What about other claims made in forums ?

There is a short and there is a long answer to this question. I'll give you both, starting with the short one : these claims are invented (to be polite).

Onto the long answer. No, Starforce doesnt destroy of prevent the use of other softwares (CD burning, emulation or others). It doesnt break down your computer, doesnt spy on your use of a computer, it doesnt require a web connection (unless in the case of a protected download of course). There was no report of such problems, and the installed base of Starforce with Ubisoft games alone is quite enough to be considered a good statistic. There were problems with the previous protection systems we used, and I dont think there was such a rant.

So what about all that can be read here and there ? That's called a hate campaign. Its fueled by people who are indeed made angry by the protection, and the only group that is made angry is the crackers. As they and their friends are pretty much living online (a quirk I share to some extent), they can be quite effective in spreading rumors. And it seems that many forum readers can be impressed when two or three persons keep repeating the same thing over and over, even if it happens to be false. I'm afraid this is how politics work too.

I will keep checking problems reported here, but let me just say that I wont break a sweat about false claims, and about crackers and their friends being annoyed.

Ok but what happens beyond a problem report ? More than 95% of these problems have been solved with the help of Starforce or Ubisoft support people. Actually the level is usually 100%, except on two problems.

The first is with a system crash, it only gets solved two thirds of the time. This happens in 2% of reported problems, less than one user out of ten thousands. So its unsolved for one user out of thirty thousands. In such case starting in safe mode and removing the protection suppresses the crash cause.

The second is with cd/dvd functions problems (no more read/write) reported with Silent Hunter 3. Out of 11 such problems reported, only 2 cases were solved. The problem could not be reproduced, and the origin could not be found. It is suspected not linked with Starforce. It could be due to a defective manufacturing of the cd in the first place, as this is appearing only with one game title. On a statistics level, it is still very low, around one user out of a fifty thousands (0.002%).

Sure, but these are reported problems only ? What about the real existing problems that do not get reported ? Well that's right, we don’t know about the troubles encountered by users who did not report them. But when you're a legitimate buyer, and you have all the contact info to try to solve an issue, why would you NOT do it ? Not much of a logic there, so hopefully these reports cover most actual problems.