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NOTE: If you are a Vista user and you are getting “Power Favorites has stopped working. Windows is looking for a solution” error, run the program as Administrator (thank you Mark - I can't believe I did not think to do that by myself =D).
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Table of Contents
Quick Pros and Cons
The Good
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The Bad
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Rating (out of 10)
Features as Described
The company makes a lot of claims about the program, but may featured are half-done.
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5 |
Ease of Use
It has a decent learning curve. Playing around with it for 15-20 mins, I still feel like I do not know how to use the software.
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5 |
Usefulness
This gets a 5 because this could be useful to people who travel or use different computers a lot - if they have Power Favorites on their other computer!
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5 |
Full Review
I am going to be blunt from the start: I dislike Power Favorites. First it gave me the headache of initially not working on Vista. Finally got it working by running it as Administrator (thanks again Mark). But I did not hold this against the program because if I had brains, I would of figured it out myself =X. Second, once I got it working, the initial profile that was loaded by default already had 21 bookmarks in it. Bookmarks I did not add nor wanted. Third, I was overwhelmed by its interface. I have used URL Gather before this, and I expected to be able to delete/edit bookmarks in mass right from the tag list. But instead I had to go to the Category list to be able to do all I wanted. It would be nice if you could do it from both lists.
With Power Favorites, you have the ability to import your bookmarks from IE, FF, Opera and a delicious profile. When importing from either of the browsers, PF correctly categorizes those bookmarks that were placed in sub-folders, but incorrectly categorizes the bookmarks that were just added into bookmarks (and not placed into specific sub-folders). For Firefox, it does not even import those bookmarks that are not placed into sub-folders.
The export feature does not work for me - the program freezes whenever I try to run it.
One good feature about this program is that you can sync your bookmarks with an online server provided by the company who made this software so if you travel, you can sync up other computers with the server and download your bookmarks automatically. The only problem? You have to have Power Favorites on each computers you want to sync up meaning you would have to ether install this program on all computers today, or pay for it later.
PF also gives you the option to install an add-on for FF and Opera. What this add-on does is that it adds a "Add to Power Favorites" option, when you right click in the browser when you have it open, so that you can save bookmarks directly into PF. Pretty handy.
PF comes with a "Duplicate Bookmark" and "Dead Link" finder. I ran the Duplicate Bookmark and it successfully found duplicate bookmarks - it prompted me to delete them (I could opt in or opt out). The dead link finder scanned my bookmarks to see if all of them were working links. Then, it deleted all my bookmarks.
I also noticed that on the software maker's website they claim "Chrome support". What exactly are we talking about here? You cannot import bookmarks from Chrome, and you cannot export bookmarks to Chrome. The only "Chrome support" this software has is being able to set the program to open your bookmarks, that are stored in PF, in Chrome if you double click them.
It could be a compatibility problem between Vista and this program, or maybe I am just a moron, but in my book, this program is epic fail.
Before we get to the alternatives list, let me dismiss a myth about this program: you do not need a del.icio.us profile to use this program. It is optional. A del.icio.us profile is handy though if you want to be able to share bookmarks.
Free alternatives to this program:
If anyone wants to be able to make backup copies of their bookmarks, check out URL Gather. It works on all windows and is free of bloat/spy ware (CNET verified, and I just scanned/ran the program too)
With URL Gather, you can
* Import bookmarks from Firefox and IE.
* You can make backups of your bookmarks by exporting your bookmarks - it places all the bookmarks in a folder on your computer (you get to choose where to place the folder).
* Categorize your bookmarks.
* Search through your bookmarks with a built in search tool.
* Password protect URL Gather so only you can access your bookmarks.URL Gather also adds as option directly into FF/IE to save URLs directly into URL Gather (right click while on the page you want to save -> URL Gather: Save Current URL…).
The downside to this program:
* It only supports IE/FF.
* It does not automatically sync bookmarks between computers.
* If you want to carry your bookmarks from one computer to another, you will either have to email your self the backup you made, or carry it on external media like a flash drive.The biggest pro for this program is that it does not store your bookmarks anywhere on any server on the internet. It is all locally based.
While it is not the most flashy program, this program could be very handy for those people who need to make backups of their bookmarks. And it works well.
Foxmarks (Firefox only)
Foxmarks is a plugin for Firefox. It is for anyone who wants to be able to sync bookmarks and passwords across multiple computers. You install Foxmarks like any other add-on. When you run it for the first time, you have to create an account or login into one you have already.
Every time you make a change to your bookmarks, Foxmarks saves the change. All your bookmarks/passwords are saved on your profile on Foxmarks' server so you can access them from any computer you want. The only draw back is that you must have Foxmarks installed on all those computers and you must have a Foxmarks account. Note: they store your bookmarks on their server, so if you do not like that...don't use this.
For anyone worried about having a plugin save your passwords: You have to opt in before it will start saving your passwords. So, if you do not want it do that, don't opt in.
The one downside to this program I found is that it is set by default to promote you to sync your bookmarks everything you close Firefox. You have to manually turn off this option (Tools -> Add-ons -> Foxmarks -> Options -> Sync -> Sync Options -> Uncheck "Ask First")
Linkman
I did not install Linkman on my computer for the following reason:
When I accessed the download link for Linkman freeware, my K9 Web Protection Alert came up with this: <Linkman Download Link> is blocked because it is currently categorized as Arts/Entertainment, Spyware/Malware Sources and Software Downloads (it was blocked cause of the Spyware/Malware Sources category). I figured this was a false positive, so I ignored it and by passed the warning.
When I tried to scan the Linkman file with my Kaspersky Anti Virus, Kaspersky crashed (dont know what was up with that).
I went online and scanned the file via scanner.virus.org and this is what I got:
The following represents the test results from the virus scanners used by the Virus.Org scanning service when it performed the scan on the file 'linkman_8909.exe'.
File: linkman_8909.exe SHA-1 Digest: 2375f355d2a99dcd1933cb5e00dc49aff819d79f Size: 3828856 bytes Detected Packer: None Status:
Of course, these could all definitely be false positives (4.55% confidence isn't very high at all) but I am not willing to take such a risk for a program that only backups my bookmarks. Call me paranoid but even though some posters on GOTD.com say Linkman is good, I suggest staying away from it.
PMnet Verdict: If you have Vista, we recommend that you do not get Power Favorites. For XP it seems to work better (according to posts on GOTD.com). If you really have a need to back up your bookmarks, and you use IE and FF, try URL Gatherer. If you use only Firefox and want to sync bookmarks across multiple computers, get Foxmarks. If you have Opera or Chrome, start using Firefox =P (its a joke, come on guys).
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