Hi Mike,

I apologize that you did not receive a faster response to your support request. I’d like to figure out why you didn’t receive a prompt response so that we can serve our customers better in the future. Could you please let us know when and how you submitted your request? For example, did you:

* Submit your request online at http://www.carbonite.com/customersupport?
* Submit your request through the Carbonite InfoCenter (Get Support page)?
* Send an email to customersupport@carbonite.com?
* or none of the above?

If you’re willing to try the software again, I’d be happy to work with you directly to get things up and running properly, and to see if we can determine why you had a BSoD problem. Please let me know if you’d like my assistance.

Sincerely,

Len Pallazola
Carbonite Customer Support

HAHAHHAHAHAHA!

That is pretty funny. Post something negative on your blog about a company and you get almost an immediate response. E-mail the company and you never get a response. Great job.

That is one thing our company will NEVER do……..only e-mail support. Too many companies do it these days and FAIL MISERABLY at it. Thank you to Freshbooks for keeping the phone lines open and the fantastic customer service always going.

Len is attempting to rectify the alleged problem brought up by Freshbooks and in return for his kindness, he is being mocked and insulted by a Freshbooks employee.

First of all, the manner in which Mike unceremoniously dumped on all the good people at Carbonite illustrates that although he appears to champion web based services, he is not a friend of the community. I can assure you that if Mike had sent an email to Carbonite he would have received a prompt response.

Anyone can write a negative review and even the most prestigious company’s in the world have to endure these types of silly reviews. It amazes me that Len’s gesture of goodwill has been met with such a response. It shows the type of attitude the people at Freshbook’s truly subscribe to.

I’m canceling my account at Freshbooks.

Hey Mike:

Have you tried Mozy? Oft-cited competitor to Carbonite and in all the reviews I’ve read they seem to be coming out on top. They made big press a month or so back by signing up GE for something insane like 200k desktops (interesting that even one of the biggest and best corporate IT departments is admitting that it doesn’t have desktop backup under control). I’m using the Mac version, but it’s multi-platform. Sorry … not 100% that they’re Vista ready.

DAVE

If I may be so bold … if you use my referral link when you sign up, I get a little Mozy love: https://mozy.com/?ref=35QLCK

DAVE

Just do it Mike…….you know you want to………..you won’t regret. Get Daniel to do the same thing……..heck, get the whole office doing the same thing.

Aaron
Not a FreshBook employee

I’ve used carbonite for about a year without any trouble. I use it to backup my mce computer which has thousands of gigital pics I’ve taken over the last 6 years. I have used then once to restore about 6Gigs of video. Can’t speak for the vista os. I’d rather not even use it for about 2 years. Heck, they just got xp up to speed!

As for Ray… Sounds like you have an axe to grind. It also sounds like you should take a break, relax and make SURE you corectly identify who your talking to and about before you hit the “submit comment” button.

Mike, I think I was the one that suggested Carbonite to you so hopefully it didn’t mess up your computer.

I’ve got more than a few suggestions for what can help depending on what you need. Just give me some info on what you need/want and I’ll jot in a little post for everyone and I’ll email and tell you what I’ve been up to.

On to the questions that everyone needs to answer to pick their ideal service:

Do you need instant automatic backup like Carbonite or are periodic scheduled backups good enough?

Do you need file versioning? If so how many is enough?

Do you need online remote access or simply a data dump from a program to restore?

Do you simply need file backup or complete system backup?

Do you need to share files at all? If so do you need it to be password protected?

Do you need to have one account work on several computers or is having a seperate service plans for each computer acceptable?

Is this for backup only or do you want it to double as an online file access?

Do you need explorer integration?

Do you need quick pick options like “Desktop, Favortites, My Documents” or is a browse and select good enough?

Do you need the ability to pick individual files or is folder level options good enough?

Do you need to have the capability to restore to the same location or is downloading the file and browsing for the restore location acceptable?

What are you backing up is it just files or do you need the option for SQL or exchange backup?

Why are you doing an online backup vs offline drive backup?

Is a private personal encryption key important or is simply having SSL encryption itself good enough?

Anything else you need?

Another vote for Mozy. I use Mozy at home on my Mac Mini and my MacBook and use MozyPro at the office on my XP machine and on my Vista machine. Never failed me once. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!!

MozyPro the best. I’ve tested all the different online backup solutions and at the time Mozy was a new company and their client was in beta however I stuck with them and glad I did. I am now a reseller and have 10 businesses and all of them love it. Go and check them out. I get e-mail alerts every time a business doesn’t upload so their service is great.

Can’t speak for any backup company mentioned so far. You might want to look at another one: http://www.crashplan.com

Enjoy and keep up the great work!

Olav

You might want to check out some Amazon S3-based services: http://jets3t.s3.amazonaws.com/index.html. While I have not used them, Jungle Disk (http://solutions.amazonwebservices.com/connect/entry.jspa?externalID=239&categoryID=66) and Altexa (http://solutions.amazonwebservices.com/connect/entry.jspa?externalID=229&categoryID=66) look interesting.

I currently use JetS3t (http://jets3t.s3.amazonaws.com/index.html) which works well, but is not exactly a “backup” service.

Carbonite works well for us on Windows XP. It is good to know that it does not work for some and what the potential problems are. Still, we recommend giving it a try for small offices or 1 man shops.

Our experience with it is logged here.

http://techrx.blogspot.com/2007/05/carbonite-dont-stress-back-up-your-hard.html

I use Carbonite at home and I’ve been very happy with it. However at my work I need some way of managing multiple computers. I’ve been looking at MozyPro as it seems very nice and full featured, but ran into a real snag. It does not support files that are EFS encrypted (the built-in XP encryption). We routinely encrypt our laptop user’s files just in case they’re lost or stolen, so this is a real problem. Does anyone have another OFFSITE backup solution to recommend that’s both centrally managed and handles encrypted files?

gary

i dont like the retension policies..im also not a big fan of free or cheap sites..it seems that people forgot the internet boom..cheap and free were all tried already..on $5.00 its not a wortwhile biz, hard disk space cost approx 50cents a gig before operation costs, so if they have redundant servers it costs them btwn 80 cents and a dollar a gig, that being the case i would be afraid to leave my buisness with a company that is only charging a few bux… i would rather the company make money and provide a good reliable service…for not important or home files etc i guess mozy/carbonite are ok.. for buisnesss etc i would get a service that costs…in my office we use http://www.onlinebackupvault.com and we are very happy.

If anyone knows how to get Carbonite off of my computer without throwing it from the top of a 10 story building, please let me know. I have tried everything (and so have others) and cannot get rid of this POS program.

Chris, you might want to try http://www.datadepositbox.com.
They are proving to be a bit pricey for larger backups, compared to mozypro.com and others, but if I recall correctly, they are based in Canada.

Found this site when looking for the answer to a carbonite question. I went to the carbonite site first - but everytime I searched the site crashed. I tried to ‘write’ them but after I completed the form it crashed after I clicked send.

I’ll check out mozy.

Hey Rob, all I can say is I have taken Carbonite off my Vista machine and since I have done that I have not experienced the blue screen.

Rudolf - I think you misunderstood. I was making no inferences about Rob’s search - only my experiences with Vista blue screens AFTER I removed Carbonite (i.e. no more blue screens).

P.S. My background is SEO and I think Google has done a wonderful job of solving a very difficult problem - no beefs with Google here

As a follow up. I got one canned “we have received your request” message with a blurb about maybe getting back by end of next business day. I didn’t get anything. So it’s uninstalled. Sorry Carbonite - I wanted it to work - it just seems like you don’t. BTW - Amazon.com has the boxed version for 44.95 w/ a $30.00 rebate. Sweet. They don’t offer that if you buy direct. Now I just have to find a service that fits my needs…

This problems with carbonite support are not unique. I emailed them with questions about business use, told them I was a reseller and wanted to recommend it to my clients, told them I need some specific questions answered…

NEVER once got a response.

So we switched to mozypro.com for our clients, and I’m glad we did. Much better features, and they actually reply when we contact them! Imagine that.

Everybody: Don’t even bother with carbonite.

I’ve got 800 kbps upstream to go with my 8 Mbps down… not great, obviously, but at least Canadian broadband isn’t as terrible as, say, mobile service.

Also, kudos to Mozy for the awesome reference AND awesome customer service.

Well, yeah, I can understand why FTTP services like FiOS aren’t happening ’round here anytime soon. But I do sincerely doubt the difference between your 10/.5 or my 8/.8 and his 15/15 comes entirely down to the last mile… Rogers and Bell simply don’t see the kind of competition as providers in the States, so there’s no urgent need to improve.

15/15… that’s just not fair.

I was just about to sign up for Carbonite, now I’m all confused. Carbonite or Mozy?

well, i have already bought the annual subscription for one of my computers from mozy & it has been at work, having backed up around 4.8 GB so far. i am considering buying the subscription for my second machine but i have been all confused!! but after having read through all the user reviews & keeping in mind the optimum money utilisation, i am sure, now i would subscribe to mozy. the reason for that is more than obvious, one would not even want to imagine depending on a company that doesn’t believe in sharing the phone numbers. what if i desperately need some support? then is the issue of no monthly plans with carbonite. they only have an annual plan, whereby, one would be bound with them in case one doesn’t really like them. & while i agree that the other services maybe better than these once, in the given price range, i think, these are the only two, please correct me if i am wrong. out of these two, i second mozy for sure.

I have had Carbomite installed on an XP PC for 18 months or so and had no problem installing or using…
until recently when there was a problem about the service being down, except it wasn’t immediately apparent [after all they go on about how it saves without you noticing and I am a mere novice about computers with no technical knowledge] and then it was definitely a problem for in excess of 24 hours..
nor did I recive an e-mail about the problem or how to overcome…
I eventually found a forum which explained the problem and how to sort it by reinstalling..except it then took me hours even to get onto the site [try it yourself if you have a few hours to waste].
I then had to reinstall again a week later…e-mails to customer service were slowly responded to and no real explanation or apology.
But since then things have been OK and for the most part I was satisfied with my subscription.
Take note this was an XP machine.

I have now networked a Vista PC and wanted to use Carbonite.
Boy, just forget it.
It is supposed to be easy - that’s what the Home Page tells you - but it isn’t.
The endless e-mails to and from Customer Service - their replies requiring me to uninstall and reboot and disable Windows Defender or Norton Firewall or Spybot etc etec etc.
Even when I finally got onto the website or to the Manage screen [in itself took days as the server seems to go on and off like a yo-yo] reinstalling was fine to a point but mostly blew out at some point or another.
Only once in the last four days have I completed installation, Then when 73% through initial back up it stopped and that was that.
I am at this moment trying to get back on to the Manage site to reinstall having uninstalled etc etc
Its like a soap on TV except more annoying and ridiculous.
Have starting ccing the VP of Customer Care - remains to see if he cares.
Is it a problem with Carbonite conflicting with Vista? I am not having any problems with my XP machine for back-ups although I can’t get to the Manage screen on that machine most times I try.

Very Very dissapointed in Carbonite…I agree that it worked fine for almost a year…until I needed to restore my files…it did back up all the files it was supposed to…silent, in the backgound etc…then I purchased a new computer…my old hard drive was wiped but I wasn’t worried. I had Carbonite…long story short, I couldn’t get it to install and I lost over 15gbyts of files…Once I finally got a hold of a customer service tech rep (50mins on hold) he spent over 2hrs trying to restore my files…he was at a loss as to why and I he arranged for a refund of $49 dollars back…a pretty fair trade in return for thousands of files, family photos’ and family videos…needless to say, I’m backing up the old fasion way…with a 250gig external harddrive…this online back up is waaay to risky…another thing I found very disturbing with Carbonite is while on hold ( forever) a recording keeps coming on repeating the option to bypass being on hold by pressing the star sign and paying an addtional $19.00 for the “priority costumer support line”…it says you then get to speak to a tech rep right away with no wait and get “red carpet” treatment…shouldn’t all costumers get that treatment!!!!…nothing like being on hold til the end of time and feeling like you are being forced into paying more money to be a “priority” customer.

I’ve seen Memopal (www.memopal.com) recently, and was impressed by the site blurb, and some scattered reviewed on the web. Looks like good “get-your-files-anywhere” service.
Italian company, so I wonder how service will be to the states …
Considering now Mozy, or Memopal?

I really wish I had read these reviews before I wasted my money on Carbonite. I purchased it in September 2007 and backed up my files on my computer, it took three days and everything was fine. However, I recently got a new computer and all I wanted to do was restore my files…which I thought would be “simple”….I was definitely wrong. After 4 days, Carbonite has frozen my computer twice and is also only 4% done restoring my files. I spent 35 minutes on hold trying to find out it what was going on. All the tech person could tell me was that the Restore Status bar probably wasn’t working properly and that my files were in fact being restored….when I was on the phone with him it was around 8% and now back to 4%?

I just purchased an external harddrive and am backing up my files manually. Thank God I hooked up old computer back up and was able to salvage my files…I know others haven’t been as lucky. I have so many files on this computer having had it for 5 years…there is a lot to lose. I will never use an online backup system ever again…I’m just backing up my files the old fashioned way!

I started using Carbonite a couple of months ago and was very happy with it till a few days ago. It stopped backups, Status: Backup Pending. Restore wasn’t working either. I sent messages to support, no replies. Interesting that they were very responsive before I subscribed for 2 years.

After 4 days, it started backing up files again, and I mean *again*…. all the previously backed up files (about 22 GB). 3 days now, and it’s still doing this. All previous green dots became yellow.

I spent 2 hours yesterday waiting on the phone for tech support before I gave up. I’m holding right now; Recording said I’m the 3rd person, how long can that be (rhetorical question).

More messages to them, both emails and web support. No replies, not even confirmations of receipt.

I can’t tell if they’re still there, or are all on vacation.

Most important, I don’t know if the original files are still backed up with them.

Thanks for listening.

I signed up for Carbonite after hearing the endorsements from Rush and Kim Komando. It took three days to back up, but I thought it was well worth it. That was five months ago, and I would have continued to feel that way until the big blue screen three days ago. I thought, oh well, I HAVE CARBONITE, NO PROBLEM. I bought a new Dell three weeks ago and of course it came with Vista Home Premium. I changed laptops on the site, and in another five days, it finally restored my files to the new laptop. Then two weeks later after a blue screen, I had to reformat the hard drive. I told myself no problem since I HAVE CARBONITE.

On July 30, I started “restore”. When I got up the next morning, the screen said I was on the same amount of files as I went to bed. I restarted the restore again, and when I came home from work it said it was completed. I went to look at my restored files, but they were not there. Each time that I restarted, it seemed to hang up and not have any progress.

On Aug 1, I called the C/S number at 9 am and was advised I was #1 for tech support. At 1140 am, I was advised that they had alot of calls, and please call again sometime. I was disconnected because they were too busy. Now I am furious. I email them, and get a response that they will get back to me in 24-48 hours.

By the way, last night I restarted the restore again, and the progress got up to 67 per cent today, but then it stopped.

I sent an email, as if it matters, to Kim Komando and Rush telling them how useless and undependable the company was. From all that I have read, they do not really have a handle on online backup, much less any service of any kind. I think you would be better to depend on your local florist to handle your backup. At least they answer the phone and probably have the same amount of your data ready to restore as Carbonite does.

G.

[...]   Though this review is a year old ( http://arstechnica.com/reviews/other/online-backup-solutions-a-review.ars/1 ) I think you would be better served with option 1 or 2.   Costs of external hard drives are very competitive and there are some solutions that are very portable. Blog about problems with Carbonite. [...]

On 8 Aug 2008, I purchased a two-year automatic backup system from Carbonite. Unfortunately, I have discovered that I cannot open .doc files with long names. Prior to this time I did not have a problem and continuously opened the same .doc files that had longer names. The following is a real example of the message I receive when I try and open a long doc. file:

The full path of the file ‘4.4 Syllabus LDSP 200 Back Page’ is too long. Please try using the ‘map network drive’ command to connect to the server to shorten the path.

I do not have a clue what the above means or how to do it.

I have tried using Windows Explorer to open the file and nothing happens after I double click the file (no message, no nothing). I tried sending the long file as an email attachment to myself, hoping that I could shorten the file name prior to saving the attached file, but the long file will not attach.

Help! The files with long names that I am trying to open are critical and needed for a class that I will be teaching in two weeks.

hmm, i did not know that about carbonite. are you sure there arent settings you can change so you can store stuff on it?
-jason

Carbonite is a disaster for support. I need to backup my Outlook data. The restore has been showing as “in progress” for the last two hours with 0% complete. The “live chat” was dead. Nada. Nothing. The phone tech support told me there would be an estimated 90 minute wait for a technician. And the web site tech support page tells me to check the preference page to see what the progress is. WHAT preference page? I told so many of my friends to get this. I’ll now tell them to bale as soon as their subscription expires if not sooner.

I’ve had similar issues with Carbonite

Non existent support (4 requests over 3 months, never answered…)

I am changing and asking for my money back.

It seems that online backup has hit a nerve here - which is excellent considering 94% of people do not regularly backup. Many good backup solutions exist, and I’m happy to see that some of the people on this discussion are using something.

I’m going to put a quick plug in for our solution: http://www.backblaze.com. For $5/month we provide unlimited backup with a service the US News called “The simplest way yet to backup PC files.”

Give it a try. It takes 3 minutes to get started, asks no question to setup, and has a free trial.

Gleb Budman
CEO, Backblaze

I have been using Carbonite for about 2 years now. Its good until you need help, than forget about it. It took me three hours on hold to get someone to talk to and it was the same with a friend that is using their service. They have the wrost support I have ever had to deal with. When I have emailed to complain, I got no responsive. Now, it is telling me that I have reached the back up limit, but I never knew there was a limit. I am looking for a new service.

ohh…and as per Melissa’s comment about being charged for upgrades for a transmit limit breach, we don’t charge you for any transmit limit because what ever is saved on the device gets saved on our servers. We also push out updates to our devices weekly, at no charge as well.

…I swear no more advertising

Carbonite seemed like a great solution for my remote backup needs. However, it has caused my computer to lock up multple times per day and I now have it disabled. I contacted customer service twice and they did not reply. I then emailed David Friend directly (he gives what appears to be his email address to everybody) and he had one of his people contact me.

Their 2 or 3 emails to me have basically been pre-written responses that they have for common problems. Their fixes have not worked. I’ve emailed them 3 times since the last supposed fix and they have not replied. I am now asking them to cancel my account and refund the prorated remaining portion of my 2-year subscription. My guess is that they will not do it - heck, they probably won’t even reply.

I’m not sure why Carbonite isn’t working for me, and if it works for you, it should be fine, but I can’t stand it and their customer service is a joke! Best of luck if you try it.

Gary W.

I have just tried to cancel my Carbonite subscription after 4 months of trying to resolve system crashes caused my Carbonite. The support group was horrible. They kept suggesting non-sensical solutions, which I did to a point. I had to remove Carbonite from my system because I was afraid of the damage that was being done to my system. Also, when Carbonite is active, hibernating your system become problematic.This is a case of buyer beware. The customer agreement does not allow for refunds so I am stuck with the bill.

Wow, I wish I had found this review BEFORE I bought Carbonite. Here’s my experience:

I found Carbonite’s restore process incredibly painful and their support even more — like a root canal.

The original restore missed most of my files and it took several days for them to tell me that I had to reconfigure Windows Defender, Windows Firewall and Norton to accept Carbonite — no mention of that anywhere on their site.

Their support has limited hours (only until 5 eastern) which is ridiculous when you can’t get to your data. Even after paying an additional $19.95 for “priority” support, I didn’t get the response time I would have liked and like the others, I found their responses canned and not helpful.

While the back up process might work quite well, the proof is in the restore. Not yet ready for prime time!

I waited 2.5 weeks for a response from Carbonite and gave up and initiated a chat session. They emailed some instructions for further investiagating and it has now been more than 2 weeks since that email and despite nbumerous emails to support and CEO and marketing VP, NO ONE replies! over 5 weeks without a working backup. Shocking service. And they keep bloggin and PR’ing about how focussed and excellent they are. Yeah, right. If only I knew before I signed up.

Below is a response I received from Carbonite regarding floppy access issues. Note that this has been a problem with Carbonite for QUITE some time and has yet to be addressed (Along with lack of network/external drive support).

I’ve been exploring online backup solutions and there really is no free lunch. I’ll probably stick with JungleDisk and Amazon S3 ’cause it does what I expect it to and it does it pretty fast. The cons I found with Carbonite:

1) Slow uploads (1/4 my upstream speed)
2) Accesses my floppy
3) No external drive support
4) Doesn’t backup all files even when telling it to backup a directory (It excludes various files!) by right clicking it and telling it to backup. If I tell it to specificly backup a directory it better backup everything UNDER it…

I also tried Mozy but I didn’t like how it jammed everything into a temp file prior to uploading so I dropped it pretty fast.

–
Hello and thank you for contacting Carbonite Customer Support.

We apologize for the inconvenience. We are working with Microsoft to find out a resolution. However, if you wish you can disable your floppy drive until this issue gets resolved.

Click start, right-click on My computer and go to Manage. Click on Device Manager and click on Floppy drive. In there you will be able to right-click on the floppy and disable it.

Please feel free to contact us for any further assistance.
–

I uninstalled Carbonite from my system on December 3, 2008. I’ve not had a single lock up since then. 15 months of troubles and it came down to Carbonite. Wow!

I found Carbonite’s support terrible just as others have mentioned. They did send back “form responses” as others have stated based upon key words in my emals. Many of their supposed fixes were nonsensical. I wish them the best and I hope they fix their technical support.

I’m now using Mozy and I like the features better, especially that I can backup external drives and the option to purchases a data CD from them if I have a crash and lose all of my data, but the upload is slow. I’m working with their tech support to figure out why. Hopefully they can resolve this issue.

Anyone aware of IP issues related to Carbonite? I’ve got similar probs on 2 PCs at same address.

In general the patterns are…
- PC slowed gradually over the past 6 weeks since install, eventually leading to crashes when hibernating, shutting down, etc
- Icon disappeared from tray
- When loading from progs list, InfoCentre usually opens as IE error
- Backup Centre links don’t work
- Reinstall doesn’t work
- Support emails are going unanswered

I find it difficult to believe this raft of complaints can be attributed entirely to poor corporate practices, and wonder if there’s a hitherto unknown fault at play - IP blocking or some such.

My computer keeps going to a black screen and totally locking up on me. I’ve had carbonite for almost a month and really wished I’d have read this prior to paying for a year.

I’ve been researching Mozy and Carbonite.

It seems Carbonite’s biggest issue is Vista.

On other post Mozy’s biggest issue is the time it takes to restore. I believe anywhere from 18-36 hours. I don’t know if I would like to wait that long.

Any comments on Carbonite’s restoring time?

Also, open for any other comments.

Carbonite got an “A” for every facet of their service in the beginning. They wound up with an “F” and here’s why.

I kept getting emails from them warning me that I hadn’t had a backup in over a week. My system told me otherwise, so what should I have believed? I replied to every email and asked for help in understanding the discrepancies. Without this knowledge, how could I know if Carbonite was securing my data?

No one ever replied to my questions. Several Carbonite “Service Reps” (and I use that term loosely) sent me robo-emails about unrelated topics. After many of these over two months, I asked that someone call me directly or send me a refund for the rest of the year. I was informed that phoning was a higher-cost service (again–they don’t know the meaning of the word), and they don’t do refunds because of their free trials.

I refused to pay them any more money, and I went into a trial with another backup service. My one-year subscription with Carbonite was
over in mid-December ‘08, but the company continues to spam me with warnings about my unsecure data.

Throughout my dealings with Carbonite, every one of their emails was signed, but not one of the rebots did a thing to help me.

CARBONITE RIP OFF.

My computer crashed & the tech couldn’t save anything (faulty memory).
Not to worry I had paid CARBONITE for the first year and then was automatically billed for the 2nd year so for a $100 bucks I knew I was safe.
What a shocker when NOTHING WORKED, nada, zip, big O.
Then the Carbonite nightmare began.

Carbonite not only is terrible but they are RUDE - NO CUSTOMER SERVICE unless you want to pay $20.00, - Keep you on hold for hours and hours.

DAY 1
Was on hold 1 hour and 40 minutes (thankfully I have a speaker phone so my ear didn’t swell). I was #4 in line that time. Another hour and 20 minutes but I made it to #2 before I was disconnected.

Day #2
At least 7 more calls plus the online help which is a bigger joke than their phones.
I got a live person. Asks for my email addy and then says I do not have a contract, would I like to make the purchase now? NO WAY!

Explained quickly in a PLEASE help a little ol’ lady (I AM) voice.
My password didn’t work at all so this guy sent me numerous password all about 12# long………………..NOTHING, nada, zip, big O. Exhausted I quit.

DAY #3
Call in morning 70 minute wait on phone, live guy… Passwords again nada, zip, big O.
DAY #3 afternoon
After 3 calls each waiting a minimum of an hour plus I couldn’t take it any longer.

DAY #4
RESOLVE and determination I started in the morning and by 4pm I got another guy.
Went through the password game again but this time he said “let me check it out”
Shock someone that knew something. Answer ” I don’t know exactly happened but all your files are corrupt and you won’t get anything.

4 DAYS to get “you’re wasting your time lady you are out of LUCK”!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Want my $$ back….answer you’ll have to call billing.
WHAT the billing dept. Is on another planet and you can’t connect me?
Carbonite has a HUNDRED BUCKS for nada, zip, big O and I have to chase it down????
TOOOOOO angry to start trying the billing dept. On Uranus, I was sure.

DAY 5.
Waited so long (they must have 1 ONE phone in the joint) I got to 1st in line after 15 minutes more…… A recording giving me the hours they are open which was not now!!!!!

Finally went to CONTACT US on Carbonite web site.
Wrote a summery email asking how do I get my wasted money BACK!!!!

Received an email with an apology for the inconveniences and she would help now. FINALLY something more positive.
She wrote next day showing they refunded my credit card for $49.95.
WAIT what about the other $49.95 from August.
“I’ll check on that”

THIS WAS A MONTH AGO and I still waiting for $49.95.
Now I write and get NOTHING nada, zip, big O.

They treat customers like crap, lie, cheat and then steal your money and you get
NOTHING,nada, zip, big O.

My computer crashed 5 weeks ago. I had been using Carbonite for 10 months then, without much issues (on Vista). After reinstalling my pc the first thing I did was install Carbonite to retrieve my files. Unfortunatly the installation would not succeed, not on my pc or one of the other six computers I tried it on. To make a long story short, after e-mailing and chatting online with the supportdesk for over a month, it took an angry e-mail to Carbonite CEO David Friend to have a technician call me up the next day to resolve the problem through a remote desktop session which lasted only 10 minutes. The problem was not with my pc, but with the account on their server wich contained an error. The restoration has now been going on for more than 24 hours and seems to work fine, and I probably will continue to use Carbonite just because it’s so cheap, but I will make an extra backup locally, just to be safe.

If you’re having troubles with Carbonite, just make sure you get to talk to a technician on the phone, forget about e-mail or the live chat on their website.

I am FURIOUS!!!!! I wish to high heaven I had known this before I installed this on my laptop. However, I trusted that damn PC Mag referral and now I’m screwed. I have lost tons of files not to mention the dreaded blue screen appeared and now my entire pc is lost.

If I could see the person that is in charge I would slap his face!

If you are not into large corporations taking care of your backups, then try out what a company I have been using for the last 6 years. Their support is top notch.

http://www.Remote-Online-Backup.com

I have a major complaint about Carbonite. After a long wait, the only responses to several inquiries that I made were the same “canned” responses, over and over, that I can solve all problems through their on-line info. I don’t have hours to spend researching a solution that they should be happy and willing to help me with on a timely basis. I just bought a new computer, one problem came up, I called HP and the problem was resolved in minutes. This is the way customer service should work. I have uninstalled Carbonite and moved on. Needless to say, Carbonite has ignored my requests for a pro-rated refund. Buyer Beware!!

Carbonite is a joke .I had a triel for less than 3 days and it is a chaos .I don`t like the service whatsoever not to mention the customer service

Get away from these guys …

Old laptop running XP started acting up almost a year ago. Heard Howard Sterns ad and figured what the heck 50 bucks….My mother board went so off I went for a new laptop w/Vista….No problem most files where restored.Now my subscription expired and I haven’t renewed. My computer is acting weird.I boot up yesterday and my desktop appears like when I first got the machine asking me to register(the PC) I did that a month ago all my icons gone different wallpaper etc. Ah …Houston? After a reboot it all came back.Today tried to do some online banking…Couldn’t log in. Called the bank and she had no problem logging into my bank account. I mention Carbonite….And am told that’s the problem? Can they do this? Anyone else experiencing these issues? Holy crap

My boss installed carbonite loved it and then sent me a coupon for it she liked it so much. Then carbonite started freezing up after backing up files. Nerfarious things started happening like zone alarm froze when carbonite was running. Well thhings went from bad to worse. My boss had set up carbonite on her home computer and that computer had the exact same problems that the office computer did. She used or should I say tried to use the troubleshooting solution found on carbonite’s website to no avail. Then both computers froze and she lost the internet at home and we are in the process of replacing both hard drives. Thanks carbonite

had problem with Carbonite, online agent sorted it out after live chat and remote access in 15 mins - was a bit wary of giving him remote access, but seemend very professional - and did the job nicely!

So 5 stars for carbonite support

The company I spoke of in the comment above is Subterranean Data. Their web site is http://www.remote-online-backup.com They had a free trial when I signed up, I assuem they still do.

I tried Mozy about 2 years ago and it just about brought my PC to a dead stop because it was suing so much in resources. Tried to contact customer support and never got an answer.
Went with carbonite and everything seemed great. Initial backup (about 120 gig) took a while, but didn’t use much in the way of resources.
When computer crashed restored everything from a local backup and attempted to set Carbonite back up. After more than 2 weeks, it was still attempting to back everything up and was saying I had more than 210 in backup files (with almost 20 gig left to backup). Yes PC was running 24/7, not set to go to sleep, and have a decent interest speed 0about 3 mbs.
I attempted to chat online 3 times with Carbonite about this. Two times chat sessions cut off mid way through. Never could get it working the 3rd time. Have sent 4 emails spelling out my problems, twice they have come back with instruction on how to restore my data even though I have made it clear I am attempting a new backup, not restore. Other 2 times no response at all. Email response is about 48 hours.

I’m dropping online backup services except for critical files. WIll go back to an external hard drive stored in offsite safe.

Recently upgraded computer (Vista) and restored files from Carbonite. Then I realized that any work I had done since 4/11/09 had not been backed up. Reinstalled it and still had the problem. For the past 3 weeks I have dealt with 4 support people. The first one said he had sent me instructions on how to send my logs to them - NEVER SENT IT! They have had my logs for 2 weeks and every time I go back to support they need an additional 12-48 hrs. My subscription ends this coming week and I will not reup. Don’t sell a product if you can’t support it.

I just got out of a chat with Carbonite support and Timothy tells me “don’t worry” when I discovered that their remote access doesn’t function. He said that their engineers are aware of the problem. Oh good then I won’t worry,,,,,,, He said check back in a couple of days. No problem Tim, I can shut down the business for a few days. No worrys!!

Terrible product…it might backup date but when you need a full restore it won’t work and the customer service is of no help. Don’t waste your money

Carbonite back up is an awful service. The tech support is even worse. I paid for my subscription and my hard drive crashed. The “death click” and Carbonite could only restore 90% of my files. The other ones were unrestorable. What? it is a back up software that has lots of bugs. Do not buy a subscription as it is a waste of money. The customer service is a joke too. All they can tell you is what is on their computer screens over in Asia somewhere. Find another way to back up your data as this one is a joke.