WinZip vs. WinRar vs. Open Source
General Thoughts, System Utility December 14th, 2003
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I am writing about software after a very long time. Have not had great experiences with new software I try out in the little free time I have with a limited bandwidth net account :P . But here is one little Open Source software that kicks the asses of the paid software I checked. 7-Zip is the compression software I am talking about. And the good thing about this piece of binary is that it’s free, open source and does Zip, Tar in addition to it’s own superb format 7-Zip. The three formats I tested were Zip, Rar and 7-Zip. I had wished to try WinAce too, but I did not have it. Here are the results of the sizes of the compressed files that were created on using the files of my website.
Size of the Folder: 3,092,018 bytes
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Results |
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File Size (bytes) |
Compression Format |
Software Used |
|
834,515 |
7-Zip (Maximum Compression) |
7-Zip |
|
875,405 |
Rar (Maximum Compression) |
WinRar |
|
1,379,644 |
Zip (Highest Compatible Compression) |
7-Zip |
|
1,387,264 |
Zip (Highest New Compression) |
WinZip |
|
1,389,994 |
Zip (Highest Compatible Compression) |
WinRar |
|
1,390,075 |
Zip (Highest Compatible Compression) |
WinZip |
The strange thing is that:
Other compression technology software makes smaller Zips compared to WinZip.
7-Zip makes a smaller Zip file using old and more popular format as compared to the new compression format used by WinZip 9 Beta which is yet to become popular.
But the fact remains that the Zip format remains the de facto standard of compression technology worldwide and WinZip remains the most popular Zip Client. But if my findings are to be considered, using 7-Zip for making Zip files gives you 2 benefits. You make a more widely acceptable compressed file and it is smaller is size.
What a waste of time to do such a test when no one is going to discard WinZip and Zip format in order to go open source. I perhaps just might ;).
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This is not the best feature of 7-Zip.
You don’t even highlight the fact that you can store 100GB+ in 10MB with 7-Zip. Ok 100GB might be exaggerated a bit, but if the files in the archive are similar, they will take virtually no extra space at all, because 7-Zip doesn’t duplicate the same data.
I agree with your opinion, and i’m still dont understand why people still using winzip. right now i’m using winrar and start to use 7 zip.
This is terrible. I think the ISO must intervene! Actually, it’t not that bad. If you have Winzip, you’re good to go because although it may not be the best or most efficient, it always has been and always will be the worldwide standard. If you have either of the other two, you’re also good to go, because they can open ZIP files. Just whatever you do, don’t offer your files to clients exlusively in RAR or any other standard than ZIP, because ZIP by far the most common and can be opened by any compression software. Furthermore, ZIP files can be opened without any software, with most recent Windows, there is integrated “compressed (zipped) folders” compression and decompression.
Honestly, I haven’t used 7-Zip yet. I’m currently using PowerArchiver, which to my standards, is THE BEST! Althought it’s not free any more, yet it read different formats such as ZIP, RAR, 7.zip, Ace, and create them as well. It’s worth trying. I would deffinetly give 7 zip a try… But check out PowerArchiver, to me having one universal archiver (Specially when we have different compression forms) is better! Yet, better is a relative term…
This article is bad. You have to make a choice between speed and archive size, and WinRAR is the best choice. 7Zip is too slow.
Really not a good article. Only one test is performed, and only size is taken into consideration, not other factors like speed, security, redundancy, etc.
As far as comparing compression algorithms this is still a bad article as it only consists of one single test.
The thing I don’t like about 7zip is its inefficiant file manager. Although I don’t need to use it (it installs a menu option when you rigth click to add something to an archive or extract one), I would like for it to be better. Maybe one day I’ll get around to working on it. ;)
You also didn’t mention what kind of files you compressed. That’s a pretty big issue. Plus one test doesn’t mean anything. I don’t really mind that you didn’t mention speed and all that other stuff, but c’mon, guy. Get rigorous!
I do a lot more decompressing than compressing… which tool can unzip the fastest… I find winrar to be much faster than winzip… I will give 7-zip a try.
WinRAR makes neat little book icons, so its better.
WInrar sucks because it cost $$$$. WinZip is free!!!! And if any of you guys are still using Internet Explorer, please pull your head out of your ass. Firefox is SO much better than IE. Check it out at Firefox.com
I ment to say 7ZIP is free!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Sorry for the mix up.
FIREFOX.com
Newer PowerArchiver versions are not free but the last free version is 6.11 (can still be found by searching Google for powerarc611.exe) and is better than Winzip because there is no annoying dialog box every time you open it.
I have been using winrar for three years now and I find it perfect but one cannot deny that winzip is the standard nowadays. Also winrar cannot create a password-protected winzip file. That’s why I decided to use also winzip…
interseting artical, just a basic overview and that is fine, if I want rigor I would go to Toms Hardware. Thanks for highlighting a new alternative. personaly I have Ace, Zip, and Rar on my PC and use them interchangably.
Cheers
as seen here & also in my pc test … as of now(9-28-2005), 7zip does compresses better than other soft, without a doubt. To become more useful/popular, along with better, faster compression & good GUI, they also need to release command line compress/decompress utility (for DOS, etc platform) like rar, pkzip did. As of now, decompression / unzipping of 7zip format is not available / supported in DOS by none of these software 7zip, ZipZag, WinRAR, PowerArchiver, TUGZip, IZArc. In my opinion, DOS utility is also very important.
even though below(this) info is not specifically related to this thread/page, still want to inform others … found another better compressor … UHARC. Better compression than 7zip. Compressed a folder containing 571 MBytes of 790 cab files. 7zip compressed it into 113 MBytes, whereas, UHARC compressed it to 81 MBytes. 7zip reduced/compressed 80% of the original collection/files. UHArc reduced 85%.
7zip command line utility executable can be used in DOS by using HX DOS-Extender.
~MagnetStone / atikotek
I wanted to know more about the PowerArchive that someone mentioned above… Bye
I am using both Winzip & WinRar. When it comes to compressing file w/ .zip extension, i prefer winzip. I don’t know why cause WinRar could read .zip and even better right? Maybe the GUI?
I found that 7-zip will uncompress a file about 5 times faster that winrar. Have you guys found that too. I think that my Winrar installation may be messed up. But I am now going to use 7-Zip religeously.
El Gonzi: winrar cannot create a password-protected winzip file
Are you sure you looked? I have created password protected zip files with WinRAR.
Security is not a big issue if you combine it with TrueCrypt, another great open-source product.