RARLab - (Shareware)
The very popular WinRAR compress any file or folder offering the possibility to protect or to recover them in case of necessity.
WinRAR is a reference in the field of archiving data compression utilities. Based on RAR compression algorithm, it can significantly reduce the size of the documents.
WinRAR is very useful when it comes to open its archives in case the user does not have this software because it can create self-extracting archives.
WinRAR integrates with Windows Explorer and allows to compress and decompress files from the context menu. For mainstream users, this feature may be sufficient, but WinRAR also includes more advanced features such as protection of archives by creating recovery volumes possibilities, adding passwords, test archived files or a module for benchmarking test performance by compressing the computer. The encryption uses the AES (Advanced Encryption Standard ) method with a key of 128 bits.
The application is also able to repair a damaged archive when a network transfer was not completed correctly or the storage medium is faulty. But the program is not limited to RAR and ZIP formats because it allows you to view and extract the contents of archives using less common formats such as ACE , 7 -ZIP , CAB , TAR , ISO, GZIP and BZ2 by instance.
- Multithreaded version of RAR compression algorithm improves
the compression speed on computers with several CPU,
dual core CPU and processors with hyperthreading technology.
Multithreading is enabled by default, but you can disable it
in "General" part of "Settings" dialog.
- In the command line mode you can control multithreading with
-mt switch.
- WinRAR can display the folder tree panel allowing to navigate
in disk and archive folders. Use "Options/Folder tree" submenu
to enable the folder tree. It can be configured separately
in file and archive management modes.
- Folder tree replaces "Browse for folder" command previously
available in "File" menu and uses its Ctrl+T keyboard shortcut.
- Now WinRAR "Rename" command also works with ZIP archives.
Previous versions could rename files only in RAR archives.
- Added decompression of LZH archives created with "-lh7-" algorithm.
- New "Remove duplicate folders from extraction path" option
in "Settings/Compression" dialog.
- If this option is on and you unpack an archive which root folder
has no files and only one 'somename' folder and if destination
folder is new or empty and also ends with '/somename', WinRAR
will exclude one 'somename' from resulting 'somename/somename' path.
- New "Define volume sizes..." button in "Settings/Compression".
This button activates "Define volume sizes" dialog. Here you
can customize the list of predefined volume sizes associated
with "Split to volumes, bytes" field in archiving dialog.
- Speed of RAR general compression increased for some data types.
Depending on data type and size the gain may achieve 5 - 15%.
- New "Rename automatically" option in the extraction dialog
and command line -or switch to rename extracted files automatically
if file with the same name already exists. You can also enable
the auto-renaming mode directly from the overwrite confirmation
prompt with "Rename All" button.
- Renamed files will get names like 'filename(N).txt',
where 'filename.txt' is the original file name and 'N' is a number.
- "Set modification time" option in "Advanced" part of extraction
dialog is accessible also for ZIP archives. Previously it could be
changed only for RAR archives.
- "Multithreading" option added to "Benchmark and hardware test"
command, so you can compare performance of usual and multithreaded
versions of RAR compression algorithm.
- New 'ch' (change archive parameters) command line mode command.
Its purpose is to apply switches like -av, -tl and -cl to archive.
- New 'cv' command line mode command. It provides the command line
interface to WinRAR "Convert archives" command. It is supported
only by winrar.exe, not by rar.exe.
- New command line -sl and -sm switches to set size
limits of processing files.
- New command line -fcu[file] switch allows to read archive
comments from Unicode files. It also modifies behavior
of "cw" command, setting the comment output format to Unicode.
- 7Z added to list of formats stored without compression
when using -ms switch without a parameter.
- Switch -e[+] is now supported by most of command line
operations including extracting and deleting files. Previously
it was supported by only archiving command.
- It is allowed to use environment variables in archive name
in archiving dialog, in destination path in extraction dialog,
in folder names on "Compression" and "Paths" pages in WinRAR
settings. For example, you can enter '%temp%' in "Folder for
temporary files" field.