Link to home
Create AccountLog in
Hardware

Hardware

--

Questions

--

Followers

Top Experts

Avatar of moyles
moyles

Dongle no longer recognised. Old DOS Software
Hi,
I've an old DOS program (1992 installed) that requires a dongle to work. I recently did a backup of the harddrive, the software worked fine after rebooting but when it was moved to its work location and rebooted it failed to find the dongle on the parallel port. The parallel port prints fine.

The company no longer exists who developed the software is there
1. Any option to get this running again?
or
2. Modify the dongle.

I have another dongle for another computer but it is different serial number and only works with its own computer. There is a battery in the dongle.

3. Could this be removed without causing the dongle any harm.

The Dongle is Dallas Semiconductor.

Thanks...

Zero AI Policy

We believe in human intelligence. Our moderation policy strictly prohibits the use of LLM content in our Q&A threads.


Avatar of ridrid🇸🇱

"I recently did a backup of the harddrive, the software worked fine after rebooting but when it was moved to its work location and rebooted it failed to find the dongle on the parallel port. The parallel port prints fine."

What did you do, exactly? You moved the hard drive? From what to what? What O/S(s) are involved here?

If the HD was moved between computers, the I/O address of the parallel port may not be the same in both systems.

/RID

Avatar of moylesmoyles

ASKER

Hi,
The harddrive (DOS) was moved to a remote USB copier where we able to copy the data to another computer harddrive (Windows XP). The program did work after reinstalling the harddrive.

I did try to install a ZIP drive so we could use this as a backup tool but this did not work as it failed to find the device. The computer was installed on site and then the problem arose.

Avatar of ridrid🇸🇱

So, if I got you correctly, it worked and works in the DOS environment, but not in win XP?

If so, it's very probably the Hardware Abstraction Layer (included in win NT and onwards) that doesn't allow proper access to the hardware, which makes it impossible to read the parallel port dongle correctly.
/RID

Reward 1Reward 2Reward 3Reward 4Reward 5Reward 6

EARN REWARDS FOR ASKING, ANSWERING, AND MORE.

Earn free swag for participating on the platform.


Avatar of moylesmoyles

ASKER

It worked in DOS and worked after the data backup copy and the attempt to install the zip harddrive but does not work now when it went to site. The XP computer is only for Backup and I do not expect it to operate in XP.

The problem is it is now looking for dongle XXXXXXXXX and then can do no more. The dongle is installed as before as it is labeled.

Thanks for your time.
Brendan

Avatar of ridrid🇸🇱

If it is the same computer - check that nothing has become dislodged.
If it is another computer - check I/O address and IRQ line that is used for the LPT port you are using; I guess it must be the same values in both computers (BIOS settings, or at least info in the BIOS system summary screen).
/RID

Avatar of moylesmoyles

ASKER

It is the same computer and everything seem ok.

I tried another computer and it had the same problem, although I did not look at the settings. How do I check the I/O address and IRQ line.

Brendan.

Free T-shirt

Get a FREE t-shirt when you ask your first question.

We believe in human intelligence. Our moderation policy strictly prohibits the use of LLM content in our Q&A threads.


Avatar of moylesmoyles

ASKER

The Dongle battery is currently only reading 3.2V maybe with the dongle removed from the PC for over an hour it lost its data information. The PC was not moved or checked in over 10 years. Should the battery reading be closer to 5V

Just a thought?????

ASKER CERTIFIED SOLUTION
Avatar of PUNKYPUNKY🇺🇸

Link to home
membership
Log in or create a free account to see answer.
Signing up is free and takes 30 seconds. No credit card required.
Create Account

Avatar of Chris BChris B🇦🇺

What is the program - might be able to find it somewhere.

Chris B

SOLUTION
Avatar of ridrid🇸🇱

Link to home
membership
Log in or create a free account to see answer.
Signing up is free and takes 30 seconds. No credit card required.

Avatar of moylesmoyles

ASKER

The software is TCCS30 not available anywhere it was installed with the system in 1992 and is used to monitor and store generating capacity and errors from a number of generators.

The company no longer exists and no dongle replacement is available.

You are right some this company http://www.donglefree.com/ say they can help and modify the software to run dongle free any thoughts.?

Reward 1Reward 2Reward 3Reward 4Reward 5Reward 6

EARN REWARDS FOR ASKING, ANSWERING, AND MORE.

Earn free swag for participating on the platform.


Avatar of PUNKYPUNKY🇺🇸

You can try, but I have been thru with such issue before, system crashed, someone messed up, etc. and that costed my company a lot of money to obtain new keys. Is the parallel dongle key is RainBow, or Sentinal?

Avatar of moylesmoyles

ASKER

Dongle is a Dallas Semiconductor.

Avatar of PUNKYPUNKY🇺🇸

Believe me, you are out of luck for this issue. Made from 1992! or made in present, still same issue. Engineering does very good job on such to protect it from illegal activities and they have so far very successful. Sorry, though. You might read the link below, and ask some support if they could help.

http://www.macrovision.com/support/by_category/dongle_faq.shtml#dongle 


Free T-shirt

Get a FREE t-shirt when you ask your first question.

We believe in human intelligence. Our moderation policy strictly prohibits the use of LLM content in our Q&A threads.


Avatar of PUNKYPUNKY🇺🇸

Also, go this forum: http://www.woodmann.com/forum/index.php 

Avatar of moylesmoyles

ASKER

Hopefully found an old contact that should have sourced a dongle. So this should work. Not going to risk any dongle crack sites.

Thanks for your time guys, it is hard maintain software when companies change all the time.

Avatar of PUNKYPUNKY🇺🇸

Moyles, I have been thru this situation before (on many CAD machines in my company), and I knew it is no good when we mess with it. Not only software, if you lost dongle key, they could charge you up to thousands bucks for a replacement.

Good luck, and thank for the accept.

Reward 1Reward 2Reward 3Reward 4Reward 5Reward 6

EARN REWARDS FOR ASKING, ANSWERING, AND MORE.

Earn free swag for participating on the platform.


PUNKY,

thanks!
Hardware

Hardware

--

Questions

--

Followers

Top Experts

Hardware includes cell phones and other digital living devices, tablets, computers, servers, peripherals and components, printers and scanners, gaming consoles, networking hardware such as routers, hubs, switches and modems, storage devices and security equipment such as firewalls and other appliances.