Am I the only person who does not like Mezzo 4.2?

[George Cumbee]

Enough said?

I got 4.2 reauthoized finally and tried hard today to use it. I think they just made it too difficult and unfriendly. I can't seem to get it operate anything like I think it should. Lots of things, but after I inited a new tape to backup a project, on it's own it just started backing up 14g worth of stuff from another drive without me telling it too. It was files I had already backup up on the first tape.

I managed to bail out. I changed the extension back to 3.8, restarted and launched it. I got the second tape to re-format in 3.8 and I backed the second project up on it.

Is anyone else having problems getting 4.2 to work right or just work at all?

[Mark Haliday]

Although I lack time to go into the details, it took me along time to finally get to use mezzo 4.

Version 4.2 maybe a bit buggy still but I have to admit that the extension that handles my exabyte mammoth tape drive through SCSI works 200% better than the one from 3.8. Much more flexible, not once single error anymore.

With 3.8, whenever some crash happened I had to reboot the Mac. Now with the new extension this does not happen.

I will try to elaborate later, but I think that the new overall philosophy of the software makes things complicated at times. Changeover from ver 3 to 4 was a real shock. I don't fancy having to relearn from scratch software at every new version. I wish some kind of transition tutorial had been produced

Apart from that I believe the main reason why there has not been any bug solving releases since 4.2 is the same as all current software developers for Mac at the moment. They are totally immersed into producing a viable OSX version.

[maxserg]

I've dropped it 7 years ago! [img]images/icons/grin.gif[/img]

Nuf said! [img]images/icons/wink.gif[/img]

[techdude]

I have been having some growing pains with it on a Dual 867 Blowhole; 3 other older G4's are OK. More sensitive to cables and terminations? I do not know. I could not get the Atto UL3D to work with 4.2 and a AIT2 drive at all, so I am still with the PCIDC. Sometimes it crashes on loadup, and I have to force Mezzo to create a new App. Supp. folder and re-load media databases.
Mezzo requires a TIGHT SCSI chain, so I always look there after a database re-build.
I like the interface, and the ability to monitor transfer rate. I also like the tech support. They always respond quickly and thoroughly. We'll live with the bumps.
Mike

[audiobob]

My Mezzo has been having trouble with blinking lights and crashing and corrupting databases and general bugginess. When it's performing verification I've learned not to even breath on the computer or it will crash. Things are just not working right and to tell the truth the way 4.2 has been acting up latley I'm just not comfortable trusting that I can restore what I've backed up.

When Mezzo works it's the best though my confidence level has been dropping lately. I'm hanging in there.

OS X version on the way?

[blairl]

Originally posted by George Cumbee:
Is anyone else having problems getting 4.2 to work right or just work at all?

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">I can't even begin to tell you how many problems I am currently having and have had in the past with Mezzo. There are so many bugs it's hard to know where to begin.

First of all when I launch mezzo, my whole system freezes while Mezzo scans the hard drives. This takes about 5 minutes. I've got lights flashing that say I need to format new tapes for a set that don't need new tapes. I've got lights flashing that tell me a set needs to back up files that don't need to be backed up. I've got overviews that say files belong to them that don't. Mezzo 4.2 won't import many of my version 3.x tape sets. The list goes on.

I have contacted Mezzo several times and have received some answers back. Whenever they can't answer anything, I don't hear from them anymore. I've got several issues still on the table with no answers back from Mezzo. I have reminded them that they need to answer me, but they still haven't. They ignore me when they don't have an answer.

I've got tapes going back to 1996 that have been archived with Mezzo, so it's hard to jump ship. Retrospect looks appealing, but they still don't do session file based archiving like Mezzo does. If Retrospect would get that aspect going, there would be no stopping them. I have suggested it on a couple of occasions, but they haven't done anything about it.

[trombino]

Can someone explain the advantages of using Mezzo over Retrospect? Is it strictly the session based archiving it does? What is that, anyway? I use Retrospect and it has always just worked. I tell it what to backup and it backs it up. I've never felt the need for anything more. But I've always wondered about Mezzo...

[maxserg]

It seems that some peoples don't want to realize that mezzo good ideas in a crap software.

Just "Save a copy in" with All audio/fades files to another partition or any avail space. Then take CDFolder partitionner then burn multiple CD's.(if session is too large to fit on oneCD)

No hassles, no bugs, no phones to tech support, no incompatibility with OS'es, no waitin for updates/bug fixes etc., etc., etc. ad nauseam. and finally: cheap and reliable media(CD-R)

And MOST OF ALL: F R E E ! ! ! [img]images/icons/grin.gif[/img]

...and I forgot, no anger or frustrations about it on this forum. [img]images/icons/tongue.gif[/img]

[TXDigi]

also having lots of bugs n Mezzo 4.2 especially with database corruption.

however... the ideas and concepts in Mezzo are what keeps me from jumping to Retrospect. Session based archiving and the database search is an invaluable tool when i have to search thru tons of 50GB ait tapes. Searching for a project or even a specific file takes second instead of possible hours with Retrospect.

I do have a dedicated machine for backups and dont touch the machine once it starts running a routine.

I have problem retargetting drives and crashing and corrupting databases but I'm still there.

When it works its fantastic

but i'm on the fence about dropping

[PlugInJunky]

Mezzo was the worst thing invented for Studio Back Ups...we have had hundreds of bad restores and blown out tapes because of Mezzo....Made my life as an Assitant Engineer a living nightmare....infact the only thing that manage to keep me happy was the installation of the Vipre100 Drive running Retrospect....and Restores have been flawless and safe.....

Mezzo....Sucks....you can quote me on that....