WinRAR - What's new in the latest version Version 3.61 1. Corrected a bug in multithreaded text compression module, which under some circumstances might result in corrupt archived data. This bug was present only in multithreaded mode and only in WinRAR 3.60. RAR versions for other platforms are not affected. 2. Resolved a compatibility issue preventing WinRAR 3.60 to run in Windows 95. Version 3.60 1. Multithreaded version of RAR compression algorithm improves the compression speed on computers with several CPU, dual core CPU and processors with hyperthreading technology. Multithreading is enabled by default, but you can disable it in "General" part of "Settings" dialog. In the command line mode you can control multithreading with -mt switch. 2. WinRAR can display the folder tree panel allowing to navigate in disk and archive folders. Use "Options/Folder tree" submenu to enable the folder tree. It can be configured separately in file and archive management modes. Folder tree replaces "Browse for folder" command previously available in "File" menu and uses its Ctrl+T keyboard shortcut. 3. Now WinRAR "Rename" command also works with ZIP archives. Previous versions could rename files only in RAR archives. 4. Added decompression of LZH archives created with "-lh7-" algorithm. 5. New "Remove duplicate folders from extraction path" option in "Settings/Compression" dialog. If this option is on and you unpack an archive which root folder has no files and only one 'somename' folder and if destination folder is new or empty and also ends with '/somename', WinRAR will exclude one 'somename' from resulting 'somename/somename' path. 6. New "Define volume sizes..." button in "Settings/Compression". This button activates "Define volume sizes" dialog. Here you can customize the list of predefined volume sizes associated with "Split to volumes, bytes" field in archiving dialog. 7. Speed of RAR general compression increased for some data types. Depending on data type and size the gain may achieve 5 - 15%. 8. New "Rename automatically" option in the extraction dialog and command line -or switch to rename extracted files automatically if file with the same name already exists. You can also enable the auto-renaming mode directly from the overwrite confirmation prompt with "Rename All" button. Renamed files will get names like 'filename(N).txt', where 'filename.txt' is the original file name and 'N' is a number. 9. "Set modification time" option in "Advanced" part of extraction dialog is accessible also for ZIP archives. Previously it could be changed only for RAR archives. 10. "Multithreading" option added to "Benchmark and hardware test" command, so you can compare performance of usual and multithreaded versions of RAR compression algorithm. 11. New 'ch' (change archive parameters) command line mode command. Its purpose is to apply switches like -av, -tl and -cl to archive. 12. New 'cv' command line mode command. It provides the command line interface to WinRAR "Convert archives" command. It is supported only by winrar.exe, not by rar.exe. 13. New command line -sl and -sm switches to set size limits of processing files. 14. New command line -fcu[file] switch allows to read archive comments from Unicode files. It also modifies behavior of "cw" command, setting the comment output format to Unicode. 15. 7Z added to list of formats stored without compression when using -ms switch without a parameter. 16. Switch -e[+] is now supported by most of command line operations including extracting and deleting files. Previously it was supported by only archiving command. 17. It is allowed to use environment variables in archive name in archiving dialog, in destination path in extraction dialog, in folder names on "Compression" and "Paths" pages in WinRAR settings. For example, you can enter '%temp%' in "Folder for temporary files" field. Version 3.51 1. Bugs fixed: a) fixed two vulnerabilities, which could be exploited with specially crafted ACE and UUE/XXE archives; b) previous version did not delete some of temporary files; c) WinRAR could crash when processing very long (more than 1024 characters) archive name parameter in the command line. Version 3.50 1. Now it is possible to change WinRAR's look by installing interface themes. Theme files are available on http://www.rarlab.com/themes.htm Theme files are RAR archives, just open them in WinRAR to install. You can manage installed themes using "Options/Themes" menu. 2. WinRAR supports decompression of ZIP archives created using Zip64 format extension. Zip64 was introduced to remove original ZIP format limitations on archived file size. 3. Added support of multivolume (multipart) CAB archives. 4. New options in "Advanced" part of extraction dialog: a) "Delete archive" options allow to delete extracted archives; b) "Check authenticity information" option controls processing of authenticity information in RAR archives. 5. "Wait if other WinRAR copies are active" option in "Advanced" parts of archiving and extraction dialogs. If enabled, it waits while other WinRAR copies are creating, modifying or unpacking an archive and starts the operation only when other WinRAR tasks are complete. If you are going to perform several archiving or decompressing tasks, such queued execution can help to reduce the amount of disk seeks and improve overall performance. 6. WinRAR is able to integrate to Windows context menus also on Windows x64 systems. 7. SFX modules: a) SFX modules are not compressed by UPX anymore, so they are larger now. UPX compression caused numerous false alerts by antivirus software. If you wish to use compressed modules, you can get UPX from http://upx.sourceforge.net and compress *.sfx files in WinRAR folder; b) The default SFX logo can be replaced by a custom bitmap file. You can do it either with "Load SFX logo from the file" option in "Text and icon" part of "Advanced SFX options" dialog or using -iimg command line switch. Note that -iimg is not supported by console RAR, only GUI WinRAR recognizes it. This option is not supported in Windows 95, 98 and Me. Also you cannot use it if you compressed SFX modules by UPX. c) It is possible to specify user defined SFX icons larger than 32x32 and with any color depth. Like the previous item, this improvement is valid only if SFX modules are not compressed by UPX and your operating system is not Windows 9x/Me; d) DOS.SFX module moved to RAR/DOS32 distributive. If you need to create DOS SFX archives using WinRAR, just copy DOS.SFX to WinRAR folder. 8. "Wizard" command allows to specify a password when creating or updating an archive. 9. Previous WinRAR versions unpacked the complete archive contents if the user pressed Enter or double clicked on *.exe, *.htm and *.html files. Now it is possible to define file masks to unpack everything for. Such masks can be entered on the "Viewer" page of the "Settings" dialog. For example, if you wish to unpack only a file under the cursor when you double click on archived HTML file, remove "*.htm *.html" from this field. 10. Additional file name extensions for archive formats supported by WinRAR can be specified in the "User defined archive extensions" field on the "Integration" page of the "Settings" dialog. For example, if you have files with ".001" extension, which are in RAR format, you can enter "001" here to associate WinRAR with such files. 11. New "Show encrypted or compressed NTFS files in color" option in "File list" page of "Settings" dialog. 12. New "Lock toolbars" option in "General" page of "Settings" dialog and in the menu displayed after clicking the right mouse button on the toolbar. "Lock toolbars" prevents accidental toolbar moving or resizing. 13. "Repair" and "Extract" commands replace invalid characters (colon, question mark, etc.) by underscore also in file names in ZIP archives. Previously WinRAR did it only for RAR archives. 14. New -n and -n@ switches set additional include filters, so only files matching the mask will be processed. 15. New -id[c,d,p,q] switch. Additionally to previously available -idp switch (disable percentage indicator), switches -idc, -idd and -idq instruct the console RAR to hide the copyright message, "Done" message and all information messages. 16. Switch -e+ allows to specify file include attributes mask. For example, you can use -e+h switch to compress only hidden files. 17. Switch -ver[n] supports the optional 'n' parameter also when archiving. It limits the maximum number of file versions. 18. If the short name of an already existing file is equal to the long name of an unpacking file, WinRAR changes the short name of the already existing file before unpacking. In such situation previous versions prompted to overwrite the existing file even though long file names were not equal. 19. Security changes: a) WinRAR shell does not allow to run *.pif files. Archived PIF files is one of typical ways for computer viruses to distribute; b) WinRAR shell does not allow to run files having 5 or more continuous spaces in the name. For example, "calc.txt .exe". Viruses frequently add such spaces to confuse users and hide the real extension. WinRAR shell removes these continuous spaces except first and last also when displaying names of such files in the file list. 20. In Windows XP WinRAR highlights the sorted column in the file list using the different color, like it is done in Windows Explorer. Version 3.42 1. Fixed a buffer overflow bug in WinRAR GUI "Delete" command, which could cause a crash when deleting a file in a corrupt archive. Version 3.41 1. Bugs corrected in this version: a) when adding new files to an already existing RAR solid archive, RAR 3.40 compression ratio was lower than in RAR 3.30; b) WinRAR "Repair" command could crash when repairing a corrupt ZIP archive. 2. If archived Unicode name is invalid, RAR 'l' and 'v' commands display ASCII file name instead of corrupt Unicode. Version 3.40 1. "Fastest" (-m1) RAR compression method has been modified to provide much higher compression speed and lower ratio. It may be useful for tasks requiring the high speed like regular backups. You may increase "Fastest" speed even more selecting 64KB compression dictionary instead of default 4MB. 2. WinRAR is able to decompress archives created by Unix 'compress' tool (.Z files). Like GZIP and BZIP2 archives, WinRAR opens tar.Z and .taz files in one step, so users do not need to unpack .tar manually. 3. WinRAR is able to decompress archives created by 7-Zip (.7z files). "Find" command is not supported for this archive type. 4. New "Security" dialog in WinRAR settings: a) "File types to exclude from extracting" option to prevent extracting of potentially dangerous files like .exe, .scr and .pif; b) "Propose to select virus scanner" option modifies behavior of "Scan archive for viruses" command. You may turn it off if you wish to skip the virus scanner selection dialog. 5. New command line switch -ep3 allows to save and restore full file paths including the drive letter. WinRAR shell equivalent of -ep3 switch are options "Store full paths including drive letter" in "Files/File paths" page of archiving dialog and "Extract absolute paths" in "Advanced/File paths" page of extracting dialog. 6. You may select and compress disks directly in "My Computer" view in WinRAR shell. Just choose "My Computer" in WinRAR address bar, select disks to compress and press "Add". If you selected more than one item, WinRAR will automatically set "Store full paths including drive letter" archiving mode. 7. If you have selected several disks in Windows Explorer "My Computer" view and started archiving from the context menu, WinRAR will automatically set the "Store full paths including drive letter" mode when compressing them. 8. New command line switch -oc to restore NTFS "Compressed" attribute when extracting files. RAR always saves "Compressed" attribute when creating an archive, but does not restore it unless -oc switch has been specified. WinRAR shell equivalent of -oc switch is "Set attribute Compressed" option in "Advanced" part of extracting dialog. 9. Starting from this version RAR volumes contain the volume number field. If the archive was created by WinRAR 3.40 or newer, you may view the volume number in the top line of "Info" dialog and in the address bar. In the command line mode the volume number is displayed by 'L' and 'V' commands in the line with the total volume information. This feature may be useful if original volume names are lost and you need to rename volumes to correct names. 10. Commands 'L' and 'V' display NTFS "Compressed" attribute in archive listing. 11. Switch -ag may include an optional text enclosed in '{' and '}' characters. This text is inserted into the archive name. For example: -agHH{hours}MM{minutes} Same feature is supported in the "Generate archive name by mask" field of WinRAR archiving dialog. 12. If switch -ac is specified, RAR will not reset the "Archive" attribute of those files, which size or modification time was changed after starting the archiving operation. So files modified after placing them to an archive and before clearing "Archive" attribute, will be included in next incremental backup. The same is true for WinRAR "Clear attribute "Archive" after compressing" GUI option. 13. If you use the "Add to favorites" command inside of an archive subfolder, WinRAR will save the subfolder and restore it when accessing this favorite item. Previous versions were able to restore only the root archive folder. 14. When editing archived files, WinRAR proposes to update them immediately after detecting that file was changed. Previous versions waited until an external editor terminates before updating a changed file. 15. If you drop an archive to the WinRAR address bar or toolbar, WinRAR will display its contents even if an other archive is opened right now. Previous versions proposed to add a dropped archive to browsing one. You may still drop an archive to WinRAR file list if you need to add it to browsing archive. 16. Corrected processing of corrupt LZH archives to exclude a possible crash when reading corrupt LZH file headers. 17. RAR and WinRAR display the operation progress while repairing an archive containing the recovery record.