There is no dearth of compression software out there today. All the different applications have their own positives and negatives, which allows users to choose one as per their needs and preferences. As such, it is quite difficult for another new entrant to claim the top spot unless it manages to compress files to the size of a worm-hole; which is exactly what the makers of KGB Archiver claim it does.
KGB – No We are Not Talking of the Russian Spy Agency
The minimum hardware requirements stated by KGB’s creators are quite staggering considering that the program’s installation file itself barely crosses the 1 MB mark. As for the requirements, they are 1.5 GHz processor and 256 MB of RAM. The software’s makers are confident of the program achieving the best kind of compression compared to other programs.
Installing KGB is a straightforward option. Once you launch it, a screen pops up greeting you with three options that concern compression, decompression (of an archive) and some custom options.
Compression
You can choose to get any file compressed in two formats; namely ZIP and KGB. The level of compression for the latter is pretty impressive but it can also vary with the kind of file you are compressing. So compressing a bitmap file will give you better results than say, compressing a JPEG file.
You can choose from 10 different compression levels. At the two extreme ends are ‘minimal’ and ‘maximum’. Without a doubt, no other archiving program matches this range of compression options. However, most archiving programs available today can keep up with KGB up to certain compression levels but the latter literally takes off when it comes to higher degrees of compression, which in KGB-parlance mean ‘very good’, ‘extreme’, and ‘maximum’.
Decompression
The decompression feature is pretty much comparable to the ones from other programs. Usual stuff like the ability to select a source archive, extraction destination, file list, extracting individual or multiple files, status of any operation etc. are all present. However, there is one very major irritant in the program’s user interface. It organizes all its functions as per the kind of operation you prefer to get done instead of an automatic logical manner. Also, the program does not allow you to go back one step once you have selected one among the three main options. To do so, you will have to close the program before launching it again.
Pros
When it comes to compression, KGB does walk the talk. Besides being of a small size, the archives compressed by KGB are also quite secure thanks to the AES-256 encryption level (with a further option to password protect).
Cons
Those intending to compress large files to a very high level will need to spend lot of time in doing so. KGB also stresses the system’s resources to a fair degree.
Speak Your Mind