Is Turbo Lister Down? 2/23 10:30 p.m.

[Deleted]

I've been trying to start Turbo Lister for the past hour.  When it starts I get a multiple choice screen asking if I want to open a new id, existing, etc.  I choose existing, click on my main id, and then nothing happens.  No inventory, etc.  Then I get a message after a few minutes that it's not responding.  I tried a different ID and just got a spinning wheel, then the not responding message.

Figures.  Just when I kicked my butt and wanted to get a couple listings in tonight.

[zoesam]

Turbolister resides on your PC, not at EBay, so it really can't be "down". Sorry. Unfortunately that screen is usually a problem with the way it last ended. I get it fairly often, but typically can just select the ID I want & click existing & it will open. Unfortunately, if that is not working for you, I think you're gonna have to restore your database, it sounds like it's gotten corrupted.

It's working fine here, so I can't replicate that screen to see exactly what you have access to. Ebay has a pretty good TL board, it used to be staffed by an employee. Not sure where they moved it with the board shuffle though.

eta; It's not that hard to restore your DB, but it's a bit of an involved process.  Around how many listings did you have?  Were you good about cleaning up old stuff or was there lots of junk in there?

[Deleted]

Thanks Zoe.  I already decided that I have to restore.  I seem to recall problems with the last update.  So I restored to a backup and it's still not working.  I'm just going to reload TL tomorrow when I'm not exhausted.  I think I can bring in my current listings by syncing?

I am pretty good about keeping my current listings in order, and I don't have many.  I moved all my Sold items to Sold folders.  I'd hate to lose all that history, but if necessary, so be it.

I'll play with it again tomorrow.

[zoesam]

I never synch, so IDK. But u can simply import active listings.

[Deleted]

And the saga continues.  I restored a few backups, each time getting the "not responding" message when I clicked on "Inventory".  So I ran a full virus scan last night, just in case.  Uninstalled Turbo Lister and reinstalled it, and the same thing happened!  I'll have to play with it some more today.

I checked the ebay boards and wrote to the ebay guy who looks like he's the Turbo Lister troubleshooter.  I'll see if he has any worthwhile input.

In the meantime I guess I'll just use the ebay listing form.  I really wanted to get some stuff up this weekend.

[zoesam]

Ugghhh, that sucks. That sounds like more than a corrupt DB. I've had to restore my DB maybe 3x in 10 years, but that's always been the fix. Are you reinstalling the latest version? I know you probably are, just wanted to throw it out there to make sure you're installing a current version. I'm lost on this one :-(

[Deleted]

I'm assuming I'm installing the current version Zoe.  I'm getting the link right off of my Selling page.  I'm going to try to go way back on the backups and see if I can get a working version.  Although I'm wondering now whether the backups include the actual application code.  Guess I'll find out.  This is what I get for always checking for and installing their stupid updates!  Worked fine before the last one.

Ah, could be my laptop.  This thing is a POS.

[zoesam]

No, backups would not include the application code. Backups are for your DB.

It sounds like you probably are installing the current version.

I only install their updates about once/year or so. I don't like to be on the bleeding edge.

It sounds like you may want to install an older version of the product & I'm not sure if you can do that :-(

[Deleted]

That's what I thought Zoe.  I have a separate hard drive backup that I thought backed up the entire hard drive.  But when I look through it, I can only find some random Turbo Lister files.  I guess that might be my better bet, to keep searching through that.

[Deleted]

OK. I give up. Uninstalled and reinstalled TL. Read some more troubleshooting tips so allowed it through Norton firewall. Also logged into it as Administrator on my laptop. Deleted my seller ID in TL, created a new ID (the same one of course) and tried to synch with Ebay. An hour later, the little timer was still spinning. Whatever the heck happened, it's dead to me! lol

[zoesam]

Well, I never sync, at all, it takes forever.

It sounds like you may have gotten it installed ok & then had problems with the sync. Depending on how many live items you have, a sync can easily take an hour. I would simply IMPORT your live listings.

[Deleted]

The install goes o.k.  It's what happens after.  Nothing works.  But I'll try the import instead of the sync.  Thanks for the tip.

I heard back from ebay support and got a long list of things to do.  Most of them I've done already, but maybe not in the same order.  If I can't do the import, I'll attempt what they told me.

Thank you!

[val2525]

Um, have you thought of maybe just switching to another program?

[Deleted]

Yes I have Val.  Spending way too much time on this.  Any suggestions?  Since I've been using TL happily for years, I pretty much tuned out discussions of any others.  Thanks.

[val2525]

You might start a new post - several members use Inkfrog and Auctiva and they're usually happy to post the pros and cons of the products. I use eBay's SYI since I'm on a Mac and don't really care to learn Garagesale.

Seems like there's a third option too but it has a long learning curve. A few sellers on CAB used it, LikeNewSuits was one (blackthorn maybe?).

[zoesam]

Not saying that Val's idea is a bad one. But I personally would never use 3rd party software over mfr. software, even when it's problematic. 30 yrs in software personally taught me that. There's no guarantee of the 2 co's talking to each other, how quickly they'll talk to each other, IF they'll talk to each other & how WELL they will talk to each other. So obviously, I've never used Auctiva & Inkfrog & I wouldn't, but many people do. I know they aren't free.

I've heard of Blackthorne, also not free & isn't there an SSB?

[Deleted]

Thanks for the info Val.  Free definitely matters.

Zoe, I tried the import.  Left it running for 2 hours, came back to the usual "not responding" message.  I give up for now.  Just going to use the ebay SYI form so I can get some stuff listed.  I'll go back to the TL challenge later.  I have 2 pages of instructions from the ebay guy, but I'm guessing the outcome will be the same.  And I can't afford to throw the laptop out the window right now. 

[zoesam]

Here's what I would do, if I were you. Wait. It sounds like you just downloaded a new version & release. Can you get this far? Go into TL & just bring up the main screen. Then at the top, select the Help dropdown, click "About Turbolister" & just make a note of the ENTIRE Version number.

Then I'd wait for a new version to be available. Probably within a month, as software generally has regular maintenance (in other words, those numbers to the far right of the version number will change). When one is available, I would download that & install it. It almost sounds like you have a bad version, perhaps for your PC & some bugs may be fixed in the next release.

The alternative would be to try & install an old version if you have one. Even maybe one from disc, when they used to send it out on CD's. That may be too old though, as your DB may well have features that weren't avl.

If you don't want to drive yourself crazy. I'd simply wait for a new release, as I outlined above & see if it fixes the problem.

[zoesam]

One other thought. TL is a huge memory hog. Is it possible you don't have much memory when it's running? Check your system resources. If memory is low. Maybe reboot, don't open anything else up & run TL on it's own.

[val2525]

I don't use any of it, but I will say I've seen a LOT more complaints posted about TL than I have about Inkfrog or Auctiva, and the CS for IF and Auctiva seem to be a lot more responsive than TL customer service.

Again, I'm only going by what I've read on the various boards and forums.

[Deleted]

After using the SYI form, I thought I'd give TL a whirl. I was excited to think that I'd be well-prepared for a marathon listing experience. That was months ago...

I used it to upload about six listings before I gave up on it. It was s-l-o-w to load pics and upload, plus I had a hard time using the form. I had to use a large magnifying glass to see what I was inputting half the time. It just wasn't worth the extra aggravation and amount of time I was sacrificing. Oh, and it did freeze up when it was in synch mode. 

[zoesam]

Mar 2, 2015 14:21:43 GMT @betsroff said:

After using the SYI form, I thought I'd give TL a whirl. I was excited to think that I'd be well-prepared for a marathon listing experience. That was months ago...

I used it to upload about six listings before I gave up on it. It was s-l-o-w to load pics and upload, plus I had a hard time using the form. I had to use a large magnifying glass to see what I was inputting half the time. It just wasn't worth the extra aggravation and amount of time I was sacrificing. Oh, and it did freeze up when it was in synch mode. 

Bets, TL is actually quicker than SYI with pics IMO, BUT you must have them sized right. TL does not play well with too large pics & it slows down to a snail's pace. I get that you were frustrated & prolly won't try it again, but should you decide to, change the size of your pics first, to EBay's recommended size & it will likely run like a charm. Same with the synch, the pic size comes into play there too.

I learned this when I switched editors & didn't realize I wasn't resizing my pics automatically anymore.  Suddenly my TL slowed to a crawl.  I mean 1/2 hour to upload 8 pics.   Unknown lead me to the problem.  As soon as I resized them, I was back to 1-2 second processing for each photo.

[Deleted]

Mar 2, 2015 18:16:51 GMT zoesam said:

Mar 2, 2015 14:21:43 GMT @betsroff said:

After using the SYI form, I thought I'd give TL a whirl. I was excited to think that I'd be well-prepared for a marathon listing experience. That was months ago...

I used it to upload about six listings before I gave up on it. It was s-l-o-w to load pics and upload, plus I had a hard time using the form. I had to use a large magnifying glass to see what I was inputting half the time. It just wasn't worth the extra aggravation and amount of time I was sacrificing. Oh, and it did freeze up when it was in synch mode. 

Bets, TL is actually quicker than SYI with pics IMO, BUT you must have them sized right. TL does not play well with too large pics & it slows down to a snail's pace. I get that you were frustrated & prolly won't try it again, but should you decide to, change the size of your pics first, to EBay's recommended size & it will likely run like a charm. Same with the synch, the pic size comes into play there too.

I learned this when I switched editors & didn't realize I wasn't resizing my pics automatically anymore.  Suddenly my TL slowed to a crawl.  I mean 1/2 hour to upload 8 pics.   Unknown lead me to the problem.  As soon as I resized them, I was back to 1-2 second processing for each photo.

Thanks for the advice. I do resize everything and rarely have a problem time-wise in using the SYI. But the small input fields on TL is the bigger problem for me. My eyes just ain't what they used to be...  Heck, I was 40+ before I ever had an eye exam outside of public school freebies! But it's all been downhill since...

[zoesam]

LOL, I do know that feeling. It seems like the last 10 yrs my eyes have gone downhill so fast! Alas, that I have no advice for, except what you're doing...do what works for you :-)