Activation Manual

General Information
Alliance plugins include a new proprietary licensing system which is completely
software based. Thus, no hardware USB dongle is required to run any of our plugins.
No additional software or drivers are needed, either. Everything is handled from
within the plugin. All of your licenses are stored in a single file that resides on your
computer. This file must be updated whenever you buy or demo a new Alliance
plugin and install it on your computer. We support either online or offline activation.

We highly recommend using online activation if possible as it is the most user-

friendly method. By default any plugin can be activated on up to three (3) different
computers or USB flash-drives per license.

License Types
Our plugins support Full Licenses, Trial Licenses and Lease Licenses.

A Full License unlocks your plugin for an unlimited amount of time. You will obtain a
full license whenever you purchase a new Alliance plugin.

A Trial License will let you try a plugin for 14 days. Trial licenses are free of charge.
There are no limitations to the demo versions of the plugins. You can save settings
and presets, automate the plugins in your DAW and render mixes. A trial license can
be activated on three devices as well, but it will only be valid for 14 days after the
first activation.

Lease Licenses are valid for a period of 30 days. They can be renewed after ex-
piration (see below) by paying your next installment. This allows you to perform an
installment purchase of a plugin.

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Installation

Download the installer for the plugin you want to install from our website's
download section at www.plugin-alliance.com/downloads. It doesn't matter if you
are going to try out a demo or if you are going to install a plugin for which you have
bought a full license. The installer is the same. We have separate installers for
Windows, Mac OS and VENUE Systems.

Run the plugin installer by double-clicking the EXE-file contained in the installer
archive if you're a Windows user, or double-click the PKG-file if you're on a MAC,
respectively. This will start the installer. Confirm the legal information and select
which plugin formats you want to install (for example VST, AAX, RTAS and AU). The
format you need depends on the audio host program you are using and which plugin
format is required for your host. By default all formats are selected. We recommend
you install ALL versions, especially if you aren't sure about the format you need.

Activation Process
Once the installation procedure has finished simply start your host software.
Unauthorized plugins will be grayed out and disabled. In Pro Tools unactivated
plugins will bring the activation dialog shown below (Fig. 1) during the plugin scan at
startup. Simply click on the plugin window to bring up the activation dialog in all
other DAWs.

Fig. 1: Activation Dialog

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You can choose if you want to use the online or the offline activation procedure by
clicking the I'm online or I'm offline buttons. We highly recommend using the online
option since it's most easy and automated.

Since we're using a single file to manage all your licenses, there is no need to
reactivate the same plugin in different DAW-formats. This means that if you activate
a plugin using e.g. Pro Tools you can use it with Logic as well, as long as you are on
the same computer or USB flash-drive.

Set the checkbox Activate all my plugins to activate all your licenses in one go. This
way the activation procedure doesn't have to be performed for all installed plugins.

Online Activation
If you have chosen I'm online the online activation dialog will appear (Fig. 2). You will
be prompted for your registered email address and your password. The process is
identical to your login at www.plugin-alliance.com/myplugins.

You must create an account on our website if you haven't done so. Opening an
account at plugin-alliance.com is free. You need an existing account to activate both,
full licenses and demos.

Fig. 2: Online Activation

As soon as you click Activate, the plugin will contact our server and download a new
license file to your computer or USB flash-drive.

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In case there is a valid full license in your account the plugin will be activated forever
for the actual computer, otherwise a 14-day trial version will be activated and
started.

Save Password

It's possible to save your password by selecting the Save password checkbox in the
online activation dialog. Saving your password allows you to activate new plugins in
the future without having to re-enter your login data for every plugin you activate.
When enabling this feature, passwords are stored on your system's hard disk using a
secure encrypting scheme.

Offline Activation
If your music computer is not connected to the internet the plugin activation and the
transfer of your license file must be done manually via an additional computer that
has internet connection.

In this case choose I'm offline in the Activation window. The offline activation dialog
(Fig. 3) will pop up.

Fig. 3: Offline Activation

In general you will need to exchange data back and forth between your offline music
computer and your online internet computer twice to activate a plugin on an offline
machine. Use e.g. a USB flash drive to do so.

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Step 1: Make sure you have created a trial license in your Plugin Alliance account or
you have purchased a full license in our store. Of course, this can only be done on a
computer with internet access as well. To create a trial license in your Plugin Alliance
account please see details below.

Step 2: Submit your Machine ID to your account. The Machine ID is the number
displayed in blue in the activation window (Fig. 3). It is used to identify your music
computer in our system.

Choose Save to file and store the text-file called machine_id.txt on a removable
drive (e.g. USB flash-drive) connected to your offline music computer. Now connect
the USB drive to your computer and log into your account on your internet computer.
Upload the created text-file from your USB-Stick using the Activate From File option
under View Registered Devices / Deactivate Devices. Download your new license file
to your USB stick by clicking Download License File.

Step 3: Connect your USB stick to your music computer. In the plugin activation
window please click Open license and choose the license file named pa.license
which is now located on your USB stick. Finally, click Activate and your plugin is
working now.

Offline License Management

Every offline music computer has to be registered in your Plugin Alliance account
only once (as described in Step 2 above).

To start a new offline demo use the Create Demo / Free License option and choose
the product you would like to test. An overview of your registered devices can be
found under View Registered Devices in your account.

USB Activation
Alliance plugins give you the ability to transfer your licenses to an ordinary USB flash-
drive, which then can be used to run your plugins on other computers without the
need for these computers to be activated then. This is especially useful for travelling
FOH engineers or engineers who have to work in different studios a lot. We highly
recommend to activate USB flash-drives via an online computer.

You can store the plugins or the plugin installers together on one USB flash-drive.
This enables you to copy the plugins into the plugin folder or to use the installer on a
computer system you intend to use temporarily (like a VENUE console on a festival,
for example) from a single USB flash-drive. When you've finished mixing just delete
the plugin files and take your USB flash-drive with you and youre done. No need to
deactivate the computer / console afterwards.

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Step 1: In order to activate your plugin on a flash-drive make sure that this drive is
properly connected to your computer and currently mounted in your file-system.
Open the plugin(s) you want to activate on your USB flash-drive in your DAW of
choice. Use an online computer on which the plugin is installed.

Step 2: Bring up the activation dialog (Fig. 1) by clicking on the little key-icon in the
plugin's toolbar (Fig. 4). There will be a pull-down menu that contains a list of devices
the plugin can be activated on. Your flash-drive will be listed in case it is supported by
our licensing system. The local machine will always be listed as first entry and is
selected by default. Select your flash-drive and click I'm online.

Step 3: Enter your login data and click Activate. The plugin will contact our ac-
tivation server and download a mobile license file to your flash drive that can be
subsequently used on an arbitrary machine just by plugging it in.

NOTE: The above procedure also applies for offline operation. Please refer to the
Offline Activation section above in order to learn how USB flash-drives can be
activated offline.

There may be some very old unsupported flash-drives that won't appear in the device
list. We are working on an overview of supported & unsupported drives that will be
available via www.plugin-alliance.com/support soon. If your USB flash-drive is among
the unsupported models you have to switch to a model that is supported. Don't
worry, the big majority of all USB flash-drives available is able to handle the task.

Licenser-Toolbar
Alliance plugins have a little toolbar (Fig. 4) below their user-interface giving you
access to additional functionality, which is described in the following.

Fig. 4: Licenser-Toolbar

PA Logo: Clicking the Plugin Alliance logo takes you to the Plugin Alliance website
via your web browser if your computer is online.

License Type: The toolbar displays information about the type of license you're
running: Trial- and Leaselicenses will be displayed along with number of days until
expiration while there simply isn't any note for full licenses as these run unlimited.

$ Icon: If you run a demo version of any of our plugins this icon will be visible. Clicking
this icon opens up a browser that redirects you to the respective product-page in

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Plugin-Alliance store so you can easily purchase a plugin or pay your next installment
without having to look it up on our website.

Key Icon: Clicking on the key icon brings up the activation dialog allowing you to
manually change from trial status to full licenses before the end of the trial phase (in
case you have bought a license in the meantime which has not yet been activated on
the current device). You can also use this feature to activate additional computers or
USB flash-drives.

? Icon: Clicking the ? icon opens up the plugin manual PDF. You must have a
PDF reader installed on your computer to be able to read the manual. Get a
PDF reader for free at www.adobe.com.

Plugin Alliance LLC

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702 N. West St Suite 101
Wilmington, DE 19801
United States of America

www.plugin-alliance.com