Software downloads are freezing! Please help! (exe file)

[devi]

Agreed - I have been using ejunkie for under a week now and so far 75% of my customers are unsatisfied. NOT a good way to start my business. This is giving me a bad reputation. I also had to buy the $18 package in order to get ejunkie to even work for me, so I couldn't even use the 7 day free trial. So far, I have paid for a service that is hamstringing my business. I'd be better off mailing out DVDs.



I don't mean to come in here and crap on you, ejunkie folks, but as a new business owner who was so sure I could trust that your service was easy to use and perfect for me, I am sorely disappointed and I'm forced to look for an alternative to your service.



If you can help in any way, you might just save this customer. Yes, I have already opened a service ticket, and yes, the problem is still happening.



My fingers are crossed that your team has some answers coming before my business goes in the toilet.

[dsieg58]

Don't get me wrong. I might be whining, but I'm not complaining. E-junkie is a fine service, who charges MUCH less than other services out there. Ex: The same package I've got ($18) on e-junkie costs $100 on XXX (we won't say who) ...Just to get digital downloads and you can't even bundle tangible and digital products together!



The tech guys are also great. They've responded quickly and professionally many, many, times since 2008. I wouldn't hesitate to recommend e-junkie to anyone.



But this ONE problem is starting to really suck.

[devi]

Yep - I've appreciated their quick response time and their willingness to help, but the bottom line is: nice people or not, if I can't run my business through ejunkie I simply HAVE to use another service.

[E-junkie_Guru]

@Devi:

75% is an extraordinarily high complaint rate. Please send the Transaction IDs of affected download orders to our Support team, and we'll help you sort out why so many of your buyers may be reporting problems.



Make sure your products are set to allow at least 5 Attempts, or no fewer than 3 Attempts at the absolute barest minimum (though allowing so few Attempts will almost certainly increase your complaint rate, especially if you are serving a fairly large file). This help page discusses some factors that can prematurely expire download links, which can seem like a stall depending on the download manager they use:

http://www.e-junkie.com/ej/trouble.downloads.expired.htm



Unfortunately, there simply is no such thing as a 100% reliable download service that works perfectly for everyone on their first try every single time for files of all sizes; it's simply not technically possible, due to the way the Internet itself works, not to mention variable factors involving the buyer's own computer (such as how their anti-virus or download-manager software works).



For instance, even if our system and the buyer's computer are working perfectly, and even if software on the buyer's computer isn't introducing any confounding factors, and even if the buyer's ISP has no issues in their own network, there's still the matter of numerous network routing hops along the path across the Internet between the buyer's ISP and our Amazon S3 download server, all of which are out of our and the buyer's and their ISP's control. Any one of those network nodes along the way could be having a problem handling traffic, which can interfere with download performance until they clear up the problem, and in that case there's nothing you or we or the buyer or their ISP can do about it.



This also explains why a direct download link from another server may seem to be working fine while the buyer may be having a problem with their E-junkie link to download from Amazon S3; the path across the Internet between that server to the buyer's ISP may differ from the path between Amazon's network to that ISP, and there may be a problem along one path which does not affect the other path. However, providing a direct link to an alternate download server also means the buyer can share that static link with others, who can use that link directly to download for free, which bypasses the primary point of using E-junkie, ensuring that every link issued can never be good forever if it happens to get shared out.

[dsieg58]

"However, providing a direct link to an alternate download server also means the buyer can share that static link with others, who can use that link directly to download for free, which bypasses the primary point of using E-junkie, ensuring that every link issued can never be good forever if it happens to get shared out."



Yes, exactly my point. I'm having to by-pass my own built in security system, and put my product at risk, unnecessarily. In addition to paying for the extra bandwidth and service. One of the things we're paying for is the ability to have clients safely download our products. The ripple effect created by this problem is far-reaching.

[E-junkie_Guru]

We would be glad to help you troubleshoot any particular case of download problems if you email our Support team the affected Transaction ID to investigate. At this point, any problems that may occur would be isolated, idiosyncratic cases, as presently we are not getting reports from our other 12,000 merchants indicating any broad-scale, common issue affecting our download system in general, nor has that been the case for quite some time now.



Posts in this thread since March have been about isolated problems unrelated to the matter from springtime -- e.g., your post of July 16 was about a buyer reporting that their laptop actually shut down while they were downloading -- not that the download itself stopped or stalled -- so they were seeking your assistance to resume/retry their download and may just have needed their link re-activated/re-sent.



Most of the other "people reporting the exact same problem" earlier in this thread were affected by a general issue that occurred earlier this spring, which was causing a sporadic few downloads seemingly at random to stall as soon as they started without making any progress at all -- i.e., the download progress-bar dialog would appear and remain open, but the progress bar itself would just sit there without even starting to move at all.



If buyers reporting a problem are not reporting exactly that specific behavior, their issue is unrelated to the problem from this past spring, which has since been resolved. In fact, it seemed to fix itself independently of our own efforts, possibly due to a monthly Windows Update fixing a bug that may have been introduced by an earlier Update. If that was indeed the source of the problem, any buyer still reporting this particular problem behavior may be behind on their Windows Updates by several months.



We also noticed a fair number of affected buyers appeared to be using the FDM (Free Download Manager) browser add-on that caused problems because it would try to split every download into dozens of parts to download simultaneously, which would of course instantly expire the buyer's download link since each download segment would count as an Attempt against the link -- trying to download a file in 20 parts at once when the link only allows 5 Attempts would instantly expire the link as soon as they started their download. Asking the buyer to remove or disable this FDM add-on and then re-activating their link would solve this problem.

[dsieg58]

Look, I appreciate the fact that you can't isolate the problem. I can understand that no two computers, or customers, or downloads, are going to be the same. I understand perfectly that 100 things have to work in sync. And you know what? That's YOUR job. Not mine, not the customers.



As you know, must customers downloading general internet products aren't internet whiz kids. Most can hardly find the space bar if it had blinking lights. Asking them to download is like asking them to go to a foreign country and no guide book. Asking customers to jump through hoops, and dazzle us with their internet brilliance by taking multiple actions prior to downloading is going to be a hard sell. In fact, that horse died at the starting gate. They are used to Amazon.com where it goes smoothly 99.9% of the time.



Most customers screw it up, granted. They don't bother reading download instructions. I have extensive download instructions in "Dummy-proof" screenshots to explain it, I have my email address for help in 3 different places, I have alternate download links, and STILL they automatically assume the VENDER is cheating them and the VENDOR is a scammer. This causes complaints to Google, PayPal disputes, credit card company disputes, bank disputes, charge-backs, negative forum posts, the list is almost endless. Trust me, I have been living this nightmare. Unfortunately, that's MY JOB.



And what really frosts your nuggets, is I have a quality product, I deal honestly with people, I go the extra mile ALWAYS for good customer service, and I have a business I'm proud of that took me years to build. The resulting ill will, if it was directed at YOU AND YOUR BUSINESS, would move you to take action, I guarantee it. These guys aren't joking...this is a problem that can ruin reputations!



But what really frost your balls is IT ISN'T MY FAULT!!!!! and I can't get the problem fixed! What bothers me the most is I COME OUT looking bad every single time.



I'm just sharing a little bit of the wealth of feeling I get with you. :+)



Now having said that, the problems have dropped off this week. I don't know why. But I also don't know why they dropped off before and then magically reappeared either.



Do you guys have enough bandwidth? Your servers overloaded? Certainly other download services providers MUST have the same problem then. (with FDM add-ons) How did they fix it?



But I love you guys...you know I do. :+)

[dsieg58]

Just to give you a little taste of what i was dealing with last week...Let me cut and paste...This is from someone I spent the better part of 2 days working with to get their downloads correct. Don't ask for the transaction ID, I already sent it.



"YOU ARE A FUCKING ASSHOLE AND WE HAVE REPORTED YOU TO THE CPU COPS!!!!! THE CREDIT CARD CO HAS ALSO BEEN NOTIFIED OF YOUR LOLIFE SCHEEM AND IF YOU NARE FOR REAL YOU WOULD SEND US SOME REAL INFO.TOOO BAD"



Sweet, huh? How would you like to wake every morning to an inbox full of those?



Welcome to the land of "Hanging Downloads."

[E-junkie_Monster]

We appreciate your frustration, but it is simply inherent to doing business online.



We can only speak for what happens on our end of the connection, and there's no problems there nor are we being taxed beyond our capabilities. But even when things are running smoothly you will still get a certain amount of complaints.



Statistically there will always be a few buyers who are unable to complete a download successfully, and unfortunately some of those people will not be patient about it. The number of people who experience these problems is always going to fluctuate naturally up and down at any given point of time.



As guru said above, there is absolutely no 100% reliable download service. No one else out there has "fixed" it because no one owns the entire network. It is impossible to guarantee the performance of systems you do not own and cannot control and anyone who implies otherwise isn't being truthful.



We have thoroughly researched the transactions you have reported to us and found no unusual issues that signal something within our control to repair or improve.



We'll be happy to continue investigating any new problems, but first we recommend that you personally test any download link that a buyer contacts you about. Unless there is an unusual problem that can be duplicated in your own test there's probably nothing that we can do.



If a download times out, the buyer simply needs to try again. You may wish to consider offering more than five download attempts or a longer time frame to decrease the number of complaints you receive.

[dsieg58]

ok..thank you.

[christimages]

Personally testing the link doesn't solve the problem. For instance, I started out testing every link that "hung", and about half the time I got the same thing they did "0....downloading". Then one day in frustration, I canceled a hanging link and immediately tried it again, and it worked perfectly. Then was when I realized the hanging downloads and timed-outs were computer/isp based.



I, too work with excellence, and feel this is a reflection on me and my business. This week it seems like every download has a problem - either no email or hanging. Changing my settings to 5 attempts is good advice and I'll also beef up my thank you page to include a blurb about checking their junk mail for the link. But this follows 3 months of no complaints at all. It's easy to think that something is wrong here when they all come at once. I tend to believe it's just the law of averages playing out.



Also, a direct link to the product for download is a huge security gamble - something I would never do. I send a refreshed link and at the same time, a free link email and cut and past both of the links in the apology email to the customer. Overkill helps the customer see that you are serious about solving the problem quickly.

[christimages]

Let me add that my files are 250 megs and only once in over a year has there been a download that just NEVER worked for a customer. That is .03% failure rate. I don't think you could beat that anywhere.

[ellen]

Hey everyone,



Just to check in on this from the dev perspective, we just pulled a sample from our logs and still aren't seeing any statistically significant increase in our download error rate, and as usual pretty much all the errors we do see are tied to the use of abusive download managers/accelerators, which greedily try to start a bunch of connections at once to get better download rates. We don't support them, and other file download services don't support them; please advise your clients that are having troubles to disable any such tools they may be trying to use, or at least limit them to 1 download thread at a time.



Now, We're not completely heartless; we realize that some clients may have these things installed without even realizing it or what they do. We're looking into putting Cloudfront (the AWS CDN service) in front of S3; with luck it will let these abusers down a little more easily than bare S3 does, in addition to the standard benefits of a CDN (files are served from from more points, thus generally higher speeds).

[dsieg58]

My downloads last week, as well as this week, have been smooth. (Fingers crossed.)



Thanks for the update.