CS3 trials are out, but…..
Our team has been eagerly awaiting our copies of CS3 to go through corporate purchasing. So when I saw Senocular's post yesterday morning stating that the trials had finally been posted, I quickly forwarded the link to the rest of the team and we began downloading. Once the files were downloaded we all started installing... and waiting...and waiting ...and waiting. The install process took forever, easily longer than it took to install Office and at likely as long as it took to install the OS. At least they got theres to install though, I'm not so lucky. While I have the same machine as everyone else on my team, for some reason my installer disappears after the "initializing..." message.
So I do what any good nerd would do and I search Google for a solution, and to my surprise I'm not alone. I tried everything I could find. I un-installed the Photoshop CS3 beta and ran the clean up script ...nothing. I tried windows update to make sure my OS was up to date ...nada. I reinstalled the Windows Installer ...nope. I re-downloaded the files and tried again ...nice try. I tried a different installer (Illustrator this time) ...wishful thinking. This sucks! Nothing has worked and I've wasted an entire day trying. Out of curiousity, I tried pulling out my Studio 8 disc and installing fireworks (since I didn't have that installed) and it was just fine, no issues. What is with this new installer? Why does it take so long (WHEN IT WORKS)? And why so many problems? Why does it suck?
Many people are working with tech support to solve their issues (when they can get through). But I think for those of us who haven't received their serial numbers yet, we have no recourse. This is absolutely ridiculous, and unacceptable.
In the end though I'll do whatever I have to do to get it working, I'm a Flash guy, its what I do so I don't have much choice. But if I was a potential customer who was downloading the software for evaluation before I spent the (inflated) money for the software, this would give me serious doubts. Installing software should not be a pain in the ass. Installing software should not require sitting on the phone with tech support. Installing software SHOULD...well... install (theres a novel idea). Did I mention that this sucks?!
Thanks Adobe... nice work 
/***** UPDATE 5.9.07 @3:23pm *****/
Okay well I FINALLY got Flash CS3 installed. And my thanks to Adobe tech support who had no problem with the fact that I had no serial number yet. "Paul" worked with me for about an hour to get every last bit of the Photoshop AND Fireworks CS3 betas removed my machine. It required running the cleanup script several times, manually deleting folders, and creating a new user account to get the app installed, but it is installed. I was able to get Dreamweaver, Photoshop and Illustrator installed as well. It did however take repeated times of retrying setup since I would constantly get the "You can only install on Adobe application at a time..." error even though I WAS only installing one at a time. It was like it had a delay before the installer would realize that the last install was finished (on the 4th setup try seemed to be the sweet spot). Fireworks on the other hand asked for the CD so I was not able to get that installed.
I sill stand by my original comment that this is horrible, inexcusable, and should not be happening. I did learn my lesson though, NO MORE ADOBE BETAS FOR ME!!! That'll teach me to try and get ahead of the curve 
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May 9th, 2007 at 9:28 am
Thanks for the link. I just posted a walkthrough for installing CS3 Web Premium on Windows XP that (hopefully) will be helpful to you. I, like you, had tried everything… and last night, using these steps, was finally able to get CS3 installed.
http://cdharrison.com/2007/05/08/installing-cs3-web-premium/
May 9th, 2007 at 9:35 am
I have been having issues as well. At first, I thought the damn installer was busted or something. It turns out that it was just reeeeaally, reeeeaally sloooOOOoOooOOow (and trust me, it aint my specs). Seriously, I think it took me less time to install Windows on my last PC.
After a little research, I found what I believe to be the reason. Adobe outsourced their installer to a company called “BlueFlavor”. For reasons unknown, they built the installer using DHTML/AJAX technologies. WTF? I wonder what was wrong with their old installers.
Anyways, you can always express your self to them here: http://www.blueflavor.com/blog/news_events/new_work_adobe_cs3_installer.php#comments
…or read their case study here: http://www.blueflavor.com/pages/clients/case_studies/web_design_development/adobe_cs3_installer.php
WAY TO GO ADOBE! The first release under the new brand and you can’t even get the installer right.
May 9th, 2007 at 10:39 am
Thanks for the link Chris. Unfortunately that didn’t work for me either. It just blows me away that people have to make 4 page tutorials to install freaking software (although I thank those greatly for taking the time to do so). Not sure if these Blue Flavor folks created the installers used in the trials or just the interface on the CD versions, but whoever botched this damn thing should be the ones creating the tutorials.
May 9th, 2007 at 12:14 pm
Man, that’s a bummer… sorry it didn’t work for you. Adobe has really dropped the ball with CS3. These installers are horrible… and Adobe needs to do more than just issue CleanScripts and whatnot.
I don’t blame BlueFlavor for this… Adobe’s the one responsible for Quality Control in the end. It’s their name, their reputation on the box… Know what I mean?
May 9th, 2007 at 3:39 pm
I share your pain. Just downloaded 400Mb installer for Flash CS3, unzipped files (5min of time), started installer, made sure I have 1.2 Gb of free space, waited for 30 minutes for installer to copy files.
For me it is a definite step back with a installer of Flash CS3 when I compare this process with the installation routine of Flash 8.
What can we do? Obey our destinies, I guess.. Do not want to complain on BlueFavor blog…
May 9th, 2007 at 7:08 pm
Your right Chris and JabbyPanda, its not BlueFlavors issue, it all came down to (in my case) the beta software from Adobe. This is NOT BlueFavors fault at all.
May 14th, 2007 at 10:18 pm
It’s too bad people are having problems with the installer. Just to be clear, all Blue Flavor did was the front-end development (AJAX/XHTML/CSS) and some interface design work. I’m pretty sure the work we did has nothing to do the problems people are having.
Still, it’s too bad. I know the folks at Adobe were shooting for the best possible experience with the installer and it seems that, for some people anyway, they missed the mark.
May 15th, 2007 at 6:51 pm
Thanks for the reply Keith, from the sounds of it, it appears
most of the issues are surrounding the beta installs conflicting with the cs3 installs.Scratch that, its more than just the betas…its much worse. I wont be installing any more Adobe betas going forward, I can tell you that much.May 17th, 2007 at 12:33 pm
[...] I mentioned in my previous post that I was having installation issues with the trial downloads of Adobe’s CS3 products (namely Flash and Photoshop). I assumed that I could install the trials and when my serial number arrived I’d be able to enter it (as I have in the past) before the trial expired and everything would be great. Boy was I wrong. I tried to input the serial number but its a no go. So I say “screw it, I’ll go ahead and install the whole CS3 Web Premium Suite”. I get our software guy to login to the Adobe download center and begin the 1.6 GB download for the whole suite. I burn the software to a DVD and try to install, it unpacks the software to my desktop and I begin the setup process. I select the products to install (basically everything accept Version Cue) and I get presented with an error asking me to “Please insert Adobe CS3 Web Premium to continue installation”. What? The disk is in the drive, the files are on the desktop… what more is there? So again I head to Google, run a search based on the error and find a few things to try from one of the Adobe technotes regarding the CS3 installation problems. I have to admit to being a bit caught off guard by some of the suggestions (albeit in the “advanced troubleshooting” area) that suggested that I actually “Reinstall the operating system, or run a system restore” to get Photoshop to work. Are you f@$king serious? [...]
May 23rd, 2007 at 10:19 pm
This is effed up, i mean c’mon Adobe, ur installation process is the owrst ive experienced in my life. Its insanely slow and full of errors. Shame on you Adobe. Hope theres an official release of a solution to the problem ASAP!
July 12th, 2007 at 1:53 pm
My experience with their ficklke installer was horrible. I had to use drive imaging software to revert my notebook to its ‘new’ state and retried many times on my PC to get Illustrator up. As it turns out, it didn’t like the fact that some other software had the ‘.SVG’ file association, and if Illustrator couldn’t have it, then… I couldn’t be allowed to have Illustrator. So it deleted its self and undid over an hour’s worth of installation (especially the repetitive ‘updating components’ steps). A dozen times.
BTW, the error information appears in the ‘Administrative Tools/Event Viewer’ doohicky. It would’ve been nice to know that up-front, instead of after three days of trying (Adobe Support apparently doesn’t answer on the weekends).
FYI: Here are the ass-hats Adobe contracted out to and claim to be responsible for it. They’re naturally proud and talk as if it’s the best thing ever.
http://www.blueflavor.com/pages/clients/case_studies/web_design_development/adobe_cs3_installer.php
All because some moron at Adobe got the idea in their head that the installer experience should behave exactly the same on the Mac and the PC, regardless of the fact that there are big differences in what it needs to do, and in the ways users EXPECT to be notified of problems.
Well, mission accomplished: IT SUCKS FOR EVERYONE!
Unconscionably slow, repeats extremely time-consuming steps unnecessarily when problems occur, doesn’t provide ANY built-in or automated diagnostic help facility, REQUIRING contact with technical support. Would it have been so much trouble to tell ME on-screen when there was a problem and give a link to possible solutions? No wonder this software costs five times as much as it should, they have to maintain all of that support staff to interactively ‘fix’ these fatal non-issues that make the installer crap its self.
July 27th, 2008 at 6:04 am
I have had mega problems like everyne else.
Started with trying to install Dreamweaver cs3. Would not work at all so I un-installed it and accidently uninstalled Flash Player. It’s taken me the best part of four evenings to get Flash Player back – got there.
Now I have re-installed Dreamweaver cs3 from cd (did not ask for a seriel number???). then tried running it and got the following message
“You cannot use this product at this time. You must repair the problem by uninstalling and then reinstalling this product or contacting you IT administrator or Adobe customer support for help”
Tried their customer support and not able to send anything throuhg – great help that was
Tried Uninstalling and reinstalling – no good
If anyone has any ideas I would appreciate it – HELP ME
I am running Widnow Vista Home Premium
thanks
Jules
Many Thanks
Jules