madmik

Software Reviews by madmik

The reviews and opinions below are posted by SnapFiles visitors. They do not necessarily reflect our opinion, and they are solely based upon the experience of individual users.

AX64 Time Machine

A must try

A refreshing and innovative approach.Nothing similar is available. The simple, clean interface has all the options need to backup,restore partitions and files,which are then shown in an Explorer style Backup Browser.Files can be copied at any time back to the main system. All functions can be made from within Windows or from the recovery media.Hourly backups are available. Once the initial base image has been made the subsequent images are created a lightning speed. AX64 is ideal for those situations where you feel a backup should be made but you just cant be bothered,such as before installing some dubious badly written software.Just press a button and its done and the restore is just as simple. AX64 is truly a Time Machine. Price: Free Trial ($39.95)

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Download Accelerator Manager

Excellent and recommended

Integrates perfectly with your browser and quickly captures the required download,which is then transferred with great speed. Simple to use without unnecessary complications and definitely one of the best downloaders. Price: Free

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SyncFolders

Superb

Rarely have I come across a piece of software,either free or shareware,that is so logically thought out and just so pleasant to use. Setup is simple and all functions are powerful and robust, with very fast synchronizations and perfect accuracy. All sorts of thoughtful details are provided to assist and the whole package is quite surprising for being so comprehensive in view of its small size. For my purpose of backing up and restoring files and data, I use the backup functions. To restore, make reverse restore rules to the corresponding backup rules and activate or deactivate as required. Probably the best of its type I have used so far-grab it-a must try!! Price: Free

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SyncBackSE

Premier backup solution

Having tried probably all the well known backup apps,I was constantly frustrated with problems, mainly inaccuracies in backing up and restoring,difficulty in setting up and with some not even having a restore feature. SyncBack SE excels in all departments and surprises in some,for example its very fast backups for incremental downloads and the fact that even locked apps. like active browsers,can be backed up. Don't bother with the freeware version-go directly to SE,as the added features make this really worthwhile. Support also seems excellent. I keep SB in the traybar and every so often backup incrementally-this takes seconds. Price: Free Trial ($39.95)

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Image for Windows

Highly recommended

Once the many options are waded through and you discover the default settings are the ones to use,IFW is pleasantly simple to use. It has proved 100 reliable and is fast in use. The recommended recovery disk is the GUI version of Image for DOS,which loads almost instantly and makes recovery probably the fastest. Whilst others are still loading,the job has almost finished. Pricing very reasonable and with excellent support. Price: Free Trial ($49.98)

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Firefox Browser

Recent problems

Prior to versions 9 and 10,Firefox was a moderately fast, relatively trouble free browser packed with features which made it a winner. Regrettably, something seems to have gone wrong with the last two versions,which seem wracked with mysterious issues,causing freezing and shutdowns on a frequent basis.I doubt these are unique to my particular configuration,as these problems didn't occur prior to version 9. One recent change in versions 9 and 10.1, seems the allowing of over riding compatibility with extensions ,which previously may have been considered incompatible. Whatever the cause, these issues are severe enough for me to consider a browser change. These problems have been reported. Regrettably,owing to the present difficulties,it is hard to recommend the current versions. Version 8 was good if not particularly fast. Price: Free

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SpyShelter Free

My favorite hips

Not only an anti-keylogger,but also very useful for general malware protection. Not intrusive,easy to use and can be used in conjunction with other security products if desired. Price: Free

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JStock

Very useful

An excellent application of its type,one of the best of the freebies. Uses Yahoo Finance for prices and consequently there is usually a delay-20 minutes in my case.However it's self refreshing. Handy as an adjunct to your main stockbroking platform,for those quick price checks,for example after hours,or for running a trial portfolio. Even has quite usable graphs.The only criticism is that stocks can't be arranged alphabetically after entering. Well designed. Price: Free

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Pale Moon

Almost identical to firefox

Tested the startup times for Palemoon 5 and Firefox 4 - they were virtually identical at about 3 seconds. Possibly Palemoon is slightly faster overall. In any case a very nice browser,but I will stick to Firefox as I'm getting an error "TypeError: Components.classescid is undefined", which I can't eliminate! Price: Free

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RoboForm

Unique

Over the years,Roboform has performed perfectly for me,being fast,reliable and easy to use.The shareware version allows more password capacity,but storing many passwords can become untidy as there is no provision for grouping.Anyone who has the previous version 6 installed will realise by now that it doesn't work with Firefox 4.Just install Roboform Lite version 7 free,which works with existing passwords.Recommended! Price: Free Trial ($9.95)

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Maxthon

Surprisingly fast

One of the engines is Webkit,same as Google,so little wonder its exceedingly nimble.Only let down for me is the fact there are virtually no extensions available,such as Speed Dial,Desk Cuts.This does make some serious browsing difficult and means a Firefox user has to adopt to a different style of work.However for a user who just wants an excellent basic browser,with most essentials built in,Maxthon would be hard to beat. Price: Free

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Foxit PDF Reader

Outstanding.

The new version 5 adds some great new features -such as internet search access to selected text-save PDF to Text and many more. Improves an already excellent reader. Takes a bit of work to find which features could be useful. Still as fast as ever and spot on as regards selecting the correct page display size. Not crazy about the GUI colours,however. Highly recommended. Price: Free

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Back4Sure

Very good

Fast and accurate whilst easy to setup. Suggest a restore feature wouldn`t be difficult to incorporate,to save copying and pasting. Apart from this omission, certainly recommended Price: Free

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Nuance PDF Reader

Very nice, but...

Too slow to start which is the killer for me. A tabbing feature would be good instead of putting pages into memory.Automatically allows viewing at a suitable page spread. Price: Free

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Uranium Backup Free

Disappointing

The most important feature in a backup program is accuracy and Uranium seemed OK in the initial backup copy only. Unfortunately, file deletion in the destination does not occur,as there is no mirror synchronization. Subsequent backups were inaccurate,which automatically warranted an uninstall. Also there is no restore feature which is so handy. Could be useful for transferring to media,but would check accuracy first. Good features are its very fast copying and easy initial setup. Price: Free

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PureSync

Excellent for data backup

One of the very best for accuracy and speed. Takes a little while to set up,but thereafter it's so easy to perform fast incremental backups of all your important data with just one click. Excellent logs and more foolproof than most. One of my two top favorites. Price: Free

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Paragon Partition Manager

Great improvements

The current Partition Manager 10 Personal now has a free add-on-Virtualization Manager and sells for $39.95. Paragon has greatly improved its layout and is now amongst the very best, whilst somehow the performance generally seems much better. The partitioning and cloning features are the best in my experience, whilst V.M. alone is an extremely handy app. capable of many important operations such as loading drivers into a newly cloned OS on a different disk, booting into different cloned OS and creating VM images directly from your OS. Most functions are intuitive and simple and a good help section is provided,so its unlikely much support would be needed. Read the instructions first! Price: Free Trial ($39.95)

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XXCLONE Freeware

Sensational

Other data and full system backup apps,even a VM software testing machine,could realistically be replaced with this simple looking beauty.The only feature really missing is incremental clone, available in the shareware version, well worth buying. After cloning the current active system to another disk ,the target volume becomes fully bootable,if necessary with the help of the Quick Boot Diskette.Making a new disk bootable and this new hardware compatible is usually either impossible or difficult and is a feature rarely possible with backup apps.A great achievement! The bootable clone is ready to go in case of any system failure. All folders are cloned in normal file form,so data only, can separately be copied back to the main drive. Can be cloned between the partitions to give a permanent spare,or even has the possibility of keeping different versions of the system, eg each with different apps, data etc, on different partitions,for whatever reason. Price: Free

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Lunascape

Trying to work out its purpose

Nicely designed and worked perfectly,but in practice all three engines functioned similarly, possibly WebKit slower than expected. So for me its only useful purpose,apart from the novelty value, would be as a substitute for Chrome, but only if the engine can be made to perform as well. Lunarscape does offer a more complete interface, Price: Free

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EaseUS Todo Backup Free

Excellent

Has features comparable with top ranking shareware,so making it freeware is quite generous.Very flexible in its capabilities, simple and intuitive to use, fast to back up or perform any functions. Great interface. Support is very helpful. However,it's important to read the comprehensive Help file first,as workarounds are given for the few recognized potential difficulties the user may have. Also any unusual features are explained. At the moment,seems to be sensitive to any disk sector errors. Price: Free

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Avira AntiVir Premium

Tops for detecting malware

Consistently scores at the top or among the top for actual malware detection,which is the most important factor. A HIPS component is now being Beta tested,so should be available soon,which will make it even more powerful. Does not slow a reasonably powerful machine down at all,loads very quickly.Nice modern interface. Auto updates happen without any problems and the servers are only overloaded on rare occasions. The only possible doubt is the occasional false positive. No real drawbacks at all-a top antivirus program! Price: Free Trial ($26.95)

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xplorer2

Well designed

Easy to use,reliable,fast and problem free as regards remembering and alternating between any combination of settings.,Just the right amount of usable features which can be simply configured. My favorite! Price: Free Trial ($30.00)

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ShellLess Explorer

Good.

Easy to use,nice features. However can be slow to load and occasionally forgets previous settings. Were these items corrected it would be excellent. Price: Free Trial ($29.95)

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Google Chrome

Still too basic

Has great security features and is fast to load and browse,but really is too basic for extended use. Makes sense if intended for use with the projected Google OS as a hybrid system. Price: Free

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SyncBack Free

Superb in most areas

An outstanding backup app ,but the interface is certainly different. Amazingly fast,either at backing up or restoring, if set up for speed and the logs are the best of any software in my experience. Seems 100% accurate in its functions.Probably the best data backup app. I've tried. Price: Free

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Cobian Backup

Restricted features

Just carries out full,time stamped backups without any synchronization or deletion at the destination. Accordingly it's necessary to remove old folders manually after each backup. Good simple backup function. Needs more work to realize its full potential. Price: Free

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FBackup

Very basic but reliable

Obviously intended as a sample for the shareware versions,which should be excellent. This free one is quite slow and there is no incremental or true mirror backups, as the mirror doesnt delete or sync any files in the backup destination. But very reliable, seemingly with a verify feature and an excellent restore feature. If you are happy with slowish functions and creating full backups each time,recommended. Price: Free

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The software developer responded to this review on Jul 31, 2009: It s slow because you re doing a full backup each time, so it will add all the files and folders. This is a more reliable backup method, but if you want fastness you can use the mirror backup type as it has an option (fast mirror) that copies only changed/new files. The new version will delete files from the destination if they re not in the source anymore, so you can consider it a sync.

DiskBoss Free

A must have

For efficient file management and keeping wasted space to a minimum,FlexTk Express really makes a big difference. Consistently I manage to reduce my disk size by finding mistakes obvious or otherwise made by other apps and deleting the offending files. Worth spending a little time learning what its capable of,as so many useful features are crammed into it. Price: Free

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Winamp Full

The best for the serious user

Great versatility and ability to tailor exactly to ones specialized needs,amazing number of quality plugins. The actual sound can be superb. My use is with Shoutcast Radio,which sounds fantastic with a plugin called Stereo Tool. Connect to good stereo speakers and an amp and the sound is Hi Fi CD quality. Cant understand those who criticize it for bloat etc. They must be running Win 95 and hardware way past its use by date. Get a bit more memory and a hard disk bigger than 32gb. You cant expect a lot of usable feature and a tiny application!! Price: Free

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Karen`s Replicator

Foolproof once properly set up

Takes a little while to set up,but once up and running, is one of the very few data backup applications that can be relied upon to be 100% accurate, in that it seems to backup all of the chosen files-most leave out a few in a random manner,which may or not be critical. Missing a dedicated restore function,but this is achieved by merely copying back to the original sites.Quite fast. Highly recommended if you are prepared to do some work using the interface and take the trouble to set it up as required.! Price: Free

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GFI Backup Home Edition

Could be the best if.....

A few problems with GFI. Have extensively tried two clones of GFI and had no problems in the actual backup function(except not all files were occasionally copied by either-a serious fault )-but after trying about 5 times on the same settings,GFI will install but not backup at all-freezes at 0%. Then it won't uninstall normally as the log file cant be found(the log file has to be moved to another area like desktop and then can be found by the problematical Wise uninstaller,which apparently is the culprit).GFI should warn users of this. As the two identical clones worked OK, doubt any of all this a conflict in my setup. Potentially could be superb and one of the very best. Price: Free

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ShadowProtect Desktop

Outstanding

This is the only backup tool which has been virtually trouble-free and I've used many. Extremely fast backup and restore.Lots of excellent useful features, like automatic incremental backups every 15 minutes if required,taking seconds in the background. Quite easy to use-can also backup to new hardware(Hardware Independent Restore). Its commercial grade foolproof-not the cheapest but worth every cent,for the security it provides. The best! Price: Free Trial ($99.95)

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Software Reviews by madmik

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