{rw_text}Giveaway of the day for September 8, 2009 is:

Plato Video Joiner

Version reviewed:

v9.48

System Requirements:

Software description as per GOTD:

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{rw_good}

• ?????

{/rw_good} –>

{rw_bad}

• Doesn’t give you very much control over output video settings.
• You must manually type in video size if you want to change it from the default.
• Developer’s website falsely advertises the features of this product.

{/rw_bad} –>

{rw_score}
{for=”Arbitrary Equalizer” value=”1″}This category reflects an arbitrary number that does not specifically stand for anything. Rather this number is used to reflect my overall rating/verdict of the program in which I considered all the features and free alternatives.
{/for}
{/rw_score} –>

{rw_verdict}[tdown]
{/rw_verdict} –>

Update – I just downloaded todays giveaway and it looks GOTD forced the developer to clean up the software. It should be okay to download now. I still give it a thumbs down though for reasons stated below.

Update 2 – Oddly enough the download from the developer’s website is of v9.48 while the version from GOTD is v10.08.01. I didn’t notice aany major changes.

Plato Video Joiner is a software that allows you to join videos together into one video. Please be warned the trial version I downloaded from the developer’s website to evaluate this product comes packed with malware. I sent GOTD an e-mail about it and hopefully they can clean up the giveaway before they release it tonight but because of the time difference between me and them they may not be able to. Please proceed with caution.

When I first went to the developer’s website (dvdtompegx.com) to download the trial version so I can write a review on it, I was noticed WOT has bad ratings for the developer’s website and SiteAdvisor lists it as dangerous. Besides the orange rating WOT did not provide much more detail but as per SiteAdvisor many of the downloads on the developer’s website contain some sort of malware and/or undesired crap. Now when SiteAdvisor speaks, I listen. However as the old saying goes, “trust, but verify”. So I downloaded Plato Video Joiner.

After I finished downloading it, I scanned the installer with Avira. Avira did not detect anything so I double clicked on the installer to install. Immediately Avira brought up a warning telling me of “ADSPY/AdSpy.Gen [adware]”:

Instinctively I hit ignore the first time around so I had to go back and rerun the installer to grab the above screenshot >.>’. Anyway after denying it access and canceling the install, I googled “RKVerify.exe” and the Google results pretty much condemn it as something you don’t want to have on your computer. After googling “RKVerify.exe”, I ran PlatoVideoJoiner.exe through VirusTotal. Via VirusTotal only NOD32 labeled this software as dangerous. Now in my experience when Avira does not detect malware in a software when I scan the installer and VirusTotal pretty much gives it a green light yet the software still contains malware, this usually means the software itself is not dangerous but rather it contains a malware third party software that you are “given the choice” of installing (this is just my observation, and not fact, so that does not mean the software itself is clean so don’t install Plato Video Cleaner and come knocking at my door if your social security number is stolen the next day). To confirm my suspicion I jumped on my already malware infested desktop and tried to install Plato Video Joiner.

The first thing that happened there was Threatfire raised a red flag (just like Avira):

After I told Threatfire to allow this to continue, I proceeded with the installation. Not surprisingly the second installer window was telling you about how Plato Video Joiner comes with “RelevantKnowledge”, a third party software that monitors your computer activity “for research purposes”:

Look at how cheeky Plato, the developer of Plato Video Joiner, has done this. The second installer window, usually the one where you must “Accept” or “Decline” the program’s EULA, is asking you to “Accept” or “Decline” the EULA for RelevantKnowledge (the third party malware). If I was not specifically looking for this crap, honestly I would have just clicked “Accept” thinking this was the EULA for Plato Video Joiner (I have done that in the past with other malware third party offers). Furthermore, because of the way it is worded, I think even if you “Decline”, RelevantKnowledge may still be installed on your computer. Pathetic. Sad. Angry Ashraf.

As I just mentioned, since I already have a malware infested desktop (which I keep isolated), I figured I may as well see if Plato Video Joiner is any good as a software (ignoring the fact it tries to infest your computer with malware). So this is what Plato Video Joiner program window looks like:

After giving it an overview and playing around with it, my conclusion is even if Plato Video Joiner did not have malware in it, I would still give it a thumbs down. This is why:

• Input and output is limited to AVI (.AVI), MPEG (.MPEG/.MPG), Windows Media (.WMV/.WMA/.ASF), QuickTime (.MOV/.QT), and RealPlayer (.RM/RMVB) videos; there is no support for FLV, 3GP, or MP4.
• The control over output video settings is limited. Not once did I ever see the ability to change the video bitrate.
• When you add videos to join, the “Video Size” is automatically set. If you want a different video size, you must manually type them it. There is no drop down menu, or anything similar, to allow you to select videos sizes (i.e. so you must have them memorized).
• Clicking on “Help” does not do anything so not help file.
• The developer is falsely advertising the features of Plato Video Joiner on their website:

This review was conducted on a laptop running Windows Vista Home Premium 32-bit. The specs of the laptop are as follows: 3GB of RAM, a Radeon HD 2600 512MB graphics card, and an Intel T8300 2.4GHz Core 2 Duo processor.

{rw_freea}

FormatFactory

Trusty old FormatFactory always pull through for us. Amongst all its features, FormatFactory has a “Video Joiner” feature. FormatFactory’s “Video Joiner” is completely superior to Plato Video Joiner in everyway with one exception: you cannot join to MOV or RM. However if you really want MOV or RM, join the videos to something like AVI then use FormatFactory to convert that AVI to MOV or RM.

{/rw_freea} –>

{rw_verdict2}Thumbs down for Plato Video Joiner. It is malware invested and if you happen to get a malware-free version, it is lacking some key features. My recommendation is FormatFactory.
{/rw_verdict2} –>