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Rating: 
Summary: Not Micromat's best effort
Review: I've been using Macs and utility programs such as Techtool and Norton for about a decade now.Through the years I would say that Norton Utilities and Techtool have traded back and forth in the top position as the best utility to own. As a fan of Techtool 3 I would say that Micromat had the better product for several years. I can't say that now. Running a B&W upgraded to a 500 MHz G4 with ample RAM I've yet to find Techtool 4.0.4 useful - under either Mac OS 10.2 or 10.3. My first major problem Techtool couldn't fix and I quickly purchased a copy of DiskWarrior which, although slow, fixed the problem. But DiskWarrior only fixes the disk directory. You need a broader utility such as Techtool or Norton for general errors. Now I've got some new problems with my hard drives (I have three in my machine). Techtool says it found the errors and, if I want them fixed, I have to redo the test with the "repair on" button checked. Well, the button _was_ checked. Infuriating. Overall, I'd say that Techtool 3 was a far better product. The interface seemed far more friendly and you knew that when you told the program to automatically fix errors that it would do so. Unfortunately, Vers. 3 isn't meant for OS X. I'm giving Vers. 4 three stars, not because of what it has done, but because I assume it will earn its keep eventually - or perhaps they'll release an update to this version which will address these problems. In any case, you never can have too many disk repair utilities. Still, I think it's time to venture back to Norton to see what they've got cooking. It certainly can't be any less functional and helpful than this.
Rating: 
Summary: This is the only game in town for a general Mac utility
Review: In an earlier review I lamented how Techtool had seemed degraded in its performance since its upgrade to vers. 4.0 and Mac OS X compatibility. I have since learned that Symantec, maker of Norton Utilities, has indeed decided to no longer upgrade their general utility program. (According to news reports, they will continue to upgrade their virus and Internet Security software.) So what does this mean for Mac users? For one, DiskWarrior is a must have. As for Techtool, there's almost no choice - you have to have a general utility that's more powerful than Apple's rather weak First Aid. Here's hoping that Micromat comes up with a good update to Techtool and gets it back to the days of when it was arguably the best utility for the Mac.
Rating:
Summary: This is the only game in town for a general Mac utility
Review: In an earlier review I lamented how Techtool had seemed degraded in its performance since its upgrade to vers. 4.0 and Mac OS X compatibility. I have since learned that Symantec, maker of Norton Utilities, has indeed decided to no longer upgrade their general utility program. (According to news reports, they will continue to upgrade their virus and Internet Security software.) So what does this mean for Mac users? For one, DiskWarrior is a must have. As for Techtool, there's almost no choice - you have to have a general utility that's more powerful than Apple's rather weak First Aid. Here's hoping that Micromat comes up with a good update to Techtool and gets it back to the days of when it was arguably the best utility for the Mac.
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