jimusic

Bristol_Jonesey
I was getting fed up running from machine to machine in order to effect offline authorizations, so I bought a wireless dongle which plugs into the front USB port of my DAW.
 
It's a HUGE timesaver (as well as being a lot more streamlined & effective) and the chance of picking up something nasty for that brief time is vanishingly small.
 
The routine is:
 

• Enable AV (MSE)
• Plugin dongle
• Authorize software
• Remove dongle
• Disable AV

Couldn't be simpler

Care to share some technical details or maybe even a photo for us there Bud?

Jim, there's nothing technical about it at all, and I can't provide any photos because my studio is currently scattered all over the house while I'm STILL re-decorating & re-modelling it.


But it's as simple as I outlined above.
 
By default, my Anti Virus & Firewall are switched off because 99.99% of the time I'm not connected to the internet.
When I DO need to go online for authorising software, the first thing I do is switch both of these on.
Then, I plug my wireless dongle into the front USB port of the computer and establish a connection to the home Wi-Fi network (this takes a couple of seconds) then, with most software, there's a prompt for "online authorisation"
so you click the button, and get your stuff authorised.
 
Then I disconnect from internet, remove dongle, and disable AV/Firewall.
 
Does this help?

There are  reasons other than paranoia to not be able to get access to the internet. The flash thing works fine for me, however ADrums does not work like that.

I use a thumb drive for the most part, but at Jim Roseberry's recommendation, I purchased a USB wireless access point and use that whenever I need to access the Internet. The NIC on the motherboard is disabled.
 
Works really well and no DPC spikes from NIC polling.
 
Regards,
Dan
 

For those using wireless USB adapters, any recommendations on brands and/or models just for this purpose?   I was initially considering the long cable run workaround, but two floors and a set of stairs between is sounding less and less favorable...    And if there's typically no polling or other unwanted interaction because of the device type, maybe this is how I'll get AD installed - I was going to try the "copy these three folders" steps outlined elsewhere because they're simple enough, but it seems odd that AD would have no regsitry keys to go along for the ride...
 

I just got good news from Cake saying that if I DON'T install ADrums when prompted on X3 install that Sonar X3 will find my existing ADrums. That's good news for me but doesn't help anyone who is going for the new install. Guess I can go X3 and stay offline for now.

Bristol_Jonesey
 
Does this help?

Yes - Turns out I was thinking of something else altogether.
 
I do have this option already.
 
Thanks for the clarification though B-Jonesey. 

RickJP909
Hi Guys.
 
I totally understand what everyone is saying...
...why thinking that surfing known trusted sites is okay when in fact there's no guarantee that they've not been compromised:
 
http://forum.cakewalk.com/FindPost/2898343
 
Hope that helps.

Thanks for the input Rick. Good info!