Time to ditch the Qual Browser! FreeStyle is rad!

FreeStyle has been floating around out there for a bit. If you got a new instrument in the last 2 years or so, chances are it came with the installation CD or installed on the PC on the instrument, but its just kind of lurked around. I know these cool guys up on Victoria Island that have been using it and one lab at NIST that uses it to make figures for papers...but...that's it, really.

I heard these words yesterday while anonymously sitting in on a vendor webinar. "FreeStyleWILL replace QualBrowser completely" and it sounds like soon.

YIKES!  I'd better download that sucker and give it a real run. The way the Warriors played last night, they did not deserve even 70% of my attention.

First of all. FreeStyle is very very blue. Like seriously blue. Like Ben Healey blue. Seriously, though, its worth looking at cause its honestly a lot better than Qual Browser.

Proof:
1) FreeStyle knows what scan it is looking at -- every time -- and puts decimal places accordingly
2) FreeStyle can do all sorts of real-time processing stuff for you with single button presses (at the top of the screen. Check this out:

Is that an Xtract button? Seriously? You have your spectra open for your intact mass (protein or nucleotide chain...or...whatever) and you hit the Xtract button. A little menu pops up on the right where you put in very simple parameters and you hit "Apply"

AND ITS XTRACTED!!!!  You get a window with your masses and a table at the bottom that gives you the outputs. Here I took a myoglobin file I found in my downloads file (horse?cow? I dunno) and this is your real output. It found the intact mass of 16941.0072 and two less abundant peaks that look like water loss. How simple is that?

What if its small molecule data? Pull up a file, get to your MS/MS spectra and hit the NIST search tab. A NIST window opens to the right asking where your NIST library is. Reference that library -- and match. (Can't show you that one -- I've got to get to work in a minute!)

What I can show you -- hit the mzCloud button!  (First time you use it you'll have to Install MicroSoft SilverLight. BE VERY CAREFUL. It will try to set Bing as your default search engine...ugh....and make all your browsers start at MSN.com.  Uncheck those boxes! And install the rest. I promise it is worth the risk. Cause...

BOOM GOES THE DYNAMITE!

Here are your molecule matches, predicted structures, evidence, fragmentation tree. YEAH!

Okay, holy cow, I need to shower and get in my car!  There are other features, but I'm behind.

So...how do you get FreeStyle? Get your Xcalibur upgraded to the newest version and it just comes with the install. If you can't upgrade your Xcalibur cause you're on older instrumentation -- register or log in to the Thermo FlexNet and you can download, trial, and register it.