I have used Sonic Foundry products for years. Since they began in Madison WI years ago. I also used early Cakewalk for my midi needs due to lack of in Vegas and Sound Forge.
 
Sony bought out Sonic Foundry a few years back. No longer could you make a call and talk to support. Now you wandered through the maze of website spin set up to confuse not solve problems.
 
I updated to the newer versions of Vegas and Sound Forge a little over a year ago. At that time I bought new full versions of these programs from an ebay store. After I received the download programs and serials I checked with Sony to make sure the serials were legal then installed the programs. Sony activated the programs, registered them and sent update during the time I used the programs. Then the hard drive failed. Reinstall everything, but needed new activation codes. Sony says your serials have been deactivated due to being fake, but they would be happy to sell me new software. I sent copies of my receipts and my story. Too bad, so sad. Buy new versions. Sooooooooooooo
 
I bought Sonar X2. I called support at Cakewalk and within two minutes had support on the line. I had been using Sonar X1 for my midi needs but never got into the wave section due to my usage of Vegas, need for video editing and Sound Forge. I wanted to make sure I would be able to access support. Real support. They were great and sold me on a long time midi friend. PS; I had no trouble reloading and activating Sonar X1.
 
Thank you Cakewalk for a great product and support. The wave features are wonderful and easy to use.
 

Welcome aboard and welcome to the forum. 

Good to hear a positive story. Have your cake and eat it!

Hey I'm glad things are working for you here in Cakeland,  but I want to give you a heads up about the Sony Vegas/Sound Forge thing...If you registered your products you can go to the web site and Dload the software and get your serial numbers.   Just go Here:

http://www.sonycreativesoftware.com/Default.asp

and go into "My Account".   

I recently experienced the same issue, a computer with all my video editing software had a Power supply go bad and destroyed all the hard drives.  I reloaded my software with no problems.    

Welcome to your dysfunctional family!

This forum is chuck full of all kinds of folks, but one consistent thing here is that we all pull together to help each other, and I can tell you that particular attention is given to those just coming on board with Cakewalk products, as we have also all had to go through the learning curve.

So, in this forum, it makes it easier for any of us to help someone when we can, at a glance, see the system specs - a listing of the hardware and software of your system, and most folks edit their forum 'signature' to include that information.

Then, any post you put out here asking for help will give us what is usually helpful information even before we work on posting back and forth with solutions.  Having your specs on the original posts will reduce back and forth posts looking for that info.  (Hope that all made sense).

(Jimbo 88 this would be a great time for you to add your specs too)

Anyways, again, welcome to Cakewalk and to this forum.

Bob Bone

Love Cakewalk, love the forum. Despite any issues that sonar has (not that any other DAW software doesn't), I wouldn't change it for the world. I feel at home here. Amazing people. Enjoy your new software path ;-)

Bibs

Welcome to the forum Thomas.

Welcome. 

You should be able to use your Sony Software. The same thing happened to me with a program they make called Sonic Factory for Mini disk management and converting ATRAC to MP3. It came free back in 2003, but now they want money for it. It's not any different and the old version still works. I just cannot register it.  All you need is the original activation code and/ or serial #. 

I'm in the habit of storing all my software on a back up drive. If it came on a CD or DVD I make an ISO image. Each is in a folder and the serial numbers are in a text file. Makes it so easy to re do a new computer. 

Never just download software and run it. Always save it then back it up.  
You don't normally have to "register" software. It is only an option so most of them can bug you by email about updates. I usually don't bother. 

Welcome to the forum.

I'm in the habit of storing all my software on a back up drive. If it came on a CD or DVD I make an ISO image.

Yeah but Johnny, you're just anally retentive suffering from OCD actually quite sensible.