Encyclopedia Britannica 2004 Ultimate Reference Suite

Rating:
Summary: Good but not great
Review: First, let me tell you: I've consumed encyclopedias (book and e-form)for a long time now, I am also a teacher and for me this is an OK product but not great. It is not user friendly, the text looks poor on the screen (I have top of the line Viewsonic monitor), the maps are bad (no zoom, no roads, no details--only political). The layout is not very efficient, windows tile and you constantly have to move them around.

The strongest point I can make for this product is its in-depth articles but that's it. It does not encourage exploring like Encarta. In short, I'd say that this product is more for college students than smaller kids. If you have kids through HS, then I'd recommend you get Encarta.

Rating:
Summary: Good, but Research Organizer needs some attention
Review: Hi have used Britannica 2000, and I now use Britannica 2004 Ultimate. For some years, the Research Organizer has remained the same - not very user-friendly, and poorly explained in the on-line help.

Perhaps the publishers could learn something from research software such as Net Snippets, etc.

Rating:
Summary: User friendly encyclopedia
Review: I bought recently the Brittannica Encyclopedia Ultimate Reference Suite in CD.

I'm very satisfied with the product. After reading the reviews, I was expecting a "less-friendly" software. However I was very possitevely impressed on how easy was to conduct a search, to use the links and to use the research assistant. Even my 4 years old kid is enjoying the navigation thru the contents, pictures and videos.

I also think that the general contents of the Encyclopedia are better (deeper and more complete) than the Encarta's.

Rating:
Summary: This is garbage
Review: I had trouble with this from the moment I installed it on my computer. When I did a system restore I had further trouble. When I did it again it didn't even work, it froze on me. I cannot get in touch with the support team. You have to pay for the call to them and usually you cannot get through to them. They do not return you calls. I would never buy another product from them again.

Rating:
Summary: Wow. Britannica!
Review: I have been using the Britannica products for years and this is definitely the best version that they have produced.

Basics:
- Three complete (age specific) encyclopedias: In addition to the main encyclopedia, this product also includes, a complete Elementary encyclopedia, a complete Student encyclopedia, and ten years of Year Book articles (including recent topic coverage).
- Other (age specific) content: For each of these age groups the product also contains an Atlas feature (much improved than previous incarnations), a series of Timelines, Dictionary and Thesaurus (it appears that two versions of each are included, the primary difference seems to be the exclusion of 'bad words' from the Student and Elementary versions), and online content.
- Searching: The product does a simultaneous search across several content types (articles, images, video/media). Results are viewed by clicking on the content type. A link to on-line content is also included.
- Browsing: The product has additional ways to find content including subject browse (one for each encyclopedia), Yearbook and video browsing, Classic articles, and the standard A-Z method.
- Interface: The interface follows a very no nonsense approach to finding content, although, it has been improved in both appearance and function. It's a single screen system that allows you to see all the controls on part of the screen while opening, viewing and manipulating content in the larger work/article area. You select an age specific 'library' to work with and then search, browse, or open any of the features using simple, intuitive controls. The control area can even be adjusted to show more of less of the options you work with regularly. The work/article area allows you to view articles, media or other features that you choose from any of the libraries. You can have a lot content open at the same time and move the windows around to organize them.
- The articles: Articles are displayed very cleanly with much improved font handling and size controls. The navigation within the article is intuitive making them easy to read. You can find related content (images, tables, graphs, maps, etc.) or even other articles that are related in subject matter (using the index or a new feature that finds related people and places). There are embedded links, a built in dictionary (double click any word), Search term bolding, a new 'find' feature.
- Other features: The product contains a number of other useful features including a separate dictionary/thesaurus, a visual browser, a research organizer.

Improvements:
- Performance: I could not believe the improvements related to installation and start-up time, over all speed, and general stability. The product works fast and reliably. I have had many pieces of content open/active without a severe slow down.
- Articles: There are new ways to find related materials, the display is much improved, a new 'find' feature is available, the navigation is much more intuitive and natural, article text can be copy and pasted into other applications.
- Data: There are more types of content and more of each type of content (at least according to the materials supplied). New content includes classic articles, ten years of yearbook articles, new on-line content, etc. All features seem to be updated to include more content as well as more recent content (timelines include some events from 2003).
- Interface: - The interface has improved dramatically, it is intuitive and responsive. It includes many new features. Examples are mouse wheel support, article summaries that appear on mouse over, images that appear on mouse over, the ability to remember what I was doing in other libraries, etc.
- Video quality: The quality of the video is much better. They are about four times the size and can be scaled to any size you choose. There are also more of them.
- Browse features: There are new browse features in this years product including Classic articles, Yearbook articles, Subject/Topic listings, and a Media browse. It works better and includes time-saving improvements like an Auto-complete feature.
- Searching: All results are now in a single scrollable list, the results are more accurate, spell-checking is improved and happens automatically now, as needed. A search history is maintained, article titles can be auto-completed, and new advanced searching options have been added (for searching just titles, etc.)
- Display: The problems with last years font seems to be fixed, the overall appearance is greatly improved (it's visually appealing), library homepages have been added (includes tips and links to library features)
- Atlas: A new atlas that contains many more maps, country statistics and new features to allow for easy navigation.
- Bolding: You can choose to have all your search terms bolded in articles that you open.
- Pop-up dictionary: You can double click on any word to automatically see the dictionary definition.
- Configuration options: A number of user configuration options can now be permanently set. Includes items like font size, starting library, and term bolding.

Conclusion:
Even if Britannica was not the most reliable and definitive source of reference information on the planet - this is a superior product. It has an excellent design and approach to content access and management. It is genuinely useful and not simply some pretty showpiece that is difficult to navigate and use to any real end. The bottom line is that there is no real viable alternative on the market.

Rating:
Summary: Britannica 2004 versus Encarta 2004
Review: I have bought both Encarta and Britannica for years (EB in printed edition too: 32 volumes, 32.000 sheets). This is my opinion in brief: Encarta is excellent in all aspects, but Britannica's authoritative text (sometimes outdated) makes interesting to buy both.
¿DVD or CD? Both editions are actually the same. You can copy them in your hard disk.
TEXT: Britannica is a superb encyclopedia in text (not in visual aid) since 1768 (you know: an article by Einstein and so on...). Text in electronic version differs from printed encyclopedia (very large articles have been shortened). Britannica claims that it has more items than Encarta, but this is a joke: articles like "Mexico" are only one (with a lot of subdivisions) in Encarta, while in Britannica subdivisions are unconnected, and you must "jump" from one subdivision to another, which is slow and very annoying, especially if you want to copy it in "WORD". Very often, the text is not updated.
In the other hand, Encarta's text is not bad at all. Most articles have the name of their contributors (professions, works...): They are not John Doe. You can find large fragments of literary works, literature guides, a lot of sidebars and thousands of quotations. "Encarta Africana" is included. The Pop-Up (double clicking a word) Dictionary and Thesaurus has sound for correct pronunciation (by the way, it can read aloud, with a robotic and ugly voice, a whole article). The "Translation Dictionaries" to Spanish, French, German and Italian must be improved, because they are minimal. It gives you a lot of "Internet links", even if you are not connected. With Britannica you must be "on-line" and it searches in an EB Web page.
In theory you can update Britannica over the Internet free for a year quarterly (4 times), but this does not work: You can not find new files. Encarta can be updated free EVERY WEEK with new articles and additions or corrections to the old ones (till October 2004). With Encarta updating really works. Technically, is amazing to see the changes in old items.
ATLAS Britannica has not a real atlas; only a worlds map whose maximum detail is the States of USA. Statistics are very poor. Encarta's Atlas is like another encyclopedia, with a great detail (1 cm/ 4 km all over the world) and 20 types of atlas presentations (statistical ones can be counted by dozens). If you look a geographical article (city, river...) you can see in a corner where it is placed and, with only a click, open the atlas. In articles of cities, if you are on-line, you can see in another corner the weather of this place in that moment. If it is a USA place, you can read the latest news.
MULTIMEDIA: They say that "serious" or "adult" readers do not care about "pictures"; that multimedia is only for kids. I do not agree, because I think that, sometimes, "A picture is worth a thousand words". Works of art, anatomy, historical maps, diagrams ... Encarta devastates Britannica with a lot of photos, paintings, drawings, charts & tables, animations, interactivities, videos, music and sounds, pictures, 2-D and 3-D virtual tours, 360-degrees views, timeline, games... It is not only the quantity and quality. It is the easy access you have to all the multimedia, and that text and multimedia are fully integrated. Britannica is not really multimedia. It has photos and videos, but they make the program slow and sluggish. They should edit an alternative version with only text, as they did with the first edition in 1995. It worked fast and easy in old computers.
INTERFACE AND PERFORMANCE: This is the worst side of Britannica. With Encarta you only have to type a word or the beginning of a word to see all the articles and multimedia that contain it. If Encarta does not find anything, it gives you automatically alternative spellings. Even if you write the name of a small village lost in any country, you see it in the atlas. If you need to copy text or pictures, the integration with Microsoft WORD is perfect. It has additional ways to find content, including subject or multimedia browsing, "related articles" and the standard A-Z method. The "Research Organizer" is very helpful too. Encarta's TEXT FONT is very clear (Britannica's...) and you can choose 3 sizes.
Navigating with Britannica is different. 2004 edition is better than 2003 one, but still it is disappointing. I will only give you an example: if you do not know the exact and correct spelling of a name or word, it does not help you with similar spellings (unless you open a window and fight with it). As I said before, the program's performance speed is very slow and sluggish, and it must be dramatically improved. To go "back and forward" you do not find any icon and you need to open a "menu".... One "pro" for Britannica: they say it works with Macintosh.
I repeat my modest piece of advice: Encarta is excellent in all aspects, but Britannica's authoritative text (sometimes outdated) make interesting to buy both.

Rating:
Summary: User friendly encyclopedia
Review: I have reviewed both Encarta and Britannica. If you want great presentation, very light content, and biased history, buy Encarta. If you want history more in line with the actual facts, in depth articles, articles by great minds (i.e., Einstein, etc) buy Britanica.

In most cases you can find both products at a local Library and review them for yourself. My own experience led to me buying Britannica. Britannica is the more accurate and the product demonstrates the qulaity of its scholars.

Rating:
Summary: Much Better Than the Other Products
Review: I have reviewed both Encarta and Britannica. If you want great presentation, very light content, and biased history, buy Encarta. If you want history more in line with the actual facts, in depth articles, articles by great minds (i.e., Einstein, etc) buy Britanica.

In most cases you can find both products at a local Library and review them for yourself. My own experience led to me buying Britannica. Britannica is the more accurate and the product demonstrates the qulaity of its scholars.

Rating:
Summary: Poor, sluggish, especially on a Mac!
Review: Save your money, especially if you're on a Mac.

The program is sluggish even on a fast computer (you can count 5-10 seconds before windows open up). Its auto-completion algorithm distractingly flashes alternative search text when you try to type something in--and slows that down, too!

On a Mac, the program runs inside of a window--with tiny Windows menus (those distracting items with underlines for keystrokes) on a thin Windows toolbar and uses Windows windows (with a series of small icons in the upper right corner). No Aqua or brushed metal interface, no red-yellow-green window controls. All this, even though it is running under OS X.

I've had windows open up such that the close/zoom controls are off the screen and no amount of moving the window around will bring them back! The windows are actually confined within another window and do not behave like Mac windows where you can slide a window to and fro.

The program takes forever to launch also. And wouldn't you know it, in spite of the much vaunted supposed thoroughness of EB, one of the very first thing I searched for--the variations in Earth-Sun distance--was not readily available. Others have noted how sparse and poor the multimedia offerings are. I loved the hard copy EB, but this doesn't live up to that. I had much better luck with Grolier's Encyclopedia, but that was in the OS 9 days.

I got this FREE as part of a TurboTax promotion and, even so, I am ready to delete it from my hard drive!