If you read my E3 report about Starforce (shame on you if you didn't!)

SimHQ E3 Starforce Report

you know that we had an excellent meeting with Starforce representatives and they were very receptive to hearing our member's concerns, questions, and issues as respects their anti-piracy software products.

So much so, that I have just received an email from their PR Manager as a follow up to that meeting confirming their interest to get our feedback.

Therefore, now is the time to speak up and hear back directly from Starforce. We have had several threads in this forum, and others, but none recently, so I like to know what the fallout has been since the initial explosions of interest.

Please keep your posts in the context of problems that you personally have experienced, not something you "heard about" that someone had. Be specific about the product you bought that had Starforce on it, what the problem(s) was, how you first noticed it, if it was resolved how did it get resolved, if it's still a problem how are you coping with it and what have you done to try and fix it or get answers. A brief description of your machine specs would be useful, especially if it involves CD/DVD drives.

Realize that StarForce is a configurable product, meaning that the software producer/developer has some flexibility in how they utilize StarForce (such as limited activations) and that some of these issues may not "belong" to StarForce at all, but rather to the producer/developer's use of it in their product. We'll try and find out which issue belongs in whose court.

If you have StarForce questions, that's fine too, but keep them brief and to the point.

One final thing, which I hope you can all appreciate. I reserve the right to make decisions on what will be forwarded on to Starforce. If certain questions are closely related, I may summarize them into one, etc. In other words, I can't guarantee I will have an answer to every single question, but I will do my absolute best to see that every legimate question or issue is addressed.

With that caveat, I open the floor to you.

I am going to purchase Silent Hunter 3 this weekend and will benchmark IL2FB+Aces before and after installation and report my findings. This is the issue that has made me the most apprehensive about purchasing SH3. I would appreciate other's results of similar benchmarking. I have seen reports of lost performance here, but I'm not convinced that driver changes between benchmarks aren't to blame. Limited activations prevented me from purchasing Lock On FC by direct download from Eagle Dynamics by the way.

Is starforce developing or considering developing the ability for a user to make and use a backup copy of a game rather than the original CD/DVD?

I would not find the answer 'you can get the damaged CD/DVD replaced via the publisher' to be a satisfactory answer.

If installing a game with "Starforce" on it, causes damage to my other programs....say my DVD writer no longer writes properly...[a common complaint]...what recourse do I have to recover my lost time and money?

Can I sue them here, where I bought the product, or would I have to go to Russia?
Will they be obligated to pay, being from Russia and my being in the US?
Can Starforce just ignore me, with no penalties?

Hi Tom .

My system has slowed right down since I loaded SH3, some programs do not respond and I have to re-boot. The `security` programs I run also have a hard time with it.

I KNOW the problem lies with `Starforce`, IMHO they should sort this out NOW, many people have said that they will not buy any other products with `SF` included - I am one of them.

UBISOFT - are you listening ? (obviously not)

I will donate money to any person/group taking out a class action - this has got to be sorted out.

Hi Murphy, how ya doing?

I'm not sure about the "slowness" issue. Just from my reading, it does seem some people have had that problem, others certainly haven't. Don't know what the proportion is.

Guys, I will ask the questions, as I said I would and I am quite sure they will investigate and respond accordingly. It is clear to me that some issues properly belong to StarForce and others to the developers. Which are which? One of the things I hope will be clarified.

If there are problems which have occurred with DVD writers no longer working, or whatever, it may just be there are some fixes for what ails us, that do not involve lawsuits or threats or claims.

I don't think threatening them with lawsuits is the way to foster what I see as a cooperative effort. They have clearly stated their intention to hear us out, so let's give them the opportunity to do so.

Also, let me repeat, if you have specific problems, it would probably help to have some system specs. Just think about all the permutations of computers in the world, from OS to hardware, software, peripherals, etc. It's mind boggling and probably explains to some extent why certain folk have legit problems while others do not.

Hello:

I have SHIII and I have recently upgraded to Win64 XP. The present StarForce does not work under Win64. Do they have a 64 bit version of StarForce? If so, where can I download it or does Ubi need to implement a patch for SHIII? I cannot play SHII until this problem is corrected.

Thanks
SHunter

#1 installs off my toshiba but the SF cant read the dvd. Had to disable the toshiba and use an old flaky pioneer dvd to play.

#2 screwed up my backup software. Wasted 2 dvd+r + 1 with a error (data checked out though) before I figured what was up. Unstalled SH3 & SF and the problem disappeared.

switching the dvd is a pain but messing up my RW is too much.

Brand new system, P4 3.6 Ghz, NU DWD/RW.

After I installed SH III, it ran nice the first time. After that, whenever I tried to launch SH III, it would keep checking the disc and never start. It runs on my laptop though.

What is worse. I was no longer able to play any DVD´s on the drive, I uninstalled SHIII and starforce, reinstalled Powerdvd and now it runs.

I looks as if I won´t be able to run SHIII on this rig. Shame

Guys, we need a brief description of your machine specs would be useful, especially if it involves CD/DVD drives.

Ever since I installed SH3 and StarForce, my DVD (read-only) drive has been behaving erratically.

It will only play movies when it feels like it (which is rarely) and it no longer autodetects discs (DVD OR CD), meaning that I have to manually start up everything.

This is clearly not satisfactory, and before StarForce reps reply in the arrogant fashion they used on the Ubi boards, I'd like to point out that no, I do NOT own any "hacker tools", I do NOT own a single piece of pirated software and yes, I DO know how to build a computer. I was building them while the employees of StarForce were still trying to graduate from Kindergarten.

I want solutions, not condescending attempts at shifting the blame on me.

My box worked flawlessly prior to SH3 and StarForce, it doesn't now.

Do the math.
__________________________
Athlon XP 2700+
Gigabyte GA-7VAXP MoBo
1 Gb PC2700 DDR RAM
Audigy 2
BFG 6600GT OC
Benq DVD ROM drive

All drivers, including chipset drivers, are latest versions.

I have a PIONEER DVD-ROM DVD-115 which does not work with silent hunter 3 If i install from this drive it can not read the dvd, luckily i had also a dvd rw burner from NEC when I installed it from this drive I could play. This kind of things is very annoying when you buy a game and you have to deal with this protection issues. Thank you

Hello, first post over here; wish it were a more pleasant topic for a first post. I have five concerns about Starforce. Silent Hunter III is my only encounter with it so far, and I've been unimpressed enough to decide that it will also be my last unless things are drastically improved.

1) I object to it in principle. It presupposes guilt on the part of the purchaser in advance of any crime being committed. Even if they don't articulate it as such, U.S. customers do practically everything with an idea in the back of their heads called "right to privacy." So in my opinion Starforce makes these customers uncomfortable because it assumes that what they do within that privacy is illegal.

2) The "warning" on the outside of the package is utterly inadequate. I realize this particular problem needs to be addressed by software publishers (such as Ubi) as well, but customers with no previous knowledge of what Starforce is or how it works are not getting fair information BEFORE they make their purchase. I don't care what it says in the EULA because you won't be able to see that until you've bought the game -- in many cases that purchase is made from a store such as Best Buy which under most circumstances will not take the software back for any reason. So all you have to go on is the product info on the box, which is scant in the case of SH3. On my SH3 package all it says is: "Notice: This game contains technology intended to prevent copying that may conflict with some CD-RW, DVD-RW, and virtual drives." This is written in tiny print at the bottom of the back of the box. It doesn't begin to provide answers to logical questions, such as "WHICH DRIVES?" Again, I realize that Ubi is at least partly responsible for this, but between them and Starforce, the legal purchaser is the only one getting the shaft, not the pirates.

-- I'll leave the political philosophy there because the rest of what could be said would be a thread unto itself.

Ok, so more tangible issues:

3) Inability to make backup copies of Starforce protected software. I always make a backup disc of whatever I buy for sake keeping, and I consider that to be part of the fair and legitimate use of the product I paid for.

4) My autoplay has become unpredictable as well. In particular, WinAmp no longer plays music CDs when they are inserted. Before SH3 (and thus, Starforce), they played fine. Now, they won't play on autorun OR on manual. I have Roxio player, too, so that's not a major inconvenience, but as far as I can tell it is a conflict caused by Starforce.

5) My biggest single issue is that since installing, burning CDs and DVDs has become hit or miss. Sometimes they'll burn, and sometimes they won't. With Nero they won't burn at all. With Roxio sometimes they will, sometimes they won't. This includes images, audio, documents -- ALL of which I legally own, ALL of which is related to my profession, and NONE of which has ANYTHING to do with Silent Hunter III -- and is therefore nobody's business but mine.

I have to come down on the side of freedom instead of security on this one. After all, it's not MY security Starforce is invested in, and certainly not MY freedom. I'm all in favor of copy protection, but only to the extent that it protects what I agreed for it to protect when I accepted the EULA. In other words, when I accepted the SH3 EULA, I agreed that I would not make -- or, more importantly, sell or otherwise distribute -- mass quantities of Silent Hunter III. I did NOT agree to surrender any other use of the PC in order to use their product. Thus we're back to #1.

I'm not a software pirate, I don't use "hack tools" (unless you count that rusty saw in the garage), and I'm not some twit who can't assemble a PC. If you want the twit that put mine together, call Dell.

Back in the early days of computing there was a distinction made between systems software and applications software.

Systems software provides services across a wide spectrum of PC programs. Operating Systems like Windows are considered systems software ... sound/video drivers ... disk compression ... fire walls ...

Applications software provides a much more narrow and targetted functionality for performing a specific task. Text editors, word processors, spread sheets, and games fall into this category ...

One of the key concepts is that systems software is usually continuously in operation and interacting across a wide range of software that is executing on a system. Applications software tends to only be executing and interacting with other parts of the system when it is needed by the user to perform specific tasks.

Thus, a game is only loaded, executing, and interacting with the hardware and software environment when the user decides to play it. However, a video driver is continuously loaded, executing, and interacting regardless of what the user is doing with the system.

Another key concept is that improperly implemented systems software represents an exposure (potential for unwanted behavior) to the entire system. Whereas an improperly implemented application only presents any exposure when it is in fact in use. And usually the worst exposure introduced by an application should be that it fails to perform the task for which it was intended.

If not for Starforce, SH3 which is marketted as a game, would be classed as an application. However, due to Starforce and its implementation as systems software (a permanently resident and executing device driver), SH3 becomes systems software. Thus, the exposure a user has when installing any SF game is far greater than any non-SF game. Installing an SF game is on par to upgrading video or sound drivers; except that the manufacturer of those drivers seeks a tight and effective implementation of those drivers for maximum stability. The manufacturer of Starforce drivers must by their very nature seek a convoluted and difficult to reverse engineer implementation which puts these drivers in a much more suspect class of reliability than video drivers.

My question: Does Starforce intend to introduce a better implementation to the marketplace such that the scope of the interaction of their product with the user's system is no greater than the game (an application) that was purchased? Specifically an implementation that will require no memory resident and executing software when the game itself is not loaded into memory?

Thank you.

There was a security issue with a previous version of Starforce that allowed access to what should be protected kernel level space. What steps are Starforce taking to prevent such problems in the future?

With all due respect: Impending lawsuits is not a "threat", it's a promise, since StarForce is obviously skirting dangerously close to being in violation of just about every US law regarding third party software installing itself without the express knowledge of the user and ability to opt out, NOT to mention the fact that it interferes with parts of your computer's functionality that fall entirely outside of the scope of legitimate copy protection.

In other words, it's spyware, malware, call it what you will.

Edited Repost from a different thread in this forum:

I am getting very frequent (some times as much as once every 30-60 minutes) semi-random CTDs (most of the time with some sort of Windows error message, though sometimes without) in several games, including SH3, WWIIOL, etc. The problem seems more severe if I have IE running in the background, but even disabling it doesn't guaruntee stable play. At other times, other minor applications (such as Game Commander, TIR, or GF keys) also crash with similar random error messages. Other games (Wings over Vietnam, Il-2FB/Pacific Fighters, Rome: Total War, etc.) seem relatively or entirely unaffected by this problem.

I have run numerous virus scans, disk checks, etc., and whhile they have found and fixed some minor problems, the big problem remains unaltered. I first noticed having serious trouble with this problem with on or around the time I installed SHIII (though since I was not actively looking for the problem or its cause at that point, I cannot be sure). While I have not yet been able to rule out entirely a driver, hardware, or virus as the cause, it is beginning to look like Starforce or something else related to SHIII is at fault.

I don`t know if this is the fault of `Starforce` but I`ve now found out I`m unable to add attachments to e-mails ??

specs :-

AMD 64 3200+ Stk 754 OEM
Akasa AK 855 socket 754/940 cooler
Gigabyte GA K8 VT800 Pro
1Gb PC3200 DDR 400
Maxtor serial 160Gb 7200
Radeon 128Mb 9800 Pro
Liteon/Ms 52x24 IDE ReWriter
Creative Audigy ZS
7700 Creative Labs Inspire
Logitech Premium desktop optical

No problems here. Everything is tip top. I am not bothered by the presence of starforce at all.

I've been having some problems with my GSA-4082B DVD-RAM drive after installing Silent Hunter III. Sometimes it refuses to read disks at all, both DVDs and cdroms. Other times it will read them, but takes a really long time to start reading properly.

I've confirmed it's not the drive itself, since I've returned it to the shop I bought it from, but they found no problems with the drive at all.

These problems disappear when I use a Starforce removal utility, so it seem pretty clear Starforce is the problem here.

No virtual cd or burning programs are installed.

Other specs:
AMD XP 3000+
Ati Radeon 9600 XT