Lightroom 3 - The worst program Adobe has ever put out...

Question

If anyone cares to read this, I will be the first to say DO NOT UPGRADE!!
I am spreading the word - facebook, word of mouth, every professional photographer in LA I know, blogs, etc. 
You gotta raise hell to get changes.
Lets see if Adobe will do anything about these issues...
I thought that Adobe created "beta" for a reason - to smooth out all the kinks before they put the disk out. Nope. 
I have been waiting for them to put out updates on many issues since I purchased the disk a month ago.... Still waiting Adobe!!!
It is excruciating to watch my photos take literally 4-5 minutes to open.  Even worse, is the time it takes to save from Photoshop CS5 back to Lightroom - I timed 14min. FOR A PHOTO!
I feel like the old days when I rendered video - went out to get a coffee, and came back to find the spinning of wheel of death still spinning.
Oh, and I got to talk to India today too! for 3.5 hours - with no resolution to my problems. 
Susheel accessed my computer remotely  - saw my catalog - sees 73,000 images, and asks "are you a photographer?"  REALLY?!  DId you REALLY just ask me that Susheel??
Why I HATE Lightroom 3 - let me count the ways:
1. Adobe closed their tech support in Portland (whom I have spoken to many times, and ALWAYS got my problems resolved.  They always went above & beyond the protocol - and we sit here and wonder why the US economy is crashing), now you get a no-name person in India or in the philippines (who have no extension, no email, not even a direct line so when you sit on a call for 3.5 hours and need to call back you are starting all over again.. Dear Adobe - do we live in 1980?? You are suppose to be a LEADER in technology. 
     I am morally against outsourcing, my artwork is all about the death of american industrial capitalism.  In a time when the US is in crisis, Adobe works on moving things out of the US.  I'm outraged - You can't get someone in the US EVEN IF YOU TRIED!  The best I could do was talk to someone in sales about this - wow. What does that say - American's "look good and sound good to sell our product, but when it comes to something advanced in technology like using the product and trouble shooting, we prefer to use someone with no extension in another country"
2. They don't offer support for anyone who is running off a network (they expect professionals to be working off their local "c" drive or Mac internal hard drive.  HA!! 
3. They continued to blame my network - even though my network is running smoothly, has no limitations on access, will open directly into photoshop just fine (and quick!), worked absolutely perfectly in Lightroom 2.... Yeah, it's the network, riiight.
4. Lightroom 3 is corrupting files when opening into Photoshop CS5 - if I'm lucky enough to open them
5. When I do get a photograph open, it loses it's filters once saved back into Lightroom (I rate my photos to help me navigate through the masses) - this really is hurting my workflow. When I shoot 800 images in the studio in one day - I DO NOT want to go back and fish around to find the edited version that lost its flag...
6. I have been promised to get a phone call "sometime next week" since there is no extension I can call back on to move forward.  I'll keep you updated - let you know if Susheel keeps his word.  He couldn't tell me who was going to call me, or when, but he "assures" me it will happen.
     I wont hold my breath

Answer 1

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Keith_Reeder wrote:
ambienttroutmask wrote:
So the worst programme Adobe ever put out, yet even though you can have a 30 day trial you still went out and brought it...
Yep, everything is always someone else's fault. It's never because they've made a stupid decision to buy before making absolutely sure that the software will work for them.
Seems like nobody is prepared to take responsibility for their own actions these days.
So, by that logic Adobe does not have to take ANY responsibility for pushing this kludge out the door?  Given they had a RC ready almost INSTANTLY after release should be sufficient to show they KNEW they were pushing garbage out the door.  Adobe is indeed responsible for their offering a know buggy product, bugs which CROSS PLATFORMS so it has to be the core code design not the user hardware or anything a given user has done.  Sure some systems might have setups which help make these issues more apparent, but that is on Adobe to deal with as they should publish limitations and known configurations which can potentially induce greater problems...but these entail an admission and accepting responsibility for the original buggy release...btw, release notes used to be where one would find quirks info and how to work around them post system requirements being carved in stone and set to entice the lowest common denomonator user.
One more thing...LR is marketed not as a PRO TOOL, it is sold as a tool for the average to hobby level photographer.  That is also has huge appeal to the pro market is a happy accidentally-on-purpose thing...but to berate people who don't feel it's their job to troubleshoot a commercial app is completely unreasonable...but anymore the US consumer is the largest beta tester group on the planet...I wonder how our EU counterparts are fairing as ironically, they have stronger consumer protection laws...try pushing a crap product out in the German market...heh-heh, yeah good luck with that.
Actually I would say this is not the worst software Adobe has ever pushed out the door but perhaps the worst photography software they ever sent as RTM.  Many, many PDF related apps and utils have actually been worse and we won't get into what they have done to Flash and Dreamweaver after that acquisition.  The closest analog I can see if that of what happened to Norton products post Norton being purchased by Symmantec.
However, I am willing to give Adobe time to address this because they did have the RC ready almost right away.  Should they have done this?  No way, but perhaps the marketing wonks put the company in the position where it had to meet the release date even if issues were discovered and fixes in the pipeline already and it was gonna be a 3-9 week delay before the issues were mostly fixed.  But they did and well, even those who ran the beta, ran the 30-day trial did not find the issues because they simply did not use that part of the program enough for the bugs to manifest their effects to the degree when you the user, realize something odd is happening.
I too am pissed, beyond belief as I depend on LR for my business, I can, however work around it for a while but I don't make money as a photographer I use photography for my business so the issues, while causing huge levels of frustration, are not fatal....yet...all I know is I don't want to revert to LR2.7 because I have done so much work onLR3/ LR3.2RC already and the tools themselves are indeed superior in LR3.x....when they work and that is the rub.  So many here are telling those with these bugs affecting their income/workflow bought into this to save time and leverage the bestter NR/sharpening and I say much improved adjustment tools.  I don't use the lense profiles at all really so nothing special for me there.
I would ask a question...I am sure this has been asked and answered but, eh, why not one more time because search is sooooo "haaaard"
but does this issue affect all file types?  I am shooting DNG but can switch to PEF if needed and convert on import but would rather just shoot DNG.  I am not willing to switch to JPG because if I have to do this I give up too much control on my images, for that I would switch back to LR2.7.
Also, what versions of Camera RAW were used in the beta and what versions are being used with LR3.  I know I did upgrade to ACR6.2(?) or whatever the most current version.  I understand there are a ton of factors at play in these bugs but I do doubt it's ACR as my old antique PS CS3 version of Photoshop does not have any problems, of course it's using the old version of ACR 4.6(?) again sorry I forget what version exactly but it's trivial and can be determined.
I like LR because I don't need the advanced features of PS all that often, still PS is a fun tool to have as a backup for the complicated shots though I don't have time to really spend in it as I would like to...
But in general I guess I am trying to say, Adobe had to know in advance of the RTM original LR3 because they had the RC ready almost instantly.  Of course past releases of LR also had the same experience just the bugs were, well, not as impactful I suppose.  I have been happy with LR since 1.x versions but this version is painful to support...and I as I previously posted I won't screw with Adobe's refund people, likely off-shored staff who get bonuses for talking customers OUT of getting a refund, I will simply file a chargeback with Mastercard...that is why I use it, so I don't have to let companies waste my time wading through their red-tape.  And btw, Adobe knows the customer will WIN any chargeback because this evidence of a known to be defective product was sold to the consumer and the customer even allowed the mfg to remediate the issue only they failed to deliver in a timely fashion.  So, if one is not happy just "go to the mattresses"...use the chargeback hammer.  The bonus is every chargeback granted to the consumer costs the retailer, Adobe in my case, $35 when they lose...