PSP X4 activation screwing me up (again)

[ender]

I upgraded to Windows 8 Pro as soon as the final version was available on MSDN. PaintShopPro X4 and X3 (I've got both installed) worked fine after the upgrade until I had to replace my network card - neither of them would activate afterwards, and I couldn't get them activated even with the help of support (I'd get an error that the activation code is invalid). Since I'm running Windows 8, the support just suggested that I pay for upgrade to X5 - less than a year after I bought X4, something I'm not willing to do precisely because of the bad experience I have with activation (in the past I've had PSP deactivate every time I upgraded VirtualBox, and had to make international phonecalls to get it activated again).

Anyway, 2 days ago PSP X4 suddenly worked again - without me doing anything. And yesterday it worked once, then requested activation. I clicked Activate, and this time it didn't report any errors - PSP started. But when I exited it and ran it again, I was again asked to activate. Instead of doing that, I first uninstalled VirtualBox and then clicked Activate and reinstalled VirtualBox (because that's what prevented PSP from deactivating after VirtualBox upgrades in the past), except this time PSP was again deactivated when I ran it after install. However, I didn't try to activate it and just clicked Close and re-ran it - after a few tries it started, and right now it seems to work like this - run PSP, if it wants to activate cancel and retry until it works.

How can I get PSP permanently activated, because I'm really getting tired of "Time's up!" popping up? No other program on my computer has such a broken activation system.

[teknisyan]

You may need to generate a new activation code, since the activation process will kick-in once you change any hardware component on your computer and in your case the network card.

Rather than calling, I suggest that you contact the Corel Online Support by going to the Corel Support page at http://corel.com/support then click on the GET LIVE SUPPORT you'll at the upper right corner of the page or just below the cart icon. They will be able to help you.

[ender]

I used the online chat this time (because I called outside working hours for EU tech support). The agent was trying to help, but the activation codes he generated didn't work for me (we tried several times, both for PSP X4 and X3). He escalated me to e-mail support, which gave me a new serial to try, and that one didn't work either (I uninstalled PSP X4 and then reinstalled it with the new serial - activation still didn't work, the message I got when trying online activation was "The Activation Code you have provided is invalid. Please try again, or visit www.corel.com for information on contacting customer service." - the same as when I used the activation code provided through chat).

[ender]

Yesterday I was told that my case is being escalated. Today I got an e-mail telling me to pay for CD version, because that doesn't need activation - WTF?!
1) Why should I pay for physical copy when I already have the ESD version?
2) Why doesn't the physical copy require activation, and why can't that version be made available for download? I already bought the product.

Also, I don't have an optical drive (haven't had one for years), which is why I buy my software in ESD versions.

[Kathy_9]

They can and should email you a link to their FTP site so you can download an image of an installation CD free of charge. That would solve the problem as activation would not be required.