Radio-Jupiter Pro

CNET Editors' reviewby: CNET staff on October 15, 2009 Radio-Jupiter Pro helps users find the best times to listen for radio noise from Jupiter. Although the publisher's description advises that the program can help users "get started in radio astronomy," those who are beginners with this sort of thing will have to be pretty ambitious if they're going to learn to use this program.The program's interface is dated-looking and filled with numbers and graphs that will mean absolutely nothing to the uninitiated. We decided we'd better check the Help file for guidance, and we were dismayed (and annoyed) to learn that the Help file would have to be downloaded and installed separately. We did that, and found that although the Help file is well-written, some serious thought would have to be put into learning to use this program; it's definitely not geared toward the casual user. The program does contain a fair number of features, including noise storm predictions that are based on the user's location, CML and Io plots, sky maps, and more. It was easy to enter our approximate location and get a prediction, although the Help file did not provide entirely adequate information for understanding the results. Experienced amateur astronomers will likely find all of this pretty useful, but this is definitely not a place to start if you are just beginning to get interested in the subject.Radio-Jupiter Pro has a 30-day trial period. It comes as a ZIP file, as does its separate Help file, but uninstalls without issues. We recommend this program to intermediate and advanced amateur astronomers.