By Terry Currier
If you want a utilities program that has just about everything and for a low price, you'll really like the new Ontrack SystemSuite 4.0 (SS4).
New to the SystemSuite is a Firewall from Sygate Technologies. The NetDefense personal firewall is a bi-directional defense to help keep out hackers and Trojan horse programs from calling home.
Trend Micro writes their anti-virus program. You can configure it the way you want to. Choices include fast scan for memory and boot sector, to deep scan including compressed files. You can have it check all email attachments, as well as any file you access from your hard drive, before the file is actually opened. It also scans the boot sector and memory for viruses during system boot. AutoEmailScan will check your email for virus attachments.
JETDefrag defragments the hard disk, bringing together the fragments of files to help your computer access the information
quicker. In terms of speed you could say it's not a jet, but it's not constantly allowing itself to be interrupted only to start over with the " drive's content changed: restarting…" message. So it is much faster then the defrag utility that comes with Windows. What also sets it apart is the use of what it calls the use of IntelliCluster technology to organize chunks of available space into one contiguous free space area, and moving files and other data into another area of the disk. It analyzes the drive to see what programs you run, how often you run them, and all of the associated files that each program calls while it is launching or running. Then this information is used as the basis for organizing files on the disk. Programs are placed next to the files they need. Programs run most often are placed where they can be accessed fastest. RegistryDefrag will defrag the registry, attempting to make it respond quicker. You can also edit the registry using RegistryMagic which is easier, and quicker to use than Regedit.
Critical to such a utility suite is recovery from a crash. SS4 will even help prevent them, or at the very least warn you of a possible crash. This is what you would expect from a company that is a specialist in recovering data from failed hard
drives. The PCDiagnostics module will let you know how the components of your computer are working. Part of the hard drive test uses the Self-Monitoring, Analysis and Reporting Technology (SMART), for checking on the physical health of the disk. The SMARTDefender module uses this technology to tell you if your disk is in trouble. Along with that it checks the Partition table against the master boot record, file allocation tables (FAT/FAT32 systems only), and files to verify the directory structure, looking for invalid directory contents and file sizes. SystemExplorer gives you information about your system from who made your motherboard to every program running, and the amount of memory each is using. You can use the SystemMonitors to watch your resources.
RegistryFixer searches for invalid links in the system registry and either repairs or removes them. They put colored icons for you to recognize ones that can be done safely (green), whereas yellow or red have varying degrees of caution or danger. It will not process the changes unless you agree to them. DiskFixer is the same as scandisk that comes with Windows. CrashProof is a utility that can halt some types of crashes (not all), allowing you to save your data. EasyUpdate makes it easy to go to the Ontrack.com website to check on updates for the SystemSuite.
SystemSaver is one of the first utilities you should run. It makes a backup copy of your system files. Its good to have a backup of those files, and this makes it easy to do so. In the same vein is DiskSnapshot which makes a copy of your File Allocation Table (FAT) and Boot Sector information in case of a crash. The EasyRecovery module will help you recover up to 50 files due to hard drive failures, virus attacks, or software corruption. This alone can make it worth buying. There is also a file undelete and rescue disk creator.
Their uninstall section does everything. It will monitor installations, backup an application, and move or copy a application to another computer. Uninstall will uninstall any application for you, while Archive will backup, and then uninstall an application. Use Restore to reinstall a backup application.
Here you can empty your Internet cache, cookies, history, and delete unneeded plug-ins. One click to delete the temporary files, remove a unneeded Active X, and have the registry scanned for unnecessary links. Use AdvancedFileClean to select from additional categories of files you might want deleted. To restore files that were backed up before deletion, use the UndoIt tool.
Simply put, you can do everything you need to regarding zip files. Zip, unzip, create self-extracting, backup to zip, and repair zip files.
With One-Stop Solution you can speed up the computer, clean up unnecessary files, fix problems with your computer, or even do everything at once. The FixUp Wizard will backup system files, tests critical hardware components, test the hard dive to see if it is about to fail, and test for invalid links in your registry.
All this comes with PowerDesk 4 Pro my favorite file manager program. Even if you don't buy SystemSuite I recommend you go to the Ontrack website and download their freeware version of PowerDesk. Ontrack SystemSuite 4.0 is compatible with Windows 95, 98, Me, NT, 2000 and XP and sells for about $60. For more information go to http://www.v-com.com/product/ss_ind.html. Special note the Ontrack utilities which includes SystemSuite has been sold to VCOM. The link has been updated to reflect this.
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Summary: A great well rounded utility program that will help recover and protect you from viruses, to a hard drive crash. I give it 4.5 stars, because of all the utilities it gives you for a reasonable cost. Ontrack SystemSuite Win 95/98/ME Win NT 4.0/2000/XP Required RAM 32MB - Recommended RAM 64MB Free disk space 20-90MB depending on which modules you load. |
From our February 2002 newsletter
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