Netopsystems FEAD Optimizer
February 25th, 2006 by joseSo a few weeks ago I was upgrading my version of Acrobat Reader. I start the installer, wait a couple of seconds and am greeted with the message “Netopsystems FEAD Optimizer is now recomposing data for setup program”. After a few seconds of confusion wondering WTF is this thing recomposing and WTF is “Netopsystems FEAD Optimizer” I decided to do a little research.
Turns out Netopsystems is a German based company that specializes in data distribution. Besides a catchy name that just rolls off the tongue they offer a variety of other amusing solutions. Besides the FEAD Optimizer, they also offer the FEED Optimizer. Who is the braniac that names 2 different products from the same company a name that sounds the same? I can see a conversation going like this: “Hello, this Heather at Netopsystems, would you like more information regarding our FEAD Optimizer or the new and improved FEED Optimizer?”
Netopsystems also managed to register the word get with their new get® solution. So please be aware the next time you use “get” since you might have to pay some royalties. A closer look at their BLD solution tells us that “Downloading voluminous files can take quite a long time, especially with a modem connection and also when broadband-connected.” Who the hell uses voluminous to describe files? At least they offer very easy to follow graphs like the one below to explain exactly how FEAD Optimizer (not FEED) works. I’ve been looking at it for the last 10 minutes and I still don’t get it. If you do, drop me a comment.
Hilarious! These guys are marketing geniuses!
I at first assumed it was some kind of spyware…
I just experienced the torture of waiting for eighteen (18) minutes while this ‘FEAD’ optimized the s**t out of my patience. To top it off, when it finished ‘optimizing’ it told me it needed IE 5.01 to install the Reader, and it refused to install the Reader. Since I did not have IE 5.01 and have no intention of getting it (I don’t use IE), I’ll just do without Reader 6.xxx.
I will continue with 5.xxx until I complete my migration to Linux. We don’t need bandwidth optimization, we need better software and less crap getting in the way of using said software.
And for a optimizer its not so good because it´s not soft, needs more than 128 mb of memory ram. I did not success to install a printer driver optimized with fead optimizer. Oh god I have to install more memory to install a drive for my hp. where can I find this kind of memory for an old pc? send me a light. Yeah, I know, I´ll will develop a new driver for my printer, I think that it´s the more easy way.
I’m guessing it’s a form of compression, indicating people download things more often when it’s smaller.
But it still doesn’t make any sense. I smells management stupidity.
And just wait until you run it in a Terminal Server or Citrix session where the C: drive is your local drive, not the server’s physical C: drive. It caches to the C: drive regardless of where the TEMP folder exists, which means it can take hours to decompress a file that took 2 minutes to download.
Just encountered this hilariously awful software in some downloaded HP printer drivers – it is simply terrible. Watched in amazement as the “FEAD Optimizer†(there’s a name to conjure with) absorbed every CPU cycle on a dual-core 3.4 machine for nearly 10 minutes, just to unpack a compressed file. Why on Earth didn’t they just use Zip?? This wheel, I think, didn’t need to be reinvented.
well, after conquering 3.O raw without any help in ‘94 (?) the demise of dos with 95 then 98 the end of HTML and up to now three or four computers later to XP and waiting for vista – and my approaching old-age ( was it my fault we were all old when the computer age entered? ) anyway, I have become alert to the changes and have started to investigate what is actually in my computer – and most of it is well, shall I say more??? SSSSSSSSSSSSSSS
I think the graph is trying to say that without FEAD and get (WTF for the registered trademark?) less users are willing to start a download, and more users are likely to cancel the download. Both, I’m assuming, due to the download’s size. Obviously, there’s no mention of scale on the graph. In any case, FEAD is bulky, messy and overkill software. They could just as easily use UPX or PECompact.
Read this at http://www.schooltechnician.co.uk/
FEAD Optimizer Extract Tool
Written by Terry Watts
Saturday, 15 July 2006
It has finally arrived. Introducing the FEAD Optimizer Extraction tool. This tool is designed to allow the quick extraction of a FEAD Optimized installer application such as Acrobat Reader. I am surprised that NetOpSystems who make FEAD have not developed an application for network administrators that will allow easy extraction of the proprietary compressed files. It would have been a simple application to make, believe me, there is a huge demand for such an application …
Regarding comment #15 [http://garbage.net/blog/2006/02/25/netopsystems-fead-optimizer/#comment-15]:
Dan has the right idea. The graph is a poor representation of the number of end users who either didn’t bother to download, or started and then aborted due to excessive size, compared to the number of new site visitors and successful downloads after implementing FEAD (and growing horns, pointy tail and wielding a pitchfork).
What the graph doesn’t show is the number of end users who turn to the competition, because of the frustration and agony from the pointy-horned ones FEAD-ing them a pile of $#|+!
I’ll never forget when I downloaded an HP drivers and software pack for a PSC-2355. Seemed small enough… But then I tried to unpack it and the FEAD hit the fan!
The first PC I tried to unpack on didn’t have the required 128MB RAM — actually, it had 196MB, but less than 128MB was free. A little bit of hair-pulling later, I lobbed the blob over the network to another PC with enough RAM, only to get the second joy of FEAD — which is worse than a frozen mukluk to the groin — it told me I didn’t have enough free TEMP space! I nearly ripped my head bald, ’cause I was using an NTFS hardlink to link %TEMP% to another drive for, basically, that very reason! When C:=2.5GB, it doesn’t take long to run out.
I must have spent at least three, four, maybe seven days trying to find a solution! Eventually, I stumbled on a developers technical document which described the error codes returned by a FEAD archive, including some command line options that could override certain forced defaults, such as a temp folder that isn’t even THE %TEMP% folder. I swear, the document seemed like it was not intended for end users to need, or find, but thanks to some dumb luck, I was finally able to unpack/detonate the ~400MB bomb, which mushroomed to over 900MB!
And now, Adobe is taking the cake! Reader 8 for Vista… FEAD un-optimized to force end users to have the Vista User Account Control (UAC) enabled in order to avoid the dreaded “not enough temp, or no permission” error! I turned UAC OFF after the second day of using Vista! Talk about a P.I.T.A., having that confirmation pop up for 85% of the things I did in XP on a regular basis! At least there was an alternative to re-enabling that nightmare: go to the Compatibility tab of the FEAD archive and set it to run in XP compatibility mode… (boggle)… Am I crazy, or was compatibility mode added to support programs that weren’t intended to run on todays Win-D’OH-s versions? Way to go, Adobe! Reader 8 for Vista, which cannot be installed on Vista by many end users…
Well, that’s my rant…
In case anybody wants/needs it, here’s the relevant “solution” from the FEAD technical document I found (and thankfully saved). The solution doesn’t make a lot of sense, but does include the command line option to force-FEAD to a User-specified temp folder. I don’t know if it’ll work to force-FEAD Reader 8 for Vista, but from the sound of Netopsystems, they probably haven’t changed much, if anything, on their end…
Error Code
3.1812.01.2.25018
21.1812.01.2.25016
3.1812.01.225016
6730.1054.01.2.25016
Antwort
The device you try to install this application is not ready. This
is a driver or hardware related problem. Please try again.
Please start the application via command line:
yourexe.exe -nos_o”f:\temp”
and try again.
*The information above was obtained from the document, “fead_tfaq.pdf,” with the title, “Microsoft Word – FEAD TFAQ Errorcodes kurz.doc.” It was written by Bjoern and is ©Netopsystems.
Thanks Brandon, that command line info probably just saved me hours. I can’t believe how sh*tty this FEAD program is to use.
Same here, I came across this blog while I was killing time while the FEAD thing was unpacking my HP printer drivers for the 3rd time (it’s a network printer and I have to go through this for every PC on the network).
I would LOVE to know WHY this program exists and what the heck it does better than Winrar or Winzip or whatever!!!!!!!!!!!!! 10 to 15 minutes to extract a DRIVER!!!! It nearly failed on one PC because of lack of space or memory (like the above post).
Pfffffff…… what a waste of timeand ressources.
shit program, needed a printer driver from HP only the command line provided here saved me to get the driver unzipped.
terrible
I just downloaded a driver for a printer from HP and found it was in this FEAD format. It would not install, complained that a directory did not exist. The solution proposed by Brandon did not work for me, but I discovered that if I just created the directory it was complaining about, it worked, but about 5x slower than ZIP. FEAD is a product that should not exist, let alone be used.
HP uses netopsystems to update their printer software.
I’ve yet to use an HP download which works on any computer I have.
Send this software back to the Fatherland…..They deserve it!
I’ve entered the FEAD nightmare and after 15 minutes it still hasn’t completed a download for a file that should have taken 2 minutes tops. This is light years beyond aggravating! HP, What did we do to you to deserve this garbage downloading software?
I have been trying to install an HP photosmart 7350 printer for hours. Fead 2.5 optimizer gives me an immediate error message that states and I quote
You need Windows 2000 No Service Pack and up to run this program.
I’m running Windows XP Pro on a RAID mirror system at my home. I think that is way ahead of Windows 2000. Anyone have a solution to this issue. This printer worked with no problem on the last setup which was a RAID striped array then after four and a half years I had a drive fail completely so two new drives later I can’t get this freeking printer installed. Someone help……PLEASE
FEAD SHMEED… This thing sucks!
I wonder if HP knows that this massacre of a program is what makes people like me decide to buy Canon printers from now on.
Anyone who uses anything from hp will soon be bald, if you are allready bald, the stress of not having something to pull from your head and releive the frustration of thier software will most likely kill you.
Thanks to the person who suggested the FEAD Optimizer extract tool. That’ll save a lot of time and frustration.