Why is my Signed Machine ID invalid for the trial?

If your Signed Machine ID is being rejected when you try to purchase the copy trading free trial, it's almost always one of two things: the "Invalid Vendor Name" error, or this machine has already claimed a Replikanto trial. This article covers both, plus how to generate the Signed Machine ID in the first place.

How to generate your Signed Machine ID

1. Open the NinjaTrader Control Center, then click Help > 3rd Party Licensing.
2. In the Vendor Name field, enter FlowBots — capital F and B.
3. In the User Defined ID field, enter a short identifier for you or your machine using only letters (A-Z) and numbers, up to 60 characters, with no spaces, dots, @ or other symbols. If it contains any other character, checkout rejects the Signed Machine ID as invalid.
4. Click Submit just once, then close the window.
5. Copy the newly generated Signed Machine ID into the Signed NinjaTrader Machine ID 1 field on the checkout page.

For the full walkthrough, including what to do when buying licenses for more than one machine, see How can I generate a signed NinjaTrader Machine ID?

Why checkout might say the Signed Machine ID is invalid

"Invalid Vendor Name" error

This is a known NinjaTrader bug, not something you did wrong. It happens when the Submit button on the 3rd Party Licensing screen is clicked more than 5 times (including across NinjaTrader restarts), which gets your IP address temporarily blocked by NinjaTrader's license server.

• You don't have to wait: the block is tied to the IP address of your current internet connection. Connect your computer to a different network (for example, your phone's mobile hotspot) and retry right away — entering FlowBots as the Vendor Name and clicking Submit only once. Once NinjaTrader shows your new Signed Machine ID (ending in your User Defined ID), you can turn off the hotspot and go back to your usual internet connection; you don't need it to restart NinjaTrader.
• If you can't use another network, the block lifts on its own after 24 hours. Then retry the same way, clicking Submit only once.

Machine ID already used for a trial

The free trial can only be claimed once per Machine ID. If this machine already redeemed a Replikanto trial, checkout will keep rejecting it with the message "Machine ID ... already used for trial, please change your input." no matter how many times you regenerate it or change the User Defined ID — the hardware portion of the Machine ID (before the dash) doesn't change. You'll need a genuinely different machine to start a new trial, or purchase a licensed version instead.