Posted by Cray_Z on 1/21/2000, 3:38 pm
206.168.243.198
II. Intermediate Tasks I've been spending my spare time the last few days working in W32Dasm and looking for help on the board. And after this time, I've realized something........I'm lost! For some reason, I can't get SICE to work on my computer, so I've been forced to do all of my work on W32Dasm. Most people's answers are from SICE, and since I can't use SICE, I'm not getting as much help from the board as I'd like. (I'm not saying people aren't doing great and trying to help the newbies like me, it's just that without SICE, I'm getting lost when I read some people's threads.) I did find some good help tho. Shade's thread has been helping me more than anything. Thanks Shade!! Anyway, this is incomplete, but it's what I've been able to come up with.
II.1 Try to get rid of the nagscreen. Find a patch that removes the nagscreen (the one that appears at startup.
Well, I can't figure out how to JUST make it so that the nag doesn't appear. By changing the jump if equal at :00446efc to nop nop, it makes it so that the nag doesn't appear AND the program doesn't expire. Normally I would be happy about this, but as this is a learning experience for me, I'd like to figure out how to ONLY make the nag disappear.
II.2 Change your date and bypass the "Evaluation period expired" nag. Find a patch that makes the program never expire.
Read anser to II.1
II.3 Make your name and company appear in the "About screen". In registered versions, the name and company replace the "Unregistered" in the nagscreen - Find a patch for it.
This one didn't give me much trouble. I found the string reference 'Unregistered' (which there were 2 references, so I had to try them both), and right above the reference there was a jne which I changed to je, and that did it!
II.4 Get a valid serial for Name:Unregistered - Company: Unregistered Now, the serial-stuff begins. Get a valid serial for the specified name and company.
As I said before, I can't get SICE to work on my computer (if anybody knows where I can get some help with that, please let me know), and as far as I know, there isn't a way to get the serial with just W32Dasm.
II.5 Find the "best" patch for nagscreen, time limit, register box (accept all serials) and About box.
Patch the file in a way that you remove all limits by changing less than 7 bytes - 3 bytes are my solution, so go for the 2 ;)I'm still trying to work on this one, but it's a tough one for me! I have read some people's threads where they get a 1 or 2 or 3 byte patch, but I don't really understand HOW they knew to change what they did.
Thanks for taking the time to read my thread!Cray_Z
P.S. I hope there's not a problem with me posting my task 2 answers on the task 3 board. If so, lemme know.