Windows Anti-Piracy Check Already Cracked

[DereX888]

Any way to disable this in Win2000, or is it even necessary in win 2000? I have an old copy on my mother's PC and I just had to download the WGA in order to get any updates. It didn't stop anything but I don't know if that will last forever.

This is a legal copy, but it's been installed on two other PCs before this one (now only on the one PC) so I don't know if that will cause future issues.

Geez man, didn't you read the thread from begining?

Here for you again:
http://home19.inet.tele.dk/jys05000/
(just because I had it bookmarked for all friends, otherwise I'd send you to hell, or to google )


My buddy at [censored hehe] Canada Ltd. (one of sysops there) said they had to follow it and disable WGA on many machines running Win 2000 corporate version too, because it insisted its a pirated copy (ROTFL!)

I had same problem on one of my Win2k machines too (and no, i don't have pirated versions at the *government* owned office ofcoz).
Disabling WGA in IE's option was just easier and faster thing to do, than making a call to msoft and going throgh all the crap...


-------------------------------------------------

Just had some great discussion on irc.
I have to share some points with you


MSoft one day will shoot itself in the foot with all this protection hoopla.
I mean: how much more money Gates still need?
Instead of wasting valuable resources (manpower and money) on more and more annoying 'protections' they should finally spend it all on a better new OS. Its the biggest software corporation in the world. Literally thousands of programmers backed by a billions of dollars - and all they can come up with in the last year or so is a new 'protection' for their patches and upgrades? I was LAUGHING like hell when I found out about it that Monday they've introduced it, and I was DYING LAUGHING when I read day later how to disable it
They still don't get it: any protection *will be* broken. Ditto. Period.
The only real protection is availability (price that low that it doesn't make any sense for anyone to make any pirated copies).
$10 a piece for their OS would seal their world domination for any foreseeable future. And it wouldn't make them any weaker (on Wall Street), if it wouldn't make them stronger. Theyre stupid. And no one will tell me that few hundred millions OS copies sold worldwide at $10 each would not be profitable?!
Every monopoly ended that way in the past, and I can see the cracks in Msoft's walls already... "product support cycles" (WTF? anyone ever heard of it when Win95 came out 10 years ago?!), "WPA", "DRM"/"Rights Managements" (since when it is concern of Microsoft, or since when Msoft has became storefront for RIAA/MPAA cartels?!), now "WGA"... it is all annoyances for customers. Give me any real alternative OS that average Joe can use without first learning 1000 manpages or UNIX (thats why linux will always stay in "geek ghetto") and it will take over the world overnight the way Windows 95 did 10 years ago.

Old DOJ vs Microsoft case should've ended diferently. Had they've split Microsoft into few separate, competing companies - perhaps these people would have really doing some real coding Instead Msoft has become such giant behemoth that one project engineers don't have a clue what the other ones are doing... thats how IBM has fallen apart, thats how Apple was taken down to its knees (Mac team vs Apple team?!! lol, Jobs was really smoking too much pot back then! ), and many others if you look through the history - most of them simply crushed under its own weight, and thats what will kill Msoft soon. Expect "Vista" to be last Msoft's OS. I take bets now. Something else soon - perhaps MacOS for x86 ? - will take the desktop's lead like storm (and yes, forget linux).

[Poppa_Meth]

I saw that link. Thing is, after I installed it, I don't have an add-ons menu in IE. So far as I know its the newest version available in Win2000. I'll have to look into it further. I know I have it in XP Home.

[Poppa_Meth]

Rechecked and yes it't IE6 SP1 but no Addons menu and yes WGA definitely installed. It passes every check so far though. I just like to know how to disable it in case I ever do have issues.

[Mythos2002]

Did you check under Tools? The Add-Ons should be there.

Mythos

[Poppa_Meth]

Yes checked in the tools menu. I've talked to a few other people running Windows 2000 as well and it isn't there for them either. There is no Add-ons menu.

[stiltman]

I don't have the add-on manager tab either.

I just installed WGA, then all the available updates

BTW, there isn't a "ManageAddonColumns" in my registry, so I guess something has changed or it's just not an option in win2k

[bballnut]

Its funny you should mention Open Office.

Where can I get a copy of Open Office?

[bazooka]

Its funny you should mention Open Office.

Where can I get a copy of Open Office?

http://download.openoffice.org/1.1.4/index.html

Next time, use google.

[SCDVD]

Microsoft has just released a new version of its Windows Updating Software. The new version will not allow the disabling of the Microsoft Genuine Advantage Add-on. After you do the latest update, the "Enable or Disable" selection is grayed out and cannot be changed.

[ROF]

Finally.

[Supreme2k]

When did they release it? Is it in effect now?

My store-bought copy of XP wouldn't pass the Genuine test, so I used the "work around" to update it (since I didn't want to have to yell at some tech support guy and waste my time). I downloaded two updates today. One update was from Automatic and the other was from Microsoft.com

[Dv8ted2]

There are other ways around it.

[mazinz]

I passed the validation test but my IE did not have that "manage" option at all". I am running windows XP

it was not greyed out, I just never had that option to begin with, still everything is running ok though

[burnman99]

I was one of those people who made a concerted effort to use OpenOffice (v1.0.x) for about 6-9 months since I didn't want to buy another copy of Office (my last one was Office 97). I was quite enthusiastic about it initially... however, it eventually wore me down.

Start up with OpenOffice is slow and it has problems parsing Word documents with even more than a slight degree of complexity, e.g., images/watermarks come out "wrong".

Eventually, I gave in and bought OfficeXP and it was like a breath of fresh air. It basically starts up instantly and most things just "work". I haven't tried v2 of OO but certainly v1 is NOT a serious competitor if you use an Office suite regularly for a living.

Regards.

Your mileage may vary, but i use OO2 all the time, works fine even exporting to .pdf. Never tried 1.0 so can't compare, but 2 is much better than office 97 that i got with my old puter back in the day. Will never buy another version.


Roger

[TwistedLincoln]

I've used OpenOffice.org since version 1.04, and I can certainly say that version 2.01 (stable release) is much, much better than older versions. Compatibiliy is very high, and load times are much faster. Making PDFs directly from it is a plus.

There is also a new standalone database frontend-- it is basically a free alternative to Microsoft Access...

I use OpenOffice.org exclusively at home, and while I use Office 2000 at work, I only do so because we aren't allowed to install software on our work machines, so I'm stuck. I have been able to send myself files from my home machine to work, and vice versa on a regular basis, and have never run into any issues getting them to work.

I recommend OpenOffice.org to anyone...

[joy]

Microsoft has just released a new version of its Windows Updating Software. The new version will not allow the disabling of the Microsoft Genuine Advantage Add-on. After you do the latest update, the "Enable or Disable" selection is grayed out and cannot be changed.

I noticed it also half an hour ago.

[ROF]

I passed the validation test but my IE did not have that "manage" option at all". I am running windows XP

it was not greyed out, I just never had that option to begin with, still everything is running ok though

You may be running a pirated version which doesn't include this option since all validation was removed from this hacked up version.

[TBoneit]

When did they release it? Is it in effect now?

My store-bought copy of XP wouldn't pass the Genuine test, so I used the "work around" to update it (since I didn't want to have to yell at some tech support guy and waste my time). I downloaded two updates today. One update was from Automatic and the other was from Microsoft.com

Question comes to mind why a genuine store bought copy would not pass. I myself would have taken it and the computer back to the store and demonstrated the problem and expected them to make it pass the genuine check while I was there. Not some workaround and if they didn't then I'd have reported them to microsoft piracy and see where it ent from there. They may be innocent and their supplier sold them one of the many decent looking pirate copies floating around. In that case they should be able to pull their records and prove innocence to microsoft. OT: I understand that there are real looking copies of Norton s/w floating around too.

[EAO]

I believe Manage Add Ons does not show unless you have SP2 installed.

And...

has anyone cracked their fix yet?

If not I give it 3 days.

[Supreme2k]

Question comes to mind why a genuine store bought copy would not pass. I myself would have taken it and the computer back to the store and demonstrated the problem and expected them to make it pass the genuine check while I was there. Not some workaround and if they didn't then I'd have reported them to microsoft piracy and see where it ent from there. They may be innocent and their supplier sold them one of the many decent looking pirate copies floating around. In that case they should be able to pull their records and prove innocence to microsoft.

Way too F'ing much trouble. I couldn't care less about piracy (at least at that level). I have a retail box and reciept in case a black helicopter lands on my lawn. I'm not the piracy police. It was less of a hassle for me to do the work-around than it would be to get embroiled in a big ass cluster-f**k between Fry's and MS.

[mazinz]

I passed the validation test but my IE did not have that "manage" option at all". I am running windows XP

it was not greyed out, I just never had that option to begin with, still everything is running ok though

You may be running a pirated version which doesn't include this option since all validation was removed from this hacked up version.

Thats not true at all , I bought/built my pc at best buy, windows xp came directly from compaq (this is going back to 2001), I have kept up on updates, reformatted a few times (and had to call microsoft to re-validate) and my IE just has never had that option in it. Perhaps it was something that was added in after 2001?

[jimmalenko]

As EAO mentioned, the "Manage Add-ons" menu option (which is where you used to be able to Enable / Disable the GA addon) only appears if running SP2 (or the IE update included in SP2) AFAIK.

[mazinz]

AHHHHHH that would explain it. I did once install sp2 and it totally f**ked my computer and I ended up reformatting. Since then I have not and will not put sp2 back on the pc. thanks for the info--

forgive me for skimmng over the post where EAO had mentioned it

[DereX888]

AHHHHHH that would explain it. I did once install sp2 and it totally f**ked my computer and I ended up reformatting. Since then I have not and will not put sp2 back on the pc. thanks for the info--

forgive me for skimmng over the post where EAO had mentioned it

add SP2 to your installation disc and then install it, instead of installing sp2 on already installed plain windows xp, and you won't have any problems...

[jimmalenko]

AHHHHHH that would explain it. I did once install sp2 and it totally f**ked my computer and I ended up reformatting. Since then I have not and will not put sp2 back on the pc. thanks for the info--

forgive me for skimmng over the post where EAO had mentioned it

add SP2 to your installation disc and then install it, instead of installing sp2 on already installed plain windows xp, and you won't have any problems...

good call.

I cannot recall the name of it, but google found me a really good slipstreaming package. Basically had to copy contents of XP disc to a folder, extract downloaded SP2 package to another folder, point the program to the two folders, click the go button and burn the created bin/cue.

It was truly that simple.

[MJA]

I believe Manage Add Ons does not show unless you have SP2 installed.

And...

has anyone cracked their fix yet?

If not I give it 3 days.

its done already.1st day it came out

option 1.
" There is a way around this new Validation Update. When you reach at the screen where you have to choose Express or Custom, go to Tools - Internet Options - Security and move the slider all the way to the top to High Security level. Then click on Custom. This will bypass the validation, but make shure after you choose the updates that you want to install turn the security level back to Medium and click on 'Install updates'. It worked for me. Let me know anyone else if it worked for you too. "

option 2.

" download axhelper from http://www.nirsoft.net/ (it's free!)
decompress and run axhelper.exe
select 'Load ActiveX list from the following CLSID/ProdID list:'
and paste this: LegitCheckControl.LegitCheck.1
and click OK
Right-click on the registry key and select ' Disable selected item'
Close all IE Windows and restart IE "

[thevoelk]

jimmalenko, I think you have nLite in mind. From my experience, if you just want to add a service pack, it's just as easy to do it "The Microsoft Way", with the /integrate switch when running the hotfix. For adding drivers, removing components, and customizing, nLite does seem to be the tool of choice.

[ROF]

option 1.
" There is a way around this new Validation Update. When you reach at the screen where you have to choose Express or Custom, go to Tools - Internet Options - Security and move the slider all the way to the top to High Security level. Then click on Custom. This will bypass the validation, but make shure after you choose the updates that you want to install turn the security level back to Medium and click on 'Install updates'. It worked for me. Let me know anyone else if it worked for you too. "

option 2.

" download axhelper from http://www.nirsoft.net/ (it's free!)
decompress and run axhelper.exe
select 'Load ActiveX list from the following CLSID/ProdID list:'
and paste this: LegitCheckControl.LegitCheck.1
and click OK
Right-click on the registry key and select ' Disable selected item'
Close all IE Windows and restart IE "

Option 3.

Buy the OS and never worry about a workaround solution.

[Dv8ted2]

option 1.
" There is a way around this new Validation Update. When you reach at the screen where you have to choose Express or Custom, go to Tools - Internet Options - Security and move the slider all the way to the top to High Security level. Then click on Custom. This will bypass the validation, but make shure after you choose the updates that you want to install turn the security level back to Medium and click on 'Install updates'. It worked for me. Let me know anyone else if it worked for you too. "

option 2.

" download axhelper from http://www.nirsoft.net/ (it's free!)
decompress and run axhelper.exe
select 'Load ActiveX list from the following CLSID/ProdID list:'
and paste this: LegitCheckControl.LegitCheck.1
and click OK
Right-click on the registry key and select ' Disable selected item'
Close all IE Windows and restart IE "

Option 3.

Buy the OS and never worry about a workaround solution.

You aren't paying attention.

There are people with store bought operating systems that will not pass.

[ROF]

Option 3.

Buy the OS and never worry about a workaround solution.

You aren't paying attention.

There are people with store bought operating systems that will not pass.

Then call Microsoft. They will correct this issue and you can avoid looking for a work around. You paid for it and as long as you haven't invalidated your license Microsoft will solve this issue. I know I would personally never accept someone elses work around for a product to continue providing me with the service I bought it for. Remember a portion of your payment when buying a product pays the corporation to provide technical support. Failure on your part to utilize that is like throwing money away.