Software doesn't recognize dongle

[dinotwo]

My wife has a very old version of Bernina embroidery editing software installed in Vista on an old MacBook Pro, which we haven’t used for a number of years, but she would like to use the software occasionally again. It’s not worth it to her to purchase a new version, as it is quite expensive. With a new battery and AC adaptor the computer runs fine, and Parallels and Vista start up just like they used to.

However. The software won’t run because it can’t find the USB dongle (security device). It always ran years ago. I got it to run once by using Device Manager to scan for hardware changes, and when that didn’t work, uninstalling the dongle driver, then reinstalling it. But that was once and I can’t duplicate it.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. We have always been Mac users and know little about Windows.

MacBook Pro 17-inch, Early 2008
Intel Core 2 Duo
6 GB RAM
OS X El Capitan 10.11.6
Parallels Desktop 9.0.24251
Windows Vista Service Pack 2

 

[wither 3]

When the dongle is plugged in, does it or an unknown device show up in Device Manager, Universal Serial.................?

Also, do you have more than one USB connection port on the computer?

 

[dinotwo]

I don't notice anything change at Device Manager > Universal .... when I plug in the dongle.

I get the same result with all 3 ports.

When my wife runs the software, she has to right-click and select Run as Admin. Could the driver software be incorrectly installed?

 

[dinotwo]

OK, this is weird. I was away from the computer for a while, and when I came back, the light at the end of the dongle was lit, and the program loaded fine. I had forgotten that there was a light there. I shutdown Windows then restarted, and the light remained lit and the program ran. I shutdown Windows and the computer and the light went out. When I restarted the computer, the light came on briefly while the Mac OS began to load; but then went out and hasn't been on since.

 

[wither 3]

Are you able to boot the system with Windows or do you have to boot with the MAC OS. Based on this-

Stop! Don’t plug that USB drive into your Mac until you read this

Learn the nuances of file formats to get the most out of your flash drives.

www.macworld.com

The drive has to have a particular format to use in both a MAC OS and Windows OS

 

[dinotwo]

The computer boots with the Mac OS. Since this older computer will only run an OS older than macOS 10.13 High Sierra, it must be formatted to Mac OS Extended. Windows runs in Parallels.