Activation manager won’t open on my Windows machine

Activation manager won’t open and there are no errors. Licence manager wworks fine. Download assistant works only after a restart and then will not open more than one time. Cubase and Wavelab are stuck on searching for licences. I had the licences on USB but they moved to the new licence system ater a windows reinstall (wish it had a def name) and now they cant be retrieved. So Cubase and Wavelab arent usable. Support ticket unanswered.

Did you check in your Windows Logs (under the System log) ?

@Mic2002

No, this is impossible, and does not happen. What is possible is that your soft elicense needs to be reactivated after the Windows update.

It’s not possible to help without the following very basic info needed to troubleshoot.

  • OS and version
  • Exact name of the Cubase product you own (Pro, Artist, Elements, AI, or LE. Find the info in your Steinberg account.)
  • Version number of Cubase

It does. “Steinberg Licensing” as opposed to “Elicenser” for the old system.

this is not a valid way to troubleshoot problems with Cubase, and recommendations like this aren’t useful to non IT-professional users.

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I don’t even know how to do that !
Thankyou

Thanks for responding -
I’m using windows 11 PC build 22621.
ELicenser version is 6.12…8.3315
Cubase Pro 12 version 12.0.52 Wavelab Pro 11 version 11.1.20
Activation manager version is 1.4.11.903
Steinberg Install Assistant version 1.2.0.65
Download assistant version 1.33.2

This is what I meant by the licences being transferred after the reinstall…

It is a valid way to troubleshoot Windows problems. And it helped me fix my Cubase problem when nothing else did. But I understand your concern that it might be too difficult for most users. However this problem of software not starting, seems to happen quite often. And just the Cubase dumps aren’t always the solution either to this problem.

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These Cubase dump files contain more specific information about what happens during a problem. They have information that will never go into any Windows log.

The Windows event viewer can be helpful as well, but the first step is always the application log or dump. This is the same for every other application as well.

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Thanks.

You described a few things, but I’ll try to help you out with the first one,

If this were my machine here is what I would do. ( I say it this way because I’m not a Steinberg employee, just a log-time Cubase user.)

I would make sure I don’t have any privacy browser extensions active, and also that there are no programs that can inhibit websites pages.

If in doubt, create a new profile in Microsoft Edge, and set that to be your default browser. The activation manager uses the default browser to login.

edited solution is Activation manager won’t open on my Windows machine - #23 by Mic2002

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Thank Steve - No luck with Activation manager (see screenshot ) but I notice that Download assistant is opening more than once without having to restart !

This must be do to some local config on your computer, alas, one cannot help with that on the forum

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Steve appreciate your efforts !

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Ditto here with the activation manager palaver. I possibly hold the record for an unresolved error! My support ticket was received by our heroes at Steinberg support on 19th June 2022. After several reinstalling attempts I was quizzed "which antivirus do you have installed on your system?"nothing changed!
I was eventually informed after another series of emails on 29th July that “They have forwarded the issue to digital unit” nothing then informed on 29th August - “Support is rechecking the specs. The team is on the issue” Unfortunately nothing regarding fixing the problem has materialised in my inbox since - I surrender!!!

I’m on a mac - running OS Monterey V. 12.5.1 - Processor 3.3 GHz 6 Core Intel Core i5 - Memory 40GB 2133MHz.

Colin does that mean you haven’t been able to use your products? The real problem for me is that once licensing goes to the new system it appears you can’t go back…and if activation manager isn’t working then the products won’t either. I hope there’s a workaround! But in my case this was all working after a reinstall of windows. Then Cubase and Wavelab stopped and I can’t figure why activation manager will not run…

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Yes I managed to work round it and did eventually get Cubase 12 working, unfortunately it was a few months ago so I’m unable to remember how I managed to do it, sorry.

I was a little disappointed with the lack of support from Steinberg, as far as the support team were concerned I was left high and dry, to eventually receive an email after over 6 weeks saying “Unfortunately with vacation time the response has been delayed” in my book is poor. I’ve resisted defecting to another platform and been a loyal Steinberg user since Pro 16 in the mid 80’s. These flaky issues have convinced me not to change platforms from Sibelius to Dorico, I’m a professional arranger and composer who relies on powering up and everything to complying

Sorry to be a grumpy old man but all the other software I run installs flawlessly and works perfectly, plus everything I work with (which has to be because of how I work) is the most recent and up to date versions. i.e. East West, Spitfire, Avid Sibelius, Amadeus, Kontakt, Toontrack etc. - and If there every is a problem it’s usually resolved in under 12 hours either by email or by a remote session.

Come on Steinberg customer support get your act together.

The end.

Colin

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Note that for this type of issue the solutions for Windows and MacOS will be different.

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Pro16 ! Im a mere Pro24 guy! :joy:

In happier news Ben from Steinberg has picked up the issue thru the forum so here’s hoping !

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