Precision M90 won't find FlexLM server in PTC/Setup when installing PTC Pro/e Wildfire 2.0

Rats.  Sorry to hear that you weren't able to resolve the issue with the install.  Maybe I'll give the same thing a shot on this end and see if we have the same success you did.

Thanks for the response!

Cheers.

Anybody having flexLM issues should wipe the machine, fresh install XP, install only video and ethernet drivers, install flexLM apps, confirm everything works, THEN install the rest of the drivers one area at a time and confirm nothing breaks. Trust me, it resolved a flexLM issue that was driving us nuts!!

Hi folks.

Well after weeks and weeks of effort on my side and on the software vendor's side (including discussion and code writing with Macrovision), we discovered that there was a duplicate .dll that was causing our FlexLM issues.  :smileymad:  Apparently, the lmgr10.dll was installed in 2 places, one in c:\windows\system32 and one in c:\program files\softwarename\dyn.  The system32 dll file was being called before the one in softwarename, which was the cause of the conflict.  Renaming of the .dll in c:\windows\system32 to something other than .dll has resolved the issue with no problems with the other software that calls on FlexLM.  A simple fix in the end.

Just wanted to share our solution with everyone.  I couldn't say that this exact .dll could be causing the other issues, but we suspect that AutoDESK is what introduced the duplicate .dll.

Cheers.

Sharon

Message Edited by Roswell73 on 06-28-200603:07 PM

Nope - never able to track it down to a specific driver - it's either bluetooth or wireless - with these drivers NOT installed, no FLEX issues - also, no issues with installing the drivers AFTER the FLEX apps. Good luck!!

Hi there.

Neither of the M90's that we were having this problem with have the fingerprint readers, but they do have the Embassy Trust Suite software installed.

HTH

Hi, everyone. Sorry to awaken a dead thread, but I think I figured out the problem. Simply, having Embassy Trust Suite installed breaks FlexLM. I have a small armada of FlexLM based applications and they all play nicely together, except on the Precision M90 we have. After fussing and fighting with it for a few days, I stumbled upon this thread and decided to uninstall ETS. We didn't use it, and didn't even know what it was until now. When uninstalling ETS, you'll notice that a Broadcom driver installer pops up. This throws up a major red flag to me.

Disclaimer: I'm an old hardware guy who is used to old unix machines. I work on windows too, but it isn't my forte. I may not be 100% correct, but I'm pretty sure I've roughly got this figured out.

Anyway, if you're running a FlexLM based app on the same machine as the FlexLM server, here's what you have: The server spawns processes that listen for a tcp loopback connection. However, these processes encounter an error that is indicative of a network connectivity problem. Obviously, there should be no problem if the client and server are the same machine. The same scenario presents itself whether you use a license file based on disk serial number or ethernet MAC. So, something is interfering with FlexLM's ability to make a network connection to itself. Could this have something to do with the Broadcom driver? It seriously bothers me if "trusted computing" involves a breaking a network driver. It is likely Broadcom's implementation of TPM in their ethernet adapter or driver.

Solution for the time being: All the FlexLM problems from our M90 were solved after uninstalling ETS.

So how does this problem get fixed? FlexLM is an industry standard multiplatform license manager installed that has been in use for many years. Who up: Wave Software (who makes ETS)? Broadcom? Dell? If we have half a million dollars worth of software on a computer that doesn't work because some preinstalled program doesn't play by the rules, there will be pitchfork carrying masses marching towards some company's offices. And many in those masses have deep pockets if they have several FlexLM apps and buy laptops like top of the line Precisions. Do these companies really want to earn their ire?

I have not been able to experiment with this or repeat my findings since our M90 was needed for work, but if I get the time, I'll post back here with what I find out. I hope this helps anyone who continues to have trouble with FlexLM on their Precision M90.

Hi compmd Thanks for the info: Just got an M90 with Windows Vista Ultimate, tried last night to install Wildfire 3 (many many times): Also keep having this issue where the licence server cannot be found, although I do not have Embassy Trust Suite installed. Am about to kill the disk and put XP on.....which I would rather not do if I can avoid it. The other problem that i have noticed is that when I run ptcsetup.bat (in the bin folder in proEwildfire)it intermittently wont flash up. When it does run, the first thing that happens is that I get the message that "PTC.Setup was unable to detect a host ID", with the OK button as the only option (this window pops up behind the setup flash screen). Any ideas? Another question, which may be stupid and I realise doesnt belong in this thread, but if I am logged on as a user in the Adminisrtator group, surely I will run everything automatically with administrator rights? I get the feeling that Vista isnt giving them to me..... Appreciate any info or advice you may have Mark

Mark,

Interesting problem you have there. As I said before, I'm more a unix guy than a Windows guy, but I am most certainly a CAD guy, so I think I can help. I may be mistaken, but I think Windows Vista has TC "features" built into it. So, if I was correct about the XP ETS/Broadcom driver being broken for the sake of TC, perhaps the Vista certified driver is broken as well, but by default. If the licensing setup program is unable to determine a hostid, something is very wrong, because depending on how the licensing is set up (I'm assuming its FlexLM) it is usually your MAC address, or disk serial number, neither of which should be difficult for the program to figure out. I don't think PTC is using composite ids yet like UGS.

In any case, Vista + CAD = Nightmare. I run UGS NX4, NX5, SolidEdge v19, and CSi Concepts Unlimited on Windows machines, and they are all atrocious experiences on Vista. If you can get your hands on XP, I think things will work much better. All of my CAD workstations are running XP, Suse Linux 10.1, or Solaris 10 except for the Precision 670, which runs XP x64. The 670 however does not run Concepts Unlimited (issues with the ACIS kernel), and NX4 would do some really screwy things on it every once in a while (flipping the axes in the modeling module was my favorite). Consider that XP x64 is actually derived from the Windows 2003 code tree and you can see why there might be some issues. In short, professional CAD/CAM/CAE software is EXTREMELY picky about the environment it runs in.

With the new security paradigm in Vista and UAC, I believe logging in as administrator will run everything with administrative rights. I don't know enough about Vista to say with any certainty.

I'm never one for admitting defeat, but when my OS puts my work at its mercy, I say "fine, you win" and then reformat the drive and put a different OS on it. So if I were in your shoes, I'd put XP on the machine and expect that ProE would run. Hope this helps.

Mark,

Glad to hear how well its working! I apologize, I didn't consider dual booting XP and Vista. I only tried doing that with Vista RC2, and things didn't go so well. I bet ProE FLIES on the M90. UG runs really, really well here. Have a great day!

I can confirm this behaviour for Wildfire 3.0 M070, Flexlm 10.8 on a new DELL M6300, Windows XP. Uninstalling ETS does solve it.