Filed under: Utilities, Windows, Freeware, Beta, Windows x64
Portable Snowbird is a fast single-pane file manager
by Lee Mathews Dec 30th 2008
If you're looking for a simple, fast, portable file management application to run instead of Windows Explorer, you might want to take Snowbird for a spin.
It's less than half a meg in size and includes some features that aren't included in Windows by default. Snowbird's main window is split between a tree view on the left and folder view on the right. Like Vista, breadcrumbs appear as you navigate but there's also an up button - an omission from Vista's Explorer interface that tends to irk some people.
Snowbird also maintains a list of recently visited locations and allows you to bookmark local and networked folders. The integrated search performs well, displaying results in a popup window. Memory usage is very light, and it ran without issue on my Vista Ultimate x64 install.
Overall, there's not a ton of functionality in Snowbird, but it's certainly good enough to serve as a replacement for the Windows default.
The author's site is hosted by GeoCities, so you may want to head to the via link at Freeware Files to download it.
[ via Freeware Files ]
It's less than half a meg in size and includes some features that aren't included in Windows by default. Snowbird's main window is split between a tree view on the left and folder view on the right. Like Vista, breadcrumbs appear as you navigate but there's also an up button - an omission from Vista's Explorer interface that tends to irk some people.
Snowbird also maintains a list of recently visited locations and allows you to bookmark local and networked folders. The integrated search performs well, displaying results in a popup window. Memory usage is very light, and it ran without issue on my Vista Ultimate x64 install.
Overall, there's not a ton of functionality in Snowbird, but it's certainly good enough to serve as a replacement for the Windows default.
The author's site is hosted by GeoCities, so you may want to head to the via link at Freeware Files to download it.
[ via Freeware Files ]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Mark said 8:16PM on 12-30-2008
This looks like it might be the very thing I'm looking for. I really hate the new Windows Explorer in Vista and 7, so I've been using the old File Manager from Windows NT 4.0 instead. It works great, though you can't right click and do anything like rename or delete. So this could be just the thing, that is if I could download it. Why on earth do people host pages on Yahoo, their bandwidth limits are pathetic.
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Mark said 8:25PM on 12-30-2008
Oh nevermind, I didn't see the freeware files link. Well, I gave it a try and it has a long way to go to being usable but it looks promising. First there are no options at all, at least none that I could find. There's no way to tell it not to show system folders like $recycle.bin and system volume information. It also seems sluggish when first loading the file system, even the old Windows File Manager brings everything up instantly. I don't like how it underlines what you point at or how it automatically expands folders either. Polish the interface, add the ability to set options and fix the performance issues and this will be a nice Windows Explorer replacement though. Until then I'll stick with good old winfile.exe :)
Saint Seminole said 9:39PM on 12-30-2008
Why not use the much better freeware file managers, like Nexus File or Xplorer2? They have double-pane interfaces that use tabs, and include special copy/past functions, compare-folder functions, etc.
The one above seems just like Windows but with a few add-ons.
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