TouchStone Software Corp is one of the few companies with a new software package to sell that runs under Microsoft Corp’s Windows 3.1. No, the product is not incredibly late: Win’95 Advisor is a migration tool that determines if a user’s hardware is suitable for running Windows95 and advises of changes necessary for a smooth […]
TouchStone Software Corp is one of the few companies with a new software package to sell that runs under Microsoft Corp’s Windows 3.1. No, the product is not incredibly late: Win’95 Advisor is a migration tool that determines if a user’s hardware is suitable for running Windows95 and advises of changes necessary for a smooth installation, the Huntington Beach, California company claims. It uses a points system to rate a personal computer’s suitability or otherwise, for converting to the new operating system. Computers are scored on the main system, that is the central processing unit, bus, floating point unit and existing operating system version, memory, hard disk space, other installed devices such as CD-ROM and floppy disk drives and finally, ports. Once the points are totted up the computer gets one of five ratings, into which the company could have perhaps put slighty more thought. The highest accolade awarded is a cringe-making Wow! followed by Good, OK, Poor and down to a lowly fail. A computer would fail if it had a 80286 processor, for example. The bulk of the points for RAM are awarded for between 8Mb and 16Mb, sensibly ignoring Microsoft’s advice that 4Mb would be sufficient. The disk space planning tool assesses how much compressed and uncompressed disk space is available, and the clean and zip utility advises on the deletion of unused and unnecessary files, and the compression of files so enough disk space will be available. The product’s pre-install option planner and tutorial takes users by the hand and guides through a dry run of the installation process, which takes a minimum 30 minutes. A batch file can be created that runs through the installation process, based on the choices made in the pre-install option planner. This is mainly for use with multiple installations, said the company. A range of reporting and multimedia benchmark options are also available. Win’95 Advisor is out now in the US and the UK, costing $50 and ú40 or so respectively though the company hinted it was anticipating a street price of around one third the cost of Windows95.
