Customer Reviews

PC Study Bible 4 Complete Reference Library

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I HAVE REVISED THIS REVIEW IN LIGHT OF THE RESPONSE (SEE ABOVE) FROM KIRT WILLIS, AN EMPLOYEE OF THE PUBLISHER
(...)
I have been a user of PC Study Bible since version 2 in 1998. the new interface in v4 alleviates most of the problems from previous versions which showed their DOS/early Windows roots. The incremental releases, up to the current v4.3 have also added some additional functionality that is much appreciated.

In addition, my experience with Biblesoft's customer support has been extremely positive. They are prompt to answer and always answer thoroughly.

What bothers me is that when I bought my original version back in '98 I was pretty green with knowledge of various Bible study tools (commentaries, lexicons, etc). I have since discovered that over half of the resources that Biblesoft included in this "Complete Reference Library" set are public domain and can be found for free on the web or in other programs. Even the "Bonus CD" has a large percentage of public domain resources.

I still own PCSB and use it when needed. However, I have discovered e-Sword, a free Bible study program with many free resources available for it, many of which you would have to pay for with PCSB. While perhaps not as flexible, it has suited my studies just fine. Plus, there is a very active online community of e-Sword users (primarily on Yahoo Groups) that have made many other resources available for free as well offering help when needed. There are also some free, third party tools available for creating your own resources in e-Sword, similar to the "Authoring System" in PCSB.

Biblesoft, like most commercial bible study software publishers, seems to be built on a business model of selling you their base "package" products and then charging extra for add-ons, which are the things you really want. But it has been my experience that other companies such as Logos and WordSearch include fewer public domain resources in their base package offerings than Biblesoft does. Why pay over $250 for mostly public domain materials?

PCSB is great as a general study tool and the authoring system is nice (though not as good as the one in Bible Explorer.) While PC Study Bible does offer some things that you can't get for free (online or with e-Sword, etc.) there are other commercially available products that I think are better and more powerful, especially if you are planning to get into original language studies. I'd personally recommend the Logos Bible Study Software as a good choice.

This is not an "unbiased" review since I work for Biblesoft, the developer of PC Study Bible. Since there is only one other review on this page which has voiced his negative concerns, I thought it would be good to balance that opinion out until others have provided further "independent" opinions about the product.

Take a look at the Amazon customer reviews on Version 3 of PC Study Bible. They are balanced and give you some pro/con insights:

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B00002S6LF/104-9722846-9885504?v=glance

With Version 4, those aspects of the Version 3 program that either confined the further development of the product or that caused customer confusion were changed to give greater functionality and ease of use. Some people do not like change, but others have adapted to it and agree that the experience is better.

Visit Biblesoft's user Forum at
http://www.biblesoftexchange.com/html_asp/forums/index.php
and see the extensive comments (good and bad) from actual customers who are willing to critique as well as praise this product.

I have the 2.0 of this and it was wonderful my Dad pasted away and had the 4.0. I loaded it up what a mess it is. I can't find anything on it. Don't waste the money if you don't use the web to get stuff free just get the 2.0 It will have all you could ever need unless you are working on you Dr. and need every version of the Bible ever print even in Spanish! With notes from a dozen men.