I just moved from my old PowerPC G5 Mac (OS 10.4.11 Tiger) to my new Mac Pro Intel Quad, running OS 10.6.4 Snow Leopard.

I have been using LimeWire since maybe 2005, had upgraded to LimeWire 4.18.8 on the old machine and had been chomping at the bit for years at the thought of being able to upgrade to a newer version that my non-Intel machine could not run.

One of the first things I did, after moving all the old files to the new machine was to log onto the LimeWire site and downloaded the new Pro 5.5.10.

Overall, I am VERY disappointed!

It seems to me that anytime a software company ‘upgrades’, it OUGHT to be better than the earlier version.

I really hate this ‘newer’ LimeWire. It is NOT ‘user friendly’ –or intuitive, as was the previous version I had grown to know and love.

I am wondering if any other users feel the same way about their upgrade?

Maybe from a ‘technological’ viewpoint, you guys are happy with your work, but, as a ‘user’ I find this very hard to ‘work’ and it lacks the features the older versions had which I had come to know and love.

For instance, I only use ‘audio’ and I am now limited to using only one ‘folder’ to save to, where I used to have a ‘Shared’ folder, an ‘Incomplete’ and a ‘shared-repair’ folder –where my uploads went, so I could ‘massage’ them (correct spelling, capitalization, etc) before I moved them to ‘Shared’ where the public had access to.

I just don’t understand, why, in the process of ‘upgrading’ you guys made this fine product a lot more user unfriendly? This is almost tantamount to ‘elder abuse’, changing things so radically that a user needs to go back to school to figure things out. Does any older, long time user agree that the ‘changes’ are not for the better?

Drew Johnson
Captain USNR-Retired

Just as well you did not try the earlier versions of LW 5. LW 5.0 was a bare-bones program with hardly anything in it. Gradually with each version LW have re-added tools & options & in more recent times added new tools. Still they have not added all things from LW 4. The reason they redesigned the program was the code was too messy with things added on top of others, they say the interface was also becoming crowded & not much room to add things. So they started the code from scratch with better design coding, added tools one by one back in. The new interface, yes many people have complained about getting used to it & the loss of tools. Last year there were a lot of flack complaint posts about the negatives aspects of LW 5.

What LW 5 offers now: Being able to see both upload & download windows at same time. Having download window visible at all times (excluding the introduction window when you open the program.) They added size-filter for search results. They improved the connection technology where it actually seeks genuine new peers to connect with. LW now opens up much faster and connects much faster than LW 4 or the earlier versions of LW 5. LW 5 uses less computer resources than LW 4. There's more options they added but cannot think of them presently, can see changes here: http://wiki.limewire.org/index.php?title=Changelog

For me personally? I use LW 4.16 in one account & LW 5 on another account on same computer. So I get best of both worlds. LW 5 & LW 4.18 will not download from users with versions older than LW 4.14 unless I'm mistaken, whereas LW 4.16 does.

Be wary about cancelling files with LW 5. When you do this, it not only removes the download but deletes the incomplete file. LW 4 on other hand only removed the listing from the download window.

LW 5 might be slow for you to get accustom to, however here's some guidelines for using LW 5: http://www.gnutellaforums.com/gettin...ire-4-5-a.html

OK . .thanks for the timely and thorough response.

From the sound of things 5.5.10 is still a 'work in progress', which makes me WONDER why I was charged $35 for something that does not measure up to the version I already had on my old computer.

I am J U S T a little irked that they have the temerity to charge for something that, apparently, is still under development and does not come close to the 'look & feel' and 'ability' of the older version I had been using for a long time.

I can see 'potential' here, but am NOT happy to have to stare of 'advertisements' and keep getting messages that 'you do not have permission to write to the 'Incomplete' folder'. AFAIK, this is a 'Beta' and I shouldn't have to cough up the $35 until such time as they 'finish' it.

Thanks again for the 'heads up'.