I'm in the midst of building a new desktop PC. Is it a simple process to “deactivate” a Houdini license on current machine to activate on the new when ready? What happens if one were to forget to deactivate before the machine is retired? Is it all handled server side or software?

TIA. Stay warm!

See https://www.sidefx.com/faq/license-management/#faq18 [www.sidefx.com]
1. Open the License Administrator on the machine that the license is installed on.
2. Right-click on the license, and choose “Return License”.
3. Log in to your license account to return the license.

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Thanks, Christopher.

What happens if the machine that has Houdini installed/licensed on is inadvertently taken offline/reformatted let's say without returning said license?

I can easily return the license on the existing computer but am thinking if I forget that one time which will be inevitable.

If you do lose the machine on which the licenses were installed, it is possible to recover them. See www.sidefx.com/faq/question/58/. The process is more difficult than returning the license from the machine on which it was installed.

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Very helpful info and yet very archaic methodology. Lol!

I'm building the new Core i9 9900K machine this weekend so I'll be sure to return license first.

Thanks again.