Countdown MAX!

Personal information managers are great for helping you keep track of important events, appointments, reminders and various other types of tasks. However, many such tools have comprehensive options that some people never need to use.

If you're looking for a simple and straightforward app that can monitor multiple countdown timers to events, you can try Countdown MAX!. Originally, it was called HS Countdown and could only count down to one event at a time. But the developer decided to take it up a notch, adding support for many simultaneous timers. The app also has plenty of customization options.

Because it's wrapped in a no-install package, you can download, unzip and double-click the .exe to start Countdown MAX! right away. On the other hand, you should know that the tool is not truly portable because it needs .NET Framework and creates configuration files (in the same directory as itself) to remember your settings and countdown timers.

Once launched, the application creates an icon in the systray, providing quick access to all options on the right-click menu as well as to your countdown timers on left click. To set up a new event, all you have to do is write the caption name, indicate the date and time, as well as personalize the font, background and border colors, along with the border size. The timer's window can be previewed while picking colors. And, since as we previously established that countdown timers are saved to configuration files, you can set the file's name too.

There is no limit to the number of countdown timers you can create and save to files. By default, they are stacked together so that you can effortlessly move everything when changing the main window's position on the screen. But it's also possible to split up the timers to individually control them.

If you're interested in statistics, you can bring them up for any timer (of all) thanks to  Countdown MAX!, in order to check out total weeks, week days, weekend days, days, hours, minutes and seconds, together with the target day of the week, day of the year, and date/time.

Additional configuration settings can be used for changing the properties of all timers at once (e.g. transparency, date format, autosize height), keeping them on top of other applications, locking the window size, displaying scrollbars, or copying all text. Background images may be applied instead of solid colors.

Unfortunately, keyboard shortcuts aren't supported, and Countdown MAX! doesn't trigger visual or audio alerts when time's up for an event. Nevertheless, the application is intuitive and practical, ideal for users looking for a straightforward timer tool.