VuePrint -- VuePrint combines many of the best features found in ACDSee and LView Pro. It also adds a few exclusive features of its own. While not quite as quick as ACDSee, VuePrint is definitely faster than LView Pro at image decoding. In addition to support for BMP, DIB, GIF, JPG, PCX, RLE, TGA, and TIF image files, five other file types are also supported by VuePrint. MCI, MID, and WAV sound files; AVI, FLC, FLI, MMM, and MPG movie files; SLI slide show files; UUE, UU1, 01, MSG Uuencoded files; and ZIP files are all supported. VuePrint's strength lies in presenting users with a multitude of options for manipulating and managing these types of files. In addition, VuePrint is availabe in eleven different languages, including English, Dutch, Finnish, French, German, Japanese, Italian, Korean, Russian, Spanish, and Swedish. VuePrint incorporates many useful features for these two tasks, including slide show capability, thumbnail picture viewing, sound and movie players, a built-in decompression utility, and a screen saver client. In addition, for every file type there are several options designed to make your images, sounds, and movies perform and look better. These include transparent and interlaced support for GIF images, two pass dithering and optimization for JPG images, quick conversion for all image types, and a multitude of options for sound and video playback. Overall, VuePrint is stacked with a ton of features for making the most out of your files and is by far the best client at doing so. VuePrint is not without its weaknesses, though. To start, VuePrint lacks the ability to preview an image before loading it. Surprisingly enough, VuePrint also lacks a screen capture utility for capturing windows and images on the desktop. When compared to ACDSee, VuePrint isn't quite as quick in loading images, especially JPG files. Finally, at $40, VuePrint is more expensive than both LView Pro and ACDSee, so users with limited graphics needs and even more limited funds may find that their needs are better met by either LView Pro or ACDSee. Aside from these minor complaints, VuePrint is a great client that will likely meet almost all of your image, sound, and video needs. Pros: Ton of features; six file types supported; thumbnail, screen saver, and slide show clients Cons: Lacks image previewing feature, screen capture utility, and support for PNG images New: Faster JPEG decoding, improve encoding/decoding support, bug fixes, more Version Reviewed: 4.6 Date of Review: 5/6/96 Reviewer: Forrest Stroud apps conference Main Menu