Customer Reviews

Datapilot Cell Phone Data Transfer Suite Lg Usb

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I purchased the DataPilot software within days of purchasing my new LG PM-325 phone and was excited about the advertised ability to keep my mobile phone's calendar and phonebook synchronized with those in Microsoft Outlook. What I didn't expect is a quirky and unreliable product that would cause me far more frustration than having to manually synchronize that data.

Here are the problems I've encountered attempting to run this under Windows XP Professional (these may or may not be universal issues):

1. In addition to the phonebook entries in my phone, I also have a separate set of voicedial numbers. Uploading phonebook data to the phone causes voicedial numbers to be changed and/or deleted. The first time I noticed this was when DataPilot changed the voicedial number associated with my voicemail to that of my university newspaper. Other times, voicedial numbers were simply deleted, causing me to look like an idiot trying to tell to the phone to call an entry that no longer existed.

2. Contacts uploaded to the phone for Outlook had email addresses randomly shuffled. If a contact did not have an email address in Outlook, for instance, it might show up in my mobile phone with an email address of some other seemingly random contact. This can be awkward when attempting to send an email to a contact and having it go to the wrong person.

3. I've consistently had problems with the software working properly -- and this is my biggest gripe with the software. I use DataPilot with my laptop and therefore am constantly having to connect and disconnect the USB cable. Sometimes things will work fine and then other times DataPilot will malfunction with a Windows error that says "One of the USB devices attached to this computer has malfunctioned, and Windows does not recognize it." I'll then have to completely uninstall and reinstall the software in order to get it to work again.

In addition to the above, I've run into even more frustrating problems with the software lately. I cannot even uninstall the USB drivers in order to reinstall the software and have run into some extremely quirky behavior with the installation software for reasons I am still trying to figure out.

In my opinion, the software is simply not worth the trouble, although I will say that when it actually works, the calendar synchronization works quite well. But, I really wish I had read reviews from others before spending $59.95 on it directly from Susteen and having to go through all the headaches and frustration I have had to endure. I only hope that I can return the product and get my money back.

I bought this useless program to help me with scheduling/calendaring. After 2.5 hours spent trying to install the program, going through the entire exercise twice, I have given up and am returning it.

It shipped as version 3.4. During installation you are forced to upgrade through 3.6, 3.7, 3.8.0, 3.8.1, 3.8.2, 3.9, 3.10, and 3.11, as well as to upgrade the USB drivers. This takes a while, and does no good as the calendaring functionality just doesn't work. Instead you get a messagebox about how "The program excute environment may be corrupted" [sic].

Phone: LG 6000
Provider: Verizon
Area: Atlanta metro
PC: Dell Optiplex 170
OS: Windows XP SP2 with all patches

My solution will be to get a new phone/PDA device that includes PC-synch capability.

I have been a Windows software developer for the past 12 years. The poor quality of this software, its installaton routine, and its documentation cannot be overstated. This is the worst commercial software I have attempted to use in the past 10 years. Don't buy it. DataPilot is a waste of money, time, energy, and peace of mind.

I upgraded my cell phone to a new Samsung A560 and figured this was a good time to get some software to allow me to back up and restore my address book and calendar. I checked out Datapilot and saw they support my phone for these functions, so I shucked out the $34.95 to download the software (for instant gratification.)

Installation was smooth and seemless, and I got a rush of excitement when it recognized the phone and began downloading the phone book. I also downloaded the calendar with no problems. Then I made some changes to the calendar and uploaded to the phone. Worked beautifully.

Then I made some changes to the phonebook and upload...

First sign of danger was a warning message saying that it didn't recognize numbers listed as "Mobile" and would place it in the phone as "Other." Okay....

So I click "Continue" and the software starts the upload. Then, the whole thing freezes and the software tells me there's a communications error.

When I checked my phone, it was EMPTY. Everything there was wiped out!

I immediately went to the website and looked for answers, but there were none to be found, so I opened a "Support Ticket." What a laugh! That was one week ago and it still has NOT BEEN LOOKED AT!

Today I went for broke and decided to call their Tech Support phone number. It was repeatedly busy, but after 15 minutes of redialing it finally got through.

Well, I'm still on hold, listening to their on-hold music and occassional message telling me "All support technicians are busy with other calls."

I've been on hold for 80 minutes! Thanks god I have an internet phone and I'm not actually paying for this hold time.

I have now decided to give up on DataPilot and Susteen. They'll take your money, and their product may or may not work for you. If it doesn't work for you.... Buyer Beware!

[...]

When the software arrived, I read the directions that said it should be installed before the cable or phone was connected. Okay good - I'm glad I waited. I popped the CD in and it started up an installer program. I looked through the online manual, then clicked "Install". After some disk whirring, it prompted me to accept a license agreement, and then to enter the serial number. So I type in the number that's printed on the label on the front of the jewel case insert.

Well, hmmmmph! I must've made a typo. So I typed it again, carefully. Same thing, it says it's an invalid serial number. I try an "I" instead of a "1". I try all lower case instead of upper case. I enter it over and over again, and nothing works. So I visit Susteen's Support Site and look for an answer. I found suggestions to reboot, to make sure there was only one copy of the installer running, to clean out the \winnt\temp directory, to clean out the \winnt\installer directory... I tried all those things, and nothing helped. So I went back to the website and created a support ticket (2380-1849322), just like they said. I described the problem as well as I could. In response, I got a canned message via email with some "You must be stupid, let me tell you how a computer works" kind of help, including the stuff they'd suggested that I'd already tried. I captured a screen shot, then went back to their website and submitted that, saying their canned messages hadn't helped, and I'd tried everything they had told me to do, with no luck.

Six days later, they responded with "It's been a few days since I left a message and I have not heard from you, please feel free to re-open the ticket if you still need assistance." and they marked the ticket as closed and RESOLVED. I was livid.

I reopened the ticket and responded: "It's been a few days since I've heard from *YOU* after I submitted the screen shot showing the invalid serial number error message. This problem is still outstanding. I have been unable to install this software. I need to hear some type of actual solution from you guys soon or I will be requesting a refund. I've purchased and installed many types of software in the past and have never had this many problems right from the beginning. This is ridiculous."

24 hours later, the ticket hadn't been touched, so I tried to call them. Their main number (949-341-0007) said if I had technical questions, hang up and call 949-789-8200 for technical help. So I did. Over and over again, with the same results each time - a busy signal. So I decided I was just going to return the piece of crap and try BitPim. On the website, I found a place that talked about returns, so I went there. In order to generate an RMA number, they want my order number (which I have) and an authorization number (which I don't have). So I just decide their website is a complete waste of time, and I call their main number to ask for an RMA number. After entering the pushbuttons for customer service, it rings, and... guess what? I got somebody's voicemail. While wondering if any real humans actually work there, I leave a message saying I was unable to install the software, I couldn't get help from their technical support, and I needed an RMA number. I left my phone number. I wonder if they'll call me back.

They never did call me back, but I did get a real person when I called again the next day. She barely spoke English, but she did give me an RMA number and an address without even asking why I wanted to return the product. <shrug>

I sure wish I'd read the reviews here on Amazon before I bought this.

I had purchased this software when I had a Motorola E815. However, since I had a bluetooth adaptor, I didn't need to spend any additional money to use this when I swapped my E815 for an LG VX9800. After I paired my phone with my laptop, I just went in to the settings and changed things over to the bluetooth com port. So, as long as your phone is supported, any bluetooth phone you buy will work with this software. DataPilot supports a wide range of phones from a wide range of carriers. Don't underestimate the importance of this. If I had bought Motoroal Phone Tools, I'd be stuck looking for something that worked with LG phones.

Even though I had the techs at the Verizon store transfer my contacts, I was able to back them up on my laptop in DataPilot with no problem. Since the phonebook on the 9800 supports multiple numbers per contact, they show up this way in DataPilot as well. You can also import contacts from a palm device as long as the palm software is installed on the same machine. One thing to note though is that this software does not do true syncing. You either write to the phone or the PC, and the source data overwrites the destination.

Then came calendar functions. The lack of true syncing is really a pain here. I import from Outlook on a daily basis. However, appointments deleted from Outlook are not deleted from he calendar in data pilot. The workaround for this is to delete the data in data pilot then reimport from scratch. This mimics what data pilot does with the phone. This is klunky, but once you figure it out, it works ok.

Then, I messed around with ringtones. I have been able to download midi files to my laptop, and then open them in the midi editor. Once there, I can transfer them to my phone - contrary to what Verizon would have you believe. Midi tones are not great, but you should be able to find something better than the tones they give you. Oh, if you should like some of the factory set "my sounds" as ringtones, you can read them from the phone and send them back to the phone as ringtones.

The only other feature that is supported on my phone is picture/video transfer from phone to PC. I don't use my camera much, but I took a test picture to see how well it worked. When I tried to tranfer the picture to the PC, data pilot crashed. This is not important to me, but it is worth noting if it is important to you.

I haven't tried to use DUN so I don't know if this works or not. It is not supposed to be supported, but it might work.

Overall it's a decent product, and once you know the workarounds it is functional.

Go to their website and see how much support the software offers for your particular phone. For my LG PM-325, this package is not really worth it. It can download the phone #s off my phone. But it can't retrieve my ringtones nor can I upload ringtones to the phone. It can get pictures from my phone but it cannot upload to the phone. Kind of pointless with such limited features.

Worst part is the length of time it takes to update the software. Its ridiculous as one writer wrote having to upgrade each incremental update yourself (3.1, 3.2, 3.3, 3.4.....3.11).

Similar experience as most of the other reviewers. Very buggy, unreliable and poorly written software. If Amazon is smart, they will pull products from Susteen out of their system.

I've submitted a ticket to Susteen tech support, but don't expect much help based on the other users' experience.

Run, don't walk, away from DataPilot.

Since Verizon tries to make you pay to transfer pix from your phone, I wanted another solution. Datapilot works as advertised. I am able to send pictures, both ways from phone to PC and back. The transfer process does take about 30 seconds/picture.

I likewise can download ringtones to my phone. However the ringtone editor is somwhat weak so you may need another piece of software to convert your MP3s to ringtones, then easily import them to DataPilot.

The back-up mechanism for contacts was simple and straight forward.

I had problems from the start with this product. After emailing tech support all they did was repeatedly quote solutions that were on their website FAQ's (which I had already tried and notified them of that in my email). They chose to ignore my subsequent emails telling them that none of their solutions worked. They kept trying to close the ticket without finding out if their solution worked for me. I have had the ticket open for a month and still no response even after sending follow-up emails to them.
Stay away from this product and anything made by Susteen!!!

I recently purchased this cable and software for my LG phone. Worked fine moments after install, then lost connection to phone. Only after a re-install did it work again, and that was momentarily as well. Now not able to use software at all. Definitely a rip off.