[MICP1480]

One can see the writing on the wall, that Empower Interactive support team, if one does exist, has no clue how to correct this major issue concerning the compatibility of their product with the Blackberry 4.5 OS, so they obviously choose to ignore a flood of incoming emails in hopes that everyone goes away. I have coined this as the Wizard of OZ, to simply say, it's all smoke and mirrors, with difficulty getting pass the front door. This is based on my own experience.


MICP1480

[ajdaniel]

If people want to harass the developer/owner for taking our money and splitting the contact email is on this domain name lookup site:

WHOIS domain registration information results for getempower.com from Network Solutions

[Patrick G.]

Well, after mentioning I might dispute the charge with my CC company, Mobihand.com finally got Empower Support to respond:

"Hi Patrick,
Apologies for the delay in response. To hide the Sent Messages you need to set it under BESMailBox options. Please goto Options > BESMailBox and check/uncheck 'Show Inbox Only' as per your preference. Unread Message Count is not a listed feature of this product. This is a limitation set by the APIs and this count is not available to developers of 3rd party products.

The view that you get for split-second is the last opened mailbox. This is the behavior as implemented by RIM on OS 4.5. It seems that the last view is either 'cached' or there is a restriction that you can only open BES mailbox through the RIM standard mailbox, hence you see the last opened mailbox till the time the BESMailBox is loaded.

Please feel free to write to us in case there are further issues, we will be glad to assist you.

Thanks & Regards,
Team Empower,
www.getEmpower.com"

[kjjb0204]

What would be interesting is to see how quickly they would respond to a question about their BES mailbox product....

[MICP1480]

Well, I am not giving up without a fight. I don"t have BES but BIS and Empower Interactive has BS. I ATTEMPTED to reach out to customer support over at Handango for where I made my purchased and every link for customer support is invalid. I was able to make it through the back door and I am waiting for a reply to see if a product they claim will work on my BB 8330, that they will make good on with an exchange. Like a hen sitting on a egg, I have a very funny feeling my egg will become hard boil.

Is there a software convention being held somewhere that everyone decided to shut down their responses? I think this is a lesson well taught, that no software should be purchased until it is first taken out for a spin, and to scrutinize their support team and customer service.

If any new developments I will keep everyone posted.

MICP 1480

[Patrick G.]

So, is ANYONE getting an unread message count on the BES MailBox icon on any OS version?

[Patrick G.]

Originally Posted by kjjb0204

What would be interesting is to see how quickly they would respond to a question about their BES mailbox product....

This was a question about the BES MailBox product.

[kjjb0204]

Wirelessly posted

I meant how quickly Empower would respond.

[endure161]

Originally Posted by kjjb0204

Wirelessly posted

I meant how quickly Empower would respond.

This week I had my Curve replaced under warranty. I upgraded the OS before restoring my data and doing the BES activation. Of course Empower said I was using a trial version because my pin changed. I emailed them on Monday with my old pin and the new Curve pin. Yesterday morning I got an email back telling me that my account was updated. Then I just did the Update Registration.

You can go to Empower Options and then click on About. Check for updates will get the latest version. I got 3.0.72.7 yesterday. It works very well for me with no problems on OS 4.5. I am very happy with it.

[Patrick G.]

Originally Posted by endure161

You can go to Empower Options and then click on About.

Specifically how are you doing this? I don't see any place to select "About" and check for updates on my 8330. Or are you talking about Empower HTML Viewer?

[CureMS]

I believe the original post was about Empower HTML Email Viewer. It seems to have gotten switched back and forth between products a couple times.

I also have the most current version of the viewer but still I am unable to view or download attachments and the viewer seems erratic in that not all messages seem to be accessing it.

When I contacted Empower about the incompatibility with 4.5, I received an almost immediate response directing me to the latest update. But when I replied that attachments still could not be accessed, I received no response at all.

I've also contacted Handango to tell them that in the absence of appropriate responses, I will follow up as necessary (my credit card company, BBB, etc.) I certainly wouldn't buy another product from Empower at this point.

[endure161]

Originally Posted by CureMS

I believe the original post was about Empower HTML Email Viewer. It seems to have gotten switched back and forth between products a couple times.

I also have the most current version of the viewer but still I am unable to view or download attachments and the viewer seems erratic in that not all messages seem to be accessing it.

When I contacted Empower about the incompatibility with 4.5, I received an almost immediate response directing me to the latest update. But when I replied that attachments still could not be accessed, I received no response at all.

I've also contacted Handango to tell them that in the absence of appropriate responses, I will follow up as necessary (my credit card company, BBB, etc.) I certainly wouldn't buy another product from Empower at this point.

Again - I am using Empower HTML Email Viewer with OS 4.5.0.102 on my 8310 and the upgrade to DTG that is available if it is installed with the OS. I have opened attachments with no problem with several versions of OS 4.5.

Just open any email message and click on Empower Options. Then do a check for updates. That quickly gives you the latest version.

I have not had a problem with Empower support. They have usually given overnight replies, probably because they are somewhere in Asia. However, I have not had good service from Handango. They have been basically non-responsive when I asked for any help.

[CureMS]

Originally Posted by endure161

Again - I am using Empower HTML Email Viewer with OS 4.5.0.102 on my 8310 and the upgrade to DTG that is available if it is installed with the OS. I have opened attachments with no problem with several versions of OS 4.5.

Just open any email message and click on Empower Options. Then do a check for updates. That quickly gives you the latest version.

I have not had a problem with Empower support. They have usually given overnight replies, probably because they are somewhere in Asia. However, I have not had good service from Handango. They have been basically non-responsive when I asked for any help.

I am using OS 4.5.0.81 on an 8320 (this is the most current OS). I've received another response from Empower but only after I contacted them yet again with this problem. This time they told me:

"On OS 4.5 and above, there are some versions of the OS 4.5 which may have issues with emails containing attachments. For ex. v4.5.0.18 and v4.5.0.37 works perfectly with Empower Pro. So depending on your exact version of 4.5 you may be experiencing this issue. Basically, some features that are used by the application are no longer available in these OSes. Our developers have just released a patch for it a few hours back. (This is an even later version than the one you had from our last response.)"

"If you are on such a version of 4.5, then please visit ... to install the version v3.0.80.7 of Empower. This release has a patch that switches to RIMs default mail viewer for those emails that have attachments in them. Other emails continue to work as before with Empower."

There was an error on their server until just a few minutes ago. Nevertheless, I'm still stuck with a product for my email that is incompatible with any email attachments.

I've also contacted them again to inquire why some emails seem to be viewed through Empower while others do not (aside from the attachment issue). While Empower does look nice (backgrounds and choice of text colors, etc.), it isn't functioning consistently for me and as stated, it is incompatible with attachments. So at this point, it still seems to me that it was a waste of money and is currently a waste of memory on my curve.

I will be asking what their expectations are as to correcting this problem and will request that they update all of their advertising appropriately. And FYI, Handango did respond and they are giving the developer a chance to respond first (as am I), something that does demonstrate good business practice.

[blakeatl]

Well I've moved on and I'm actually enjoying the OS html viewer.

[CureMS]

The final word for me from Empower is that it is currently compatible with OS 4.5 up to .37 and they are working on .55 and .77. Since I'm on .81, it doesn't look promising that they will catch up. I'm writing it off as a waste of money for me but they have also agreed to update their advertising so that others don't find themselves in the same position.