Adobe CS6 no longer working

[Caitlyn16B8]

Hello-

I purchased CS 6 in roughly 2012. I have had it installed on my computer since then and have never had any issues until recently when I started to get a message that the registration was no longer working on Illustrator. However, this is not preventing it from opening. When illustrator is running it seems to lag and windows do not show up until I scroll over them.... It's as if the entire program is disintegrating. Any ideas? 

[John T Smith]

I hope you have your original install media (disc or download) and serial number in case you need to reinstall on a new drive, since what you describe MAY be a symptom of a failing hard drive

[Caitlyn16B8]

I have the serial number, unfortunately I don't have the dowload anymore 😞 I can't for the life of me remember where I purchased the software - it does not appear to have been Adobe. 

[John T Smith]

Oops! That is a problem

Adobe has removed ALL public download links for serial number programs
-links are ONLY available to someone who purchased a download from Adobe
.
For serial number programs you may download ONLY if you bought direct from Adobe via download
-Log-in to your account and click this link https://account.adobe.com/products
--click Order history on the left and then the link to your order that will show on the right
--and finally click the link "Downloads and serial numbers" that will appear
---as always, write the serial number in a text file AND copy that text file and the
---download file(s) to an external drive (or two) to be sure you have what you need
-if you did not buy direct from Adobe via download you must find your original install
-if you have an Education or volume license you MUST use your original media
--the link for an Education or volume license download is not available at all
-if you bought a disc and don't have a drive you will need to buy an external USB drive
-if you bought and lost a disc Adobe does not provide a replacement via download
-if you bought a download from a 3rd party vendor you will need to contact that vendor
.
When you do have a download, be sure to copy it to at least one external device
-a usb flash drive or hard drive, or write to a DVD
-plus a text file containing your serial number

[Caitlyn16B8]

In a very interesting turn of events, I turned off almost all of my startup items, and all of the issues have resolved themselves. 

[John T Smith]

Hardware crashes or virus infections or simple software problems happen, so you should buy AND USE software to make a full backup of your hard drive to an external USB hard drive... plus, making step-by-step backups during a new setup or major program addition makes it easy to go back a step if something doesn't work
.
This backup and then restore is, of course, only to the same computer with a new drive (or the same drive as long as you don't mind writing over everything) since doing a restore to a new computer requires extra steps due to Windows and many programs having activation information that is keyed to your hardware (which is why Windows will force you to RE-Activate if you change very much hardware)
.
The product I bought and use is at http://www.terabyteunlimited.com/image-for-linux.htm
.
Image runs off of a bootable CD via Linux (the Zip you download includes a program to make the bootable CD) and it reads EVERYTHING on the drive, even the hidden registration information, so everything is restored when needed... and you may not only restore the image over a messed up install, you may restore to a brand new drive in case of a hardware crash, and not have to re-install anything (my version 2x DOES require me to restore to a same size drive... I think the current 3x Image program allows restoring to a larger/smaller drive, but check with the vendor to verify)