Ubi and Copy Protection

[DaemianLucifer]

and as for any progame out there that can destory your mother board according to my father who is progamer for software there is none.

Tell it to my poor burned hard disk

[ThunderTitan]

all of you are dreaming if you think ubi is going to put out a mac verison of heroes v wiith out some sort of burning portection software with it that is bad bussiness decison to protech a pc verison and not portech a mac verison of the game b/c it's just as easy to crack a mac verison as it is a pc and by the way starforce only interferes with iso image burning softeware and as for any progame out there that can destory your mother board according to my father who is progamer for software there is none.

The point was that it won't have SF, because it doesn't work on Macs or Linux, just Windows. And that's all HP cares about.

And software doesn't directly destroy hardware, but i'm pretty sure that unless struck by lightning ur HW doesn't burn when it's not runing.

[erik9280]

where are you people getting this idea that sf does not work for mac any way b/c all it take is to port sf over to the mac os which form my understanding is just a better verison of the windows os also form what i am hearing is that ubi is discusing with mac about porting the sf softeware over to work on thire os anyways by the time the mac verison of heroes v is set for relase in 2007.

[DaemianLucifer]

And software doesn't directly destroy hardware, but i'm pretty sure that unless struck by lightning ur HW doesn't burn when it's not runing.

Ok,its not burned physically,but it also doesnt work,and is beyond repair.I can only sell it as scrap metal now.

[Orfinn]

Ok,its not burned physically,but it also doesnt work,and is beyond repair.I can only sell it as scrap metal now.

Well at least you get some money for it. If possible, who want to buy scrap metal anyway?

[DaemianLucifer]

Well at least you get some money for it.

Oh,yes!A fortune,no less!I can get a whole hundredth of a cent(US,not Euro)for it!So long poor succers!

If possible, who want to buy scrap metal anyway?

SOmeone wanting to build a scrap metal house?

[ThunderTitan]

Ok,its not burned physically,but it also doesnt work,and is beyond repair.I can only sell it as scrap metal now.

Well at least you get some money for it. If possible, who want to buy scrap metal anyway?

Apperently there's enough money to be made that some people started stealing railways from still working lines. God, I love this country.

[Ethric]

Not going off topic here, are we? *jingles keys*

[DaemianLucifer]

So we have two beta testers that have aleged problems with SF now(or do we have more?I didnt count).That should be more than enough for a full investigation,shouldnt it?

[Gaidal Cain]

"Full investigation"? What do you mean with that? Do you suggest that AS would try and get his hand on a whole bunch of computers to test if they malfunction when H5 is installed?

[Derek]

"Full investigation"? What do you mean with that? Do you suggest that AS would try and get his hand on a whole bunch of computers to test if they malfunction when H5 is installed?

Well, sure...is that a bit much to ask?

I suppose what he means is that some independent organization, whatever that may be, should go and find out what problems are caused by SF. (Such as that Tom's article that is brought up so often.) I'd like to see something like that done, but I doubt any of the round table members have that much money sitting around.

[lilacperfection]

and as for any progame out there that can destory your mother board according to my father who is progamer for software there is none.

Hello all!

This is lilac's son, as I'm sure you have all been hearing about me and the troubles that SF has caused my machine. I'll gladly elaborate as to what it has done as my mother is not as technical as I am. As a little background, 10 years in the computer industry, Comp Sci degree from school, I deal with hardware and software daily in my work, so I do have a little idea of whats going on.

I have an Alienware desktop, all custom built, AMD 64, 4 HDD's, DVD burner, the works, I wont bore you with the techincal details. The machine is less than a year old, never had any issues with it. As all of you are, me and my mother were extremely excited about Heroes 5. And when we were chosen in the beta, we couldn't load it onto our 2 computers quick enough! So we played a few games...besides the obvious work that needs to be done with the game, we enjoyed it greatly. Shortly thereafter I started noticing 2 things. One of my hard drives had become very sluggish and began to lag greatly. Secondly, my DVD burner began taking 5 times longer than normal to burn disks. The same symptoms that many have spoken about, the buffer would jump from 100% to 0% to 100% over and over, maxing out the CPU at nearly 100% as well, on an AMD 64! Something was seriously wrong. So google was my friend. I did some research and I came across this StarForce product that seemed to produce the same symptoms I was seeing.

A quick check of both our computers revealed such product, and it was quickly removed; Drivers, and from the Registry. This did not solve my issue unfortunately. Some more research and I found out what SF had really done. As the software is known to do, it attaches it self to an IDE chain in the PC. This being my Primary one, I had my dvd burner, and a Hard Drive on this chain. It had attacked it, and changed the transfer mode to PIO only. Both devices on this IDE chain needed Ultra DMA, as does ANY modern PC device these days. Constant usage at PIO, caused the devices to break down. Even switching back to Ultra DMA, at first SEEMED to fix this issue. My hard drive was LESS sluggish, altho still does not seem right when using its max buffer. I dont think the drive is shot, just more of an annoyance. The shot drive is the DVD burner. Back at Ultra DMA mode, it still burns the occasional coaster (hey its at least fast now when it screws up a disk!). But audio cds still skip terribly, even when burned at a reduced speed. The worst was while attempting to burn a new Linux Distro for work related business, all 4 disks would constantly fail CRC creck. Meaning, the drive is corrupting data still as it burns. The constant usage at PIO mode cause the drive to eventually break down and fail, theres no fix for it.

I have a new DVD drive on order, luckily the prices have come down quite a bit in recent times. The money is not even an issue at this point, its the fact that a legit company could put this software into their product even after listening to countless complaints from their customers about it. That is a terrible marketing strategy. Working in the Internet field, i've come across many skeptics in my time. There are still customers of ours who believe Spyware doesnt damage their Operating Systems, but it is up to me, working for a professional company, to take the needed steps to prove to this customer what the problem is, and offer them a solution. If that customer just complains to me, and then I tell them oh tough luck and blow them off, they will surely terminate their service. Enough people doing this means I'm out of a job. Surely someone at UBI must have a little sense to realize bad customer service is NOT a way to make money.

The game WILL be pirated. Every single game using SF has been sucessfully cracked and pirated. This will be no exception, they are not saving money.

I will gladly answer any more questions anyone has and I will try and remember to login to the forums more often then once a weekend when mom reminds me lol.

- Pete

[pepak]

Constant usage at PIO, caused the devices to break down.

The rest of your post is feasible, but THIS is an utter nonsense. I don't know where this myth came from, probably from somebody who has no idea what a DMA or PIO means, but it is still a nonsense.

But audio cds still skip terribly, even when burned at a reduced speed. The worst was while attempting to burn a new Linux Distro for work related business, all 4 disks would constantly fail CRC creck. Meaning, the drive is corrupting data still as it burns. The constant usage at PIO mode cause the drive to eventually break down and fail, theres no fix for it.

More likely, either you didn't uninstall the whole Starforce or your drive has been dying long before it, only you didn't notice. Which of these is true can be easily discovered by putting the drive in a computer with clean Windows installation.

that a legit company could put this software into their product even after listening to countless complaints from their customers about it.

Here I must admit that StarForce people are somewhat right: Most of the complaints are either nonsense or lies. Unfortunatelly, it is a fact that SF can and does cause issues, but nothing like the horror stories you can find in those complaints.

There are still customers of ours who believe Spyware doesnt damage their Operating Systems,

I am not your customer but I share their belief that spyware doesn't damage my OS. Why? Because I don't install any program that comes with spyware...

I understand your concerns about StarForce, I am absolutelly with you in regard that it shouldn't be used by a respectable company (and I won't be buying Heroes 5 until there's a version without SF), but what you wrote is a combination of a rational core ("SF messed up my OS") with a lot of urban legends around it ("Constant PIO will kill a harddrive").

[erik9280]

LIlac i need to know form your son weather he or you are using any softeware that will let you burn a iso image of a disk and if your son has been tin the computer bussines for as long as he has then he'll know what i mean by an iso image burn is and if you are using said software then that si your problem sf is desinged especially to attack any software that will allow this type of disk copig or burning.

[Wildbear]

I read an interesting story today.

We've been talking about GCII around the campfire, in the oblivion topic. So I wanted to look at it. Here is an interesting link about it:
http://forums.galciv2.com/index.aspx?fo ... 106741&c=1

All starforce opponents will be happy to learn that a starforce admin actually posted a bittorent link to download the game because it is NOT protected by starforce. The game sold better than expected, without any copy protection.

Obviously, this annoyed starforce enough to encourage that game's piracy.

see this picture: http://www.neowin.net/staff/lardiop/starfo1.jpg

Now you can make yourself an idea about the people behind starforce.

[Angelspit]

Obviously, this annoyed starforce enough to encourage that game's piracy.

We should keep this in perspective: this was just a discussion on a message board by a forum administrator who may or may not be a Starforce employee, not an official statement on the company's site. By doing so, he actually helped Stardock by telling them about the site. But the way he did it is very questionable, and is unlikely to make Stardock (or several other companies, now that the post has been reprinted everywhere on the Net) one of their customers.

[Wildbear]

To me it's like the shop assistant of a gunsmith who would shoot at you to show you how this world is dangerous and prove you need a gun or a flak jacket to defend yourself.

[Gaidal Cain]

Make that "Shoot an innocent bystander", and I'm with you . It's not like it was Starforce that was behind those alpha leaks. Or was it?

[ThunderTitan]

"Of course you need a gun. If you don't have one some guy could just walk up to you and shoot you. Like this."

Salesman walks out to the window, pulls out gun, shoot a guy that was just passing by in the head.

"See, now if that guy had a gun... err... he would have had a better chance not to get shot in the head... if he ever saw me that is"

[Wildbear]

Make that "Shoot an innocent bystander", and I'm with you .

If you're with me and the guy doesn't shoot at you, then I'm the bystander and I'm the one who is being shot... Not sure I like the idea