DaDesktop

Issues with Trial Licence when linked to a MAC address

Machine details:

The problem is that GraphPad ties the use of a trial machine to a MAC address. When a Fresh Start machine is cloned, it will normally use the same MAC address. Ordinarily this wouldn’t be an issue, but here the application reports the licence has already been used, as it was on a previously cloned machine. The machine could be on a different server or in a data centre on a completely different continent, and it will still throw up this error. 

So the workaround is to change the MAC address. On Linux this is straightforward and well documented, but on Windows it’s a bit trickier.

Changing the MAC address inside Windows using the usually recommended steps won’t work, because the qemu.conf file for the machine will override any change you make there. So you can update the MAC address in Windows 10, but on its own that still won’t do the trick.

This is because the qemu.conf file has a MAC address configured to work with it. That address can be changed to provide a different MAC, and thus allow a different licence key to be used. 

But to make this work, ‘Network Isolation’ on each machine needs to be set to ‘Disabled’. Then the MAC address set in qemu.conf will be used.

Please contact DaDesktop Support for help if you run into this issue.