Yet another FileVault Question

[hukalaki]

I need to have some kind of security for some of my data and would prefer to be able to encrypt my Mail folder, which Knox cannot do and have it behave properly.

FileVault seemed like the only thing that would safely encrypt my user folder. I had heard about problems but was willing to give it a try anyway. After Dave's advice re logging out of my user account and then backing up, my backups worked fine, although not automated at all--a definite downside.

More importantly, however, I did develop issues with FileVault itself. First I had a wierd problem with Safari not being able to download files when it could download in other user accounts without a problem. Then I began to be unable to properly save in Word--I'd get a filename/path error, which I never had before. So I figured things were getting buggy.

I tried turning off FileVault from the Security pref pane, but it gave me an error "error making copy--unable to decrypt FileVault."

So this gave me the willies. From my admin account I pulled all my user files out of FileVault, transferred them into a new user account, deleted the old user account and re set my ownership and permissions. So I am now back to square one.

My experience supports the common comment that FileVault has problems. I can't recommend using it and would appreciate any alternatives.