Adobe CS 3 Brings together Adobe's Assets

Website: http://www.adobe.com/creativelicense/
Grade: ? Pending
Price: $489.95-$995.95 depending on version (Academic Pricing)

Later this month Adobe is scheduled to release it's CS 3 suites of creativity software. Adobe has made many acquisitions over the last few years including Macromedia with the most used web development software Dreamweaver and Premiere the popular Video Editing software. With the release of CS 3 now the interoperability of these industry standards will be paired with Adobe's dominant Photoshop software package that works seamlessly together. The way the programs work together is the most significant change, but each of the applications has many enhancements that significantly improve the user experience.

Program: Stellarium
Website: http://www.stellarium.org/
Grade: A
Cost: Free

Stellarium is a free open source planetarium for your computer. It shows a realistic sky in 3D, just like what you see with the naked eye, binoculars or a telescope. This application is available for Mac OSX, Windows, and Linux. A useful guide is also available on the site that provides you with all of the information you need to get started. The imagery is amazing and very accurate. This is a very powerful tool that is being used in many planetariums. This is a perfect application for any class studying space.

Computer Maintenance "Free Solutions"

I have received a significant amount of response from my consumer alert regarding System Mechanic 7 Professional. Many others have had great challenges and problems with System Mechanic. The challenge we are faced with is how do we keep our XP systems running efficiently. I am currently looking at the other alternative of System Mechanic, from Norton. It is Norton System Works Premiere. I'll wait to post a review of this software until I have had time to sufficiently try it out. The problem with Windows systems is over time things happen under the hood that gradually slow the system down. It becomes necessary to preform a little maintenance to keep your machine running smooth. I like the idea of having an all in one location where I can fix these issues, but as we found out with SM7 that is not always helpful.

In this article I will cover the basics of keeping your computer up and running correctly. These solutions can be done using software included with windows or with free downloadable software. Here are the steps you should take and the recommended frequency of the tasks.

1. Run Disk Cleanup (once a month) run on computer by going to Start>All Programs>Accessories>System Tools>Disk Cleanup.
   
2. De fragment the hard drive. (once a month) run on computer by going to Start>All Programs>Accessories>System Tools>Disk Defragmenter
   
3. Remove unnecessary programs from Startup. (When new software is installed) Go to Start>Startup>Right click on unwanted programs and select delete. This does not uninstall or disable the program. You can still start it through the start menu all it does is keep the program from starting every time you start your computer.
4. Clean up your desktop. Remove all unessisary files and start buttons from your desktop. Files should be put in folders. I even group my applications in folders. The more icons you have the slower your machine boots up.
5. Install and run Spy ware software. (Weekly) I recommend Spybot Search and Destroy

One other major issue is registry problems. There is some fine software to assist you with this like Registry Mechanic, but you need to pay for it. Unfortunately I have yet to find a free tool to do this well

Consumer Alert: System Mechanic Professional 7

I recently purchased System Mechanic 7 Professional because I had some slowing of my machine and my Anti-Virus subscription ran out so I thought I would give it a shot. I made the mistake of purchasing the program without using the 30 day trial, and it turned out to be a big mistake. System Mechanic Professional is made up of 3 basic components, first there are the system tools, second an antivirus, and third a firewall. I will discuss the three basic components.

First the system tools are a set of utilities that help fix and optimize your PC. Many of the tools work very well, and do make a significant difference in PC performance. Purchasing the standard version includes all of these tools. I have had a little trouble with the disk defragmenter utility because it freezes halfway through the process. But with that exception it has worked well.

The Antivirus is the worst I have used. It hogs system resources and is very slow and tedious. The worst component is the email scanner. When it would start it would run for hours using %90 of the processor resources and when running would not allow us to send and receive email. I have since uninstalled the Iolo antivirus and loaded AVG Free and all of my problems disappeared. In fact the AVG antivirus found 2 viruses that iolo missed.

The firewall is very effective at blocking all traffic on the internet. It requires manual configuration for any interactive web sites, so for a blogger and techie like me it would have taken hours to get it set up so all of my web applications would run correctly. It was just to impractical to use.

If you need system tools to tune up your PC the standard version is capable and I reluctantly say may be worth the $39, however the Professional version that includes the antivirus and firewall should be avoided at all costs. Even with the system tools you should take advantage of the 30 free trial to make sure it works well for your system. Iolo will not issue refunds after the purchase for any reason, But that’s to be understood. I would have a hard time standing behind the product too.