Lazybit

The time has come, Private Disk 2.10 is now officially released. Some of the changes were already commented in the release notes of an earlier beta version of PD (those features are Disk Firewall's training mode, trusted program authenticity verification).

One of the most important things is compatibility with Windows Vista systems of all flavours that exist out there. Private Disk is now shipped with digitally signed drivers, so if you have a 64-bit Vista platform - you can use PD on it. This makes Private Disk yet again compatible with every version of Windows (starting with Windows 95).

There is also a new icon, which looks good whether you're looking at a zoomed in version, or at a tiny icon in a "list view".

Run Private Disk as a service

This is a very handy option, it used to be a part of the older 1.x versions of Private Disk Multifactor. Once this is enabled, you can run Private Disk, mount the image, then log off - the virtual drives will still be mounted, allowing other logged on users to access them (including those who access them from the network, if they are shared).

The idea is that you can mount the disk and restrict others from changing its settings (ex: alter the white-list, or change the disk's properties, etc). As an administrator, you can start the server and mount the disk, then share it; from that point on end-users can connect to the server and use what they are allowed, without being able to do (break) anything. This feature will help you offer users only as much power as they need to get their job done.

PD File Move - the secure data migration utility

This is the newest addition to Private Disk's arsenal, and it was not a part of any of the beta versions that were made public prior to the release (although the utility itself could be downloaded from the site, if you explored it thoroughly). It is designed to find a group of wanted files in a certain location, create an encrypted disk of the right size, move them to the protected storage vault, and then wipe the originals, so that the files cannot be recovered.

This is a typical screenshot of PD File Move

What can it do?

• Let's say you have a music archive you want nobody to see. Just tell PD File Move that you want to look for MP3, WAV, AAC, FLAC, WMA and OGG files (you can add your own extensions too) in D:\. The program will find all those files, and then securely move them to the new location. Afterwards there's no trace of the original files, if you used the file wiping option.
• You purchased a new computer in your office, you want to move all the data from the old machine to it. You don't remember clearly where all the documents are, but you know that you work with PDF, DOC and ODT files. PD File Move will find them for you, so there is no chance that you accidentally forgot to copy something before giving the old computer to a relative, or donating it to a school.

We decided not to bring these features into Private Disk itself, and instead have a separate utility to do the job. Private Disk continues to be extremely lightweight (using about 2.5 MB of RAM when disks are mounted), and PD File Move will not get in your way while you use Private Disk.

We are against bloatware, so you can be sure that Private Disk will continue to be a fast and solid tool, and it will never turn into a performance hog.

Here comes the changelog of the final version:

+ added XP-style and Vista-style icons
+ allows to run Private Disk software as a system service

+ added Disk Firewall Program integrity verification feature
+ allows to disable/enable Disk Firewall Program integrity verification

+ added Disk Firewall Traning Mode feature
+ allows to disable/enable Disk Firewall Traning Mode

+ compatibility with Windows Vista
+ compatibility with Windows Vista x64

+ the encryption password can be changed when the disk is mounted
+ allows to create a backup copy of a disk's encryption key automatically

+ optimized disk creation speeds when "fill disk with random data" is enabled
- fixed bug with occasional blue screen errors if Windows Defender is installed

- fixed bug with autorun.inf on USB-drives

Enjoy using the software!