I’ve been using the service on and off for years so I’ve got a long, though not expert background in their software. The thing I used to hate about them was the interface of their software. Their databases were awesome, but the software left much to be desired. About five years or so ago they redesigned their software suite. At first the improved interface was beset with a lot of teething problems.

I used to have the old version of Family Tree Maker and I while loved the searchable databases that came with a subscription, I always found the software to be rather lacking. The interface was just really hard to use, and viewing data was frustrating. I held off upgrading to the new program for a long time but I finally decided to try it out. They have greatly improved how you view data.

I have a pretty decent background with high end photo editing suites and CAD software and I have a pretty big tolerance for lag times. However this Corel Draw package is so slow to load I rarely use it. The feature set? Great. The price? A good value for what you get. The load time? Two minutes + on a fairly modern Quad core system running Win7. I just couldn’t take it any more.

I’ve had this installed on an old netbook for some time and it’s working really well. The netbook isn’t exactly a powerful machine (Atom CPU) but I don’t notice any slowness. The user interface is fairly straight forward. There are basic menus for each of the sub features such as Anti-virus and parental controls. I seem to get fewer pop-ups than I did with Norton, which is nice. Overall a good product.

This is such a great tool for researching your roots and recording your family tree. These are two distinct tasks: researching and recording. Researching your background is where you find relatives you never knew you had. Recording is where you save the results of your research and report them to your future generations. The 90-day free access to the Ancestry genealogy records is outstanding. After 90 days, there is a monthly fee and the fee is pretty significant.

If you have content that you want to convert (DVDs or BluRays), this won’t do what you need, because those discs are copy-protected with DRM (digital rights management). In order to convert those discs to a format you could play from another source (like your iPad, iPhone, Kindle Fire, or tablet), you need to somehow remove the DRM first. This product doesn’t do that. The rest of the features for this product are clunky and are redundant when you realize that your PC already has Windows Media player and probably iTunes installed.

This is such a great tool for researching your roots and recording your family tree. These are two distinct tasks: researching and recording. Researching your background is where you find relatives you never knew you had. Recording is where you save the results of your research and report them to your future generations. The 90-day free access to the Ancestry genealogy records is outstanding. After 90 days, there is a monthly fee and the fee is pretty significant.

This was the first Learn by Video series course that I’ve used, and I’m very impressed with the production. For the most part I’m impressed with the content too, although the introductory level was frustrating at times. The course provides a good introduction to the CS5 user interface, the Flash tools, file types, and managing the timeline. There’s also a very basic chapter that introduces ActionScript (AS3), which is the coding language used to create complex logic in a Flash application.

I’m a big fan of Norton Antivirus the past few years. Slim, low profile and gets the job done. Norton’s changed the product line and merged Norton Antivirus and Internet Security. Big mistake. This product covers five devices, but most people don’t need it for five systems. At $80 a pop that’s a crazy expensive product. The mobile product line is deceptive. The iOS version doesn’t offer any malware protection (apple does that).

If you’ve wanted to know how family members are driving your car, this product is for you! It’s also great for small business owners tracking employees. Insurance companies have been using these devices for years. It plugs into the ODB port in your car. That’s usually by the steering wheel and is part of any car made since 1996. If you have a car made before then..well kudos for keeping it around so long!