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We’re only hours away from Google’s special event when the company is expected to launch the Android-based Nexus One mobile device. There has been a lot of speculation about the handset, and how it will differ from competitors like the iPhone. An early hands-on review by Engadget suggests the Nexus One will be a solid device, but not be immediate threat to the iPhone.

But that won’t stop the endless comparisons to the iPhone once the Nexus One is released later today. So why not just dive right in with several things Google needs to get right on the Nexus One, as well as the Android platform in general, to beat the iPhone.

Speed
It’s all about speed when it comes to smartphones, as users want a blazing fast connection and a device that doesn’t take forever to load a program. The Nexus One is widely believed to have a 1 GHz Snapdragon processor making it super fast, although not blazing fast according to Engadget’s review. The iPhone 3GS, where the ‘S’ stands for speed, has a 600 MHz processor, so clearly the Nexus One will have the advantage for the time being.

CCleaner is a freeware system optimization, privacy and cleaning tool. It removes unused files from your system – allowing Windows to run faster and freeing up valuable hard disk space. It also cleans traces of your online activities such as your Internet history. Additionally it contains a fully featured registry cleaner.

Latest Changes:

• Added support to Wipe MFT Free Space.
• Added cleaning for Windows Explorer breadcrumb bar.
• Added cleaning for Opera beta versions.
• Added option to turn off CCleaner jumplist tasks on Windows 7.
• Added menu option to Registry Cleaner to add key to exclude list.
• Improved support for SeaMonkey 2.0.
• Improved Windows 7 Taskbar progress accuracy.
• Improved minimize to system tray functionality across all platforms.
• Improved Opera cleaning by including opcache and temporary_downloads folders.
• Improved performance of Compact database routines.
• Improved Wipe Free Space code to avoid locks.
• Improved security when deleting files.
• Minor GUI and interface improvements.
• Minor bug fixes.

Download CCleaner 2.27.1070 Slim (no toolbar)
Download CCleaner 2.27.1070 Portable

Western Digital is beginning to use a new hard disk drive format that opens up between 7% and 11% more capacity on hard disk drives, meaning a 1TB drive could gain more than 100GB in capacity.

The disk expansion technique, known as Advanced Format, takes advantage of industry changes in drive sector sizes to consolidate overhead information and free up that additional space for data storage. Advanced Format is also being adopted by other drive manufacturers to wring more capacity out of existing hard drive technology.

There are 3 basic methods for increasing capacity on a hard drive: increase the bit density; increase the number of tracks per inch; or increase the number of surfaces (i.e. disk platters). WD chose to boost bit density because it takes advantage of additional space already available on every track of a hard disk drive platter, the company said in a document posted on its Web site.

Hard disk tracks are currently composed of 512-byte sectors. But for efficiency reasons, the industry as a whole is moving to larger sectors that store 4,096 bytes of data.

What’s New in Firefox 3:

The Web is all about innovation, and Firefox 3 sets the pace with dozens of new features to deliver a faster, more secure and customizable Web browsing experience for all.

Download Mozilla Firefox 3.56

User Experience. The enhancements to Firefox 3 provide the best possible browsing experience on the Web. The new Firefox 3 smart location bar, affectionately known as the “Awesome Bar,” learns as people use it, adapting to user preferences and offering better fitting matches over time. The Firefox 3 Library archives browsing history, bookmarks, and tags, where they can be easily searched and organized. One-click bookmarking and tagging make it easy to remember, search and organize Web sites. The new full-page zoom displays any part of a Web page, up close and readable, in seconds.

Performance. Firefox 3 is built on top of the powerful new Gecko 1.9 platform, resulting in a safer, easier to use and more personal product. Firefox 3 now uses less memory while it’s running, and its redesigned page rendering and layout engine means users see Web pages two to three times faster than Firefox 2.

Security. Firefox 3 raises the bar for security.

SoftPerfect Network Scanner is a free multi-threaded IP, NetBIOS and SNMP scanner with a modern interface and several advanced features. It is intended for both system administrators and general users interested in computer security. The program pings computers, scans for listening TCP ports and displays which types of resources are shared on the network (including system and hidden).

In addition, it allows you to mount shared folders as network drives, browse them using Windows Explorer, filter the results list and more. SoftPerfect Network Scanner can also check for a user-defined port and report back if one is open. It can also resolve host names and auto-detect your local and external IP range. It supports remote shutdown and Wake-On-LAN.

• Pings computers.
• Does not require administrative privileges.
• Detects hardware (MAC) addresses even across routers.
• Detects hidden shared folders (normally invisible on the network) and write accessible shares.
• Detects your internal and external IP addresses.
• Scans for listening TCP ports and SNMP services.
• Retrieves currently logged-on users.
• You can mount and explore network resources.
• Can launch external third party applications.
• Exports results to HTML, XML, CSV and TXT
• Supports Wake-On-LAN, remote shutdown and sending network messages.
• Retrieves potentially any information via WMI.
• Retrieves information from remote registry.

Download SoftPerfect Network Scanner 4.4.3

Disk fragmentation leads to system slowdowns, PC crashes, slow startups and shutdowns. Auslogics Disk Defrag is designed for fast optimization of modern hard disks.

Hard disks are by far the slowest component in your computer. CPU and memory work much faster than hard disks because they do not have moving parts. Therefore fragmented disks often become a bottleneck of the system performance.

Besides causing slowdowns, fragmentation makes the hard drive disk heads move frequently when reading files which leads to freeze-ups and system crashes. It is important to keep your disks defragmented and optimized as much as possible.

Auslogics Disk Defrag is not just a defragmenter any more, but a fully featured disk optimizer. And with all the advanced techniques of disk optimization it has, Disk Defrag 3 remains extremely compact and even easier to use!

Version 3.1.2.90 Changes

• added new languages
• improved program appearance
• fixed bugs
• improved installer

Download Auslogics Disk Defrag 3.1.2.90
Download Auslogics Disk Defrag 3.1.2.90 Portable

NetWorx is a simple and free, yet powerful tool that helps you objectively evaluate your bandwidth situation. You can use it to collect bandwidth usage data and measure the speed of your Internet or any other network connection. NetWorx can help you identify possible sources of network problems, ensure that you do not exceed the bandwidth limits specified by your ISP, or track down suspicious network activity characteristic of Trojan horses and hacker attacks.

The program allows you to monitor all your network connections or a specific network connection (such as Ethernet or PPP) only. The software also features a system of highly customizable visual and sound alerts. You can set it up to alert you when the network connection is down or when some suspicious activity, such as unusually heavy data flow, occurs. It can also automatically disconnect all dialup connections and shut down the system.

The incoming and outgoing traffic is represented on a line chart and logged to a file, so that you can always view statistics about your daily, weekly and monthly bandwidth usage and dial-up duration.

Karen’s LAN Monitor starts by displaying important information about every network adapter on your computer. These details include the adapter’s speed, IP address(es), DHCP Lease information, and more.

Next, the program shows all current connections between your computer and others on the local network, and on the Internet. You’ll see the name and IP address of the remote computer, and the type of connection (HTTP, POP3, FTP, etc) that’s being made!

The LAN Monitor also displays real-time traffic statistics, including bytes sent and received, transmission errors, and network connection load factors.

Download Karen’s LAN Monitor 1.4.3

Aion has had a rocky release, to say the least – bots, RMT, crashing, slow XP leveling, lack of quests at certain levels. NCSoft today implemented a 2nd wave of bannings for bots and appears to be taking this issue seriously. Also, earlier this week, NCSoft release its latest patch. Included, although unpublished, was a fix or a great step to fix the constant crashing during fortress sieges. The future is uncertain but these latest steps may stabilize the subscriptions somewhat and this latest video now may stave off additional defections and regenerate some of the earlier excitement with the game, if the changes come sooner rather than later.

The video shows high-quality graphics that are simply amazing, mounts (with combat?), swimming, underwater leveling areas, housing, killer casting animations, more active weather, city sieges?