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[Verne]

 When I first purchased JRiver, the licensing went reasonably smooth. Then I got the notion, after reading the forums, to try the "portable installation" feature. It's been downhill ever since. And yes, I've read all the posts I could find on these matters, but for the life of me, I cannot get a portable installation properly licensed.

It's not possible for me to go through all the details of the attempts I've made, they were numerous. And I followed the advice as much as possible from these forums. But frankly, I find the whole thing a confusing mess. Most of it has to do with versioning. A license key for MC19 should work for all minor versions of MC19 no matter what, and no matter how any later minor versions are installed. Yet that appears to not be the case. At least, I couldn't find any consistent way to get it to work. The only thing that seemed to work is to always go back to the original version I purchased, and then let MC update as time goes by.

Q: Does the installation key I get from "restore license" work only for the version of MC that I originally purchased? I think the version was 19.0.128 when I first purchased MC. Now the current version is 19.0.146, which JRiver had automatically updated me to a few days ago. That caused no end of grief when trying to get a portable install to work. I eventually found and used the procedures outlined in these forums, but instead of getting the portable install to work I managed to wipe out the license for my main machine's installation of MC instead -- and spent the next hour trying to get it licensed again. The only thing that seemed to work was to completely uninstall MC and reinstall the originally purchased version -- which for me was 19.0.128.

Q. Is there some expectation of where the installation key must be placed in order to work properly? I couldn't seem to get it to work anywhere except on the physical drive of where my main installation was placed. Coincidence or not? What's the rule here? Please think about making the instructions for using the installation key extremely clear - no ambiguous wording, and list all requirements. Your customers will greatly appreciate that. And no, I don't think it's acceptable to have to search around in the forums for answers, (how do I know I've entered the correct search terms?) you really need to have this info in one place, preferably in a pdf, and have it be the official word on such matters. IMHO, for paid software, there's no excuse for not doing this.

When I tried to use the install key for my main installation that I had to reinstall after it's license got munched, MC19 kept asking me for my registration code when I tried using the install key I had just obtained (and copied from an earlier corresponding restore license email). Not wanting to waste yet another restore, I kept canceling out of the dialog box, to try some other tactic. Nothing worked. Eventually, I gave up and gave it my registration code again, thinking I'd just eat another restore, and viola, it the licensing worked and didn't seem to eat into my restore count. So, I had apparently wasted much time over a poorly worded / presented dialog box. Please change the wording and/or design of the licensing dialog box to make it extremely clear what is expected and what is going to take place. Make it clear whether a restore is going to be eaten. Make it clear exactly how the license key is to be invoked, from where and in what fashion.

I finally gave up on getting a portable install to work. It's a great idea, and kudos to JRiver for attempting to provide such a feature, but IHMO it is seriously broken. And I wasted many hours and now my restore count is down to 7 for no good reason. Could I get my restore counts back?

[Matt]

I for the life of me cannot figure out JRiver's licensing procedure. When I first purchased JRiver, the licensing went reasonably smooth. Then I got the notion, after reading the forums, to try the "portable installation" feature. It's been downhill ever since. And yes, I've read all the posts I could find on these matters, but for the life of me, I cannot get a portable installation properly licensed.

Don't do a portable installation.  Do a normal installation and get the license working.  Then move on to portables, etc.

[Verne]

Well I did do a normal installation at first, and used it for a week or so, happy as a camper. And then MC decided to upgrade itself, and the licensing was messed up. (I didn't do anything to cause this). Finally straightened that out by reapplying my original license key. Then I got the notion to do a portable install onto a USB flash drive, for use on an otherwise space-limited laptop that I didn't want to pollute with a lot of installed applications. A portable install seemed like just the ticket here. Alas, I was never able to get it to work, and all the behaviors that others have reported in regards to portable installs surfaced, such as it saying the license was installed, only to have it still come up with an unregistered "trial version" in the registration dialog, etc, etc. And then it actually wiped out the licensing of my main installation on the hard drive. Have no idea how that happened. Probably because I kept trying to double click the license key to get something to happen. Apparently I clicked it at the wrong time, or from the wrong place. The documentation for where, when, and how you are supposed to do this for portable installations, or even normal installations, is lacking -- at least I couldn't find a clear description of it. The documentation is scattered all over the forums, instead of in one place. It wastes a lot of time.

At this point, I've pretty much given up on portable installations. Nice idea, but seriously flawed. No point in wasting any more time on it. But my questions still stand, portable install or no. Still curious to know exactly what the rules are for using the installation key. Where can that file be placed? When can it be executed? How many times can it be executed? It seems to work exactly once (if at all) and that's it. It's a strange beast. And yes, I'm aware of the two week limit on each key.

I find MC's behavior for licensing unintuitive at best. I understand JRiver is trying to make it flexible and allow us to install on multiple machines, which is laudable, but at some point, the resulting low price isn't worth it if many hours are spent trying to get things to work. I'd rather pay a bit more, and have the stuff just work.

[JimH]

The licensing has been heavily tested and works well.

A portable license won't work unless you're installing from a machine that is licensed for the same version.

[Yaobing]

Still curious to know exactly what the rules are for using the installation key. Where can that file be placed? When can it be executed? How many times can it be executed? It seems to work exactly once (if at all) and that's it. It's a strange beast. And yes, I'm aware of the two week limit on each key.

Install keys are valid only for 14 days.  You can save one anywhere on your computer.  When you need to install a license during the 14 day period, you should execute (double-click) the key.

[Verne]

I thought the problems were pretty detailed in the previous posts. Guess I didn't make them clear enough. In those posts I asked two main questions. I thought they were pretty clear and direct questions. None have been answered. Instead, what I get back is an almost boiler plate response: to "double click on the installation key," and that the "installation keys are only valid for 14 days" even though I had said in the previous posts that I'm well aware of that restriction.

I've tried too many scenarios to enumerate them all here, but here is the main problem again, boiled down to its essence, and note this is just for a standard installation, but on a second machine, (lets forget portable installs for a moment) using the registration code and the version of the MC install executable that I received when purchasing the product. Version 19.0.128. Note: I had a successful install on the first machine.

I install Media Center on the second machine, double click on the installation key that I had received earlier. The dialog box that pops up (call it Dialog A) wants me to "restore the license" by having me enter my registration code. This is after I had already entered my registration code earlier -- hence me having a valid installation key to double click on in the first place. (And I'll say it again, I'm well aware of the 14 day limit on the installation keys.) Instead of entering my registration code, which I believe would take me into endless rounds of "restoring my license and getting another installation key", I choose to click on the Continue button of Dialog A instead. Media Center launches, but the help dialogs still say my installation is unregistered. A reboot does not help.

In Dialog A, had I instead entered my registration code again to "restore my license" I may have lost another of my 10 "restores." I know this, because I tried it. Sometimes, it seems to "eat" a restore count. Other times, it doesn't. Once, it actually worked and left me with a validly licensed install. Other times, no dice.

In yet other attempts, when I've reinstalled Media Center and double clicked on the installation key, a dialog box comes up and says the license was accepted (I forget the exact language), yet when firing up Media Center, it still says its unregistered. Hence the confusion. Which button do I push, and when?

In all these scenarios, I had a valid install key that was less than 14 days old.

I'm running Windows 8.1 Pro Update 1, and my original purchase of MC was for version 19.0.128. I run no virus checker other than the standard Windows Defender (or whatever its called these days.)

Note that I *have* gotten MC to install on both machines at one time or another. (They were subsequently removed for various reasons not related to Media Center. Could that be the problem? Those earlier installs that were uninstalled?)

If the questions I asked in previous posts were addressed concisely and clearly, that would go a long way in helping me troubleshoot from my end what the problem is. I would at least know if I'm navigating the dialog boxes correctly. All I've received so far are answers to questions I already knew. The previous posts should have indicated this to you.

Update: I see one of my questions has been answered -- that the installation key can be placed anywhere. Thanks for whoever posted that. It eliminates one more variable.

[glynor]

We cannot forget the Portable installation, because I think that's exactly where you went wrong, and is the fundamental thing you don't get.  The behavior you're experiencing isn't normal for a regular install, from what I can tell.

You can only make portable installs using a machine that has a regularly installed, licensed, copy of MC installed.

If you installed the copy of MC on the second machine in Portable mode, then you need to uninstall it completely, and start over on that computer.  You can't install in portable mode "on" a computer that doesn't already have a copy of MC installed.  I really think that's the cause of your trouble.  You were up to some funny business with the portable installation (not being nefarious, just confused).  Portable installs are for installing MC onto a USB stick, or something similar, and (again) can only be done using a computer that already has a licensed copy of MC installed and working "in normal mode".

Otherwise, assuming you fix that, or don't have that issue... You can add a license for MC in one of two main ways:

1. You can enter your Registration Code (this is the code you get when you bought MC) directly into the application.  You can do this from the splash dialog that comes up in Demo mode on launch, or you can find it under the Help menu once MC is running.  This adds a license for that install automatically.  It should pop up a web page and give you a "license installed" dialog message.  You don't have to do anything (though, if you need it for a different PC, you can download the installation key file from that web page).  Licensing it this way counts as a "restore".  You get 10 restores per rolling calendar year.  If you screw up somehow, though, and use them all up, ask for help and they can be reset if needed.

2. When you do #1, they email you an installation key (or you can download it from the web page that pops up).  This is a MJR file that you can double click on any other machines to install the license (the one where you did #1 gets the license automatically and doesn't need the installation key file).  These last for 14 days and can be used on any other machines that you own.  To use one of these, just copy it to any computer that has an unlicensed copy of MC installed, and double-click the file.  This will launch MC, and install the license.  MC does NOT ask you to do anything with it.  It typically just will pop up a dialog box that says it was installed.  If the MJR file is no longer valid, then you'll get an error and need to generate a new one (or just enter your Registration Code into the program, which is the same thing).

Option #2 can also be used to add a license to any computers that can't get online.  You can generate an installation key manually by visiting this page:
https://rover.jriver.com/cgi-bin/restore.cgi

And then use the MJR file to install the license.  There is no benefit to #2 other than that it doesn't use up a "Restore" to license multiple machines (so you can save them a bit more if you have two or three computers).  But, if needed or your MJR file expired before you got to it, just use #1.

If it isn't working the way described above, then the most common culprits are anti-virus programs doing something weird, or having run registry cleaners of some kind which broke your installation of MC.  The simplest solution to the latter is to reinstall MC.  For the former, your anti-virus program shouldn't be interfering with an application like this (though it has been known to happen) and you'll need to disable it or uninstall it or fix it somehow to proceed.

[glynor]

By the way, to explicitly answer your original first question...

The MJR files are not linked to the version of MC that created them (in fact, as explained above, they can be created on the web without even having a copy of MC involved).

But, that's a weird question that no one really wanted to answer directly because:

If you are having trouble of any kind, never install any version of MC but the latest one.

Work back from there.

[Verne]

Thank you Glynor! I'm now at least getting some answers! I particularly thank you for confirming that the install key is not tied to the (minor) version number. The docs on this website are ambiguous in this regards (at least I couldn't come to a firm conclusion about it) hence my wondering if I was doing something wrong along those lines.

Your suggestion that it may have something to do with the initial botched portable install is interesting ... might be the first big clue ...

My first attempt to a portable install *was* to a USB stick, inserted into a machine that already had validly licensed MC installed. It had seemed to work, (double clicking on the install key caused a dialog to popup saying the license was installed, or something to that effect.) But I attempted to run that copy of MC from the USB stick while still attached to the main computer that already had its own copy installed, and that's when things seem to go haywire. It seemingly tried to do an automatic upgrade of the USB copy (or at least it ran the extraction process) and then afterwards said the program wasn't licensed. I rebooted the machine, checked the USB version again, still saying not licensed, so then rebooted again and tried a double check by installing and licensing the latest version again (the version I had on the main computer) to the USB stick, but still would say the program wasn't licensed.

Then I uninstalled the copy from the main machine and reinstalled and "licensed" to the originally purchased version (19.0.128), and then did a portable install to the USB stick, and this time going straight to the laptop before actually trying to run the USB installed copy. When running from there, it promptly tried to upgrade the installation, and ended up installing that upgrade on the laptop's hard drive, not what I wanted at all! That's when I finally found a comment on these forums to not have "auto update" checked. But how am I supposed to do that without running the program? Puzzled, but not ready to give up, I uninstalled from the laptop again, and tried again from the main computer, this time somehow managing to wipe out the license on the main computer (don't know what I did there), and took another restore count or two to get the main computer copy working again.

It was then I gave up with portable installs and tried just doing a standard install to the laptop, using a still valid non-expired license key. No dice. Clearly not pushing the right buttons somewhere, or misunderstanding the dialog boxes.

You say I should try always using the latest version I can. I'll make sure and do that for future attempts. In the past, this never seemed to work well. I seemed to always have to start with 19.0.128, instead of 19.0.1.146 (that's the latest version I have). But then I'd get into upgrade hell. I've yet to get a copy working on the laptop except for the very first attempt that wasn't even intended (the USB version "auto upgraded" and install on the hard drive of the laptop).)

I'll also try your option #2 for obtaining a license key (the restore.cgi from the website). I didn't try that before, thinking it would just use up a restore count. You are saying it won't?

Thanks for your help. For the most part I like the other features of MC, it has lots of options for setting up the audio-path "signal chain" that's great for experimenting with. More so than the other products I've seen. It's just getting the install keys to work reliably that's been frustrating.

My guess is that uninstalling MC from Windows 8.1 is not actually uninstalling every last bit in the registry or something and hence it's messed up. I don't have the luxury of wiping out that computer and reinstalling windows, unfortunately.

[Verne]

Problem solved.

Even though in the last post I had retreated and was just going to settle for a "standard installation" on my laptop instead of a portable install, I decided I really wanted to have it as a portable installation, so decided to try it again, using Glynor's information about how and when to use the installation key, and in particular, to always use the latest version of MC. The portable install finally came up and said it was "registered" --- but if and only if I had the drive attached to the desktop computer where my original MC installation resided. As soon as I moved the USB drive to the laptop, it would come up and say it wasn't registered.

Being the persistent sort that I am, I tried this one more time, being extremely careful of the steps. Still no dice.

Finally, this morning it dawned on me to try a different USB drive. The one I was using was a SDHC compact flash card. Instead I tried doing a portable install to a regular old USB stick.

That worked! I now have a portable install of MC that says it's registered when I use the USB stick on my laptop.

Don't know whether the first USB drive was flaky/corrupted in someway, or whether it had to do with the fact it was a flash card as opposed to a USB stick. Maybe the portable installs aren't mean to work on compact flash cards?

Either way, I'm now a happy camper.

Thanks for your help, Glynor.

[Hendrik]

Glad you got it sorted.
We'll investigate the SD Card problem, not sure its something that was ever tried.

[Arturo!]

I'm interested in purchasing MC 20. My question is if it is possible to do a "Portable Only" installation and not have to install it on my main PC.
I have looked at the trial version and I see that there is no option for this option. I really only want to install it on my portable USB HDD for access for my desktop and laptop for it to be a truly "Portable" installation as the name implies.

Why can't you just enter the license key when installing the "Portable" version and be done with it?

Any suggestions?

[~OHM~]

You can only make portable installs using a machine that has a regularly installed, licensed, copy of MC installed.

[ivalentic]

I have tried to install portable version on SD card because i'd like to use MC19 on a windows tablet with only one usb port (for dac).
Everything works fine on my main computer even from SD card, but i have "licence expired" problem on tablet (when i tried to run from SD card).
Please help!