Software for Biblical Archaeology

I have been asked to give my opinion on the best archaeological resources available for Logos Bible Software (Libronix), ranking them in order I would recommend for those with limited budgets. I was given this list:

Bible Review: The Archive
Archaeology Odyssey: The Archive CD-ROM
Biblical Archaeology Review Archive CD-ROM
The Biblical World in Pictures CD-ROM
Biblical Archaeologist on CD-ROM
And other products at: www.logos.com/products/groups/allitems/biblical-studies-biblical-archaeology

My recommendation for the five listed, in order, is:
Biblical Archaeology Review Archive ($120) – excellent source of general information about many subjects, and easily searched

Biblical Archaeologist ($109) – more technical and limited, but has many important articles in the 60 years covered.

Archaeology Odyssey: The Archive ($50) – this is good if you are interested in the archaeology of places outside of Israel, including Jordan, Egypt, Turkey, Greece, and Rome. But there are only 5 years of issues, which makes the collection limited.

Not recommended:
The Biblical World in Pictures ($150) – I don’t recommend this for a student, and hesitate to do so even for teachers because the picture resolution is low and the quality poor. On the other hand, for photos of artifacts, I don’t know of anything else. (For photos of biblical sites, see BiblePlaces.com, of course :-)).

Bible Review: The Archive ($80) – this magazine is usually so liberal that I don’t find it worth my time. As a reference, it can be more valuable, but it usually leaves archaeology to its BAR sister.

Others (from the list here):
The Context of Scripture, 3 volumes ($300) – not cheap, but worth every penny if you are studying the ancient world.

Archaeological Encyclopedia of the Holy Land ($30) – the entries are generally brief and dated (1996; this is not the latest printed edition), but since neither the New Encyclopedia of Archaeological Excavations in the Holy Land (NEAEH) nor the Oxford Encyclopedia of Archaeology in the Near East (OEANE) is available electronically, this is next in line. I believe that Shimon Gibson has a new printed edition of AEHL in the works.

Final Note:
I would buy Anchor Bible Dictionary ($230) and probably also the IVP Reference Collection ($120) and the International Standard Bible Encyclopedia ($130) before any of those recommended above. If you can’t afford Anchor, get the Eerdman’s Dictionary of the Bible instead ($45).