Strange Software Problem

[conigar]

Heres a strange circumstance that may test even the most knowledgable software geeks!.

Firstly!
I have three computers in the house, all are modern machines all running XP Pro SP2.

I have purchased the National Burial Index version 2 (4 disks) that I can install on all three machines, each showing "Installation Successful"

On two of the machines the software runs as it should and I can access the data without any problem, but on one machine the software will not work.

On clicking the shortcut the software opens (briefly) with a splash screen followed by the search page, but on the one machine the same splash screen opens and closes without the search page opening.

The installation is via the DVD-RW peripheral on each machine (all are Pioneer DVD-RW) and I have even tried installing on the one machine via an external USB drive using various peripherals from CD to DVD-RW but
the prog still does not open.

I did notice in the Prog folder in C:\ of the none working machine that there is a file called Nbi.ini that is blank, whereas on the other machines that will run the prog the Nbi.ini file has 72 bytes of information.

I thought I had solved the problem by copy/pasting this ini file from the working machine/s into the folder but again this did not work.

Because the installation appears not to install the full Nbi.ini, even though
the icon shows in the folder, is this a possible reason?.

Can anyone understand what is happening and why this software works on two of three virtually the same machines, and how I can fix this.

Any pointers gratefully received.

Thanks
conigar

PS...The machine it will not work on is my machine and I am the one
that needs it for genealogy purposes.

[pip22]

The Nbi.ini file will probably just be a file to hold the user settings and layout once the program has started, so obviously it will be blank on the machine that won't run it. The Nbi.ini file starts off being blank on all three until you run the program.

I think, therefore, that's just a red herring in this case. Something else is causing your problem.

Do you have to activate the program online similar to XP activation? If so, maybe their servers keep a record of how many activations it's had and your only allowed two maximum for two different machines?

If activation does not apply here, I would have said maybe your only allowed to install it on two machines at any one time, but then how would the CD know about previous installs?

Unless it's to do with online checking/activation --- your right. I'm stumped anyway!

[conigar]

Hi pip22.

Thanks for the reply.

The Nbi.ini file shows 72 bytes of information when I install the software onto any other machine, and the prog works fine but when I install onto
my machine the Nbi.ini file shows as blank when it should have the following:

[Data Location]
Drive=HD
[Options]
Eject=1
Clear=1
Font Size=10

On two of the machines this ini file shows the contents above before I
attempt to open the prog.

I have tried importing this ini file from the other machine and it accepts
the overwrite but it does not help.

There is no license restriction and the software can be installed onto any
computer as it is protected and the disk is required to be in the drive to
allow it to open.

I even tried installing it as a Virtual CD but again the ini file is blank and
doing a copy/paste again does not work.

All three machines in the house are the same, the only difference being
the burner drives but all are Pioneer DVR just different models.

It is a complete mystery why the software runs on other machines and
not mine.

Thanks for trying, much appreciated.

conigar.