Lazybit

After a rather long development cycle, Private Disk 2.12 is officially released. What has changed?

Major changes under the hood

On lack of admin rights - one of Private Disk's strengths is the ability to start directly from USB flash disks, requiring no installation on the computer. This is a widely used feature, but its use is impeded by the fact that mounting an encrypted disk requires administrative rights. This is a show-stopper, you realize this as soon as you attempt to access your encrypted files in an Internet-cafe, or on a computer at work (university, or any other non-home environment), where administrative privileges are revoked.

Private Disk introduces "Explorer mode", which provides read\write access to the encrypted disk's contents. This mode is invoked automatically, if the required privileges are not available. If you wish to start Private Disk in Explorer mode even if you have admin rights, use the /explorer command line argument.

This is a unique feature for disk encryption software of such kind. To take things one step ahead - we made sure that this works for all the file systems used on Windows - FAT, FAT32, NTFS. Thus you can be absolutely sure that your files will be accessible in any circumstances, regardless of how the planets are aligned in the sky.

Handheld computers and phones - another significant improvement is Private Disk's ability to access encrypted data on Windows Mobile and Windows CE handhelds. This is achieved by adding compatibility with SecuBox from Aikosolutions. In plain English, it means that:

• SecuBox users can mount their encrypted images on Windows desktops;
• Private Disk users can mount their encrypted images on Windows-powered handhelds.

Another interesting bit worth mentioning in this context is that if you already own a license of SecuBox, you can get Private Disk with a discount; and if you already have Private Disk, you can buy SecuBox with a discount.

Here's how SecuBox looks like on a handheld, notice how the interface closely resembles that of Private Disk.

Looks familiar, doesn't it?

Minor changes
Private Disk suffered just a few cosmetic changes, most of the hard work was invested into things that are under the hood. Here are the simple bits:

Installation - you will notice a prettier and a friendlier installer, it sets up Private Disk in 3 clicks (in the past it took about 7). A few clicks are not essential, but they do make a difference.

Playing nice with Windows Vista/Seven - as of Vista, Microsoft made some changes in the way the system behaves. The new version of Private Disk takes that into account and plays nicely with UAC, requesting admin rights when necessary.

Tricks on 64-bit platforms - Private Disk has been updated to behave well on 64-bit computers, which ensures a consistent functionality on any Windows computer; regardless of the hardware you have - Private Disk works in the same way, you don't have to change anything or learn anything new; Private Disk takes care of the details.

Per-user settings - Private Disk keeps user-specific settings, rather than system-wide settings. In the previous releases, the changes made by one user would affect others in the system; that is not the case anymore. Each account on the system can have their own preferences (ex: hotkeys, program icons, etc).

Splash screen can be disabled - I have mixed feelings about this one. On one hand I like the fact that people can see the Dekart logo and Private Disk's icon; on the other one - I always turn splash screens off when possible. You can do that too, the command line argument is /nosplash.

There are some other changes that I will mention here, but I'll ask you not to tell anyone about it ;-)

• If you installed a trial version, and the trial period expired, Private Disk will let itself be purchased with a discount;
• If another copy of Private Disk is running on your network at the same time, Private Disk will be happy that you use it somewhere else, and offer another copy of itself to you with a discount.

What has NOT changed?

A few things haven't changed, they are:

• The licensing policy is hyper-friendly - you get free updates for all the versions of the same major branch (i.e. anything that is 2.x is free for you);
• Technical support is free. We are there when you need us; you can interact with us on our forum, on Facebook, by posting comments on our Youtube channel, by writing an email to the helpdesk, by posting comments here - on Lazybit. For more details, check out Dekart on the social web.
• Private Disk continues to be a lightweight application with a small memory footprint - it is fast, it will not slow your system down, it will not get in your way;
• Private Disk continues to provide a high level of security, to make sure that your secrets stay secret.

What happened to v2.11?
Private Disk jumped directly from 2.10 to 2.12 - that's what you see if you observe what happens on the site. However, a 2.11 release does exist, it was made available for the Japanese market only.

P.S. Private Disk turns 10 soon.

P.P.S. Thanks for reading it all the way down to this point. Patience pays off, here is a link to purchase disk encryption software with a discount. :-)