<> *4@5 17 BIT (FIFTH DIMENSION) - CD REVIEW *3]5@7 by SKiDZ / A51 *1]1 @1 Again, this CD has been one I've been waiting to order for months now. I have all the other 17 Bit CD's and to complete the collection I just had to order this. ]5Why?]1 Well, it was selling for a cheap price! Normally this CD would cost about £17-£20 mail order, but Epic had a bargain month and were selling it for only £6.99! How could I refuse this price? I simply couldn't! :^) The CD itself isn't really that great, but there are a few hundred disks on it ready to be unpacked onto floppy. The first thing I noticed is the new interface. No more of that shitty coded jobby which 17 Bit used on all other CDs. Instead they have opted for the (now) standard Amigaguide files. This is a good thing I suppose coz it is far easier to use, but the things I don't like about this CD over their past efforts are: Not enough disks! It seems empty compared to past 17 Bit CDs! You can't use this CD to unpack files from previous 17 Bit CD's either! With the past CD's you had a ]3FULL]1 index of ]3ALL]1 titles on each CD from which you could unpack the disks from. The 5th Dimension seems to be a stand-alone product which is a shame. I'm not saying that this CD is poor! It is good value for money if you consider how much it would cost to order the floppy versions direct. But I did expect more from this CD. There is still the usual description of each title and it is very easy to unpack the disks too. In fact, you can unpack them to any device which is great. For anyone who uses HF Mounter (Virtual Floppies on your HD), this is good news. What a difference it makes! The only gripe I have is that they have set DMS up to use the Verify mode which does slow the whole thing down a bit! A simple double script could have been used to give the user the option of No-Verify or Verify which would have been nice. Still, it's good to see 17 Bit still produce a nice and easy CD to use. (I hate unpacking disks to DF0: all the time, so the option to unpack to any device was a warm welcome). Thanx 17 Bit ;^P It only took me about half an hour to look through the whole list of titles on this CD and about another half an hour to unpack the titles I was interested in seeing! That's it! I don't think I'll have this CD in my drive too often. It's not Aminet, it's not meant to be either, but there is a lot of good stuff on it, as well as your usual crap PD titles. Maybe Aminet has spoilt us for choice and the likes of 17 Bit PD disks are no longer required - after all, most files are now on the Net and are added to each Aminet CD, so enough said I guess. Still, it's a great CD to have in your collection, especially if you have all the other 17 Bit CD's too. In all fairness, I'd still recommend this CD to anyone who is interested in PD titles. It does contain quite a good collection of games, utils, demos and info files. etc. In total there are 646 DMS files ready to be unpacked. *3@5 Rating - 8/10 [3 Value - At only £6.99 it's a bargain, but I wouldn't pay anymore... *1 @3 Available from: Epic Marketing: 4 Akers Way Swindon Wilts SN2 2NF @4 ]5 Freephone: 0500 131 486 E-Mail: epicmarketing@dialin.net ]1 @1 Order Number: 17 Bit 5th Dimension CD157-£6.99 #7* *@1 Only for bargain month as shown in advert!!! @6 ------*------@1 Epic also offer a discount to regular customers. My total cost for both the 17 Bit Cd and Speccy '97 CD was: *3@7 17 Bit £ 5.09 Speccy £11.05 *1@1 Not bad eh? But don't forget that postage is extra on each order. Give Epic a call at the above number and ask for a list of all their CDs. You may just get that discount you were after also. Epic are backing the Amiga 100% - So in return, why not back Epic by ordering from them? They are one of the best mail order companies I have used and also one of the quickest at dispatching the goods too. Well done Epic! I'm one happy customer and I will certainly be ordering many more CD's from your list.