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How many machine / auths?

charlieclouser

charlieclouser

Senior Member
I know I’ve probably asked this before, and it’s probably been answered to death, but…

I’m finally migrating (manually) from my old Mac Pro trash can to TWO new computers (an m2ultra Mac Pro and an m1max MacBook Pro) and I need to move all 24tb of Kontakt libraries to new drives (PCIe 8m2 on the Mac Pro and ??? on the MacBook).

So the question is: Will NI Access shut me down for trying too many authorizations?

(I’ve only ever authorized most of these libraries once, but some really old ones might have been done twice.)

Is there an official max number of authorizations for libraries?

Is there a way to de-auth libraries from old machines?

Will k5 or k6 run on these new machines or am I stuck with k7 and up?

What say you @EvilDragon (or anyone else…)?

I’m on Ventura 13.6.4 and full version of Kontakt.
Click to read more...
 
I don't think you'll be shut down. If you own Komplete that supports authorizing on three machines. But I've at one time had things authorized on 4 machines and nothing happened... AFAIK NI doesn't do the "you get this number of activations per product" game, they may only be detecting simultaneous logins to the same NI account from multiple IPs (although I haven't confirmed this myself).

As for product compatibility on macOS: here. Kontakt 5 is not supported on Ventura, you need Kontakt 6.3 at least.
 
charlieclouser said:
Is there a way to de-auth libraries from old machines?
Click to expand...
If you remove the com.native-instruments.<library name>.plist files from the preference folders for each of the libraries (from both the root and user folders to be on the safe side, though only one will have the activation key in it IIRC) and run NA, they will show as no longer installed. Whether this resets an installation counter at NI HQ, that I don't know.

But as ED says, NI doesn't seem to track installation count in the way IK or Ableton do.
 
I've authorised some libraries at least half a dozen times and never had an issue. You'll be fine Charlie.

In general I'd suggest Kontakt 6, but on my M2 macbook K7 performs really well. I have terrible trouble with it in Windows launching slowly, but if you don't have that issue you'd be better off future-proofing with 7 imo.
 
charlieclouser said:
All very good info, and reassuring to say the least. Thanks all!

I’ve been installing software for three days and I’ve only made it as far as “F” in my alphabetized Applications folder, so it will probably be a couple more days (weeks?) until I get to “N” for Native Instruments…. Ugh.
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Just went through this, took me nearly a week so you have my sympathy. Having said that, Native Access was somewhat flaky but ultimately NI sent me a new version that got the job done. Very responsive and quick.

iLok shined and I have renewed gratitude for this easily portable system. Just install, already authorized.
 
You know @charlieclouser I find it alarming that, despite the fact that I'm in the same process as you are (moving to a new 'main' Mac Pro), you keep posting questions I never thought of...
 
Hi Charlie,

I just wanted to add my experience. Always migrated from different machines without problems, but I actually somehow hit a number of maximum install that caused a serial to be locked automatically 4 years ago. It was Cinematic Strings and but it was promptly unlocked by Alex personally, so everything was sorted out very fast.

I am saying it just for the sake of completeness but I really don't know if this backend behavior is even still active and for whom.
Certainly I don't want to cast a shadow on the already laborious process! but as a contribution to the discussion. As I understand it, that limit was specific to that serial but I must admit my ignorance about this.
 
clisma said:
Just went through this, took me nearly a week so you have my sympathy. Having said that, Native Access was somewhat flaky but ultimately NI sent me a new version that got the job done. Very responsive and quick.

iLok shined and I have renewed gratitude for this easily portable system. Just install, already authorized.
Click to expand...
Yeah, it also took me a week to get the new machine up and running with most of what I need installed. A month and a half later, I'm still working on it, as every now and then I find something I forgot I needed.

I used to have problems with some Kontakt libraries running out of authorizations (Heavyocity in particular), but the last two machines I've migrated to, I haven't encountered any issues with libraries, other than relocating everything remains a pain.
 
When moving to a machine I usually deleted Komplete from add/remove programs and ran the installation manager again just to be sure.

NI is one of the more forgiving software when it comes to hardware changes. Software that is touchy about hardware changes I stop supporting. I also learned that physical iLok is better than using your harddrive. Not every vendor is quick about resetting authorizations.

Sometimes I think it would be great to have a list of software that is a PITA to reauthorize over something small like upgrading a bigger OS drive.
 
kitekrazy said:
When moving to a machine I usually deleted Komplete from add/remove programs and ran the installation manager again just to be sure.

NI is one of the more forgiving software when it comes to hardware changes. Software that is touchy about hardware changes I stop supporting. I also learned that physical iLok is better than using your harddrive. Not every vendor is quick about resetting authorizations.

Sometimes I think it would be great to have a list of software that is a PITA to reauthorize over something small like upgrading a bigger OS drive.
Click to expand...
The one company I had trouble with this last time was izotope. Their manager refused to recognize authorizations on the ilok dongle and would only accept their own machine authorizations. It was most peculiar. I haven’t yet contacted izotope support to get it straightened out since I’d prefer they resided on the ilok dongle (since I have one and have to use it for other things).
 
charlieclouser said:
All very good info, and reassuring to say the least. Thanks all!

I’ve been installing software for three days and I’ve only made it as far as “F” in my alphabetized Applications folder, so it will probably be a couple more days (weeks?) until I get to “N” for Native Instruments…. Ugh.
Click to expand...
Just had to reimage my laptop due to a botched Windows update, I feel your pain.

Anyway, just seconding the motion, I've done at least 4 activations due to hardware swap and PC wipe-and-reloads, never had an issue once since they went to Native Access.

But it bugs me that it's ambiguous, I'm spoiled by iLok in one area, where at least you see exactly what license count you have used and where it's assigned. The stupid part with iLok is only allowing one PC per cloud license, like it's a dongle. DUH. This is where NI does it right... so from one machine going to two, activate away, you won't hit THAT wall at least. Glad Steinberg moved to three machne activations also. It's getting better. Mostly.
 
I have all my factory/serialed libraries on one drive and all my Kontakt Full/Retail libraries on another. I've done two previous system upgrades (new computers; PC) without any NI issues concerning Kontakt libraries.

If you use Absynth5, you might want to try starting your NI applications with by installing Absynth with a version of Komplete that has it.

Paj
8^)
 
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