Hello!
This will be a long post. I hope that's ok, and I hope I'm posting in the right place.
I frankly don't know where else to go.
I've been having slow-down and serious freezing problems with my dinosaur Dell Dimension 1100/B110 for a couple of months and have tried a LOT of free remedies -- you name it, I've tried it -- some of which have worked temporarily. My next step is to purchase memory since I've been running on the original 256MB the system came with in 2006, but that's another discussion for another forum.
A few days ago I was once again perusing my Dell user manual for some information, prompted by some email exchanges I've been having with Crucial, and ended up at the Dell support website. At the bottom of the page I saw three options, one of which says:
Free PC Speed Check
Find out what's slowing down your PC.
Get a customized error report and a list
So I clicked on it. Big mistake.
I think it's incredibly misleading for Dell to put this Free PC Speed Check link on their page, presenting it as a FREE service that's part of Dell's diagnostics, which apparently it is not.
I trust Dell, (or I DID), so I downloaded and ran the scanner, thinking it would fix the problems it found as it claimed it would. It was doing such a thorough (and long) scan, I suddenly got the feeling that this couldn't possibly be a free service and that I was gonna be hit up for some astronomical charge in order to remove the problems.
When it finally finished scanning, it said it would fix all the problems found today for a one-time fee of $9.95. (There was another more expensive option if I wanted to purchase year-round service.) It was then I discovered this wasn't Dell but a company called Iolo Technologies. I don't usually fall for this kind of sleazy marketing, but this time I figured what the heck let's see if it helps, paid the lesser fee and clicked "repair".
Right after my transaction was completed, it said I was activated but that first I needed to click on a link in an email they'd just sent me in order to validate my account. I did all of that, closed the browser and then clicked "repair" again. Nothing happened. I clicked "repair" again. Again nothing happened.
Finally after about 10 minutes it said "Repairing Now..." Okay. So, I sat there and waited.
And waited.
And waited.
And waited for 2 hours for something to happen. But it didn't, despite it saying, "Repairing now...".
I saw no progress bar, heard no sounds of technology coming from my computer to indicate any action was occurring.
The voice inside my head: "Sucker!"
After 2 hours I finally gave up, closed the application and then went online to google this company which as it turns out has scammed many people out of money and has even badly damaged some people's computers, despite it apparently being a legitimate software company based in California. I tried to find a customer contact link on Iola's website, but of course, this itself has been turning into yet ANOTHER trip down the rabbit hole which may never get resolved.
To use known licensing information when registering an iolo product, enter the User ID and Serial number, and then click Register. https://secure.iolo.com/myaccount/Register.aspx
The problem is that at no point was I sent or given a Serial number. During the downloading, installation, scanning, payment, email verification and fixing (supposed) process of this application, I was never informed that I'd need to create ANOTHER account. Nor was I informed that I'd need to register my product or that I'd need a serial number to do so.
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The Knowledge Base article you have requested is temporarily unavailable or does not exist. Please try your request again in a few minutes. If you continue to experience problems, you may try one of the alternative options listed below. https://secure.iolo.com/customercare/kbarticle.aspx?id=KBA-01423
http://support.iolo.com/ics/support/www.iolo.com/customercare/licensinginfo.aspx