Foreword

On Monday I reviewed the  Doro PhoneEasy 612 and today we are going to take a look at another product in the Doro range, Doro for PC.

With Doro Experience®, no one needs to feel uneasy about using a computer. Anyone can use a PC and stay in touch with family and friends. Send and receive emails, browse the web, read, write and print documents, share photos, play games, listen to music, watch video clips, keep track of important contacts and events, and more. Also enables free voice and video calls via Skype. Install on your new Windows PC, or make your old computer easier to use. Features simple navigation and specially selected apps. The license key is valid for 2 years from date of registration.

Designed for people who find the who PC thing just a little too hard to navigate and understand, Doro have created a minimal interface that allows users to see only what they need to however the question is, does it work as well as it says it does and how easy is it compared to todays Windows 8 interface.

Price & Where From

£40 from Amazon UK

In The Box

* Software CD

* Instruction Manual

Minimum PC Specs

• Windows XP Service Pack 3
• 1 GB RAM
• 2 GB of free HDD space

Software Layout

Doro Experience for PC is made up of tabs and app buttons and looks very much like the interface of things like Leapfrog’s LeapPad.

Good Points

• Simple to use interface
• Ease to Set up
• Full screen layout

Bad Points

• Licensing
• Browser
• Lack of Multi User support

Conclusion

Before I start to talk about my thoughts, take a look at the video below for an overview of how this software looks and works.

So now that you’ve had a look at the video, let’s talk about how I found the software and the overall experience.

The set-up itself was fairly straight forward and consisted of 10 screens however I found that it took quite a bit longer to install than it should have given the nature of the software.

When it installed I launched it and was instantly greeted with the apps layout and I have to admit that I liked it, it was clean, it was fresh and most of all it just made sense.

Navigating the experience was simplistic, it was obvious that even for a new user there would be no problem knowing what was what and the likelihood of running into right click mayhem that plagues so many new users is impossible.

The settings menu was perfect, nothing that could cause a user to get lost or confused and what’s even better is that users can’t change system wide settings that might cause their experience to be tainted.

The one thing I didn’t like however was just how easy it was to get back to Windows. A few clicks and I could hide the Doro Experience behind Windows or completely come out of it all together. I would rather that the software had a specific key combination or a password protected area that let admin or experienced users get back into windows.

Outside of the setup, look and feel there was the apps, all pretty well designed for the task they performed and kept minimalistic however the browser was pretty dated and is in clear need of being swapped out or updated for perhaps Firefox or Chrome Kiosk mode.

The in software media player for videos and music was spot on, perhaps the music interface could do with a bit more work however for what it is and who it’s designed for, there really isn’t much need for changing it.

Overall the software is great, I could see this being put in classrooms, day care places or elderly residential homes  to get people online however the downside to that is that the software does not allow for multiple users (a massive fail) and that when bought, the licence only lasts two years (even bigger fail).

It’s hard though not to love this, even with the multi user and licensing fails, the software does exactly what it says it’s going to do and that’s what matters.

SCORE

[rating rating=”3″]