Umberto none of the case you describe changed so you are assuming wrong and your advice is deceiving.
I'm not "assuming" anything, I just pointed you out to another thread that could be helpful TO YOU, to UNDERSTAND what MIGHT have happened.
I did not have a firewall blocking.
If you got a message saying the activation server couldn't be contacted, then yes, you DO have something ( a firewall, an antivirus, or similar ), which IS blocking online access to the activation server.
Have you TRIED the web-based activation ? It connects to the activation server, just using your BROWSER.
If the web-based activation works, it clearly shows the activation server is working, because the browser can connect to it, and the sim can't, because something is blocking it.
That's why there's a web-based activation to begin with: sometimes it's just easier doing that one, than trying to figure it out who's blocking what.
I did not do Windows updates.
I did not install a new hardware.
Nowhere I said here on in the thread I linked that what caused it, happened because of something YOU did!
In fact, the FIRST line of my explanation was:
One of your drivers has an issue or a bug or similar problem, so it reported to Windows a new hardware ID for some reason.
This can happen entirely without your (or our software) intervention.
When a notification says HARDWARE has changed how come you say a driver has changed (maybe) and this detects it as HARDWARE ?
For the simple reason that NO regular software can "talk" with your hardware!!! Only a DRIVER can, because they are programmed to have entirely different permission levels than any regular software.
Anything a software see about your hardware, is not direct, but goes through some kind of driver. Which means, if this driver has some bug/quirk/strange behavior, it will APPEAR has an hardware change.
HARDWARE in activation keys language is MOTHERBOARD change. As far as I know this is where a new PC installation (activation key wise) is detected.
If things were so easy...there are countless of hardware items on a motherboard! And each has its own driver. Some of them might be checked by Esellerate, and might appear AS IF you changed the mainboard, even if you haven't.
I understand you say nothing changed from Add On Manager or Couatl side and blaming Esellerate.
I'm not blaming Esellerate. I only said that we don't see or control the reason of the hardware change reported by Esellerate. Which talks with your drivers (not with your hardware).
But what does Esellerate do ? Every time we launch it checks activation keys of all our sceneries ?
Yes, of course it does.
But it does it OFFLINE. It doesn't connect to anything. It will ASK you to connect to the activation server only AFTER it has detected an hardware change.
When you say a generic hardware term it sounds like we will loose our activation if we install a new MOUSE, or a DRIVE, or a JOYSTICK. Please don't be so generic.
The Esellerate official wording is:
"major hardware components"
We, as developers, don't have any control to this, and we don't even know exactly WHAT they check. But I assure you a Mouse or a Joystick will NOT be seen as a driver change. Or, more precisely, nobody has reported this before after a change of joystick or a mouse. This doesn't obviously exclude the theoretical chance that a *bugged* mouse or joystick driver MIGHT cause this, but it hasn't happened so far, as we as we know.
A change of a "drive", if you mean an hard drive, might be seen as an hardware change, if it's the drive Windows boots from OR if, due to a change of a drive, the letter of the drive Windows boots from will change.
But again, this what I believe it will happen, but Esellerate doesn't say for sure, I guess for security reasons, they don't disclose it, even to their customers ( which are we developers ).
I uninstalled Simconnect and reinstalled it but I cannot imagine that being related to FSDT products activation status
In fact it's not. It was purely coincidental.
