Hi guys,
I am hesitating to purchase GP 4 because of the possible problem of losing an activation to a system update on my Macs. I read this on the website. I update the OS on my Macs regularly and cannot afford to waste activations when I update my OS. I also read that if I do an OS update I must manually deactivate GP on that system.
This is a worry because my system does automatic updates. Is there a way other than manually deactivating GP before?
Next question is if I purchase the Mac & Windows option am I allowed to have 3 licences for mac and 3 licenses for Windows?
Updates and some installs, whether system, application, or plugins, risk breaking your system. There’s a great example from a few years ago where a Mac OS update broke completely the ability to use aggregate audio devices. An earlier Ventura update broke IAC MIDI.
We know of one highly regarded plugin where an update causes it to revert back to demo mode, not something you want happening an hour before you go on stage.
Some windows applications have, upon installing them, broken other applications because they changed some system libraries.
It is frankly foolish to allow any changes to occur uncontrolled to a system in which you depend. Any changes should only be made when you have several weeks before you need to use the machine for anything important (like a gig), giving yourself stress free time to sort out any consequences.
The best tip you can get from anyone here is to disable automatic updates.
Your plugins may fail (say, a plugin is not tested or updated for Ventura), your 3rd party software may fail (for example, Blackhole configuration or virtual MIDI driver), or your system settings can break (for example DNS settings).
You must control this process if you perform live. That is my best tip. And not just operating system updates → ALL updates.
A very good point, thanks. I guess I’d have to commit to deactivating before an update. There’s also many small updates for the mac on a bi-weekly bases.
I doubt it….this is the first time this particular issue has been raised. People using software in a critical environment generally understand the risks of blindly updating anything.
Heck, I’m still using MacOS 10.14 for touring. Works great….no reason to change anything.
Generally, as long as you don’t update too often (making the license process think the machines are different), the system will reuse an existing activation.
But frankly, if you are more concerned about updating your machine all the time than you are with stability and predictability of a tested environment then maybe GP (and probably many other plugins) isn’t the right solution for you.
I carry a backup laptop with me on all tours, have done so for years. But I do that because of the (low but not-non existent) risk of a hardware failure, machine refusing to boot, or getting dropped by a roadie, etc.
