Oh God (Autodesk) .. Not AGAIN...

My dearest Autodesk,

After a clean reinstall of Windows I have reinstalled Autodesk Inventor 2008 Suite on my laptop and now I can not activate it any more (again) (for a change). I still had it running on my desktop and thought I would be able to export the license to my laptop as usual (especially since it is the same laptop as before the windows reinstall), but not so: on my laptop it now says the imported license is broken and needs to be reactivated. As a result I can not re-export it to my desktop any more either before I activate first on this machine. (Why ?!)

I have tried to activate by logging into my account, but my group id of yyy-xxxxxxxx for AI 2008 suite is not accepted.
On the other hand my group id of xxx-yyyyyyyy for AI 2009 suite is accepted and I could activate 2009 suite if I wanted which I don't; I have previously had bad experiences running AI 2009 and Solid Edge V20 on the same machine and I don't want to go through all that again. At that time I had asked for a downgrade to 2008, which was eventually given to me - after a delay of four days during which I could not work with the software - at least: I was sent an activation code by email. Apparently the actual downgrade has not been performed since my account shows that I am still registered to use AI 2009.

Now I have tried registering 2008 suite with the group id for 2009 suite by automatic activation, but that doesn't work.
I am afraid to generate the activation code for AI 2009 while logged into my account, because if it doesn't work for AI 2008, you are going to accuse me of activating 2009 and with that upgrade forfeiting my right to use 2008 suite, which is not what I want to do.

My only wish now is to activate AI 2008 suite and to be able to activate it at any time I need to, on my own machines, (and use the portable license utility etc.) nothing further. So I first ask you: Can I get an activation code please? And second: is it possible that you make this downgrade permanent and remove the group id of xxx-yyyyyyyy from my account, replacing it with the group id for 2008 suite, which is yyy-xxxxxxxx ?
Please!

God!(Autodesk.)

Forever yours, (Oh no)

With all my love, (This. Sucks.)

etc. etc.




Summary: after reinstalling Windows and my cad software on ONE of my machines, instead of TWO working installations of Autodesk Inventor, which I have legally paid for and should be able to use alternating by means of the Portable License Utility, thanks to Autodesks AMAZING (I truly think the word amazing is appropriate) licensing system, I now have NONE.

(Picking up a new license for UGS Solid Edge worked like a charm.)

Comments

  1. I'm glad that I'm out of that engineering business for allmost 8 years. I never liked Autodesk. At the moment I only use simpel bitmap stuff in MS Paint and at the end I transefer it with Coral to a small gif-file. Anybody can view that. I just made a drawing of a new house and how additional shade is causing more heating costs to a neighbor. Both the neighbor and the civil servants of the municipality can view my simpel sketch. No (Auto)CAD needed. :-)

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  2. I'll give Autodesk some credit; I have tried Bricscad and other software and Autocad is the smoothest and the richest in possibilities. But I have never liked their licensing system, I have always had trouble with it, even when I paid the yearly maintenance fee and now that I have stopped paying it is ten times worse. And to think I still like release 2006 best, makes me mad! Progress isn't always progess, if you know what I mean...

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  3. Et dire que pour XSI on va devoir passer par autodesk maintenant ... sniff sniff

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  4. I was used to their dongle-system that ruined the printer port. Our office had the official Dutch version with that stupid dongle all neatly stored in a safe. We used the self-imported American version which didn't use a dongle. No problem, we also had an American office. :-)

    They are by far the leading software for vectorbased drafting. I've tried to use the Windows MetaFile-system but that was terrible.

    I make this kind of sketches and copy parts of PDF's supplied by the municipality. Most PC-users have no AutoCAD. So this method is more practical. And it goes pretty fast (1 hour) since I got used to Paint.

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  5. I use PrimoPDF to export my Autocad drawings to PDF. It is free software. Bricscad can export PDFs without any extra addons (So can OpenOffice, unlike Miscrosoft Office). I have bought a license for Bricscad (400 Euro's, permanent license, compare to Autocad 4000 plus "semi-optional" maintenance of 1200 a year) but the problem is I had written a library of VBA tools for Autocad that I can not easiliy export into Bricscad plus it is slightly slower and I have to adapt to it, because I am used to Autocad, and it is annoying.

    For 3D actually UGD Solid Edge is better than Autodesk Inventor (and more expensive - 6000 plus maintenance of 1800 a year), it is faster, doesn't constantly mess up your registry and doesn't need to be reinstalled the whole time, much easier to build complicated and adaptive models. I still use Inventor for one customer for who last year I have built a model involving pipe circuits, but this is not enough work to warrant to pay for the yearly maintenance fee. This year I earned around 500 Euro's with this project and the maintenance fee is more than twice that amount.

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  6. Perfect sketches to go with the horrendous experience!

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  7. I'm so happy knowing nothing about it, tralalalala......oeps I'm sorry.

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  8. At first look, I thought this sketch should an outline of something which is not working properly there. Now I understand why life is always a sketch:) ~Have a sketch-full weekend.

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  9. I enjoy this very nice sketch but I only understand that something is not working in your computer software... :)

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  10. Sorry about your troubles! Wow. Those images sure do capture the frustration of dealing with "customer service." Eek, egads, and golly.

    (Thanks for you thoughtful post on my blog. I do appreciate your input!)

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  11. Thanks Sandy. Oh, Autodesk are notorious for this.
    Of course the Dutch dealer blames the fact that it is an American organization, but the last time I complained I got my activation code from someone in India, and some weeks later got a phonecall with an apology from a Dutch representative for Autodesk who had been forwarded my mail by his colleague in Sweden.
    Maybe it is their strength which is their weakness... too big and too international! ^_^

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