Invalid activation key

[Sydney_railer]

I also can't activate Railmaster.

Windows 10.

My account is flagged as administrator.

I had activated Railmaster on this laptop previously when it was running Windows 7. I then upgraded to Windows 10 and maybe thats when the trouble started.

I think I'll uninstall Railmaster and download it again from Hornby, if I can find rm_setup.exe.

Anyone got a better suggestion?

Thanks

Simon

RAF96 thanks for the tip about sticky posts in rm forum. I went searching but just found posts talking about glue. Do you have the link for these sticky posts?

Also I got an email from rail-master.support and they suggested I run RM whilst connecting to a hotspot on my phone.

That gave me the new message "The Activation Key you have enetered appears to be invalid. Please try again."

I went back to wi-fi and got the same message.

The problem with using hotspot is that Im in a rural area and the network power is weak.

Any more suggestions will be appreciated.

[Fishmanoz]

Sydney, hopefully the mods will move this thread to the correct RM forum for you. If you then look at the posts at the top of the forum, these are the stickies RAF refers to.

First suggestion - do not uninstall RM, it solves very few and only the most extreme problems and will likely create problems you didn’t have in the first place. But do download and install the latest version over your existing before you do anything else.

Your correct activation key should appear in the cover of your original RM CD, if you have one. If you really have lost it, all is not lost. Within your RM folder, there is a file called activate.dat and it contains all of the original info you used when you first activated. If you quote this back to HRMS, they should be able to fix the key for you.

Once you are activated, you will find there are some specific configuration things you need to do for W10 that you didn’t have to do with W7, including editing your .ini file. All the info for doing this is in the FAQs sticky at the top of the RM forum.

Please do report back and tell us how you go.

PS1. Edited to correct error noted by Paul below, thanks.

PS2. You only need to put one carriage return between paras, the forum software adds a second. If you add more than one, you end up as your post appears spread over the page with lots of white, as opposed to mine done with only one return.

[96RAF]

The sticky posts (called that because they stick to the top of the page and do not move down and get lost in the clutter) are highlighted in a different colour shade to the normal posts.

It is best if you can copy and paste your activation key from the RM activate.dat file rather than type it in as that works round any 1 or l or 0 or O errors.

I have moved your post into the RM forum area.

[Sydney_railer]

Hi Fish and RAF

Thanks for your tips. I found the pinned posts and that lead me on to find the RM help website, very useful. I opened the activate.dat file and noticed the activation key was showing the four components of the key listed down the left hand side one on top of the other. Is this right?

rm support emailed me and suggested I deactivate and reactivate, but that means uninstalling and reinstalling doesn't it, which Fish you said brings more trouble?

I will try a deativate (deregister) and reactivate tomorrow.

[Fishmanoz]

No, you don’t uninstall to deactivate, separate processes. Yes, do as HRMS says.

Not sure what you mean about key overwritten? Can you read it to confirm it shows as it does in the Help tab?

[P-Henny]

Deactivation process is described on page 131 of the Railmaster manual. But do read the whole section from pages 130 to 132.

Yes.... the key is listed vertically in the activate.dat file as four blocks of text. But if the activate.dat file is saved in the RM program folder on the W10 Railmaster installation, then this should automatically populate the activation screen shown on page 130 with the correct data.

P.S. When I implemented the free MS upgrades from W8 to W8.1 then later, W8.1 to W10 on my Railmaster (RM) laptop, RM just continued working as before without any issues with the key. For the elimination of doubt, I did not need to deactivate and reactivate or take any other corrective actions. Once the W10 upgrade completed, everything just work exactly as before.

Just a slight correction to information provided by Fishman in his earlier reply. The Elite driver used by W10 is exactly the same as the Elite driver used by W7. It is the Vista and XP driver that is different.

QUESTION - What country are you located in? And who is your Broadband service provider?

[Sydney_railer]

Hi Fish and henny

on page 131 of the RM DCC manual:

"...When 

reactivating on the same or another 

computer you will need to activate your 

main RailMaster key first, followed by the 

Unlock Code. ..."

I've only been using one Acivation Key, no Unlock Code. What does the manual mean by Unlock Code? My Activation Key is on the CD pack from Hornby.

I'm in Australia and my broadband provider is the government NBN company.

[Sydney_railer]

I've just attempted a "deregister" as per the guide page 131 and I get the message "Unable to verify Activation Key - (0)". Has it left me with an evaluation copy or did it error out?

[96RAF]

If your copy is still registered the key will show in one of the screens. I can never remember where as they are not logically presented across the app.

[gilbo2]

If you press the big ? (help) button does it display any activation keys, if not, that explains why deactivate fails.

Did you try the registration process through a mobile phone hotspot?

[Fishmanoz]

The big ? Button might be better described as the Help tab of RM. It is in here the activation key (the one on your CD case) is entered. Is it showing there?

If not, enter it.

[P-Henny]

The 'unlock code' is a reference to Railmaster PRO. If you don't have the PRO upgrade then you ignore the 'unlock code' reference in the manual.

The 'unlock code' terminology derives from the PRO upgrade process. When you upgrade RM standard edition to PRO edition you purchase a PRO 'unlock code' to unlock the PRO feature set.

All the manual is saying is that when re-activating RM you first re-activate the key (for the RM standard edition) then you re-enter the 'unlock code' for PRO if you previously purchased that upgrade.

Your issue may possibly be related to you being located in Australia.

I forget the details now, but Fishman may have a better memory than me. It has been previously identified on the forum that there is an Australian ISP (can't remember which one) who have been actively blocking communication to "www.rail-master.com" as they consider it some form of unsafe website. I remember that HRMS posted a reply in forum that they were trying to get the block removed, but had been unsuccessful. This reported event was about 5 years ago to the best of my recollection.

This is the reason I asked you the question regarding location and ISP as your nickname suggests AUS.

Are you still using the same Internet service that you used to perform the original activation. If not, then that might be the cause of your issue.

EDIT: Found this historical forum thread using Google advanced search.

https://uk.hornby.com/community/forum/help-installing-railmaster-evaluation-version-12?ccm_paging_p=1&ccm_order_by=&ccm_order_by_direction=

This second thread, also found using Google, actually posts a 'workaround' fix to get over the AUS ISP block by using a third party DNS service not associated with the ISP.

https://uk.hornby.com/community/forum/rm-v165-available?p=7%2F&ccm_paging_p=15&ccm_order_by=&ccm_order_by_direction=

If this workaround fix on page 15 of this multi-page thread works for you too, please update the forum with the details.

[Trevor from Oxford]

Hello All,

I am having a similar issue having just upgraded my computer from a machine which had happily run Railmaster for years. New computer set up with admin rights and firewall deactivated but refuses to connect and activate despite the old key being reset by Railmaster.

I also had the response from support saying to try activating via a hotspot. I tried two, same error message. I have tried with a few old computers this week running Windows 10 and 11, but exactly the same error on each of them!

I genuinely wonder if they are having technical gremlins their end! Has anyone done a successful activation this month (May 2023)?

Thank you.

[Fishmanoz]

Paul and Sydney, pretty sure the blocked Aussie ISP is bigpond. Sydney has reported his ISP being NBN (National Broadband Network) but that would be unusual as they are wholesalers in general with connection to their fibre optic network being via retail ISPs, one of the biggest being bigpond.

As for possible HRMS gremlins, I’ve reactivated recently with no problems (ISP is NBN via iiNet).

[Sydney_railer]

RAF and gilbo

My activation key stays in the help screen. I tried personal hotspot but get the same error.

Henny and trevor

I am using Telstra Bigpond now and that is probably the source of the problem, thanks for the info. Where I live I have no other choice. Thanks for the tip on trying a DNS to get around Telstra. I will give it a go and let you all know what happens.

The original ISP I used to activate RM was iiNet in 2021 and it worked fine, but I was living in Sydney then.

[Sydney_railer]

Monday PM update

I changed my DNS values in Windows Settings network adapter properties for both ipV4 and ipV6. I set them to Google Public DNS (ipv4 - 8.8.8.8, ipv6 - 2001:4860:4860::8888).

I also realised that where RM is asking for an unlock code I was entering an activation key. So once I got that clear, I got back to a message that I had last week: "Key was not downloaded correctly...", etc.

I then changed all subfolders of RM to writeable. Got the same message as previous.

I then tried to deregister(deactivate) and it went through a few steps, but it still ended with the error: "Unable to verify the Activation Key - (0)"

I had uninstalled RM last week when I first got errors. Maybe I need to make sure all RM folders are deleted and start again as if its a new install?

Thanks SR

[gilbo2]

Monday PM update

.....I had uninstalled RM last week when I first got errors. Maybe I need to make sure all RM folders are deleted and start again as if its a new install?

opps, I've worn that tee-shirt too in the past. Uninstalling without deactivating all your licence keys first, does break the licensing. The licence server does not know you did this and does not allow what it sees as a second installation. These things happen though, just like a dreaded hard disk crash. Just email HRMS explaining you uninstalled in error, along with your original registration key (+any Pro / Handheld keys if relevant), address and email used at that time (ref Activate.dat file discussed earlier). They will then reset the keys from their end.

It's also my view from what your seeing, that your ISP doesn't seem to be the issue, especially if this link shows a "under construction" message rail-master.com. The caveat to this though is that a number of us are seeing what appears to be server issues this weekend. We'll see what happens next week though with that one. Let us know how you get on with HRMS.

 

 

 

 

[P-Henny]

rail-master.com is not configured as an HTML website in the traditional sense with an HTML 'Home Page', hence the "under construction" holding page which has always shown, long before current issues.

The "under construction" message does however confirm that you can reach the HRMS site. Which I think is the point that gilbo was making.

[gilbo2]

The "under construction" message does however confirm that you can reach the HRMS site. Which I think is the point that gilbo was making.

 

 

Exactly grinning

[Sydney_railer]

Breakthrough!

It's working. So the DNS substitution is required and there were loose wires between the eLink and the track. What a relief! Thanks to all contributors for helping me sort the problem. Now on with playing trains.

SR

[gilbo2]

Glad you're all sorted now, that's the important thing.

There were confirmed server issues over the weekend which compounded the problems leading to blind alleys, but from a lessons learnt, I'm beginning to think you were activated all along. This is why you were seeing your activation key under the ?/help button discussed earlier.

Also, maybe an assumption that because eLink wasn't responding due to loose wires, it was an activation issue? Faults with wiring / eLink / (Elite) do not impact activation.

Out of interest, were you getting a message about evaluation period having ended at the start of all this? This would have confirmed activation problems.

[Sydney_railer]

"Out of interest, were you getting a message about evaluation period having ended at the start of all this? This would have confirmed activation problems."

No. No message on eval period ending.

[Mr Spigot]

Just adding my two cents and findings on here.

I spent a long time trying to download the latest version of Rail Master with different web browsers and Windows 10 refusing to download it, putting it into quarantine and generally complaining that it was malware. However Windows and the Browsers were just doing their job - I think that it's the Rail Master software that's at fault here.

Eventually I managed to download version 1.74 and install it, and many thanks to the people posting to this forum for guidance.

And then the activation issue. I tried everything. I ran as administrator, I set admin permissions, I changed my DNS settings, I used a VPN with a UK server. All to no avail. According to the log.txt file, the connection to the activation server was made, but the key was invalid.

Finally I saw this thread with Sydney_railer and then I wondered. I live in New Zealand, could this be the same issue?

I set my iphone to be a personal hotspot. Connected the PC to wifi and joined the hotspot, and the Activation went through first time. Bearing in mind I changed nothing in the activation screen for every attempt I made, so this was definitely the fix.

So a completely bonkers resolution, and no help or clues at all from the error message, but for anyone living in Australia or New Zealand (and possibly other countries outside of the UK/Europe) try the hotspot first!

[RDS]

Very interesting Mr Spigot - Thanks for sharing, although I must admit I cannot see why it worked unless your PC had not been connecting to a WiFi or Ethernet source previously?

[96RAF]

From past posts about these down under problems it is the landline ISP that is the blocker. The same mobile hotspot fettle has been used in Spain.