Everything but the kitchen sink - PC Tools Deluxe 6.0 - evaluation

Nation's Business, Nov, 1990

Everything But The Kitchen Sink

PC Tools Deluxe, the Swiss army knife of utility programs, is up to version 6.0. As this program has evolved, it has added features. It is now a DOS shell (managing files and programs), a back-up program, a data-recovery program, and desktop manager. Users with a great deal of PC experience swear by the program, and it has for months been one of the top 10 sellers.

Because it is so feature-rich, PC Tools Deluxe can overwhelm the novice user. The program does allow you to choose the level of complexity you want, so less experienced users aren't exposed to all the variations at once. Sometimes, in its effort to be all things to all people, it reminds us of Harpo Marx: Whatever you want is somewhere in that huge coat. For example, there are three different kinds of pop-up calculators. It will manage your fax card and modem, speed up information transfer with a disk cache, analyze the hard disk for problems, and so on.

The great advantage of PC Tools Deluxe is that it puts so many essentials in one handy place. With a single interface, there's less to learn when you want to turn to a necessary function. Every PC user should have a utility for protecting data from hard-disk problems. And everyone should have a relatively simple and efficient way of backing up files. If they save you from the horror of a disk failure, they will have saved their cost. Adding in the file managers is icing on the cake. PC Tools Deluxe, V.6, is from Central Point Software (503/690-8083) and lists for $149--a real bargain for all you get.