Be careful with the search from Cart Power. We kept having problems with nightly errors when the dedicated and then a VPS kept trying to "dump" what was done in to the /tmp file. The errors were caused because of the amount of information that the Live Search from Cart Power was creating and then when the database went to "dump" it on a daily basis it caused a load problem on the server. We ended up turning it off and taking the add-on completely off our server. It ended up killing the resources of the server on 200 products! Once deleted we did not have the issues.
We ended up moving back to the search from Alt-Team.
Please note that since we deleted the software, Cart Power did offer a refund, but we had already switched to the one from another vendor and we did not take the refund. I then asked if they would move the license to another site and they did that...but then they sent out an email saying that my upgrade license expired in 24 hours. So Cart Power went from offering a refund one day to ending the upgrade the next. Needless to say I did not use the license on the other server because it was unclear if they had fixed the bug.
Please also note that we have other wonderful add ons from Cart Power and their service has always been top notch. The only not so good experience would have been with their search add on. I would NOT recommend it.
Thanks for that feedback on Cart Power - maybe someone from there might respond with an update on the problem and what they have done about it. I have a server with over 1000 products, so I would probably run into similar problems.
Searchanise looks great (the drop down list is very nicely formatted and looks a lot better than the alternatives) and seems to work well. And for large numbers of products, maybe it makes sense to offload the work to a separate server.
The problem I have with Searchanise is not its recurring charge - if you are getting value for what you pay for - but the fact that it is closed source. If it works, great, if it doesn't work the way you want, too bad - you are totally at the mercy of their development priorities. One of the great things about CSCart, and add ons from the likes of Alt Team and Cart Power, is that if you really need a change, and they are not prepared to provide it, you can change it yourself, either by hiring a developer or doing it yourself if you have the skills. What is more the CSCart software was designed to support such changes through hooks. That is such a powerful design and makes CSCart very special. I hope that they don't move away from that model.
I was using searchanise and worked well until they wanted monthly fee which is good for people who can not edit or tweak and you do not own it to do what you wish. I really love Twigmo 75% of our accounts use it and well worth the fees because it pays for itself but searching does not. I wish there was a good one out there for free trial or just free
Latest searchinse is realy improved and fast… from my perspective it’s better to have a subscription rather then a 6 month upgrade to somekind search addon…which are not so sophisticated