Symantec Norton Utilities 3.0 In With the New Michael Hayman
Symantec has really outdone itself this time. Apart from having souped up its existing utilities and modernized the interface, there are also a plethora of new things to discover:
Norton WinDoctor If you thought your Windows 95 system was running perfectly, just run this utility and you’ll be in for a surprise. This program finds incorrect registry entries, outdated shortcuts, missing but necessary shared files and lots more.
Norton CrashGuard 3.0 Every Windows 95 user fears those dreaded "application xxx caused an invalid page fault at yyy" errors. In normal circumstances, you can press OK to close the offending application and that’s it. All of your previous unsaved work in that application has to be redone. CrashGuard intercepts those crashes and offers you the option to save your current work in progress before closing the application. You can also save the crash information to send it to the developer.
LiveUpdate Pro Symantec’s mechanism to update their own software is called LiveUpdate: just log on to the Net or a BBS, run LiveUpdate and a few minutes later your update has not only be downloaded, but applied as well. LiveUpdate Pro builds on this existing update mechanism by expanding it to all software, not only Symantec’s. The device drivers for your hardware can also be updated this way. LiveUpdate Pro only works via the Internet and is a subscription based service. There’s a coupon in the NU 3.0 box for a 6 month free trial, after that it’ll cost you $23.95 US a year, which still is very reasonable for the functionality offered. Instead of having to go out and search for updates yourself, LiveUpdate Pro will list them all in a matter of minutes.
Norton Zip Rescue The latest version of Norton Utilities adds something special for those of you who own either a Zip or a Jazz drive. If you have one, Zip Rescue's rescue disk you make will boot you straight into Windows 95 and run many repair utilities so that you’re back up and running in no time. The "normal" procedure will require at least three 1.44 MB high-density diskettes.
Norton AntiVirus Starter Edition A trimmed down version of the full product, NAV SE will detect/repair viruses through Norton System Doctor.
Norton Speed Start According to the box, this program will allow you to start your programs "50% faster". This particular application makes Norton Utilies worth it if you have less than 32 MB of RAM -- a significant boot time increase was experienced when loading applications while Norton Speed Start was running.
Norton Optimization Wizard Talk about a useful program! This innovative application will allow you to optimize both your registry and swap file. Operation is totally automatic. Registry optimization will compact and fine-tune your registry for optimal performance, while swap file optimization will make a fixed swap size and put it at the beginning of your hard drive for faster access.
Norton Utilities Integrator Remember the utilities in the DOS days? In a certain version, it shipped with a program from which you could launch any utility. Symantec has converted the program to Windows with wonderful results. Instead of having to wade through your Start menu, just open this program and you’ll have all the utilities logically grouped together by function.
