Misled By Sales -- Who To Contact?

Discussion in 'Acronis True Image Product Line' started by nemesisdb, Jun 25, 2008.

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  1. nemesisdb

    nemesisdb Registered Member

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    I have used Acronis TI 8 and 9 for some time. I recently started using a full disk encryption program and wanted to encrypt my backups as well. I was aware that the password feature in TI9 did not actually encrypt the archive.

    Given this, I asked acronis sales through live chat which product would be more appropriate for me: Echo (which I suppose is what used to be called workstation) or Home. I was told that AES encryption was implemented "equally" in both version. This seems to be confirmed by this product comparison chart: http://www.acronis.com/enterprise/products/ATICW/comparison.html

    It lists both Home and Echo as supporting archive passwords and lists both as supporting "password-based encryption (AES)." There is no line on the comparison chart that would indicate that the encryption abilities are different between the products.

    After hearing this, I went out and purchased a copy of TI-11 Home as it was on sale. Upon installing the product, I discovered that it will not allow me to encrypt the images, and that this is solely a feature of Echo. TI-11 Home serves my uses no better than TI9 did, and seems to have a lot of extra bloat/"features" that have nothing to do with backups. It works fine for backups, but was a complete waste of money since TI-9 did the same job for me just as well.

    I am upset about this. I tried contacting sales again through the live chat service and was told that there was nothing they could do. I created a technical support ticket 3 days ago. I am not sure what the normal response time is these days, but I fear they will tell me that this is not a technical issue.

    Who should I contact? Is any type of resolution possible here? Is it possible to speak to anyone who has the power to remedy this?

    Thanks for any advice.

    edit: for what it's worth, I do have logs of the chat (and these were attached to the support ticket)
     
  2. Acronis Support

    Acronis Support Acronis Support Staff

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    Hello nemesisdb,

    Thank you for choosing Acronis Backup software.

    Could you please tell me the number of your case in Acronis Customer Support Department? I'll try to forward the case to our Sales Expert and he'll take care of it. As a matter of fact encryption feature is really available in Acronis True Image 11 Home but in German and Japan versions only. Please be sure neccessary information will be added to the comparaison chart. Please accept our apologies for the misleading information.

    Thank you
    --
    Nikita Sakharov
     
  3. nemesisdb

    nemesisdb Registered Member

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    Nikita, I really appreciate your reply and offer to help. My ticket is "Acronis #1550072"
     
  4. Acronis Support

    Acronis Support Acronis Support Staff

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    Hello nemesisdb,

    Many thanks for your answer.

    I've found your case and contacted appropriate person so you'll get an answer in the nearest time. Please accept sincere apologies for the inconvenience you've expereinced due to the wrong info.

    Thank you
    --
    Nikita Sakharov
     
  5. nemesisdb

    nemesisdb Registered Member

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    I again appreciate your help with this matter.

    I was contacted via email by a representative today. He acknowledged the problem but the only remedy offered was for me to pay a (presumed) $30 upgrade fee to replace Home with Echo.

    I am not going to copy and paste my email here, but I responded detailing why I felt charging me such an amount was unacceptable. In short, the only reason I upgraded from TI v9 was to gain the encryption feature. The proposed offer would make my net costs around $80 -- and I would not have paid this amount up front to gain access to this feature.

    I don't want to appear ungrateful (I really appreciate you having someone contact me!) but I really don't think that this is a fair outcome. Ultimately, I do not think that I should have to pay more for Echo to gain access to features that I was promised would be in Home. I know there are other benefits of Echo -- but they are benefits that will largely go unused by me.

    Thanks again for all of your help with this.
     
  6. nemesisdb

    nemesisdb Registered Member

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    I don't know if anyone is still following this thread or not, but it's been four business days (six actual days) since my emailed response and I've gotten no reply.

    I assume that there is no other way to contact acronis support? Does anyone care to rate my chances of getting this worked out?
     
  7. nemesisdb

    nemesisdb Registered Member

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    Time for another update.

    I was contacted again via email on 7/4/2008 (guess some people didn't get the day off). The email asked me for details about who the sales agent was who said the functionality was "equal" as well as where I found such information on the acronis website.

    It's sad that I had to wait a week to be asked for something that I included in my original request for support (which started the ticket #). Regardless, I re-attached the relevant information (a chat log and website screenshot) and replied on the same day.

    It's been well over a week (11 days now) and I've received no response. Is anyone out there? :D
     
  8. MudCrab

    MudCrab Imaging Specialist

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    I'd send another PM to Acronis Support with a link to this thread. You shouldn't have to wait as long as you've had to.

    As far as I can remember, the non-existent AES encryption support in TI 11 (English) was supposed to have been taken care of shortly after TI 11 came out. Acronis had it listed as a feature when it wasn't included in the final product.
     
  9. chuck11

    chuck11 Registered Member

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    Well, I wasn't misled but I am really dissappointed they require the upgrade for the encryption. I also believed it was "coming" but alas I am not surprised. I've used TrueImage before they started watering it down and milking the home user to get features they need. I'm actually surprise they kept the Recover Boot CD in the home product and didn't charge an upgrade for that functionality too...
     
  10. bledd

    bledd Registered Member

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    that's a complete joke, you're not selling the product you advertise, i don't need AES personally, if i did i'd demand a free upgrade to Echo :doubt:
     
  11. nemesisdb

    nemesisdb Registered Member

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    Mudcrab, chuck, and bledd, I appreciate your responses.

    I sent a PM to support on the 14th, as suggested. I've received no response at all.

    It's annoying that I finally seemed to be making progress over email and now there's just silence. I mean, why ask for confirming information if you're just going to ignore it? Were they hoping that I wouldn't have it so they could just tell me to go away?

    Again ... no contact with acronis since they asked me for additional information on July 4th.
     
  12. Acronis Support

    Acronis Support Acronis Support Staff

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  13. nemesisdb

    nemesisdb Registered Member

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    Marat,

    Thank you for solving my problem. I apologize if I was getting impatient -- I just wanted to make sure that I hadn't been forgotten.

    If this program works out for me, I can almost assure you that I'll be buying a second copy of Echo for my laptop.

    Again ... thank you for all the help!
     
  14. nemesisdb

    nemesisdb Registered Member

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    The same comparison chart was updated for Acronis Home 2009. It lists this product as supporting AES.

    Does Acronis Home 2009 (for the United States, since apparently that's important) support AES encryption of the archive images?

    If it does not, why is this error still present on the website even after an update?
     
  15. MudCrab

    MudCrab Imaging Specialist

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    TI 2009 does have AES encryption support.
    AES_in_TI2009.jpg
     
  16. tonyseeking

    tonyseeking Former Poster

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    What's wrong with using the password feature? Who will be able to break that anyway?
     
  17. shieber

    shieber Registered Member

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    There are diff levels of security and AES encryption is better than mere password-access restrictions. What level of security a person or organization needs for backups is something that varies by person and organization, depending upon such things and the value of the data, the likelihood of the being stolen (how attractive a target), and the harm caused if it is stolen or accessed.

    Depending on the resources one wishes to devote to bypassing security, mere password security might be a useful impediment to trespass but not to anyone with a bit of computer skill, some mediocre hardware and and some patience. Blunt force attacks are usually sufficient to break mere password security on files.

     
  18. nemesisdb

    nemesisdb Registered Member

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    It's great news that TI 2009 Home has added this feature! It's a much cheaper upgrade than Echo.

    And in my case, I have client files that require encryption.
     
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