unless you can seemlessly prevent illegal use without affecting the paying customers at all, this is a futile exercise.

I was surprised to find out the 20 deactivation limit when my program stopped my from deactivating. I for one would like the option of endless activation and deactivation, so I can use my license wherever and whenever I need to, on my work computer, home computer, laptop, and lab computer. But I only have the option of using it on 2 of them now.

And now you're telling me the license can 'expire'.

Seems like the pirated versions are the only way around this problem...correct me if I'm wrong.

HELP!!! I downloaded the trial ver of CS4...worked until I got the "License Has Expired" message...Went and BOUGHT the FULL version of CS4..came home, uninstalled previous version of trial...Installed from the CD...went through the steps...Registration etc...Go to open Photoshop and guess what??? I get the error message!!! Called customer service, got a new serial number...uninstalled reinstalled again...GUESS WHAT!! STILL CAN NOT USE THE PRODUCT!!!! It will open Bridge, but nor Photoshop...am I out $750.00 or what?? I NEED HELP!!!!!

I am gobsmacked at what I am reading.

I have CS4 Design Premium. and have always been unhappy upon learning that I only have limited control of my activations. BIG money was paid for this software, yet Adobe could in theory stop me using it. I have never come across this practice with any of my software and I run a music and film/design studio setup -so run a lot of software.

Now i learn that the limited automatic activtion is only going to be removed but ONLY for the next CS5version. THIS STINKS, and really P****es me off. I would have to pay adobe another £600 or so to get the right to eventually have total control of my software which I have legally paid for.

Very poor customer service for existing users, and I dont buy the limited team resources nonesense. I have dealt with a lot of one man operations and they often work quickly to deal with software issues.

This reeks of poor practice and money grabbing, and for something which sould'nt have been done in the first place. (I even wonder at the legality of it given the recent autodesk ruling on reselling software)

This should be also available as an update for all existing cs4 customers.- it is a question of support Or has support for cs4 customers ended already, I thought that only happened when the next version is released. It seems software support only exists for a few months after release and then ceases as the team focuses all their attention on the next paid version.

I have already pay double the US price and now Adobe are trying to screw me for more if I want to have full control of my software. (I just wish someone could challenge Adobe on this in court).

An unhappy adobe customer.

Paul,

We hear you and have actually been looking at what is feasible for removing the deactivation limit for existing products as well. We're leaning that way; but, have to finish some of the technical investigations before committing.

Eric,

I am glad to see your last statement here about removing the deactivation limit from current product lines. Frankly the deactivation limit conflicts with Adobe's long standing perpetual license policy.

I have been going around in circles via email with customer service/support regarding the deactivation question for 2 weeks now.

Does the 20 deactivation limit currently apply to CS3 products as well as CS4.

I ask as I am using Photoshop & Illustrator CS3 and wanted to test them in Windows 7 environment, but not at the "cost" of using up deactivations against my license.

Since the Activations and Deactivations are basically Adobe server side, I certainly hope that the no limit on deactivations on existing CS4 and earlier products is implemented as soon as technically possible and widely announced to registered users.

Tim,

The current deactivation limit applies to CS3 and CS4 products equally. It will be removed for all Adobe products as soon as we finish up the work on our side, including CS3 and CS4 and future versions.

Can you test your deployments in Trial mode? All CS products except Acrobat on the Mac support Trial.