As useful as CD-ROM drives are, the sad fact is that they are dog slow. The average hard disk is ten times quicker at finding data than a CD-ROM drive. A CD-ROM cache utility can help put some hustle into that sluggish optical drive by storing recently retrieved data on a fast hard disk or even in RAM. For a measly $US29, CD-Quick Cache lets you designate a portion of RAM or any local hard disk as a cache to boost the speed of your CD-ROM drive. It's easy to install and use and includes a utility for before-and-after speed tests. CD-Quick Cache works in Windows 9x and requires a CD-ROM using a 32-bit driver.

A trial version, cdq95.exe, is available on this month's cover CD or from the manufacturer's Web site ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/circuitsys.