www.192.com UK-Info Disk 7.0

A searchable directory of personal and business information.

UK-Info Disk 7.0 is a searchable directory of personal and business information covering the UK and the Republic of Ireland. Address details are combined with maps showing the location of selected premises.

However, although it's a useful general reference, the maps vary in quality. Personal data is sourced from the 2001 Electoral Roll and BT's OSIS telephone directory database. Dun and Bradstreet's data is used for business searches.

You can search the Electoral Roll data without limitation, but each search through BT's directory enquiry data requires an OSIS credit. The title comes with 100 credits but, once these are used up, you'll need to buy more from www.192.com.

There are a variety of one-off and regular credit plans, but you can buy 200 credits for £10 (ex. VAT), which can be used at any time.

You can search on a person's surname or a business name by postcode, or in a region of the country. The Standard version that we reviewed only permits searches on the first four digits of a postcode.

To carry out full postcode searches, you'll need to purchase the Pro version for £165 (ex. VAT). This also offers a wider range of search types, including the ability to select a map area and view all of the businesses or residents in that area.

Once the results of a search have been returned, contacts can be stored in a database by dragging and dropping entries from the main search screen.

Using the software's map tools it's possible to view the location of an address, but this is one of the weakest points in the package. Positioning is poor, with addresses on the map shown as much as half a mile away from their correct location.

In addition to viewing points on the map, there's also a route-planning tool, enabling you to enter a start and end location for a journey. The software will then generate a list of roads and turnings between the two points.

UK-Info Disk 7.0 should be a useful tool, but it is let down by some gaps in its data and poor map location tools. However, the developers run an online search service which produces more accurate results.

Occasional enquiries are free so, unless you need to carry out regular searches, this service may be more appropriate.

Price: £41.25 (ex. VAT)

Minimum requirements: Windows 9x, ME, 2000, NT4.0, XP; Intel Pentium 2 or faster; 32Mb Ram; 64Mb free hard disk space.

Contact: i-CD Publishing 08000 192 192
www.192.com/products.cfm