If you have an enormous amount of files, no matter what they are, you’ve probably felt the urge to maintain an effective way to track them. Media Catalog does exactly as its name suggests — it allows you to keep track of your files, and where they’re stored, without the need of having said media inside your Mac at all times. If you have to tread the dangerous waters of keeping track of vast amounts of files at all times, keep on reading to find out more about it.
Design. Media Catalog has a simple one-window user interface, which is very consistent with Leopard’s aesthetics. Actually, you’ll feel right at home just because it is much like the latest Mac apps: it has a sidebar keeping all the important stuff, and an integrated information box that displays a file’s general information. Sadly, Quick Look integration is MIA as of version 3.8.4. In general, it has a smooth design throughout all the app.
Functionality. Media Catalog has the ability to magically manage thousands — if not more — of files, and their location. While I could not effectively test more than a couple of thousand within my computing environment, still, no matter how much information I threw at it, it never choked on me. Media Catalog also boasts that it has an advantage over its competitors in terms of speed , so I compared it with one that was recently reviewed in the website. While it may be a relatively small difference, perhaps one regular users would not notice or benefit from, the speed advantage is there. And once the information of any kind of disk imagined is stored, it is a breeze to navigate through. Or better yet, put its powerful search features to the test.
Limitations. It’s a well-rounded app, except that it doesn’t have Quick Look support. Now that would be a wonderful addition to a media indexing app.
Final thoughts. While keeping track of every last file is not a function that regular Mac users may need beyond Spotlight — for the ones who do, Media Catalog is capable of doing the job perfectly thanks to its power and speed. A license of Media Catalog costs $24.99, but a demo is available for those who are interested in trying it out beforehand. And if you like it, it’s certainly not hard to recommend as one of the various media indexing alternatives available for the Mac.
Ives on April 7th, 2008 at 10:18 am says:
Nice, I’ve tested it also and bought it! Excellent for all those indexing of backup dvd’s!