jbmoar,

Repeating only what I've read before and not saying I'm 100% accurate, the activation records are saved in 3 areas. One is some hidden part of your drive's master boot sector, the second is the windows registry, and the third is some other location (presumably some innocuous file saved who knows where) that I'd guess to still be the system partition if you have a multiple-partition hard drive. When you image the drive, that should maintain the latter two records intact. However, unless your drive image included the master boot record, and you restore the full image inclusive of the MBR, then you'll not likely be able to run PSCS again without first reactivating it.

For the most part, reactivation shouldn't be a problem. Given that this problem of yours arose on the 2nd activated system, the error message you got suggests that the activation process sees your system as a new one. Why? Because the activation process is flawed.

Hopefully that will answer your question. As GH said, it does sound like you'll need to contact Adobe for assistance, but once you reach them that should go smoothly based upon my own experience.

Now, elaborating further...

There is a problem with Adobe's scheme for activation that often requires reactivation under conditions when reactivation really shouldn't be required. Stephanie Schaefer of Adobe once posted that if PS CS is run any time after a System Restore point or drive image has been made, and System Restore or a drive image restore is performed at a later time, then the activation records will be out of sync and a reactivation will be required. That is, when PSCS is run, it updates those records. So, if you restore a drive without including a restoration of the MBR, then the record in that location will be newer and out of sync from the records in the other two locations. The result is a required immediate reactivation. There is no grace period that allows you work with Photoshop CS if you're in a location where phone/internet access is unavailable. That is the single biggest flaw I'm aware of regarding Adobe's activation scheme.

I'll add too, that there was a time when I imaged my laptop PC's hard drive, reinstalled an old image to check out some problems, then reverted to the original image. I don't recall having ever run PSCS during that time, yet when I restored the original image I was not able to run PSCS without first reactivating it. Reactivation usually is no big issue and can easily and quickly be performed over the internet...I've done it without a hitch on several occasions. In this instance however, reactivation was denied both by internet and phone-in attempts, and personal support was required...yet was not available due to my needs arising on a weekend, outside the normal support hours for Adobe. My need to use PSCS wasn't critical, but might have been if I'd been a professional who was on a deadline. The following Monday, I phoned during normal business hours for Adobe, received support and reactivated my PS CS without a problem. I was only told that the activation process somehow must've been seeing my hard drive as a new one. That doesn't explain why reactivation was denied...that should never have occurred.

So, a second problem...for a required but denied reactivation, Adobe should provide 24/7 personal support with optional toll-free numbers to call if it is necessary to call another country to obtain help (presuming another country could support your country's version of PS). If other toll-free numbers cannot be provided, then collect calls should be accepted...whether they are or not, I'm not sure. In any case, reactivation should be fully supported and staffed at Adobe's expense, at all hours of the day, every day of the week, until the time comes that they revise their activation process to be accommodating of all scenarios where reactivation is prompted.

The third problem is that reactivation should never be denied on a system where 2 of 3 activation records are the same. The activation records should be based solely upon hardware IDs for some number (I suggest 6 perhaps) of hardware items in a system that are among the least likely to be modified or swapped out. If any one of those components is replaced, the activation manager should update all records when PSCS is launched, but still allow normal operations to proceed. Reactivation should only be required when 33-50% of those components are replaced concurrently; if more than 50%, then and only then should reactivation be denied...and yet even then there should still be some grace period of use permitted, 3-5 days maybe. I don't know that this would address all issues, but it should permit drive restorations under most scenarios to have no impact upon reactivation. I've likely overlooked other factors that may need consideration as well, but at least I've thrown out a few ideas here.

By the way, Adobe knows they've got problems with their activation scheme. What sort of solution they might ultimately offer, we can only wait and see. The fastest solution they could provide, easily and inexpensively, is to allow all registered users of PS CS to download an update that removes the activation check, and fall back to trusting the integrity of their legitimate customers. This could be considered yet one more perk of registering your software...while not required, there is some real advantage in doing so.

<edit> Hmmm...seeing the other posts that have arrived, and their time stamps, I see I took longer writing my reply than I realized. Oh well, what else is new? :)

Regards,

Daryl

jbmoar

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Activating Adobe Photoshop CS