How is it possible for Adobe Support to be so bad ?

[Sorin_Jurcut]

I mean really ! For a multi billion dollar company, support is worse than Microsoft ! And that speaks heaps !

I had the worst customer experience throughout the day with people that have no grasp over the english language and moreso, no technical skills whatsoever ! None managed to understand my problem or fix my issue. I am aware they are pade minimum indian wage, but since a regular CC subscriber pays a hefty 50 bucks a month, the support is supposed to at least be faking like its helping ! I know how bad support is because I've worked for a software company myself and the people that ended up in support usually went there because they couldn't find anything better at that time. And they generally had really bad technical skills too.

Getting to the point of it all: By means of this ordeal that is Creative Cloud, I've come across a very frustrating bug. A bug that makes Creative Cloud Desktop app think its another PC. basically if I sign into the desktop app and the open Photoshop, PS tells me that it needs to be activated and while doing so, hits me with this beauty

so I go ahead and sign out of Creative Cloud and close Photoshop. Then go ahead and start Photoshop again without signing into the CC desktop app. Lo and behold ! Activation Sucessfull ! Sign back into the desktop app, close Photoshop. Open Photoshop back again. BAM, same screen you just saw up here. I have to mention that my CC is being used in 2 places. At home and at work. At work while i'm writing this the laptop's closed. So the only logical conclusion would be that CC desktop = 1 new pc. Either that or Photoshop is seen as such.

Given the great amount of NO HELP that i got from support I concluded that I will be dropping the sub first chance I get, after getting CS6. I am one of the biggest Adobe fans, and used Photoshop starting with version 6 all the way to CC, and even dreamed about working for Adobe, but I am getting tired of how badly the software is starting to be. And seriously Adobe, hire more competent support personell, that is preferably not indian. I don't have anything against them as a people, but those that work at support are just as bad as the jokes say they are. Disappointed all the way. Wonder if anyone else feels the same or experienced the same bug as I did...

[Trevor.Dennis]

I can see that would be frustrating, and while CS is none too flash on the best of days, that's exactly the sort of issue they should be able to field and answer.

The thing is, those people are not Photoshop or CC experts.  They work from Expert Systems, and cover the >30 applications in the CC, plus all those that are not.  It would be a huge ask to expect CS to be truly expert in all that, plus I have a strong feeling they handle more than one call at the same time, so you get long delays.  Yes it really is not good enough, and you'll get no arguments about that here.

OK, to your problem.  I'm going to suggest that you try a parallel thread on the CC forum, because there are Adobe staff there (proper staff, not call center staff) and the staff people on the CC forum are really good with your sort of problem.

Good luck

http://forums.adobe.com/community/creative_cloud?view=discussions

[Sorin_Jurcut]

Thanks a lot for the link. I'll look into it and try to see if I can get this across. Its been such a long day for me with this whole thing and I'm really really disappointed in Adobe as a company for bringing out such a crummy product.

And btw: this issue is not necessarily related to all other CC apps, but rather only to the activation part, which from my understanding is a pretty bad one that rears its head ever so often around here.

[Trevor.Dennis]

OK, but very few of the regular posters to this forum have problems with the products.  I have a full CC subscription on two systems, and it works flawlessly.  We tend to see people with older systems mainly with problems, but also with updates like Mac 10.9 and Windows 8.1

When you start your thread in the CC forum, tell them what operating system you are using, and a bit about your computer specs.  The more information you provide, the better folk will be able to help.  I am certain they will sort out your problem - so long as your system specs are OK, so the end is in sight.

[JJMack]

I find what you have written here very hard to take. I only have Photoshop. Photoshop has many bugs that have gone unfixed release after release,  Bugs that have been reported to Adobe and acknowledge by Adobe to be bugs.  The 14.2 update introduced many new bugs.  There is no easy way to blackout bad updates like 14.2. I think I may be able to reinstall CC on top of itself and apply all updates but 14.2  If Update 14.1.2 is still available.

Perhaps the bugs don't show up on your system because their upside down south of the equator. I realize not all bugs reports are actual bugs but just go to Adobe Photoshop Family Feedback site and see how may bug reports have been filed how few have been address,  acknowledged, fixed or are being worked on..  Adobe Management does not fund or staff support well.  Its more a management problem the a support problem.  If Adobe Management funded and staffed and managed a good support group I'm sure it would function well.  Without competition  I feel Adobe management  does not think good support is required.

I run Windows 7 professional on a Dell Workstation with dual six core xeons 40GB ECC Ram  SSD Fast Disk and external USB 3 drive Wacom Intuos 5 have CS2, CS6 and CC installed all have bugs.

[Trevor.Dennis]

You do seem to be good at finding them JJ, and I did have you in mind as an exception when typing the above. Sometimes I see bugs reported, and can't go back and test the before state so am not sure if it is wrong or not.  So much of working with PS comes down to muscle memory, or automatic process like touch typing.  If someone asks 'how do you do that?', I often can't answer straight away.

As to Adobe Support, it would appear to come down purely to cost savings, which sounds cynical, but the evidence seems irrefutable.  When I had a bee in my bonnet about price gouging prior to CC, I was spending time looking at Adobe staff structuring, and the reports I read showed them concentrating on sales and marketing.  It’s pretty darn ugly when you think about it, but has nothing to do with the people manning the Development teams.  You could bet the farm that no one from Sales and Marketing gives up their free time helping folk on these forums. 

[JJMack]

The OP also stated he had the worst time ever dealing with Adobe customer support. He is not alone there.

I also feel there have been Management policies put into place one of them  being a policy of silence. An other to delay fixes for a update like 14.2 till all new bugs have addressed.  Adobe management does not seen to care how much they unconvinc their users even when the Adobe acknowledge bugs Adobe does not commit to fix them or give any time frame as to when a bug may be fixed.  Adobe needs to test code better then they do before releasing updates like 14.2.

I do not have any licensing problem.  I have had Problems with CC updates where Adobe support through this forum was able to fix their problem after several tries introducing a new problem at the same time that I was able to rectify.  14.2 killed shortcut I use all the time and made the polygon lasso tool almost unusable. And add a bug into smart objects.  Thanfully when they replaced the Place UI  with "Place Embedded" and "Place Linked" The Scriptlistener code for the old Place feature still works so my scripts still function.

[War Unicorn]

Using Photoshop CC on Windows 8.1 as well; there's a niggling bug when flicking but that could be a video driver issue. (The bug is when I go to flick, I have to really flick it to get the workspace to move.) In any case, closing and restarting PS CC fixes it...until it happens again, which I cannot determine when or why at this point.  xD

Other than that, I've had no problems but then again, I'm just an enthusiast.

I use Photoshop Touch as well and had a nasty bug where using Camera Fill would crash PS Touch. It was apparently something to do with the Nexus 7 2013, which is the tablet I use. I promptly reported it in the appropriate forum giving as much detail as I possibly could. It was fixed faster than I had anticipated.

One of those YMMV situations, I guess.

[JJMack]

I know it may hard to understand that I'm an enthusiast also. If I were not I would not hang out here.  Photoshop has great value it also has many bugs it would have even greater value without all the bugs it has.  Microsoft cleaned up is OS Adobe should clean up their applications.

Some companies like Noel's and even big ones like Microsoft address user reported bugs. Adobe should too.....

[War Unicorn]

JJMack wrote:

I know it may hard to understand that I'm an enthusiast also. If I were not I would not hang out here.  Photoshop has great value it also has many bugs it would have even greater value without all the bugs it has.  Microsoft cleaned up is OS Adobe should clean up their applications.

I dunno about that where Microsoft's concerned. I'm still waiting on freakin' proper Windows 8.1 drivers for my wireless adapter. Apparently, it's like parsing the meaning of life.    (Though, to be honest, Windows 8.1 isn't bad otherwise.)

[JJMack]

From what I read Windows 8 even 8.1 isn't all that good.  History seems to be repeating again. It seems like  Windows is a binary system, Good one, bad one, good one, bad one,  Given the history  98 good, ME bad,  XP good, Vista bad, win 7 good. Win 8 bad, Win 9 good time will tell. Yes I know I left out some Microsoft systems like DOS, NT versions like Win 2000 and OS2.

[War Unicorn]

I upgraded from Vista, which worked fine for me until compatibility became an issue. Photoshop CC was one of the reasons that compelled me to upgrade; CC doesn't work on anything lower than Windows 7, which seems to be a continuing trend among developers.

My brother has a Windows 7 machine so I was already familiar with that. It almost feels like Windows 7, minus Aero and a few tweaks.

I like Windows 8.1; you just have to wrap your head around Metro when required (everything else just about works the same, especially if you're familiar with Windows 7). Didn't take me long to get used to.

My only gripe was releasing the OS before getting the hardware support behind it. I'm not the only one with a driver problem from what I've researched. Can't even use drivers designed for Windows 8 with Windows 8.1 without jumping through hoops. I'm sure it'll all sort out in the end but geez...   xD

[slashpot]

This is a worry!

I'm using the demo of Photoshop while I decide whether to get the whole shebang or Just Photoshop. I have several problems with Photoshop, the worst being a total failure of the Liquify command (I can make my adjustments, but when I go to save/exit I get an error message and lose whatever changes I've made).

I've also had dialogs and dropdowns all going blank, several short freezes, and a couple of other glitches. My one brush with the support call centre happened to be an absolute breeze (Photoshop wouldn’t save any prefs/settings/modifications, so I had to spend half an hour setting the whole thing up from scratch each time I started Photoshop). The Indian guy I got on chat happened to have very good English and solved the settings problem in two minutes (I had to move two files from my Library to the desktop - Done! Prob solved).

Now it appears this was the exception rather than the rule, which is a big worry. I cant afford to lose an hour each day dealing with glitches and certainly don't want no access to the liquify tool I use a lot. If Adobe had any real competiton I'd be on their website now buying their product, but despite attempts there's only one Photoshop. On the other hand my work is illustration so I may take another long look at Corel Painter (for a fraction of the price).

I will never understand people who create faulty products, know they're faulty, and sell them at ridiculous prices regardless simply because there is no alternative. Even less do I understand those who enable this behaviour by buying the product.

Are there not anti-trust laws designed to prevent this very thing? Do I sign up and pay to buy a product I know to be deeply flawed?

I wonder how good the new Painter X3 is?

[Sorin_Jurcut]

I got 8.1 too and I don't experience any driver issues. At least not video-side. I only miss the start menu. Otherwise, compared to my work pc with 16 gb of ram & Windows7 , my 8 gb home pc does far far better. Startup time is better, app performace is better, stability is really good. Can't complain, really.

For me, upgrading to 8 / 8.1 was a decision made knowingly, because I worked with WPF (Windows Presentation Foundation) which is behind vista and win7's whole interface. Its slow, uses hw acceleration to display common stuff and allocates a lot of resources just to display data instead of having those hw resources for actual running applications.

[Noel Carboni]

That said, Windows 8+ is absolutely NO faster or more efficient than 7.  I've done extensive testing.  It's actually slower at most things, including the all-important disk access.  The only thing it's faster at - and I guess what Microsoft hopes people will notice - is that it boots up quicker.  But even most of that is a ruse that comes with a big downside.

My suggestions:

1.  Get Classic Shell to restore your Start Menu.

2.  Get Aero Glass for Win 8.1 to restore some desktop style (especially drop shadows around windows) so your eyes don't bleed.

3.  Deconfigure the "Fast Hybrid Bootup" that achieves most of that speed increase, because it will give you trouble in the long term.

4.  Avoid using Metro/Modern applications, as they are a flash in the pan and doomed to failure, just as so many of Microsoft's prior "gadget" type efforts have been.  Metro/Modern provides no advantages and nothing useful/important for serious computer users is showing up in the Microsoft "App Store".

I have a whole book out on how to set up Windows 8 to be a "to work" desktop-oriented system if anyone's interested.  Hopefully it will take us through until they release another advancement in operating systems over Windows 7.

-Noel

[Semaphoric]

Warunicorn wrote:

I dunno about that where Microsoft's concerned. I'm still waiting on freakin' proper Windows 8.1 drivers for my wireless adapter. Apparently, it's like parsing the meaning of life.    (Though, to be honest, Windows 8.1 isn't bad otherwise.)

And it's not not just Adobe and Microsoft. Hello, yes, AMD, I'm  talking to YOU!!!

10-bits my ***!

[Noel Carboni]

JJ, to be fair different people use different features of the product, so some might find it more flawless than others.  Personally I find Photoshop CC 14.2 to work rather well for what I use it for (and I'm on Win 8.1, Trevor!)  14.2 even fixes some issues I saw before with version 14.1.  Is it bug-free?  No, but it delivers good value.  I get a lot done with it.

With regard to the issue expressed in this particular thread, I'm not having any licensing issues.  Are you, JJ?

That said, Sorin has described a very specific problem and should be able to look to Adobe support to help solve it quickly.  It occured to me that this could be case where someone else has cracked his password and using Photoshop on his CC subscription on a third machine.  Support really should be able to help him sort it out quickly and directly!  They have a database, I'm sure, that shows what computer has been activated at what time.

Let us all remember that the Adobe account database was stolen not too terribly long ago.

Sorin, have you tried changing your password for your Adobe ID?  Log all your machines out, and log out of the Adobe site here, then log back in again with your new password.

-Noel

[Sorin_Jurcut]

According to Adobe:

Creative Cloud Member Support

Target response time:

1 Business days.

)))))) its been more than 3 and no answer from friggin adobe, since I updated my issue. People & businesses that are not able to withhold their end of the bargain lose their credibility to their customers.

[MadisonLeupp]

Hi Sorin, can you please private message me your phone number? I'll get you set up with support right away. Thanks, Madison

[Sorin_Jurcut]

Thanks Madison,

I have sent the phone number.

I am trying not to hate on Adobe because of the long relationship I have with Photoshop, but with each release, its harder, due to the increased amount of bugs that are present. Some even ancient relics (EX: When you dbl-click on a layer to work with the layerstyle, dbl-click the shape-layer thumbnail to change layer color Photoshop opens up several Help pages and in some case even crashes because it either couldn't find Adobe Help (useless junk of a addition) or there were just too many instances of help open. Its a popular case of endless loop)

I am especially disappointed about how support went about this, and I am concerned about the fact that Adobe is false advertising its turnaround times, especially because there is no footnote disclaiming that "In special cases turnaround times may be higher due to unforseen amount of support tickets received". Someone should seriously consider fixing that or just not advertise turnaround times that are simply not true, because the information provided is lawsuit liable.

To check it out:

http://www.adobe.com/support/programs/policies/sla.html

If I may suggest something: It would be a good ideea to provide users with acess to the bug-tracker to be able to submit bugs easier, or just make the forums easier to work with so that bugs are easier to submit.

Cheers !

[JJMack]

There is a support Phone number if you try hard you can find it. Number for sale and everything else too.

[Sorin_Jurcut]

That's not the phone number she was talking about. Besides, I don't like to be coerced or forced into having to phone for support. For me the old-fashioned email does it just fine.

Also, I don't have time to phone support during business hours at my workplace (which is why there's email support in the first place).

EDIT: PS, it just so happens that I am not in the US so, US phones & PST is not something I really care about.

[Trevor.Dennis]

Sorin Jurcut wrote:

Also, I don't have time to phone support during business hours at my workplace (which is why there's email support in the first place).

How long have you been reading this forum?  How many dumb questions have you seen, where a complete lack of helpful details sometimes require two or three requests before we actually have a clue, and can hazard a guess at an answer?  That's the reality of using email for Customer Support, and the time it wastes, is quite possibly a strong contributing factor to the long wait states people experience when phoning CS.

You can often tell right from the outset that a poster is going to be hard work, and I refuse to do the banging my head against a wall thing, so those people don't get my help.   I've actually had rude PMs from people like that, because I've dropped out of a thread that was going nowhere.

[Sorin_Jurcut]

Well, in all honesty, this (the time that I had licence issues) was the first time I've been reading the forums. I usually can solve issues on my own, so I rarely need support, unless there's something really really nasty. And I think it speaks volumes about me, but that's neither here nor there. Unfortunately I do know what you mean, but seeing as you are not officially part of support, it is your choice to respond to some of those dumb questions and subsequently get bombared by idiotic PMs as a consequence. And as harsh as this sounds, it is your choice to be offended. I personally don't care much about insults. I just treat them as words. Rarely do they get to me. But alas, not everyone is like that.

Back to the point though, email support is one of the most basic and old forms of support that are offered by companies, which is why its more or less compulsory to offer it. Phone and chat support is nice, no doubt about it, but does not cover cases like the one described. If a problem is not that urgent, I would much more prefer to have a civilised email convo, rather than loose time explaining over phone (without being able to attach pics or come back to with additional info) how a bug reproduces.

In any case, I'm really sorry you had to endure such rude behavior from users. That's certainly not ok, especially because you're doing it out of the goodness of your heart.

Appreciate the response !

[Trevor.Dennis]

Sorin Jurcut wrote:

And as harsh as this sounds, it is your choice to be offended. 

I never get offended Sorin.  I just go look for more interesting threads.