I had followed the threads about backing up hard drives, and not just Quicken files, from a few months ago. Margaret Wilson's endorsement of True Image encouraged me to check it out. I ordered the downloadable version from Newegg yesterday morning. Got e-mail confirmation that my credit card was charged within minutes, but no download link. I called late morning, and was told that the link was being prepared. By late afternoon, still no link, so I called again. Turns out their server has been down, but they expected it to be up very soon.
Well, this morning I just get a busy signal on their customer service number. Oh, and no reply to my e-mail inquiry from yesterday.
BUT, Newegg IS $29.99 versus $49.99 on Acronis's site ;-)
Wow, I've only had occasion to call Newegg once or twice, but I've gotten right through. When I bought mine, I think it took at least several hours to get the link, as it has to come from Acronis via Newegg IIRC. I recall being perturbed that it took a bit. But once I got the link and my registration number everything has been peachy, and I've registered it at Acronis as well as downloaded and installed several updates successfully.
One tip when you finally do get the software.... When you create an image, make sure you configure the options so it checks the integrity of the image after creation. Once in a great while, some app on the computer will update, or an entry in an event log will cause the comparison to fail. You want to know this when the image is created, so you can immediately do another. Otherwise, if you later go to restore, it will fail. I use LinkLogger software, and I have to close this app, because the logs get written to so frequently, I can never get a good image with it running. When the integrity check fails, the second image has always been perfect. The other thing, is I never use the incremental/differential image feature. I tried it once or twice at the beginning, and the integrity check failed. I decided it wasn't worth the trouble. Since I have *lots* of disk space, I always create a full image.
Bob, if you don't get your software soon, email me. :-)
Thanks for the tips. I'll use them if I ever get the software ;-)
I'm not sure that this was a tragedy to begin with, but it is certainly becoming a farce.
I did get through to customer service at Newegg, and was told that a supervisor would intervene, and send me the download link.
Well, I did get an e-mail, not a download link, but a form to be completed for a refund.
Bob
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Bob, I just remembered something that may help. Now that I think about it, I don't believe the link ever came via email. Go look in your order history. IIRC, as I was getting antsy waiting to be able to download my software, I poked around and found the info in the order itself, or somewhere nearby. Sounds like Newegg's service has taken a nosedive, or a dunce processed your request for assistance. :-)
I've used several imaging programs and True Image 9.0 is consistently the best IMNSHO. Be persistent, don't go the refund route ... yet, anyway.
Also check "order status." The link was somewhere in my account on the Newegg website. I recall thinking after all was done, that they have a very difficult process for purchasing and obtaining downloadable software, unlike most other places.
As far as I am concerned, Newegg has egg on its face big time.
I was told to apply for a refund for my original order, and reorder.
Guess what, still no link. This time I asked to speak to a supervisor, Eric at extension 109.
He told me that Digital River is having problems, and that I am not the only customer affected.
BUT, their customer representatives are telling people to reorder, and getting charged twice for non-delivery, INCONCEIVABLE!
Bob
Also check "order status." The link was somewhere in my account on the Newegg website. I recall thinking after all was done, that they have a very difficult process for purchasing and obtaining downloadable software, unlike most other places.
Not that you shouldn't verify, but have you considered booting to the TI boot CD ("bootable rescue media") when you create an image of the boot partition? You wouldn't have to worry about the possibility of a rebellious process corrupting the image and, IMO, would increase reliability.
I haven;t had any trouble with customer service, but I will say that I've been using TI since version 7. I've also used Ghost and Drive Image (which Symantec acquired). Aside from my dislike of Symantec products (for the last
6 or 7 years, anyway), I can objectively state that (IMO) Acronis is vastly superior to the alternatives.
Yes, I actually do this on occasion. But it's really not that hard to close LinkLogger before making an image. TI is set to automatically verify the image after creation, and it doesn't take that long to make a second if the first fails. It all depends on how I feel at the time. If the machine hasn't been rebooted in a while, I image from the CD. If it has, I do it while logged in.
I have used Drive Image, Ghost (both corporate and personal), and I share your opinion that TI 9.0 is the better product. My one very minor complaint, is that I have to mount an image as a drive to look at it. I preferred a viewer that let's me look inside an image and drag out what I want. But I'm willing to give that up to stay far, far away from Symantec, a company I used to really like.
Considering all it does, TI has a smaller resource footprint, too. Similarly, my copy of Partition Magic 8.x was purchased before Symantec took PowerQuest over. When it comes time to upgrade, I will be moving to Acronis' product, unless something else better comes along first. Not only can I find no way to upgrade products now owned by Symantec if they were purchased from the original company (or boxed at a store), but I won't touch Symantec with a 10-ft pole.
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