WinZip targets digital content through new compression algorithms. With version 14 of its popular file compression package, Corel-owned WinZip Computing is targeting the digital media users, and has added new compression algorithms, as well as support for new file formats.

The Pro version has plethora of new utilities. It has Windows 7 integration, image viewer, an FTP client for directly sending files through FTP, DCD burner and AES encryption for extra security. We looked at the Professional version ofWinZip 14, installing it on Windows 7. The general appearance of the interface differs little from the previous version, other than several
minor refinements.

The major addition is on the compression front, where WinZip has beefed the package up with algorithms targeted at specific file formats. The JPEG picture format now has a custom compressor, which can also be deployed to pull images straight from the camera, as well as orient them correctly.

File sizes can be drastically reduced, and WinZip claims that a 20-25 percent reduction is possible with no loss of image quality. In our test, we found 20 percent size reduction. Users can't specifY JPEG compression implicitly, they have to select 'best method for each file type' and leave WinZip to deal with the file depending on the file extension. We used two data sets containing
Name: 29llmwj.jpg Views: 40 Size: 52.0 KB
WE SAY

Extra algorithms targeted at specific file formats around 1 GB of data, with a mixture offile types - one with normally compressible files, the other with nonnally incompressible files. WinZip 14 has several compression methods available and four of the methods are compatible with the earlier WinZip releases (bzip2, Legacy [WinZip 2.0], LZMA and SuperFast methods). Encrypting files had little or no effect on how long WinZip needed to process the data, and no effect on how much disk space it needed.