If you will no longer be using Photo Mechanic on one of the computers registered to your license, or would like to uninstall the software, you will need to deactivate it first, to free up that activation for use on a different computer.
Deactivating Photo Mechanic
- Launch Photo Mechanic on the computer you wish to deactivate.
- Click on the Help menu.
- Choose Licensing.
- Click Deactivate this computer...
- Photo Mechanic will ask if it can contact the Activation Server, click "Yes".
- You may be prompted for your Administrator Password to run a helper tool that will perform the deactivation Process, this is typically the password you use when you turn your computer on. Enter this password and click "Install Helper". If the password was entered correctly and Photo Mechanic was able to reach the server, the deactivation will complete, and Photo Mechanic will quit.
When to Deactivate Photo Mechanic
Once Photo Mechanic has been activated using your License Key, that activation will remain in use on your License Key until you deactivate it. This means that if you would like to uninstall Photo Mechanic from your computer, you will need to deactivate the software before you remove it from your computer. When you deactivate Photo Mechanic, that frees up the activation in use, allowing you to use that activation on a different computer.
We also recommend deactivating Photo Mechanic when:
- Retiring or selling a computer - Because an activation on your License Key remains active until you deactivate it, an activation can count towards your license even if Photo Mechanic has been uninstalled and the computer has been wiped. If you have lost access to a computer before you were able to deactivate Photo Mechanic, please see the section below.
- Modifying any hardware on your computer Photo Mechanic creates an activation file from the unique configuration of components in your computer. Changing components such as the motherboard, RAM, or Graphics Card can cause the Photo Mechanic activation file to become invalid. If you modified the hardware before you were able to deactivate Photo Mechanic, please see the section below.
If You Cannot Deactivate
If your license was purchased before March 11th 2024, please submit a ticket and the Camera Bits Support team will assist you.
If your license was purchased on or after March 11th 2024, please log into your License Portal account.
Read more information about finding your accounts here.
Uninstalling Photo Mechanic
Once Photo Mechanic has been deactivated from a computer, it is not required to uninstall the software before you can use your license to activate on another computer.
Follow the steps below for your operating system. After the application itself is uninstalled, there are a few other folders containing some supporting files that do not get removed by standard uninstall methods. Please note that these files are typically under a few megabytes in size.
For MacOS
- Deactivate Photo Mechanic as described above
- Quit Photo Mechanic (Command+Q on your keyboard, or click on the Photo Mechanic menu in the Menu Bar and click Quit Photo Mechanic)
- Use the method for uninstalling via the Finder described in Apple's support documentation
Paths to additional folders and files on MacOS:
- /Users/username/Library/Caches/Photo Mechanic
- /User/username/Library/Caches/com.camerabits.PhotoMechanic
- /Users/username/Library/Application Support/LicenseSpring/pm
- /Users/username/Library/Application Support/Camera Bits, Inc
- In /Users/username/Library/Preferences/
- Any file or folder that begins with ‘com.camerabits.PhotoMechanic’
For Windows
- Deactivate Photo Mechanic as described above
- Use the Remove option from the Photo Mechanic installer or one of the methods described in the Windows support documentation
Paths to Folders and files on Windows:
- C:\Users\username\AppData\Local\Camera Bits, Inc
- C:\Users\username\AppData\Roaming\Camera Bits, Inc
- C:\Users\username\AppData\Local\LicenseSpring\pm