Worst Technical Support I have ever seen

Acronis may have a decent product, but they have the absolute worst technical support I have ever seen. I have been doing this work professionally for almost 20 years and have never seen a group with worse support. They don't seem to care if you have a system down or not. Some of the worst response times I have ever encountered. Each technical support person, if you can get them to reply, give the same answers each time whether the case notes reflect progress or not.

I have been trying for a week as a reseller to get support for creating an Acronis WINPE .iso image for a customer with a system down for nearly a week now. The Linux bootable media will not find the RAID set and the only other method is to create a WINPE .iso and include the drivers or be able to supply the drivers with F6 like you do with the BART PE CD. Support is unable to give me a link to the v9.7b8353 Acronis WINPE and they say they don't have access to it. How can they not have access to it? This story goes on and on.

Their documentation for creating it is inadequate and incorrect, like their technical support responses.

If there is anyone from Acronis that reads this and wants to salvage a reseller that has been behind Acronis for years now by helping, please let me know (1-304-327-7188x24 or jmeadows at citlink dot net

 

Get ready for the typical Acronis response! - "Thank you choosing Acronis...etc..etc..."

I agree, the answers support provides is very scripted and unfortunately these is very common for a lot of companies nowadays. Sorry to hear of your problems and I hope someone helps you sort them out soon.

 

Forgetting the inadequate nature of the Official Support for the moment, there is documentation done by one of the regular forum members for making a WinPe cd - I think it's Mustang and I believe another regular member, Mudcrab, has the instructions in a link in his signature.

That being said, I've found that making the BartPE cd with the True Image plug-in embedded into it to be easier to make. The instructions for making this are here:
https://www.wilderssecurity.com/showpost.php?p=839781&postcount=1

 

Welcome JMeadows to the forums.

I think that you have correctly summed up Acronis Support.
The good news is that there are some really helpful users here who will help you.

 

I have to agree. There's no direct support line. You have to put in your claim and hope to god they send you a response within 48 hours. What if it was a critical mess? That's what this program is designed for. I can just image the havoc this process would cause should a large corporate office ever go down and have to wait 48 hours for a response.

Its bad enough I've had to wait over 5.5 hours with no response.

I have to agree that sometimes the users have to band together and help one another out. That's what has worked with several other applications, most notibly Quickbooks/Intuit in my line of work. Seems like unless you know the right chain (which thanks to countless hours of working up the chain, I now have the programmers direct line, and email address), it takes just as long and everything is scripted as well. Its like they go down their little sheet checking each question off one by one. You'd figure especially for IT professionals at least they could get you past the standard mess and on to someone who knows you've gone through the basics, and tried certain things, and still aren't able to get anything. Speaking from experience, it seems like every Tech Support I've ever dealt with is that way. It's completely ridiculous!!!

 

I would imagine that paid for support gets priority especially for businesses who would be the most likely to require it.

 

JMeadows,

What problems are you having when you use WinPE Builder?

First you have to be a Microsoft Partner (free level will work) to download the OPK (OEM Preinstall Kits). If you aren't already you can signup here.

Then for WinPE 1.0 (XP) the latest OPK is Windows SP3. The file name is "windows_xp_service_pack_3_update_opk_english.img" and it is a 347 MB disc image.

For WinPE 2.0 (Vista) the latest OPK is Vista SP1. The file name is "6001.18000.080118-1840-kb3opk_en.img" and it is a 1.4 GB disc image. If you go with WinPE 2.0 you also need to install "Automated Installation Kit (AIK) for Windows Vista SP1 and Windows Server 2008".

Once you have your OPK downloaded you can either burn a disc, mount the image in a virtual cd\dvd player or simply extract the contents.

Finally, start the Acronis WinPE Builder. When it asks you to "Specify a folder with Windows PE files" point it to the OPK files you just burnt, mounted or extracted.

The rest should be self explanatory.

Hope that helps. I agree the documentation on the process is very limited. It is almost a trial and error process.

 

Also, here is a KB article about creating a WinPE 2.0 disc. It looks like this way you don't need the OPK but it looks much more confusing to me.

 

Hello all,

JMeadows, please accept my apologies for the inconvenience. I would escalate this issue and ask the appropriate person to contact you. I would also check what happened with your support requests and take some actions.

Thank you,

Michael Levchenko

 

Usually. Most companies that you pay for support usually have another line and can get you to someone who can answer your questions. Though it can sometimes take a few go arounds to get it done. I make sure to take the tech's name, email, and direct line, so I don't have to go through the mess all over again next time.

Just as a heads up to Acronis Support Staff. I still haven't received an email or response to my post on here. Thanks.

 

If you just made a post here it is unlikely you will get an email and a response, maybe. If you want to raise an official support request then you have to do it through the Acronis site. The Live Chat service seems to get the best comments.

As you can see, Acronis staff do participate in this forum but it isn't the official Acronis support route.

 

I went to Acronis' Site first. Did all that. Live Chat was just a blank box. I got an email back with a case # and that was it. Nothing else has been sent or said from their tech support. I called and left a message with their Tech Support voicemail at the North American HQ. After no response there, I posted on here, and haven't gotten a comment on my problem either.

https://www.wilderssecurity.com/showthread.php?t=248043

Its probably something no one has an answer for.

 

Hello all,

I'm taking care about this support request.

Thank you,

Michael Levchenko

 

Thanks to all that have responded - I agree with each and every one of you. I have experienced each of your issues along with RCrews issues with Intuit/Quickbooks. They may be worse, not sure.

I finally managed to get the call escalated to someone in support that was actually very helpful, no scripted responses, etc. He was able to help me get it created. I still have some other issues that he has not gotten back to me on yet, but time will tell.

I agree that Acronis has a good product line, but there are entirely too many cases where you have to have long, drawn out conversations with the support and still don't get anywhere. I should be used to it by now - after 20 years of doing this and dealing with Microsoft/Citrix/Acronis - you name them and I have dealt with them.

I appreciate the welcome to the forum. Thanks to all and I hope to be able to offer some assistance to any of you that need help with Acronis or other issues with imaging/restoring.

 

If you ever have an issue with quickbooks/intuit again let me know jmeadows. I have the direct contact to a programmer, Mike. He had to rewrite a special version of Time Tracker for our company due to the new update causing issues with every client computer I had in the office. 30+ people could not enter in their time. He was really helpful and said usually Time Tracker/Quickbooks/Intuit Support is horrible. Seems they outsource the first Tier. He'll usually take a little bit to get back, but I know I'll have at least something by the end of the day and that he's tested the issue several times when he does give me a reply back. My first experiences were AWFUL, but since getting Mike directly its been MUCH BETTER with Intuit. I got to agree though, they are pretty much on par. Acronis maybe a tad worst in the response time department though.

I FINALLY got a phone call from Acronis Support this morning at 11am EST. They are researching my problem and will get back to me through email sometime today. I will post any thing they find out on the thread with my error message. At least this way, anyone going through the forums may be given some form of an answer and not have this long waiting issue.