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Norton System
Works 2006
What a
strange kettle of fish this product is. Hit and miss, kill or live, I’m
not too sure what went on with the production of NS 2006 but two
installations on two different machines for two very different results.
Both machines running XP Pro, one a laptop, the other a desktop unit.
Now I am going to sum it up in a nutshell. This feels like a very
unfinished product, the way that it works on the machines, or rather
doesn’t. My laptop experienced a full crash after installation, whilst
the desktop struggled along, refusing to allow testing of the GoBack
feature on the disk.
Suggestions I had during the process were that I just use System Restore
instead. No way Nelly! That software is part of the package and
essentially has been rendered useless. Repeated installations later on
the desktop showed that my Internet Security Antivirus would not live
with this one. Crash!
Finally after stuffing around with the registry and then resorting to a
full reinstall (thank god it’s a test machine!), I got the software up
and running OK, still no GoBack functionality. I know that normally we’d
give a featured product like this a full write up but I frankly am
disappointed for the first time with a Symantec product.
I am a huge fan of this company and I do feel that this release is more
than a little half-arse (excuse me). The 2005 edition ruled and this one
doesn’t! Other software on this disc includes:
Norton AntiVirus
Norton Utilities
Norton GoBack
CheckIt Diagnostics
System Optimiser
I did like the System Optimiser part of this package and did note slight
performance increase. Bear in mind though I was working on a clean
install and tested the package over roughly a week period so not a great
deal of optimisation was needed.
I’m not really prepared to give this the sort of write up we’d normally
give a package such as this. I would have to suggest that you tough it
out until Symantec go back to the lab and fix the problems with the
installation and just how niggly the whole thing behaves as a whole.
I like the Norton products as a rule as I previously stated, however I
think this one is a disappointment that might cost Symantec a number of
customers unless they fix these problems promptly. If there are any
doubts as to this, see our review of the previous product that scored
9/10.
I possibly give this one a miss, but keep an eye out for any
announcements for updates or new versions, then maybe it will be worth
installing. I feel odd scoring it 5.5/10 considering some of the
problems I had and my general annoyance with the product for not
delivering 100%, however the CheckIt Diagnotics and System Optimiser are
good products and good to have as part of a package. If you have need of
those products then possibly you can go for this, however just be aware
that you might have problems.
Contrary to this review, I have seen others that had no problems,
however considering this was tested on a clean install, I am simply
reporting my findings.
Sorry. |
