If you use the new 2011 Total Uninstall feature while updating, do you have to transfer the license first?
Does it tell you this while perfoming this option/
If you use the new 2011 Total Uninstall feature while updating, do you have to transfer the license first?
Does it tell you this while perfoming this option/
Bryan,
Better to be safe then sorry. I would transfer the license. That way you know it
is secure and not going to be an issue.
Bryan,
Total uninstall directions are here: https://forum.solidworks.com/docs/DOC-1014
And they don't specify one way or the other. Hopefully someone takes notice of this concern and updates that page accordingly. I will see if I can push it to the right person.
You should only need to transfer license if you intend to re-install to a different computer? If you are re-installing to the same computer, then no transfer is taking place.
The association of the license to the computer will be checked online after reinstallation.
I don't know Kelvin L., TOTAL UNINSTALL sounds like, well like TOTAL.
Well, hopefully someone in the know from SW will step in to confirm or deny, but I will put money on not needing to transfer the license if SW is being re-installed on the same machine ... providing the HDD is not being changed.
Think about it, when installing SW on a new machine, the activation procedure obtains the drive ID automatically and links that to the license. If that ID has not changed, then no transfer has taken place.
I suspect he's right. The article by Greg states that the new total uninstall removes the folders and the current user reg key. This, to me is NOT a total uninstall as there are still many, many reg entries left over - the main one being the local machine key, which is where the license info is. So if his statement is correct, and I suspect it is, then the license key is not removed because the local machine key is not deleted.
Go take a look at the post called My process for getting a clean installation of SW. One of the files there is documentation of how I totally clean a machine before installing a new version. It involves uininstalling all things SolidWorks, and then removing ALL reg keys that deal with SW - including the CLSID keys. I also clean up all the SW related folders that are scattered throughout the hard drive in various folders.
I have been a part of discussions about cleanup before installing new versions, and some people are of the opinion that my method is a waste of time. To a certain extent, maybe, but I have figured out a way to find the CLSID keys quickly enough to where I feel it's worth the time to dump all that junk out of there. I have also been told that digging out the LM key stuff is also unnecessary. Now that I don't agree with as there is so much info there that will carry through into a new install. My thought and experience is that the time it takes to TOTALLY clean a machine is worth it in that I know I am not carrying forward any problems that may have crept into the registry. Knowing that a new install is totally clean gives me a repeatable baseline on that machine.
In talking with Melissa about how to automate a total cleanup, we decided that it was too dangerous to attempt, and therefore that's probably why you see the new SW solution as only a partial, low level cleanup. One roadblock to a total cleanup is you can't just go through the registry and blindly delete all keys that say SolidWorks. Why not, you ask? Our SW laptop has a name of SolidWorks2 and so any key that refers to the name of the machine would also be deleted. That's just one example of the danger of a blanket search and destroy.
Now, all that being said, there are people that have told me that they just update from version to version and get along fine. I'm happy for them. :-)
WT
If you are going to reinstall it on the same machine then you don't need to transfer the license but it is a good idea to transfer it. It only takes a couple minutes to transfer it & give you peace of mind. It will reauthorize when you reinstall it. I believe it uses the mac address & some other hardware ID to link it to the computer.
I did NOT transfer the license back to SW before upgrading from 2010 to 2011.
When upgrading to 2011, the system thinks the Computer ID changed (this was all on the same computer.
Here is information that points to this known issue.
Note that the WORKAROUND below did not work for us! We struggled to get our VAR to believe it was a problem and that they needed to deactivate the serials so I could continue w/my SW installation. This resulted in some downtime for our users.
Irrestive of the the process/method you adopt to uninstall, make sure you transfer license first so that when you reinstall, you can use the license again. If you don't transfer license before uninstalling you'll have lot of trouble and issues in getting it back.