UG18 / NX2 Running on Windows 7

[Mateo R]

Greetings! Does anyone here have experience running old versions of Uniqraphics or NX (V18 or NX2, respectively, in a Windows 7 environment?

I have a UG V18 license (and up do NX2) that i originally ran on an Win XP box (a long time back). When i moved to Win 7 some years back, i was not able to reinstall the software. Being so old, and way out of maintenance, there's not much recourse except to reload XP and repeat the original install.

I've attempted to install on Win 7 most recently, after much research and following my old notes, and have gotten close (looks like UG is starting and displays the V18 image) but ultimately doesn't launch. Obviously, i have not mastered the "license as a service" piece of the tool.

Does anyone have any user tips on installing V18 (or even NX2) on Win 7? I read other users, esp. the "UG Evangelist" indicate they've had V16 thru. mid NX versions running on Win7.

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Thank you, Mateo

 

[nxexplorer]

Hi Mateo R
From my experience (around 2000-2003) V18-NX2 used a dongle key (LPT or USB). Please Make sure your dongle key is now in a good condition.
You must check the environment variable and license services. Another thing is the driver software (Sentinel) should be compatible with the OS and the version of UG or NX.
Hope this will help you.

Regards,
nxexplorer

 

[cowski]

From my experience (around 2000-2003) V18-NX2 used a dongle key (LPT or USB).

A physical dongle was an option in this time frame, but it wasn't required; NX could connect to a license server, (nearly) the same as it does now.

Do you get any error messages when running the install? Have you tried running in "compatibility" mode?

www.nxjournaling.com

 

[Toost]

If you manage to get the license server running, the "service". It will write a logfile , per default in the same directory as the license install.
Open that, it should be pretty readable to see if it runs as it should, and will be able to serve licenses to a client.

The Dongle was an option as Cowski said and not required.
Back in time , the license file was locked to the Network adapter MAC address. Then somebody noticed that the MAC address could be changed * and then Siemens invented the "Composite host ID" which is a mixture of hardware addresses in the server computer and much more difficult to fiddle with.
* By changing the MAC address one could use the same License file on multiple computers.
I do not remember when the composite host ID was implemented. might be after V18.

When the license is running , starting NX will also produce a logfile. this is by default under c:
C:\Users\username\AppData\Local\Temp and will have the name "yourloginsomenumbersandletters.syslog" ( something like : "tomas223e464a.syslog")
The end of this log should have information on what did not work.
Notice that the logfile also contains information about you / your company * which you might not want to upload here.
* in the beginning of the logfile there is info on whom this log "belongs to" in the "Licens server information" -block.
That too can be of interest to read /check.

Regards,
Tomas


Never try discuss with a fanatic, it wastes your time and it annoys the pig.

 

[Mateo R]

Good evening - thank you @Toost, @cowski & @nxexplorer for all of your insights! I'm running down all of the suggestions this week and will advise.

@nxexplorer - dongle key is in good condition with no visible signs of wear/corrosion. I'm working on the environment variables.

@cowski - i do get errors in the syslogs; will try some other variations on the settings and see how these change; i seem to remember using the license server method in the past but don't see those in my install notes.

@Toost - i'll double check my settings...as mentioned above, i do see the syslogs in the Temp directory - i'll mess with these this week and if i cannot make headway, i'll sanitize and paste them in here; i did not see any logs in the license directory but will double check.

Again, thank you all for the inputs; will reply back this week after i mess with the settings and deep dive the syslogs.

Mateo