Nico on more than one Mac

One subscription covers three Macs — a laptop, a desktop, and one spare. Paste the same key on each.

A reinstall on the same Mac costs nothing

The fingerprint Nico reports is derived from a hardware identifier that survives an operating-system reinstall. So reinstalling macOS, or erasing and restoring, is the same Mac and the same slot. You paste the same key and carry on.

A new Mac

Paste the same key. If one of your three slots is free, the new Mac takes it.

If all three are in use, Nico hands over the slot that has gone longest without being used — provided that Mac has not asked for a licence since your last renewal. A Mac that has not checked in for over a month has either been replaced or is switched off in a drawer, and in both cases passing the slot on is the right answer.

Nothing is deleted on the old Mac when that happens. Its licence simply runs to its own end date, and it asks for a new one next time it is online.

A logic-board repair looks like a new Mac from the outside and costs a slot. That is honest rather than ideal, and it is one email to fix.

"This licence was issued for another Mac"

This is not an accusation, and Nico is careful not to make it sound like one — the commonest cause by a wide margin is simply a new Mac. What the app says is:

This licence was issued for another Mac. Nico will fetch one for this Mac the next time it is online. Press Refresh licence on the Status screen to do it now.

So: press Refresh licence, and in almost every case that is the end of it.

When you genuinely run out of slots

If all three slots are held by Macs that are still in regular use, Nico tells you which three and when each was last used, so you know which one you are willing to let go.

If none of them can be handed over automatically, email vinay@wingmannico.com and we will clear it for you. One person reads that address and he replies. There is nothing to prove and no form to fill in.

One thing worth saying plainly

Machine binding is there to stop a licence file being posted on a forum, not to police you. It is not a serious obstacle to somebody determined to get round it, and we know that. The real reason not to share a key is that it is tied to your email address and your card.