We reviewed an earlier version of this reference tool in January 2000 (you can read the review here), and found it to be stunning, packed full of fascinating articles which were linked together in ways that drew you in and saw hours or even days of your life being frittered away in new discoveries.

Like that earlier product, this new version features the entire text of the 32-volume printed Encyclopaedia Britannica, plus lots of additional treats that books just can't handle. For the statistically-inclined, there are now 5,500 more articles than the previous version (so we're told, anyway; counting them is really not an option), and lots more pictures and movie clips.

The installation process will dump Microsoft's Internet Explorer 5 and Java VM, along with Macromedia's Shockwave and Flash Player on your hard drive, before even beginning to install the actual application. This is mildly irritating if you don't already have or want these modules on your PC, but there's no obvious way around it if you want access to all that the program contains.

Once installed, you can start to take a wander through the disk. And forget about your life for a few hours. Start off with a natural language search, such as "What is the capital of Chile?" and click around from there, learning about people, countries, cultural developments, spotlights on particularly world-shaping events or organisms, and much, much more...

Two of the most useful sections of the encyclopaedia, particularly for students, are the Analyst section - which allows you to create customised charts, graphs and tables that compare nations and regions on topics such as land use, trade and communication - and the Timelines history element, which examines the progressive development of world cultures from the dawn of civilisation to the present day, broken down into categories that include exploration, medicine, music, sports and technology.

And then there's the entire content of the New Oxford Dictionary of English, a Research Assistant to help pull topics together, an in-depth lesson in geography and thousands of photographs. Still not enough? A quick trip to the Britannica Web site gives you access to a further 125,000 or so reference sites, all allegedly hand-picked. It really is information overload.

Verdict
As you'd expect, you get more video footage, photos and multimedia gubbins on the DVD version of the encyclopaedia, but - as regular visitors to this site will know - we're not too bothered by the eye-candy. It's the depth of information on offer that really appeals, and in that respect the Britannica CD/DVD is the only reference work that most users are ever going to need.

Company: Britannica

Contact: 0808 1007100

Tags: adobe flash player encyclopædia britannica internet explorer 5 macromedia microsoft encyclopaedia britannica flash player internet explorer