Hi

Although I am a long-term fan of Xara, having bought every version since Xara Studio (about 10 years ago), I am INTENSELY frustrated and irritated with your re-activation proceedure.

Because Xara Professional 7 *CRASHED* and became unusable, I have had to re-install it on my work PC. And because like many people, I use three PCs (work, home, laptop for commuting), this meant that I have now exceeded the maximum number of activations.

1. It is incredibly fiddly putting in 6 x 6 digits and very easy to make a mistake.

2. It is irritating to have to then press 3 to move onto the next group.

3. It is even more irritating that the phone system then reads on the number I need to call ("00 49 57 41 34 55 31", I think) ONLY ONCE. So if we dont get it right first time we then have to enter all 48 (6 x 6) digits, plus 6 threes all over again.

4. More irritating still is the fact despite being a UK company you are forcing us to make an international phone call in order to continue.

5. EVEN MORE IRRITATING is the fact that when you get through the phone system talks to us in German(??) for a minute or two first.

6. TOTALLY IRRITATING is the fact the their office turns out to be closed when I called at 11:45AM despite the fact that they claim that it would be open until 12:30PM.

A. What do I do next?
B. Xara - WTF are you playing at?

If you really, REALLY want to irritate your customers it would be hard to think of any automated system that would do a better job of it. Are you sure you havent unwittingly employed the staff of your competitors who clearly wish to destroy your loyal fan-base?

With thanks

Alec