Support? What support?! Acrobat...

[Mwambi]

Well now... Adobe just lost a several monthly subscriptions user thanks to what I consider a rip off! You behave in a way I feel I am being stolen so you won't see another cent out of my pocket. Here it is: I have used my laptop for some years. Purchased a new one yesterday and I was installing here the software I have running in the old one. Including Adobe Acrobat XI Standard. So I did. I have kept the ZIP folder from my previous installation and ran it as the way to get all data and files from XI was so difficult that one would easily fall into despair... After installing Acrobat XI on this laptop I was asked to enter the license key, which I did. It returned my license key was no longer valid. To contact support. Which I did. After a couple of sentences the support employee just wrote: we no longer support Acrobat XI. And vanished. Which is great for me. As a pissed off customer, I am starting to save a few hundred USD per year. Not bad. But, before I forget about Adobe for good a few questions:

1- I don't want support. All I wanted is you guys not to delete valid license key from your servers about legally purchased licenses from your customers!

2- When I bought Adobe Acrobat XI I wasn't told the license key had a shelf life!

3- What is your legal basis to invalidate a legally purchased license key to your software?

4- That Adobe, after I have purchased my license for Adobe Acrobat XI, decided to change your business model, that is your problem not mine. That you totally disregard all those customers who helped you out throughout the way to reach the place where you are at present, by invalidating legally purchased license keys, concerns me and tells me a lot about the way you see business!

5- I am too a businessman. The kind of those who keep with their commitments and stick to their deals, informing my customers about all business related issues. That is fair and a must for a sound, balanced and fair supplier/customer relationship;

6- And I never leave a customer without an answer as your "Support" chat employee did;

7- Considering I need Acrobat XI to keep on working on a daily basis, I would like to know how am I gonna use it considering I can't finish installing it because of your action to invalidate that license key?

A very disappointed old time customer about to leave for good!

M.

[Peru Bob]

We are not Adobe.  This is a user to user forum.

Please see if this helps:

https://helpx.adobe.com/x-productkb/global/invalid-revoked-serial-numbers.html

and also this:

https://www.adobe.com/genuine/landing-dnr.html?promoid=791Y6S4Z

[try67]

I can't defend Adobe's support policy for older applications, but a few things are missing from your description:

- Did you originally buy the application from Adobe, or ever registered it with them? If so, that's proof that it is a valid license, and therefore the serial number should be accepted.

- What was the exact text of the error message you got? Did it say it was "invalid" or maybe something like that it requires an earlier serial number? If the latter, it means you have an upgrade license and must locate the s/n for the previous version.

While it's true that Acrobat XI is outdated and no longer supported, activation and licensing issues should still be handled properly, as the license is "perpetual", so-called. If you see you're not getting the support you need from a rep, ask to speak to their supervisor. Also, try calling instead of a chat. That tends to yield better results. Good luck!

[Test Screen Name]

Warning, scammers may contact you privately pretending to be Adobe staff. Adobe will never send you a private message asking you to email an account that isn't @Deleted User, or use Skype. Adobe never ask you for their password. These scammers want your Adobe info, credit cards, your money and control of your computer, please take care.

[JR Boulay]

Instead of going disgusting on a forum being surprised at the "abnormal" behavior of Adobe, a real businessman should have wondered if he was not missing information because he would have been badly informed.

Which is the case: on a modern computer Acrobat XI can only work in its latest version, so you just need to update it.

Acrobat XI latest version is 11.0.23

You can download updaters here:

https://supportdownloads.adobe.com/product.jsp?product=1&platform=Macintosh

or

https://supportdownloads.adobe.com/product.jsp?product=1&platform=Windows

[Dov Isaacs]

@Mwambi 

A few issues to check first:

(1)  Maker sure that you are entering the actual license serial number, usually several groups of letters and digits separated by a dash. A common error to to enter the product's SKU which obviously would yield the error message you received. Note that there is a big difference between an invalid and a revoked product serial number. Exactly what message did you receive?

(2)  Assuming you registered your copy of Acrobat 11 when you originally installed it years ago, if you logon to Adobe's website with the same Adobe ID you registered the product with, you should be able to find the product serial number in your account information. If that serial number doesn't match what you've been entering, voila, you have the source of the problem.

(3)  You mentioned something about a ZIP folder from the previous installation. You cannot reinstall any Adobe product, including Acrobat, by simply bringing over the contents of what you believe to be the software directory created by the previous installation. There are a number of directories associated with Acrobat and many Windows Registry entries. You need to run the actual product installer. If you didn't run the installer, that could be the source of the problem.

Although Adobe no longer provides support for Acrobat 11 in terms of use, it does continue to provide support for license and activation issues for perpetual licenses. The agent should not have given you the response that you report. If you ever encounter that, ask to speak with a supervisor. I recommend that you call Adobe by phone after the holiday and immediately ask for a supervisor, providing your Adobe ID for validation. See https://helpx.adobe.com/contact/phone.html  for a list of phone numbers.

Adobe doesn't revoke perpetual licenses from older software versions after initial installation unless it subsequently finds that the license was invalid in the first place (such as from unauthorized resellers “unbundling” corporate, bulk licenses or the result of “cracked” software) or was part of bulk “term license” that expired. Such term licenses were never offered by Adobe to the general public 

To be very clear, Adobe absolutely does not arbitrarily revoke or otherwise invalidate software licenses and certainly not as a means to force users to buy new perpetual licenses or subscriptions as you appear to accuse Adobe of doing.

Please check on the suggestions I have supplied above and if they do not resolve the problem and/or answer your questions, again, contact Adobe by phone as I have suggested.