Deleted DRM Folder

I have a Dell Inspiron 1520 with Vista Home Premium and Windows Media Player 11. I have a Dell tv tuner card and Windows Media Center. I download music from Ruckus. If you aren't familiar with Ruckus it is free to college stuents and it's legal. All of the songs are protected by DRM. I usually play the songs with WMP but an error kept popping up, R & R Installer. I looked for a fix on the Microsoft website and one of the steps was to delete the DRM folder. I did and now Ruckus, WMP, and Windows Media Center will not even open. I restored the deleted files from the recycle bin but it didn't fix the probelm. How can I fix this?

 

Does anyone have any suggestions? Thanks

 

After deleting it you have to go to the following site and "re-individualize" WMP...

http://drmlicense.one.microsoft.com/Indivsite/en/indivit.asp?force=1

Then you should be all set. P.S. you shouldn't need to restore the DRM folder, as a new one is created. However, after doing this it will treat your computer as "out-of-box", meaning that if you have any stored licenses, you will have to go to the site and re-download them.

 

I tried going to that page and it won't even load. IE just closes. It's the same when I use firefox.

 

Really? That's strange....almost like a virus. I suggest a repair of Windows. I just got done using my Windows disc to perform a System Restore. There are a few more options with Vista than XP when doing a repair install. I'd check it out and see what you can find. Otherwise, delete the DRM folder like you did previously and use this KB to get to that site.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/925705/en-us

 

WMP keeps accessing the internet...sends & recieves data packet...

is it spying on my music authenticity?

 

For DRM-protected music or other license-protected content, WMP needs to connect to the net to make sure the licenses are still legitimate. For the most part, you could illegally download until you are blue in the face, and WMP would not throw up any flags.

 

I believe Ruckus comes with built-in spyware. That's how they put all the advertising in the player.

I am a college student too and my campus has Ruckus as well. When I installed it, Ruckus added things to my system that it never warned me of. For example, what use do I have for Bonjour Service? I found out that Bonjour Service is a security risk because it adds a very easily breachable backdoor to the system. Upon uninstalling Ruckus, the Bonjour Service and the spyware that came with Ruckus were not removed. Let's just say that Ruckus trashed my system.

I recommend that you not use Ruckus.

Now onto the OP. All music downloaded through Ruckus contains DRM. In fact, any music from an online store contains DRM. The player has to connect to a server to obtain rights to play the song or what not.