beware of corel X5

[Michael Simpson Virgina]

I was working on a new drawing today and at about 2 hours or so in the program crashed.

Bang.... 2 hours lost.

And yes its the latest version. If you have version X4 and its working ok for you dont make the change. Honstly I have not noticed much difference anyway. Unless you count the crashes.

[Edi Royer]

I had to learn the hard way too to make sure and save periodically while working. I've had it suddenly close on me several times too.

[Robert Walters]

CTRL+S is your friend =)

[Tristan Ranatza]

I just set the auto backup/save time to 5 min... never have a problem again!

[Anthony Scira]

I have had a couple instances where Corel crashed in all versions. But I have the autobackup set to 5 minutes and have not had a problem with the restore previous session when needed. Are you saying that failed too ?

[Michael Simpson Virgina]

I was able to get most of my work back as I had an Autocad Export. Loaded it in replaced the fonts and added my shading and 2 hours saved. I had the backup set to every 20min. dont know why It was not working.

[Doug Griffith]

I'm sure I've lost a few thousand hours in my day due to crashes. I've learned to save often and apply version control. I also back up to an external, mirrored raid on a regular basis. They are cheap these days. I also back up the raid to removable media and keep in a fire-proof safe. I guess what I'm getting at is don't trust your hard work data to software or hardware.

[Mike Null]

There is no question that X5 is quirky but I still use it as it opens files that can't be opened with earlier versions. I personally prefer X3 and may re-load it.

[Jiten Patel]

Illustrator is your friend! 0 Crashes!

[Scott Challoner]

There is no question that X5 is quirky but I still use it as it opens files that can't be opened with earlier versions. I personally prefer X3 and may re-load it.

I agree. If I knew then what I know now, I probably wouldn't have upgraded. I always joke that X5 is an appropriate name because all of the problems are now multiplied X5. The crashes have gotten better with the updates, but it still takes a long time to send files to the laser (about X5 longer than previous) and I don't know why. Now that I've switched to Windows 7 it's gotten worse. I have to monkey around with unplugging the USB cable, turning the laser off/on, standing on my head etc. to get it to print the first time of the day. After I get it to work the first time, it gets better, but still slow. I can't tell if the problem is with the laser, Windows, or a combination of all three.:confused:

[Scott Shepherd]

Why wouldn't you have autosave turned on from day 1?

I've had plenty of crashes on Corel. Open it back up, it asks if you want to restore the file, you say yes, and then you've got it.

[Michael Kowalczyk]

I have X3 on my laser only dedicated PC and X5 on my office PC. Haven't had many issues with X5. Pc is a quad core that I upgraded from vista 64 to Windows 7 64 bit. I have mine set on auto save also but i have gotten in to the habit of saving as soon as I open a new file and periodically save after making a modification that I want. But remember that after you save it Cntrl Z, I believe, will only go back to the saved version or what ever you set up, whichever is less.
Since I do most of my work in the office and X3 works fine out at the laser, this system works for me. Yes I have to re-save it as a x3 file but I use a 32 gig USB mem stick to transfer. So it becomes my back up also. I do not have the laser pc networked on purpose. Virus protection slows it down and I don't want any interference while I am running the laser. so SAVE SAVE SAVE

[Neil Pabia]

Auto save...Hhhhhhhmmmm... learn something new everytime I come on here. Thank you.

[Gary Hair]

Maybe I'm just lucky but I have had no problems with X5 and find some of the new features pretty handy. One thing that may be keeping mine running is that I installed it on a fresh copy of Windows, literally nothing else loaded when I installed it.

Gary

[Dave Spitzer]

I've been using X5 for some time without any problems, I also save my work often. Most crash problems can be the cause of other programs doing things (not following Windows rules) and not the fault of the actual program you're using.

Dave

[paul mott]

I think the title "Beware of Corel X5" is perhaps a bit unfair - I use Microsoft Word a lot and always save my work on a regular basis and I really consider it would be foolish not to do so - what is so different about using Corel ?
All our graphics work takes time and therefore has great value, if it is not saved on a regular basis then fool you because crashes happen, power outages happen, **** happens.
Sorry Michael but save often is the secret to success. ;)

Paul.

[mike berry]

I have been using X5 for quite some time and have not experienced any crashes.....did you have auto backup on? If you lost 2 hours of work and did not have it on...sorry, you are to blame. We run Windows XP Professional and use to with our Vision and Gravograph with no issues.

[Mike Null]

I use XP Pro as well and have had no more than one or two crashes which I don't attribute to X5 but to other issues. (my pc is connected to 3 printers, the laser and the Newing Hall and has accounting and office software on it as well) not to mention my email and IE. I use Carbonite as a back up along with an external hard drive.

I've operated my pcs like this for years without many of the problems I see posted here frequently.

[Dan Hintz]

Same as Mike... plenty of use (including the betas) and no crashes since moving to beta2 and beyond. I still come across bugs that are hard to repeat (so I can't file them), but no crashes.

[David Fairfield]

Yes, Illustrator is a very stable platform, but not bomb proof. Strange as it may sound, its more reliable on my PC than it ever was on my Mac. I had many many Illustrator crashes on my Mac, first due to bugs in the OS, then when the Mac itself started to fail. On the PC, maybe one crash per year, which I think are avoidable, if I could only remember to close windows I'm not using!

Dave

[Ruben Salcedo]

I agree with you Dan,

same here, with the only difference that the betas I ran them in XP, then I upgrade to Windows 7 (same system) in which I'm running the retail version of Corel X5 without any problems, my system is also load it with various programs (many) and 3 printers, a vinyl cutter, scanner, engraver and a laser engraver.

Ruben

[Dan Hintz]

Ruben,

I'm running mine on Vista systems... so if there's a contest as to who is running it on the least-stable Win OS, I think I'll win :) XP was pretty darn stable, and so far no problems with Win7-64 at work.

[Ruben Salcedo]

Dan,

for sure you're the winner, :) one detail I forgot to mention is that I'm running my system on Win7 32 bit, do to... at that time there were no 64 bit driver version available for my laser engraver.

Ruben

[Dan Hintz]

Ah, may bad, clarification... I was testing (and currently using) X5 betas/gold on Vista (32-bit), as well as controlling the laser with it. The Win7-64 is just at work for programming, no laser on that one... but so far it has been stable.

[Aaron Koehl]

I've used every version since v6, and have had every version crash on a file, but I've been overall very satisfied with the product. I currently use X4.

Would a try {...} catch {....}, emphasis on catch {...} be too much to ask?

[Dan Hintz]

Aaron,

You're assuming they know the appropriate spots to put a try...catch. I filed numerous bugs during beta just on failed user entry checking. Fixed, but it's possible I've found more since (still need to file).