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Run-of-the-mill security program

It's less an advanced security application than an odd grouping of tools: this utility suite simply bundles together a group of so-so functions. Advanced Security Tool's multitabbed check-box laden interface offers no Help manual or much in the way of onscreen instruction. Intermediate users will pick up the basic functions with a few minutes of click and watch. Advanced users have the option of a custom install, but then the program doesn't offer any customization. It doesn't get much better from there. The functions are not well-explained or very useful to experienced users.

The app places … Read more

AST co-founder seeks room inside the PC

LOS ANGELES--There is very little room inside a PC these days, both literally and figuratively.

Tiny Netbooks leave little physical space for any added components, while brutal price competition means it's just as hard financially to convince PC makers they need something extra.

Still, that's what Safi Qureshey, who co-founded PC maker AST Research almost three decades ago, is trying to do.

His start-up, Quartics, is pitching a chip that would augment the PC's main processor and graphics card with a programmable chip for handling things like Flash movies and video conferencing.

"It's a co-processor. … Read more