4.7

Review: Block all your browser pop-ups with GlimmerBlocker for Mac

Pop-up advertising impacts most users' Web browsing experience. GlimmerBlocker for Mac blocks most advertisements adequately, all while stopping the need for reinstallation after browser updates.

Download of GlimmerBlocker for Mac completed quickly and the program installed as a separate application modified from the main computer preferences menu. Unlike other third-party ad blocking applications, this program is outside of the Web browser, itself, which prevents it from being deleted or modified when the browser updates. The application has no menu of its own during operations and works in the background to prevent animated ads from playing. Support for product updates is … Read more

Edit photos on your mobile device with Snoxter

If you're keen to shoot photos from your phone, you might need a powerful photo editor. This app will crop photos and even help you throw filters on them. Snoxter will remind you almost too much of Instragram, except it doesn't seem to have a fraction of that app's popularity.

The app requires Facebook to work, so you need to let it use your account to edit photos. However, once you've connected the app to Facebook, you can't pull photos right off of your feed. You can snap a picture right from the app or … Read more

Paste Easily with Plain Clip for Mac

Copying and pasting between different programs can cause a lot of formatting problems and waste a lot of time. Plain Clip for Mac tries to fix these issues by allowing users to preset clipboard styles and eliminate format issues when cutting and pasting. However, the program's inconsistency overwhelms its usefulness.

Plain Clip for Mac is a free program that has a great concept but is too buggy to be useful. The program allows you to select which elements you want to remove from material on your clipboard. You can remove all formatting, spaces, lines and even HTML code. Unfortunately, … Read more

Compress and open archives with this free, well-designed compression utility

PeaZip is a free tool for creating and opening ZIP files quickly and easily. PeaZip can read RAR files, but it cannot write them, the one missing archive format we wish PeaZip could support.

We found PeaZip's interface to be well-designed and user-friendly, but users need to take care when installing this utility as it will install the AVG Security Toolbar and change your homepage and search functions to AVG Secure Search with the default settings. Fortunately you can choose a custom installation that avoids the add-ons. Once installed, the right mouse button brings up the traditional Explorer menu … Read more

Find cool new stuff on the Web with StumbleUpon

Let's face it: there's a whole lot of content on the Internet, and there's no way to find the best of it without a little help. StumbleUpon can help with this monumental task by recommending sites to you based on your interests and the recommendations of others. The StumbleUpon Chrome extension integrates StumbleUpon's functionality into your browser, making it easy to discover and make note of new and interesting sites.

We didn't have a StumbleUpon account, so the first thing we had to do was create one, which was a simple process of selecting a … Read more

Personal VPN service

CyberGhost VPN is a personal VPN client and online service that lets users browse the Internet anonymously by acting as a firewall and server between your PC and your ISP. It lets you surf the Web normally while hiding your IP address and displaying a dead-end address. It's available in free and premium versions; the free version can only be installed on one PC and only one account can be activated on each computer, whereas the premium account offers more options and features.

CyberGhost installs and sets up easily, including creating a username and password, though we had to … Read more

Animal instincts

To be perfectly honest, we could probably waste the better part of a day online looking at animal photos. Cute animals, funny animals, ferocious animals...we find them endlessly fascinating. If you do, too, consider Animal Desktop Wallpaper Screensaver App. This fun program is a screensaver with a social networking component, supplying a constant stream of high quality animal photos.

Although Animal Desktop Wallpaper Screensaver App is accessible in the Display Properties menu along with all your other screensavers, it also has its own manager. The program comes with six high-quality nature images, but that's just the beginning. Clicking … Read more

What's up? Docks.

What's up with docks? For starters, they're handy little apps that launch other applications via shortcuts, typically from a centralized, customizable desktop menu. You "dock" your favorite programs, Web sites, documents, or anything that can be opened with a shortcut to the app, and launch them quickly from it. Appetizer is a neat little dock from Pogopixels, a developer that specializes in widgets and desktop gadgets. We looked at the installed version, but it's also available in a totally portable version that automatically detects apps even when run from a USB drive.

Appetizer's fully … Read more

Rumor: New iPad has 7-inch screen, Cortex-A9 processor

Now that news related to the iPhone 4 launch has cooled down, iPad rumors are heating up. The latest suggest a speedier and possibly smaller-screened tablet device from Apple as early as January.

Digitimes claims to have the drop on Apple's first revision to the wildly successful iPad. According to the report, Apple will beef up the speed of the iPad by swapping the Apple-built A4 processor with a Cortex-A9 and replacing the 256MB of RAM with the same 512MB currently found in the iPhone 4.

Interestingly, the report also claims that Apple will release a 7-inch version of … Read more

Speak your e-mail

Business professionals who spend a substantial amount of time behind the wheel will find a helpful dictation secretary in MyCaption. A simple interface mirrors the application's ease of use. Click to record an e-mail up to 3 minutes in length, or a memo, task, or calendar item. You can opt to review the e-mail message before sending it out. MyCaption then uploads the content to secure, Amazon-hosted servers, where it's transcribed using a combination of machine-based speech recognition and human transcription, and rerouted.

Thanks to human interception during lengthy dictation, e-mails were accurate during our tests. More complex … Read more