Why aren't people using Comodo Time Machine?

Are you saying that if I install COMODO Time Machine on my Windows 7, Dynamic Drives system that it will fail and mess up my whole system?

 

They're started the development again.

 

Source?

 

https://www.wilderssecurity.com/showthread.php?t=313299
It is a quote from Comodo forums.

 

https://forums.comodo.com/news-announcements-feedback-ctm-b198.0/

 

I tried installing CTM but it gave this error:

http://i42.tinypic.com/1zdowib.jpg

But I don't actually have Truecrypt installed, I only have a Truecrypt container, which I load sometimes, nothing more.

 

TheMozart, already answered in Comodo forums

CTM is NOT compatible with installed TrueCrypt and you have system partition encrypted due to MBR incompatibility.

CTM could be not compatible with installed TrueCrypt if you have other partitions encrypted.

CTM is compatible with TrueCrypt portable if you use only container encryption (not partitions).

Well, at least, this is my personal experience.

 

But I am using Truecrypt portable, a container only, and Truecrypt is NOT installed, yet COMODO thinks it's installed.

I even made sure truecrypt.exe was not running, yet CTM still tells me it's installed, so it must have searched through my C:/Program Files folder and thought it's installed.

I hope they fix this in 3.0

 

Portable means not that TC driver is not leaded while installing CTM.
You can check with http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb963902

Anyway, CTM is going for version 3 beta next months. Maybe the detection get improved.

 

I checked my C:/windows/system32/drivers folder and there is no truecrypt.sys file in there. As I said, I have never installed TrueCrypt, I only extracted it as portable version and that's it!

So even though I do NOT have C:/windows/system32/drivers/truecrypt.sys and even though I have NEVER installed Truecrypt, CTM still complains that it cannot install because I have Truecrypt installed. Crazy.

Oh well, hope they fix this bug or detection error in v3.0

 

Comodo Time Machine: Important read.

I was a user of Rollback RX (RRX) for a few years and decided to try Comodo Time Machine (CTM). They promoted it as the next generation in system recovery, and it was free! What could be better?
As it turned out, everything.
I installed CTM on two of my home computers. The install went OK. The later uninstall destroyed the MBR of both computers. My only option was to re-install the OS and lose everything. I lost very important documents and pictures that were irreplaceable.
In a panic, I visited the Comodo forum. I was shocked to find far too many similar complaints (posts). Comodo always responded as if they had never heard of this before, said they would look into it, offered a few of the same solutions over and over that never worked, then nothing.
It became very clear to me that Comodo knew of the problem, covered it up, and continued to promote the software.
In my investigation, I learned that CTM is based on a very old version of RRX. How they got it is in dispute.
It appeared that Comodo attempted to modify this old code to make updates easier. I believe their inept coders broke the software causing the program to corrupt the MBR on computers. Once this happens, the computer will no longer boot.
I attempted to alert users of the problem in their forum. The problem is, users tend to visit forums once they already have a problem. It was too late by this time. Most users installed the program believing the marketing BS that Comodo promoted.
Comodo finally banned me from their forums.
As far as I can tell, Comodo continues to offer this program knowing how dangerous it is. Their inept code writing is matched only by their willingness to knowingly distribute dangerous software.
Even if CTM is no longer available, I would never install any software from this company nor should anyone else IMO.
I am writing this to alert users of how unethical Comodo is. Their forums would not allow me to do that.
I would recommend no one use the products of any company that would go as far as they did to knowingly distribute destructive software and lie about its safety.

 

Re: Comodo Time Machine: Important read.

Stay away from CTM. It is abandoned-ware. They're been promising a new version for well over a year and there are still a few naive users on their forums who think it is still coming.

Comodo will not support you in any way and CTM is extremely old. Use at your own risks and the risks are significant.

 

Re: Comodo Time Machine: Important read.

Hi guys

I recently tested CTM version 2.9Beta on an older Dell Inspiron E1705 laptop with dual core T2500 2GHZ Intel processor, 500Gb HDD and 3GB RAM running Win7 pro SP1. I had read over the last 2 years the many horror stories and indeed this type of software can really cause issues for some folks, as has RBRX over the years while many others have used them without incident.

I wanted to see for myself how CTM handled itself, so I imaged my entire drive, (3 partitions total) then prepared my OS drive C for installation, i.e., chkdsk, then defrag, then installation of CTM 2.9Beta. I picked this version as there were many that saw improvements with 2.9b over the supposed "stable" release of 2.8. In fact many feel 2.9B was much more well behaved and stable than 2.8.

Installation went fine with 2.9B. Rebooted and it created the baseline snapshot, all went fine. First thing I did in my test was go directly to settings, and made sure I gave myself full administrative access to CTM along with password protection required to enter the interface and settings/options. I changed a few settings, and proceeded through the testing, installing software, then restoring to the baseline. No issues, it worked as stated at this point.

What i did not test was multiple snapshots. I only was interested in seeing how it handled itself using strictly baseline snaps, resetting them once daily to first see how it handled minimal demand. I had no issues with this and the software worked quite well and stable, with no noticeable performance impact on this Laptop.

The next testing phase I will create several snapshots in addition to the locked baseline, and see how it handles going back and forth in time, a feature of RBRX that many have liked and it is indeed a nice feature if one does a lot of software testing.

I do think taking full administrative control at least in my experience over a week or so, may be helpful, but I assume many did that so it probably makes little difference. The only setting I kept was defragging snapshots, and I set that to defrag after the deleting of 2 snapshots.

Overall, I really do not "trust" this kind of software in general, and the much safer way to preserve the stability of ones system is utilizing drive imaging, but this kind of software does have useful features for those looking for a way to restore a system quickly or undo problem situations.

So I was biased going into this due to so many problems I had read about, but minimal testing so far with CTM 2.9B has been fine. I also tested uninstallation, following the PDF manual for CTM and it uninstalled cleanly without any MBR issues, leaving only a few registry entries afterwards. I used a hex editor to see where CTM places its console within the MBR of a drive, and I did use 2 different MBR utilities to back up MBR and partition table before installing in addition to a complete drive image as mentioned. The utilities used for this step were MBRfix and BOOTICE.

I like the features, they are convenient, but not true protection and of course offers nothing as far as recovery from potential Hard disk failures. I will mess with this more and try it with multiple snaps and see how it handles itself, but overall, my advice for anyone at this time is in my opinion, nothing can take the place of regular methodical drive imaging/backup strategies that cover ones needs.

I can certainly see how many had complications with this kind of software...it either works well, or it brings one ultimately to having to invest much time and effort into having to recover their data and/or entire drives in some cases due to corruption. In any case, before I installed i covered as many bases as I thought necessary to recover quickly in the case it was destructive. At this time, CTM performed very well, under minimal demand, but I would honestly be nervous recommending this kind of software be it CTM or RBRX for any clients, and always recommend drive imaging first and foremost.

Just my opinion so far. Thanks guys for your comments and sharing your experience with this. One must weigh the risk(s) involved with this type of software before trying it and hopefully *IF* they decide to utilize it, whether it is CTM or RBRX, etc., they will take the necessary precautions in order to be able to quickly recover from any potential system corruption, before proceeding.

Have a good day

Jim

 

Re: Comodo Time Machine: Important read.

My opinion but first this admission: I have never used this program in any of its forms or companies. I just will not trust ANY program that "tricks" the hard drive in order to work. Your computer's hard drive was not designed to be fooled, especially at the sector level.

Acadia

 

Re: Comodo Time Machine: Important read.

Discussed here.
www.wilderssecurity.com/showthread.php?t=315726

Review here.
www.lockergnome.com/.../nightmares-of-comodo-time-machine/

 

I avoid anything Comodo for that reason.

 

The 'drama' factor is indeed one of the reasons I am personally not a Comodo fan in general. Their security software is capable, but I am not too fond of the attitude that can accompany their products, if that makes any sense. Just an observation on my end.

Jim

 

Moderator, thanks for relocating this thread.

 

Re: Comodo Time Machine: Important read.

I used it on an XP desktop and Vista LT (still on both but don't use those machines much) for years. Once/month I would remove CTM with its un-installer and then defrag the machines, image with Paragon, then install CTM again. I'd have to rate it A+. The only issue I ever had, I once uninstalled CTM on the LT with revo. BSOD, however, I restored the MBR from the Paragon image and was back in business. I'd use it now but this W7 PC only has an SSD, so based on RB RX I assume there is no trim. The other thing is a complete Paragon restore takes just over five minutes. Yesterday I restored just a PDF shop manual in about 70 seconds after drilling down from the Paragon archive to its location. So I guess the point is I really don't need it anyway.

 

I did try CTM once and everything was fine until i uninstalled the program and then i found windows would not boot anymore but that is because of the modification to the MBR.
With hindsight i should have made a copy of the MBR but at the time never realised uninstalling it was a major issue until i visited the comodo forum.

 

Re: Comodo Time Machine: Important read.

Your only option?? Hmmm, have you ever heard of the concept of a full disk backup? What about creating a couple of copies of your pics and important docs stored away on an external disk? I'm sorry brother, but what you did (reinstalling Windows) was totally ignorant and idiotic. You could have easily repaired the MBR using a Winows start-up media. Your computer woud be bootable again in a few minutes, and you would have lost nothing.

Always make a full backup of your OS system disk and keep the backup updated as you add and remove stuff in the system. Always make at least two copies of the backup plus two copies of all the files you value. Those copies should be stored in two different mediums, one of which should always be stored away from the PC. This would cover you for everything, including real emergencies, like disk failure. NEVER RELY ON A SINGLE MEDIUM FOR YOUR IRREPLACEBLE DATA.

In any case, you most certainly cannot blame Comodo for this. You have actually installed a low level system utility like CTM (which is provided by Comodo for FREE), without making sure that you got a full system backup beforehand. If you know nothing about something as basic as a backup, then you shouldn't be playing with low-level programs like CTM in the first place. What happened was 100% your fault. After it happened you could have easily fixed the prob in a few minutes with a Windows start-up disc and would have lost NONE of your data - but you didn't know of that score either. Instead of googling for a proper solution to your problem or ask other users for help, you embarked in a slagging match against Comodo. You got burned, and you still learned nothing from it, which is rare (most people actually learn from mistakes like these). Stop blaming others, and accept that what you did was down to your own lack of knowledge and ignorance. I may sound harsh but what I say is the absolute truth. You can't see it yet, but you will, as you learn more.

Sorry for being blunt, but what you did was extremely foolish. That's why half-knowledge is often worse than no knowledge at all. You've been burned, at the very least learn from it man... Find out what's the score with backups. Get used to them. Learn more. Google is your friend.

 

It would be really nice if you guys could just stop beating a dead horse...

Comodo stopped offering CTM in August 2011. The last stable version 2.8 was roughly at the same level as Rollback V. 8. We can all agree on the fact that snapshot applications like Rollback or CTM go deep into the system and can cause all kinds of trouble (on systems with nonstandard MBRs, interaction with security software, whatever). Rollback certainly had (and still has) all kinds of issues, but still it proved to be useful for many users.

I am especially offended by this post by Masterblaster:
https://www.wilderssecurity.com/showpost.php?p=2239439&postcount=37

The post is from 2013, and he makes it sound like these are current experiences he made. This is completely untrue, he had this experience in 2010. Ever since then he seems to be on a personal vendetta against Comodo, you should look up his posts on the Comodo and HDS forums.

He claims that upon uninstalling CTM his MBR was ruined on two computers, and he lost all of his data. Anyone who installs this kind of software without creating a full image of his drive beforehand is playing Russian roulette. The only person he has to blame for his data loss is he himself. Period!

And still he has the nerve to accuse Comodo of being an unethical company. May I ask how much he had paid for CTM? How unethical must other companies be who sell software with substantial bugs for a lot of money?

I am not here to defend Comodo. You don't have to like them or their business model, but they sure do have a lot of satisfied users. I had CTM 2.8 on two computers for many months without having even the slightest problems, and it saved my bacon more than once. And there are many other CTM users who were very happy with the software...


So please, let this matter rest for good. Can a mod please close this thread...


Cheers
manolito


//EDIT//
Hi CyberMan969, you beat me by 15 minutes... LOL

 

Hey man, I agree with all that you said. It is really annoying when people come up with total crap like blaster did. Such extreme ignorance is really ugly, especially when the ignorant ones are totally oblivious of it all, and think that they are right...

 

Re: Comodo Time Machine: Important read.

If you had done some homework before offering your sarcastic opinion, you would have found that neither CTM or RRX are compatible with any backup programs. My point wasn't that I should have done something differently. My point was this is dangerous software. Isn't it easy to ask someone why they didn't do something after that did it? Maybe next time you could add something constructive and informative that others could find valuable. Then again, never mind.