Reader response to our second annual Readers' Choice awards is gratifying. We asked you to let us know which products and services merit your confidence and support. In response, nearly 7800 readers—almost quadruple the number of readers who responded to last year's Readers' Choice survey— voted on products in 16 general categories: storage, training and certification, utilities, Web-based services, security, systems management, messaging, network infrastructure, network management, remote computing, telephony, business applications, client hardware, development tools, disaster-recovery tools, and Internet and intranet solutions.
Within these 16 categories, you chose 84 of the best products among hundreds of products and services. In addition, you voted for five special awards: Best Hardware, Best Software, Most Innovative Product, Best Service/Support, and Rookie of the Year.
Your votes gave HP's ProLiant servers the award for Best Hardware; ScriptLogic 4.0 earned the award for Best Software; and you said Dell provides the best service and support. VERITAS Software's VERITAS Global Cluster Manager and Sunbelt Software's I Hate Spam Server Edition (SE) captured awards in two new categories—Most Innovative Product and Rookie of the Year, respectively.
Thirty-three vendors won this year's Readers' Choice awards for 89 products or services. Of those 33 winners, 18 won multiple awards. The winners of multiple awards are ACCPAC International, BMC Software, CheckPoint Software Technologies, Cisco Systems, Dell, Executive Software, HP, Intense School, Microsoft, NetIQ, Remedy, RSA Security, ScriptLogic, Sunbelt Systems, Symantec, VERITAS, VMware, and Winternals Software.
The big winners—those vendors that captured five or more awards—were Cisco, HP, Symantec, Microsoft, and VERITAS. VERITAS and Cisco dominated the categories of disaster-recovery tools and network infrastructure tools, respectively.
Many of you took the time to share your thoughts about some of the products you voted for. We have found your comments interesting and instructive and have included as many of them as we can throughout this issue.
By voting for your favorite products and services in our 2003 Readers' Choice awards, you provide valuable feedback from the trenches, and you let your peers know which products you believe deserve recognition in the Windows market. We thank you for your votes, and we look forward to another successful Readers' Choice issue in 2004.
Products We Missed
Because of an error in ballot preparation, we inadvertently left two vendors and five products out of the voting for the 2003 Readers' Choice awards.
Auscomp submitted four products to this year's competition. Auscomp Fort Knox and Auscomp Smart Login software were intended candidates for Best Password-Auditing Software in the Best Security Products category. Auscomp Fort Knox uses 448-bit Blowfish encryption to securely encrypt and protect sensitive files and information with one master password. Auscomp Smart Login also uses 448-bit Blowfish encryption to let you securely manage your Web site passwords and logon IDs with one master password.
Auscomp IT Commander was an intended candidate for Best Help Desk Software in the Best Business Applications category. Auscomp IT Commander, a Help desk application for intranet systems, includes a fully searchable knowledge base, a comprehensive cost- management system, and an application/system version tracker.
Auscomp eNavigator Suite was an intended candidate for Best Web Site Development Tools in the Best Development Tools category. Auscomp eNavigator Suite lets you control your Web and intranet development and includes instantaneous ActiveX technology.
To learn more about Auscomp's products, visit Auscomp on its Web site at http://www.auscomp.com.
HelpSTAR.com submitted one product to this year's Readers' Choice competition. HelpSTAR was an intended candidate for Best Help Desk Software in the Best Business Applications category. HelpSTAR lets you automate workflow processes, enables multi- user access from anywhere in the world, and scales to keep pace with your growing business. To learn more about HelpSTAR, visit the HelpSTAR.com Web site at http://www.helpstar.com.
We apologize for any inconvenience these errors might have caused.
