Can I do this?

[NigelC]

I have upgraded Photoshop every few versions or so. When I got a new desktop for P/shop work, I de-activated CS2 on our general home computer as it was now running on new machine and laptop and reverted to P7 which doesn't have activation. As I have now upgraded the two other machines to CS5, can I re-activate CS2 on the "home" machine? I just wondered if the upgrades are self standng or actually sit "on top of" the previous version, in which case the 2 CS2 activations are alraedy used, if you see what I mean!

[martinog]

I have CS5 activated on 2 computers and CS3 on a 3rd. It hasn't caused any problems so far.
Martin

[Mark D Segal]

I have upgraded Photoshop every few versions or so. When I got a new desktop for P/shop work, I de-activated CS2 on our general home computer as it was now running on new machine and laptop and reverted to P7 which doesn't have activation. As I have now upgraded the two other machines to CS5, can I re-activate CS2 on the "home" machine? I just wondered if the upgrades are self standng or actually sit "on top of" the previous version, in which case the 2 CS2 activations are alraedy used, if you see what I mean!

Best is to phone Adobe Customer Care and confirm your options with them. My understanding of the licensing rules is (i) you are allowed no more than 2 copies of the program but can use them only one at a time. So if you already have CS5 activated on two computers, you will need to de-activate one of the installations in order to put the same application version/same license on another. You can still up-grade from CS2 to CS5, but that is the limit of the number of back-versions to which you can be eligible for the up-grade price.

[sniper]

I think once you have upgraded a version you can't then re-activate it (could be wrong)