Oh great, all knowing and powerful STW Massif your help I beseech you…

I'm running a small business using Sage 50 Professional Accounts Software Version 16 (2010). Been working with Sage software for some time, and have steadfastly avoided updating it wherever possible due to the clusterfeck that always follows so doing. Having succumbed to version 16 currently my networked machines are falling over one after another with fairly terminal problems that neither the Sage Help desk, not my IT support people seem able to resolve, rather they all seem to be passing their time by standing in a circle pointing at the guy on their right going "its not me its him".

So the question is…… I've had enough! So what experience of other small business accounts packages capable of being used on a network of 8 -10 machines is there in the STW Maasif and what would you recommend.

Ta

If you are using Sage and your team are familiar with it, and all of your archive data is probably compatible with the newer version then I would not change. Plus what you describe may continue with an alternative product which would simply compound your problems.
Do you have a "roll back" solution? re-installing the older software?
You could then install the new version in a limited test environment or evaluate other packages and plan a migration. At least doing that your business continues to function.

I know little about Sage per se but in that situation if you have a half decent IT team they should at least be able to diagnose the issues.

good luck

Ah well thereby hangs the rub surfer, everytime you install an update your data is recoded so you cannot revert back to the previous version.

I've tried all, and I mean all of the obvious and not so obvious solutions, includig upgrading my network speed from 100Mps to 1Gps, (because obviously any speed problem is clearly going to be an equipment issue and not their shitty software!)Net result = No change.
Without going into huge and boring detail, all our kit is new, all on the same versions of all software, all licenes up to date, all firewall and anti virus settings checked and rechecked, all netwrok paths mapped and remapped ad infinitum. etc etc etc Last time out I tried the test intall that you suggest, took me days to unravel the ensuing calamity!! alongside choruses of its your kit mate, which it clearly wasn't, given that Ithen went on to run the self same version having bottomed out the programming glitches for 4 years without issue.

This will be approx the 10th or 12th time I've been through this crap and I've had enough of it. I do not want to continue using Sage software, and I am going to find an alternative. Just hoping for someone else to have some experinced that I can build on.

… Sorry if that sounded like a bit of rant… it was, but not at you and I do appreciate your thoughts.

Is it slow? Bet you're AV is scanning the (huge) amount of data Sage is passing around the network. Turn the AV off for a short test period, see what happens

Sounds like you need a test system where you can iron out these bugs before impacting your production environment.

Then after you're happy on the test system do a complete back up of your LAN. Then install the new software if it goes crash then restore your full backup.

how often are you doing upgrades to sage? i think we've upgraded once or twice in about 10 years

I don't think changing solutions would be a good idea if it's all TU at the moment. At my last place we used Datafile which was very good and completely flexible in how it is applied. Contact Terry Moore at Sense for more details. 0115 9646 646

It's probably not Sage50 that's at fault; the client I'm at at the moment runs it (can't remember version) with no probs. Changing the system won't commonly cure your ills, as its rarely the 'system' that's at fault.

It will be a missed conversion, a (manual) setting on the network, a hardware issue, a piece of custom code, a licence issue or even (just possibly) a user created issue.

I'd recommend fixing the actual problem.

Where are you?

North Essex Suffolk border for location

Re Test installtion see above 3rd post i nthread

Upgrade as few times as I possibly can as the expereince is the same every time. This is the first time since 2006 for that reason.

So I pay a fortune to have helpdesk backup. And the answer is always the same…. must be your equipment. FANTASTIC! Its the same equipment that was running your software successfuly yesterday, it complies with your system requirements, you can't
figure out the problem, nor can our IT support guys (who incidentally are having the same issues at other clients). SO why would I want to stick with the product?? Remind me please

OK, so this is why you upgraded your network to warp-speed:

http://msmvps.com/blogs/thenakedmvp/archive/2006/07/22/105479.aspx

And the limited number of 'hits' I got with V16 makes me believe that not many have upgraded to this version – TBH you should never upgrade to the latest version, no matter what the s/w company says.

More searching…

Hmm seems like V14 was the one to have.

Have you got much in the way of customising and/or auto-interfaces – could you take a step 'back' and implement an earlier version?

TBH I don't specialise at all in SME packages, but concentrate on fixing 'IT' problems – which 99% of the time are people (and process) centric.