[Darryl Ramm]

Originally Posted by bruceup

I just reinstated my annual plan for Pro Tools Ultimate, and was running 2018.12 on Mac Pro 5,1 High Sierra with an HD i/o flawlessly (with no plan) until the reinstatement this morning.* Account and iLok show licenses are active and good for another year.* Now PT no longer launches at all.* I uninstalled, reinstalled 2018.12 and hd driver, nothing. *

PSA: folks please stop leaping to reinstalling Pro Tools when you have problems, troubleshoot first. If you reinstall stuff if often does not help and you don't know if the ongoing problem is the same as the original or you created more of a problem.

Even if you should have done this there is normally no reason to uninstall anything on a Mac. How did you uninstall Pro Tools? Just drag and drop the app folder in the trash?

What exactly did you on the Mac prior to first finding Pro Tools did not launch?

Any chance macOS updates ran and updated stuff?

Updating a Pro Tools perpetual license obviously should not stop a version launching that is also covered by the new license. And a license problem should not cause this behavior, but maybe a licensing change triggered some other problem.

Are you absolutely sure you did not accidentally purchase a subscription or somehow you were sent a wrong licenses? No that should not cause the symptoms you are seeing but maybe it triggers some other problem. What exactly does ILM say for license details on your iLok?

All I get when I double click the PT icon is a short flash and then nothing, no plug scanning or any of the usual ritual (just spinning beachball). System shows that PT is active, but it's not, and only a force-quit will stop whatever process is going on. *

Is the Pro Tools icon bouncing up and down in the dock after you double click it? If so that can be a sign that it's waiting on Apple code signing/verification servers. I doubt that is the problems, but you can verify your Mac can reach the servers by in the Terminal running...

$ ping ocsp.apple.com

And seeing that those validation servers respond to the ping. You can also disconnect your Mac from all networks (Wifi, Wired Ethernet etc.) and that will stop macOS gatekeeper trying to reach the servers.

I can't trash prefs, caches and such since it won't launch. I'm stumped and up against deadlines of course.* Any ideas?

You mean because Pro Tools will not launch? Or because PT Prefs will not launch? If you mean Pro Tools this does not make sense. Since you can trash prefs at any time and you are supposed to do it with Pro Tools not running. Are you seeing errors when you try to trash prefs. Describe *exactly* what low level things you are doing and seeing.

Here are some troubleshooting things that would probably make sense to have tried earlier and try now;

Trash prefs (ideally use Pete Gates PT Prefs to make sure this is done correctly).
Reboot the computer.
Hold down 'N' and see if Pro Tools gets further, and you can select built-in output as the playback engine. (yes even if the failure seems to happen before this point the playback engine dialog would open)
Move all .aaxplugin files out of the plugin folder, trash prefs try again. Pro Tools will put the core plugins back. Just leave them like that and don't resinstall anything out until you make more progress. (yes even if the failure seems to happen before plugins load)
Create a new Admin account and test from there.
Install the latest version of iLok License Manager and repeat tests.