Fall 1996 Special Issue Table of Contents

Only the Best

By Mike Elgan, Editor

Which Windows?

By Joseph C. Panettieri, Associate Editor, Features

Stop wondering which Windows operating system is best for the way you work. Explore the pros, cons and possibilities of each of these 32-bit contenders, and you'll be ready to make a smart choice.

Reviews

Our editors have tested and reviewed thousands of systems, peripherals and applications to identify the latest and greatest products. We summarized the original reviews of 143 products in 20 categories to give you all the data at a glance.

Hardware

You need more than a computer to compute. So we gathered--all in one place--reviews of 43 peripheral products that were awarded the WINDOWS Magazine Recommended seal. You'll find modems to meet your communications needs, monitors for your viewing pleasure, SCSI adapters and uninterruptible power supplies, printers and storage devices. The Recommended List that follows breaks the roster into subcategories like internal, external and PCMCIA modems. Once you're through with these reviews, you'll be ready to turn your system into a power machine. Use our Recommended List to make your final purchase decisions.

  • Input Devices

  • Mass Storage

  • Miscellaneous

  • Modems

  • Monitors

  • Multimedia

  • Printers

  • Scanners

    Software

    There are thousands of software programs out there: Are you willing to traverse that uncharted territory with your data? You don't have to, because we've already chosen 56 apps we unreservedly recommend. Even after we finished our severe filtering process, we came up with a wide variety of programs--from business software to utilities, from development environments to office-automation programs--to help you accomplish chores from balancing the books to sweeping data debris from your hard disk. Once you've read the reviews, you'll find everything you need to know about each product in the Recommended List that follows.

  • Business

  • Communications

  • Database

  • Development

  • Internet

  • Graphics

  • Office Automation

  • Utilities

    Systems

    Before you spend $2,000, $3,000 or more on a new system, make sure you get what you pay for. In the following pages, you'll find reviews of 46 systems that have earned WINDOWS Magazine's Recommended seal. We've got a rich mix of computing devices here: desktop systems and notebooks; systems that run at speeds from 75MHz to a blazing 200MHz; and systems based on Pentium, Pentium Pro and Cyrix 6x86 chips. The desktop systems are categorized by price-greater than $3,000, between $2,000 and $3,000, and under $2,000-to help you find those that will best meet your needs at prices you can afford. The Recommended List provides a complete table of all the systems reviewed.

  • Systems Over $3000

  • Systems $2000 - $3000

  • Systems Under $2000

  • Notebooks

    Recommended List