News :: 15MR: Tray Commander

Hello all! Sorry for the unusual delay; It seems my host had some emergency power issues last night.

So without further delay; Here’s today’s review of Tray Commander by Ardamax Software—an application used to increasing productivity by giving easier access to your most commonly-used applications the way you want it.

As Giveaway of the Day states:

“Tray Commander is a tray launcher that lets you gain quick access to your most frequently used applications and system commands via a customizable menu.

Not only can you open applications and files, but also launch screen savers, shutdown, reboot your computer and much more, all from the system tray! Also you can use this multifunctional utility for everything, from opening multiple applications to optimizing your computing environment! All commands may be executed by pressing hot key.

Quick Pros

• Non-intrusive by landing itself in the task tray
• Customize left click, right click, middle click or doubling the clicks
• Wide range of built-in functions
• Multi-launch functionality
• Drag n Drop functionality

Quick Cons

• Positioning in the task tray still less-productive
• Similarities to Start may be difficult for people to warrant moving to this application

Expansion

Not too much more to explain here. This application is nice in that it doesn’t invade your workspace at all; it drops itself in the task tray. The ability to have up to 6 total menusets, it is actually really powerful. Add in all of the built-in functions, incluyding multi-launching and much more, and it is an application that can quickly enjoyed for its simplicity.

There is one issue that does bring down the productivity level of this application that I would like to note; it is hard to deal with it being inbetween a sea of other icons. Granted, you do have the option of hiding all of your other task tray icons, it’s kind of a workaround fix. Ultimately would have made sense that either it would have landed on the right-most (or left-most) task tray icon somehow, or ended up as a toolbar on the taskbar itself to avoid being lost in a sea of icons. I will give it this much; the huge white-and-black icon makes it an easy target for finding and clicking.

Now something I thought while testing this application; If you’re Start is well laid-out, what is the benefits to this than over the Start button? Well, speed still and the expanded functionalities. I could see people not liking this application because the icons aren’t right there in your face, and it ends up feeling like the Start button. But being able to make YOUR favorites in here categorized by type of click is actually a pretty good idea, and would increase productivity over wading through the recursive trees of the Start menu. To top it off, for those who are using Vista without reverting to the XP functionality may find this to bring back a little bit of XP that they wanted while keeping Vista looking great.

Final Verdict

While I may not use this application myself because if the icon in the middle of 6 other commonly-used icons and my Start button is laid out nice (With hotkeys as well already), I could see people who don’t like the intrusive pop-up/overlay/etc quicklaunchers loving this application. I would recommend anyone who is looking for a quicklaunch application give this one a try and see if it works for you. This is almost what I want and closest to my needs, but not quite. As my theory with all quicklaunchers; it is a productivity tool and if you think that $14.95 is worth it for an increase in productivity, do it. $14.95 for a productivity tool is worth it, and I do not see a reason not to pay that for this application.

Posted by BladedThoth on Sunday, February 25, 2007