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spredbury
Contributor
Message 1 of 37

Total Protection 2010 "Your software is about to deactivate"

I have repeatedly recieved a message that my total protection 2010 software is about to deactivate in X number of days even though my subscription does not expire until Oct of 2010. I called tech support and they removed and reinstalled the software which solved the problem. Now, just 1 day after contacting tech support and reinstalling software, the problem has returned. It seems I have had nothing but problems with this package for the past 3 or 4 months. Have had to reinstall product 6 or more time in last 3 or 4 months. Prior to this I have been very pleased with performance and reliability of the product. If I can get this problem solved post haste I will purchase another vendor's product and install it. Don't have to time to go through the removal and reinstallation process every week or so....  Anyone having same problem or a reliable fix?

36 Replies
spredbury
Contributor
Message 2 of 37

Re: Total Protection 2010 "Your software is about to deactivate"

Forgot to mention I am runing Win 7, 64 Bit version...

exbrit
MVP
MVP
Message 3 of 37

Re: Total Protection 2010 "Your software is about to deactivate"

Try deleting your browser history, cookies etc.   Assuming IE8 go to Tools/Internet Options/Advanced and click Reset, Appy and OK any prompts.  Close and reopen IE8 and then go to Tools/Manage Add-ons and re-enable the add-ons.

Also double check that your computer clock is accurate both date/time and time zone-wise.

Right-click the McAfee taskbar icon and select "Verify Subscription" - see if that helps.


Message was edited by: Ex_Brit on 10/07/10 1:43:11 EDT PM
spredbury
Contributor
Message 4 of 37

Re: Total Protection 2010 "Your software is about to deactivate"

Thanks for the reply and suggested fix. Tried what you suggested but was not successful in correcting problem. I have had my fill of problems with this software. In light of the problems I am experiencing and other problems being reportedd by other users I am removing the software and moving all my systems to Norton. Can't be any worse. It just amazes me that I have had such good results with McAFee for almost 2 years and then nothing but problems for the past 3 or 4 months. I have worked in the IT world for over 30 years and very seldom feel the need to call "tech support". Usually any call is necessated by lack of documentation. McAfee's fix for each and every call I have made to them has been "remove and reinstall software". Bottom line, I have better things to do with my time than fool with inept security software. All that said,,,,,,Thanks again for your assistance..

exbrit
MVP
MVP
Message 5 of 37

Re: Total Protection 2010 "Your software is about to deactivate"

Well I'm sorry it didn't help and you feel that you need to move to Norton.   Good luck there.

I fell that perhaps you could have asked Technical Support Chat to excalate this to a higher level as it is very unusual for it to happen.

bero
Former Member
Message 6 of 37

Re: Total Protection 2010 "Your software is about to deactivate"

Same problem here. My four subscriptions deactivate randomly at least two every week. This month the situation got even worse

on average every week I have at least 10 deactivations. I contacted support and they told me that there could be a problem with

leftovers from old versions of McAfee SW still being present on my machines. I took one machine and did a clean W7 instalation

and installed TotalProtection on it, activated it (nothing else was installed), two days later that copy deactivated itself.

My account still had this PC marked as active, so I deactivated it and did a new download and instalation.

It got activated, but the next day it was deactivated again.

I contacted support many times, and the only solution they had was to run the MPCR (performs a total uninstall of McAfee) deactivate

the PC on "My Account", wait a couple of hours, and then download and install TotalProtection again.

This is going on for too long, I have spent more than 150 hours removing and reinstalling again and again.

I do understand that McAfee wants to protect itself against illegal copies of their SW, but I can't accept that the paying customers

become victims of their half-finished "solutions".

The only decent thing that McAfee could do in such a situation is to deactivate the "activation check" until they fix their activation SW.

All my collegues that use McAfee are having this problem for months already and we found it necessary to warn all our collegues

(broadcast mail) not to buy MCAfee anymore.

I Was a happy McAfee user until they screwed up my windows instalation a couple of months ago by removing an essential file

preventing PC's to boot again. Luckily I had good backups, and didn't loose any data.

I don't undserstand that any respectable SW company could let that happen, a simple test would have detected th problem.

If I was the quality manager at McAfee, I would have resigned and started a life as clochard.

Unfortunately the corporate culture at McAfee seems to tolerate (and maybe even encourage) people that see SW development and test

as an "avoidable cost" that should be reduced. They don't care about their customers, they only see short term profit.

I will claim a refund, not for the money itself, but to make it clear to the beancounters at McAfee that their customers are leaving.

exbrit
MVP
MVP
Message 7 of 37

Re: Total Protection 2010 "Your software is about to deactivate"

It certainly isn't a widespread problem.  There has to be something causing it.  Any competing software installed or are you using registry cleaners by any chance?\

Are you using System Restore a lot?  Is your system clock accurate all the time?

Just a few suggestions.

Message was edited by: Ex_Brit on 30/07/10 6:10:15 EDT PM
bero
Former Member
Message 8 of 37

Re: Total Protection 2010 "Your software is about to deactivate"

I don't have any competing products installed.

On a clean W7 Ultimate with only TotalProtection there could be nothing external to cause the problem.

Still it happened there as well.

At work I know at least 12 collegues that have the same problem.

As far as I can see the problem is in the McAfee database of activations.

I have seen several inconcistencies in the database. Examples are:

- claiming that 4 licences are taken, and the list of active PC's only contains 2 PC's

- having the same PC activated more than once

- after deactivating a PC, it can take up to two hours before the situation gets updated (I check this by

  logging off from my account and then logging back in) and I still see that the licence is active. After

  a couple of hours it shows correctly that it is deactivated.

- I often see discrepancies between what McAfee SW on my PC claims and what the online database

  indicates.

It looks to me, like the activation database is replicated over several machines and that the propagation of updates

is not handled correctly. An update of one record on one replica gets overruled by the values of that record on

other machines.

bero.

exbrit
MVP
MVP
Message 9 of 37

Re: Total Protection 2010 "Your software is about to deactivate"

12 collegues 

That's a clue, what environment is this?   In an organization behind some kind of firewall perhaps?

bero
Former Member
Message 10 of 37

Re: Total Protection 2010 "Your software is about to deactivate"

The 12 have this problem at home. At work we work in a unix servers and linux workstations (we do SW development).

BTW, one of the support people (talked to six different people) told me that more than 90% of the calls to support are

related to repeated activation/deactivation problems and that there is no solution for the problem at this moment, they have

to expleain to people that the best they can offer right now is the MCPR, because very often a

- simple deactivate/reactivate doesn't work

- deactivate follwed by windows removing total protection (add/remove programs) and re downloading will not work

I would start looking at the replication of the subscriptions database on the McAfee servers. The problem is (almost)

certainly not on users PC's. The PC simply queries the McAfee database to verify that it has an active licence, and when the

server responds that the licence has expired, the PC deactivates.

bero.

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