I’d love the ability to go dongle-free on my laptop. Any chance we could see hard drive activation options like Dorico just received?
Your request brings up a one of Steinberg’s biggest failings.
This should have been addressed years ago. One of their biggest competitors is Mac and Logic. The fact that the Mac is the protection dongle is irrelevant. (It was really clever of Apple to buy Logic) The point is that you don’t need to carry around a dongle. It’s ‘easier’ to use Logic on a Mac for this simple reason.
I hope they follow your request.
It really is silly to me to be limiting customers usage like this. 90% of the time that I’m starting ideas on my laptop I’m not using Nuendo because I don’t have the dongle on me, and I’m loading up Ableton Live or Logic instead. This is not a great habit to put customers in, and now that both iLok and eLicenser offer hard-drive authorization, limiting customers to a dongle seems old-fashioned, harmful, and out of date.
First of all, Logic isn’t really used for post, which is Nuendo’s focus.
Secondly, Logic is a measly $200. The very fact that you need a mac is totally relevant. If we assume for a second that cracking Nuendo would be more likely without a dongle then those wanting to do so really stand a lot more to gain. More people would figure that for a $1,700 saving it’s worth using a crack of Nuendo, whereas fewer would arguably do so when the price tag is $200. So then with the decrease in revenue for Apple from Logic, because it’s so cheap, that revenue that’s “lost” needs to be made up somehow, and that’s done by the price of the Apple computers.
So, if Steinberg stood to risk more cracked software and therefore less revenue there is no hardware to make up for it. And I really do doubt if sales would go up simply because there’d now be no dongle for Nuendo. I really, really doubt that.
While I don’t have a big issue with using a dongle, the option would be nice. I really like the way Plugin Alliance is doing things these days. So simple and direct. I’ve yet to have a single issue. And I’m unaware of them having been cracked, at least at this point. That would be a nice option for Nuendo.
That said, Steinberg does happen to own eLicense, having bought it some years ago. And they do sell the licensers for peripheral income, so there is that…
Quick follow up.
Does anybody else think of salsa, guacamole and other dips when they see the word Dorico?
“True”, and “Yes”, respectively…
I completely agree with everything you say. However, many users including myself use Nuendo for everything, including post. The point I’m making is that in my experience the people using Logic on a Mac do so because it’s simple. I personally don’t like Logic or Mac and don’t use either for studio work.
I wonder how Steinberg intends to prevent Dorico from being cracked…?
It would be a totally silly move from Steinberg to get rid of the E-licenser protection system for Nuendo.
Nuendo has not been cracked since they bought Syncrosoft and tighten it. Neither have the software solutions who adopted this protection scheme.
Gone is the time of Nuendo, Cubase, Vienna Symphonic Library and Wavelab on every kid’s computer.
More money to the developers but much less people in the forums as a side effect…
A much smaller license key (see : usb mouse receivers) would be a great portability solution (and less prone to break).
Dodorico, sounds like the morning call of the Gallic rooster to me.
But Dorico still uses the eLicencer program for authorization. I assume now that iLok and eLicenser allow for hard drive authorizations that they must be more secure than previous call and response or internet authorization systems.
Yes, the Elicenser system allows "soft elicenser’ that resides on hard drive. I reckon it’s been for a little while now.
But how would you move Nuendo to another comp then ?
Well I personally never have to do that. I run my whole setup using Thunderbolt 2 from my MacBookPro. So everything is from one computer, it’s just about if I have the dongle on me or I don’t (which I almost never do).
But ideally the eLicencer program should allow a transfer of the license from dongle to hard drive and back in case you have to work on another computer. It might allow this already btw, just not sure.
I actually got a copy of Cubase Elements because it can work with the “soft e-licenser”. As limited as it is, it does an adequate job for basic recording, and works as a halfway redundant system on my laptop.
And… as I write to you from a Denver hotel room, it completely saved my butt this trip, as I had to record and master about 75 radio spots in a last-minute situation and, in a rush to get to the airport, I forgot to clip my Nuendo dongle to the lanyard in my laptop case. Everything ultimately got done (without batch exporting or offline processing, and the exporting help of iZotope RX)… though what would have been a two or three hour project turned into an all-nighter. So…
I also wish Nuendo could work with the soft e-licenser. I mean, why not? Just like the Metric Halo stuff with iLok-- you can use software OR hardware (though not both at the same time). Why Cubase “Mini-Me”, but not the pro versions nor Nuendo, where arguably (and in my case, definitely) the soft e-license would be of great practical value?
Chewy
This 100%
I also get paranoid bringing my dongle on trips and vacations for fear of losing the little thing.
Well, I admittedly rarely go out and work with my mobile setup, but the one thing I did was just create a piece of paper that I print and leave in the laptop bag. Whenever I have to go out I take the paper out, grab a pen, and then I just place item by item on the list in the bag, placing a check-mark next to it once it’s in the bag.
It’s such a simple thing to do it seems nonsensical almost, but the fact that it’s so easy to remember so few things makes it easy to forget how easy it is to forget one of those few things. On this note, it’s interesting to hear that surgeons don’t have check lists like pilots do in a lot of cases, and as you may or may not know there are plenty of cases where tools or objects are forgotten inside the human body after closing the body up! It’s apparently often a matter of “pride” where they feel they don’t need the help… except they do…
Anyway, that was a digression: My only point was to give a suggestion to help remember things when traveling. I do the same for regular travel btw.
Completely OT, but …
Maybe it is different where you live, but I know for a fact that in most of Europe, there is a procedure to prevent that.
All the tools are counted before the surgery, and again after the surgery.
And the documents are kept in the archives.
Fredo
Well then, while you are at it…what happens in the case of a missing tool post op ? I risk only one guess… 
Back to topic…I do not have a laptop for audio work. However, if I did, the dongle will go with passport, cash, etc in one small bag on my person.
I appreciate everyones’ theoretical techniques described above-- and I do the same…checklists, safe places, etc.
But I do a LOT of mobile recording-- and in practical reality, stuff happens. A dongle breaks. A travel kit fails… in the seven or eight years I’ve been doing this stuff on the road I’ve only had one traumatic dongle loss, and because I had a friendly connection at Steinberg/Yamaha things worked out ok in the long run. But stewarding a dongle is a hassle under the best of circumstances; they take up a USB port, they affect the profile and compactness of your laptop (not to mention how it sticks out into the aisle when you’re working on a plane), and since the soft e-license does exist, why not have it work for Nuendo?
Like Umfufu, I simply do not like taking the dongle out of my house. I can see any number of circumstances where that would be preferable to using a soft e-license, but as a rule I’d rather leave it at home.
Chewy
Yup. 100% again.
So then…I’m just guessing here, that users who would like to go dongle free while traveling and record…there must be at least a couple of other cost effective ( even free ) DAW versions that you could just record on dongle free.
Not ?