Activation DISABLES network interface?Answered

I'm confident they are on the latest Windows 11.

To be clear - are we talking about updating the Realtek USB GbE Family Controller drivers (the one that gets disabled) or other ones?

Update all the network adapters.

Our customer has done this, everything is updated, the effect is still occurring. One of the adapters gets disabled by the activation process.

The specifics of this configuration is that one of these interfaces is a calibrated Dell monitor connected via Thunderbolt→USB-C, which has a network interface. Maybe Turbo Activate just does not know what to do with it?

I can provide activation key and product privately if it's going to help with diagnostics.

This was covered recently on the forum: https://wyday.com/forum/t/18927/disabled-network-interfaces/#post-40043

Basically, if you're using the latest everything (TA, Windows, and all drivers) *and* it's still broken, then that post will help you fix it.

Long story short: it's a them problem. They're either not up-to-date, or they installed the wrong drivers.

Long story short: it's a them problem. They're either not up-to-date, or they installed the wrong drivers.

Hey Bart, if that attitude doesn't doesn't get you wondering about your choice of licence management, I don't know what will.

Hey Bart, if that attitude doesn't doesn't get you wondering about your choice of licence management, I don't know what will.

I'm a direct communicator.

We have a lot of experience digging into problems at every level of the stack. Including a large collection of these particular problems (i.e. network adapters acting up in all manners). So, when I say it's a “them problem”, I'm not blowing the problem off (although, I see how it could be misinterpreted that way). I'm instead saying it's something *they* need to fix.

The good news is that once they actually fix their computer other things on their computer will start working better (because they'll be up-to-date, more secure, and usually with updated network adapters things will be faster). Our licensing requires a bare-minimum of a functioning machine.

It's not a good use of our time to remotely log into a customer's computer and update their software. This is something that can be handled by moderately-experienced users or tier-1 tech support.

Our time is better spent fixing bugs (this is not a bug – again, see above), adding features, improving workflow, and improving speed.

Now, if you're using a licensing product that ignores broken devices and accepts garbage input… well, *that* should have you wondering.

We could (but won't) add a feature to TurboActivate that if this error happens it (a) forces their machine to update and (b) searches for and installs all the latest network adapters. But a handful of the noisiest users would be apoplectic. Most users would be grateful that the problem “fixed itself” (i.e. we fixed it for them). But dealing with the noisy users make it not worth our effort.

Hi Wyatt,

Thanks for taking the time to respond. In turn, I will attempt to put aside my admitted frustration and anger over the nerve-wracking time wasted in trying to get our paid video grading plugin tool working again together with its willing support.

I don’t know about your “noisy users”, but in our particular case, we are working on a professional 8k video workstation, on which we are extremely careful and to update all software and drivers according to the relevant manufacturers. As such, our (super stable) Windows 11 pro installation is kept up-to-date via the General Availability Channel (currently 21H2 build 22000.1696), all Intel drivers are derived exclusively through Intel’s Driver & Support Assistant, our discrete GPU is maintained strictly on NVIDIA’s Production Branch release of the RTX Enterprise Driver (currently on 528.89), and our OWC 10GbE Thunderbolt controller is up-to-date (according to OWC).

One of our two USB-C connected color-calibrated monitors does carry a 1GbE network adapter, which we don’t use, but which your activation scheme appears to be having an issue with. We did install the driver for this “Realtek USB GbE Family Controller” from the link received from Bart, but the issue remains. Every attempt at activating the tool (opened as administrator) results in it *itself* deactivating the controller and stating: “Activation failed. This computer has disabled network adapters. Run this application as an Administrator and activate it then.”

As paying users of numerous pro video and audio applications we are used to various copy protection schemes including hardware dongles, phoning home, iLok, etc. What I just have a hard time explaining to my team here is that we should risk screwing up our incredibly stable system to satisfy the exotic needs and desires of our previously wonderfully useful €69 video plugin that we had grown fond of over the past year, but lost access after its last update.

I’m really not trying to be provocative, but would you have any further suggestions than suggesting “a bare-minimum of a functioning machine”?

Thanks for any assistance.

Phil

What monitor model is it? I know Dell includes those junk Realtek adapters for some reason in their monitors.

We’ll investigate once we have the model number.

A Dell UltraSharp U3223QE.

Thanks

Ok, we have some comparable Dell monitors (the smaller dimensions, identical product line) with the same Ethernet controller built in. We’ve disabled the controllers on our monitors (there should be an option on your monitor to turn off controller).

We’ll see if we can reproduce this buggy behavior next week.

In the meantime the solution to your problem will be to disable the controller on the monitor.

Thanks. Unfortunately, I am unable to find an option to disable this monitor's adapter (throughout the depths of the built-in menus as well as the user manual pdf).

I have tried uninstalling the driver for this “Realtek USB GbE Family Controller” while selecting the option to try and delete the driver software for the device. If I don't scan for hardware changes in Device Manager and try the activation again as administrator, I now receive the following error:

"Activation failed.
Program runs inside the virtual machine or MS HyperVisor is active. Contact ((support@ Bart's company email)) to resolve this issue."

Looking forward to hearing back next week and Happy Easter!

Happy Easter!

You’re closer to a working activation. Disable Hyper-V.