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Moved Macs -- Adobe licensing stopped working

T

tipem

macrumors member
Original poster
Apr 20, 2007
42
0
Columbus, OH
Hi,

I just switched from an iMac to a Macbook. Got the Macbook for college stuff and I'll be selling my iMac shortly. I transferred everything over to my Macbook via an external hard drive, following the instructions on screen. It transferred everything successfully; couldn't be happier.

So I pulled up Photoshop CS3 on my new Macbook. The error message displayed is The licensing has stopped working, with no error code provided. Weird thing is, the products still worked on my iMac. So, I proceeded with these steps:

  1. Deactivated my licensing on my iMac
  2. Uninstalled Adobe CS3 on my iMac
  3. Restarted my Macbook, same error
  4. Used Adobe's license repair tool and removed the licensing registry from my iMac
  5. Restarted my Macbook, tried again, same error
  6. Uninstalled CS3 from my Macbook
  7. Reinstalled CS3 on my Macbook
  8. Restarted my Macbook, tried again, same error
  9. Used the license repair tool on my Macbook, removed the licensing registry from my Macbook
  10. Uninstalled CS3 from my Macbook, re-installed everything
  11. Restarted my Macbook, tried again, same error
I am absolutely out of ideas as to what to do. Please note that this was a computer TRANSFER, so I don't suspect is has anything to do with the weird CS3 network errors some people have had in the past. Both my iMac and Macbook have Snow Leopard on them.

Since I find that most technical support is not helpful, before I call them up, I thought I would ask the community about this. Any ideas?

Thanks in advanced.
 
Not that this is much help, but I'm having the same issue. Except the Licensing Repair Tool won't even launch properly, and all the other 9 solutions listed on the Adobe site don't work.

I hate being treated like a criminal when I paid hundreds of dollars for these products.
 
Um. This may seem like a basic question. But did you re-enter the license key when you re-installed CS3?

I'm not exactly sure how the license works, but it appears to be hidden. Also, the license key appears to be someone linked to the hardware it was installed on. When my Mac Pro went in for repair earlier this year, and came back with a new video card and new logic board my Adobe CS3 told me it was unlicensed. I was able to simply key in the license again.

My accounting software was also tied to the HW and the license needed to be rekeyed.

If the license is truly "broken" (i.e. needing repair) then there is one more tip that I can to the list of things you tried. Note @ crustyjusty this may apply to you too.

My CS license "broke" yesterday for no apparent reason, and needed repairing. The Adobe License Repair support page is actually pretty helpful... except they don't tell you where to go and find the LicenseRepair app when you mount the DMG. It doesn't open up on the desktop. IIRC it puts the folder with the app in the root of the HD. The other - and more important thing - they don't mention. You may have to run the License Repair App as an admin. The app runs in the terminal, and therefore the feedback is, um, less than I was used to when using the GUI. I knew what the problem was, but I didn't know how to elevate myself in the terminal. So I just moved the License Repair App to the applications folder, logged out and logged back in with my Admin account and the Repair tool worked like a charm.

Good Luck.
 
Just call them. I did this recently and wasn't on hold for long at all, the person gave me a long number to enter and that was it. I don't think their whole deactivation process (which is supposed to be done before the application is deleted) works all the time.
 
Does adobe still support CS3 using the version of the OS that's on your new hardware?

Around 15 months ago I bought a new iMac and had a problem installing CS2. The response from Adobe was "sorry! we don't support that product and can't help you"

call adobe but be prepared for a horrible tech support experience
 
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