Having used the previous two versions of PowerDirector, I have grown comfortable with the interface and controls. This continues along the same path. Although I have not timed identical sessions, this program really seems to be faster than previous versions. Operation under Windows 7 (i7) and 10 (i5) is fine and I have not encountered any problems. One nice feature is the automatic split and trim. This seems to automatically trim the repeated scenes around edit splits.

As a user of Cyberlink’s PowerDirector software, I was interested to try out this software. I first loaded it on my main editing desktop. It installed easily but I opted out of defaulting to it for most of my media files, and just selected video. A few test videos looked better (more vibrant) than using the default video player and it played videos over the network well. So I decided to try the other media players.

This is not Adobe Photoshop and that is a good thing. Overall, I like this software. It has most of the power of Adobe Photoshop without the high cost. The learning curve is also less steep. I mostly use Adobe Photoshop Lightroom to catalog, touchup, and print my photos. Every once in a while, I need to perform more extensive editing and printing. For these times, I prefer to use Corel Paintshop Photo instead of Adobe Photoshop (Elements).

I have been using NIS for a few years now. I really liked the 2004 version and have had no major problems with it other than once my computer boots, I always had to go into NIS properties to see if my EMAIL SCANNING said ‘ON’ or ‘ERROR’. Evidently, something on my computer will occassionally cause the email scanning to not load properly, so if it showed ‘ERROR’ - I would have to reboot and then it would be ok.

I can’t even begin to tell you how much I love Windows XP. Why? Because when people used to have computer problems with Windows 95,98, and ME, I was always first on everyone’s list to come fix their computer problems. It was fun at first, but then I was really sick of it. When XP came out, I recommended to all those people to get XP. Now, NO ONE has called me since with a computer problem.

Norton’s AntiVirus 2004 is basically the same thing as 2003 with only a couple of new features, which, in my opinion, are not even worth paying for an upgrade. It’s just a ‘touched-up’ version of 2003. I was hoping for a lot of new features in this one, but they just aren’t here. Yes, there is an expanded threat detection and a more comprehensive messenger scanner, but that’s it. If you are happy with 2003, I would recommend skipping this version this year and buy next year’s version.

I didn’t have any major problems installing this software. The only problem I had was a few components didn’t quite load correctly upon startup, but a reboot fixed the problem. I had NIS 2003 and was very happy with it; this new version really doesn’t seem to offer a lot of exciting new features, seems merely the same as 2003 dressed-up to look like a new version. Anyhow, this software is working fine and no problems since I installed it two weeks ago.

Windows XP really is the best windows operating system to date. It is not perfect by any means, but it works the way it’s supposed to almost all the time. If you’re thinking about using this upgrade version, let me warn you of two things: (1) You need to check all of your software to see if it’s compatible with XP (there is a checking-program on this disc, but you can also download it from Microsoft’s website to see which software you have is not compatible).

Corel Painter X3 is the most powerful paint program Corel makes and it functions a lot like Photoshop. That’s a good thing. It means not having to relearn many of the tools. The floating palettes, menus and interface should be immediately intuitive to anyone who has used an Adobe product. Buttons and key functionality are even located in the same place on the screen and much of the terminology is the same.

Kaspersky make it impossible to stop renew… took 3 calls and 45 minutes. Do business with a real company. Emails have fake links, no easy way to contact company.