I want to protect a Visual Basic 2008 Application.
Which Protector is save against deassembler and Re Engineering,
(at the moment)?

I want to build in a Demo Mode. Whats the best way?
Encrypted License file, or Password on telephone call ?

Use SmartAssembly and code a good reg scheme. that's all

The best way to design a demo mode is to have two seperate versions of the program - one which is a demo version and one which is the full version requiring a license or reg code. The reg code/license will always get hacked, but if you control the distribute of the full version (eg, you send it to people who reg), you will make it more difficult for hacking to get hold of.

The demo version will have all the stuff you don't want usable in at all (eg. code for saving to a file completely missing), so hackers can't re-enable it.

+1 I was just about to post this SAME thing when I read it.

Squidge, this man knows what he's talking about. This IS the best plan.

and maybe next time I'll write my response in English. Sometimes I write complete gibberish that even I can't understand!

Yes...Squidge has given a very good way to protect your app. I would like to add that you can put lot of water-marks unique to each copy of the FULL prog , when distributing it to individual customers, so that once the hackers get a copy leaked out, you can always trace out from WHICH customer the copy of the prog got leaked. This is something like what IDA has...

Of course, the hackers can buy it in the name of some children etc whom you can't trace out and punish easily...But otherwise it is a good way.

One thing we all should remember is that ALL software can be and will be hacked and pirated...Some sooner , some later...We can only delay the process of the pirated copies leaking out...
Of course the ONLY way to make sure that your software is NEVER pirated is to NEVER RELEASE IT in the first place! :-)

I can't think of even a SINGLE piece of software which had NEVER been broken into or cracked, if it was worth it!

drigo, if you wrote your app in vb.net, it shouldn't be too difficult to port it to a web application. then you can ensure that only people with valid licenses (login credentials) uses it because all the code is on the webserver

What about people without internet connection...Especially a fast internet condition...?
STILL, not all people in the world are fortunate enough to have broad-band...Sometimes even the dial-up is not reliable...
Many companies want to avoid web-applications, especially those that require connection to the internet ( as opposed to the ones which are hosted on the intra-net), to avoid problems when the network is down...
This is something which is still seen in the developing countries. They therefore tend to settle for the applications which can be installed locally on their workstations!

I do however agree with Disavowed that porting it to a web application is quite a good way to protect the app...