Did I get tricked into buying a Stablebit Scanner license?

[FreydNot]

I run Drivepool and Scanner on my HTPC.  I'm a happily paying customer and love the product.

 

Some time ago I installed a 30 day license on scanner on my workstation PC.  It had expired long ago but I never removed the software.

 

Today I get an email notifying me that my C drive is about to fail on my workstation PC.  This is the only Corsair SSD that I own.

So, I go pay for a second Scanner license so I can properly access the situation.

 

Stablebit Scanner is now working but it not showing any problems with the drive.  Weird...

 

 

And the scan shows the drive is healthy.

 

 

WTF?  I guess I'm glad the drive isn't dying, but I'm pretty unhappy with Stablebit Scanner lying to me.  I feel like it was done intentionally because they know I would probably go ahead and purchase a license.  Not cool.

 

I guess I'm glad I have the software activated on this PC again, but this really didn't do much to boost my confidence in the company.

 

Anyone else have similar stories?

 

 

[Christopher (Drashna)]

I apologize if you feel like you've been tricked into purchasing a license!

 

If you really feel that you don't want the license, please contact us directly at https://stablebit.com/Contactand we'll see about refunding you.

 

 

As for the issue, StableBit Scanner ONLY sends notifications a) if they're configured, and if the program detects an issue.

 

However, the cause of this is most likely a WMI issue. We use WMI by default to query for SMART data. Unfortunately, some controller/disk combinations will occasionally (or sometimes, frequently) mis-report the SMART data, sending blank or wrong data. This will cause that sort of issue you are seeing.  

To fix that, you can set the "NoWmi" option for SMART, which should prevent that from happening.

http://wiki.covecube.com/StableBit_Scanner_Advanced_Settings

Find the "Smart" section, check the 'NoWmi' option, and reboot the system (or use "services.msc" to restart the "StableBit Scanner Service").

 

There is a chance that the drive actually showed a different value for the SMART data that did indicate a problem, but was changed later on. 

 

 

 

 

Again, if you really don't want the license, then please do let us know, and we'll take care of it.

https://stablebit.com/Contact

[FreydNot]

I don't want to return the license.  It's worth what I paid for it (and more).  It just seems strange that a fatal error was reported and then completely went away after a license was registered.

 

I was also surprised that it would still function enough to send a warning email even after the license expired.  Is that by design?

[Christopher (Drashna)]

Okay, I just wanted to make sure that you wanted the license, and that if you didn't..

 

As for it notifying you, I've flagged the issue for Alex (the developer), because it really shouldn't have well, don't anything in this case.

 

But as for the error, I do think that this was a legitimate error that it noticed that resolved itself, went away, or was inadvertently created (as per the WMI stuff that I mentioned above). Though, it's very hard to tell, after the fact.