[Sara Arell]

Ok, I know I am not the most organized person in the world, but normally with things like serial numbers I am very good at keeping up with them - I always keep my expensive software cds in the box in which they came for safekeeping.

Back in the fall of last year, I upgraded my CS to CS5 and have had all of it installed ever since - I don't know what I did with the serial numbers after I installed the new CS5........the update also included an update for Adobe Acrobat which is something I use all the time -

Rich has been having me fill out forms for him on my computer for the department and I decided this morning to install Acrobat on his laptop so he could do it himself.

Got the CS5 box out - proceeded to try and install it on his laptop - got to the part asking for the serial number and I DID NOT HAVE IT ANYWHERE!

So.........began the phone calls - first to Adobe, then back to Apple, and back and forth for 3 solid hours trying to get them to give me the serial number. What was so weird was that they immediately gave me the serial number for my InDesign but refused to give me the serial number for Acrobat for some reason - it is included in the CS5 package - so it was all one big purchase.

Long story short - after 3 hours calling back and forth between the two of them, finally got Apple to notify Adobe of all of the info they needed to give permission for them to send me the serial numbers.

Now, I have to wait for the email from Adobe with the serial numbers so I can install it on Rich's laptop.

In the meantime, I have been steadily typing away on the forms Rich must have for his interview for a police department applicant. And those forms are long and so in depth!

MORAL: Even if your serial numbers are on the sleeves of your software, write them down somewhere and then write them down again in a third place! Ack! What a morning!

I am grateful that support was available to me on a Sunday morning though!

[April Showers]

My husband always writes the serial number in sharpie on the install disks. That way it is always there.

[Sara Arell]

April Showers, on 14 August 2011 - 06:03 PM, said:

My husband always writes the serial number in sharpie on the install disks. That way it is always there.

That's a great idea, April and I used to do that, until one incident where, believe it or not - the writing kept the disk from loading - we didn't believe it at first until we had to take the computer in to the shop because not only would the drive not read it, we couldn't eject it either - the techie said that the writing on it was the reason. Go figure - I would have thought that the perfect solution too! Ack!

[April Showers]

For my adobe things, the serial number is on the plastic disk case as well as on the box it came in. Another idea is to create a document with your software and serial numbers so you can have them all accessible in one easy place. Of course then you'd have to remember where you saved it.

[Sara Arell]

Took me three days of phone calls, sending my receipt to Adobe for my software but I now have all of my serial numbers for my software again and they are now written down in several places where I can access them when I need them - also wrote them on the sleeves of the CDs again -

This will not happen again - it was a real chore to get Adobe to cooperate - finally Apple called them and they are the ones that got Adobe to cooperate. Adobe support was all foreigners in another country - Apple is the good old USA and their tech support is awesome!

Thanks for the help and suggestions, April.

[BarbaraC1977]

Most of my software is downloaded now, some by choice, some no choice. For downloaded products, I make a folder for EACH Vendor, such as Adobe, in my computer's Downloads folder. Then a subfolder for each product. I save the downloads to this location. If there are patches later, they get added.

I create a notepad (plain text) file--fast and easy to open on any computer, and title it by vendor & product, e.g., Adobe_PSCS4_LicenseKeys.txt. The keys, the username and/or email address for logging into vendor site, etc, all go in this file. If they email other info, I copy that to the file, also. The file lives in the same folder as the download, and I write-protect the text file to prevent accidental deletion. (You have to UN-Write Protect it to move it or change the contents.) This works pretty well for me.

[teecee]

BarbaraC1977, on 17 August 2011 - 09:28 PM, said:

Most of my software is downloaded now, some by choice, some no choice. For downloaded products, I make a folder for EACH Vendor, such as Adobe, in my computer's Downloads folder. Then a subfolder for each product. I save the downloads to this location. If there are patches later, they get added.

I create a notepad (plain text) file--fast and easy to open on any computer, and title it by vendor & product, e.g., Adobe_PSCS4_LicenseKeys.txt. The keys, the username and/or email address for logging into vendor site, etc, all go in this file. If they email other info, I copy that to the file, also. The file lives in the same folder as the download, and I write-protect the text file to prevent accidental deletion. (You have to UN-Write Protect it to move it or change the contents.) This works pretty well for me.

This is a great idea Barbara. Thanks for sharing!

[Sara Arell]

That IS a great idea, Barbara! Thanks so much for sharing it! I need all the help I can get as far as organizing things go! LOL I'm a terrible organizer!