Customer Reviews
A 'MUST' replacement after "The Flood of '06" 
2008-05-14
After replacing the bare necessities of life (thanks in no small part to Amazon) lost in the "500-Year Flood" that hit upstate New York nearly two years ago, I'm finally getting around to finding the "Oh, yeah, I wonder where I might find...? Amazon, of course!
Two caveats, after that you're home free...
1) Forget the 'Text to Speech' feature. Whichever voice you choose, it is delivered in a monotone, and the software only reads words by syllable, so the word 'action' comes out "act-i-on". Better off just reading it yourself.
2) It only contains material "in the Public Domain", so there are a few things you won't find. No problem with really old things, but being a 'Mystery' fan I was a little disappointed. All dozen or so of Conan Doyle's 'Sherlock Holmes' were there, but the copyright to "Miss Marple, Hercule Poirot et al" are still held by Dame Agatha's family.
BUT!... Don't hesitate, especially at this price. Great value for a family. Everyone can read their favorites, and little Billy or Susie can quote President So & So from his State of the Union address for that **** term paper.
AND FINALLY, to all New Yorkers: When is enough... ENOUGH?!?! Tell your State Senator or Legislator
Unbelievable value! 2007-07-03
This is one of the most astounding things I own. Over 10,000 books in a 4-CD case the size of one paperback.
I especially enjoy the pulp novels--The Shadow, Doc Savage, The Avenger, The Whistler and others. You'll find all the Shadows (hundreds) and all the Doc Savages (127) here. Classic fiction writers like Kipling, Talbot Mundy, Max Brand, Jack London, Stevenson, Cooper.
I set up my printer for "executive" size pages and print these books out on cheap 3-hole notebook paper.
In a collection this size, you'll find lots of stuff you'll never read, like ancient history and philosophy by Greek and Roman writers. Many of the books are out of print and others are in public domain, meaning their copyrights have expired. But there's tons of enjoyable reading here.
It also has a neat feature in which you can have your computer read the book to you, and you can choose from a woman's or two men's voices. Super for the sight-impaired.
It's a rare occasion when you buy something that just blows you away, but that's what the Ultimate Library did for me. If you love to read, this is a true gold mine.
EXCELLENT PRODUCT 2007-01-03
I am amazed at the amount of books in this CD set! The price is fantastic and they ship really fast. When will they come out with a CDROM with all of the books in the Library of Congress? That would be great! I'd pay up to $50.00 for that!
A lifetime of reading 2005-08-31
I got this product before amazon offered it (they've got a much better price, darn!) and I'm amazed at how much data they crammed into these CDs. Its easy to navigate, you can print out the books or read them on the screen, the text to speech is cool, but not perfect. I hope they release more CDs like these, not that I'd have time to get to them if I read all 10,000+ books!
