STRIFE

STRIFE is a tiny and portable Windows application equipped with approachable tools for calculating checksums to verify file integrity. It doesn't require previous experience with hash calculators, thanks to its intuitive interface and options.

As installation is not necessary, you can save the program files anywhere on the HDD or on a removable storage unit and simply click the .exe to launch STRIFE. More importantly, it doesn't create new entries in the Windows registry.

At startup, STRIFE brings up a classical file browser that lets you pick the file whose checksum you want to find out, regardless of its extension. Batch processing is supported, so you can discover checksums for multiple selected files at the same time.

The hashes are immediately calculated and shown in the main app window with a neatly organized structure. These include CRC16, CRC32, XSUM and MD5.

Plus, STRIFE reveals the binary code of each file and lets you flag adjacent identical files or between marks, remove adjacent duplicates, send flagged files to the Recycle Bin, as well as to import or export a flagged list.

We haven't come across any surprises in our tests as far as stability is concerned, thanks to the fact that the utility didn't freeze, crash or prompt error messages. Unsurprisingly, it barely used CPU and RAM, so it didn't hamper system performance.

Although its skillset is not particularly rich and the interface is not that attractive, STRIFE delivers a fast and effective method to calculating various file hashes, and it can be handled by anyone.