There will inevitably become a point when your system will require a clean up, to remove unwanted or unused files and folders. Even basic tasks such as browsing the Internet will lead to your machine accumulating unimportant files which can build up, and if left unchecked, may eventually lead to your system becoming crippled with unnecessary files. Privacy is another issue if Internet files remain on your machine, as you may use an banking service and other online passwords which you may want to keep secure.

CCleaner 2.11 is a powerful system cleansing utility that will enable you to remove any data, irrelevant or sensitive, that may be stored by online applications. Use it to remove temporary Internet files and clear browser history as well as clean Registry files.

CCleaner 2.11 link.

If you've 'collected' digital audio from the old Napster days, we'd safely say that you probably have a rather extensive audio collection, with most tracks lacking the right information, artwork and other elements that you want for a successful catalogue. The snag is, if you have thousands of tracks, updating them isn't an easy task. Ideally you'd find a companion tool that would reside alongside your existing iTunes library and enable you to update tracks en-masse.

TuneUp Companion 1.0.4 is such a tool. It enables you to check your tracks and search for and then update your artwork. You can fix track information on the fly and much more. However, there are two big problems - firstly if you store your iTunes audio on another computer (such as a media server), then you can't use it to fix or manage your tracks. Secondly, one of the key features is to search for and update the artwork on your tracks, but in our test, out of the 50 tracks where artwork was clearly missing...it could only find artwork for one of these tracks. These 50 tracks were all sourced from iTunes or imported via audio CDs a few years ago. Old they may be, but a tool such as TuneUp Companion 1.0.4 - designed to fix these issues - should be able to do what it says on the tin.

The other issue we have is that it will only clean a small number of tracks before you have to pay a subscription fee.

TuneUp Companion 1.0.4 link.

If you're worried about infecting your PC with a virus or similar security threat, there's no reason why you couldn't use a virtual operating system to test new software. There are many other good reasons why you might want to use a virtual operating system manager. For instance, you can run a virtual Linux operating system, without having to leave Windows. If you have a virtual desktop manager, you can even open your virtual OS on another screen and quickly switch between open spaces.

VMware Workstation 6.5 is the latest version of the virtual OS manager that now enables you to run a secure virtual operating system, so you could take your virtual OS on the road, along with VMware Player 2.5 and leave no trace of your virtual environment on your host PC.

VMware Workstation and VMware Player links.

When buying a new PC, as with anything, if it's cheap it's usually for a reason. Many mainstream computer manufacturers claim to provide 'value-for-money', unfortunately though, that's not always the case. The literature used in advertising PCs is often misleading and uses selected information to advertise the better points of a machine, but many of these parts will be sourced as cheaply as possible and the final product may not run as efficiently as a competitor's machine with a similar specification. You can see this for yourself by using a system information utility.

PC Wizard 2008 1.86 is an advanced utility designed to analyze all aspects of your systems performance. Test and benchmark your CPU, RAM and hard drive performance as well as many other useful features. Use it to identify if your computer matches the manufacturers description.

PC Wizard 2008 1.86 link. 

Even an entry-level PC will ship with a large hard drive that's more than capable of storing a huge amount of information. The only downside to having all that space is it can be difficult trying to keep things organised. The more room you have to store data, the more chance there is that items can become more difficult to find as you have to search through hundreds of gigabytes worth of files and folders. One way to organise your drive is to divide it up into more manageable sections by creating separate partitions.  

EASEUS Partition Manager 2.0 is a free but comprehensive tool that will enable you to manage your drive more effectively. Use it to create and maintain partitions as well as resize, delete and format them. You can even hide or show individual partitions for privacy reasons and organise data in a way that may enhance certain areas of system performance.

EASEUS Partition Manager 2.0 link.  

Passwords are an integral part of computing, without them, our personal and/or sensitive data could be accessed by almost anyone. The only problem with using passwords is if we forget them, and it's not that difficult when their are so many to remember, it can be difficult to regain access. Any online account you use will require a password  and it's obviously not secure to use the same one for each account, but remembering  individual online passwords for  banking, social networking or auction sites can be difficult, especially if you don't access them regularly.

AI RoboForm 6.9.9.1 is an established form filling application that's been popular for a number of years. It keeps your sensitive data completely secure as well as enabling you to quickly fill in annoying online forms. The latest revision supports all major browsers including Netscape 9, Firefox 3 and Internet Explorer.

AI RoboForm 6.9.9.1 link.

There are only so many upgrades an ageing computer will benefit from, so it's inevitable that you'll have to replace your computer at some point. This old machine will contain a wealth of items that you may wish to transfer to your new machine such as music, videos and photographs as well as any other important data. However, what if your new PC ships with a newer operating system than your current machine.

Easy2Sync 1.30 is a handy tool that enables you to synchronise data, across multiple computers even if they are running different operating systems. This is ideal for transferring data from an old machine or when synchronising files between  machines at home or in the workplace.

Easy2Sync 1.30 link. 

There was a time when creating high-quality PDF documents required expensive, commercial software. Even though there were freeware apps available based around Ghostscript technology, the final product never really matched that of the more commercial software and generally, were not good enough for commercial printing. PDFs are a useful, universal file format that is useful for displaying all manner of information, so it's important to be able to download and read the literature contained within these documents.

doPDF 6.1.274 is a free PDF tool designed for both personal and commercial use. It will enable users to create print or web quality PDF documents from a number of Windows applications. Although an able application, there are alternatives which may give you an even better result such as Expert PDF Professional. 

doPDF 6.1.274 link. 

Most of us do not need to backup an entire partition or drive. As long as we keep our most important documents, files, media and other components backed up, we can quickly restore this data if we move to another computer or need to re-install Windows, at a later date. For instance, when I move across to a new machine, I make sure my documents, key data files and fonts are stored elsewhere as there are surprisingly few files required to maintain a work PC.

Cobian Backup 9.5 is a free file backup and restore tool. If you have some remote server space, or perhaps you were given some web storage when you signed up for your broadband account, then why not make use of this space and use Cobian to backup your files to this location?

Cobian Backup link.

It's easy to store your audio tracks on your desktop computer and then play them back through a media manager such as Apple iTunes or similar. However, you can also use iTunes to stream your audio tracks to a compatible wireless device such as the Apple Airport Express. If you want to distribute audio across multiple rooms, however, you may be better with a dedicated application that will enable you to intercept audio on your PC and re-direct this to your various Airport Express devices, situated through your home.

Airfoil 2.6.1 is a commercial tool that enables you to take just about any audio source on your PC, intercept, then distribute it to various wireless audio devices, connected to speakers through your house. This enables you to walk from room to room without missing your favorite track.

Airfoil link.

Our ambition is to get more Mac apps on to vnunet.com/downloads in the future. At the moment, we have small selection of some of the better apps available. Many of these were updated at the weekend and we briefly touched upon the fantastic Delicious Library 2.03 which will enable you to catalogue your entire media collection.

Other highlights include Sparkle 1.5b6 which is still in beta. This tool will enable Mac-based developers to add an auto-update facility in to their software, so that end-users can automatically check for new versions of their installed software. ForkLift 1.5.3 was updated, which is a superb replacement for your Finder. If you're a web developer, we seriously suggest you take a look at Coda 1.5.1, which is an old-school development tool that will enable you to code up and preview your work, as you progress.

iSale 5.2.1 will enable Mac users to promote and manager their eBay auctions, whilst Flow 1.03.1 is a simple FTP manager. Rapidweaver 4.1.3 is a tool that should help users design and publish their own professional-level homepage.

It's really easy to do; you have a party and people browse your CD and DVD collection, then ask if they can borrow them and for you to forget who borrowed each item. One easy way of tracking your media collection would be to create some kind of database and then type in the details. An easier way would be to use a dedicated media cataloguing tool which will enable you to scan in using the barcode on the DVD or audio CD, extract the information from Amazon, then display in your virtual catalogue.

MediaMan 3 is a brand new version of the PC-only media cataloguing tool that will not only enable you to store and view your media collection via a 'virtual shelf', but also track who has borrowed each item. There's a Mac equivalent of this application called Delicious Library, which is also worth a look.

MediaMan 3 and Delicious Library 2.0.3 links.

Many of us have more the one machine. This may include our regular desktop machine at work, another at home and our laptop, which we take on the road. Factor in our mobile devices such as our iPhone or smartphone, and we always need access to our latest files and documents. Regular online backup tools give you the option to, well, backup securely and then restore if you have issues. A better solution would be a tool that not only will backup your files online, it will also synchronise these files across your other computers and even enable you to share these with other users, if required.

Dropbox 0.6 is a cross-platform backup and synchronisation tool that will enable you to backup files online, synchronise these files across various computers - irrespective of operating system - then also share with other people. Ideal if you want to share some work documents that you are editing, on the road.

Dropbox link.

When we're browsing the Internet, it's easy to come across a word, a phrase, an address or similar where you're simply stumped. Of course, it's not too difficult to open another browser window (or tab) and simply check Wikipedia or Google. But what if they don't always give you the answer? You can keep on looking. Another solution is a device which would enable you to perform a custom check or search, depending on your choice, from the page you're currently browsing.

Hyperwords for Firefox 5 is an extension that enables you to highlight a word on a page and quickly find a reference in Wikipedia, Google, find a location on a map if it's an address and so much more. You simply right-click on the word and a list of options will appear.

Hyperwords for Firefox link.

We've just put a couple of media catalogue managers online, the Mac-based Delicious Library and the equally as good PC-only MediaMan 3. These tools enable you to import and catalogue your audio from your CDs. However, many of us still have lots of old LPs and cassettes and these are our only source of some of the rarer tracks, particularly live tracks. Over time tapes will certainly deteriorate. For this reason, it might be a wise idea to import them to your computer, so you have a digital copy.

Vinyl Studio 5 is all you need to record from your old LPs, tapes and video cassettes, import the audio tracks, edit and touch-up the imported audio, then save as MP3 files or simply burn the tracks directly to CD.

Vinyl Studio link.

Web designers and anyone who access a remote server, will normally work offline, edit a version of your site locally, then upload the contents using either the design tool or FTP client. However, this isn't the only option and may not be the most appropriate if more than one user is accessing the same files. It's too easy to overwrite relatively new files with your work. The other option is to simply access and use the files on the remote server. With a fast broadband connection, this is certainly an possibility.

WebDrive 8.2 enables you to turn a remote folder, stored on a server, in to a drive, with it's own drive letter, so you can access the contents in the same way as a USB flash drive was connected to your PC.

WebDrive link.

After months of using your PC, the drive will become fragmented. This means your apps will start more slowly, files will take longer to load and your system may feel more sluggish. The solution is to use a disk defragmentation tool that will analyse your drive and re-arrange the contents so they are in more of a systematic order, enabling your computer to find the contents more swiftly. There are two types of defragmentation tools, the old-school that will spend ages going through your entire drive, whilst you have to do something away from your PC, whilst it re-arranges the content. The other is a more modern disk defrag tool that will reside in the background, monitor CPU usage, then perform the defragmentation when you are not using your machine. As soon as you start using, it will pause automatically.

Uniblue DiskRescue 2009, a rather oddly named application, is an old-school disk defragmentation tool that will spend time going through your drive sorting the content. You can schedule a defragmentation or leave it running overnight, but it's a fairly basic app that, sadly, can be handled by freeware apps. Not one of the better Uniblue apps.

Uniblue DiskRescue 2009 link.

Purchase a recent edition of Windows and install it to your PC. You may believe that it spends time optimising to your components; it does not. You'll often find it installs vanilla versions of old drivers and configures your system for stability, rather than performance. There are also many hidden functions deep inside Windows, which Microsoft does not allow the average user to access. For this reason, you need a system tweaking and tuning tool.

With Computeractive 276 we're giving you the free full current version of Ashampoo WinOptimizer 2009 which will enable you to get even more from your installed copy of Windows XP or Vista. Open hidden areas, cleanse your system, tweak application settings and more.

Computeractive 276 link.

Current graphics cards enable users to choose from a number of different display options, unfortunately though, these will often be pre-configured settings for the card installed in your computer. The trouble is, you may not be able to adjust particular settings. You may want to connect additional monitors or even change your current one and to get the hardware to perform correctly, this may require you to manually tweak display settings.

PowerStrip 3.83.635 enables you to adjust your display settings using over five hundred controls, including adjustments for multi-monitor set-ups, so you have full control over your settings. It also supports numerous graphics cards and chipset vendors.

PowerStrip 3.83.635 link.

There are certain desktop tools, once you start using them, it becomes difficult to imagine not using them again. They may not even be the most complex or even expensive but they may save you time, or help with day-to-day tasks. A calendar is one of those handy desktop tools that make it easy for you to quickly refer to, regarding meetings, appointments or deadlines. Calendars that are incorporated with your desktop make it even easier for you to quickly access.

Active Desktop Calendar 7.6 enables you to view appointments, daily tasks and other useful information. You can colour code particular items and even mark dates and add alarms to important notifications. You can  also share calendar information with colleagues on you local area network, without showing any private notes.

Active Desktop Calendar 7.6 link. 

Even basic photo or image viewers ship with some basic editing features, although they  key  feature with most of these tools is the ability to convert the format of your image. If you accumulate images from a number of different sources, from the internet, via email or even pictures you have taken yourself which may need to be converted into a single, more manageable format. This is especially useful when emailing pictures to friends and family or putting your photos on a website.

XnView 1.95 Beta is a small tool with many useful applications. It will enable you to convert images into almost any other file format. Like other tools, you can use it to crop, fix and edit any of your images before conversion.

XnView 1.95 Beta link.

We've previewed the beta's of the new VMware Fusion for Mac a few times on this blog. It's a superb product that enables you to run Windows, or another OS such as Ubuntu, on your Mac, without having to leave your regular desktop. Indeed, if you use Leopard, you can use Spaces to open the virtual OS on another screen, then quickly switch between both operating systems. Really effective.

VMware Fusion 2 is finally available and ships with a whole host of new features. We won't go in to all the new features here, but the final release now enables you to allocate up to four CPU cores to each VM (providing you have an eight-core Mac!), which is superb for Mac Pro users. Allocate a few CPU cores and 2GB of memory to Windows Vista and you shouldn't see too much slow down at all.

VMware Fusion 2 for Mac link.

Sticky notes are great for taking notes or ideas, perhaps when your're on the phone. Place them around your monitor screen and after a short period, they start to lose their stickiness. If they fall off and land on your desk or the floor, you may find the cleaners have removed your notes when you return to your desk the next morning. It's too easy to do. The other option is to ditch the sticky notes and place similar computer-based notes on your desktop. Safer for the environment, too.

PNotes 4.0.112 is free sticky notes software for your PC that enables you to place the notes on your desktop. You can use various skins to spruce up your notes so that each note looks different. You can have different notes between your home and work based 'to do' lists. Of course, you might want to take these 'to do' notes on the road, so there's also a portable version of PNotes.

PNotes and PNotes Portable link.

Only yesterday we announced that Acronis were offering True Image 11 Home for only $9.99 (£5.89) for one week only. However, we've noticed that if you go for the Acropack 2008 option, which is Acronis True Image 11 and Disk Director 10 as a bundle, then enter the coupon code we gave you, you can get Acronis True Image 11 for 80% off, or $9.99, but then get Disk Director 10 for free! This has to be the software bargain of the year.

UPDATE [18/09/08]: Acronis have taken the 80% off promotion offline and the coupon code is no longer available. Note that this promotion ended without notice and we received no prior warning. The current 20% coupon still works, however.

Components that are shipped with your new computer are ultimately responsible for its performance. Even if your computer does require a performance enhancement, it's important to identify the area that is most beneficial to upgrade depending on your own needs. If you just browse the web and your computer is sluggish, upgrading your systems RAM may improve general performance but will not necessarily have any impact on web browsing. Use a system analysis tool to identify hardware upgrades applicable to your own needs.

Everest Ultimate Edition 4.6 enables users to run a full system analysis helping to identify performance statistics of all installed hardware. Use it to compare it to other hardware or check if components are performing correctly. The latest version fully supports Windows Vista.

Everest Ultimate Edition 4.6 link.

Wouldn't life be interesting and rewarding if you could make money, working from home, helping other users understand their own machine? I bet there are few novice users who do not want to have to spend money purchasing 'How To' books to teach them how to use their PC. It's way easier if you can have someone around at your home showing you how to use a particular application.

The alternative solution is to give someone access to your machine, remotely, and enable them to show you how to perform particular actions on your PC. You're in control. Although you give remote access to other users, you can disconnect them at any time and they can't suddenly infect your machine with a virus. You can also prevent access from particular areas of your computer - so files in your 'work' partition are out of bounds to the remote user.

However, if you want to do the demo work, you can choose to help other users and charge a fee. For instance, you could charge someone $40/hour to help someone get to grips with using their email client, as an example. Remember, you don't need to leave your laptop to do this. You simply need a fast Internet connection and hope your remote user also has a fast connection.

CrossLoop 2.3 is the solution we're recommending for this task.

If you work between an office and a laptop, file sharing may be part and parcel of your computers everyday life. You may use your laptop during meetings, on the move or whilst on business where you may also need to upload and download folders and files from numerous external sources. The trouble with constantly transferring files is that some files may be infected with a virus or other malicious applications, which inevitably, infect your computer.   

ClamWin 0.94 Portable is the portable version of the popular open source antivirus application. Take it with you on a USB flash drive, CD or even your iPod and use it to scan folders and files and folders. You can use it on your laptop or on any other machine you may be using without leaving any personal information behind.

ClamWin 0.94 link.

It's a good idea to backup your most important data. If you have your work or media files stored on one partition, you could simply backup this partition and restore if necessary. With incremental and differential backup, you only backup new and updated data on your partition, so the next backup is handled swiftly. With Acronis True Image 11 you can now backup your files, as well as an entire drive or drive partition.

Acronis True Image 11 is being offered at a staggering discount of 80% off the standard retail price for this week only. That means you can buy Acronis True Image 11 for only £5.98 ($9.99), which a massive discount from the $49.99 retail price. To buy, click the link on Acronis True Image link and then 'buy now', entering the coupon code.

Acronis True Image 11 for only £5.98 link.

When installing or upgrading Windows many users are unaware of how overabundant default installations are. Many of the languages, add-ons and modules are unnecessary to most users taking up hard disk space and contributing to long-winded installations. Unfortunately, you can only slim down your installation to a certain extent and may need to use a third-party application to configure a pre-installation setup which enables you to remove any unwanted items.

nLite 1.4.9.1 is an application that enables you to create a custom Windows installation, removing any unwanted components. Remove language packs, add-ons and other items you may not need. You can also use it to perform a number of useful tweaks to create a slimmer operating system which will also reduce installation time.  

nLite 1.4.9.1 link.

If you're seeking an alternative, there's no reason why you couldn't buy yourself a Mac laptop and use OS X to manage your photos, your iPod and handle your work. If you need to launch Windows, simply run a virtual manager such as VMware Fusion and you'll be able to run XP, Vista or Linux OS, without having to leave your regular operating system.

VMware Fusion 2 RC1 is now available and it's still free whilst in beta-testing. The new version has a few additional features including a free version of McAfee Anti-Virus, including 12 months free updates, so you can keep your Windows-based virtual OS virus-free during use. There are also many fixes and enhancements.

VMware Fusion link.

Ever wonder what your computer is doing? Sometimes it can feel as though you don't have any control over which areas your systems performance is concentrated. You could be listening to music, browsing the web and all of a sudden an application will freeze and you may be unable to continue using it or even close it down. Being able to actually view performance statistics of your computer may enable you to identify where system resources are being used.   

Moo0 SystemMonitor is a small utility that enables you to view important system information. It enables you to check processor performance, memory used, hard disk activity and even the performance of your operating system. This monitor uses few resources itself, so you can accurately see what your system is doing.

Moo0 SystemMonitor link.

Explorer is a fairly basic component of Windows, certainly prior to Vista. Within Vista, the Explorer interface was revamped, extra functionality added, but it still isn't as good as many of the Explorer replacements that are available. For instance, Directory Opus is superb. At a very basic level, if you want to open an Explorer Opus window, simply double-click on any location on your desktop and the window will appear under your mouse pointer. For anyone who works with files, folders and other information, this makes life far easier.

XYplorer 7.60 is another alternative Windows Explorer replacement which, like Directory Opus, will enable you to open a multi-tabbed window so you can quickly move files between different directories. It's portable too, which means you can take XYplorer with you, on the road, and use it to manage a host PC.

XYplorer link.

There are numerous Firefox add-ons, some more useful than others. The good thing with using add-ons is that you can take the best parts from other software applications or web browsers and incorporate them in Firefox. Some features incorporated into other popular browsers such as Internet Explorer and Opera are useful, but others less so, so being able to pick and choose how to customise your version of Firefox enables you to get exactly what you want from your browser.

Fast Dial 2.6 enables you to create a panel of thumbnails of your favourite sites. It replaces the ¨about:blank¨ page and enables you to assign URL's to empty cells, with a thumbnail preview of each one. There are also a number of other customisable features as well as shortcuts designed to personalise your browser.

Fast Dial 2.6 link. 

If you're used to using the Mac OS X operating system, it's very easy to publish a document as a PDF. This enables you to design a document using your favourite word processor or DTP tool and then print to a PDF document, keeping the fonts, layout and structure in place. You can then put a web-quality version on the Internet for download by other users or produce a high-resolution version for commercial quality printing.

PrimoPDF 4.1 is a free PDF creation tool that enables you to produce PDF documents by simply exporting from any Windows application. You can produce anything from a low-res to high-resolution document.

PrimoPDF link.

Install Vista and you'd think that your new PC would now include the latest versions of the software drivers required to manage your various hardware components. Very wrong. In many situations, Microsoft plays safe and will include basic vanilla versions of various drivers to offer compatibility across various systems and configurations. Your ATI-based graphics card may not include the ATI control panel and other modules.

Uniblue DriverScanner 2009 is a tool that will enable you to auto-check your current drivers against the latest versions available. When new drivers are available, you can choose to download and install. You can also choose to backup your existing drivers so that they are always available if you need to re-install Windows at a later date.

Uniblue DriverScanner 2009 link.

There are a number of 'big name' software manufacturers that specialise in particular areas. Symantec have been developing and manufacturing Internet security solutions for a number of years. As one of the most established manufacturers of security software they are also responsible for equipping many new computers with pre-installed security suites that provide protection from an array of online threats from spam to spyware.

The latest offering from Symantec is the official release of Norton Internet Security 2009. This latest revision has been vastly improved in a number of areas, including a new architecture than runs more efficiently and uses far less system resources. Start and scan times have been reduced, as well as the silent mode that enables definition updates without interruption.

This comprehensive security suite offers complete protection from the latest online threats and may be a good solution for those who are looking for a fairly low-maintenance online security solution.

Norton Internet Security 2009 link.   

The software industry does confuse me, somewhat. I can understand why people still prefer to purchase Microsoft Office - they want complete compatibility as, in business, you can't afford to not be able to open or read important documents. However, there's no reason why you'd need to use a commercial archive manager and then keep purchasing an upgrade each year. Some do and many use WinZip.

WinZip 12 is the brand new version of the popular archive manager and it ships in two editions: Standard and Professional edition. The new version will enable you to compress your photos and images by up to 25%, saving space when you create an archive. The Professional version contains even more functionality, including support for handling password protected archives.

WinZip 12 link.