Hi, this is not particularly a technical topic but I'd like very much to know this.
After some research I figure out that x² and TC are the two best filemanagers available in the world. Right now I think X²is the best because of the easiness to use and the friendly interface.
The competitor, on the other hand, has the power to accept a great variety of plugins, besides I think it's a little faster to access the directories.
What are, to sum up, the features x² has that tc doesn't, and why should I stick with x²?
Nice! I read the whole article.
But what other things? Do we have an article written by someone else? (doesn't mean that I don't believe it, after all x² is the nicest one for me so far indeed).
narayan wrote:Seems we don't have much on that... Can you do this as a start? Get the trial pack from TC and do the comparison!
Actually I'm a control/performance/productivity freak, and have both of them. I discarded Opus a long ago, it's too resource hungry. The problem is that I'm unaware of a reliable and impartial method to conduct the comparison
Actually, Ross, you could start out by performing the same tasks in both X2 and TC to give an idea not only of the time it takes to perform said tasks but also the relative ease with which the average user can conduct those task in each program. If you post your results here in a topic, I a sure that anyone else interested in more details will be willing to suggest other tasks for you to try and / or be willing to try other tasks themselves, the results of which they would (hopefully) add to the topic.
If the topic were to get detailed enough, then perhaps Nikos could conglomerate the data into yet another comparison article, or else one of the mods here could make it a sticky at the very least.
Then we also have this chart: http://www.zabkat.com/x2lite.htm
This chart gives a complete list of features. It can be used to compare x2 with all other file managers.
For any given feature, try to rate both products with a "ease of use" rating (from a range of 1-5), rather than a simple "yes/no".
in the end your choice will really just come down to personal preference, since both TC and X2 have their advantages and disadvantages.
i chose X2 because it is a very comfortable mesh between a hardcore programmer's file manager and a standard windows program. TC looks like it's 10 years old - no eye candy at all. while X2 has a bit, what was important for me is that it blends in well with my windows environment, and it is very familiar in terms of menus, shortcuts, graphics, etc.
i was already quick with windows explorer, using a combination of keyboard shortcuts and mouse operations. since using X2, my productivity has increased tremendously. i detest having to use a windows machine without it!
that said, i know people who swear by TC, and watching them do what they do without a mouse is just amazing - it's a program for people who can memorize a hundred keyboard shortcuts, and fly through them without a thought. though i suppose you could do the same with X2, but i am too accustomed to using a mouse to give it up entirely. plus, my mind is more graphical than abstract - i like to see what is happening on my computer.
i tried all the major file managers, and X2 was the last on my list. as soon as i started to use it, i knew it was for me. it's fast, friendly, and very, very powerful. once you start using Scrap Containers you'll wonder how you managed without them!
anyway those are my thoughts, for what they're worth.
BTW, if you do replace windows explorer, why not go all the way and get a shell replacement too? if you are serious about saving memory and resources, then you can't beat Litestep, BB4win, or Emerge. that way, you don't have to run explorer.exe ever again!
One thing that bothers me: I like to use the mouse as least as possible. The more functions I can perform with the keyboard, the better. Since I'm also a Autohotkey user, I'd like to know, since the subject has come to this, what are the main x² features/functions that can't be performed without the mouse at all.
Tks!
