When I bought my first "IBM"-compatible computer, it came with a 500MB hard disk. Applications back then didn’t hog as much space as they do now, but storage still became an issue, hence the advent of the Archival Utility. Taking that 700k MIDI file down to 500k was significant savings, plus the ability to "bundle" several files together was handy.
Both of those uses still exist, but the latter is the more common use for an archival util in modern times. 1.5TB hard drives are under 140 USD, so saving that few k’s of drive acreage isn’t as much of a concern. I work with a lot of projects that are ’sets’ of files that work together, so I find myself using archivers all the time. Back in the day, I used WinZip, which has become far too "feature-heavy" for my liking. I used WinRAR for a time, but it wasn’t quite my speed, either. My friend Scott from AppsPlus recommended 7-zip, so I gave it a try.
7-zip has one major plus: it’s free. Open-Source, to be exact. They accept donations, which brought me to one of the few things about 7-zip that turned my smile upside down. There are two options for donations: 50usd and 100usd. Oh, you can donate multiples of them both if you wish to donate MORE. Sorry guys, for most people these days, 50 bucks is a fair chunk of dough. Fail. Add a button for 10 or 20, and you’ll get a few more takers, I bet.
7-zip is available in a command-line ver, Windows flavors 32 and 64 bit as an EXE or MSI installer, as well as Linux/Posix and WinCE. There are links to "unofficial" versions for Mac, FreeBSD, Debian and Fedora among others. You can grab any of these as well as the source code and SDK on the download page.
The install is quick and painless. No toolbars to opt out of or EULA’s to ignore. The 7-zip UI is utilitarian at best. However, I doubt you’ll ever use it. The shell integration is superb, both in Windows Explorer and my (lately) preferred file manager, Directory Opus.
From the right-click menu, you can view, open, test, extract and email your archives. 7-zip can create ZIP, GZIP, BZIP2 and TAR files as well as their proprietary archive, .7Z. 7-zip can also open (but not create) ARJ, CAB, CHM, CPIO, DEB, DMG, HFS, ISO, LZH, LZMA, MSI, NSIS, RAR, RPM, UDF, WIM, XAR and Z. Hell, I’ve never even SEEN half of those at least. I’m easily impressed I suppose.
The .7Z format boasts an average of 30-70% more compression than ZIP format, and even when using ZIP or GZIP files, 7-zip out-compresses WinZip and PKZip by up to 10 percent.
I was more concerned with SPEED of getting into archives. I tested 7-zip against WinRAR on a 700meg, 49part RAR archive. 7-zip unpacked this archive in 31 seconds, and WinRAR, apparently the filetype it’s designed to be used for, took about the same, 34 seconds. Oh, did I mention that WinRAR isn’t freeware, setting you back about 30USD and has support for less filetypes? It also only has full support for RAR and ZIP, and can unpack about 10 others. And you have to pay for it, did I say that already? Bother. Suppose I’m just a bit bitter about the fact that I’ve been paying for something when there is a free alternative that seems in most ways, superior.
Live and learn.
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