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Microsoft Encarta or Encyclopedia Britannica ? Help me choose

Anna Lagerkvist of Personal Computer World has done an extensive review of the two most popular digital encyclopedia titles - Encyclopaedia Britannica 2005 vs Microsoft Encarta 2005 here. The days of using heavy, printed encyclopaedias are long gone. Now, all you need to do is move your mouse around digital pages on your PC. Microsoft and Britannica have released 2005 versions of their reference suites; here is a comparison of the DVD editions.


Microsoft Encarta 2005 - The latest DVD allegedly holds more information than 60 print volumes, with some 130,000 articles, 1.8 million map locations and over 3,000 audio and music clips. There's a large archive from The Times and a year of free online updates. The Interactive Timeline shows cultural, social or scientific events across the years and how they relate. This is as impressive as ever, allowing users to jump in and out of history to find out more about key developments.


Encyclopaedia Britannica 2005 - The single-disc DVD Ultimate Reference Suite 2005 contains a Student Library, Elementary Library, General Reference Library and the Britannica Brainstormer. Britannica displays search results in alphabetical order, rather than order of importance or according to the country you're in. For example, searching for 'London' will show up London in Ontario, Canada, before London, England.

The final verdict

MICROSOFT ENCARTA Publisher's Site
Encarta is miles ahead thanks to its impressive content, use of multimedia and easy navigation. There's no denying the pedigree of Britannica, but it hasn't made the best transition from print to desktop.

Pros: User-friendly, impressive content; new Search Bar
Cons: Can be a little slow
Verdict: Full of features but still affordable

ENCYCLOPAEDIA BRITANNICA Publisher's Site
Britannica is let down by poor interface design. Each article still opens up in a new window, making it hard to return to one without wading through them all. Where Encarta excels with its Interactive Timeline, Britannica feels a bit dull with its scrollable boxes. The atlas still doesn't fit onto a 1,024 x 768 screen, and the outline feels flat.

Pros: Content; value for money
Cons: Static feel; interface design
Verdict: It has the content, but the interface needs to be improved to really compete with Encarta

Indian Edition of Encyclopaedia Britannica

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