How to activate PowerDVD 11 in offline mode.

[Mario]

I was pleasantly surprised by the recent release of CyberLink's PowerDVD 11. A universal player, PowerDVD 11 is designed to be the only application you’ll need to view Blu-ray and DVD movies, videos, photos and listen to music. PowerDVD 11 introduces a multitude of new features including support for playback and transfer of content from the iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch and Android phones. In addition to smart device content, PowerDVD also facilitates the playback of remote media from sources such as DLNA servers and social networking sites like Facebook, Flickr and YouTube.

I've been a fan of PowerDVD since version 3. The main reason I started using it was to watch DVD movies on my computer. I have been using it ever since, although at around version 7 it started getting a little silly and bloated. The installer (a single executable) went from 12 to 103 megabytes. Version 8 brought us MoovieLive, which I don't much like how it imposes itself on the user. It's not too bad for what it does, and I understand it's purpose giving the nature of the program. I'd prefer if it was a selectable feature during the install process.

Anyway, version 11 seems to be getting better in a number of ways. The installer executable stands at a somewhat respectable 91MB compared to the previous version's 129MB. The registration process can now be skipped and disabled without having to rely on third party registry hacks. (See Figure 1.) PowerDVD 11 now comes with a basic but descent photo viewer. It's streamlined as part of the regular interface under it's own tab. (See Figure 2.) I found the viewer snappy and easy to use - there's not much to it really. It's not going to replace any dedicated program you may use, but it's good enough to get by when there's nothing else. The settings interface also looks and feels a lot better than previous versions, although I would have preferred more extensive advanced options.

Figure 1.


Figure 2.



Like many of today's software, PowerDVD uses online activation to try and curb unlicensed use. It does this via the use of a unique serial number that gets verified via an internet server. Software activation is something I greatly dislike. I dislike online activation because it forces you to be online, and because you have to rely on the activation service to be able to use the software. The good news in regards to PowerDVD 11 is that there is a rather simple, elegant and legitimate way to bypass online activation entirely. You need simply change a registry key in order to facilitate an offline activation mode. Install PowerDVD, and locate the corresponding registry entry based on your operating system as shown below. Then, simply make sure the UI_UpgradeStrategy value is set to eight (decimal) zeroes. Once done, when you run PowerDVD you will be able to use your serial number to activate the program offline. (You may use this serial: NQMKD-Z774P-4DSQJ-9MRNX-H9ZSG-CRBUA).

32-bit Windows operating system:

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\CyberLink\PowerDVD11\CustomReg]
"UI_UpgradeStrategy"=dword:00000000


64-bit Windows operating system:

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\CyberLink\PowerDVD11\CustomReg]
"UI_UpgradeStrategy"=dword:00000000

I was somewhat disappointed with versions 8 through 10, including version 10 Mark II. PowerDVD 11 seems to be a fresh, re-energized version. I'm very happy with this release. For reference, I am using the Ultra edition of PowerDVD.