How *NOT* to keep customers

Sometimes you have to wonder why companies can stay in business.  I use Veritas Backup Exec 8.6 on my home network to take care of my backup and data recovery needs.  It’s worked great for years and saved my behind on numerous occasions.  Tonight I needed to install their remote agent (RA) on a laptop that had a problem.  To do the RA install, I went through the product installation and was, as always, asked for the serial number.  I typed it in and got a dialog saying: “A higher edition of Backup Exec is required to install on this edition of the operating system.”  (I had upgraded the server with the tape drive to Windows 2003 recently.)  A quick check of the software license said nothing about only being limited to Windows 2000.  No big deal, I was willing to upgrade, if that was what was required.  In fact, I have (or had!) a task in my Task List to look at upgrading at the beginning of the year.

However….. All hell broke loose when I canceled out of the dialog.  My perfectly working version of Backup Exec was instantly reverted to an evaluation copy and a timed out one at that!  I don’t know if this is a bug or we’re looking at a truly evil corporation.  All I know is that my expensive piece of backup software is pure detris on the disk.  I called technical support and all they told me to do was read their knowledge base.  As you would expect, there was nothing there on how to get my software working again.  I created a case through their web email system, but I’ll probably never hear a word back or the only word will be spend another $1,000 USD on a forced upgrade.

I don’t have a problem with Veritas requiring an upgrade, but I’m extremely upset that their software killed a perfectly working installation.  Something tells me that Veritas won’t be getting any of my money.  Does anyone have any recommendations for good backup software?