FIRST IMPRESSIONS COUNT

Well, at least that's what happened to me when I tried and opened for the first time "windows explorer", "This interface sucks" was the first thing that hit my head and I'm talking about a decade ago one windows version after another. It was boring non friendly and visually deceptive at the least.

What I wanted was something appealing to my constantly enduring search for a novelty look which at the least would allow me to do a minimum of tweaking, personalizing and bottom of the line just make life easier for me.

After this first visual shock, I obviously Goggled for similar software and started downloading trial software of what was out there and by all means it was quite frustrating.

Trial and error, one after the other, load and uninstall, I couldn't find anything that would fill my expectations, until "eureka" Power Desk Pro 8 showed up.

I've heard of this software years ago through an acquaintance, but really ignored it until now.

Power Desk is what you would call a shell replacement for Windows Explorer. What this means, is that in a glance it shows you your disc or discs environment in its integrity, that's the shell concept.

But having this option would be useless if we couldn't interact with the interface doing multiple tasks "and I really mean multiple".

Some of the things most users want to do with their files without major keystrokes are:

• organize and manage your files and folders

• see at a glance the layout of the drives you have installed

• locate a given folder and within it a file

• see the file size

• see the file or folder path

• compare the layout or shell of two or more discs side by side horizontally or vertically

• manage the files you located between the discs--- I mean copy and paste immediately between one and the other

• check the file size and properties

• rename files or folders

• and here's a kicker: you can view the contents of a folder without opening the mother program "wow" this pays for it by its self

• locate files through a built in search engine

These are just some of the things most computer fans want to do with ease and usually crave for on a daily basis.

If you want a fancy description of what a file manager should do, let me quote what I found in cyberspace searching for this category.

"The File Management category includes software programs designed to manage, delete, recover, convert, move, or monitor your computer files. Software in this category may offer both document management and disk management features. Programs may also enable command-line utilities, monitor free space on your drives, create a virtual drive, or compare files and directories."

Well do your due diligence and you'll find magnificent software with positive reviews from specialized magazines and articles, that do all of these things and much, much more. Find a company that's a leader in the industry which has been around for some time and has an impeccable name.

It's always bewildered me why a multi-billion dollar company likes Microsoft which has literally hundreds of persons developing their products keeps windows Explorer unchanged or at least minimally changed year after year and version after version.

I suppose they're giving leeway for private developers.