Just wondering…
USB sticks are big enough these days, or, you could just buy the dongle and it would automatically install Cubase…
USB 3 is faster these days too
Not sure of the tech issues…
Z
That may be an understatement. 
I don’t think this is a good idea at all.
Your probably right… 
But, why cant it unpack from a dongle instead of CD?
imo keeping the dongle seperate as its own dedicated device and a seperate installer media eg cd/dvd is a good idea. if i lose my cd/dvd or it gets scratched they are easily downloaded in minutes on modest bandwidth. aside from that the dongle is not a simple usb thumbdrive it contains a proprietary processor for protection encryption. imo i think this is a well thought out time proven protection system. “if it aint broke…dont fix it” 
but having said that its definitely an alternative distribution media for the installers they should explore as alot of new computers/laptops dont even have a cd/dvd reader these days. elicenser dongle +usbmedia installers for one price. satisfies everyone and still maintains the copy protection integrity of the dongle.
cheers
But the dongle is just the license. No reason to load it with the software. There are enough issues for some with just that or Ilok…
It just fine as it is. IMO no need to further complicate things.
Just brainstorming really… but you have to have a dongle to run Cubase, so it would make sense to keep a copy of the program on the dongle, USB3 is much faster, but it would probably place some bandwidth restrictions that would prevent the app running from there… but I can see a future where the dongle might be on a keyring and the app and all its tracks stored there, travellling from machine to machine, then of course there are qubits where Cubase may be in more than one place at a time! 
Aloha guys and just to chime in…interesting thought.
[quote=“ZeroZero”]Not sure of the tech issues…/quote]
That’s my question as well.
Not so much: ‘should it be done’ but more like: ‘can it be done’?
TIA (thanks in advance)
{‘-’}
Don’t forget that the eLicencer is not for Cubase only. It’s for WaveLab, Nuendo and all Steinbergs VST/VSTi’s aswell. And that’s not counting other vendors products. So putting the programs on the dongle, would result in an awful lot of dongles. And how would you deal with updates?
Perhaps the dongle could be writable. But then there’s the following question. Why not put all media on the dongle aswell? Now the dongle would start to resemble a dedicated computer equipped with a huge SSD drive and I’m sure that such a dongle would cost much, much, much more than $30.
Maybe Steinberg could start selling mega-dongles and give away the cheap stuff (Cubase Pro, WaveLab, Nuendo) for free.
I think it’s best to let the dongle deal with the copy protection, and leave it at that.
Like the thinking… fair point cant have the lo0ts of dongles thing going on, but one dongle instead of a PC - portable -
wonderful!
Or maybe even all of it on the cloud!
Lateral thinking only…)
It could be possible using “software packaging utilities” to make a portable app, however there will be likely performance issues even when using USB3 devices. All your registry and profile related things if coming from the usb device will put a heavy load on it’s bandwidth. When choosing to import all the registry en profile setting onto it’s harddrive where it belongs the startup times will radically increase. The idea is nice for small applications Cubase isn’t a small app. I didn’t touch the subject on sampedata (vstsounds) becuase this will make thing worse and complex.