10 LOW-COST LASER PRINTERS
annpuTE
i COMPU?t f CHOICE AWARIk ' WINNERS! f
DECEMBER 1993
BEST PRODUCTS
OF THE YEAR!
PLUS!
50 GREAT MULTIMEDIA Gif T IDEAS!
• HOW TO SPY ON WINDOWS
• VISUAL BASIC 3.0 GOES DATABASE
• WINDOWS VIDEO
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l[ilro(lut:i!i!J the all-in-one Cotiijjaq Presario. It's much more personal llian nlher pi'i-.soiial loniriLiters. Case in point. The buih-in an5\\ering maehiiio ai'Uiallv niws cvcrv- nlie voii \\\v \\ ilh theii' o\wi Personal Message Center, So il I'efords vour TOtei.'. And Sallv's. Ami Dean's. Am\ so on. I'lus, there's a built-in fax that allows vou In semi anil receive (locumcnt.s ri^ht troni \our computer.
Even more per.sonal is the u'a>' tl answers \ourc[ui.'siions. Quicklv, directly and in plain
Thrri:''. iu> r;,iH'n (c ^pcnj a jiinttnc htivmtj
t' iWi Ci>nipJ«| Computer CoTpontion. .\li nghu mrr.-cd. CompKj jnd die Compatj logo registen^ti t| S. I^Alinl in^l TraiicmiTlc Oflfic*. F i*4rt-Mity, rotiULl ihc Ctimpm Custumtr Supjioii Ci?nicr. "nw Intel iog»> IS * tndvtn^ of tnlcl Corporitmn.
nd P*T<iitnl .VU-sMj^c Ctnlcr
Your Questions. WER Your Phone.
San: (imc (tinil mon^yt. The awarj-winntng proi^riim Qttickcn can help yvu g<t 0II of your perstinol jinonccs jn ortler.
English. (Remember when you • needed help just to find the Help command?)
Finally, its all-in-one design not only saves space on your desk, it makes setting up the Presario about as easy as plug- ging in a toaster. And it comes with six software programs- all the cssentials-so you can get started right away. With Presario, we want you to be able to do everything with your computer. Except waste time getting started.
For more iniormation on Presario, or for a nearby lo- cation where you can take a closer look, just give us a call at 1-800-34S-1S18.
COMPAa
?t tridcmarks of Compac] Cnmputrr Corporation. Produtt nilnci tticntidnrti h^^ein may be trjdpmarts of their rwpectivc companies. For funher dtuiU on our Umitetl
Nov. 15, l<«<13 vi
connpuTE
VOLUME 15, NO, 12, ISSUE 159
DECEMBER 1993
FEATURES
8 THE COMPUTE CHOICE AWARDS
Edited by Robert Bixby
The 25 best hardware and
software products money
can buy.
36
TEST LAB
Edited by Mike Hudnall
Ten low-cost laser printers for
under $1,000 each, with
sharp output and great
graphics.
98
PRODUCTIVITY CHOICE
By William Harrel PagePlus 2.0 from Serif.
COIUMNS
4 EDITORIAL LICENSE
By Clifton Karnes
The men and women who
invented the future.
58
NEWS & NOTES
By Jill Champion Booth
Top computer news.
62
FEEDBACK
Answers to tough questions.
66
INTRODOS
By Tony Roberts
Secrets of the PATH
command.
68
WINDOWS WORKSHOP
By Clifton Karnes
Spying on Windows with
WinScope.
70
PROGRAMMING POWER
By Tom Campbell
Visual Basic goes database.
72
HARDWARE CLINIC
By Mark Minasi
Video Blaster, Video Spigot,
and Indeo put to the test.
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76
TIPS & TOOLS
Edited by Richard C. Leinecker Tips from our readers.
100
PERSONAL PRODUCTIVITY
By Bradley M. Small
Put OS/2 to work for you.
102
ART WORKS
By Robert Bixby
The new Harvard Graphics
for Windows.
160
NEWS BITS
By Jill Champion Booth Top stories at press time.
MULTIMEDIA PC 83
FAST FORWARD
By David English
Are we witnessing the birth
of a new art form?
84
50 GREAT MULTIMEDIA
GIFT IDEAS
By David English, Phillip
Morgan, and Lisa Young
Create some excitement
with a multimedia gift.
92
NEW MULTIMEDIA PRODUCTS
Edited by Lisa Young
The hottest hardware and
coolest software.
96
MULTIMEDIA SPOTLIGHT
By David English
Pro 16 Multimedia System
II from Media Vision.
EHTERTAINMENT
106
DISCOVERY CHOICE
By Clayton Walnum
Eagle Eye Mysteries from
Electronic Arts.
108
GAME INSIDER
By Shay Addams A look at new games coming for Christmas.
110
ENTERTAINMENT CHOICE
By Scott A. May
Betrayal at Krondor from
Dynamix.
112
GAMEPLAY
By Denny Atkin
Previews of games almost
ready for release.
REVIEWS
116
NMC Universal
Winstation 433,
Microsoft Word 6.0,
WordPerfect 6.0 for DOS,
Day of the Tentacle,
Winlmages:morph,
Rock and Bach Studio,
Raiiroad Tycoon Deluxe,
ARES 486-33DX,
Grand Slam Bridge II,
Micro Bridge Companion,
XTree for Windows 1.5,
Axonix LapStation IV,
Realms of Arkania,
SJ-144,
Medley Plus.
Eternam,
TurboBooks, and more.
ADVERTISERS' INDEX
See page 145,
COMPUTE (ISSN 0194-357X) s published monthly in the United States and Canada by COMPUTE Publications Inlernationai Lid , 1965 Broadway, New York. MY 10023-5965. Volume 15, Number 12, Issue 159 Copyright © 1993 by COMPUTE Publications Inlernationai Lid All rights resorved COMPUTE is a registered trademark ol COMPUTE Publications Inlernationai Ltd Distributed worldwide (except Austral a and :he UK) by Curtis Circulation Crsmpany, PQ Box 9102, Pennsauken. NJ 08109 Distributed in Australia by The Horwitz Group. P.O. Box 306. Camn'eray NSW 2062 Ausira'n ana n trc UK by Noricem and Sheli Pic . PC Box 381. M llhatbour. London E14 9TW Second-class postage paid at New York, NY. and at additional maiimg oflces POSTMASTER: Send address changes to COMPUTE Magazine, PO Box 3245. Harlan, lA 51537-3041 Tel (800) 727-6937 Entire contents copyrighted. Ail rights reserved. Nothing may be reproduced in whoie or in part without written permission from the publistier Subscnplions; US, AFO - S19 94 one year; Canada and elsewhere -$25.94 one year. Single copies S2 95 in US. The publisher disciaims ail responsibility to return unsoliclied matter, and ail rights in portions published t^ereol remain the scie property of C0^/1PUTE Pubiicallons International Lid Letters sent to COMPUTE or its editors become the property ol the magazine. Editorial otiices are focated at 324 W. Wendover Ave., Ste. 200 Greensboro NC 27408 Tel- (919) 275-9809.
Printed in ttie USA by R. R. Donnelley & Sons Inc.
#R126607415
2 COMPUTE DECEMBER 1993
HOW TO BUY A
DOUBLE-SPEED CD-ROM. . .
WITHOUT GETTING
TAKEN FOR A DRIVE
Introducing Creative OmniCD.
If you've been thinking about adding the power and excitement of an internal CD-ROM to your PC, here's some great news: thanks to our exclusive Creative Double-Speed Technology," double-speed CD-ROM performance is now avmhble at about the same price you'd expect to pa\j for a single-speed drive.
And we're not talking about just any CD-ROM here. This is a full-featured, MFC 2 compliant, XA-ready, 300KB/second, multi-session photo CD drive with a blistering fast 320ms access time: Tiie all-new Creative OmniCD."
CREATIVE
®
WORKS WITH ANY SOUND CARD.
Of course Creative OmniCD works with your Sound Blaster— after all, it is the industry standard for PC audio. But what if you've already got another sound card?
No problem. Because Creative OmniCD
works perfectly with just about every major brand of
audio card. . .or even without a sound card for applications that don't use audio.
Best of all, Creative OmniCD opens up a whole new world of CD-ROM applications. Like photo CD— we've even included Aldus Pholostyler'SE image enhancing software right in the box. And also games, multimedia and business applications, education, and more.
THE BOTTOM LINE: A LOT MORE DRIVE. A LOT LESS MONEY. Sure, there's plenty of other manufachirers offering double-speed CD-ROM drives. But as part of a complete package with an SRP of less than four hundred dollars?' Novf that's Creative. For more information and the name of your nearest Creative Labs dealer, call 1-800-998-5227,
soundi CRZ ' Tl VE
c^ -1
BLASTER
CREATIVE LABB, INC,
Circle Reader Service Number 125
vi
EDITORIAL LICENSE
Clifton Karnes
in this issue
we tiDitor
our Industry's
present
past, and future.
This issue's big story is tlie COMPUTE Choice Awards, and looking at tlie finalists, I was struck by liow far the personal com- puter has come in the last ten years and by how critical gra- phical user interfaces, mice, la- ser printers, networking, and object-oriented programming have become to its success. Most of the software products in our finalist list are GUI based (most, in fact, run on Windows). Almost all of these programs support the mouse, and many — such as the desktop publishing and presentation programs — de- pend on laser printers for their final output. And commu- nications (networking) soft- ware has become one of the fastest-growing categories in the last year. Lastly, many of these top programs were built with object-oriented tech- niques, and in fact, our pro- gramming-tool winner this year is an object-oriented pro- gramming language.
The interesting thing about all these innovations is that they didn't come from Micro- soft, Apple, or IBM, at least not initially. They originated someplace you probably wouldn't expect — Xerox.
As most of you already know, Xerox, which was origi- nally called the Haloid Compa- ny, invented the photocopy- ing process. It spent 15 years developing xerography, and when it finally brought it to mar- ket, the company was reward- ed with instant success. Xer- ox realized, however, that pa- per was not the future. It felt that the future of the office lay in digital— computer— technol- ogy. To help it gain a foothold in this uncharted area, Xerox founded a research institute whose broad mandate was to discover the architecture of in- formation. It built this institute in Palo Alto, California, and called it PARC, for Palo Alto
COMPUTE DECEMBER 1993
Research Center.
To gauge just how impres- sive PARC's achievements were, we need to take a look at the computer situation in 1970, when PARC was found- ed. At this time, the main- frame computer was king, and most mainframes ran just one program at a time. As a programmer, you would cre- ate your program, punch it on- to cards, and give it to a white-coated computer techni- cian who would load it into the computer and run it. The next day or the next week, you'd get your results. In 1970, the cutting edge of com- puter technology was some- thing called timesharing. In a timesharing system, there are several users connected to one computer, and each gets a portion of the computer's time. Using this model, the computer can serve more us- ers, but with a slight degrada- tion in performance.
At first, the researchers at PARC considered jumping on the timesharing bandwagon, but an insightful leader, Bob Taylor, saw beyond timeshar- ing to the personal computer. In his vision, each user would have his or her own comput- er, connected to other person- al computers so information could be shared.
Through Taylor's persis- tence and vision, PARC skipped timesharing and start- ed working directly on build- ing a personal computer, tt succeeded and called its cre- ation the Alto. It wanted the Al- to to have a graphical user in- terface and a mouse, so it built that in. It also realized that a WYSIWYG display de- manded a WYSIWYG printer, so it invented the laser printer (which is based on the xero- graphic process). Since laser printers were even more ex- pensive then than now (the cost for the first ones ran around $30,000), it designed
a way to connect the person- al computers to the printer us- ing cables and protocols. It called this Ethernet, the first lo- cal area network or LAN.
To mal<;e it easy for end us- ers to program their ma- chines, Alan Kay and a team of researchers developed one of the first object-oriented programming languages — Smalltalk.
It would be 15 years before the world at large would see these developments reach fru- ition, and none of the success- es would come from Xerox.
With a combination of bad timing and inept manage- ment, Xerox failed to turn even one of these miraculous inventions into a viable prod- uct. PARC's seeds bore fruit in other people's gardens, however, PARC showed the GUI-based Alto to Steve Jobs and Bill Gates, for exam- ple, and it formed the impetus for Apple's Macintosh and Mi- crosoft's Windows, And sever- al researchers left PARC to found their own companies to develop products based on the ideas that originated at PARC.
Why did Xerox ignore these breathtaking innovations? The answers are complex, but they're put forth well in Fum- bling the Future by Douglas K. Smith and Robert Alexander (Morrow, 1988), which has been the basis for most of my PARC info.
The point of this bit of his- tory is that the five most impor- tant technologies in the last 20 years were all created at PARC: the personal computer, the graphical user interface, the laser printer, the local area network, and object-oriented end-user programming. In this issue, we're honoring the winners of the COMPUTE Choice Awards, but I'd like to take a moment to honor the men and women at PARC who invented our future. □
Missi
ission
IBM Programming Systems introduces C 361++!" the most complete application development package you can buy for ■ OS/2® Its 32-bii C/C++ compiler lets you unleash all the power of OS/2 — so you can create the most advanced, high- performance applications.
It has an extraordinary code optimizer with a full set of options. Even a switch to optimize for the new Pentium'" processor. Plus a full set of class libraries, including application frameworks for PM, container classes and classes for multitasking, streams and more.
There's also a full complement of other helpful features. Such as an interactive source level debugger.
And the unique Execution Trace Analyzer traces the
execution of a program, then graphically displays diagi-amsof the analysis. Plus a class library broivser that shows class library relationships.
What's more, you get Workfrarae/2™ a language- inde]Dendenl tool that lets you customize your o^vn envi- ronment. It's adaptable and flexible — you can use any 16 and 32-bit DOS, Windows"" and OS/2 tools.
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ANSI 0X3,159-1989 |
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NIST validated |
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ANSI C++ X3J16 (Full ARM) |
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Global |
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Optimization |
Inter-module |
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Function inlining |
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Instruction scheduling |
To order C Set++ , contact your nearest dealer or caU 1-800-342-6672 (USA) or 1-800-465-7999 ext. 460 (Canada).
Clearly, there's only one place to start. C Set++ .
starts here
IBiy and OS/2 are registered Irademarlts and C Set++ and Worl<frame/2 are trademarks of International Business Machines Corporation. Pentium is a trademark ol Intel Corporation, Windows Is a trademark ol Microsoft Corp. 9 1993 IBM Corp.
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HANG ON!
PANASONIC INTRODU . (NJERACTIVE
ore responsive, more colorful, and up to 50 times more powerful than ordinary systems. If s 3D0 technology and Panasonic makes the only system that has it.
Strap yourself in; this is no armchair flying game. You plunge into pursuit, barrel-rolling through the atmosphere at Mach speeds. Pulling up to skim the planetary terrain, you lose your horizon and go into a spin. Earth. Sky. Earth. Sky. Earth. And your stomach just can't catch up. This is a video game you can feel. ThisisR-E-A-L
Introducing the Panasonic R-E-A-L3D0™ Interactive Multiplayer.™ The most highly evolved integration of audio, video and interactive tech- nology available.
What you're seeing are near 3-D graphics
Crystal Dynamics' Total Eclipse'" gives you Ifie real feeling of flight.
combined with state-of-the-art flight effects. What you're hearing is full, digital CD sound. Definitely cinematic. Except that you're in control in a world without edges. Fly as far as you want left or right and the program never stops you.
Facts. Up to 50 times more powerful than ordinary
PCs and video game systems. With up to 16 million
displayable colors for photorealistic picture quality.
And a custom multimedia architecture that makes
R'E-A-L so responsive it practically redefines interactivity.
There's a range of 3D0 software available; from flight simulators to education, information, sports and children's titles. Plus, R*E'A-L also plays audio and photo CDs and soon, with an optional adapter, full- lengfh movies.
Entertainment, music and more interaction than ever— the Panasonic R'E'A-L 3D0 Interactive Multiplayer brings you the future in one amazing unit. And, yes, it'll fly.
To speak directly to the dealer nearest you, call 1-800'REAL-3OO. Bi
8
Burn
Panasonic
just slightly ahead of our time.'
so iiYSSOegninjh
Circle Reader Service Number 1QS
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'ach year, COMPUTE hon- I ors the best hardware and software products with the COMPUTE Choice Awards. From the hundreds of products we see annually, we select the finest in 25 categories. Every year, it gets hard- er to choose the finalists and win- ners, because the overall quality of hardware and software products is improving. Because of our lead time, each year's awards also cover products released at the very end of the previous year.
What does it take to be a COM- PUTE Choice Award finalist? I always know when it's time to start picking them because I start getting phone calls from publicists asking how they're selected. Here's how it's done. 'We contact a few dozen peo- ple whose opinions we value — writ- ers, editors, computer enthusiasts, industry watchers — and ask what they've seen lately that really blew them away. Some respond enthusi- astically with only one or two recom- mendations. Others reply with sev- eral recommendations in every cat- egory. We look over the lists, make sure the products meet the editors' qualifications, and set about narrow-
ing the list. In other words, every product listed here, whether a final- ist or a COMPUTE Choice Award recipient, is a winner.
The changes from other years include a heavier reliance on Windows as the operating system of choice. Less and less outstanding software is originating in DOS. More products, like Claris Works and Lotus Improv, are challenging the existing metaphors and seeking out new ways of visualizing and working with information.
In some areas, the race seems to be tightening considerably among the major contenders. In laptop computers, graphics, and desktop publishing, for example, you will see familiar names and faces from years past. But while the distinctions among products in some areas become clearer, in other areas (operating systems and environ- ments, for example) the waters just seemi to be getting muddier.
All of this is great news for soft- ware junkies. Instead of one right way of doing things, you will find many divergent ways of getting work done and having fun on your computer.
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Microsoft Word for Windows 6.0
Microsoft Word for Windows has always been king of the hill in Windows word processors. With Ami Pro and WordPerfect for Windows, both of which are excellent products, the competition's hot, but for our money, Word for Windows 6.0 is slill the one to beat.
WinWord made the toolbar famous, and since the features accessed by its toolbar are at the heart of the pro- gram, let's take a quick toolbar tour. Going from left to right, you'll find but- tons for opening and saving files; printing; print preview; checking your spelling; cutting, copying, pasting, and format painting; undoing and redoing; autoformatting; inserting tables; setting coiumns; entering drawing mode; inserting charts; show- ing special symbols; zooming; and calling help.
WinWord 2.0 fans will recognize several important additions in the tool- bar list. The format paint button can copy formats from one paragraph to another. Undo and redo offer multiple levels, unlike the single undo in 2.0. Autoformat takes your data and for- mats everything from paragraphs to characters based on a style you select. The drawing button actually turns WinWord into a graphics pro- gram, which iets you draw right on the page. And the zoom tool is a combo box that lets you specify almost any scaling for your pages.
Below this toolbar you'li find the ribbon, with options for style, font, character styles (bold, italic, and underline), justification, and so on. In addition, you'll find five other toolbars you can use, customize, and display at your option.
You won't see this feature on the toolbar, but WinWord 6.0 has a built-in autocorrection module that automati- cally changes typos like JHe to Ihe and recieve to receive. You can edit the correction dictionary to cope with your own idiosyncratic typing errors and turn this feature on or off.
Having thoroughly researched user's wants and needs, Microsoft sets a new standard in word process- ing with Word for Windows 6.0, a product that's amazingly powerful, intelligent, and well designed.
CLIRON kARNES
Microsoft Word for Windows 6.0
(Microsoft)
Circle reader service number 325
10 COMPUTE DECEMBER 1993
Other Finalists
Claris Works (Claris)
Circle reader service number 326
WordPerfect 5.2 for Windows (WordPerfect)
Circle reader service number 328 WordPerfect 6.0 for DOS (WordPerfect)
Circle reader service number 327
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Quattro Pro for Windows 5.0
The spreadsheet war continues to escalate. Each new version of the most popular spreadsheets adds fea- tures and ease of use. In a tight race this year, Lotus 1-2-3 for Windows Release 4 ran a close second, earn- ing itself an honorable mention, but Quattro Pro for Windows 5.0 came out on top, the winner both because of its feature set and because of its unheard-of introductory price of
$49.95 (the product will be regularly priced at $99.95).
We've always liked Quattro's note- book feature and its easy-to-use SpeedBar. This new version has added more SpeedBars (which can be available or hidden), Borland has added a SpeedBar Designer so you can create your own SpeedBars using built-in or custom controls. The new spelling checker (available on the $495 Quattro Pro for Workgroups ver- sion) is also a nice feature. The spelling checker suggests words and lets you build custom dictionaries — a feature we've always wanted on our spreadsheets.
Getting help with Quattro has been made more convenient, particularly as the number of items available on the SpeedBar increases. In addition to the instant help that appears when you move the pointer over an icon,
Borland has included what it calls Ob- ject Help. With Object Help it's easy to get more information about each item by simply pointing and clicking. If the short help isn't enough, just click on the Help button that appears, and you'll receive more in-depth informa- tion. It's all very convenient, and it takes us one step closer to not need- ing the manual.
Quattro Pro for Windows excels as an easy-to-use spreadsheet for begin- ners, but it's also a powerful, complex tool for those who need a full-featured number-cruncher.
STEPHEN LEVY
Quattro Pro for Windows 5.0 (Borland International)
Circle reader service number 331
Other Finalists
Lotus Improv (Lotus Development)
Circle reader service number 330
Lotus 1-2-3 for Windows Release 4
(Lotus Development)
Circle reader service number 329
^ec^time^e
Paradox for Windows 1 .0
Paradox for Windows is a beautifully designed database program that has something for beginners and pros alike. With its intuitive design tools, tyros can get databases up and run- ning quickly without writing a line of code, and pros have a powerful built- in language at their disposal for demanding tasks.
When you run Paradox for the first time, you'll see what looks like a typi- cal Windows application with a menu bar and a toolbar (Borland calls its toolbar a SpeedBar) with buttons for opening a table, form, query, report, script, or library, as well as ones for opening a folder and adding and deleting folder items.
Forms are the heart of most data- bases, and designing a form in Para- dox for Windows is a pleasure. You can move and resize all of a form's fields, and more important, you can change a field's properties by simply hght-click- ing on it. When you do, you'll see a pop-up menu with a list of entries, each of which is a cascading menu, so choosing one calls a submenu.
Paradox for Windows' main com- petition In databaseland is Microsoft Access, and the two have been bat- tling head to head for about a year. Both are superb programs with excel- lent design tools, both are easy to use, and both were COMPUTE Choice Award finalists. Our decision for the
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You'll find a Time- line with over 5,000 entries that lets you travel from prehistory to the present. And a Knowledge Tree™ that takes the search out of research hy letting you explore broad topics, then quickly narrow your search to a specific topic.
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Boot up the New Grolier Mukimeaia Encyclopeaia just once, and you'll see wny Macworia voted it the "Best General Reference on CD-ROM." And why PC Magazine hailed it as one ""' of "27 Good Reasons to Buy a CD- ROM Player." $395.00 list price.
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203-797-3530 • 1-800-285-4534
The Xew GroktT Muh>m«dh Eniyaopid'ui runr un MS/DOS, Maciriofh ^nd ^inJoaVMPC.
Circle Reader Service Number 167
best database came down to a choice between these two tools, and because of Its Innovative design, Paradox edged out Access, which still rates an honorable mention. In fact, Paradox for Windows is so well built that it's actually fun to use.
CLIFTON KARNES
Paradox for Windows 1,0 (Borland International)
Circle reader service number 332
Other Finalists
Approach 2.1 (Lotus Development}
Circle reader service number 333
FoxPro for Windows (Microsoft)
Circle reader service nurrber 334
Microsoft Access for Windows (Microsoft)
Circle reader service number 504
SuperBase 2.0 (Software Publishing)
Circle reader service number 335
Q & A for Windows 4.0 (Symantec)
Circle reader service number 336
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WinFax Pro 3.0
In just a few short years, we've become accustomed to faxing from our computers. It's remarkable that we take it for granted — that working as a fax machine should be just another function of our computers. Much of the credit should go to Delrina for its WinFax Pro.
First released in January 1991, WinFax has remained the most popu- lar PC-based fax program and is still the best overall. The current incarna- tion, WinFax Pro 3.0, adds annotation and drawing tools (allowing you to mark up faxes with text and graphics), OCR (using Caere's AnyFax pattern recognition technology and a built-in spelling checker), fax document man- agement (letting you categorize, com- press, save, sort, and search both incoming and outgoing faxes), an improved phone book (offering a vari- ety of description fields, as well as Import from and export to common file formats), a cover-page designer (sup- porting both the Windows Clipboard and OLE), image processing (featur- ing antialiasing technology and ran- dom noise cleanup), scanner support (including TWAIN compatibility), and Cover-Your-Fax (providing 100 pro- fessionally drawn cover pages),
Despite all the features, WinFax Pro 3.0 is still easy to use. After a rela- tively painless installation, you simply switch to the WinFax printer driver and print your document as though you were sending it to a printer. WinFax
12 COMPUTE DECEMBER 1993
intercepts the data and sends it to your fax/data modem. It's that simple. An honorable mention goes to Crosstalk for Windows 2.0. an already- strong Windows-based communica- tions program with a greatly improved interface, (For a complete review of Crosstalk for Windows 2.0, see the October 1993 COMPUTE.)
DAVID ENGLISH
WinFax Pro 3.0 (Delrina)
Circle reader service number 337
Other Finalists
America Online for Windows
(America Online)
Circle reader service number 338
WinCIM 1 .0 (CompuServe)
Circle reader service number 345 Crosstalk for Windows 2.0 (DCA) Circle reader service number 340
InterNAV (General Videotex)
Circle reader service number 339
Eclipse Fax (Phoenix Technology)
Circle reader service number 342
ImagiNation (Sierra On-Llne)
Circle reader service number 343
Norton PC Anywhere for Windows 1 .0 (Symantec)
Circle reader service number 344 DataFAX for Windows (Trio Information Systems)
Circle reader service number 341
Quicken 3.0 for Windows
Quicken for DOS was a big hit, and Quicken for Windows is even better. In fact. Quicken 3.0 for Windows is the best financial management program we've seen.
Quicken is a personal financial manager that, at its heart, is a check- book program that both manages your checkbook and prints checks. It
does these things extremely weli, but there's much more to Quicken 3,0. It can track your investments and man- age credit card accounts and trusts, to name just a few accounts; and it can print reports that include net worth, budgets, income and expens- es, and cash flow. It also keeps track of tax-deductible contributions, and it can serve as an accounting package for most small businesses. Add-on modules like Quick Invoice and Quicken Companion can handle everything from home inventory man- agement to invoice generation, print- ing, and tracking.
Quicken's MDI sports a colorful toolbar with buttons for commonly used tasks, Each module presents lots of information, but the forms are so well designed that they're easy to grasp and use. And data entry is easy because almost everywhere the pro- gram anticipates what you want to do by searching incrementally and intelli- gently filling in fields.
Quicken 3.0 keeps its predeces- sors' motto of Safety First, saving your data with each entry. And it encour- ages you to back up your files. Add to this the ability to remind you of pay- ments due. the best data entry forms in the business, and an interface that improves with each release, and you have an excellent program.
CLIFTON KARNES
Quicken 3,0 for Windows (Intuit)
Circle reader service number 349
Other Finalists
KIpllnger's CA-Simply Money 1.0 (Computer Associates) Circle reader service number 346 Microsoft Money (Microsoft)
Circle reader service number 347
Peachtree Accounting for Windows 2.0 (Peachtree Software) Circle reader service number 348
W,/////fy
PC Tools for Windows
Central Point's PC Tools for Windows is bigger and sleeker (and more expensive) than its DOS version. It contains replacements for the Win- dows desktop and File Manager, a backup program, data recovery for trashed disks or files, an antivirus utili- ty, a system analyzer, a disk op- timizer, and a schpting language simi- lar to BASIC. A scheduling program and some wildly creative but un- documented screen savers are thrown in for good measure.
Multidesk. the program's re-
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placement for the Windows desktop, contains some of [he best features to be found in tiie product. It's arguably easier to learn and use thian Program Manager, and it's demonstrably superi- or. The best features are Quick- Launcher and nnultiple desktops. OuickLauncher lets you add program or folder names to the System menu and launch them from there, sort of like desk accessories on the Macintosh.
ScriptTools, the package's macro language, is the best such Windows script language I've seen. PC Tools has a v/hole range of file recovery pro- grams. The installation process gives file recovery top priority. PC Tools for Windows gives you a really big bang for the buck.
A close contender for the COMPUTE Choice Award for the best utility w/as Stacker 3.1. An an- swer for many during the difficult days following the release of DOS 6. Stacker 3.1 served to replace Dou- bleSpace with a faster, friendlier {and some would say safer) alternative. It's difficult to make a decision between two products so powerful and so different, but since PC Tools for Windows provides a much wider range of utilities than Stacker 3,1, we felt the Central Point Software product should receive the award and Stacker 3.1 an honorable mention. Both are excellent products, however, (A review of PC Tools for Windows can be found in the November 1993 COMPUTE. Stacker 3.1 was reviewed in the October 1993 COMPUTE and discussed m "Data Under Pressure" in the same issue.)
TOM CAMPBELL
PC Tools for Windows (Central Point Software)
Circle reader service number 350
Other Finalists
Pizazz Pius 4,0 (Application Techniques)
Circle reader service number 355 NETROOM 3 (Helix) Circle reader service number 354 Dashboard for Windows (Hewlett-Packard)
Circle reader service