PokerTracker 4 Public Beta Now Open to All Players

Friday was a major day for PokerTracker, the immensely popular poker tracking and analysis software. Why, you ask? What was so monumental about Friday that we felt the need to write a feature article just one day later? The PokerTracker 4 Public Beta has been released and is now available to all poker players. Anyone can now take PokerTracker 4 for a test drive.

PokerTracker programmers require the feedback of all Public Beta testers so that they can fine-tune the fourth installment of the software for commercial release. PokerTracker's Private Alpha and Private Beta tests have run over the last several months and are now complete. The point of the Public Beta is to root out any bugs that PokerTracker's developers and testers, for whatever reason, couldn't spot or didn't experience. It's the final step before a commercial release.

The newest version of PokerTracker is 4.01.11 and added support for Zoom Poker on PokerStars. We'll be writing a feature article on PokerSoftware about Zoom Poker very soon, but it's very similar to Rush Poker on the now-dormant Full Tilt Poker. As soon as your action in a given hand finishes, Zoom Poker whisks you away to another table with a new set of opponents and another hand begins instantaneously. If you hate sitting idly by at a table, Zoom Poker is for you.

If you're planning to use PokerTracker's HUD when playing Zoom Poker, PokerTracker officials warned, "Hand histories created by PokerStars Zoom tables do not differentiate between play money and real money play at this time. As a precaution, PokerTracker recommends that you create a dedicated database exclusively for Zoom play money hands to avoid intermingling your real money and play money hands accidentally."

Also new in the latest version of PokerTracker 4 is Microgaming anonymous table support. Now, if you're competing on anonymous tables on any of the Microgaming Network sites, you'll be able to fire up PokerTracker and use the program's Heads-Up Display, or HUD, to get stats on your opponents.

According to an e-mail sent to PokerSoftware on Friday, customers who download PokerTracker Version 4.01.11 can expect "numerous updates to address poker client support for most poker sites supported by PokerTracker 3 [and] various changes to improve response times and the in-game experience." PokerTracker officials are quick to release updates to accommodate changes made to online poker sites' clients so that users can have a seamless experience.

Multi-currency support was included in the latest PokerTracker release, as was an overhaul of the Global Graphs interface and user options. The program's development team added full ring positional reports to the Results and Stats summaries and issued a fix to address several HUD fonts that were difficult to read. Another fix solved the problem where stat locations in the HUD were reset after they were saved in the HUD Profile Editor. Finally, PokerTracker developers corrected how full houses were queried.

For now, the Public Beta of PokerTracker 4 is restricted to Windows users only.

Last week, PokerTracker officials released PokerTracker 3.12, which is the latest version of PokerTracker 3 to hit the wire. A PokerTracker representative told PokerSoftware, "This effectively ends the 3.11.X Beta development path. Therefore, we have removed the ability to download the prior Beta. Please note that there are no new features, changes, or fixes since the last Beta, but all PokerTracker 3 users should update to this major release."

If you've never tried out PokerTracker before, we're not sure what you're waiting for. The apocalypse? PokerTracker offers a free 60-day trial so you can get your feet wet before buying it. If you decide you're hooked, you can purchase Poker Tracker for $89.99 for the Full Edition, $44.99 for the Micro-Stakes Edition, $144.98 for the Hold'em and Omaha Full Editions, and $74.98 for the Hold'em and Omaha Micro-Stakes Editions.

You can also get PokerTracker free through PokerSoftware if you sign up for a brand new online poker site and complete the play-through requirements. Be sure to check out our Poker Tracker review.