Nothing highlights that…shall we say, diversity of what Stardock makes better than Fences.  So, on the one hand, Stardock makes popular PC games but on the other hand, we’re the world’s top desktop utility company.  And the number #1 utility is called Fences.

According to the data, there were approximately 3 million active users of Fences.  That means, people who have used Fences in the past 30 days.  That’s a lot of people.

Putting out a version 2 was a tall order. It’s hard to live up to a program that so many people considered critical.  For me, my favorite feature wasn’t the organizing as much as the “GO AWAY” feature (double click on the desktop, icons hide, double click to bring them back). 

There are a lot of new features in Fences 2 but in my mind, there are two killer features that make it an obvious upgrade:

#1 It lets you have “pages”. Sort of like on your iOS or Android device, you can now swipe the desktop to bring another page of Fences.  One could almost have imagined that such a UI would have made (ahem) more sense than the “Start” screen in Windows 8. 

#2 Folder Portals.  These are Fences that point to a directory on your computer.  In hindsight, it’s an obvious feature. Instead of having to dump more stuff on your desktop, you can just have a given fence represent a directory. Very handy.

You can get Fences at https://www.stardock.com/products/fences

You can read CNET’s review here: http://download.cnet.com/Fences/3000-2072_4-10909535.html