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| Buyers' Guide to Music & Video Gadgets
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Starship Kingdom 1.2
Licence: Demo, full $US20
Platform: Windows 98/ME/XP
Site: www.apezone.com/starshipkingdom.php
Starship Kingdom is a fun strategy game. In the game, you fight for the right to become the next Star King, battling another noble house and various independent challengers to the throne. You invest in your armaments, ultimately getting a Supernova bomb. You can play another opponent at your computer or online, and can create your own maps.
Crypto! 3.9
Licence: 30-day trial, then $US17
Platform: Windows (all)
Site: www.kmrconsulting.com/crypto.html
Crypto! is a fun puzzle game for children and adults. You solve cryptogram puzzles; in the trial version, the game selects a phrase or other puzzle from its library of 50 puzzles and you have to solve it. The full version offers 10,900 puzzles – a huge library, so that you never run out of puzzles.
Pirates of the Atlantic 1.31
Licence: Trial; full $US10
Platform: Windows 2000/XP/Vista
Site: www.kristanix.com/pirates
Pirates of the Atlantic is a fun game, with good graphics. In the game, you must defend your coastal fortress from the pirate hordes with cannons and gunpowder. The game features exciting challenges and you can amass gold and treasures, which increase your firepower. Buy ammunition, increase your rank and build your defences – this addictive game will keep you engrossed for hours.
Deer Drive 1.51
Licence: Trial; full $US20
Platform: Windows all, from Win 98
Site: www.deerdrive.net/download
Deer Drive is an arcade-style game. You're hunting deer and are challenged by grizzly bears and charging moose. Stay safe and enjoy the hunt, but beware: you're penalised when you shoot a doe. With great graphics and realistic weather effects, plus interesting challenges, Deer Drive is a fun game for all ages.
SolSuite 2007 7.9
Licence: 30-day trial, then $US20
Platform: Windows (all from 98)
Site: www.solsuite.com/download.htm
SolSuite 2007 is a huge collection of almost 500 different games of Solitaire. The trial version gives you three plays of each game. The games include popular favourites like Klondike, Monte Carlo and Rouge et Noire, as well as hundreds of lesser known games. If you're a Solitaire enthusiast, this great collection will keep you happy for years.
Battleship Chess 2.1
Licence: Demo, then $US20
Platform: Windows (all)
Site: www.apezone.com/battleshipchess.php
Battleship Chess is an animated 3D version of the classic Battleship game, played with chess-style moves. It makes for an intriguing game, in which you choose any one of five periods in naval history and command six different styles of warships. When you win, you can upgrade your fleet with bigger guns. You can play the game alone, or with another player.
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Water Illusion Screensaver 3.7
Licence: 15-day trial, then $US20
Platform: Windows (all)
Site: www.nufsoft.com/WIScreensaver.php
Water Illusion is a wonderful screensaver with photos of animated landscapes of waterfalls, beaches, lakes and rivers. The program also includes a utility, the Water Illusion Studio, so you can add water effects to your own photos and make your own screensavers. The special effects include snow and rain, and you can add sound too. Automatic Wallpaper Changer 3.0.5
Price: Free
Platform: Windows (all from Windows 98)
Site: awc.smurphy.co.uk
As the name suggests, Automatic Wallpaper Changer changes your Windows wallpaper at any interval you select. You can choose to display your images at their actual size, or resized to fit your screen, while maintaining their aspect ratio. There are many ways to customise the program so it changes your images when you choose, and displays them in exactly the way you want.
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ACDSee Photo Manager 9 build 108
Licence: 30-day trial, then $US40
Platform: Windows 2000/XP/Vista
Site: tinyurl.com/yu65xk
ACDSee Photo Manager helps you to organise your photos. You can find, share, and view them, as well as do quick edits. The best feature is the Print Layout, which lets you print multiple images on a single page. The program's Calendar Events feature sorts your photos according to the date you took them, and you can group them in any way you choose.
PhotoMeister 2.6
Price: Free
Platform: Windows 95/98/ME/NT/2000/XP/2003 Server
Site: www.photomeister.com
PhotoMeister imports your photos from your digital camera, lets you make quick edits to any images you choose, and then helps you to share your photos. You can create unlimited photo albums, copying photos into the albums from your hard drive, or from a scanner. If you need to enhance your images, PhotoMeister lets you edit, crop, rotate, and fix red-eye.
Paint.NET 3.08
Price: Free
Platform: Windows XP/2003 Server/Vista, Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0
Site: www.getpaint.net
Want free a professional-quality photo editing program? Try Paint.NET. With layers, channels and powerful editing features, you can get your photos ready for print or for the Web. The program offers a tabbed interface with a complete history of edits, with unlimited undo, which makes the program suitable for novices. Paint.NET is a must-have.
Image Broadway 5.1
Licence: 30-day trial, $US90
Platform: Windows 2000/XP/2003 Server/Vista
Site: www.filestream.com/ib
If you're a keen photographer, try Image Broadway. It's fast and the interface is intuitive: you can make photo corrections with sliders. Not only is it a great image editing program with advanced features like layers and channels, it also supports the RAW format from popular digital cameras like Canon, Nikon and Olympus.
Flickr Widget 1
Price: Free
Platform: Windows 2000/XP, Yahoo Widgets Engine
Site: tinyurl.com/27msfq
Yahoo's Flickr Widget makes it easy to share photos on Flickr. You can batch upload entire folders of photos to your Flickr account by dragging and dropping them onto the upload tool. The widget's features include the ability to tag your photos before uploading them, setting privacy levels for individual photos and creating photo sets.
PicLens 1.5.3
Price: Free
Platform: Windows XP/Vista, Firefox 2.0 ; Mac Firefox and Safari
Site: www.piclens.com
PicLens is a Firefox extension which allows you to view images on social sites like Flickr, Facebook and Google Images in slideshow format and in full-screen view. You can search for images, play them as a slideshow and then jump directly to the corresponding Web page. PicLens is also available for the Safari browser.
NeoPhoto 2.0.1
Price: Free
Platform: Windows (all)
Site: www.neophoto.com/downloads
With NeoPhoto, you can create wonderful photo Web sites to showcase your images. The program is both a photo organiser and a Web site creation tool, so you can organise your photos into albums and upload a complete Web site at a click. Most photos need editing, so NeoPhoto has a built-in batch editor too.
Wire Pilot 1.02
Price: Free
Platform: Windows 98/ME/2000/XP
Site: www.colorpilot.com/wire.html
Wire Pilot does one job: this photo retouching software removes wires, antennas, telegraph posts and other unwanted linear objects from your photos. If you've got photos which would look great without telephone wires or fence posts cluttering an outdoor scene, you need this program. There's also a free Wire Pilot plug-in available on the Web site for several graphics programs, including Jasc Paint Shop Pro.
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Avant Browser 11.5 build 20
Price: Free
Platform: Windows 98/ME/NT/2000/XP/2003 Server/Vista
Site: www.avantbrowser.com
Avant Browser is a small, fast browser based on the Microsoft Internet Explorer engine. It includes popular browser features like auto-fill of forms and tabbed browsing, but is unique in that it allows you to save your profile online, so that you can have your bookmarks accessible from any computer.
e-Capsule Private Browser HD 2.1.0.530
Licence: 14-day trial, then $US30
Platform: Windows 2000/XP/2003 Server/Vista
Site: www.eisst.com/products/private_browser
If Internet security is a major concern for you, it will be worth trying the e-Capsule Private Browser. This browser leaves no traces on the computer you're using it on, and in use all your browsing session's temporary files, cookies, passwords, form entries and your Internet cache are kept encrypted via Advanced Encryption Standard 256. The browser also uses proxies, so you're invisible online.
ALPass 2.74
Price: Free
Platform: Windows (all from Windows 98 onward)
Site: tinyurl.com/lx4t4
ALPass is a clever program which manages your logins and passwords. All the data is encrypted, so that it's secure, no matter how many people used your computer. You can transfer your passwords by exporting them to another computer, and the program even lets you take all your passwords with you, on your iPod, on a PDA, or on a USB drive.
Bookmark Buddy 3.6.3
Licence: 30-day trial, then $US30
Platform: Windows (all)
Site: www.bookmarkbuddy.net/about.shtml
If you're a student, or work on the Web, Bookmark Buddy helps you to organise your bookmarks. You can find bookmarks quickly, make notes, and store passwords and logins too. You can even create encrypted bookmark files to keep your data secure. The program will import all your existing bookmarks and lets you take your bookmark collections with you on a USB drive, or any removable media.
Yahoo Messenger 8.1.0.413
Price: Free
Platform: Windows 95/98/ME/NT/2000/XP
Site: messenger.yahoo.com/webmessengerpromo.php
With Webcam for video chats, easy file transfer and chat rooms, Yahoo Messenger is popular and easy to use. The program now includes free PC-to-PC phone calls: you and the person you're calling both need to be running Yahoo Messenger, and you need a headset, or a microphone and speakers.
POP Peeper 3.0.1
Price: Free
Platform: Windows (all)
Site: www.poppeeper.com/download.php
POP Peeper notifies you when you have email. The program works with POP3 email clients, as well as with Web-based email programs like Yahoo and Hotmail. A plug-in is available for Gmail. The program is portable and allows you to read incoming email. You can configure different sound alerts for each account you're monitoring.
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Crypt4Free - 4.6.10
Price: Free
Platform: Windows (all)
Site: www.secureaction.com/encryption_free
Crypt4Free encrypts all file types on all popular media, including hard drives and removable media like USB drives. You can compress and encrypt files to send them via email. The program provides strong encryption via Blowfish and DESX algorithms and includes a secure wipe function. There's no back door to the program, so encrypted files stay encrypted if you lose the password you've created.
Auction Sentry 3.0.9
Licence: 10-day trial, then $US15
Platform: Windows (all)
Site: www.auction-sentry.com
Love sell on eBay or bid on eBay auctions? Then Auction Sentry is for you. Not only does the program track all your listings, but it also provides a sniper, which will place your bids at the last possible moment before an auction ends. You may not always win when you snipe an auction, but when you do win you know you've bought the item at the lowest possible price.
Personal Finances Lite 1.62
Price: Free
Platform: Windows (all from Windows 98 onward)
Site: www.alzex.com/download.html
Personal Finances Lite helps you to manage your money. The interface couldn't be simpler – just enter your income and expenses, and you'll see where your money goes. Your credit card balances are also shown on the program's main pane. A commercial version of the program lets you run it from a USB drive.
My Movies 2.3
Price: Free (donation requested)
Platform: Windows MCE, Vista Home Premium/Ultimate
Site: www.mymovies.name/downloads.aspx
My Movies lets you compile a database of all your movies; it downloads movie information from the Internet, including covers, actors and descriptions. If you wish, you can back up a movie to your hard drive, as it's indexed for easier repeat viewings. If you want to restrict viewing of some movies, you can require a PIN number to watch certain movies.
ShortKeys Lite 2.1e
Price: Free
Platform: Windows (all)
Site: www.shortkeys.com/lite.htm
ShortKeys Lite lets you use user-defined keystokes as shortcuts to enter text. Use it to enter Web addresses, boilerplate text for contracts, and any text you enter repeatedly. The program monitors your keystrokes and when a ShortKey key combination is typed, it enters the text for you; this minimises errors and saves you time. The Lite version has a 15-ShortKey limit.
AbiWord 2.4.6
Price: Free
Platform: Windows (all)
Site: www.abisource.com
AbiWord is a free word processor. The program helps you to create and format everyday documents. With dictionaries for over 30 languages, and tables, images, lists and footnotes, AbiWord does just about everything you need. The mail merge feature lets you combine documents with names and addresses from relational databases, comma separate text files, or tabbed text files.
NoteTab Light 5.4
Price: Free
Platform: Windows (all)
Site: www.notetab.com/ntl.php
NoteTab Light is a must-have. Completely free, it's both a text editor and an HTML editor. You can open dozens of documents at once in its tabbed interface, so the program is ideal for keeping notes, contact lists and all the information you need to keep on hand daily. Great features include a pasteboard to collect clips, and macros to speed your work.
Anagram 2.8
Licence: 45-day trial, then $US30
Platform: Windows (from Win 98); Microsoft Outlook/Palm Desktop
Site: getanagram.com/anagram/download.html
Anagram helps you to get information into Microsoft Outlook or the Palm Desktop with minimal effort. Just copy contact information from an email message or the Web, and Anagram analyses it and adds it to your contacts in Outlook or the Palm. Similarly, you can copy information and Anagram converts it to a task.
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Monopoly Here & Now Edition 1.0
Licence: Demo
Platform: Mac OS X 10.2 or later
Site: www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/games/cards_puzzle/monopolyherenowedition.html
Challenge your friends and family to exciting Monopoly fun, or play against an advanced AI with multiple difficulty settings. Today's properties, today's tokens, today's millions, Monopoly Here & Now Edition is timeless fun for tomorrow's billionaires. Penguins Arena 1.0.1
Licence: Demo
Platform: Mac OS X 10.3 or later
Site: www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/games/action_adventure/penguinsarena.html
Global warming, pollution… Penguin tribes are endangered. Sedna utters them that there is room for but one tribe. And so the purging begins. Ladybugs 1.0
Licence: Shareware
Platform: Mac OS X 10.3.9 or later
Site: www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/games/kids_learning/ladybugs.html
Bugs have never been so cute and cuddly…and colorful! This game for small children will keep your little ones racing against other ladybugs, wandering around garden mazes and helping ladybugs find their homes.
Imagine Poker 2.2.2
Licence: Shareware
Platform: Mac OS X 10.3 or later
Site: www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/games/cards_puzzle/imaginepoker.html
Imagine Poker is a breath of fresh air in the world of Mac card games. Its dawn: see you later, Solitaire. Sit back, relax, and play the most entertaining, addictive, and intelligent poker game ever created for the computer.
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Wikipedia
Licence: Freeware
Platform: Mac OS X 10.4 or later
Site: www.apple.com/downloads/dashboard/reference/wikipedia.html
The perfect companion to the world’s most complete encyclopedia. View and edit complete Wikipedia articles in any language without leaving your Dashboard. Sudoku Widget
Licence: Freeware
Platform: Mac OS X 10.4 or later
Site: www.apple.com/downloads/dashboard/games/sudokuwidget.html
Sudoku Widget generates random puzzles with four different levels of difficulty, has the option to show when you have entered an incorrect answer, allows for “pencil” marks for temporary numbers, times your games so you can see how much better (or worse) you are getting, has high scores, allows for blank puzzles and more.
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Transmit 3.6.1
Licence: Shareware
Platform: Mac OS X 10.3.9 or later
Site: www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/internet_utilities/transmit.html
A next-generation FTP and SFTP client for Mac OS X. With its famously clean drag and drop interface, and powerful features set, Transmit makes maintaining files and folders through the Internet as easy as, well, the Mac!
HTML-Optimizer Pro 5.2
Licence: Shareware
Platform: Mac OS X 10.3.9 or later
Site: www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/internet_utilities/htmloptimizerpro.html
Speeds up your site by optimizing both HTML and script code of your web pages and optimizing your JPEG images. It helps you keep organized by creating a duplicate site folder for the optimized files. An added benefit is that it leaves your original files untouched. Web Dumper 2.3.8
Licence: Shareware
Platform: Mac OS X 10.3 or later
Site: www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/internet_utilities/webdumper.html
If you are viewing a Web site with your browser and you decide that you would like to make a copy of it on your hard drive, you have to manually save each page as you view it along with embedded pictures, sounds and so on. FileChute 2.8.4
Licence: Shareware
Platform: Mac OS X 10.3.9 or later
Site: www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/internet_utilities/filechute.html
An application that makes sending files extremely easy. Simply drop the file in FileChute and paste the automatically generated link into the email you’re composing. Send the email. That’s it.
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