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Find news, reviews, how-tos and tips on business software ranging from enterprise resource planning (ERP) and customer relationship management (CRM) to collaboration tools and mobile apps.
  • Review

    Check Internet connection speeds with NetSpeedMonitor

    Posted May 26, 2012 - 7:25 am

    These days, even the most powerful PC is not of much use without a solid Internet connection. And even if your connection is great, do you know how much data you consume, and at what rates? And can you tell which applications are connecting to the Internet, and where they're connecting to? NetSpeedMonitor is a small, unobtrusive donationware utility that can help you answer all of these questions.
  • Review

    Rip and convert files with free MP3 toolkit

    Posted May 26, 2012 - 7:19 am

    MP3 Toolkit is simple and it works, letting you convert audio files to a number of different types, merge multiple files into one, clip files for ringtones or the like, edit tags, rip files from CD, and record using a microphone. There's nothing spectacular about it, unless you're impressed that it's free.
  • Review

    Regain a long-missed Twitter feature with classic retweet

    Posted May 26, 2012 - 7:14 am

    Change is never easy, especially when it's one of your favorite services making the changes--and forcing them on you. But, if you're one of the many Twitter users still lamenting the loss of the old-style retweets in the new Twitter, you don't need to be sad any longer. Classic Retweet, a simple Firefox add-on and Google Chrome extension, can return you to the glory days of Twitter's retweet feature, allowing you to append your pithy comments to everything you retweet
  • Review

    Free Wise Registry Cleaner defrags the Windows registry

    Posted May 23, 2012 - 3:26 pm

    Every once in a while, I run across a program that seems too good to be free--but truly is. Wise Registry Cleaner 7 (WRC 7 from here on in) is such a program. Actually, it's a bit more than a registry cleaner. It also defrags the registry and offers quite a few system tweaks under its System Tuneup tab.
  • Review

    Microsoft System Center 2012 review: Streamlined cloud service management

    Posted May 20, 2012 - 7:27 am

    With System Center 2012, Microsoft delivers tools to help customers wring more efficiency, uptime and performance out of their existing hardware and software.
  • Review

    Browser-based games you can win without losing your job

    Posted May 19, 2012 - 7:25 am

    We all strive for focus at work, but sometimes a bit of distraction is a good way to become unstuck or gain a new perspective on some problem. Here are a few great games that you can play for free, from the comfort of your browser, without installing anything (except Flash, which you probably already have). Though they may not contribute directly to getting those TPS reports done to spec, they don't carry an "NSFW" label, either. After a few minutes of decompression, you'll be refreshed and ready to work again.
  • Review

    Sencha Architect: Visual HTML5, sort of

    Posted May 17, 2012 - 2:29 pm

    Sencha's drag-and-drop tool for building Web and mobile apps is friendly to designers if they're also developers
  • Review

    Stop spyware in its tracks with Open-Source HijackThis

    Posted May 10, 2012 - 3:05 pm

    Reviewing HijackThis is like talking to an old friend for the first time after a lengthy communications hiatus. I lost track of the program's development shortly after Trend Micro took it over. Not that I or my repair colleagues ever stopped using it--it's too darn handy when it comes to spotting malware and removing detritus from your system. Now, Trend Micro has placed the program in open source, so perhaps development will continue beyond the version 2.0.4 that it's been stuck at for a while.
  • Review

    Lion DiskMaker makes it easier to create a bootable Lion installer

    Posted May 10, 2012 - 7:35 am

    I’ve written quite a bit about installing Lion (OS X 10.7) and about the benefits of creating a bootable installer disc or drive. While the latter process isn’t prohibitively difficult, it’s still a bit of a hassle. Developer Guillaume Gète has made it a bit easier with Lion DiskMaker, an AppleScript-based utility that mostly automates the procedure.
  • Review

    Review: Quickoffice Connect is a poor iCloud clone

    Posted May 5, 2012 - 7:30 am

    Stick with the original Quickoffice HD app and either Dropbox or Box instead for a more reliable, cheaper alternative
  • Review

    Review: Avira Free Antivirus

    Posted May 2, 2012 - 12:02 pm

    Avira Free Antivirus 2012 is fast and is unlikely to scare you with false-positive warnings about legitimate files, but it is also worse than average at detecting malware, and its interface is overly complicated.
  • Review

    Review: Malwarebytes Anti-Malware Free

    Posted May 1, 2012 - 3:24 pm

    Malwarebytes Antimalware Free 1.61 is a supplemental free product that can help bolster your existing security software. The makers of Malwarebytes Antimalware pitch it as a tool for detecting and removing brand-new "zero-day" malware, and it uses a number of different technologies to accomplish this task.
  • Review

    Review: Avast Free Antivirus

    Posted May 1, 2012 - 3:03 pm

    Avast's freebie finished second in PCWorld's 2012 free antivirus roundup. Avast Free Antivirus 7 mostly excelled in protecting against malware, it has a versatile interface, and it sped through our battery of malware tests.
  • Review

    Review: Panda Cloud Antivirus

    Posted May 1, 2012 - 3:02 pm

    If you think setting up antivirus software should be as simple as possible, Panda Cloud Antivirus 1.5 is for you. Panda stops malware well, and its extremely easy-to-use interface is great for those people who don't want to tweak all sorts of settings.
  • Review

    Review: AVG Anti-Virus Free Edition

    Posted May 1, 2012 - 7:41 am

    AVG Anti-Virus Free Edition was PCWorld's top pick in April 2012's Free Antivirus You Can Trust. It performed well in virtually all of the tests we ran.
  • Review

    Dell simplifies the blade server

    Posted April 28, 2012 - 7:02 am

    Dell's PowerEdge C6220 squeezes four two-socket servers into 2RU, delivering blade server density at a rack-mount price
  • Review

    WampServer delivers a smart, Windows-friendly platform for Apache, MySQL and PHP-based apps

    Posted April 23, 2012 - 12:36 am

    While many popular website applications (WordPress, Drupal, Joomla, etc.) are open source and therefore freely available, running these PHP-based apps on a Windows IIS web server requires a bit of retrofitting.
  • Review

    SlimCleaner 3 crowd-sources PC maintenance

    Posted April 19, 2012 - 8:30 am

    At the risk of sounding like a late night "slow PC" TV commercial, I take a look at the latest release of a utility intended to keep your Windows machine running lean and mean.
  • Review

    7 top tools for taming big data

    Posted April 18, 2012 - 6:11 am

    Top-flight reporting, analysis, visualization, integration, and development tools that help you harness Hadoop
  • Review

    Real-time wiki Hackpad makes Web collaboration fast and easy

    Posted April 14, 2012 - 7:41 am

    In software, "new" all too often means "complicated." New tools often tempt us with futuristic features and promises of improved productivity, but learning to use them can be a confusing experience, not to mention the time lost while trying to get up to speed. So when I see a tool that is truly new, but also manages to be simpler and more streamlined than the current alternatives, I am truly impressed. Hackpad is one such tool: A new breed of Wiki that shows how much simpler and fluid wikis can be.
  • Review

    Find out what happens to your Outlook emails with Track Your Sent

    Posted April 14, 2012 - 7:40 am

    The folks at Caelo Software, makers of some excellent tools for organizing your Outlook email, are at it again with Track Your Sent. Unlike the company's NEO Pro, Track Your Sent is not an overall email organizer. Instead, it takes aim at a narrow part of your email experience: the messages you send. Although plenty of email utilities help bring order to your inbox, your sent items folder is often overlooked, left to drown under the weight of its own unorganized mess. Not anymore.
  • Review

    Hands-on: 3 comment platforms make blog management easier

    Posted April 14, 2012 - 7:30 am

    If you have a popular blog, it can be difficult to keep control of the conversation. We look at 3 comment platforms -- Disqus, IntenseDebate and Livefyre -- that can help.
  • Review

    Finally! An Office cloud service for iPad worth using

    Posted April 12, 2012 - 6:12 am

    Products like OnLive Desktop have given desktop-as-a-service a bad name; CloudOn may fix that blemish
  • Review

    Review: Yahoo Mojito gives server-side JavaScript a lift

    Posted April 11, 2012 - 6:07 am

    Yahoo's open source framework combines YUI on the client, Node.js on the server, and excellent use of MVC design pattern
  • Review

    Hands-on: Nokia Lumia 900 puts Windows Phone back in the race

    Posted April 6, 2012 - 6:09 am

    The Nokia Lumia 900 puts Windows Phone in with the big kids, offering good performance, a bright display and stylish design.

SoftwareWhite Papers & Webcasts

White Paper

Activities Streams Base An Integrated Social Layer

The enterprise social software market is exploding thanks to converging trends of consumerization, cloud, and mobile. In this must-read report, "The Forrester Wave: Activities Streams, Q2 2012", Forrester Research Inc. evaluated five social software vendors with core strengths in the stream based on the overall strength of vendors' current offerings, a clear product strategy, and vendor market presence. In a detailed look at the space, Forrester named Yammer as a leader.

White Paper

ESG Lab Review: HP 3PAR Peer Motion Software

This ESG Lab review sponsored by HP + Intel documents hands-on testing of HP 3PAR Peer Motion Software's distributed volume.Intel and the Intel logo are trademarks of Intel Corporation in the U.S. and/or other countries.

White Paper

Deliver Cost-Effective Business Continuity with Extreme Capacity

IBM DB2 provides application cluster transparency technology that equips organizations running OLTP applications with the ability to deliver high availability and continuous uptime for transactional data, plus the flexibility and capacity they need to remain competitive.

White Paper

What Developers Want: The End of Application Redeploys

Eliminate application restarts in Java with JRebel! JRebel is a JVM plugin that eliminates application redeploys from the Java development cycle, a process that takes over 10 minutes of coding time away from developers each working hour, according to a recent survey. Just code, refresh and see everything instantly.

White Paper

What Developers Want: The End of Application Redeploys

Eliminate application restarts in Java with JRebel! JRebel is a JVM plugin that eliminates application redeploys from the Java development cycle, a process that takes over 10 minutes of coding time away from developers each working hour, according to a recent survey. Just code, refresh and see everything instantly.

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