Nero v9

[John 'twosheds' McDonald]

RANT

As a result of a promo e-mail I decided to upgrade from Nero v8 to Nero v9. I really didn't use Nero 8 that much, tending to use Encore most of the time. But I thought - 'Well you have v8 and the upgrade offer isn't too expensive...'

So two days later I have uninstalled ALL Nero versions from my PC. Why? Well with Nero v9 I wasn't at all impressed by the way it installed itself but didn't give me any options about what file types it would handle. In fact it just zapped all of my existing preferences and installed itself as my preferred 'player'. So all .wmv, mp3, jpg, mov, etc. - you name it, now became defaults of Nero. Not only that but it appeared that legitimate mp3 files that I had downloaded and which I tried to play with WMP were played by both WMP and Nero but slightly out of phase.

To my way of thinking it is bad enough that the hated Microsoft issue new releases of Office with a default series of settings that I don't want and which take me an hour or more to turn off, but now other software suppliers seem to be following suit. In terms of Nerov9, you have been warned.

END OF RANT

Sorry

[Steve Grisetti]

No need to apologize, John. In fact, you may have saved us all some pain!

[Chuck Engels]

With most software products of that type you usually get an option for the Quick/Typical Installation, or the Custom Installation.
Unless you pick CUSTOM INSTALLATION you do not get an option to choose many things, including what files the program will now be in charge of.
This is confusing for most consumers at best and causes huge problems as you have seen John. Do you know if there was even an option for a Custom Installation?

[Ron]

I don't think there's an option for custom. If I remember right, it (version 7) started to install as soon as you click a/the link. It does take over your system immediately.

I stopped at version 7, no further problems here.

[John 'twosheds' McDonald]

I'm not sure that there was an option for custom installation but previous versions of Nero have given the option of selecting file associations in the course of the normal installation process which is why I missed it this time. (Does that make sense?)

[Bill Hunt]

I find that Nero is going down the path of Poxio, er-r, I mean Roxio. Other programs, that want to do this are RealPlayer and QT. At least QT allows one to choose the file associations, and for the last half-dozen updates, actually "remembers" my choices from before! I flat out hate some of these intrusive installations. Now, if I could only get the "Do Not Automatically Update" function to "stick" with QT...

Thanks for the H/U on Nero. I use it sparingly and only a few of its modules, 'cause many really do not play well with Adobe and DVD burners, etc., plus their version of Indexing, and file "watching," are real pains and a drag on resources, even on a powerful workstation. Just flat out bad programing in my book.

Hunt

[Dave McElderry]

So John, when you did the uninstall, did it return your associations to their previous state, or were you left with a big mess to clean up?

[John 'twosheds' McDonald]

I worked my way through Control Panel folder options to re-check that everything was OK but the uninstall seemed to enable a lot of defaults to reset. I also had to re-install the WMP plug-in for Firefox as Nero appeared to have corrupted/disabled that. So all is back to normal (?) again.

[JohnnyO]

I removed Roxio with a clean install of my computer. I usually do this once a year. That's why my computer runs so well.
I really do not like those heavy media programs like Roxio and Nero. They put thing all over your computer you do not want. I learned my lesson with the last Roxio sale. I will never purchase it again.

[John 'twosheds' McDonald]

Final comment.

After the uninstall of Nero v9 I ran a registry cleaner. Later I found that I still had traces of the installation showing up so I re-checked the registry manually. Later still I found that some new images that I transferred from my still camera has Nero associations attached. Final move was to go to the Nero site and download and run their Nero removal tool.

Now all appears to be back to where I started.

[Bill Hunt]

John,

Over the years, I have found only two other programs, that have more tentacles, than Nero - Norton (anything) and Poxio. The last time that I tried to unistall Poxio, it took me about 2 days of stepping through my Registry, line by line.

Even if one uses Norton's Uninstall program (forget the exact name at the moment), even Norton AV will NOT be a clean uninstall. It only handles about 1/3 of Poxio or Nero.

[Rant Mode ON]

Any program certified for Windows should have a 100% Uninstall routine! Otherwise, they are like Trojans, or similar.

[Rant Mode OFF]

Hunt

[Paul LS]

"Poxio"....

[GerryB]

John,

Thanks for the warning. If you (not you personally) run an "uninstall" from a wayward programme does going for a system restore with a date prior to the "install" date clear all the unwanted clutter form the system? Or have I been living in cloud cuckoo land? Are they really that careless with their programme design?

Best wishes,

Gerry