Norton Utilities 6.0

by Stuart Bonwit

I upgraded to Norton Utilities for Macintosh^TM (NUM) 6.0 from Norton Utilities 3.51. The old NUM was unable to restore files with the Unerase application. I was able to restore files with Unerase on the new NUM CD even before I installed the new NUM! The trigger to get NUM 6.0 at this time was the $50 rebate!

As recommended in the User's Guide, I ran Norton Disk Doctor (NDD) from the CD and found a number of problems that the old NUM did not find. All were fixed except one problem NDD called "major" that NDD could not fix and required reinstalling. Booting from the NUM CD opens in Mac OS 9 and changes the screen resolution from 800x600 which I use to something much higher. Booting from the CD also changes the highlighting color from black which I use to purple. When I reboot from my HD, I am forced to change back to black, a slight pain. Booting from the CD also puts out a bunch of apparent garbage from the printer, another slight pain.

Operation of Norton Disk Doctor is similar to that in the old NUM. However, it spells out what it is doing in more detail. NDD first checks the partitions (every time, on each partition) then seems to be simultaneously checking media, directories, and files. The latter was done sequentially in the old NDD. Optimizing in the new NUM is similar to that in the old NUM except that, when it is finished defragmenting and squeezing all the files together (optimizing), it continues optimizing the catalog files, desktop, etc.

Installation of NUM is very easy and very fast. I have included a picture of the Utilities window only because it is prettier than the one in the old NUM.

NUM has a new feature (at least, for me) called LiveUpdate for updating your Norton files. If its icon is double clicked while you're on the Internet, it automatically goes to Symantec's site. It then compares your system with the latest updates. When I did it, it told me my files were up to date!

Another feature listed in the Utilities is Norton AntiVirus which is greyed out on my machine because I do not have the Norton AntiVirus software.

On power down NUM scans all volumes for problems and updates all directories.

I read the User's Manual up to page 11 where it starts to tell how to do the installation. The reading was really unnecessary! It was too easy. I skimmed through the rest of the manual (not really reading!) and it looks as if NUM 6.0 operates pretty much the same as 3.5.1. So, why did I get 6.0? Because 3.51 was so unreliable restoring files with Unerase and I was sweating out the possiblity that I would trash something valuable. I'm glad I updated. If you have an older NUM and it works for you, I see no reason to update.

The package includes:

A 114 page User's Guide

CD-ROM

Rebate Coupon

System requirements

Power PC-based Macintosh (R) system

Mac (R) OS 8.1 or higher

24 MB RAM

15 MB available hard disk space

CD-ROM drive

Internet connection required for LiveUpdate

NUM is Mac only, not for Wintel machines and is a product of:

Symantec Corporation

175 W. Broadway

Eugene, Oregon 97401 USA

Technical Support:

http://www.symantec.com

Price: $99.99