ZipTools for Windows

This strange, seemingly unfinished freeware compression utility takes simplicity to an unwanted level, and promotes its biggest drawback as its top selling point. ZipTools doesn't install, so be sure to save it to a directory where you can easily find it, if only to delete it after giving it a try. Once open, it presents a mere four buttons, two of which aren't active. There's a lot of unused real estate and absolutely no effort at design. With no Help file users are forced to surf to the publisher's Web site to find a most important fact. You have to manually add .cpx as your archive's extension.

It also proudly notes that no other program can open this proprietary file format. If you share your files with others, you'll force them to use this unfriendly little program as well.

To create an archive, the steps are convoluted and two buttons are activated only after properly completing the process. The viewing window only shows information related to the current, or most recent, compression activity. ZipTools can't compress folders and only handles one file at a time. New files can't be added to existing archives.

Run, don't walk, away from this program. We can absolutely assure you that there are far better file archiving tools on the market.