The battle between the Web browsers is really tough when it comes to features, and despite the fact that Internet Explorer and Firefox have a huge lead, there are a lot of capable programs for surfing the Internet, and my favorite in the last months was Opera. Today, this excellent program got a security update, bringing the current version number to 9.24...

If you're new to Opera, then you should know that this high-end browser comes with a built in BitTorrent client, pop-up blocking capabilities, mouse gestures and even voice control, but it doesn't stop here. With Opera, you also get a bunch of additional features that I'll leave for you to discover, and the best thing about it is that you can customize it unlike most of its competitors, turning it into the Web browser of your dreams, once you gain a little experience with it.

While the alpha release of Opera 9.5, codenamed Kestrel, is still pretty far from us, I already started to dream and keep my fingers crossed to see the final 9.5 release available before Firefox 3 hits the road, but let's get back to 9.24 now...

Since Opera 9.23, there are only two security fixes to be reported. The first one concerns an issue where external email clients and news readers could be used to execute arbitrary code, which could hide some malicious parts, of course, and the second problem addressed by this update is the one that involved various scripts that could overwrite functions on pages from other domains.

I know the above may sound like Chinese for the unexperienced user, but there's no need to worry about that. Just grab this update and install it on your computer, and if Opera sounds like something new, give it a try, I am sure you won't regret it!

There are so many system optimization programs around, that I'm amazed every time I discover a new one, but after browsing various forums and finding out about people that paid for two, even three or more such programs, without finding the right one, I understood. As long as the market requires cheap products, there are still going to be released more and more poor quality programs that try to tempt you with a low price and a nice interface...

What happened yesterday with STOPzilla wasn't intended, it simply happened, so I am sure you'll believe me if I say that today's program also crossed my path and it's just a minor issue the fact that I am not crazy about it. Usually, I skip this kind of software, but I think you should also be informed about what programs you must avoid, at least until they get better, and today's unfortunate pick is called SysFixMaster...

Setup

Produced by Miracle Software, SysFixMaster is a fresh product on the market, its current version being labeled 1.25. Its demo version can be kept on your computer for as long as you wish, because you won't be able to fix anything with it. Its usability is reduced almost to zero, since you can check your registry for errors or use the Uninstaller module to remove programs from your computer. To fully unleash the capabilities of the program, you have to acquire a registration key, which is priced at $36.66 now, 50% less compared to the regular price of $73.32.












To install the program, you have to download the setup package first, which has 5.2MB in size. The only issue I encountered when installing SysFixMaster was pretty funny, but it didn't make me expect anything good in the future... As you can see in the second screenshot above, there is a radio button that allows you to create a desktop icon, and a checkbox for choosing to create a Quick Launch icon or not. The problem is that you can't deselect the first one, so the only choices are to create a desktop icon, or create a desktop icon and a Quick Launch one... What do you think about this? Not good at all, but let's move on and check the interface and features, as usual...Interface
Despite the fact it doesn't have support for adding new skins and there aren't any visual themes built in either, SysFixMaster looks great, and I don't say this only because blue is my favorite color. The main window is well organized, and the graphics are very good. The only problem that I found is that the StartUp Manager and the Uninstaller have different looks, making them completely different from the parent-application. Anyway, I am sure you won't have problems understanding how this program should work, because...

Features

...SysFixMaster has a big problem, at first sight - it simply doesn't work at all! Once the main window shows up, I try to start the first tool I set my eyes on, but I get the error that you can see in the second screenshot below. Let's suppose that an error like "The program not found, make sure the path is true(...)" doesn't sound like a text translated by a monkey, and move on. Unfortunately, every single tool returns the same error, but there's still one thing left to do...












Usually, when I install a program that doesn't work, I drop it and move on, but this time I was sure that something must work with SysFixMaster, so I checked the folder where the program resides. Really funny, but I was able to start every tool from the package manually! Since the main window is used to start additional programs, it was easy for me to find them, but I am sure this is not supposed to happen, because most beginners won't think about this.Now, let's see what do we have here - System Cleaners, System Optimizers and, at last, System Tools, these are the main areas covered by the utilities included in SysFixMaster, and I must say that I didn't find anything to blow my head off, especially since the limitations of the demo don't allow to clean the registry or optimize the memory with the Memory Manager.












These being said, "fastest memory manager" or "revolutionary technology that promise(!) to substantially increase the speed(...)" are nothing but words, without any practical backup. It's a miracle that I didn't slam this program off the wall yet, but there's time... after all, this is only version 1.25, and I didn't finish the article yet!The Good

SysFixMaster looks very good and comes with a lot of promises, but...

The Bad

...considering the fact that most users won't be able to use it, it can't get worse than this! Even if everything would work as promised, the price asked for this product is too high, especially since the English language used by the producer has some serious flaws!

Conclusion

This concludes today's review, and I hope this is also the finish of my "black reviews series". I hope you got the message, but if you have enough time to spare, please download this program and give it a try, maybe it was a random even the fact that it refused to work as promised on my computer... and if you get lucky, let us know about your experience!

Developer: Miracle Software
Price: $36.66
Trial Link: Download

No matter how good is your antivirus, there's always room for better, and you can throw eggs at me, if that's what you wish, but I think there's no perfect antivirus around, yet. The amount of threats is simply huge, and there's no program that can act as an efficient protection against trojans, worms, spyware, network attacks and the entire army of computer viruses in the wild, so people end up using at least 2-3 specialized programs to protect their computers, or an all-in-one suite. Today, I want to talk about a program that I must admit it was a real surprise for me, because I never heard of it so far: STOPzilla!




Setup

<-234x60 Half Banner - left->When I saw it for the first time, STOPzilla's name made me think about Mozilla, but this program doesn't have anything to do with the company that created Firefox, at least that's what I can conclude based on what I found out so far. Produced by a company called iS3, STOPzilla reached version 5, and to clean infections found, you have to register the copy available for download.

Installing this program is pretty tricky, because STOPzilla is not one of those "download, install and run" programs... but it's not really different either. As you can see in the screenshot to the left, the so-called "setup program" downloads another installer from the official site. The good part is that the downloader has about 65KB in size, and the size of the downloaded package seems to be only a few times larger, with about 300KB, but it was interesting to find out that the program requires no less than 38MB of disk space.












Now, my final advice regarding the setup of this program is to be careful when you're asked about the STOPzilla toolbar, because I know most people don't like an Internet Explorer full of toolbars. While the Homepage Protection is a useful feature, I don't think most users are really going to use the toolbar, so don't hurry up when clicking those "Next" buttons!

Interface

As I expected, STOPzilla looks like most antispyware tools, and that's "very good and beyond". The graphics are crystal clear, suggestive and were done using vivid colors, which may be highly appreciated by some, while others won't go "WOW" at all. In the end, it's all about one's taste, and from my point of view, STOPzilla looks great, has an interface that's very easy to use and well organized, so working with the program shouldn't be a headache, at least not until you run into trouble with it, as I did...

Features

The first stage of my torment today started as soon as I finished installing the program. Since there was no "Start the application" option to select, I thought I will have to start STOPzilla myself. The good part is that the program started automatically, but the bad part is that it also started a full computer scan without asking me anything, because I am sure that my text files and the images of my audio CD collection can't be infected by anything, but...












Anyway, to make a (very!) long story short, STOPzilla scanned my entire computer and found about 400 (!) "infections". I'll leave the surprise for later, and I won't tell you anything about the evil threats that are crawling inside my PC, because I want to tell you about the program's features now...

All the tools of the application are easily accessible from the menu located to the left of the main window, but it's enough to go inside the Home area to get a better view of this program's capabilities. The good part is that you get real time spyware protection, a built in pop-up blocker, as well as protection from Phishing attacks and other threats coming from malicious Web sites, offered by the SITEguard module. Even more, the two Quick Tools from the Home screen allow you to easily remove Cookies and clear your browser's history.

To get intimate with all the main tools of the program, namely the real time protection, pop-up blocker and the SITEguard, you have to access their pages, and that is done using the menu. If you press the buttons from the Home area, you can disable and enable these modules.

Each of the tools has extremely detailed settings - for example the real time protection module allows you to control browser protection, network monitoring, system protection and more. All the settings are well explained, and if the tips are not enough, you can check the built in Help contents. Anyway, you can discover a lot by yourselves, because I want to tell you what I promised...












...let's get to my awful infection! Spyware, trojans, malware, it's all here, on my computer! Oh, my! Well, let's see what I got in the Results area... I don't want to become boring, but you have to find out that this program is not what it claims to be. Its awards? Awards are granted by most big sites to get another incoming link, not to make things right for the user(there are some exceptions, of course), and it's sad to see so many big names on STOPzilla's official page. Anyway, let's check some infections that I got...

"Media-Codec/Trojan", found in Winamp 5.5's setup package, just downloaded from the official page. Obviously, not a Trojan. Even more, I ask myself since when did media codecs become a threat?!?

"Klez.H Worm/Spyware, Worm", found in virtually every file related to Wink, the well known freeware screen capture application. According to the description found on Symantec's site, things started to look serious. It's enough to say that Symantec considers the removal to be difficult, and the damage level, medium. The fact is that once it's loaded, this worm "Copies itself to \%System%\Wink.exe.", so C:\Program Files\Wink\Wink.exe is a "pretty good" match... Figure out the rest for yourselves - "quite near, but not the same" shouldn't EVER be an excuse for a program involved in your security!

The funny ending is that the real-time protection worked great - I wasn't able to run a clean program that's also used by thousands of users all over the world, because STOPzilla did its job in an instant, removing the program from my hard drive!

The Good

STOPzilla comes with all the features one needs from an antispyware program, an excellent interface and very good documentation, accompanied by a decent price.

The Bad

It would have been simply amazing for everything to work as advertised, but it doesn't. One disaster is enough, and I don't even want to imagine what would happen if next time, STOPzilla is going to recognize some core system components as a certain spyware or Trojan!

Conclusion

A lot of antispyware tools look great but don't work that great, and I must confess that STOPzilla is one of the greatest disappointments I had this year. It's not the awards, it's not the claims on the official site about all those features, it's the feeling that you got your hands on a crystal statue that's going to be perfect for your living room, but you end up finding out that all you got is cheap plastic...

If you really want to spend $19.95 foolishly, give it to a beggar that's going to drink it all in the closest bar, or buy a tiny piece of land in another galaxy (I don't know where you can get that, but you can try asking around)!

As a final thought, I hope this program is going to solve its problems and work properly as soon as possible, because it's really a pity to see it have this kind of problems, when it promises so much...

Developer: iS3, Inc.
Price: $19.95
Trial Link: Download

I will assume that you have seen already some HD videos or HD movie trailers. Isn’t that image quality just awesome? It’s like a pure bliss for the eyes, every detail is in its best shape and light. Have you ever wondered what kind of software the film makers use to create such trailers? I can tell that they have many tools, especially for splitting and joining, but also for encoding the final version of the trailer movie file. I have used my “special contacts” to find out: one of the widely used pieces of software is Sorenson Squeeze, created by Sorenson Media, a famous video encoding technology company.

<-125x125 Button - left->The Sorenson Squeeze suite is considered by many video editors as being the leading-video encoding tool, and we’re just about to see why. First you have to notice the interesting interface that comprises all the complicated functions and the options in a single sleek looking interface. Like I said to one of my friends – not every developer knows how to create professional software – I have to admit – Sorenson Squeeze is not something you get to see everyday – it’s more like you find out about it if you’re a movie producer or something like that.

It’s not the problem of the quality of the software, as it is pretty good and impressive (encoding two or more videos in one go? awesome!), I think the promotion would have to be increased so that it would reach a higher popularity, even outside the “elite” Hollywood circles. From the interface you can already see the exporting formats have some ready-made presets for HD video settings, DVD/CD/VCD/HD DVD/Blu-ray, and also for lower resolutions optimized for the web streaming: MPEG 4 generic, Macromedia Flash Movie and Video, QuickTime MOV files, Windows Media Video, Real Media, MPEG 1-2 and MP3 audio.

Obviously this video encoder has a lot to bring on the table and it is quite capable to satisfy the demands of any customer. The beauty of it is that both professionals and amateurs can work with it without hassle and they can reach the expected results easily.

Applicability: Movie producers, film makers, occasional video editors, all of you can use this software to bring the best out of your videos – a compact size but amazing visual quality. Is there anything else you could ask for?

Pro(s): Yes, like I said, this piece of software is highly effective and very good at encoding videos – well, if the professionals from Hollywood use it, there must be something special about it, right? I would have been tempted to say otherwise but I had a go with it and I was very impressed.

Con(s): There are times when you would have to wait a LOT for the videos to be encoded, especially if you use the multi pass encoding option. But that’s not really a downside – it’s the big and daring price that makes you think twice before buying a license for it about $500, no matter it is a shipped CD or electronic download option. Yeah, it “dares” to have a price even higher than a Windows Ultimate DVD (full 32 and 64 bit version).

Official website
Buy: $499
Request Trial Version

Every once in a while I might add small tutorials to some of the reviews I am writing, and such is the case of the GIF Construction Set Professional 3, in order to extend the examples and the reasons for using such software. The need to create animated images has become quite obvious when the development of the websites has evolved towards a more dynamic content.

<-125x125 Button - left->The GIF Construction software has a very simple and quite intuitive interface, that integrates easily with windows Vista and it has even a wizard that can help you create animated GIF images. The Graphics Interchange Format files were introduced in 1987 and this format has been supported ever since on the World Wide Web due to the portability, transparency and support capabilities that it has to offer.

Due to the limitation of the format to 256 distinct colors from the 24-bit color space, it is recommended only for simple images, such as logos and small animated banners. I must say that this piece of software does what it was designed to do very well, but it needs the very cool collection of plug-ins that can be found on the same website where you can get the Gif Construction software.

Applicability: Well, here we are at the small tutorial part. I’m going to tell you how you can create a very nice small and interactive banner for your website. First you need to make some frames for your animation. The first step is to choose correctly the software that will create them. I have chosen Photoshop by default as it is the application I trust most when it comes to web-image graphics creation. I have created a simple PSD file that has a transparent background (150 pixels height, 60 pixels width) and then inserted a centered text. But not all the text at once - one character at a time, and I saved the image as a PNG file each time I added a letter. And so I came up with about 20 PNG static frames. Then, I used the GIF Construction Set to join them together in an animation as you can see in the screenshots above. After joining the frame-images, I saved the file as a GIF animated image and, as expected it looks very well and it doesn’t even have a big size (about 20 KB only!). You can see the final result at the beginning of this paragraph.

Pro(s): The GIF animation builder has a lot to offer in terms of software value – you can easily regain your investment by creating animated banners and integrate them into websites or simply sell them. You can also export the animations into the flash SWF format, AVI or MOV video files with sound!

Con(s): I wish I could see the interface a bit changed in future versions, even if this software is not new –actually it has been on the market for some years. There weren’t any significant changes when they adapted it for Vista as well. At one point the software just crashed and closed down, but it was probably under “heavy pressure”.

Official website
Buy: $24.99
Download trial