Author Topic: Windows 7 Product Activation error  (Read 10529 times)

airberlin

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Windows 7 Product Activation error
« on: September 12, 2010, 09:43:35 pm »
Hi,

I got a new pc with windows 7 64 bit and could install Zurich und Chicago with no problems. Then I tried to install JFK and a first glance everything seems to be ok, no sign that someting with the installation went wrong. But after startung FSX ( Accelaration Pack ) , an product activation error occured: Error code 1-800004005. What could be the reason for this failure and how can I solve this problems?

Best regards

Peter

virtuali

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Re: Windows 7 Product Activation error
« Reply #1 on: September 12, 2010, 09:54:17 pm »
That message doesn't have anything to do with any of our products. It's coming from FSX itself, and the activation problem is in FSX, not in our products.

Some details here:

http://social.answers.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/vistagaming/thread/41cd8052-0f49-4d0b-b6aa-f18e83e9d010

airberlin

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Re: Windows 7 Product Activation error
« Reply #2 on: September 12, 2010, 10:08:59 pm »
But why does this problem occur after installing JFK?

virtuali

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Re: Windows 7 Product Activation error
« Reply #3 on: September 12, 2010, 11:01:08 pm »
That's entirely coincidental, our installers aren't related in any way to the FSX activation

airberlin

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Re: Windows 7 Product Activation error
« Reply #4 on: September 12, 2010, 11:20:52 pm »
Hi,

thats seems to be not in agreement with the laws of logic:

1)FSX ist activated

2) Zurich und Chicago are iinstalled and everything is ok

3) Nothing happened in between

4) JFK is installed

5) The product activation error occured

My conclusion: That the product activation error occured after the installation of JFK has something to do with the installation of JFK!!!

I dont know who is to to blame for the effect, but if that is just coincedential, than you have good chance of winning a nobel prize! 

Best regards

Peter

virtuali

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Re: Windows 7 Product Activation error
« Reply #5 on: September 13, 2010, 12:37:11 am »
thats seems to be not in agreement with the laws of logic:

That sequence doesn't prove anything, except that FSX has now lost its activation between having installed other 2 products, but that doesn't mean they are the cause.

Quote
3) Nothing happened in between

YOU might have not done anything in between, but your OS is constantly running process all the time, even if it seems that is doing nothing.

The FSX activation info has some relationship with IDE/SATA hard disk drivers and, if a problem happened "in between" which was related to those drivers, even a problem you had no notification of (like a background defrag issue, a background security scan, a windows startup optimization process, these are *all* examples of processes related to the hard drives that run constantly, even when the system is idle doing nothing), this might have caused the loss of the activation, without doing "anything", giving you the wrong idea the problem was *caused* by our installer, just because that was the last thing you did before noticing the issue. But, as I've said, it was entirely coincidental.

Quote
My conclusion: That the product activation error occured after the installation of JFK has something to do with the installation of JFK!!!

I'm sorry, but the conclusion is wrong, because there's just no way the JFK installer (which, btw, does exactly the same things the Chicago and Zurich installers do, except the scenery files are different) could have caused a loss of the FSX activation by itself.

Quote
I dont know who is to to blame for the effect, but if that is just coincedential, than you have good chance of winning a nobel prize!

I gave you a perfectly sound technical explanation of a possible issue that could have caused the loss of the FSX activation, even if you thought you haven't done "anything" between installing LSZH/KORD and KJFK, the system could have had a glitch that happened between the installs so, please, leave the humor out, because a loss of the FSX activation CAN'T be caused by a scenery installer.

The installer just copies some files in the Fsdreamteam folder under FSX. And, the ONLY FSX files that it modifies, are the DLL/EXE.XML files to add our modules, and the scenery.cfg file to add the scenery to the Scenery Library.

Nothing related to the FSX activation is stored inside any of those files and, since no other FSX file is touched, it's just not possible our installer could cause the loss of the FSX activation, which is not even stored in the FSX folder, but is buried somewere in protected system files, that no 3rd party installer could acces anyway.

Without even mentioning the fact that all our installers do exactly the same thing so, if they *were* the cause of the FSX activation loss, you should have seen it when installing LSZH/KORD, not just with KJFK.

Fact you haven't, clearly proves there's no relationship whatsoever between the JFK installation the loss of activation of FSX itself.
« Last Edit: September 13, 2010, 12:39:51 am by virtuali »

airberlin

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Re: Windows 7 Product Activation error
« Reply #6 on: September 13, 2010, 10:35:44 am »
Hi Umberto,

thank you for your assistance. But I still guess, that the problem is triggered through the installation of JFK.

1) The system is running since february 2010, untill JFK was installed, the activation of FSX was never lost.

2) Last weekend a tried at least five times to install JFK, always after recovering the sytem with true image. I installed YFK before installing Zurich and Chicago, after installing Zurich and/or chicago etc, alwasy the same effect: FSX was acivated before installing JFK, and it was deactivated after installing JFK. This effect was five times only to be seen after installing JFK.

3) After installing JFK, other third parties software like UT2, Level D, goflight, aerosoft etc. were no longer recognized as trusted software. This also was only to be seen after installing JFK, not after installing Zurich and/or Chicago withhout JFK.

It still conflicts with my logical understanding, that five times under different dates and circumstances a strange process deactived fsx just in the logicsl second before JFK was installed and that that never happened for months before JFK was installed.

Best regards

Peter Hecht

virtuali

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Re: Windows 7 Product Activation error
« Reply #7 on: September 13, 2010, 11:13:17 am »
thank you for your assistance. But I still guess, that the problem is triggered through the installation of JFK.

It's not. It just happened, but it hasn't been triggered by it.

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1) The system is running since february 2010, untill JFK was installed, the activation of FSX was never lost.

That doesn't really proves anything, except that your system ran fine since february 2010, it doesn't discount the chance the problem could have happened now.

With this logic, would you stop making regular backups, just because your system has been running fine for months ? Obviously not, a problem can happen anytime, that's why people made regular backups (at least, they should...). Your problem just happened after installing JFK, but that doesn't mean it was caused by it.

Quote
2) Last weekend a tried at least five times to install JFK, always after recovering the sytem with true image. I installed YFK before installing Zurich and Chicago, after installing Zurich and/or chicago etc, alwasy the same effect: FSX was acivated before installing JFK, and it was deactivated after installing JFK. This effect was five times only to be seen after installing JFK.

The FSX activation loss, instead, CAN be very likely created by the use of True Image, instead. Since you are always reinstalling JFK after using True Image, you are associating it with JFK. The FSX activation IS located in hidden and normally unaccessible areas of the hard drive sectors.

A 3rd party installer like JFK, cannot access this data in any way, even if it tried. A low-level hard drive access utility like True Image, instead, CAN.

By keep using True Image, you are replicating each time all the conditions that lead to the activation loss so, if you are keep restoring the system when it was in a situation were the loss of activation was imminent, keep trying you'll get the same result and, since you are doing always the same steps, which includes installing JFK, you get the wrong impression JFK was the trigger, when it clearly wasn't.

Quote
3) After installing JFK, other third parties software like UT2, Level D, goflight, aerosoft etc. were no longer recognized as trusted software.

This might have happened for two reasons:

1) The Windows secure store might have had a problem. This CAN be caused by something like True Image, but also can be any other system-related problem. And this CAN cause the loss of the FSX activation as well. But, this CAN'T be caused by the JFK installer, because it doesn't (and it can't) access the Windows trusted store in any way.

2) Your FSX.CFG file might have become corrupted. This *might* have been (in theory) caused by the JFK, because it reads and write the FSX.CFG, to read/store its settings.

But if this was the case, FSX would recreate a new one from scratch on the next start and, will NOT lose its activation, because nothing related to the FSX activation is stored in any of the FSX config files. You can verify this as many times as you like: remove your FSX.CFG, the FSX activation will always stay. Yes, you will have to re-trust all your modules, but this will not affect the FSX activation in any way.

Quote
This also was only to be seen after installing JFK, not after installing Zurich and/or Chicago withhout JFK.

There's no difference in operation between those installers, except the .BGL files they install.

This is the final proof the activation loss was entirely unrelated to the JFK installation. We compile all the installers from a common source code, and the .Dll module used (as you can clearly see during the installation) it's always the same, because it's downloade online by the installer so, it's absolutely the same things that gets installed and it's exactly the same operations that are being done, except for the actual scenery files.

In any case, a scenery installer can't cause this, not even theoretically because it can't access the FSX activation data, even if it could, because it's not stored in any of the FSX config files (is not even inside the FSX folder) the installer is  accessing.
« Last Edit: September 13, 2010, 11:15:12 am by virtuali »

virtuali

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Re: Windows 7 Product Activation error
« Reply #8 on: September 13, 2010, 11:29:21 am »
More details here about the 1-80004005 error

http://www.fszone.org/forums/topic/11017-flight-simulator-x-acceleration-activation-error-10800004005-found/
http://forum.keypublishing.com/showthread.php?t=78386

As you can see, it seems to happen randomly, and it's not related to installing any 3rd party addon.

One suggestion that might be useful, is that you have to run and activate FSX successfully at least once after installing it, then install Acceleration and let it activate. Maybe by restoring with True Image, you are back to the "still hasn't run" situation, that might cause the activation error.

airberlin

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Re: Windows 7 Product Activation error
« Reply #9 on: September 13, 2010, 12:18:17 pm »
So when you think that true image is the reason, why could I install dozen of third parties addons icluding your Zurich and Chicago sceneries with no problem, and why happened the effect " randomly " everytime after having installed JFK?

Best regards

Peter Hecht

virtuali

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Re: Windows 7 Product Activation error
« Reply #10 on: September 13, 2010, 12:39:14 pm »
So when you think that true image is the reason, why could I install dozen of third parties addons icluding your Zurich and Chicago sceneries with no problem, and why happened the effect " randomly " everytime after having installed JFK?

I'm not saying True Image is the cause. The real cause might have been something entirely different but, if your True Image backup was made when your system was already in a situation that might have lead to the loss of FSX activation in a short while, by keep restoring it, you will always end up with the same results, precisely for the reason that True Image is able to restore the system to its exact old configuration, potential problems included.

I can only repeat and confirm, there's no difference whatsoever in what the Zurich/KORD installers do, compared to what the JFK one does. Both do the same things (except for the actual scenery files, which are of course different), and both aren't able to cause a loss of the FSX activation, both access the same FSX files, and none of them is related in any way to the FSX activation.

Besides, don't you think that, if the JFK installer was causing this, we would have heard it by now, considering is has been out for about 2 years, it's one of our best selling sceneries, and nobody reported before.

So, stop for the time being using True Image.

Uninstall JFK from the Windows control panel, and reply YES to both questions about removing the 2 modules (Addon Manager and Couatl). This will clean up everythign related to JFK, except ITS OWN activation in the registry, which is entirely unrelated to the FSX one anyway.

Then, FIX your FSX activation first which, as suggested in all links I've posted, it's usually done by uninstalling and reinstalling the Acceleration Pack. This can be done without affecting other installed addons but, before reinstalling it, run FSX at least once without Acceleration, and check everything runs fine, including its activation.

After you are sure FSX is properly activated, install Acceleration pack, let it activate and run it once in activated mode, and exit cleanly.

Then, to be on the safe side, make a Windows reboot, and install JFK.
« Last Edit: September 13, 2010, 12:41:22 pm by virtuali »

airberlin

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Re: Windows 7 Product Activation error
« Reply #11 on: September 14, 2010, 10:15:51 am »
Hi Umberto.

i will try this next weekend.

Best regards

Peter

airberlin

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Re: Windows 7 Product Activation error
« Reply #12 on: October 10, 2010, 09:14:50 pm »
Hi Umberto,

finally I have done what you told me and it seems to be ok now. Only problem: After deinstallation and reinstallation of Acceleration Pack the same error occured again. In HKEY_LOCAL-MACHINE\SYSTEM\CURRENTCONTROLSET\CONTOL\CLASS\(4D36E967-E325-11CE-BFC1-08002BE10318) I had to change the registry to read only "PartMgr". Then I could activate Acceleration Pack and finally install with no problems all your sceneries.
Once again, thank you for your assistance.

Peter