When we reviewed the previous version of Ashampoo's Photo Optimizer, our tests showed that it was a decent though not stellar product. Its greatest weakness was a lack of image editing tools and special effects. With the new version 4.0, Ashampoo Photo Optimizer's feature set has been expanded, making it more fun and more useful.

Whereas previously Ashampoo Photo Optimizer was very lightweight on editing tools, Version 4 has added several image adjustments and special effects, such as Hue, Saturation, Blur, Sharpen, Outline and Reduce noise. Age image has 11 different appealing presets (plus 9 frames) to add crackling, noise and color fading, emulating the look of antique photos. The tools are applied either by clicking on an effect's name to cycle through presets, or, in some cases, by using sliders to control the levels or amount of the change.

Ashampoo Photo Optimizer has been optimized to take advantage of multi-core processors, and can now load larger images up to 45 megapixels in size. Sharing is enabled, via Windows email, to Facebook, or as a Web album on Picasa. However, a photo we supposedly uploaded to Facebook never appeared on our Facebook page or photo albums, despite repeated attempts. The vendor suggested this may be due to our PC's higher-than-average security settings.

Photo Optimizer is remarkably easy to understand and use. We expect that photo editing novices (the primary market for this program) will be up and running--and having fun with their photos--within moments of first opening the program. However, users with more experience may find the program too simplistic.