Shaggy

Software Reviews by Shaggy

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.

Microsoft Security Essentials

Excellent anti-virus!

I used avast! for years, always loved it. Then, about a year ago, I gave Microsoft Security Essentials a try. No regrets!! No futzing with registering the software, not a resource hog, has a scheduled nightly scan, automatic updates, easy to use, attractive interface, highly effective. It`s not in-your-face annoying like most security programs, it does its job pretty quietly for the most part. Easily the best anti-virus software I`ve ever used, and it`s free. Price: Free

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WinSCP

Good, but...

I really liked using this as an SFTP client, but eventually had to switch to a different program due to the strange way it copies files from remote host to local computer. If the WinSCP window loses focus because I'm working on other things (and why wouldn't I?) the file copy fails. I had this happen with multiple versions of WinSCP on multiple PCs. I should clarify that I don't use dual pane view (local/remote), I prefer drag and drop to local windows, and I turn dual pane off. I have no idea if the same issue occurs with dual pane. I can't believe the issue still exists, I had been using it for at least a few years. You can give WinSCP a try, it's still a nice free app. Maybe you won't run into the same problem I did. Price: Free

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1st AutoRun Express

Feature limited trial version

This program LOOKS great, but you should definitely consider it to be a "feature limited trial version" of the non-free program. The SnapFiles description says it all, in that any menu you create will only work on the PC that it was created on, which is nearly useless, except for testing purposes. If I were reviewing the non-free version, I'd give this 4 or 5 stars in a heartbeat, because it's a very useful, intuitive, and powerful tool for creating clean autorun menus that look professional. I'd say it's a bit of a cheap trick to offer this as freeware, but then again, maybe a trick that works. I'd recommend this as a look, but don't fool yourself into thinking this is a great piece of freeware, because it falls short. Price: Free Trial ($49.95)

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SimpleOCR

Hit or miss

The program size is misrepresented as 576 kb, when it is actually a 9511 kb install package. This was a little disappointing, as I generally hunt for smaller apps. The 576 kb piece is really just a downloader for the actual installer package, kind of cheap. I downloaded this for a specific task, and it didn't perform very well with it. I would estimate less than 50% accuracy. I understand that this has much to do with the quality of the source, but the program supposedly has the ability to read non-cursive hand-written notes, which is not what I was feeding it. Rather, I was giving it typeface, so I expected slightly better results. I have not compared the results to any other OCR apps, so I can't tell you this worked better or worse than another, all I can say is that it didn't do what I needed it to in my specific case. So I can only give it a middle of the road review and say go ahead and give it a try, your mileage may vary. Price: Free

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Avast Free Antivirus

Perfect for my needs.

Avast! provides just the right amount of protection without consuming lots of system resources. It's ideal for me, but I don't necessarily think it's ideal for the average user, as the average user normally isn't aware of the risk they pose to themselves. It's an excellent product if you understand it's limitations, and in turn your own responsibility for safe computing. It's lightweight, dependable, and of course, free. If you generally practice safe computing, and have other products employed for different types of threats (i.e. firewall, anti-spyware, etc.), then avast! is an excellent choice for traditional virus protection. I would give it 5 stars if not for the fact that it's a bit cumbersome to configure avast! to ignore certain files appropriately and consistently. I've tried other antivirus products, paid and free, but I've stuck with avast! for the past three years or more. In general, I highly recommend avast! Price: Free

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TreePad Lite

Convenient and useful utility

I have been using TreePad Lite for a couple of years now and I find it to be very, very handy. It's small, fast, and can used in a portable scenario (like run directly from USB drive). It's not overly powerful, it lacks virtually any advanced features, such as encryption, rich text, etc. It supports hyperlinks in its own limited way. Overall, it's still a great little app that I will likely continue to use. However, I am disturbed by another review that cited poor customer service from the TreePad developers. For this reason I would avoid giving them my money. I'll stick with TreePad Lite. It's a good and free way to organize nearly any kind of information in a hierarchical fashion. And last time I checked they also offered a free utility that will compile your TreePad files into EXEs. Price: Free

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TrueCrypt

Great bit of software!

I love TrueCrypt. I was previously using Cryptainer LE, which is also really great software, but it has a 25MB limit on encrypted containers. Once I found TrueCrypt I switched permanently. There is no limit to container sizes, and it's a breeze to use. I use TrueCrypt to secure all my client data on my laptop in case, heaven forbid, it should ever get lost or stolen. It's also perfect to secure data on a USB drive. If you are looking for an excellent and free way to secure your data, look no further than TrueCrypt. Price: Free

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SpamBayes

Worked ok, but...

I found SpamBayes to be decent at identifying spam, although the success rate was not nearly as high as a proxy-type spam filter that I tested previously. I didn't care for its system of putting some items in a "spam" folder and others in a "suspected spam" folder. I would have preferred that it all go to the same place, but this is configurable. Getting SpamBayes to work like other anti-spam products (intuitively), I found to be a very tricky proposition. I contacted their support for assistance. They responded promptly, but I thought they were more defensive about their spam categorizing philosophy than they were helpful at getting it to work the way I wanted. When I uninstalled, it had some leftovers, namely the SpamBayes toolbar was still available in Outlook. Although useless now, I can't make it go away permanently. Maybe the authors expect that nobody will ever uninstall this product. Anyway, SpamBayes is certainly worth a try. Price: Free

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SpamAware

Just too slow

I can't use this because it's just too slow at what it does. I am also not impressed with it's success rate, but it's so slow that I can't bear to wait to see if it gets better. It's terrific that it's free, and it has some decent features, but I'm not a big fan of blacklists. Today's spam landscape makes blacklists next to useless. I also prefer a "SPAM / Not SPAM" classification instead of the "To Blacklist / To Whitelist" that this program uses. I can't say that I'd recommend this to others, sorry, it's just not for me. Price: Free

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Playlist Creator

Lacks ability to load existing playlists!

This software is simple and easy to use. I don't get a nag screen as others have reported, but that could have been in an earlier version. I'm using v3.0.3 which seems to be stable and works fine for me. Drag-and-drop is great. I recommend this software, but I have some suggestions. The most important one being that it MUST be able to import/load existing playlists! It would be an enormously more useful app if it could do that. I have other suggestions too, but I'll send them directly to the software author. If you want to make some quick playlists from scattered music files, give this one a try! Price: Free

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Software Reviews by Shaggy

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