Installation troubleshooting for computers

The device is not showing up in the Prey panel

If you recently installed Prey but cannot see the device in your Prey panel, the client might be facing issues connecting to our servers or finalizing its configuration.

Allow time for unattended installations

If you installed the client using an unattended installation method (like an MSI package, unattended installation link, MDM script, or command line), the process finishes in the background.

• Ensure the device has an active internet connection.
• Allow up to 2 minutes for the client to perform its first connection to the Prey servers and appear in your Prey panel.

Check antivirus and firewall settings

Strict corporate firewalls or endpoint protection software (antivirus) can block the Prey client from reporting back to the Prey panel.

• Ensure that your antivirus is not quarantining the Prey executable files.
• Verify that your local or network firewall allows outbound traffic to Prey's servers.
  (See our Network Requirements documentation for the exact domains and ports to whitelist).

The device is overwriting an already assigned slot

Prey relies on unique hardware footprints to manage your device inventory. If you deploy Prey on a cloned machine with identical hardware parameters, or reinstall it on a device with a modified local name, our system recognizes the matching hardware profile. To prevent duplicates, Prey automatically merges the data—updating the existing entry with the new local name rather than consuming an additional license slot.

The Solution

Depending on your specific case, you need to change how Prey manages device recognition and naming:

Go to your Prey panel, navigate to the Settings menu and scroll to General Settings.

• If you are using cloned devices (Windows, Mac, Ubuntu): Toggle off Identify devices when linking. This stops Prey from overwriting devices if their hardware information already exists on your account, allowing cloned devices to occupy separate slots. 
• If you want to prevent automatic renaming: Toggle off Reflect device name changes. This prevents Prey from renaming devices on the Panel when their name is modified locally on the device itself.

The device may not be linked correctly during installation

This usually happens when a temporary connection issue or interruption takes place and disrupts the process of linking the device to your account, normally when running a manual installation using an installer package.

The Solution

If the installation was successful but the linking process was interrupted, you can force the device to link to your Prey panel using your Setup Key.

1. Find your Setup Key in your Prey panel by navigating to the +Add device section.

   

2. Open your terminal or command prompt (depending on your OS).
3. Run the corresponding command below, making sure to replace SETUP_KEY with the actual key you copied from your panel.

• Open a Command Prompt (CMD) as an administrator and run the following command:

  C:\Windows\Prey\current\bin\prey config settings update control-panel.api_key SETUP_KEY

• Open a Terminal window and run the following command:

  sudo /usr/local/lib/current/bin/prey config settings update control-panel.api_key SETUP_KEY

• Open a Terminal window and run the following command:

  sudo /usr/lib/prey/current/bin/prey config settings update control-panel.api_key SETUP_KEY