It was just a couple of days ago that I wrote Technical Support Sucks and You Are Partly to Blame. Unfortunately I left out one important part. If technical support asks you to test something, then try what they suggest! I saw a recent example where the user complaining loudly about a problem went absolutely crazy when asked to try something that may solve the problem.

Rather than quoting the exchanges verbatim, I’d rather focus on the problems described and the solutions. If you are not having problems, then there is no reason for you to do either of these things. But those of you having problems can certainly give these suggestions a try as they might just solve the problem for you!

Both of the suggestions I’m going to provide deal with saving files in CorelDRAW. The first one deals with CorelDRAW X4 and higher. Some anti-virus software can interfere with saving of CDR files because starting with CorelDRAW X4 they are truly ZIP files in disguise. If you think Corel is alone is disguising ZIP files, you are sadly mistaken. Many new file formats are truly ZIP files containing a variety of files. More than four years ago I wrote Speed Up File Operations in CorelDRAW X4 to address the anti-virus interference.

When a Corel representative suggested to one user to disable anti-virus for CDR files (ONLY!), the user went ballistic and said it was the worst advice he’d ever heard. Keep in mind the advice is not to completely disable anti-virus, it is simply for one file type. If it solves the problem, great. If it doesn’t solve the problem, you are welcome to change the setting back. Yet there is no way to know if it solves the problem if you refuse to try it!

The second suggestion relates only to CorelDRAW X6 and only to people having problems with files getting corrupted when saving. I personally have had absolutely no problems. As a possible solution, you can modify a setting to disable multi-threaded saving. This only changes one feature in CorelDRAW X6 and does not change any other software or anything else on your computer. If it solve the problem, you should be happy! And if it isn’t the solution for you, you can just as easily change the setting back.

Make sure CorelDRAW is not running! In your Windows menu, type in REGEDIT and hit Enter. This will launch the Registry Editor. You want to look for one specific setting, shown below:

HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareCorelCORELDRAW16.0DrawApplication PreferencesOptions-Advanced

Once you’ve clicked on that setting, you’ll see a handful of option in the right pane of the Registry Editor. One of them is labeled MultiThreading and it most likely has Data of “1.” When it is set to 1, CorelDRAW X6 will use multi-threading when saving. Right-click on the setting and select Modify from the pop-up menu. Change the value to “0” to disable multi-threading. You can always change it back to “1” later if you want to re-enable it.

Will this definitively solve your problems? No. But it might solve the problem and it worth trying! If you aren’t willing to try things that can solve your problems, you lose your right to complain that things aren’t working. Of course this suggestion and hundreds of others are covered in CorelDRAW X6 Unleashed. If you don’t already have a copy, you would be wise to get one as soon as possible.