Ableton Forum

Hi everyone. first post ere...
I have a question to ask the supreme gods of ableton, but first a bit of background.
Unfortunately i was first introduced to ableton, throught that nasty warez software. It was through a friend of mine and we made many tracks with this cracked ableton and so on.
however, i grew to love the program heaps. and i mean heaps. it's changed the way i made music and i became to realise that those nice men in berlin need my money in order to make ableton as good as the first day i ever played with it. i kept learning new tricks and techniques with this program, and finally saved up to buy ableton 4 bundledd with the evolution 49 key controller.
I waited patiently by the letter box for it to arrive , i pestered australia post incessantly until it got here and then i drove home stroking the box ( i'm somewhat ashamed to say this is factual and not hyperbole)
So i'm a convert through and through... but my question is some what cnotroviersial.
I was told by my friend who introduced me to the software that the clever copyright protection that disables a cracked copy of ableton after about a month or what ever is actually embedded into any saved .als file.
i don't care if its true or not , i don't want to discuss ableton's copyright protection , or anything like that. i just wanna know if the old songs that i made during the dark years when i was lost and confused about ableton, will those songs still play on a registered copy of ableton , or will they crash my pride and joy ?

Altho I bought Live straight up (I knew it was exactly what I had been
waiting for) I'm sure this is how most people come to use software in the
music area......

Music software is so subjective and often so garbage that trialing it via
warez is almost compulsory. I'm sure Ableton understands this and makes
it so that old files don't become corrupt.

btw I actually think that several major music software companies have
secret deals with warez groups in order to promote their software via
this "extended trial" kinda setup.

-Ben

Phibbler wrote:Hi everyone. first post ere...
I have a question to ask the supreme gods of ableton, but first a bit of background.
Unfortunately i was first introduced to ableton, throught that nasty warez software. It was through a friend of mine and we made many tracks with this cracked ableton and so on.
however, i grew to love the program heaps. and i mean heaps. it's changed the way i made music and i became to realise that those nice men in berlin need my money in order to make ableton as good as the first day i ever played with it. i kept learning new tricks and techniques with this program, and finally saved up to buy ableton 4 bundledd with the evolution 49 key controller.
I waited patiently by the letter box for it to arrive , i pestered australia post incessantly until it got here and then i drove home stroking the box ( i'm somewhat ashamed to say this is factual and not hyperbole)
So i'm a convert through and through... but my question is some what cnotroviersial.
I was told by my friend who introduced me to the software that the clever copyright protection that disables a cracked copy of ableton after about a month or what ever is actually embedded into any saved .als file.
i don't care if its true or not , i don't want to discuss ableton's copyright protection , or anything like that. i just wanna know if the old songs that i made during the dark years when i was lost and confused about ableton, will those songs still play on a registered copy of ableton , or will they crash my pride and joy ?

Firstly thanx for the honesty....
(Don't want to get into warez debate here when there's enough of them going on a KVR every second week)
At least you are now doing the right thing and supporting the company which is a good thing indeed.
Unfortunately I can't help you though.
I never used a warezed version of Live ( or Reason etc.....) and bought it new @ V3.0 so I have absolutely no clue as to what the answer is.
The only advice I can give is to try loading a warzed .als file into your freshly registered legit version and see what happens.
Not much help really am i.
Lets be honest if it doesn't work it simply doesn't work !
Atleast you can take pride in the knowledge that everything you produce in it from now on will be totally legit and totally upwards compatible with the next installment of Live ie:LIVE 5.0.
Goodluck.

What i don't want to have happen it the copyright protection violation screen splash up and and then ableton is all unuseable again.

So i'm kinda worried about doing so. if i can't use my old songs again, well that's what i'm going to have to do. it sucks but i would rather but i would rather leave my old songs in the past and keep making new songs and keep ableton cleen and chirpy then load up a old one and crash the whole deal.

Any authoritive voices out there that can help me? i haven't loaded up any old songs yet , i just want a defintive answer before i do try.

i think your all set.
but if the tracks are really important to you open them up now and save a new self contained verison..

If anything bad does happen, just contact support.....

I'm sure if they have anything destructive in there (highly doubtful) then
they also have methods for getting legit users back on track.

Any authoritive voices out there that can help me? i haven't loaded up any
old songs yet , i just want a defintive answer before i do try.

I doubt you'll get an answer from Ableton...... Generally whenever anyones
asked me about copy protection in software I've made, I've ignored them,
even giving a simple answer can give away too much info and jepardise
security..... If I have answered, I've lied and misdirected.

-Ben

I lie..... There was one guy I told a whole security scheme too..... The
products market was finished and I just wanted to brag.

Told him how the serial numbers were generated/checked, how the software
handled back-to-base license checking, the encryption methods used,
where info was stored, how often things were rechecked, etc, etc.

No way I would have done that if the product was still selling like hotcakes tho.

-Ben

There is no problem openning *.als files that comes from cracked versions of ableton.

I don't think there is anything in the saved als at all.

Theres is a lot of story on the web about the ableton copy protection.

Personnally i prefer legit software

i too was introduced to live via warez, and was so impressed ended up buying it -- however, unlike you, i was not aware of any sort of corruption issue, and continued to play with the older files i had messed about with before i bough the real version.

I can tell you straight up that nothing has locked up on me, nor have i noticed any ill effects because of a transition from pirate to legit. I'm pretty sure yer good to go man

hello.
there was a thread related to this topic in "bugs and problems".
please search under "kaufzwang". there is also an answer of bernd roggendorf: he says: "there will be no problem to open yr old .als- files with a (now) legal live- version.".


raabe