Customer Reviews

ACT! By Sage 2008 10.0 [OLD VERSION]

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(25)

 

 

I have been in IT for 20 years and am currently an IT manager for a Fortune 500 company. Act 2006 and then the "upgrade" to Act 2008 have been the worst software experiences I have ever seen, bar none.


With a ~12 seat install of Act premium, we got Act 2006 up and running with the help of a Certified Act consultant. It was ugly and the entire user base complained of not only Act being very slow, but the computers slowed to a crawl when performing all other functions as well. See the reviews of Act 2006 and you will see my experience is the norm.

An upgrade to 2008 was ordered. Cold feelings of dread went up and down my spine. The same consultant returned and we started.

Every single machine had a minimum of 6 errors related to the upgrade. Some had many more. A listing of actual and paraphrased errors follows. The consultant struggled until late in the evening to get the first four or five working. SQL was removed and installed, registries were hacked and edited. Finally she got those working.

The next day I personally attempted to do the rest.

Eventually after about 5 person-days I got the machines installed, and now the users are telling us that this version is even slower than the dog called Act 2006.
This should not reflect badly on the consultant. She was quite good. This is all about the product put out by Rage Software.


Run, don't walk away from this evil thing called Act.

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Small sample of the errors I jotted down as we went down this bloody path:

All users had errors when adding an Outlook address book, Licensing error-User count. Which eventually went away after 6-8 tries or 10 minutes, not sure which fixed it. We had the proper volume licenses.

When updating the local DB all laptops gave an error pop up "Error in the Application" with "ok" being the only choice. It seemed to complete ok after this however.

Over half had SQL errors upon upgrading from 2006 to 2008. Gave up and removed 2006 and 5 related pieces instead of upgrading.

None could register online due to Act not speaking SSL through a Windows configured proxy. (A fairly standard configuration in a corporation) We did work around this by connecting/activating with another method.

Half of the laptops caused Outlook 2003 errors when launching. "Error in registry for extension: (Exchange Extensions) Syntax or format of the registry entry is incorrect." This dialog appeared about a dozen times in a row and then Outlook would eventually launch.

25% had errors when upgrading related to SQL. The upgrade from 2006-2008 did not handle the SQL portion well at all. Once we manually uninstalled Act 2006, 4-5 SQL pieces and the XML 6 Parser, and then installed 2008 and then manually installed SQL Server it went somewhat better. There were still a couple that had major errors though relating to SQL even after doing this elaborate process.

Errors with SQL failing to start - SQLWriter-SQLDumper library failed initialization. Installation Corrupt/tampered with.

SQL Server could not find specified named instance (ACT7) please specify the name of an existing instance at the invocation of sqlserver.exe

And on and on and on.....

I have upgraded to ACT 10.0, only because my latest word software was not compatible with the last ACT I bought. I returned the previous release for a refund after trying it out. If the offer was available for this version, I would have done the same. This has to be the worst version bought out yet!!. Slow, not user freindly, e mail is terrible. This is definately the worst version yet, and as for the review posted by ACT software, why contact you, no one ever takes any notice or responds to the e mails sent to your company anyway. I certainly will NOT be buying any further versions of ACT.

I have been a long time act user, going from dos 2.0 to act 6.0 (and now to act 10). I got a new computer, and needed to upgrade as it came with office 2007. I had read the terrible reviews and was terrified of upgrading. I did the upgrade by following all instructions and knowledge base articles to the letter. I was waiting for the computer to explode or the devil to show up in my office, but everythign went exactly as it should.

The program has worked exactly as it should. There are a few things I dont like, but that is probably more due to me being used to doing things one way for the last 5 years.

For the record, this is a one person install of a private database with no network requirements (ie pulling a shared database off of a server.) In addition, the new computer is very high end (4 gigs ram, 2.5 dual core, etc.)

Hope this helps.

I have been a loyal ACT! user for many years. Ever since Sage bought the product from Symantec and drastically changed it, it has become the slowest, most annoying program I have ever owned. I have forked over my money for every upgrade, hoping for improvements, but it just seems to get slower and slower, worse and worse. I'm done - despite the enormous effort to re-enter over 1,000 contacts and histories into another program, I have simply had it with ACT! / Sage. Do yourself a big favor and read all the reviews for version 9.0 and don't be misled by the random positives (many of them sound like Sage plants to me). Trust me, you will regret your decision to buy! Its a real shame too, because if this thing actually worked, it would be a great program.

I have used ACT! since the first DOS version came out over 14 years ago. Yes, ACT! had serious problems from 2005-2007, which is why I stopped recommending it after version 6. After spending 3 months living in the new ACT! 2008, I am thrilled with version 10 (2008) and can highly recommend it.

If you read the negative reviews here, most of them admit that they are talking about ACT 2005 and ACT 8. Those reviews have no bearing on the new version 10. I imagine that like most Internet review sites, the people with problems tend to make the most noise, while the majority of happy users have no reason to.

We have over 60,000 users in our ACT! 10 database. This would have taken the old ACT to it's knees. Lookups are lightning fast, and it is scalable to support many more users and contacts than the previous versions. The new version is built on a Microsoft SQL database, which is much more powerful than the old ACT proprietary database format. The few remaining annoying bugs were fixed in the 10.0.2 patch which was released on April 10, 2008.

Remember that when people have problems with software that runs fine for other people, it is generally an issue of computers (older machines without the horsepower of up-to-date units, lack of RAM, etc) and other software causing problems. I was in computer tech support for 10 years, and I can't tell you how many times problems were caused by viruses, spyware, user unfamiliarity, and issues that were related to Microsoft Windows itself, NOT the software they were having problems with.

This is the most powerful version of ACT! ever. I have switched both of my companies over to it, and have had ZERO problems. Don't be scared off by some bad anonymous reviews from people with backgrounds you are unaware of, and with axes to grind about problems from 3 years ago.

I've been supporting a friend's Act system for close to thirteen years now. this is by far the worst iteration of Act I've had to attempt to configure, and it is the only one we're not taking. That's right, he's returning the software and I am re-engineering his system to use Outlook instead.

I thought Act 7/ 2005 was bad with the inclusion of a locked-down copy of MS SQL Server, but this takes the prize as all-time worst upgrade. I have spent 30 billable hours undoing the damage of a failed install of this product. To put it into context, I can usually do an upgrade of Act in about two hours, including fixing all pointers, database conversion, etc. This isn't even my day job -- I write enterprise level software for a top pharma. When I say this software is ridiculous, it's backed with a degree in CompSci and almost 15 years of professional software development experience for Fortune 50 companies.

The problem, I suppose, is that in between the countless buyouts and re-engineering efforts, the program has lost its way. Bulking up Outlook is far less onerous than using this product, and it is so rife with installation issues that a CRM, if you have the need, becomes a more viable option -- especially since open-source CRM is available.

There's no excuse for such a terrible upgrade process, and their tech support is designed to part you with even more money to fix their mistakes. I give them credit, thus the 2nd star, because the online knowledgebase is finally free to all readers, and it does have some good help for most problems. Just not mine.

-C

I started using ACT many years ago when I was in retail sales. I credit THAT version of ACT with organizing me and making everything simple and setting up my days and weeks and months so that I could just turn on my computer each day and make my calls...brainless stuff that "automated" everything for me. Never had any problems with the program. That was 1997 and ACT was put out by Symantac.

Almost 10 years later in 2006, I found myself needing a Contact Management Program so of course I bought the newest version of ACT...now made by Sage. Let me just say...The General Manager of ACT claiming that everyone loves it...it was as if Hyundai took over for Lexus and was still claiming to have that "Relentless Pursuit of Excellence"! Just like others here....I was on hold with the wonderful people at ACT customer support somewhere in India for an hour.....then over the course of what I guessed was quite a few hours had these people basically change around my computer. Sometime later, my computer wasn't working right anymore and the people at HP told me that this was a common thing for them with ACT. Ohh and when I had further problems with ACT and called the nice folks up, I was of course told that my support had expired and I would need to pay for help (I think it was $200 for another year). HA!

I appreciate the GM of ACT/Sage coming on here and trying to drum up sales by claiming that everything's great now and so on because that's his job. Of course if you read all the reviews from ACT 2007 then you'll get the real story. There are MUCH better CRM programs out there....even the 1997 version of ACT. I'd rather own a 10 year old Acura Legend than a brand new Hyundai. (No offense, Hyundai)

Dear Dave, I have been a long time user of ACT long before Sage took it over, and was a big fan. I consider myself an adept. I use it to generate and track customer quotes, and correspondence (I am on version 9.0), It just used to be much more workable! It's not that it is entirely unworkable but there are so many gothchas and gremlins that using ACT is often an exercise in frustration. The big thing for me is that the integration with Outlook is just awful, For example, two of us in the office use ACT. Now when I send emails with attachments my ACT registers them, but my colleague cannot get her attachments recorded. We've set up our emails in exactly the same way and our ACTs in the same way. And for those of you considering buying take note, The support only lasts for 30 days so when I discovered this (and other issues) the 30 days had passed. The support people (in India - I can tell from the accents and their rigid and scripted manner; nice people but they have learnt well how to behave like City Hall!) they won't give help unless you pay for it. The beef here is that since ACT has made many changes over time and issued different versions, inevitably functions have been moved or changed from a previous version. Because ACT is somewhat complex you can't possibly discover in 30 days where all the changes have been made or how all the functions have changed. So when you run into issues past 30 days you are confronted with the prospect of paying extra for support. I can see the logic of your policy to generate revenue by selling support but that doesn't sit well with me. When I have set everything up according to your documentation and spent hours trying to find the relevant solution to my problem in the knowledgebase (which never seems to have my problem described) is it me, or is it due to latent deficiencies and bugs in your software? The only way I can find out is to pay you more. It's all very well to tell me to upgrade to version 10.0 (god knows what new problems are waiting for me to discover in that version) but I just upgraded to version 9.0! I have to upgrade again? I'm stuck using ACT because to change would be a major undertaking. But salesforce.com is looking very tempting!

I have made 2 reviews on Amazon. Both related to Act. I do not take the time to write reviews unless something is so amazingly great- or so horifically terrible. I have used this version on a co-workers computer as to avoid problems the last time I "upgraded" act. Upgrade is a laughable term. Based on my experiences with act ( which was a GREAT product before it switched to the sql platform) I can only ask how is it possible that ANYONE would want to keep this product. Especially when they offer a return policy. The program is just terrible. If you want a good database buy a used version of 6.0

Slow- Buggy - and if you want support they CHARGE YOU. Imagine this. You Buy the software and then they have the nerve to charge you to help you with all the bugs. - THATS OUTRAGEOUS - as far as the sales manager writing a review. DO YOU THINK IT IS OBJECTIVE ? no - of course not. Do not insult me.

I have upgraded several times and so far have always gone back to version 6 ( prior to the geniuses at sage destroying a perfectly good program.

Imagine toyota upgrading the camry and you get it with SQUARE tires made from a Super durable plastic. THIS IS WHAT SAGE HAS DONE.

It makes me sick to think how much time I have wasted with tryiong to "improve my productivity" Act! in this case is an oxymorn - it should be called. STALL !

If anyone has a suggestion for an alternative to ACT!, PLEASE tell me. I just upgraded to Version 10 and I am so sorry I did. Rescheduling activities dropped from 35 seconds/activity to 7-10 seconds after working with Tech Support. This is unacceptable. The first person got the time down to the 7-10 seconds, but subsequent support staff could do no better. And not being able to drag & drop multiple activities only adds to my frustration. ACT! had bugs in the past, but I was able to deal with them and they were eventually worked out. From the reaction of each Tech Support person, it seems as if these problems are here to stay ~ at least for awhile. Unfortunately, I can't afford to wait.

If you haven't upgraded, DON'T. If you are looking to buy ACT!, DON'T.

Jeff