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Rating: 
Summary: Marginal results
Review: I found that this package did little to enhance my connections. I am using a dial up service and my tranfer speed (according to the software) was increased by 2%. (Really, I am not exagerating.) All the software really does is change the packet size of your connections plus a few other settings with which dial up is to slow to make a difference. Namely, you can change the number of hops a packet goes through before reaching your system. Sure, fewer hops are better, but usually one doesn't have a choice of the path a packet will take. If you are waiting 10 minutes for a perfect path with 2 hops, doesn't that defeat the purpose? In testing this with my friend's cable modem and DSL at my work, I saw a larger increase. Changing the packet size for a dial up connection is worthless. Imagine and ant 200% larger, it still won't be all that big. (And this package will not give you results anywhere near 200%) I wouldn't recommend this to anyone using dial up. Broadband users, however, you may want to consider it. I would test your thru-put before purchasing this product just to see if you really need it. If you are substantilly below where you think you ought to be, give it a try. If you are within 2 or 3kbs (Remember, broadband only) you may jsut want to save your money. It also has settings specifically for Token Ring networks. Nice, I suppose, but as an administrator, I wouldn't want to hassel with running this on a bunch of clients so that folks can check the weather or so some sophmoric type can goof with the workings of a LAN. But hey, got a T1 at home and a token ring setup, this is the package for you!
Over all, this is just one more gadget that does kinda does what it says. Sure, you can get the advertised results IF you meet the criteria where this package will really help. But for the vast majority of us, save you money and get something really worth your time, like taxes!
Rating: 
Summary: Sped up my connection, and helped me troubleshoot!
Review: I was skeptical at first when I saw this program for 2 reasons: 1) the ~1995 SoftRAM fiasco [in short: SoftRAM did not work as advertised, in fact it did not work at all], and 2) the potential for privacy invasion from "free" Internet accelerators. As it turns out, Netoptimizer does not cache your web pages, etc. IMO, it has 2 specific purposes: 1) fine tune your network settings, and 2) help you troubleshoot modem/connection related problems. I have a dial-up Internet connection, and Netoptimizer pointed out some bottlenecks I was not previously aware of. First the cons which, as you will soon notice, are minor: 1) fine-tuning takes quite a bit of time [took me about 20 minutes for the thorough fine-tuning], 2) does not directly work with AOL[6]/Compuserve[6]/etc [though a work around exists for AOL and Compuserve], and 3) does not support Windows XP. I thought I was downloading pretty fast by connecting at an average speed of 51k, I was wrong. The k/s indicated by the initial Netoptimizer benchmark showed that my download rate was the same as a 28.8k modem! This despite having the US Robotics 56k Performance Pro Modem [best modem around IMO], a high quality phone cable, a large network packet size in dial-up networking settings, and a very efficient ISP. After fine-tuning, which Netoptimizer does unsupervised, I gained a 40% speed increase! I ran into a problem a couple days later, my connection speed suddenly dropped to an average of 35k. This is where Netoptimizer's troubleshooting kicks in. I looked through the extensive list of modem/connection problems and found out that using the external port of the modem can slow down your connection speed. Without Netoptimizer, I would have thought it was a hardware or Windows issue and may never have bothered to solve the problem. I removed the device attached to the external port, and my connection speed went back up again! As far as Windows XP is concerned, I will upgrade to the latest version of Netoptimizer without hesitation as soon as WinXP is supported. Don't let this gem slip through your fingers!
Rating: 
Summary: Checklt Netoptimizer - Not worth it
Review: In the world of fast connections, this product claims to maximize the speed of dial-up's and fails miserably. In fact it does not seems to do anything. There was no improvement to the dial speed and also change the settings did not seem to improve anything. I do not recommend this product to anyone. Also this product could have included a firewall along with its main product and it lacks this feature.
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