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What are the reasons that Limewire became so popular on the PC and on the Mac platform?

It is probably the most popular client for the Gnutella network. This file sharing network quickly replaced the famous old Napster after it has been shut down and is now more popular than ever..

The new cleaned up Java interface in version 4.1 of Limewire looks way better than earlier versions. You know it's made for the business of exchanging files and nothing distracts from that goal.

Because it is written in Java it can be used on any Operating System where java can be installed. That includes Windows, Mac OS, Linux, Unix and Solaris.

This has also disadvantages. It needs Java to run. That means you should take care that you always have the latest version of Java installed on your computer and it's quite "resource heavy".

Another reason for it's success might be, that it doesn't tackle you with ad-ware, nag-ware or hurting colors. It just convinces with a clear and transparent surface for searching, downloading, browsing and collecting files.

The various improvements regarding network performance and downloading from multiple sources, deliver considerably more search results and faster downloads.

Version 4.1 has some nice additions that help you getting the job done.

As Limewire is open source software, you can expect that it gets updated quite fast. The last version 4.1 is maybe not the fastest, but certainly a very stable and a good p2p file sharing program.


Plus:

* Clean interface
* No adware
* No spyware (at least it seems so)
* Downloads from multiple hosts (faster downloads)
* Good search and filtering functions
* You can customize most functions

Minus:

* Not enough protection against viruses because the Gnutella network is flooded with Junk. Especially watch out for files with the file size of 851,7, 69,4 or 0,00 Kb.
* Maybe a tick slower than Morpheus.
* May not run on Macs with the latest security updates.

PowerDVD 10 has just been released, and in this review, we look at what's new, what good and what's not so good.

That big thing for PowerDVD 9 was HD, and for PowerDVD 10, it is clearly 3D. PowerDVD 9's new TrueTheater HD can convert your SD content to HD, in realtime, and PowerDVD 10's TrueTheater 3D aims to the same for the realtime conversion of 2D content to 3D. But for those without 3D equipment, or simply don't care for it, is there anything for them? Read on to find out ...

You can read the archived review of PowerDVD 9 in the article titled: Power

Ahead Nero Express is developed by Ahead Software AG and is used by 124 users of Software Informer. The most popular version of this product among our users is 5.5. The names of program executable files are CoverDes.exe, Nero PhotoShow Express.exe, nero.exe, NeroExpress.exe and TaskLaunch.exe. Works with nrv, nrw, nrs, nrg, nhf, nr3, nra, nrb, nrc, nre, nrh, nri, nrm and nru file types. The product will soon be reviewed by our informers.

The latest update of Firefox 4 Beta is now available for download and testing in more than 30 languages, adding 10 new languages. This update includes multi-touch support for Windows 7 and new JavaScript values to experience faster and smoother graphics. We also have vital feedback from our testers that we will incorporate into future updates.

More details on the cool new features for Web developers in this Firefox 4 Beta update:

Multi-touch
Firefox 4 Beta now has multi-touch support for Windows 7 to enable people to
interact with Web content with their hands naturally. Developers can use multi-touch capabilities to leverage touch-enabled devices and provide people with an intuitive and fun browsing experience. For more details, see the blog posts by Paul Rouget and Felipe Gomes.

New JavaScript Values
Changes to the C++ representation of JavaScript enable Firefox to execute heavy, numeric code more efficiently. This sort of code is used to produce smooth, streamlined graphics in modern Web applications. For more details, see Rob Sayre’s blog post.

Firefox 4 Beta includes a Feedback Add-on with Mozilla Labs Test Pilot, which will ask you to take part in anonymous studies. You can choose to opt-out of any or all studies and manage your settings in the Feedback button. The feedback is used to help us improve future Firefox Beta releases. See Mike Beltzner’s blog post for more details.

The Feedback tool has been a great success, and our half-million testers submit approximately 3,500 pieces of feedback every day. Test Pilot recently conducted a survey of Firefox 4 Beta testers to help us better understand the dedicated testers who have been giving us this fantastic feedback. We discovered that our beta users are primarily men who use the Web between two and six hours each day, mostly for entertainment and communication. This doesn’t come as a surprise to us, but it also isn’t a great representation of Internet users. We need your help! If you’re enjoying using the Firefox 4 Beta, tell your friends, get them set up and don’t forget to point out the Feedback button.

Marketers trying to keep pace with Twitter and Facebook may want to check out another emerging social media platform: Tumblr.

At first blush, Tumblr, described as a “blogging platform,” which aggregates online content on a particular theme (like, say, skateboarding), doesn’t seem to have an obvious marketing application. But IBM, EMI and Universal Music have all discovered that creating a tumbleblog (a term that preceded the two-year-old Tumblr’s existence) is a good way to help control the message online, reward fans and, in IBM’s case, position oneself as a thought leader on a given topic.

IBM began using Tumblr last fall as part of its Smarter Planet initiative, which was based on a November 2008 speech by CEO Sam Palmisano that posited that in an interconnected world, smarter solutions to problems like wasted energy, gridlocked cities and our antiquated healthcare system will come easier.

IBM ran TV ads from Ogilvy & Mather, New York, on the Smarter Planet theme, but it also has a blog and a tumbleblog related to the idea. The tumbleblog aggregates content from news sources like Information Week and The Wall Street Journal. A heading for “smarter healthcare,” for instance, includes a link to a Boston Globe story on a device developed in South Africa that can help prevent Sudden Infant Death Syndome by monitoring a baby’s movements—if it doesn’t detect any in 15 seconds it vibrates and then, if the baby hasn’t responded, it sounds an alarm.

Marketers can provide such links via blogs, but Tumblr makes it easier to aggregate content like news articles and video. Like Twitter, you can also “follow” a tumbleblog you like. Users can also hit a “like” button or reblog the post onto their own Tumblr page, making the blog items more viral. Adam Christensen, social media manager for IBM, said the idea is to drive online conversation. “It certainly raises awareness for the kinds of things that IBM is working on,” he said. “We don’t want it to be just about IBM, and Tumblr gives us a holistic view.”

At the same time, though, Tumblr can also help a marketer like IBM control its message online in ways that aren’t possible via Facebook and Twitter. Tumblr CEO David Karp said that music artists like Katy Perry and Lenny Kravitz were the first to embrace the platform, and earlier this year labels EMI and Universal Music followed suit. Karp said that marketers who go on Twitter, for instance, find that they are “having weird conversations with the public” and using the platform to short circuit public relations disasters.

In contrast, he said, Tumblr is a way to both control the message and to reward your most loyal consumers by offering them a platform via aggregating their blog posts. “You can find the most positive voices in the community and link to them,” he said. “You can vindicate them and turn yourself into a positive force.”

Michael Arauz, a strategist at Undercurrent, a digital shop in New York, said he believes Tumblr opens up the possibility of letting a marketer present itself as a curator on the Web. He suggests, though, that brands pick a specific issue like IBM did, rather than try to merely reflect its brand personality via Tumblr. “Pick something specific,” he said. “It’s really about showing what’s important to your brand.”

2011 comes with countless gadgets that gained popularity and acclaim worldwide. Along with the fast development of technology, more and more new innovative electronic products are brought into our lives and their upgraded version are also launched quickly by the electronic giants. Here, we take a look at the most anticipated gadgets of 2011 and their advanced features.

Apple iPhone 5

Apple iPhone 5 comes with a sleek design and face recognition mechanism. It is equipped with OLED screen and 64GB memory.

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It has got a built in GPS navigation feature and HD audio quality. You can synchronize with iTunes and customize SMS alerts and tones. It offers you video chat access on 3G. The screen is scratch protected for more durability. iPhone 5 has advanced graphic chips and dual core processors for improved resolutions of images and videos. The anticipated features include pico projector for presentation on a wall or flat surface. You could watch local channels on your iPhone 5.
The New Apple iPod Touch (4G)

The 4th generation Apple iPod Touch is the latest model having 32 GB capacity.


You can capture 40 hours video as well as record and edit HD video. You can also make FaceTime calls. If you are looking for one of the best electronic gifts for her in 2011, then give her the The New Apple iPod Touch (4G). The multi touch display of 3.5 inch diagonal widescreen is damn attractive. The 960-by-640 backlit LCD display and the two built-in cameras, iPod touch captures video amazingly.
Sony PS3

This is a popular gamingdevicefor kids. Hundred of games are available from action, adventure, to suspense. You can even stay connected and chat with your friends while playing through Wi-Fi connection. Your kids will definitely love to have a PS3.

3D Vaio by Sony

3D laptop computer by Sony will boast of IR blaster to synchronize with bravia glasses. Lodged in F series chassis, the laptop has 16" display, which can be used for PS3. The laptop comes with 1080p 240fps display for games and video in 3D. It comes with Blu-ray drives and can be upgraded from 2D to 3D. For crystal clear picture quality, 3D Vaio uses the same technology in Bravia TV, along with Black Frame Insertion. 3D Vaio is based on frame sequential technology for HD display via shutter glass. You can change between 3D and 2D with one touch button. 3D viao is going to be one of the best electronic gadgets of 2011.

Kindle 3G Wireless Reading Device

Electronic book readers can be a cool electronic gift for her, isn't it? She can carry this portable electronic device and read ebooks whenever she wants. Upload as many as ebooks you want, and it's compatible with iPhone, Android, BlackBerry, iPad and Kindle because of it Whispersync technology. It has a very fast global 3G coverage (more than 100 countries) and a free 3G wireless network from where you can download books and start reading anytime. Other features of this book reader include built in Wi-Fi, books in 60 seconds, 3500 book capacity, enhanced PDF reader, 20% faster page turns, glare free reading. Don't you think this is one of the bestelectronic gadgetsfor 2011?

I’m not convinced that mini-PCs are the way to go but many people are. They love the idea of having all the computing power of a full-sized desktop crammed into a container that’s smaller than most novels. Stealth has been making mini-PCs that fit the bill for years but the new LPC-670 PC may just be the cream of the crop.



Sure, you get to choose between Intel’s Arrandale Core i5-520M, Core i5-580M, or Core i7-620M processors and can slap in up to 8GB of DDR# RAM to make your machine as fast as you need it but with a price tag of over $1,650 for the base model even that might not be enough computer for the cash.

In addition to the hardware listed above you can opt for up to 750 GB of storage on a 2.5 inch hard drive. Optical drive options include Blu-ray and DVD read/write drives. Oddly enough, some of the things we’ve come to think of as obligatory on full-sized PCs or even netbooks (such as built-in WiFi, HDMI, and gigabit Ethernet ports) are conspicuously optional on the LPC-670. Presumably that’s so you can fine tune your PC to fit your needs but it seems a little backward to have to pay for any of that.

Head on over to the official Stealth website for all the details.

So a mouse is a mouse is a mouse, right? Sort of. We know that they all do the same thing but the varying degrees of success you might have controlling your input with bargain basement mouses is probably a little frustrating. If you want a mouse that’s easy to use (no programmable macros here) and gets the job done the way you want it to without breaking the bank you should check out Logitech’s newest—the M325.

It’s a wireless little performer that promises to be more precise than any other you’ve ever paid under $50 for. That’s because Logitech has tripled the average number of teeth in the cogs of the scroll wheel, added a super-precise laser, and glued on some really nice rubber grips. It’s simple, understated, and just plain nice to use.



To top it off, this mouse has an estimated 18 month battery life (with moderate use) that means your power needs won’t make up for the $40 price tag even when you measure the effective life in years.

However, like I said before, the M325 is just a mouse. There’s nothing fancy here and if you’re an above average PC user, you might want something with a little more pizzazz. For everybody else, the M325 wireless mouse is worth it.

Did I mention it uses Logitech’s Unifying Receiver? So, if you’ve already got one, you have a spare!

Hit up the official Logitech website for more info.

Toshiba, the once and (some would say) future king of laptops has announced the launch of their newest model—the Toshiba Portege R380. The machine is lean, mean, and ready to do business. Modeled after the Portege R700—slim, sleek, and stylish—the 13.3 inch R830 has a lot of the features users have come to expect from the Portege line with a few surprises thrown in for good measure.

Inside the R830 runs on a Sandy Bridge processor combined with a speedy 7200 RPM hard drive or the optional 128GB solid state drive. Upgrade to the optional AMD Radeon graphics setup and you’ll get 1GB of dedicated RAM—enough for most business uses and some casual gaming.



Another interesting addition is the USB 3.0 port, allowing lightning fast data transfer if you so happen to have a USB 3.0 peripheral or thumb drive. Sadly, the HDMI port is actually optional—a strange thing in an era where everyone is obsessed with HD graphics.

You’ll get the obligatory WiFi though (802.11 b/g/n) and Toshiba even threw in Bluetooth 3.0.

While the internals aren’t exactly impressive, they certainly make for a capable machine and Toshiba is hoping that style will sell the R830, much like it did the R700. The case is slim, black, and manufactured from molded plastic that’s supposed to look like alloy but won’t interfere with wireless signals. The lightweight materials means the laptop weighs just 5.3 pounds but is roughly 19 percent thinner and 6 percent lighter than the venerable R700.

Pricing on these puppies starts around $1,000.

Hit up the Toshiba website for all the details.

Alienware PCs have always been flashy. From the extraterrestrial green glow to the bug-eyed “Grey” staring you in the face it’s clear that the company values its image almost as much as it does its reputation. But the machines have always been one step ahead of the competition and the M18x is no exception.

This is the latest gaming laptop released from the “out there” PC manufacturer and comes with some heavy spec’s indeed. To start off the machine runs on an Intel Core i7 Extreme chip that comes overclocked and zipping by at 4GHz. Strap in your choice of graphics cards (either AMD’s CrossFireX or NVIDIA’s SLI) and you’re set to bring the heat to your next LAN party with 18.4 inches of pure 1920 x 1080 Full HD beauty.



But what’s a gaming PC without a ton of RAM, right? Alienware gives you the option of cramming up to 32GB of DDR3 inside the M18x to handle any game available on the market now and for the next decade.

You’ll also get a 3D-capable HDMI out, Wireless HD and a host of other obligatory ports for all of your favorite peripherals.

If you’re one to let style sway your decisions, the M18x’s anodize aluminum chassis is available slick black or flashy red.

There’s now word on a final launch date or a price but with Alienware, if you have to ask . . . .

Hit up the Dell website for a handful of glossy pictures and more spec’s if you’re interested.

After the 2002 launch of Friendster, several eUniverse employees with Friendster accounts saw its potential and decided to mimic the more popular features of the social networking website, in August 2003. Within 10 days, the first version of Myspace was ready for launch. A complete infrastructure of finance, human resources, technical expertise, bandwidth, and server capacity was available for the site, right out of the gate, so the Myspace team wasn’t distracted with typical start-up issues. The project was overseen by Brad Greenspan (eUniverse's Founder, Chairman, CEO), who managed Chris DeWolfe (MySpace's starting CEO), Josh Berman, Tom Anderson (MySpace's starting president), and a team of programmers and resources provided by eUniverse.

The very first Myspace users were eUniverse employees. The company held contests to see who could sign up the most users. The company then used its resources to push Myspace to the masses. eUniverse used its 20 million users and e-mail subscribers to quickly breathe life into MySpace, and move it to the head of the pack of social networking websites. A key architect was tech expert Toan Nguyen who helped stabilize the Myspace platform when Brad Greenspan asked him to join the team.

The origin of the MySpace.com domain was a site owned by YourZ.com, Inc. It was intended to be a leading online data storage and sharing site up until 2002. By 2004, Myspace and MySpace.com, which existed as a brand associated with YourZ.com, had made the transition from a virtual storage site to a social networking site. This is the natural connection to Chris DeWolfe and a friend, who reminded him he had earlier bought the URL domain, MySpace.com, intending it to be used as a web hosting site, since both worked at one time in the virtual data storage business, which itself was a casualty of the "dot bomb" era.

Shortly after launching the site, team member Chris DeWolfe suggested that they start charging a fee for the basic Myspace service. Brad Greenspan nixed the idea, believing that keeping Myspace free and open was necessary to make it a large and successful community.

Some employees of Myspace including DeWolfe and Berman were later able to purchase equity in the property before MySpace, and its parent company eUniverse (now renamed Intermix Media) was bought in July 2005 for US$580 million by Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation (the parent company of Fox Broadcasting and other media enterprises). Of this amount, approximately US$327 million has been attributed to the value of Myspace according to the financial adviser fairness opinion.

Oxfam America President Raymond C. Offenheiser, Wendi Deng, and Rupert Murdoch with MySpace co-founders Anderson and DeWolfe at the 2006 Oxfam/MySpace Rock for Darfur event

In January 2006, Fox announced plans to launch a UK version of Myspace in a bid to "tap into the UK music scene" which they have since done. They also released a version in China and have since launched similar versions in other countries.

The 100 millionth account was created on August 9, 2006, in the Netherlands.

The corporate history of Myspace as well as the status of Tom Anderson as a Myspace founder has been a matter of some public dispute.

On November 1, 2007, Myspace and Bebo joined the Google-led OpenSocial alliance, which already includes Friendster, Hi5, LinkedIn, Plaxo, Ning and SixApart. OpenSocial was to promote a common set of standards for software developers to write programs for social networks. Facebook however remained independent. Google had been unsuccessful in building its own social networking site (Orkut was succeeding in Brazil but struggling in the U.S.) and was using the alliance to present a counterweight to Facebook.

By late 2007 into 2008, Myspace was considered the leading social networking site, and consistently beat out main competitor Facebook in traffic. At its peak, when News Corp attempted to merge it with Yahoo! in 2007, Myspace was valued at $12 billion.
Decline

Since 2008, Myspace has been in in a continuing loss of membership, and there are several suggestions for its decline. Some said that Myspace failed to innovate and stuck to a "portal strategy" of building an audience around entertainment and music, whereas Facebook and Twitter continually launched new features to improve the social-networking experience. A former Myspace executive suggested that the US$900 million three year advertisement deal with Google, while being a short-term cash windfall was a handicap in the long run. That deal required Myspace to place even more ads on its already-heavy advertised space, made the site difficult to use and reduced flexibility, as Myspace could not experiment with its own site without forfeiting revenue, while rival Facebook was rolling out a clean and easily-understood site design. These have been cited as factors why users, who as teens were Myspace's strongest audience in 2006 and 2007, have been migrating to Facebook; Facebook which started strong with the 18-to-24 group (mostly college students) has been much more successful than Myspace at attracting older users.

On April 19, 2008, Facebook overtook Myspace in the Alexa rankings. The site ranking of Myspace as of March 2011[update] was 69, as opposed to the number 2 position held by Facebook.

Former AOL executive Jonathan Miller, who joined News Corp in charge of the digital media business, was in the job for three weeks when he shuffled Myspace's executive team in early 2009. Myspace President Tom Anderson stepped down while Chris DeWolfe was replaced as Myspace CEO by former Facebook COO Owen Van Natta. News Corp. Chairman and CEO Rupert Murdoch was said to be frustrated that Myspace never met expectations, as a distribution outlet for Fox studio content, and missing the US$1 billion mark in total revenues.

Myspace has attempted to redefine itself as a social entertainment website, with more of a focus on music, movies, celebrities and TV, instead of a social networking website. Myspace also developed a linkup with Facebook that would allow musicians and bands to manage their Facebook profiles. CEO Mike Jones was quoted as saying that Myspace now is a "complementary offer" to Facebook Inc., which is "not a rival anymore."

In March 2011, market research figures released by comScore suggested that Myspace had lost 10 million users between January and February 2011, and that it had fallen from 95 million to 63 million unique users during the previous twelve months. Myspace registered its sharpest audience declines in the month of February 2011, as traffic fell 44% from a year earlier to 37.7 million unique U.S. visitors. Advertisers have been reported as unwilling to commit to long term deals with the site.

At the start of 2011, there was media speculation that Myspace Corp. will be auctioned during the year. If Myspace were to be sold, it is estimated to be worth $50–200 million. Losses from last quarter of 2010 were $156 million, over double of the previous year.

The one thing you can say for certain about Twitter is that it makes a terrible first impression. You hear about this new service that lets you send 140-character updates to your "followers," and you think, Why does the world need this, exactly? It's not as if we were all sitting around four years ago scratching our heads and saying, "If only there were a technology that would allow me to send a message to my 50 friends, alerting them in real time about my choice of breakfast cereal."

I, too, was skeptical at first. I had met Evan Williams, Twitter's co-creator, a couple of times in the dotcom '90s when he was launching Blogger.com. Back then, what people worried about was the threat that blogging posed to our attention span, with telegraphic, two-paragraph blog posts replacing long-format articles and books. With Twitter, Williams was launching a communications platform that limited you to a couple of sentences at most. What was next? Software that let you send a single punctuation mark to describe your mood? (See the top 10 ways Twitter will change American business.)

And yet as millions of devotees have discovered, Twitter turns out to have unsuspected depth. In part this is because hearing about what your friends had for breakfast is actually more interesting than it sounds. The technology writer Clive Thompson calls this "ambient awareness": by following these quick, abbreviated status reports from members of your extended social network, you get a strangely satisfying glimpse of their daily routines. We don't think it at all moronic to start a phone call with a friend by asking how her day is going. Twitter gives you the same information without your even having to ask.

The social warmth of all those stray details shouldn't be taken lightly. But I think there is something even more profound in what has happened to Twitter over the past two years, something that says more about the culture that has embraced and expanded Twitter at such extraordinary speed. Yes, the breakfast-status updates turned out to be more interesting than we thought. But the key development with Twitter is how we've jury-rigged the system to do things that its creators never dreamed of.

In short, the most fascinating thing about Twitter is not what it's doing to us. It's what we're doing to it.

The Open Conversation
Earlier this year I attended a daylong conference in Manhattan devoted to education reform. Called Hacking Education, it was a small, private affair: 40-odd educators, entrepreneurs, scholars, philanthropists and venture capitalists, all engaged in a sprawling six-hour conversation about the future of schools. Twenty years ago, the ideas exchanged in that conversation would have been confined to the minds of the participants. Ten years ago, a transcript might have been published weeks or months later on the Web. Five years ago, a handful of participants might have blogged about their experiences after the fact. (See the top 10 celebrity Twitter feeds.)

But this event was happening in 2009, so trailing behind the real-time, real-world conversation was an equally real-time conversation on Twitter. At the outset of the conference, our hosts announced that anyone who wanted to post live commentary about the event via Twitter should include the word #hackedu in his 140 characters. In the room, a large display screen showed a running feed of tweets. Then we all started talking, and as we did, a shadow conversation unfolded on the screen: summaries of someone's argument, the occasional joke, suggested links for further reading. At one point, a brief argument flared up between two participants in the room — a tense back-and-forth that transpired silently on the screen as the rest of us conversed in friendly tones.

At first, all these tweets came from inside the room and were created exclusively by conference participants tapping away on their laptops or BlackBerrys. But within half an hour or so, word began to seep out into the Twittersphere that an interesting conversation about the future of schools was happening at #hackedu. A few tweets appeared on the screen from strangers announcing that they were following the #hackedu thread. Then others joined the conversation, adding their observations or proposing topics for further exploration. A few experts grumbled publicly about how they hadn't been invited to the conference. Back in the room, we pulled interesting ideas and questions from the screen and integrated them into our face-to-face conversation.

When the conference wrapped up at the end of the day, there was a public record of hundreds of tweets documenting the conversation. And the conversation continued — if you search Twitter for #hackedu, you'll find dozens of new comments posted over the past few weeks, even though the conference happened in early March.

Injecting Twitter into that conversation fundamentally changed the rules of engagement. It added a second layer of discussion and brought a wider audience into what would have been a private exchange. And it gave the event an afterlife on the Web. Yes, it was built entirely out of 140-character messages, but the sum total of those tweets added up to something truly substantive, like a suspension bridge made of pebbles.

The summer of 2010 isn't even over yet, but the 2011 antivirus utilities are pouring in already. Significant players are still waiting in the wings, it's true. Norton's 2011 product releases are imminent, as are Trend Micro's. Spyware Doctor and others won't be far behind. But quite a few of 2011's antivirus apps, both commercial and free, have already sprung up. Among others, Bit Defender Antivirus Pro 2011, Kaspersky Anti-Virus 2011, and Panda Antivirus Pro 2011 and Webroot AntiVirus with Spy Sweeper 2011 are all available and have already been through my testing. If you're looking to buy antivirus, today, the results show that there are already some solid choices available.
Note that, as always, when I say "antivirus" I mean a utility that protects against all kinds of malicious software, not just viruses. Trojans, spyware, rootkits, keyloggers, adware, scareware—a proper antivirus must handle all of these.
Standalone or Suite?
Many of this year's products blur the line between standalone antivirus and security suite. Panda Antivirus Pro 2011 includes a fully-functional personal firewall and can monitor other Panda installations on your network. BitDefender Antivirus Pro 2011 offers full remote management across the network as well as a top-notch antiphishing module. BitDefender and Kaspersky Anti-Virus 2011 both scan for security vulnerabilities, though BitDefender takes the concept a bit farther. Outpost Antivirus Pro 7.0 and BitDefender can block transmission of user-defined private data, a feature usually found only in suites. Ad-Aware Pro Internet Security 8.3 and Kaspersky will tune system performance and wipe out traces of computer and Internet use. Sometimes it's hard to remember that the product is "only" an antivirus, not a full suite.
Adjustable Interfaces, Built-in Support
Some users want to hear about every little security event, but most prefer a product that just does the job, without making a fuss. Ad-Aware appeals to both with a choice of simple or advanced mode. BitDefender goes even further. Not only can its users choose basic, intermediate or expert view, they can build a personal collection of their most-used tools.
Webroot AntiVirus with Spy Sweeper 2011 totally focuses on keeping everything as simple as possible. It updates automatically, scans while the system is idle, and interacts with the user through a completely redesigned interface. All the detail a tech-savvy user might want is available, but it's hidden when not needed.
Built-in and automated support features grace many of these tools. BitDefender includes a search box for help topics right on its main screen; a built-in tool will gather system information and contact an agent for chat-based support. Kaspersky's built-in support tool can send diagnostic reports to the company and process purpose-built scripts to fix specific problems. Panda's PSCAN lets remote analysts request samples and push fixes without requiring full chat-type interaction.
The Best Protection
I torture-tested all of these products, challenging them to clean up 13 malware-infested systems and to block malware from attacking a clean system. Interestingly, the most effective antivirus products in my tests were not those that bulked up with added features. Webroot offered the best protection overall, especially against rootkits and scareware. Ad-Aware also scored very well in my tests, but Webroot edged it out to become our Editors' Choice for standalone antivirus. For full details on how I test antivirus products see How We Test Anti-malware.
Recent Free Antivirus Releases
Commercial security vendors seem to have standardized on a "fall model year" plan, like car manufacturers. The numerous free antivirus products tend to come out with an update whenever it's convenient. I've reviewed several newly-released free products this summer, some very good, some not so good.
Panda Cloud Anti-Virus 1.1 remains our Editors' Choice for free antivirus protection. In some of my tests it has actually matched the top commercial products. For example, Panda Cloud Antivirus and Ad-Aware share the highest detection rate in my malware blocking test. With its extremely minimal user interface and cloud-based detection system it's a good choice for those whose budget doesn't stretch to a paid solution.
Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware 1.46 is a perpetual favorite among security experts. It's not uncommon to find another company's tech support agents calling on Malwarebytes to clean up a stubborn infestation. It's a tiny download, it installs quickly, and it gets right to business. What it won't do is protect your system from attack – it's strictly a cleanup tool.
I evaluated two free products for the first time this season, digital defender free 2.0 and Immunet Protect Free 2.0. Digital defender didn't detect much malware and left many threats running after allegedly removing them. Its for-pay Pro edition spent a much longer time scanning without appreciably improving the results.
Immunet focuses on protecting you by protecting the community of friends and contacts around you. You can easily hook friends up with a free copy of the program and view the security status of your entire community. Eventually this community- and cloud-based system may offer effective antivirus protection, but my testing showed that it doesn't at present.
Of course this isn't the final word on antivirus protection for 2011. I'll be reviewing many more apps in the weeks to come. Many of the heavy hitters haven't yet released their 2011 editions. For now, though, Webroot leads the pack

The one thing you can say for certain about Twitter is that it makes a terrible first impression. You hear about this new service that lets you send 140-character updates to your "followers," and you think, Why does the world need this, exactly? It's not as if we were all sitting around four years ago scratching our heads and saying, "If only there were a technology that would allow me to send a message to my 50 friends, alerting them in real time about my choice of breakfast cereal."

I, too, was skeptical at first. I had met Evan Williams, Twitter's co-creator, a couple of times in the dotcom '90s when he was launching Blogger.com. Back then, what people worried about was the threat that blogging posed to our attention span, with telegraphic, two-paragraph blog posts replacing long-format articles and books. With Twitter, Williams was launching a communications platform that limited you to a couple of sentences at most. What was next? Software that let you send a single punctuation mark to describe your mood? (See the top 10 ways Twitter will change American business.)

And yet as millions of devotees have discovered, Twitter turns out to have unsuspected depth. In part this is because hearing about what your friends had for breakfast is actually more interesting than it sounds. The technology writer Clive Thompson calls this "ambient awareness": by following these quick, abbreviated status reports from members of your extended social network, you get a strangely satisfying glimpse of their daily routines. We don't think it at all moronic to start a phone call with a friend by asking how her day is going. Twitter gives you the same information without your even having to ask.

The social warmth of all those stray details shouldn't be taken lightly. But I think there is something even more profound in what has happened to Twitter over the past two years, something that says more about the culture that has embraced and expanded Twitter at such extraordinary speed. Yes, the breakfast-status updates turned out to be more interesting than we thought. But the key development with Twitter is how we've jury-rigged the system to do things that its creators never dreamed of.

In short, the most fascinating thing about Twitter is not what it's doing to us. It's what we're doing to it.

The Open Conversation
Earlier this year I attended a daylong conference in Manhattan devoted to education reform. Called Hacking Education, it was a small, private affair: 40-odd educators, entrepreneurs, scholars, philanthropists and venture capitalists, all engaged in a sprawling six-hour conversation about the future of schools. Twenty years ago, the ideas exchanged in that conversation would have been confined to the minds of the participants. Ten years ago, a transcript might have been published weeks or months later on the Web. Five years ago, a handful of participants might have blogged about their experiences after the fact. (See the top 10 celebrity Twitter feeds.)

But this event was happening in 2009, so trailing behind the real-time, real-world conversation was an equally real-time conversation on Twitter. At the outset of the conference, our hosts announced that anyone who wanted to post live commentary about the event via Twitter should include the word #hackedu in his 140 characters. In the room, a large display screen showed a running feed of tweets. Then we all started talking, and as we did, a shadow conversation unfolded on the screen: summaries of someone's argument, the occasional joke, suggested links for further reading. At one point, a brief argument flared up between two participants in the room — a tense back-and-forth that transpired silently on the screen as the rest of us conversed in friendly tones.

At first, all these tweets came from inside the room and were created exclusively by conference participants tapping away on their laptops or BlackBerrys. But within half an hour or so, word began to seep out into the Twittersphere that an interesting conversation about the future of schools was happening at #hackedu. A few tweets appeared on the screen from strangers announcing that they were following the #hackedu thread. Then others joined the conversation, adding their observations or proposing topics for further exploration. A few experts grumbled publicly about how they hadn't been invited to the conference. Back in the room, we pulled interesting ideas and questions from the screen and integrated them into our face-to-face conversation.

When the conference wrapped up at the end of the day, there was a public record of hundreds of tweets documenting the conversation. And the conversation continued — if you search Twitter for #hackedu, you'll find dozens of new comments posted over the past few weeks, even though the conference happened in early March.

Injecting Twitter into that conversation fundamentally changed the rules of engagement. It added a second layer of discussion and brought a wider audience into what would have been a private exchange. And it gave the event an afterlife on the Web. Yes, it was built entirely out of 140-character messages, but the sum total of those tweets added up to something truly substantive, like a suspension bridge made of pebbles.

Samsung Galaxy Tab vs. iPadThe Android vs. Apple battle has officially made its way into the world of tablets.

Samsung took the wraps off its new Samsung Galaxy Tab Android tablet on Thursday. The Galaxy Tab is a 7-inch slate built to complete with the current tablet king, Apple's thus-far-unchallenged iPad.

Sure, there have been a couple other Android tablets on the market already (see Streak, Dell), but the Galaxy Tab is the first that truly qualifies as a contender.

Samsung Galaxy Tab*According to manufacturers' estimatesSo how exactly does Samsung's Galaxy Tab differ from the iPad? Check out this comparison chart for a side-by-side glimpse at the two devices' specs and see for yourself. (Click image to zoom.)

In a nutshell, the Galaxy Tab is smaller and lighter (though rumors suggest a couple of larger editions will debut before the year's end). It has the same speed processor but twice the RAM. Like the iPad, the Galaxy Tab comes with different options for internal storage. It also, however, supports up to 32GB of expandable storage; Apple's device is limited to the internal space only.

The Galaxy Tab has two cameras -- a rear-facing 3.2-megapixel camera and a front-facing 1.3-megapixel camera for video chatting -- while the current models of the iPad have none. Samsung claims up to 7 hours of video playback for the Galaxy Tab; Apple says its iPad can last up to 10 hours.

In terms of software, the Galaxy Tab's Android 2.2 operating system gives the device a number of selling points Apple's iPad can't claim, including full-featured multitasking, support for Adobe Flash, and unrestricted access to applications (Apple is notorious for censoring all sorts of material -- ranging from political satire to swimsuit-clad women -- and also for banning apps that provide functions such as free tethering and customization of the operating system).

Samsung's Galaxy Tab is set to launch in Europe within the next few weeks, then in the U.S. shortly thereafter. Pricing and carrier information for the States is not yet available, though rumors suggest the Galaxy Tab could end up on Verizon.

JR Raphael is a PCWorld contributing editor and the author of the Android Power blog. You can find him on Facebook, on Twitter, or at eSarcasm, his geek-humor getaway.

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Still wondering where you can get your hands on a PlayBook on day one? There’s one more store to add to the list. Office Depot will be carrying the BlackBerry tablet on launch day, April 19.

On April 19 you should be able to walk into your local Office Depot and pick up your very own PlayBook. If you don’t want to risk not getting on, Office Depot has the tablet up for pre-order on it’s website right now. Ordering online will have the PlayBook shipped out sometime between April 19 and April 21. As with other stores, Office Depot will have the 16GB, 32GB and 64GB models of the WiFi PlayBook starting at $499.

Office Depot is also advertising that it will have “accessories for the well-dressed BlackBerry tablet.” Not sure what those are supposed to be quite yet, though hopefully there will be some sort of accessories available at launch. Sure accessory makers have had plenty of time to come up with something.

Sony has today announced a new version of the Sony Vaio S laptop.

It is moore stylish and mobility-friendly in full-flat magnesium casing, a concealed hinge and new internals based on Intel’s Sandy Bridge offering.

The new Sony Vaio S notebook is equipped with a 2.7GHz Intel Core i7-2620M dual-core processor, up to 8GB of RAM, and a HDD or SSD.

The Sony Vaio S 2011 edition has also a 13.3-inch display with resolution of 1366 x 768 pixels, Radeon HD 6470M or HD 6630M graphics accelerator, DVD writer (or Blu-ray drive), Wi-Fi 802.11b/g/n, Bluetooth 2.1, webcam and two USB 3.0 ports. Sony will offer optional installation of 3G module.

Sony Vaio S is weighs 1.75 kg and 24mm thick and comes pre-reloaded with Windows 7 Professional 64-bit OS and enabling up to 7 hours of operation.
Sony Vaio S Series Price & Availability

Sony did not disclosed the price but said that the new Edition of VAIO S will start shipping in Mid-March 2011.

Today, finally, we get to read full reviews of Sony’s PSP Go. The device has been in the spotlight for some time and we’ve seen a number of hands-on reports, but this is the first time that sites are posting full reviews of their experience with Sony’s newest handheld system.

The Go will be a download-only device thanks to its lack of a UMD drive. This introduces gamers to all sorts of thorny issues about what to do with their old games, how to get new content without overpaying, and so on. There is no question that the new hardware is interesting and worth investigating, but these will be what really makes or breaks the Go. We should keep in mind that the Go is not a replacement for the PSP 3000, but rather something that will run alongside it, at least until the PSP 3000 is replaced.

Engadget wraps things up quite nicely:

We really do like the portable, but there’s no way to separate our feelings on the hardware from all the decisions surrounding the launch. That $50 upfront premium (more if you factor out the bundled PSP-3000 games) is more or less negated when you consider the cost of a 16GB Memory Stick Duo, something that the Go already has with internal flash memory, but long-term you’re still gonna be paying more for every retail game bought digitally instead of on disc. That last bit is something that should make first-time buyers take heed, as lack of legacy support on same-generation games and accessories isn’t our biggest gripe here. It’s not as if Sony’s oblivious to the perception — in fact they’ve even gone on the record as saying there’s a “certain premium” associated with the Go — but we’re really not getting enough here to justify it to our wallets.

Have you ever dropped your phone in a puddle, a sink, or a toilet? Most people believe that you have to purchase a new phone if it is water damaged. This may not be necessary if you immediately take the phone apart and
dry it out.

First, retrieve your phone as soon as possible and immediately remove the battery. The water will most likely cause electrical shorts when there is a power source.

Second, remove your SD card. Although these cards can withstand some moisture, you need to pat them dry. Lay the cards aside to allow them to air dry.

Then, you need to remove as much moisture as you can by shaking your phone.

After that, carefully towel dry your phone and remove any covers and plugs to open up as many gaps and crevices as possible.

Next, use a vacuum cleaner to suck any excess moisture out. Do not hold the vacuum too close to your phone, as this while cause static electricity. Hold the vacuum above each crevice for about twenty minutes. This method may have your phone working again in about thirty minutes. Do not use a hair dryer or place your phone in front of an air conditioner. These can force excess moisture further into the phone instead of removing it, eventually leading to component failure. If a vacuum is not available, you can hold the phone in front of a high velocity fan.

Afterward, draw out extra moisture using a desiccant product such as "Damp Rid". If this is not available, you can place your phone and battery in a bowl containing uncooked rice overnight. Then, lay your phone on towels. When you can feel moisture on the towels, use the vacuum again. Repeat these steps until there is no moisture evident on the towels (for about four to six hours).

Finally, put your battery back in and try to turn your phone on. If it does not power up, attempt to plug your phone into the charger without the battery. If this works, you will need a new battery. If it doesn't work, head to the cell phone store and explain your situation. Do not try to hide the fact that your phone has been wet.
Have you ever dropped your phone in a puddle, a sink, or a toilet? Most people believe that you have to purchase a new phone if it is water damaged. This may not be necessary if you immediately take the phone apart and dry it out.

First, retrieve your phone as soon as possible and immediately remove the battery. The water will most likely cause electrical shorts when there is a power source.

Second, remove your SD card. Although these cards can withstand some moisture, you need to pat them dry. Lay the cards aside to allow them to air dry.

Then, you need to remove as much moisture as you can by shaking your phone.
move your SD card. Although these cards can withstand some moisture, you need to pat them dry. Lay the cards aside to allow them to air dry.