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SMARTER HDTV

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www.pcmag.com April 11, 2006
UTILITY SUPERGUIDE
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2006 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved. Microsoft, the Windows logo, Windows Server System, and Your potential. Our passion. are either trademarks or registered trademarks
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All offers available from HP Direct and participating resellers. Prices shown are HP Direct prices, are subject to change and do not include applicable state and local sales tax or shipping to recipients destination. Reseller prices may vary. Photography may not accurately
represent exact configurations priced. Associated values represent HP published list price. 1. Lease products are available through Hewlett-Packard Financial Services Company (HPFSC) or one of its affiliates to qualified commercial customers in the U.S. and are subject to
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(use 32X high-speed media discs for best performance); for reading CD media, the max transfer rate may be up to 7200 Kbps. Actual transfer rates may vary depending on media quality. 12. One-year limited warranty for parts, labor and next-business-day support. 13. Three-
year limited warranty for parts, labor and next-business-day support. 14. Four-year limited warranty for parts, labor and next-business-day support. 15. Service levels and response times for HP Care Packs may vary depending on your geographic location. Restrictions and
limitations apply. For details, visit www.hp.com/go/carepack. 16. Wireless use requires separately purchased service contract. BroadbandAccess is available to more than 140 million people in 171 major metropolitan areas and 68 primary airports. Access limited to coverage
area of Verizon Wireless. Check with Verizon Wireless for availability and coverage in your area. Verizon Wireless BroadbandAccess offers download speeds of 400 to 700 Kbps. National Access provides download speeds of 60 to 80 Kbps. BroadbandAccess speeds are based
on Verizon Wireless network tests with 5MB FTP data files without compression; National Access speeds are based on Verizon Wireless network tests with 101KB FTP data files. 17. The hyperthreading feature is a new technology designed to improve performance of multi-
threaded software products; please contact your software provider to determine software compatibility. Not all customers or software applications will benefit from the use of hyperthreading. Go to http://www.intel.com/info/hyperthreading for more information, including which
processors support HT Technology. Microsoft and Windows are registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/or other countries. Celeron, Celeron Inside, Centrino, Core Inside, Intel, Intel Core, Intel Inside, Intel SpeedStep, Intel Viiv, Intel Xeon, Itanium,
Itanium Inside, Pentium, Pentium Inside, the Centrino Logo, the Intel Logo and the Intel Inside Logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Intel Corporation or its subsidiaries in the United States and other countries. 2006 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P.
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A WIDER SCREEN RATIO ALLOWS YOU TO SEE THE WHOLE PICTURE.
STANDARD RATIO
www.LGusa.com
2006 LG Electronics, Inc. Englewood Cliffs, NJ. LG Design, Lifes Good, and FLATRON are trademarks of LG Electronics, Inc.
Specifications and model numbers are subject to change without notice.
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Vivid AsBrilliant AsInnovative as LG.
www.pcmag.com APRIL 11, 2006 PC MAGAZINE 7
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96
COVER STORY
APRI L 1 1 , 2006 VOL. 25 NO. 6
CONTENTS www.pcmag.com
First Looks
26 Low-Cost LCD TVs
Proview RX-326
Vizio L32
Westinghouse LTV-32w1
28 Cell Phones
T-Mobile SDA
T-Mobile MDA
Motorola SLVR L7 K
Cingular 2125
41 Digital Cameras
Fuji FinePix E900
Pentax *ist DS2
Canon PowerShot SD450
44 MP3 Players
Creative Zen MicroPhoto
46 Speakers
Saitek A-250 K
i.Sound Max
48 Storage
Iomega XL Desktop
Hard Drive
Maxtor OneTouch III
Turbo (1 TB)
50 Desktops
Velocity Micro Vision GX K
52 Printers
Kodak EasyShare
Photo Printer 500
Konica Minolta
PagePro 1400W
54 Scanners
Visioneer Strobe XP300
HP Scanjet 4890 Photo Scanner
56 Laptops
Toshiba Satellite A105-S361
58 Photo-Sharing Tools
AOL Pictures
BubbleShare (beta)
FilmLoop (beta)
Phanfare
SnapJot (beta)
Small Business
60 Displays
HP LP2065 K
NEC MultiSync 90GX2
Lenovo ThinkVision L201p
61 John Dickinson on Small Business
62 Software
QuickBooks Online Edition
Laplink PCdefense
65 VoIP
IP Telephony DVX-1000 K
69 What to Buy
The best products in one place.

ON THE COVER
When Windows falls short,
photos blur, networks
leak, audio crackles, and
generally, nothing seems to
be working just right, what
you need is a good
utilityor, rather, 87
of them. Here are
some of the
favorites of our
PC Magazine experts.
14th Annual
Utility Superguide
SPEED!
POWER!
LOOKS!
FUN!
Utility Superguide
page 96
Smarter HDTV
Shopping page 26
RAZR Remix page 32
Easy Project
page 120
PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com 10
Opinions
13 Jim Louderback
17 Michael J. Miller:
Forward Thinking
89 John C. Dvorak
91 John C. Dvoraks Inside Track
93 Bill Machrone
Solutions
134 The Connected Traveler:
Silicon Alley; hacker conven-
tions; free Wi-Fi in many parks,
hotels, and coffee shops.
135 Ask Loyd: Choosing a digital
projector; graphics card com-
patibility; are more megapixels
necessarily better?
136 Ask Neil: Control displayed text
size with a mouse; clear unread
messages in Windows XP; color-
code Outlook messages.
137 Security Watch: Is your laptop
connecting to unsavory Wi-Fi
networks on the sly?
138 SMB Boot Camp: Microsoft Ex-
change isnt the only option for
workplace collaboration.
141 Vista Revealed: Will Windows
regain our trust?
142 Software Solutions: Multipage
scanning and markup made easy.
Gaming + Culture
156 Digital game delivery: Its
not just for pirates.
159 Gearlog: Attention Harley
fans! Meet the motorcycle PC.
Also in This Issue
71 Feedback
160 Backspace
Pipeline
21 Download hi-def movies, fast.
Put online dates to the test.
Pleo, the infant dinosaur robot.
The surge in Net searches.
Future Watch
22 Making nanoscale movies; Is
that a projector in your iPod?
Online
www.pcmag.com
Extend Your Networks
Looking to grow your home or
small-ofce network? Our latest
book excerpt shows you exactly
how to extend your network to new
machines and more rooms.
(go.pcmag.com/
extendyournetwork)
BOOK EXCERPT
Product comparisons to help you
decide! Coming soon:
LCD TVs under $1,000
The best multimedia desktops
Low-cost photo printers
iTunes and Google vie for video
(go.pcmag.com/roundups)
REVI EW ROUNDUPS
Discussions: Log on and participate!
(discuss.pcmag.com)
Downloads: Check out our indexed
list of utilities from A to Z.
(www.pcmag.com/utilities)
TOOLS YOU CAN USE
DVORAK ONLINE
K Each Monday,
John C. Dvorak gives
you his take on
whats happening in
high tech today. Visit
go.pcmag.com/dvorak.
EXCLUSI VE COLUMNS
ULANOFF ONLINE
K And each Wednesday,
Lance Ulanoff puts his
own unique spin on
technology. Visit
go.pcmag.com/ulanoff.
Coming up:
The 10,000-rpm scenic drive
Putting WASD into top gear
SLI vs. CrossFire: Three mother-
boards for the Athlon 64
(www.extremetech.com)
REAL- WORLD TESTI NG
130 $900 LCDs
Braving everyday consumer has-
sles, we left our sanitized lab world
and vendor-supplied test models in
a search for retail at-screen LCD
bargains. Heres what we thought
of the TVsand the stores.
BUI LD I T
120 A DIY BACKUP
SERVER
Dont throw out your old tower PC!
Use it as the core of a data server to
back up your new machine or net-
work. We let you know what hardware
and software youll needand how to
put it all together.
Cars
64 Mercedes Benz S550
Pioneer AVIC-N2
OnStar Turn-By-Turn Navigation
65 Bill Howard

www.pcmag.com
J I M LOUDE RBACK
THERE S NOTHI NG LI KE THE
satisfaction of building something your-
self. Thats why we include a DIY project
in every issue of PC Magazine.
So why does it seem like everyone from
Microsoft to Cable Labs wants to snuff out
the build-it revolution? A range of new ca-
pabilities are coming to PCs, but theres no
place at the table for you and me.
Lets start with Microsoft. Windows XP
Media Center Editions been out for years, but you still cant
(ofcially, at least) build it into your own PC. Ive tried and
tried to get a boxed copy, but Microsoft refuses to comply,
saying its only for OEMs, because of the variable quality of
experience. Thats a red herring. Any competent PC builder
will deliver a better experience than the econo-boxes from
Dell or HP will, especially using new HD tuners from ADS
and others. Neros upcoming Media Center competitor has
me salivating, but theres no reason for Microsofts reticence.
Next up: CableCard. The big buzz at this years Consumer
Electronics Show was how Windows Vista will support the
cable industrys standard DRM devicethe CableCard. This
PCMCIA-style smart card validates your cable TV subscrip-
tion and authorizes your hardware to decode and display
digital TV, both SD and HD. Its a leap forward, because the
PC can replace those brain-dead digital set-top boxes to pro-
vide DVR functionality (such as recording HBO and ESPN
HD)but itll work only on certied PCs, authorized by the
cable industrys tech cops at CableLabs. Youll be able to buy a
CableCard-equipped Dell, but not build your own. And what
happens if you decide to upgrade that Dell? Will that decerti-
fy your PC? I smell a big mess, and again the DIY guy loses.
Next problem: HDCP. Even if you could build your own
CableCard-enabled PC, youd still need a brand new monitor
and graphics card. Even if you only want to watch Blu-ray or
HD-DVD movies, your current hardware is inadequate. Al-
most every monitor and graphics card sold today doesnt fully
support the HDCP DRM used to protect those video streams.
I could go on, but you get the point. The industry (and I
must admit, PC Magazine) keeps hyping this wonderful
high-denition media world. But the draconian constraints
on actually recording and viewing all this contentlet alone
streaming it around your housespell doom. Forget mash-
ups, case mods, and custom systems. Go vanilla or go home.
New technology success starts with you, PC Magazines
readers. You adopt it early, work out the bugs, and lord it over
your friendswho end up buying it for themselves. But not
this timeand that spells failure for CableCard on PCs, high-
denition DVDs, and even the PC as a home media hub. Ca-
bleCard is a sham. HDCP will kill HD content. Instead, well
be forced to watch Gilligans Island reruns on our iPods.
MORE ON THE WEB: You can contact Jim Louderback at
Jim_Louderback@ziffdavis.com. For more of his columns, go to
go.pcmag.com/louderback.
The DIY Deathwatch:
Long Live DIY
EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Jim Louderback
EDITOR, REVIEWS Lance Ulanoff
EDITOR, TECHNOLOGY Ben Z. Gottesman
EXECUTIVE PRODUCER (ONLINE) Robyn Peterson
EXECUTIVE EDITORS Stephanie Chang, Carol L. Gonsher,
Vicki B. Jacobson (Online), Jeremy A. Kaplan
ART DIRECTOR Richard J. Demler
MANAGING EDITOR Paul B. Ross
REVIEWS
SENIOR EDITORS Dan Costa (Consumer Electronics), Jennifer DeFeo (Hardware),
Carol Mangis (Cars), Sebastian Rupley (West Coast, Pipeline), Sharon Terdeman
(Software/Web/Security)
LEAD ANALYSTS Cisco Cheng, Robert Heron, Davis D. Janowski, Oliver Kaven, Mike Kobrin,
Neil J. Rubenking, Joel Santo Domingo, Sascha Segan, M. David Stone, Terry Sullivan
REVIEWS EDITORS Kyle Monson (Software/Web/Security), Laarni Almendrala Ragaza
(Consumer Electronics), Eric Rhey (Hardware)
WEB PRODUCERS Rachel B. Florman, Molly K. McLaughlin, Jen Trolio
PRODUCT DATABASE MANAGER Gina Suk COMMERCE PRODUCER Arielle Rochette
PRODUCT REVIEW COORDINATOR Philip-James Jacobowitz
INVENTORY CONTROL COORDINATOR Nicole Graham
FEATURES
FEATURES EDITORS Sean Carroll, Dan Evans, Sarah Pike
SENIOR WRITER Cade Metz STAFF EDITOR Tony Hoffman
ART
SENIOR ASSOCIATE ART DIRECTOR Michael St. George ASSOCIATE ART DIRECTOR Liana Zamora
ASSISTANT ART DIRECTOR Aaron Able GRAPHICS DIRECTOR David Foster
STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER Scott Schedivy
PRODUCTION
ASSOCIATE MANAGING EDITOR Michal Dluginski PRODUCTION MANAGER Jennifer Murray
COPY CHIEF Elizabeth A. Parry COPY EDITORS Gary Berline, Ann Ovodow, Steven Wishnia
ONLINE
SENIOR PRODUCER Yun-San Tsai PRODUCER Mark Lamorgese
ASSISTANT PRODUCER Whitney A. Reynolds PRODUCTION ARTIST Erin Simon
NEWS EDITOR Mark Hachman NEWS REPORTER Bary Alyssa Johnson
ASSISTANT EDITOR Jennifer L. DeLeo
UTILITY PROGRAM MANAGER Tim Smith COMMUNITY MANAGER Jim Lynch
EDITORIAL COMMUNICATIONS MANAGER Anita Anthony
CONTRIBUTING EDITORS Helen Bradley, John Clyman, Richard V. Dragan, Craig Ellison,
John R. Delaney, John C. Dvorak, Galen Fott, Bill Howard, Don Labriola, Bill Machrone,
Ed Mendelson, Jan Ozer, Larry Seltzer, Don Willmott
INTERNS Veronica DeLeon, Nathan Edwards
CORPORATE PRODUCTION
ASSISTANT PRODUCTION DIRECTOR Ivis Fundichely
PRODUCTION MANAGER Michelle Chizmadia TRAFFIC MANAGER Amanda Allensworth
CHIEF CONTENT OFFICER Michael J. Miller
THE INDEPENDENT GUIDE
PC Magazine is the Independent Guide to Technology. Our mission is to test and review
computer- and Internet-related products and services and report fairly and objectively on
the results. Our editors do not invest in rms whose products or services we review, nor do
we accept travel tickets or other gifts of value from such rms. Except where noted,
PC Magazine reviews are of products and services that are currently available. Our reviews
are written without regard to advertising or business relationships with any vendor.
HOW TO CONTACT THE EDITORS
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* x=150 KB/sec. 4 GB = 45x. 2-GB card may require updated device drivers. Consult the device documentation for requirements.
Please note: Some of the listed capacity is used for formatting and other functions and thus is not available for data storage. For more information, please consult Kingstons Digital Media Guide
at kingston.com/Digital_Media_Guide. 2006 Kingston Technology Company, Inc. 17600 Newhope Street, Fountain Valley, CA 92708 USA. All rights reserved. All trademarks and registered
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www.pcmag.com APRIL 11, 2006 PC MAGAZINE 17
K
We take for granted the concept of Internet neu-
trality, the idea that your broadband connection
will wing you to any Web site at a pace limited
only by the speed of the network. I can only imag-
ine the tangled mess the Web would be if every
site had to cut a deal with all the different broad-
band providers. Yet the current system in which
you get whatever information you
want as fast as your connection
can deliver it is under attack on
several fronts.
In our current system, end-us-
ers pay for Internet service, and
Web sites pay for Web hosting
and i ncomi ng connections
(but not for delivering data).
This system has worked so
far, but in recent months,
executives of several large
telco ISPs have suggested
t hat companies del iver-
i ng i nformation over the
telco i nfrastructuresay
Googleshould pay for that privilege. And if the
information being delivered is bandwidth-con-
suming video clips and phone calls, they should
pay even more.
Whats behind this strategy? The phone compa-
nies are worried that Voice over IP services such
as Skype and Vonage threaten their businesses.
And in the long run, video over IP could threaten
cable TV providers as well.
In most cases, I agree with the free-market
argument, which says companies should make
deals that are in their best interest and then let
consumers choose the services they want. In-
ternet access is different, though, because your
choice of broadband providers is often very lim-
ited. In most markets, broadband service is either
a monopoly or a duopoly. Your options are your
phone or cable company, which use lines and
rights-of-way granted to them as
monopolies. These companies
have argued strongly that they
shouldnt be required to make
their infrastructures available
to competing providers.
I argue just as strongly
that Internet lines should
remain open to all data, and
that data should be allowed
to travel as fast as the con-
nection speed permits. The
alternative that some of the
telcos are suggesting is unten-
able. In their scenario, I would
get to some Web sites quickly and
to others slowlydepending on which ones my ISP
has brokered a deal with.
The good news is that so far, the Net has for
the most part remained open and neutral. But
concerns about ISPs changing the playing field
prompted Congress to hold hearings on the topic
in February. It also spurred some senators to talk
about introducing legislation to preserve the Nets
neutrality. The big ISPs will ght any such legisla-
tion. If you care about an open Internet, let your
Congresspeople know.
One area where we agree that all content is not cre-
ated equal is e-mail. Nearly all ISPs use software
to stop spam or at least attempt to minimize it. But
this too is changing. The idea of companies paying
for the privilege of sending e-mail as a way to ex-
pedite bulk mail and distinguish it from spam has
gotten attention recently. AOL and Yahoo!, two of
the worlds biggest e-mail account providers, are
telling their biggest mailers that for 0.25 cents per
piece, theyll deliver the mail faster than usual.
Both are implementing a system from Goodmail
that enables fast delivery for a fee.
AOL and Yahoo! claim they are doing this for
mostly altruistic reasons, to separate legitimate
mail from junk and thus cut down on spam. We
already have solutions designed to identify legiti-
mate senders, such as Return Paths Bonded Sender
Program, but they havent been widely deployed.
The telcos
alternative is
untenable. I would
get to some Web
sites quickly and
to others slowly.
Why We Need a Neutral Net
Paying for Faster E-Mail Delivery
I
L
L
U
S
T
R
A
T
I
O
N

B
Y

R
O
B
E
R
T

N
E
U
B
E
C
K
E
R
Forward Thinking
MI CHAE L J . MI L L E R
18 PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com
MORE ON THE WEB: Join us online and make your
voice heard. Talk back to Michael J. Miller in our
opinions section, go.pcmag.com/miller.
Starting next issue, my column will be a single
page, and Ill be covering tech news and analysis
on my blog (blog.pcmag.com/miller). So while I
have the chance, I want to mention some under-
appreciated products.
Adobe Photoshop is a truly wonderful product,
but if youre an artist or just want to touch up your
digital pictures, you should also check out Corel
Painter Essentials 3. Its a lot of fun, and it lets you
do some amazing things with your digital photos.
Pair it with a Wacom Graphire Tablet for best re-
sults and to get a great deal on the software.
Im a fan of subscription music services, and use
Rhapsody and Yahoo! Music a lot. (I try out new
music every Tuesday.) And to get the most out of
an iPod or any music player, you need great ear-
phones. I like the in-ear models from Etymotic Re-
search and Shure best, since theyre easy to take
along when I travel.
Im not a huge user of photo-sharing services
(though Flickr and the upcoming version of Ya-
hoo! Photos look great), but photo mugs, books,
and bags make for unique and very popular pres-
ents. Each service has slightly different offerings,
so check around. Ive been happy with Smugmug,
Shuttery, and Snapsh.
If you make a lot of presentations, check out
Serious Magics Ovation, a tool that makes Power-
Point slides look much more professional. I use it
with Interlinks RemotePoint presenters.
X1 is still my favorite tool for searching through
all my e-mail messages and les. And ActiveWords
is a great way of using shortcuts, even on a tablet
computer. If you were a DOS power user, youll
probably love it.
If youre really interested in a behind-the-scenes
look at the making of computer chips, read Robert
Colwells The Pentium Chronicles (IEEE). And
Robert Scoble and Shel Israels Naked Conversa-
tions (Wiley) does a great job of explaining how
blogs can make a business more transparent and
improve relationships with customers. Its not as
revolutionary as the indispensable Cluetrain Man-
ifesto, but it offers some great tips. Im just a begin-
ner, but I enjoyed it a great deal.
See you online, and back here next issue.
Recommended Software and Other Odds and Ends
A paid e-mail system has many benets. It would
force companies to be more careful with their
bulk-mail lists, which might decrease the amount
of mail we get. And it very likely would reduce
phishingmail that claims to come from a legit
company but really comes from someone trying to
steal your account information or passwords.
The mail companies like the concept of paid
mail because they could earn lots of money from e-
mail senders if this practice were widely adopted.
E-mail marketing was an $885 million business in
2005, according to Jupiter Research.
On the other hand, a paid mail system would
also affect the regular mail. If paid mailings are re-
ally faster than unpaid mail, would these services
slow delivery of unpaid messages? That would
risk alienating people accustomed to mail arriving
nearly instantaneously. But will bulk-mail market-
ers pay to send mail if it isnt delivered any faster?
For now, all the mail companies say that regular
mail will go through at its usual speed and that all
mail is still subject to spam lters.
Ill accept some spam in order to keep a truly
open system. And I suspect that most Internet us-
ers feel the same way. We simply dont want to lose
the free e-mail system.
Forward Thinking
MI CHAE L J . MI LLE R
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ALL THESE FEATURES
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2006 MPC Computers, LLC (MPC or Seller). MPC is not responsible for omissions or errors in typography or photography. All offers are subject to availability. Prices and specifications may change without notice; prices do not include shipping,
handling or applicable taxes, unless specifically required under contract. Seller's return policy does not include return freight and original shipping/handling charges, and a restocking fee may be charged. All return and warranty periods begin from
date product is shipped. All sales are controlled by Seller's current terms and conditions of sale and limited warranty, copies of which are available on Seller's website or from its sales representatives. On-site service is provided at sole discretion of
MPC. A qualifying diagnostic determination must be made by MPC prior to on-site service (if any). On-site service is provided by a third-party service provider under a separate contract between you and the service provider. Advertised configura-
tions may differ from award-winning configurations. Intel, Intel Inside, Intel Inside logo, Intel Centrino, Intel Centrino logo, Celeron, Intel Xeon, Intel Speedstep, Itanium, Pentium and Pentium III Xeon are trademarks or registered trademarks of Intel
Corporation or its subsidiaries in the United States and other countries. Microsoft and Windows are registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation. Other product names herein are for identification purposes only and may be trademarks of their
respective companies. 1. All hard drive sizes calculated with 1GB equal to 1 billion bytes. 2. MPC 56K modems capable of receiving downloads at up to 56Kbps and sending at up to 31.2Kbps. Due to FCC regulations on power output, receiving
speeds are limited to 53Kbps. Actual speeds may vary. 3. 52X = 52X max./17X min. 48X=48X max./17X min. 24X = 24X max./10X min. 8X DVD = 8X max./1X min.
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Coverage not available in all areas. Limited-time offer. Other conditions and restrictions apply. See contract and rate plan brochure for details. Up to $36 activation fee applies. Equipment price and availability may vary by market.
Early Termination Fee: None if cancelled in first 30 days; thereafter $175. Some agents impose additional fees. Sales tax calculated based on price of unactivated equipment. Rebate: Price before $50 mail-in rebate is $349.99. Allow
1012 weeks for rebate card. Rebate card not available at all locations. Must be customer for 30 consecutive days. Must be postmarked by 4/27/06. Additional hardware or software may be required. The BlackBerry and RIM families
of related marks, images, and symbols are the exclusive properties of and trademarks or registered trademarks of Research In Motion Limitedused by permission. RIM and Research In Motion are registered in the U.S. Patent and
Trademark Office and may be pending or registered in other countries. 2006 Cingular Wireless. All rights reserved.
The new 8700c modelis the best BlackBerry
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models and has a dazzling color screen.
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The Wall Street Journal,
November 10, 2005
2005 Dow Jones and Company, Inc.
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THE WEB HAS ALREADY become a major
medium for delivering TV, video content, and
movies, but costs and long download times
have loomed as problems. Now start-up com-
pany Itiva (www.itiva.com) is out to change
that with its unique Quantum Streaming
technology. The system lets users execute
lickety-split downloads of high-definition
video content over standard broadband lines.
In a demonstration for PC Magazine, Itiva
president Michel Billard downloaded in mere
seconds a 2-minute high-def 720p movie trail-
er from a major movie studio, at a transfer rate
of 5.5 Mbps. The trailer even played while the
download was finishing. To put that in per-
spective, remember the
general rule about down-
loading HD video using
competing technologies:
Downloading content takes
longer than watching it.
Take a look at the peer-
to-peer model, popular-
ized by technologies such
as BitTorrent. Peer-to-peer
le sharing breaks a movie
up into various pieces to
transmit it, inherently in-
creasing wait times. By
contrast, Itiva breaks HD video up into http-
based Web pages (called quanta), which can
be cached at an ISP just like standard Web
pages. With the speeds Itiva is achieving, you
could download a 90-minute movie in less
than 15 minutes.
One major studio has already signed on to
have Itiva distribute its content, and Itiva is
seeking deals with more lm studios. But the
company has its eyes on independent film-
makers, too. Scaling small is as important as
scaling big, says Itiva director Tom Taylor.
Public applications for Itivas technology are
only weeks away. It may play a key role as the
Web goes Hollywood.Sebastian Rupley
Whats Your Love GPA?
IF YOU THINK you hold your
signicant other to high
standards, take a gander at
OKCupid.com. In the latest
spin on online dating, the site lets amorous-but-picky romantics
create and post tests that potential dates must pass before a match
is made. The Slut Test, The Politics Test, and the 50-question
Three-Variable Purity Test were among recent examples.
Many users take multiple posted tests, and you can review their
answers to all of them before making an electronic advance. Oh, and
in a break from the online dating trend, OKCupid.com is entirely free,
including messaging. Dont settle for an expensive dunce!SR
Giving human responses
and skills to new breeds of
robots is all the rage. The
Pleo, unveiled recently at
the DEMO conference in
Arizona, is a convincingly
humanlike Camarasaurus.
Pleo is the rst truly au-
tonomous life form capable
of emotions that allow per-
sonal engagement, says Ca-
leb Chung, who created the
Furby robotic characters and
developed the Pleo. Ugobe, a
robotics technology group,
will begin selling the Pleo for
$199 by the holiday season.
The tiny robot has an op-
erating system called LifeOS
and 40 onboard sensors. The
Pleos most interesting attri-
bute, though, is that its base
set of simulated emotions
is customizable through
Internet downloads. If only
humans could download bet-
ter moods, too. . . .SR
Dino Bot
Net Film Distribution Coup
Want to see a hi-def movie get downloaded? Want to see it again?
A 5urge
in 5earches
Source: Nielsen/NetRatings Megaview Search
Number of searches
conducted via
search engines in
the U.5.
5
,
0
S
9
,
3
7
7
,
0
0
0
3
,
2
7
9
,
7
7
0
,
0
0
0
0ec. 2004 0ec. 2005
A|though the number of |nternet
users rose by on|y 3 |n 2005, the
number of |nternet searches |ast
0ecember was 55 h|gher than the
number |n 0ecember 2004. 0oog|e
rema|ns the top search eng|ne,
account|ng for near|y 49 of
a|| searches.
PI PELI NE
T E C H N O L O G Y T R E N D S & N E WS A N A LY S I S
BEAM ME UP LiftPort Group has stood a space elevator cable one mile
into the air, held aloft by a weather balloon, and robots have success-
fully climbed up and down. Eventually, the company wants to extend
one 62,000 miles into space, for transporting people and cargo.
go.pcmag.com/pipeline
www.pcmag.com APRIL 11, 2006 PC MAGAZINE 21
PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com 22

Making
Mini Movies
THE NEXT STEP FOR nanotech-
nology is in the can: movies shot
at nanoscale. Researchers at
Georgia Tech have created an
atomic force microscope ca-
pable of high-speed imaging 100
times faster than its competi-
tors. The colorful photos seen
here, stills from a nanolm, show
real-time molecular interactions.
Such movies can inform scien-
tists about the properties of the
material the molecules came
from, and they may aid in the
fabrication of tiny devices.
The breakthrough could
become the ubiquitous tool for
examining nanostructures, says
Dr. Calvin Quate, one of the inven-
tors. The microscope has already
lmed the rst-ever movies
showing the elastic and adhesive
properties of carbon nanotubes.
For scientists puttering with
Lilliputian technologies, leaping
from still images to movies is big
news.Sebastian Rupley
Portable video players are cool, but theyre hampered by their tiny little screens. What if
the size of the gadgets display were totally irrelevant? That futuristic scenario may be
upon us. British company Light Blue Optics has developed a projection system the size
of a matchbox, which can easily t into pocket-size devices. All you need is a nearby at
surface to view, say, a music video from your digital player.
The PVPros projection system uses computational algorithms that allow for tiny
lasers and a minuscule size. Light Blue Optics is working with several partners that will
integrate the technology into portable gadgets, according to company CEO Nic Law-
rence. And DigiSmart is working on similar mini-projector technology. Starting later this
year, you may not have to curse that stamp-size screen on your digital music player.SR
Big Things from a Tiny Projector
FUTURE WATCH
go.pcmag.com/futurewatch
1. Toshiba EasyGuard technology comprises a number of features some of which may or may not be available on a particular Toshiba notebook depending on the model selected. See www.easyguard.toshiba.com for
detailed information. 2. Toshibas shock absorption technology provides higher impact protection for your system as compared to Toshiba systems without similar shock protection features based on Toshibas drop tests.
Toshibas standard limited warranty terms and limitations apply. Visit www.warranty.toshiba.com for details. ConfigFree, libretto, Portg, Satellite and Tecra are registered trademarks and EasyGuard and Qosmio are
trademarks of Toshiba America Information Systems, Inc. and/or Toshiba Corporation. Intel, the Intel logo, Intel Inside, the Intel Inside logo, Celeron, Intel Centrino, the Intel Centrino logo and Pentium are trademarks or
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Innovation by design.
registered trademarks of Intel Corporation or its subsidiaries in the United States and other countries. Microsoft and Windows are registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/or other countries.
Wi-Fi is a registered certification mark of the Wi-Fi Alliance. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. While Toshiba has made every effort at the time of publication to ensure the accuracy of the
information provided herein, product specifications, configurations, prices, system/component/options availability are all subject to change without notice. Toshiba is not liable for pricing, typographical or photography
errors. Prices listed are based on products listed at ToshibaDirect.com at time of publication printing. Reseller/Retailer pricing/products may vary. 2006 Toshiba America Information Systems, Inc. All rights reserved.
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HAN DS - ON T E S T I NG OF N E W P R OD UC T S go.pcmag.com/first looks
Proview RX-326
T h e 3 2 - i n c h
Proview RX-326
($949.99 list) is an
LCD TV that of-
fers high-denition res-
olution at an affordable
price. It produced some
of the most eye-pleasing
imagery weve seen on a
TV at this price.
The lack of an over-
the-air HD tuner techni-
cally makes the RX-326
an HD-ready TV, but an
NTSC tuner is provided for
standard-definition analog
reception. The LCD panel
used in the RX-326 offers a
native 1,366- by 768-pixel res-
olution. Though home theater
PC users can drive the RX-326
using either HDMI or VGA
input, only the VGA input
eliminated overscan (exten-
sion of the edge of the picture
beyond the active portion of
the display) without requir-
ing adjustments in the video
cards driver control panel.
Viewing the RX-326 from
more than 20 degrees off
center in any direction made
colors look noticeably faded.
Other similarly priced LCD
TVs typically start to fade at
around 30 degrees.
In the lab, the RX-326s
warm- color temperat ure
preset produced colors that
came closest to the standard
used in film and video pro-
duction. Unlike the Vizio
L32 or the Westi nghouse
LTV-32w1, it didnt suffer
from degraded color qual-
ity when using component
video input. We measured
the RX-326s contrast ratio
at 595:1 (ANSI checkerboard
test pattern), just above aver-
age among LCD TVs.
On the HQV benchmark
DVD, the RX-326 failed to
engage 3:2 pulldown prop-
erly for lm-based video (24
frames per second), produc-
ing visible moir artifacts
and losing detail. But the RX-
326s adjustable noise-reduc-
tion function was a rare nd
for an LCD TV at this price,
and it eliminated most noise
without signicant blurring .
The RX-326 offers HD
resolution at an affordable
price. The Vizio L32 has more
input options and the West-
inghouse LTV-32w1 offers
more comprehensive im-
age controls, but our eyes
preferred the image qual-
ity and A/V input perfor-
mance of the RX-326.
Proview RX-326
$949.99 list. Proview, www
.proview-usa.com. llllm
Vizio L32
Barely sneaking in under
the $1,000 price point,
the 32-inch Vizio L32
($999.99 list) is one of
the least expensive LCD
TVs currently offering
high- definition resolution.
The L32s bright and even
picture isnt without some
minor aws, but it represents
a good value.
The L32s 31.5-inch panel
offers a native resolution of
1,366 by 768 pixels (16:9 aspect
ratio). VGA input came clos-
est to the native resolution at
1,360 by 768 pixels and elimi-
nated overscan.
An unfortunate similar-
ity that the L32 shares with
the Westinghouse LTV-32w1
is poor component video
when compared with digital
Most of us would love to own a big, thin HDTV, but the prices
are just too high. Or are they? We hit the pavement and found
three LCD TVs that retail for less than $1,000, a reasonable g-
ure for those making that rst leap to high-denition. All three
TVs have a similar screen size (around 32 inches, diagonally),
a maximum resolution of 1,360-by-768, and a built-in NTSC TV tuner and
speakers. One of these three could be your ticket to HDTV viewing heaven.
THE MAGAZINE
WORLDS LARGEST
COMPUTER-TESTING
FACILITY
Low-Cost LCD TVs
28 T-Mobile SDA
28 T-Mobile MDA
32 Motorola SLVR L7
32 Cingular 2125
41 Fuji FinePix E900
42 Pentax *ist DS2
42 Canon PowerShot SD450
44 Creative Zen MicroPhoto
46 Saitek A-250
46 i.Sound Max
48 Maxtor OneTouch III Turbo
48 Iomega XL Desktop Hard Drive
50 Velocity Micro Vision GX
52 Kodak EasyShare Photo Printer 500
52 Konica Minolta PagePro 1400W
BY ROBERT HERON
MORE ON THE WEB
Check out the full reviews on
go.pcmag.com/cheaplcdtvs
THE RX-326S SIMULATED SURROUND SOUND mode is effective
at making a sound eld that seems to come from all directions.
F I R S T
PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com 26
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HOME flip to front cover
END flip to back page
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WHAT THE RATINGS MEAN: LLLLL EXCELLENT l LLLLM VERY GOOD l LLLMM GOOD l LLMMM FAIR l LMMMM POOR
Westinghouse
LTV-32w1
The 32-inch Westinghouse
LTV-32w1 ($900 street) LCD
TV struck us with a sense of
dj vu, as its cosmetically
similar to the companys 37-
inch LVM-37w1 television. In
video input. Our subjective
exami nations usi ng DVD
videos, Windows Media Vid-
eo HD clips, and over-the-
air HDTV revealed that the
L32 was sacri f ici ng dark
detail and adding a slight
green tinge to skin tones.
Switching to the L32s HDMI
input significantly reduced
these issues.
In the lab, the L32s Viv-
id2 picture mode registered
very good pri mary color
accuracy but showed more
variation than we like to see
in grayscale tracking (color
measurements of stepped
levels from black to white.)
On the HQV benchmark
DVD the L32 scored lowest
among the 32-inch LCD TVs
we have seen. The L32 was
slow to engage 3:2 pulldown
for lm-based video (24 fps),
producing visible moir arti-
facts in the racetrack clip.
The Vizio L32 offers high-
definition resolution at an
affordable price. Though we
were disappoint-
ed by t he TV's
component video
qu a l i t y whe n
compared wit h
digital video in-
put, this is an all-
too-common trait
a mong va l ue -
priced HD moni-
tors. For digital
video enjoyment,
the L32 is a strong
performer with
good color accu-
racy and picture
detail.
Vizio L32
$999.99 list. Vizio, www.vinc.com.
lllmm
our lab testing, the LTV-32w1
delivered impressive high-
denition image quality when
fed a digital signal but fell
short when receiving analog.
The LTV-32w1 offers a na-
tive resolution of 1,366 by 768
pixels. We were impressed
that 720p video
si gnal s exhi b-
ited no overscan,
and 1080i signals
showed only a
slight overscan.
The l ack of an
over-the-air HD
t uner puts t he
LTV- 3 2 w1 i n
the HD-ready
category, but an
NTSC tuner pro-
vides standard-
denition analog
reception.
On our subjective
viewing examinations, the
LTV-32w1s display defaults
using component video input
produced a cool image, and
shadows appeared too dark,
obscuring detail. Switching
the LTV-32w1 to its warm-
est color temperature preset
yielded a more natural-look-
ing picture, but it wasnt un-
til we switched to DVI input
that we felt the dark detail
was where it should be.
Compared with the 32-inch
Proview RX-326, the LTV-
32w1 gave us about 10 degrees
more of a viewing angle be-
fore the colors began to fade.
In the lab, we continue to
be impressed by the ability
of Westinghouse LCD TVs
to produce very bright imag-
ery and very dark black lev-
els. The LTV-32w1 managed
a record-shatteri ng 833: 1
ANSI contrast ratio using its
maximum backlight setting
and 834:1 ANSI contrast ra-
tio at its minimum backlight
settings. We have yet to see
this range of control any-
where else.
The Westinghouse LTV-
32w1 has the best contrast
ratio weve measured to date,
but we continue to be disap-
pointed by Westinghouses
treatment of analog inputs.
Driven digitally, the LTV-
32w1 is one of the best-per-
formi ng HD monitors i n
this category. Its component
video inputs, however, make
it more suitable for console
gami ng t han for critical
viewing of quality video.
Westinghouse LTV-32w1
$900 street. Westinghouse
Digital Electronics, www
.westinghousedigital.com. lllmm
54 Visioneer Strobe XP300
54 HP Scanjet 4890 Photo Scanner
56 Toshiba Satellite A105-S361
58 AOL Pictures
58 BubbleShare (beta)
58 FilmLoop (beta)
59 Phanfare
59 SnapJot (beta)
60 HP LP2065
60 NEC MultiSync 90GX2
61 Lenovo ThinkVision L201p
62 QuickBooks Online Edition
62 Laplink PCdefense
65 IP Telephony DVX-1000
RED denotes Editors Choice.
>
Check out our HDTV
shopping trip on page 130.
THE VIZIO L32 comes with a good selection of A/V connections
for an HD monitor at this price.
THE 32W1s bottom-mounted
speakers make it look bigger.
L O O K S
www.pcmag.com APRIL 11, 2006 PC MAGAZINE 27
F I R S T L O O K S
Consumer Electronics: Cell Phones
BY SASCHA SEGAN
Whet her s y nci ng
with Microsoft Out-
look, playing music,
or surf i ng the Web
over Wi-Fi, the T-Mobi le
SDA ($299.99 list) puts an
irresistible amount of pow-
er into your pocket. That
makes this delicious little
Microsoft Windows Mobile
Smartphone our new Editors
Choice among keyboardless
smartphones.
We appreciate every but-
ton on the SDA, particularly
those dedicated to music.
Stretched above them is a
beautiful 320-by-240 VGA
screen lled with bold icons
and calendar information.
As a quad-band world-
phone, the SDA can make
calls anywhere from Toledo
to Tashkent with very good
recept ion. The earpiece
volume is acceptable, if not
loud. We got clearer sound
through a Plantronics Voy-
ager 510 Bluetooth headset.
Battery life was good, with
more than 9. 5 hours of talk
time and more than 7 hours
of PDA usage time.
The SDA syncs easily with
Microsoft Outlook usi ng
ActiveSync 4.1 software. The
built-in e-mail client han-
dles POP3/IMAP accounts,
over-the-air syncing with
Exchange servers, and text
messaging. Push e-mail will
come soon.
The SDAs Wi-Fi is part of
T-Mobiles move to compete
with high-speed cel lular
networks run by Cingular,
Sprint, and Verizon. At pres-
ent, T-Mobile has 7, 365 U.S.
Wi-Fi hot spots. A new un-
limited data plan gives you
as much EDGE and Wi-Fi as
you want for $30 a month. We
got acceptable Class 10 EDGE
speeds (from 126 Kbps to 155
Kbps) on our tests.
We wish, however, that the
SDA had more than 20MB
of memory. We never had
more than 5MB available.
The new phone beats our
previous Editors Choice, the
Nokia 6682 from Cingular.
The glossier Microsoft OS
is more fun to use than the
older phones; and the Wi-Fi
capability is truly amazing.
Wed also give the SDA the
nod over the RIM BlackBer-
ry 7105t, which doesnt have
any of the media capabilities.
T-Mobile says that this is
more than a business device,
and we agree. Its also a great
way to carry around your
calendar, play music, and
nd the nearest Mexican res-
taurantall with the aid of
the built-in Web browser. We
expect the T-Mobile SDA to
appeal to more than just suits.
T-Mobile SDA
$299.99 list. T-Mobile,
www.tmobile.com. llllm
Power in Your Pocket
A Smartphone For Checking E-Mail on the Go
BY SASCHA SEGAN
A
Sidekick for grown-
ups, t he T- Mobi l e
MDA ($399 list) han-
dles e-mail and Web brows-
ing over Wi-Fi or EDGE with
aplomb. Unfortunately, its
lackluster phone per-
formance and the stiff
competition from other
keyboard smartphones
will limit its success.
The MDA is a round-
ed handheld, much
like the Sprint PPC-
6700, but smaller,
lighter, and with
better-separated
keys. Dedicated
buttons let you
access e-mail, In-
ternet Explorer,
your contacts, t he
camera, and the networking
manager with one touch.
E-mail and text-messaging
are a breeze with the snappy
keyboard. Turn the phone
on with the keyboard closed
and youre running Micro-
soft Windows Mobile 5.0 on
a 320-by-240 touchscreen.
Slide the keyboard out and
the screen automatically ro-
tates in response.
After adding a few pro-
grams, we still had 20MB
of free storage memory and
23MB of free program
memoryplent y
for everyday use.
When not in Wi-
Fi range, the MDA
works wit h t he
T-Mobi le EDGE
SDA network. Us-
i ng our MDA as
an EDGE modem
for a laptop, we got
excellent Class 10
EDGE speeds of 140
to 189 Kbps.
Alas, the MDA isnt
as good a phone as it is
an e-mail device. It has
quad-band support, so it can
roam across the U.S. and the
world, but we found recep-
tion only so-so. In addition,
the earpiece was so quiet we
had trouble making out the
other end of a conversation
in a noisy environment. The
speakerphone was better.
Battery life in PDA mode
was middling, at almost 5
hours when playing back vid-
eos with the backlight turned
way up. Phone talk time was
good, at 9 hours 37 minutes.
Like so many other PDA/
phones, the T-Mobile MDA
doesnt look good when com-
pared with the easy-to-use
Palm Treo 650 and the power-
ful Sprint PPC-6700. Overall,
the MDA isnt a bad PDA/
phone, it just isnt the best.
T-Mobile MDA
$399.99 list. T-Mobile,
www.tmobile.com. lllmm
THE SDA is a small, rounded
phone with tiny buttons.
THE MDA has
a handy slide-out keyboard.
PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com 28
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F I R S T L O O K S
Consumer Electronics: Cell Phones
BY SASCHA SEGAN
T
he Motorola SLVR L7
($299.99 direct) may
be the handsomest
phone in America. But even
though it runs Apples popu-
lar iTunes music player, its
feature set doesnt excite
us. (One example: Like the
RAZR V3, the SLVR L7 uses
the primitive recorded-tag
form of voice dialing.) This is
a phone that will best satisfy
voice callers who want a see-
and-be-seen device.
Ever yt hi ng about t he
SLVRs design is well done.
The anodi zed-alumi num
back, glass-infused plastic
case, metal keypad, glass
screen, and well-balanced
heft of this half-inch-thick
status symbol make it feel far
more expensive than it is.
Along with its RAZR cou-
sins, the quad-band SLVR
L7 gets excellent reception,
though the sound quality
isnt quite as good. We found
the earpiece volume loud
enough, if not very loud. We
easily hooked the phone up
to Jabra, Logitech, and Plan-
tronics Bluetooth headsets.
The SLVR L7 stores up to
100 songs per microSD card
in iTunes. Plug the phone into
an iTunes-equipped com-
puter and it will appear as an
iPod shufe.
Audio performance is ad-
equate, as long as youre not
into bass. On our frequency
response test, it dropped
off very quickly below 100
Hz, resulting in pretty weak
lows. Overall, sound with the
included earbuds was very
mufed. If you use real ear-
phones, you have to unplug
them every time the phone
ringstotally unacceptable.
Other than iTunes, the
SLVRs feature set is pretty
2004. Theres a basic POP3
e-mail client, an instant-mes-
saging client, a dim, blurry
camera that takes VGA stills,
5-frame-per-second, 176-
by-144 video, and a glacially
slow GPRS data capability.
You can use the phone as a
PC modem, though it crawls
along at 30 to 40 Kbps.
Bluetooth support is pret-
ty good: You can sync your
contacts and calendar and
transfer photos to and from
your PC. But its the slower
Bluetooth 1.2, not the newer,
faster Bluetooth 2.0+EDR.
The SLVR L7 is available
for $199.99 with a two-year
contract from Cingular. An
unlocked model, suitable for
T-Mobile but lacking iTunes,
is $359.00 from Dynamism.
com. Wed recommend it to
nonpower users looking for
a pretty, pretty phone.
Motorola SLVR L7
$299.99; with contract, $199.99 and up.
Motorola, Cingular Wireless,
www.cingular.com. lllhm
Crazy, Sexy, Cool: Motorolas SLVR
The 2125 Puts Power in Your Pocket
BY SASCHA SEGAN
T
he Ci ngul ar 21 25
($299.99 with con-
tract) is a powerful,
good-looking smartphone
that brings Windows Mobile
flexibility to a truly pocket-
sized handset. Its a good
choice for maki ng phone
calls, syncing with PIM data,
and surng the Web.
The petite (4.3 by 1.8 by 0.7
inches, 3.7 oz) 2125 is easy to
hold and looks professional
in its gray-and-silver case. Its
flatter and squarer than the
T-Mobile SDA; the dedicated
music-player buttons are
gone from the front; and the
row of four soft keys below
the screen is now two.
Inside, we found the 2125s
performance to be very simi-
lar to that of the SDA. The
two phones share the same
195-MHz TI OMAP proces-
sor and quad-band EDGE
radio. We found the 2125s
signal strength to be excel-
lent, and the quality of sound
through the earpiece and
Bluetooth headsets to be ac-
ceptable. The 2125 got much
more talk time than the SDA,
a fabulous 14 hours.
As a Windows Mobile 5.0
Smartphone, the 2125 syncs
with Windows PCs running
ActiveSync 4.1. You can trans-
fer music and video with Win-
dows Media Player 10.
You can use the 2125 as a
laptop modem on Cingulars
EDGE network, and we got
excellent EDGE speeds of 159
to 185 Kbps in our tests. But
with Cingular now turning
on its 3G HSDPA network,
wed like to see some HSDPA
in its smart devices.
The 2125s 1. 3-megapixel
camera is pretty poor. Vid-
eos record at 176-by-144 and
10 frames per second. You
can save photos or videos to
the internal memory or to
the memory card. We didnt
run into problems with the
phones 15MB of storage.
The Cingular 2125 is small-
er, brighter, and syncs better
with PCs than the competing
Nokia 6682. And the phone
is better all around than the
venerable, beloved Audiovox
SMT 5600. Still, were re-
serving our Editors Choice
in keyboardless smartphones
for the T-Mobile SDA, the
2125s overachieving sibling,
which has Wi-Fi and dedi-
cated music buttons.
Cingular 2125
$299.99 with contract. Cingular Wire-
less, www.cingular.com. llllm
YOULL WANT
to show off the SLVR L7.
THE 2125 has a big, bright
320-by-240 screen.
PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com 32
J UMP TO NEXT PAGE >>
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A
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April/May 2006
Acer recommends Windows

XP Professional.
Acer

TravelMate

4200
Dual-Core Powerhouse
For the name of a reseller near you or further
information, please call Acer or visit our Web site:
800-571-2237
www.acer.com/us
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Duo Mobile Technology includes a processor optimized for the multitasking you do every day
plus full 802.11a/b/g wireless capability. Images are stunning on the 15.4 wide-screen display that delivers razor-sharp
1280 x 800 resolution. Abundant memory boosts the performance of application programs, while ample storage space is
provided by the hard drive and integrated DVD-Dual drive (DVD+/-RW).
100GB
1
hard drive
Integrated DVD-Dual drive (DVD+/-RW)
15.4" WXGA (1280 x 800) TFT display
Intel

Graphics Media Accelerator 950


802.11a/b/g WLAN, 10/100 LAN, V.92 modem
One-year limited warranty
2
Acer TravelMate 4202WLMi
$1,299
INTEL

CORE

DUO PROCESSOR T2300


(2MB L2 CACHE, 1.66GHZ, 667MHZ FSB)
GENUINE WINDOWS

XP PROFESSIONAL
(LX.TAV06.040)
MULTITASKING MADE EASY
Acer AL2416Wd
Prices shown are estimated street prices and do not include tax or shipping. Retailer or reseller prices may vary.
24" wide-screen
TFT LCD
1920 x 1200
native resolution
1000:1 contrast ratio
178 horizontal
viewing angle
178 vertical
viewing angle
VGA, DVI-D signal
connectors
500 cd/m
2
brightness
6ms gray-to-gray
response time
Internal power
adapter
Silver color
Acer AL2416Wd
$919
(ET.L6102.018)
24" WIDE-SCREEN
20" wide-screen TFT LCD,
Acer CrystalBrite
Technology
1680 x 1050
native resolution
800:1 contrast ratio
176 horizontal
viewing angle
176 vertical
viewing angle
F-20
Acer

Flat Panels: Displaying Quality & Value


Two 5.0W
integrated speakers
VGA, DVI-D
signal connectors
300 cd/m
2
brightness
8ms gray-to-gray
response time
External power
adapter
Gloss black/red color
Acer

TravelMate

2420
Priced Right for Work & Play
Whether you need a notebook for your small business or for everyday home computing, the
Acer TravelMate 2420 has you covered. Track budgets, plan a killer marketing campaign, work on school
assignments or surf the Web with this affordable system. Thanks to integrated wireless access, youre not
tied to home base. Feel free to take the TravelMate 2420 anywhere theres a hotspotmeetings, your
favorite coffee shop or class. You also get a built-in combo drive for your recording and viewing pleasure.
INTEL

CELERON

M PROCESSOR 370
(1MB L2 CACHE, 1.50GHZ, 400MHZ FSB)
GENUINE WINDOWS

XP PROFESSIONAL
512MB DDR2 400 SDRAM AND 80GB
1
HARD DRIVE
(LX.TB206.050)
$200 PRICE CUT!
$120 PRICE CUT!
Acer TravelMate 2423WXCi-XPH
$599
INTEL

CELERON

M PROCESSOR 370
(1MB L2 CACHE, 1.50GHZ, 400MHZ FSB)
GENUINE WINDOWS

XP HOME EDITION
256MB DDR2 400 SDRAM AND 40GB
1
HARD DRIVE
(LX.TB205.077)
Acer TravelMate 2423WXCi
$699
Intel

Celeron

MProcessor
Genuine Windows

XP Professional or
- Genuine Windows

XP Home Edition
Integrated CD-RW/DVD-ROM combo drive
14.1" WXGA (1280 x 800) TFT display
Mobile Intel

910GML Express chipset with


integrated graphics
802.11b/g WLAN, 10/100 LAN, V.92 modem
One-year limited warranty
2
Acer recommends Windows

XP Professional.
Prices shown are estimated street prices and do not include tax or shipping. Retailer or reseller prices may vary.
F-20
$539
(ET.L380B.063)
Acer

TravelMate

4060
Enjoy the Freedom of Mobility
The Acer TravelMate 4060 strikes just the right balance between performance and
affordability. Along with Intel

Centrino

Mobile Technology, you get a panoramic


15.4 wide-screen display for side-by-side document viewing plus integrated
wireless with Acers exclusive SignalUp technology for enhanced antenna efficiency.
An excellent choice for office or home computing, this notebook lets you enjoy
the freedom of mobility to work faster and smarter without sacrificing features.
Acer TravelMate 4062WLCi
$849
INTEL

PENTIUM

M PROCESSOR 740
(2MB L2 CACHE, 1.73GHZ, 533MHZ FSB)
GENUINE WINDOWS

XP PROFESSIONAL
(LX.TAK06.075)
15.4 WIDE-SCREEN
Intel

Centrino

Mobile Technology
- Intel

Pentium

MProcessor
- Mobile Intel

915GM Express chipset


- Intel

PRO/Wireless 2200BG network connection


Genuine Windows

XP Professional
512MB DDR2 533 SDRAM
80GB
1
hard drive
Integrated CD-RW/DVD-ROM
combo drive
15.4" WXGA (1280 x 800) TFT display
Intel

Graphics Media Accelerator 900


802.11b/g WLAN, 10/100 LAN, V.92 modem
One-year limited warranty
2
19" TFT LCD,
Acer CrystalBrite Technology
1280 x 1024 native resolution
700:1 contrast ratio
150 horizontal viewing angle
135 vertical viewing angle
Two 1.5W integrated speakers
Acer AL1951C
VGA, DVI-D signal
connectors
400 cd/m
2
brightness
4ms gray-to-gray
response time
External power adapter
Silver/black color
Acer AL1951C
$359
(ET.L4108.068)
4MS RESPONSE TIME
Compare LCD Prices/Features & You'll Choose Acer

Prices shown are estimated street prices and do not include tax or shipping. Retailer or reseller prices may vary.
19" TFT LCD with height
adjustment and rotation
1280 x 1024 native resolution
1000:1 contrast ratio
178 horizontal viewing angle
178 vertical viewing angle
Two 1.0W integrated speakers
Acer AL1717 Bbmd Acer AL1923 r
17" TFT LCD
1280 x 1024
native resolution
700:1 contrast ratio
150 horizontal
viewing angle
135 vertical viewing angle
Two 1.0W integrated speakers
VGA, DVI-D signal
connectors
300 cd/m
2
brightness
8ms response time
Internal power adapter
Black color
VGA, DVI-D signal
connectors
280 cd/m
2
brightness
8ms response time
Internal power adapter
Titanium color
Acer AL1923 r
$339
(ET.L660B.048)
ADJUST HEIGHT
& ROTATE
Acer

ezDock
The one-plug Acer ezDock manages and organizes peripheral
connections with ease, allowing you to add or remove devices
instantly, without turning off your notebook computer. This
compact docking solution features 21 interface ports and two card
slots for desktop-like expansion possibilities, as well as PCI Express

technology and a Kensington

lock slot.
Acer TravelMate 4062WLMi
$999
Acer

TravelMate

4060
Your Essential Business Tool
Intel

Centrino

Mobile Technology
- Intel

Pentium

MProcessor
- Mobile Intel

915GM Express chipset


- Intel

PRO/Wireless 2200BG network connection


Genuine Windows

XP Professional
512MB DDR2 533 SDRAM
100GB
1
hard drive
Integrated DVD-Dual drive (DVD+/-RW)
15.4" WXGA (1280 x 800) TFT display
Intel

Graphics Media Accelerator 900


802.11b/g WLAN, 10/100 LAN, V.92 modem
One-year limited warranty
2
INTEL

PENTIUM

M PROCESSOR 740
(2MB L2 CACHE, 1.73GHZ, 533MHZ FSB)
GENUINE WINDOWS

XP PROFESSIONAL
(LX.TAK06.079)
15.4" WIDE-SCREEN
Count on the Acer TravelMate 4060 for growing your business. Powered by Intel

Centrino

Mobile Technology,
this stylish notebook boasts high-end features at a price that wont break your budget. The wide-screen 15.4
display is perfect for viewing documents side by side. The integrated optical drive offers flexibility and
convenience, and the wireless LAN will keep you connected and productive wherever your work takes you.
Acer ezDock Docking Station
$299
COMPATIBLE WITH THE TRAVELMATE 8200, 8100, 4650, 4400
3000, C310, C200; FERRARI 4000
(LC.D0103.004)
Acer recommends Windows

XP Professional.
Prices shown are estimated street prices and do not include tax or shipping. Retailer or reseller prices may vary.
Acer

TravelMate

C310
Tablet & Full-Featured Notebook in One
The Acer TravelMate C310 is the convertible tablet that you'll want to use as
your primary computer. With a big 14.1" XGA display, full-size keyboard,
modular optical drive and optional ezDock Docking Station, it's similar to a
standard notebook but offers much more. The screen becomes a writing
surface when you rotate it and fold it back over the keyboard, perfect for
taking notes, annotating documents and completing online forms.
Intel

Centrino

Mobile Technology
- Intel

Pentium

MProcessor
- Mobile Intel

915PM Express chipset


- Intel

PRO/Wireless 2200BG network connection


Genuine Windows

XP Tablet PC Edition
4-in-1 card reader for optional
MultiMediaCard

, Secure Digital card,


Memory Stick

or Memory Stick PRO

14.1" XGA (1024 x 768) TFT display


NVIDIA GeForce

Go 6200 graphics
802.11b/g WLAN, Bluetooth

,
gigabit LAN, V.92 modem
Full-size EMR pen with eraser
One-year limited warranty
2
Acer AL1717 Bbmd
$249
(ET.1717B.MD8)
700:1 CONTRAST RATIO
Acer AL1716 b
17" TFT LCD
1280 x 1024 native resolution
500:1 contrast ratio
150 horizontal viewing angle
135 vertical viewing angle
VGA signal connector
300 cd/m
2
brightness
12ms response time
Internal power adapter
Black color
Acer AL1716 b
$219
(ET.1716B.012)
GREAT VALUE
Acer TravelMate C312XCi
$1,699
INTEL

PENTIUM

M PROCESSOR 740
(2MB L2 CACHE, 1.73GHZ, 533MHZ FSB)
GENUINE WINDOWS

XP TABLET PC EDITION
512MB DDR2 533 SDRAM, 80GB
1
HARD DRIVE
AND MODULAR CD-RW/DVD-ROM COMBO DRIVE
(LX.T270E.029)
Acer TravelMate C314XMi
$1,999
INTEL

PENTIUM

M PROCESSOR 760
(2MB L2 CACHE, 2GHZ, 533MHZ FSB)
GENUINE WINDOWS

XP TABLET PC EDITION
1GB DDR2 533 SDRAM, 100GB
1
HARD DRIVE
AND MODULAR DVD-DUAL DRIVE (DVD+/-RW)
(LX.T870E.032)
CONVERTS HANDWRITING TO TEXT
The AcerPower S280 boasts an impressive feature set in a stylish chassis at an affordable price. Ample power means
you can efficiently perform everyday tasks. Multiple expansion slots make the system easy to upgrade, while the eight
USB 2.0 ports give you the ability to connect to the latest peripherals. All in all, an excellent choice for home, school
or office computing.
Prices shown are estimated street prices and do not include tax or shipping. Retailer or reseller prices may vary.
2000 ANSI lumens
XGA (1024 x 768) native resolution
2000:1 contrast ratio
16.7 million displayable colors
PC and Mac compatible
Acer PD120D
2000 ANSI lumens
SVGA (800 x 600) native resolution
2000:1 contrast ratio
16.7 million displayable colors
PC and Mac compatible
Acer PD100
Acer PD100
$669
(EY.J2101.006)
Acer PD120D
$999
(EY.J2201.012)
Intel

Celeron

D Processor
Genuine Windows

XP Professional
80GB
1
hard drive
Display sold separately.
Display sold separately.
Even if youre short on space, you dont need to sacrifice performance. The
compact Acer Veriton 2800 business desktop gives you an
Intel

Pentium

4 Processor with HT Technology, dual-channel memory and


eight USB ports for connecting to a printer and other office peripherals.
Acer

Veriton

2800
Powerful but Compact
10/100 LAN
Integrated SiS Mirage

graphics
One-year limited warranty
2
Acer Veriton 2800
$689
Acer

AcerPower

S280
Affordable Computing at its Best
INTEL

PENTIUM

4 PROCESSOR 521 WITH HT TECHNOLOGY


(1MB L2 CACHE, 2.80GHZ, 800MHZ FSB)
GENUINE WINDOWS

XP PROFESSIONAL
(VT2800-U-P5210)
AcerPower S280
$369
INTEL

CELERON

D PROCESSOR 336
(256KB L2 CACHE, 2.80GHZ, 533MHZ FSB)
GENUINE WINDOWS

XP PROFESSIONAL
256MB DDR SDRAM AND
CD-ROM DRIVE
(APS280-U-C3600)
AcerPower S280
$429
INTEL

CELERON

D PROCESSOR 346
(256KB L2 CACHE, 3.06GHZ, 533MHZ FSB)
GENUINE WINDOWS

XP PROFESSIONAL
512MB DDR SDRAM AND
CD-RW/DVD-ROM COMBO DRIVE
(APS280-U-C4600)
Digital Light Processing

from Texas Instruments is an all-digital display technology for projectors and other
products that delivers the best picture in terms of clarity, brilliance and color.
Acer

Projectors with DLP

Technology
Intel

Pentium

4 Processor with
HT Technology
Genuine Windows

XP Professional
512MB DDR2 533 SDRAM
80GB
1
SATA hard drive, 7200RPM
CD-RW/DVD-ROM combo drive
Intel

Graphics Media Accelerator 950


Gigabit LAN
Three-year limited warranty
2
Acer recommends Windows

XP Professional.
Stability, ease-of-deployment and comprehensive management tools are the
hallmarks of Veriton, Acer's premier business desktop series. Each of these
features has been enhanced in the Acer Veriton 6800, with an improved
tool-less chassis design, fortified security tools, more powerful Intel

processors and Acer eManager software.


Acer

Veriton

6800
Optimized for Business
Prices shown are estimated street prices and do not include tax or shipping. Retailer or reseller prices may vary.
Replacement
Lamp for PD525,
PD116
$299
(EC.J1001.001)
Keep a Replacement Lamp on
hand for the Acer PD525,
PD120D, PD116P or PD100
projector. Expected life in
hours is 2,000 standard mode,
3,000 economy mode.
Intel

Pentium

4 Processor with HT Technology or


Intel

Pentium

D Processor
Genuine Windows

XP Professional
Intel

Graphics Media Accelerator 950


Gigabit LAN
Three-year limited warranty
2
Acer Veriton 6800
$999
INTEL

PENTIUM

D PROCESSOR 830
(2X1MB L2 CACHE, 3GHZ, 800MHZ FSB)
GENUINE WINDOWS

XP PROFESSIONAL
1GB DDR2 533 SDRAM; 160GB
1
SATA HARD DRIVE, 7200RPM;
AND DVD-DUAL DRIVE (DVD+/-RW)
(VT6800-U-S8301)
For permanent placement
of an Acer PD525, PD120D,
PD116P or PD100 projector in a
conference room or classroom,
youll want an easy-to-install
Ceiling Mount.
Ceiling Mount
$79
(EZ.PCM03.007)
Replacement Lamp
for PD120D, PD100
$199
(EC.J2101.001)
Acer Veriton 6800
$879
INTEL

PENTIUM

4 PROCESSOR 650 WITH HT TECHNOLOGY


(2MB L2 CACHE, 3.40GHZ, 800MHZ FSB)
GENUINE WINDOWS

XP PROFESSIONAL
512MB DDR2 533 SDRAM; 160GB
1
SATA HARD DRIVE, 7200RPM;
AND CD-RW/DVD-ROM COMBO DRIVE
(VT6800-U-P6501)
Acer Veriton 6800
$699
INTEL

PENTIUM

4 PROCESSOR 630 WITH HT TECHNOLOGY


(2MB L2 CACHE, 3GHZ, 800MHZ FSB)
GENUINE WINDOWS

XP PROFESSIONAL
512MB DDR2 533 SDRAM; 80GB
1
SATA HARD DRIVE, 7200RPM;
AND CD-RW/DVD-ROM COMBO DRIVE
(VT6800-U-P6301)
Acer Veriton 6800
$799
INTEL

PENTIUM

4 PROCESSOR 640 WITH HT TECHNOLOGY


(2MB L2 CACHE, 3.20GHZ, 800MHZ FSB)
GENUINE WINDOWS

XP PROFESSIONAL
512MB DDR2 533 SDRAM; 80GB
1
SATA HARD DRIVE, 7200RPM;
AND CD-RW/DVD-ROM COMBO DRIVE
(VT6800-U-P6400)
DUAL-CORE PROCESSOR
160GB HARD DRIVE
Acer Notebook/Tablet Service Upgrades Protect Your Valuable Investment
1
When referring to storage capacity, GB stands for one billion bytes and MB stands for one million bytes. Some utilities may indicate varying storage capacities. Total user-accessible capacity
may vary depending on operating environments.
2
For a free copy of the standard limited warranty end-users should see a reseller where Acer products are sold or write to Acer America Corporation, Warranty Department, P.O. Box 6137,
Temple, TX 76503.
2006 Acer America Corporation. Information and prices are subject to change without notice. Pricing is effective from March 7, 2006 through April 15, 2006.
Product images are representations of some of the models available and may vary from the model you
purchase. Acer, TravelMate and Veriton are registered trademarks and AcerPower a trademark of Acer Inc. Aspire is a trademark of Acer
America Corporation. Celeron, Celeron Inside, Centrino, Core Inside, Intel, Intel Core, Intel Inside, Intel SpeedStep, Intel Viiv, Intel Xeon, Itanium, Itanium Insi-
de, Pentium, Pentium Inside, the Centrino logo, the Intel logo and the Intel Inside logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of
Intel Corporation or its subsidiaries in the United States and other countries. Other names and brands may be claimed as the property of others. Microsoft and
Windows are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/or other countries.
Quality is built into every notebook and tablet PC Acer makes, and each comes with a
one-year standardlimited warranty.
2
It includes hardware technical support via toll-free phoneplus
a concurrent International Travelers Warranty for travel outside the U.S. and Canada. Extra
protection is available with one of these upgrades:
2-Year Extension of Limited Warranty (146.AB820.EX2)
$99
Prepays freight to and from Acer repair depot.
Excludes extension of International Traveler's Warranty.
Its a tough world out there, and accidents do happensticky spills, dangerous drops, nasty
knockswhich is why you should consider the Total Protection Upgrade. It runs concurrently with
the limited warranty
2
and limited warranty extension and covers the cost of a replacement unit
if your covered notebook cannot be repaired.
2-Year Extension of Limited Warranty + 3-Year Total Protection Upgrade (146.AD077.002)
$199
Prepays freight to and from Acer repair depot.
Excludes extension of International Traveler's Warranty.
For the name of a reseller near you or further
information, please call Acer or visit our Web site:
800-571-2237
www.acer.com/us
Prices shown are estimated street prices and do not include tax or shipping. Retailer or reseller prices may vary.
Acer TravelMate 8204WLMi
$2,499
INTEL

CORE

DUO PROCESSOR T2500


(2MB L2 CACHE, 2GHZ, 667MHZ FSB)
GENUINE WINDOWS

XP PROFESSIONAL
(LX.TAX06.034)
Intel

Centrino

Duo Mobile Technology


- Intel

Core

Duo Processor
- Mobile Intel

945PM Express chipset


- Intel

PRO/Wireless 3945ABG network connection


Genuine Windows

XP Professional
2GB DDR2 667 SDRAM
120GB
1
hard drive, 5400RPM
Modular Super-Multi drive
(DVD+R, DVD-R, DVD-RAM)
5-in-1 card reader for optional
MultiMediaCard

, Secure Digital card,


Memory Stick

, Memory Stick PRO

or
xD-Picture Card

15.4" WSXGA+ (1680 x 1050) TFT display


ATI

Mobility

Radeon

X1600 graphics
Integrated, adjustable webcam
802.11a/b/g WLAN, Bluetooth

,
gigabit LAN, V.92 modem
One-year limited warranty
2
Have a video
conference
almost
anywhere Integrated
Webcam
DUAL-CORE PROCESSOR
Acer recommends Windows

XP Professional.
Acer

TravelMate

8200
The Visible Power of Mobile Leadership
The Acer TravelMate 8200 includes all the new and high-end features you could want in a
notebook and earned the prestigious PC Magazine Editors Choice Award in January 2006.
Intel

Centrino

Duo Mobile Technology delivers superb dual-core mobile performance,


allowing you to easily run demanding applications simultaneously. Supercharged
ATI

Mobility

Radeon

X1600 graphics turn this notebook into a mobile entertainment


system and make the most of the wide-screen 15.4" WSXGA+ display. You also get the
Acer OrbiCam, an 1.3-megapixel adjustable webcam built into the black carbon-fiber chassis.
F I R S T L O O K S
Consumer Electronics: Digital Cameras
Fujis Nine-Megapixel Sharpshooter
of the highlights. Overall col-
or saturation was quite good.
There was a bit less fringing
in the ash image than in the
daylight shot. In general we
found a decent exposure with
the ash, although we didnt
quite get the deep, rich black
we got in the daylight shot.
Because of the high mega-
pixel sensor, the E900 image
had very high line counts on
our resolution test: It aver-
aged a score of 2,000,
which is the limit that
the test target allows
us to read. The E900
was quick, booting
up in 2.4 seconds. But
we were disappointed
in the 4.7-second re-
cycle time, which is
very slow in todays
market. There was
virtually no shutter
lag, very little barrel
distortion, and no
pincushioning.
Yet we found some
things we think Fuji
could improve upon.
For instance, the 2-inch
LCD could be larger and
could be articulating. For
video, the E900 doesnt use
MPEG-4 compression for
smaller le sizes, and theres
no way to zoom during lm-
ing of video clips.
If youre looking for a cam-
era that can produce excellent
images that you can blow up to
large print sizes, the FinePix
E900 will not disappoint. Its
our Editors Choice for a top-
quality point-and-shoot com-
pact digital camera.
Fuji FinePix E900
$500 street. Fuji Photo Film U.S.A. Inc.,
www.fujilm.com. llllm
BY TERRY SULLIVAN
Judgi ng a cameras
val ue i s no l onger
the megapixel num-
bers game it used to
be. Consumers are starting
to understand that theres a
lot more to consider: zoom
range, ISO, lens sharpness,
shooting mode, menu struc-
ture, wireless capabilities,
and so on. A perfect example
is the Fuji FinePix E900 ($500
street), which offers a
9MP image sensor and
a whole lot more.
The E900, t he
successor to the Fuji
FinePix E550, does
more than just cre-
ate big image files.
For starters, it con-
veniently runs on
two double-A bat-
teries and features
a 4X optical zoom
lens with a 7.2mm to
28. 8mm range (the
equivalent of a 35mm
lens with a 32mm to
128mm zoom) and cor-
responding maximum
f-stops of f/2.8 to f/5.6.
We like the 32mm end
of the zoom, which begins
at a wider angle than many
other compacts do.
Of course, the 9MP Super
CCD-HR sensor gives you
large le sizes, ne for large
prints or doing lots of crop-
ping. But this compact cam-
era also lets you save images
directly as high-quality RAW
files, a rare feature among
compact point-and-shoots.
In our real-world tests the
E900 captured images with
a very wide dynamic range,
even when just shooting 8-bit
JPEGs instead of 16-bit RAW
les. For example, on a foggy
morning, we shot a suburban
landscapetrees, trash cans,
parked cars, shrubsand
a sidewalk leading into the
mist. We love how the camera
rendered foreground objects
with lots of contrast and still
showed distant objects em-
bedded in the fog. The path
itself provided a test strip of
sorts: It displayed a plentiful
your portraits a more natural
appearance. Its not a pana-
cea for every low-light photo
op, but in our informal, real-
world tests (at our local Star-
bucks), our shots of people
had minimal blur, and we
could even read the lettering
and prices on various signs
and on small bags of java.
Our l ab test s showed
mixed results. In our daylight
shot, Fujis Real Photo tech-
nology increased the ISO and
thus the noise as well. Color
saturation was right on the
money, and we were pleased
to see no color casts. We did
see some fringing, however,
but the shot was well exposed
and displayed a very wide
dynamic range.
The ash coverage on our
ash test shot was maybe too
good, since it blew out some
range of tones from a dark
gray to a very light gray.
The E900s Natural Light
mode takes advantage of
Fujis Real Photo technol-
ogy, which we first saw on
the FinePix F10. In this mode,
Fuji boosts the ISO, which
gives you a better chance
of stopping the action (via
a quicker shutter speed). It
also makes it easier to shoot
without ash, which can give
ANALYST'S TIP
Terry Sullivan , Lead Analyst
In the past, the RAW le format seemed to be only for professional shooters and those with high-end
D-SLRs. But today, even point-and-shoot digital cameras are offering this option. So, when looking for a
digital camera, look for a RAW option in the image settings, especially if you plan to do a lot of photo
manipulation in Photoshop or other image-editing programs.
www.pcmag.com APRIL 11, 2006 PC MAGAZI NE 41
THE FINEPIX E900s pop-up-style
strobe makes the ash easy to control.
BY TERRY SULLIVAN
T
he Pentax *i st DS2
( body onl y, $ 75 0
street) falls well short
of the standard set by its
D-SLR counterparts. Aside
from a large LCD screen and
its ability to run on double-A
batteries, we didnt nd much
to get excited about.
Funneling light to the 6.1-
megapixel sensor is the Pen-
tax smc P-DA 18mm to 55mm
zoom lens (equivalent to a
35mm lens with a 27mm to
82. 5mm zoom range) with
corresponding f-stops from
f/3.5 to f/5.6. The lens ($199.95
list) is not included with the
camera, though, which seems
overpriced. Beyond that, per-
formance is so-so.
We found the burst mode
to be steady, although not
ultrafast, and we liked that
we could take shot after shot
without pausing. But when
we compared our test images
with the stunning results
from cameras like the Rebel
XT, t he Olympus Evolt
E-500, and the Nikon D50,
the DS2s underexposed
and lackluster pictures
just didnt cut it.
In our daylight shots,
the DS2 introduced more
grain and colored noise
than the D50. The daylight
still life was underexposed
by about 1.5 to 2 f-stops, re-
sulting in a dark image. Color
saturation was good, especial-
ly in the reds and yellows.
Our f lash test shot was
also underexposed. Again,
the camera was most accu-
rate at rendering the reds and
yellows, and there was very
little fringing. The average of
horizontal and vertical reso-
lution was 1,400 lineslow
for a 6.1MP camera.
The DS2 took an average
of 1.2 seconds to boot, which
is slow for a D-SLR. The 1.5-
second recycle time was also
slow, though we found virtu-
ally no shutter lag.
The image displayed some
barrel distortion at the wide-
angle end of the zoom and
some pincushioning at the
telephoto end.
In the incredibly competi-
tive world of D-SLRs, manu-
facturers must create nearly
flawless devices. Given the
unimpressive performance
and image quality of the Pen-
tax *ist DS2, we think most
competitors, including our
present Editors Choice, the
Nikon D50, are better buys.
Pentax *ist DS2
Body only, $750 street. Pentax Imag-
ing Co., www.pentaximaging.com.
llmmm
Pentaxs Disappointing D-SLR
Better Shots for Small Hands
BY TERRY SULLIVAN
A
s with Canons 7. 2-
megapixel PowerShot
SD550 Digital Elph,
our current Editors Choice
in the high-end ultracom-
pact category, theres a lot
to like about the 5MP Canon
PowerShot SD450 Digital Elph
($399.95 list). Yet there comes
a point when a camera is a tad
too tiny, and the SD450 may
have reached that point.
Just how small is the cam-
era? The numbers tell the
story: 5 ounces and roughly
3.5 by 2 by 0.8 inches. The tiny
buttons in and around the
multifunction selector are too
close together and will con-
found fat-fingered photogra-
phers. A somewhat confusing
interface adds to the problem.
The SD450 has a lot of ne
features, including a 2.5-inch
LCD and a glass viewfinder.
This shooter, like the SD400,
has a 5-megapi xel sensor
and a 3X optical zoom with
a 5. 8mm to 17. 4mm range
(equivalent to a 35mm lens
with a 35mm to 105mm zoom)
and corresponding maximum
f-stops of f/2.8 to f/4.9.
Our daylight shots had
noticeable noise, but color
saturation was exceptional.
Overall, the exposure was
extremely good: It had excel-
lent dynamic range and made
colors really pop off the page.
On our ash test shot, cover-
age was very good but just
slightly underexposed, caus-
ing the colors to be a bit mud-
dy, although color saturation
was quite good.
The SD450 averaged 1,400
lines of resolution, which is
very good for a 5MP camera.
Boot time was just 2. 5 sec-
onds, but the 2.9-second re-
cycle time was not as quick as
the Kodak EasyShare V530s
1.1 seconds. We noticed little
shutter lag and found no sig-
nificant pincushion distor-
tionjust a bit of the usual
barrel distortion.
Despite its small size, most
users looking for a super-
portable will be quite happy
with the SD450s image qual-
ity and performance.
Canon PowerShot SD450
Digital Elph
$399.95 list. Canon U.S.A. Inc.,
www.usa.canon.com. llllm
THE *IST DS2 is no
model D-SLR.
THE SD450: one of
the best ultracompacts on the market.
PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com 42
F I R S T L O O K S
Consumer Electronics: Digital Cameras
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F I R S T L O O K S
Consumer Electronics: MP3 Players
The Zen MicroPhoto Is Even Better in Color
tery lasted for just a bit under
15 hours. Although that isnt
extraordinary, its certainly
not terrible.
The 1.5-inch, 262,144-color
OLED screen isnt as bright
as we hoped it would be, even
with the contrast set at 100
percent, though colors are
more vivid than on the Apple
iPod nano. Pictures looked
ne overall, and even though
the detail wasnt great, they
looked the same from any
viewi ng angle. Unfort u-
nately, you cant watch slide
shows or view individual
photos with musical accom-
paniment.
You can set as many as
ten manual bookmarks, en-
abling you to jump back into
a le from where you left off.
The FM tuner supports up
to 32 presets, as well as FM
recording.
Given the choice between
the Zen MicroPhoto and the
Philips GoGear HDD1630
(an 8GB version of that play-
er, called the HDD1850, is
now available), the Creative
player has a slight edge in
usability and screen quality.
Although its tested battery
life isnt great, we like the
fact that it has a removable
battery. And let us not forget
to mention that its available
in ten colors.
Creative Zen MicroPhoto
$249.99 direct. Creative Technology
Ltd., www.creative.com. llllh
BY MIKE KOBRIN
The new Creative Zen
MicroPhoto ($249.99
direct) is still a com-
pact 2 by 3. 3 by 0. 7
inches and 3.8 ounces, like
the original, but improves on
it with a slightly larger (1.5-
inch) color OLED screen,a
beeer (8GB) hard drive, and
a few minor enhancements.
Deep down, though, this
is the same MP3 player
we all know and (sort
of) love.
The new edition is
nearly identical to its
monochrome predeces-
sor, but now the front
face i s text ured and
protrudes slightly from
the white plastic back.
All this does is make us-
ing the touch strip a bit
more of a tactile experi-
ence. Unfortunately, the
buttons surrounding the
strip are also touch sen-
sitive, so you can easily
miscalculate and wind up
jumping to the wrong spot in
the menu system. But at least
you can navigate in the dark,
thanks to the signature glow-
ing-blue outline and backlit
buttons.
You can make part of the
hard drive into a USB mass
storage classcompatible
drive for data storage, though
you cant load music this
way. The Zen Micro Photo
syncs with Windows PCs
via Windows Media Player
or you can use Creatives
included software. The de-
vice is PlaysForSure-com-
patible, so you can load it up
with protected WMAs from
various online music down-
load and subscription ser-
vices, as well as with MP3s,
unprotected WMAs, and
able wallpaper, was respon-
sive overall, though we did
experience a few temporary
lockups when using the track
skip buttons, and we often
saw a Please wait mes-
sage when moving around
in the menu system. We like
the congurable main menu,
though we wish you could
also congure the contex-
tual menus.
LEGACY OF SOUND
Our subjective listen-
ing tests proved that the
Zen MicroPhoto con-
tinues Creatives legacy
of producing very good
sound quality.
Frequency response
is very flat. It begins to
roll off as soon as it hits
the bass region, but gen-
tly enough that the play-
er is down only about 7
dB or so at 20 Hz.
When using its default
settings, the Zen Micro-
Photo puts out a remark-
ably clean signal up to 24
on its 25-step volume scale.
Smart Volume is still one of
our favorite features in this
line of players, because it
eliminates harmonic distor-
tion and keeps the volume
uniform. It does lower the
maximum output, but the
level is still loud enough to
make your ears ring.
The Zen MicroPhotos re-
chargeable, removable bat-
WAV files. Unfortunately,
the player still doesnt sup-
port lossless compression
formats or gapless playback.
Nor, as of this writing, does
it support content from Au-
dible.com, but that should
be coming soon.
The interface, which adds
a color screen and customiz-
THE ZEN MICROPHOTO is
available in ten colors.
PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com 44
ANALYST'S TIP
Mike Kobrin , Lead Analyst
Flash memory prices are coming down, and capacities are rising. The rst 6GB ash-based MP3 player is
here, and well probably see double that within the next couple of years. Flash-based devices have no moving
parts, and they wont skip no matter how much you shake them. In addition, they can be signicantly smaller.
Expect to see ash players put a lot of pressure on the small hard drive market in the coming months.
F I R S T L O O K S
Consumer Electronics: Speakers
BY MIKE KOBRIN
Saitek, best known
for its gaming periph-
erals, now has some
welcome portable au-
dio entries. The Saitek A-250
($129.95 direct), for example,
is a versatile one-piece dual-
speaker set with a neat trick
up its sleeve: It can receive
music wirelessly from any
Windows PC via a USB 2.4-
GHz transmitter.
An unusual design certain-
ly helps separate this prod-
uct from the pack. The A-250
looks a bit like the head of a
praying mantis, reminding us
of Zorak from Space Ghost but
in a high-gloss black finish.
The tweeter grilles are out-
lined in metallic red (left) and
copper (right). What makes
this thing look really creepy
are the 1-inch red drivers vis-
ible beneath the grilles.
The A-250, billed as a 2.1
speaker system, has two eye-
like tweeters on either side
behind black metal grilles.
A downward-firing 3-inch
subwoofer underneath i s
ported out the back. An active
crossover at 400 Hz distrib-
utes the high and low audio
signals among the three in-
ternal amplifiers. Although
portable, at 3.5 by 13.8 by 4.8
inches (HWD) and about 1.7
pounds without batteries, the
system is more suitable for
the home than for travel.
You can cont rol pl ay/
pause, track skip, and volume
with your music software or
the buttons on the speaker.
The buttons work with any
music software that supports
media keys on a PC keyboard.
The line-in port and included
cable let you connect to any
audio playback device.
The 3-inch subwoofer is
held off the surface by little
rubber feet, so you actually
do get a nice, tight bass re-
sponse. Upper bass is excel-
lent, which is what keeps the
speaker from sounding tinny.
The volume is good up to
about 9 on the 10-step scale:
The speaker tends to distort
at maximum volume. We got
a clear signal up to about 100
feet through walls and doors.
We like the A-250 a lot, but
we have a couple of ideas for
making it even betterMac
support, for starters. Wed
also like to see a transmitter
for portable players, and the
monochrome LCD could use
some beeng up in the view-
ing-angle department. De-
spite these minor quibbles, we
give the Saitek A-250 our Edi-
tors Choice and recommend
it for vacation homes and for
home/ofce/dorm desktops.
Saitek A-250
$129.95 direct. Saitek,
www.saitekusa.com. llllh
Funky Wireless Speakers Deliver Sweet Sound
Snap, Crackle & Hiss: A Noisy iPod Dock
BY MIKE KOBRIN
T
h e i . S o u n d Ma x
($129.99 list) is a very
ni ce- l ooki ng por-
table iPod speaker/dock that
pumps out plenty of volume
and has the most full-featured
iPod remote control weve
seen yet. Its price is competi-
tive with similar offerings
from major players such as
Altec Lansing. But the qual-
ity of sound channeled by the
dock is marred by distortion,
hiss, and digital noise. With
a hard drivebased Apple
iPod, the noise is loud enough
during playback
t o ma ke i t
hard to rec-
ommend this
product, but
the results are
somewhat bet-
ter with the nano.
The speaker itself is a one-
piece, two-channel affair,
shaped rather like a bow tie.
The dock is directly on top
of the speaker. On either side
are bass ports, which give the
Max an advantage in low-end
sound over
nonported
models .
We tried
o u t t h e
Max with
several iPods, including full-
size iPods, a mini, and a nano,
and we heard a lot of digital
noise at the beginnings of
tracks with all of them. This
included hard drive whine,
chirping, swirling (which
sounds like radio interfer-
ence), hiss, and a continuous
high-pitched sound. With
the hard drive-based models,
some of these noises contin-
ued throughout playback,
though they disappeared
after a few seconds with
the nano. When we
pressed the wide-
s t er eo but t on,
we got a bit more
bass and the highs
sounded l ivel ier,
but the distortion increased as
well. We got far better results
using the auxiliary line-in ca-
ble instead of the iPod dock.
The best thing about the
Max is its remote control,
which has dedicated buttons
for a surprising number of
iPod features including scroll-
ing through playlists, albums,
and shufe/repeat modes.
The digital-noise prob-
lem in the dock connector is
the main thing holding the
i. Sound Max back from su-
perstardom in its category.
But for now, the auxiliary
line input is an acceptable
workaround, though that
means you cant charge and
play your iPod simultaneous-
ly, and you lose access to the
remote-control features. In
its current state, the Max is
listenable, but not quite ready
for prime time.
i.Sound Max
$129.99 list. dreamGEAR,
www.dreamgear.net. llmmm
THE A-250S COOL DESIGN is
matched by its performance.
YOU CAN
dock your iPod on
top of the Max speaker.
PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com 46
F I R S T L O O K S
Hardware: Storage
Storage Brontosaurus: 1-Terabyte Hard Drives
it houses four 250GB hard
drives as opposed to the two
500GB drives in the One-
Touch III Turbo and an inter-
nal power supply.
The XL Desktop is rela-
tively quiet, even with four
drives spinning. In a design
similar to that of high-den-
sity servers, each hard drive
slides easily in and out of the
enclosure, making upgrading
drives or replacing failed ones
easier. This is a bit ironic,
though: You can congure the
XL Desktop only in a RAID 0
(striping) array. Since RAID
0 links all four drives togeth-
er to achieve the 1TB capacity
(and speed up performance),
if you lose one drive you lose
all your data.
Whether backing up using
Windows or with Iomegas
Automatic Backup Pro soft-
ware, our 1.2GB le took just
56 seconds.
The included Automatic
Backup Pro software is pretty
good, supporting scheduled
backups, versioning, com-
pression, Microsoft Windows
readable backups, and cata-
strophic failure recovery us-
ing the bootable Solutions CD.
Dantzs Retrospect Express is
included for Mac users.
The Iomega XL Desktop
Hard Drive provides a direct-
attached storage solution
for those who need copious
amounts space. But if you val-
ue your data, you might wait
until the next generation,
which will support RAID 1
and RAID 5.
Iomega XL Desktop
Hard Drive
$800 direct. Iomega Corp.,
www.iomega.com. lllmm
BY JOEL SANTO DOMINGO
S
o how much is a terabyte,
really? Well, be sides the
abstract notion of its
being 1 million kilobytes, its
also enough storage for sev-
eral million digital photos, a
few hundred thousand MP3s,
or thousands of hours of
digital video. For most, a 1TB
drive is overkill, but if youre
a graphics professional, post-
production video editor, or
anyone else who works fre-
quently with massive files
(and you dont need network-
ing capability), a 1TB direct-
attached storage drive is the
way to go.
Maxtor OneTouch III Turbo
The Maxtor OneTouch
III Turbo ($900 list) has
RAID 0 and RAID 1
capability and stores
up to 1TB of data. Although
wed like to see a couple of
improvements, this is the
high-capacity direct-connect
storage device to beat.
The OneTouch III Turbos
small chassis3.8 by 8.5 by
5.5 inches (HWD)is clean-
looking and attractive. (The
power adapter is external,
which helps the enclosure
maintain its svelte gure). On
the inside sit two 500GB hard
drives in a RAID 0 array out
of the box. RAID 0 stripes
data across both drives, giv-
ing you truly 1TB of storage.
You can also easily congure
the drives to RAID 1 (mirror-
ing), which gives you 500GB
of storage and 500GB of auto-
matic backup. Unfortunately,
the individual drives are not
removable, and replacing
them yourself voids the war-
ranty (if one fails, you have to
send the OneTouch to a ser-
vice center).
You can conf igure t he
single-button backup facil-
ity for the default Retrospect
Express HD backup (which
is useful but basic), Maxtors
Sync software, or any other
program. The drive
i s compat i bl e
with Mac OS X
and Microsof t
Windows XP but
comes formatted
for OS X out of
the box.
On our tests,
the Retrospect
Express HD soft-
ware took around
2 mi nutes 30
its RAID 1 capability edge out
the challenger, the Iomega XL
Desktop. The OneTouch III
Turbo earns our recommen-
dation and should be at the
top of your list.
Maxtor OneTouch III Turbo
$900 list. Maxtor Corp., www.maxtor
.com. llllm
Iomega XL Desktop
Hard Drive
The Iomega XL Desktop Hard
Drive ($800 direct) is user-
friendly and has good per-
formance. But the fact that it
offers only RAID 0 is restric-
tive and leads us to conclude
that the XL Desktop is not the
best choice for mass storage.
The XL Desktop is rela-
tively largeroughly 13 by
7 by 8 inches. But to be fair,
seconds to back up
our 1. 2GB test file via
USB 2. 0 when the array
was configured to RAID 0.
Although the overhead from
the Retrospect softwares
verication process leads to
the longish backup times, it
also ensures data integrity.
The Maxtor OneTouch III
Turbo excels as both an ac-
tive data drive and a backup
system. Its compactness and
ANALYST'S TIP
Joel Santo Domingo , Lead Analyst
RAID 1 (or mirroring) uses two identical hard drives to maintain a continuous hardware backup of all the
les you store on that drive. While it may seem like a waste to use hard drive storage in this manner, it can
pay off if you lose your babys pictures to the gremlins that seem to plague hard drives these days. If one
of the drives fails in a RAID 1 array, your data is safe and usable.
DO YOU
really need
1TB of hard drive
space? Maxtor and
Iomega think so.
PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com 48
F I R S T L O O K S
Hardware: Desktops
Velocity Goes Mainstream
dia machine than the Gamer
Ultra, which has a second SLI
slot for a dual graphics card
setup, its Doom 3 score (68
frames per second) shows
that it can play games well at
1,024-by-768 resolution. Also
thanks to the Vision GX's Ge-
Force 6600 graphics proces-
sor, you can take advantage
of nVidia's PureVideo tech-
nology, which improves vid-
eo quality on DVD videos
as well as on HD-encoded
Windows Media les.
Si nce i t s a si ngl e-
core system, it s a bit
slower than some with
dual-cores, such as the
recently reviewed Poly-
well MiniBox2 939NP-
MCE, on tasks l i ke
running the Windows
Media Encoder test
(the Vision GX took
12:40; the MiniBox2,
7:43). Of course, the
Mi ni Box2 i s a
more specialized
(and more ex-
pensive, at $1,888)
Media Center PC.
The Vi si on GX
performed well on
our Adobe Photo-
shop Action set (1:51),
though agai n, it was
slower than the dual-core
units we tested.
Still, the Velocity Micro
Vision GX is a good main-
stream PC thats a bit less ex-
pensive than similar systems
from the larger manufactur-
ers, and its more attractive,
to boot. All in all, it justies
the extra cost of moving up
from compact and more lim-
ited entry-level systems.
Velocity Micro Vision GX
With 2.2-GHz AMD Athlon 64 3700+
processor, 1GB DDR SDRAM, 200GB
SATA hard drive, 256MB nVidia Ge-
Force 6600 graphics card, dual-layer
DVDRW drive, DVD-ROM drive, 17-
inch LCD monitor, Microsoft Windows
XP Home, $1,399 direct. Velocity
Micro Inc., www.velocitymicro.com.
lllhm
BY JOEL SANTO DOMINGO
T
he Vel oci t y Mi cro
Vision GX ($1, 399
direct, $1,104 with-
out monitor) is a main-
stream retail system with
a bit of boutique ash. Its
designed for those who
want a powerful, upgrad-
able multimedia machine
but dont want to spend
more than about $1, 500.
Since Velocity Micro is ex-
panding from direct sales
into retail chains, you can
even look one over before
you buy.
This computer is for users
who are not serious graphics
or video professionals but
who like to dabble in media
tasksperhaps taking red-
eye out of digital photos, rip-
ping entire CD collections to
MP3, or occasionally burning
DV camera footage to DVD.
Such jobs need a machine
thats faster than the typical
entry-level desktop and has
a bit more hard drive space,
RAM, a graphics card, and
connectivity options.
The first thing you notice
is the Vision GXs sturdy
metal case. Though mini-
malist in design, its painted
in a deep bluish-purple tone
thats somewhere between
indigo and midnight blue.
The keyboard, monitor, and
speakers are the standard
black, however. (This PC
is aimed at the multimedia
market, so Velocity Micro
has omitted the ostentatious
styling of its high-end gam-
ing boxes.) The spacious case
easily fits two or more hard
drives and a couple of opti-
cal drives. The motherboard
has available ports for adding
extra drives and also has free
spots for a pair of PCI cards,
a PCIe x1 adapter, and extra
memory. The PCIe x16 slot is
occupied by the included Ge-
Force 6600 card, but this is
easily swapped out for next-
generation graphics cards
when they are released.
The Vision GX wont re-
qui re any i mmediate up-
grades, though, with an AMD
Athlon 64 3700+ (a good main-
stream 64-bit compatible pro-
cessor), 1GB of DDR memory,
a 256MB nVidia GeForce 6600
graphics subsystem, eight
USB and two FireWire ports,
and two DVD drives (one a
dual-layer DVDRW).
You wont find the dual-
core processor that some
units, such as the Cyber-
power Gamer Ultra 8500 SE
($999) include, but for many
people thats only a minor
drawback. You don t re-
ally need dual-cores multi
tasking capabilities if your
multimedia dabbling is lim-
ited to ripping, burning, and
encoding once in awhile, and
you mainly surf or play the
occasional game. (You also
have the consolation of a met-
al case instead of a plastic one
protecting your investment.)
And you certai nly can
play games on the Vision
GX. Though its more of a
general-purpose multime-
THE VISION GX
is a single-core
multi media system
with good compo-
nents, upgradabil-
ity, and a dash of
boutiquelike air.
PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com 50
7
2
%
o
f b
u
s
in
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s
s
e
s

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e
e
d
m
o
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:
YOU CAN MAKE IT HAPPEN WITH INSIGHT
Certified Systems Engineers
M
Leading Technology
M
Leasing Programs
Source Code: AD029
Insight and the Insight logo are registered trademarks of Insight Direct USA, Inc. IT For The Way You Work is a trademark of Insight Direct USA, Inc. All other
trademarks, registered trademarks, photos, logos and illustrations are property of their respective owners. 2006 Insight Direct USA, Inc. All rights reserved.

The Business Performance Forum Study, 2005.


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F I R S T L O O K S
Hardware: Printers
BY M. DAVID STONE
C
ertainly the most eye-
catching feature on
the thermal-dye Kodak
EasyShare Photo Printer 500
($199.95 direct) is its 3.5-inch
LCD for previewing photos.
But while the large LCD is
a nice touch, the EasyShare
500 stands out from the pack
of dedicated photo printers
for a different reasonthe
sheer number of its connec-
tion choices.
The 500 has memory card
slots for CompactFlash, Se-
cure Digital, MultiMedia-
Card, a reduced-size Multi-
MediaCard, an xD-Picture
Card, Memory Stick, Memo-
ry Stick Duo, Memory Stick
Pro, and Magic Gate connec-
tors for printing from a PC, a
PictBridge camera, or a USB
key; and Bluetooth support
for pri nti ng from camera
phones and PDAs. An 802.11b
card ($99.95 direct) lets you
connect the printer to a wire-
less network.
The 2.8-pound EasyShare
500, at 3.1 by 13.1 by 7.3 inches
(HWD) including the tray,
is a touch larger than most
printers dedicated to produc-
ing 4- by 6-inch photos.
Output quality was very
good, meeting our ex-
pectations. Al most
every print was true
photo quality, but we
did notice a tendency
to lose detail in light
areas. In one photo
that i ncluded white
clouds and a light-blue sky,
both the clouds and the sky
came out almost completely
white. Colors otherwise tend
to be punched up compared
with the real thing. Output is
waterproof, as it is with prints
from all thermal-dye printers.
On our standard test suite
for 4- by 6-inch photos, the
EasyShare 500 averaged 1
minute 19 sec-
onds per photo. Thats
slower than the less expen-
sive Canon Selphy CP510, our
Editors Choice, which took
1:09, but faster than the high-
end Editors Choice Epson
PictureMate Deluxe Viewer
Edition, which averaged 1:32.
Qua l i t y i s a st ep
above that of the CP510
and a step below the
PictureMates, so for
these three competitors,
higher quality seems to
go hand-i n-hand with
slower speed. As
wi t h mo s t
pri nters, t he
E a s y S h a r e
5 0 0 s l owe d
d o wn a b i t
when pri nti ng
images directly
from a camera or
memory card.
Even if you dont
take advantage of
the EasyShare 500s
many connection op-
tions, its balance of speed,
quality, and cost per photo
makes it a good choice.
Kodak EasyShare Photo
Printer 500
$199.95 direct. Eastman Kodak Co.,
www.kodak.com. llllm
A Printer with Strong Connections
Small, Low-Priced Personal Monochrome Laser
BY M. DAVID STONE
T
he Koni ca Mi nol ta
P a g e P r o 1 4 0 0 W
($119.99 direct) is one
of the least expensive mono-
chrome laser printers weve
seen, second only to the $99
Dell Laser Printer 1100. But
although its fast, its output
quality is below par. That
makes it a poor choice
for business use but a
reasonable possibil-
ity as a home or dorm
room pri nter, wit h
quality thats adequate
for things like personal
correspondence and
schoolwork.
At 9.4 by 13.9 by 16. 1
inches (HWD) with paper
tray and just 15.6 pounds,
its light enough to move
around easi ly and smal l
enough to t on your desk.
The 1400W is built around
a 17-page-per-minute engine,
which pays off in reasonably
fast performance. On our
business applications suite, it
finished in 9 minutes 50 sec-
onds. Thats roughly a minute
faster than the Dell 1100 but
slower than some competing
models at the same price.
Unfortunately, the 1400W
loses points on output qual-
ity, producing text, graphics,
and photo quality well below
par for a monochrome laser.
On our tests for text quality,
although more than half of
our test fonts were easi-
ly readable at 4 points,
one highly stylized
font had some let-
ters merging into each
other, making the text
hard to read even at 12
pointsa problem weve
never seen before with a
monochrome laser.
The most important
problem we saw with graph-
ics output was a distracting
banding, or streaking, on
most images. But there were
other significant problems,
including uneven coverage in
solid lls and a tendency for
thin lines to disappear.
Photos showed streaks, and
there was a tendency for areas
with similar shades of gray to
blend into one another, as well
as a loss of detail in dark and
light areas.
If you care about output
quality above all, the Dell
1100 is the better choice. And
if you care about speed above
all, go with the Brother HL-
2040. As is, there is no com-
pelling reason, at this price,
to choose the 1400W over the
competition.
Konica Minolta PagePro
1400W
$119.99 direct. Konica Minolta
Printing Solutions U.S.A. Inc., printer
.konicaminolta.com. llmmm
THE KODAK
EasyShare
includes a
bright LCD.
THE 1400W
is fast, but quality is low.
PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com 52
F I R S T L O O K S
Hardware: Scanners
BY M. DAVID STONE
T
he Visioneer Strobe
XP300 ($399 direct)
is the latest in a long
line of Visioneer scanners
that are both small enough
to t between your keyboard
and monitorat 2 by 2.5 by 12
inches (HWD)and highly
portable (at 1.25 pounds). The
XP300 also brings something
new to the party: duplex
scanning. That gives it a big
leg up on earlier models.
You can supply power via
the i ncluded AC cable or
USB, which is a nice touch.
Keep in mind, however, that
the scanner slows down a bit
when powered over USB.
ScanSoft PaperPort, the
XP300s primary software,
is one of the best programs
weve seen for scanning and
document management. It
lets you track your scanned
documents and drag and
drop les from the PaperPort
desktop into other programs.
The XP300 we tested came
with PaperPort 9, but
Version 10 should be
available by the time
you read thi s. You
can also download the
new release from the
Visioneer Web site.
The XP300s claimed
maximum optical resolution
of 600 pixels per inch is more
than enough to handle the
ofce-oriented tasks it is de-
signed for: faxing, document
management, creating e-mail
attachments, and scanning to
PDF le formatbut its not
ideal for photos.
PaperPorts built-in optical
character recognition (OCR)
and the included ScanSoft
OmniPage 12 OCR program
both managed to recognize
our Times New Roman test
samples at 10 points and our
Arial samples at 8 points
without a mistake.
We ran into two minor
problems in testing. First,
when open, the paper guide in
the back provides a straight-
through path for input; when
closed, it sends paper on a
curved path. Finding the right
partly-open position to make
the guide work as promised
was a little tricky.
The second, more trou-
bling problem was how eas-
ily the unskew feature, which
electronically straightens
crookedly scanned pages,
crashed the program, forc-
ing us to reboot. Once youre
aware of the bug, you can
avoid it by waiting a few sec-
onds for processing to nish.
Visioneer expects to have a
x available for downloading
by the time you read this.
Despite this problem, those
who need convenient scan-
ning will nd that the XP300
does the job and does it well.
Visioneer Strobe XP300
$399 direct. Visioneer Inc.,
www.visioneer.com. lllmm
Duplex Scans in a Record Small Size
HPs New Flatbed Photo Scanner
BY M. DAVID STONE
T
he HP Scanjet 4890
P h o t o S c a n n e r
($199. 99 di rect) i s
the best argument we ve
seen lately for never buying
a scanner based on the big
numbers on the box. The
clai med 4, 800-pi xel-per-
inch (ppi) optical resolution
and 48-bit color depth prom-
ise excellent results for
both photographic prints
and sl ides. The real-
ity doesnt meet the
promise.
Although photo is
in the 4890s name,
the 4890 does well
on almost every-
thing but. It comes
with both Twain and
WIA drivers, so it scans from
most Windows programs.
And you can modify color
saturation, tint, and bright-
ness, plus adjust brightness
for highlights, shadows, and
midtones.
To use t he i ntegrated
OCR, you select a text for-
mat for the output
f ile. Choices
include RTF and searchable
PDF, limiting the document-
management capabilities.
Also, there is no automatic
document feeder. Ac-
curacy was reason-
able, with no errors
reading Times New
Roman text at 10 points
and Arial text at 8.
For slides, this was
by far the fastest atbed
sca nner we ve
seen, taking just
26 seconds, at
2, 400 by 2, 400
ppi, for one slide.
Mo s t f l a t b e d
s ca nner s t a ke
twice as long.
Unfortunately,
quality, not speed,
is where the 4890
falls short. On our
2,400-ppi slide test, it didnt
deliver the level of detail it
should have for the claimed
resolution. The output was
blurry compared with the
2,400-ppi results from other
less-expensive models we
tested. Photo scans showed a
loss of detail in dark areas of
complex slides, though the
quality was acceptable in less-
challenging slides.
The 4890 also had problems
with photographic prints.
One scan showed obvious
streaks along a sideappar-
ently the result of light leak-
ing in along the edge.
The 4890 scans of images
on photo paper are accept-
able if you just want to print
snapshots. But there are plen-
ty of less expensive and bet-
ter choices out there.
HP Scanjet 4890
Photo Scanner
$199.99 direct. Hewlett-Packard
Development Co., www.hp.com.
llmmm
THE SMALL XP300
offers duplex scanning.
THE HP 4890
doesnt quite live up to
its name as a photo scanner.
PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com 54
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F I R S T L O O K S
Hardware: Laptops
Big on Extras, Short on Battery Life
tion to upgrade to Microsoft
Windows XP Media Center
Edition 2005. Fortunately,
there are enough third-party
applications that can help
you organize your music and
photosand since there is no
TV tuner, the lack of MCE is
not a deal-breaker.
We l i ke seei ng
USB ports spread
out, and t he Sat-
el l ite has t wo on
the side and two in
back. Rounding out
its connectivity op-
tions are FireWire,
S-Video, and VGA
ports, as wel l as a
5-in-1 memory card
reader. As you would
expect, the Satellite
comes with a dual-
layer DVDRW drive
(and these days, you
should expect nothing
less from a multimedia
notebook).
For those who enjoy
watching movies, editing
home videos, and ddling
around with photos, the
Toshiba Satellite A105-S361
is a good choice, especially
considering the price. But
the short battery life limits
you to brief trips away from
your desk, and the options
are not as extensive as those
that youll find on the HP
Pavilion dv4000.
Toshiba Satellite A105-S361
With 2.0-GHz Intel Pentium M 760,
1GB SDRAM, 120GB hard drive, Intel
Graphics Media Accelerator 900
GM, 15.4-inch widescreen LCD, Intel
Pro Wireless 2200BG, dual-layer
DVDR, Microsoft Windows XP Home
Edition, $1,450 direct. Toshiba
America Information Systems Inc.,
www.toshiba.com. lllhm

BY CISCO CHENG
T
he Toshiba Satellite
A105-S361 ($1 , 450
direct) is for media
lovers who are passionate
about editing video, watch-
ing movies, and uploading
photos to Flickr. Toshiba has
built a mainstream unit that
remains portable even with
a 15.4-inch widescreen. And
although it isnt a gaming ma-
chine, its components should
satisfy your need for speed.
The shade of dark gray sur-
rounding the lid creates a nice
slimming illusion. But the
unit is already fairly light
6.0 poundscompared with
other 15.4-inch-screen note-
books such as the HP Pavilion
dv4000 (6.4 pounds) and the
Acer TravelMate 8204WSMi
(6.7 pounds). The Satellite
has a bright, high-contrast
screenperfect for watching
a DVD or working with photo
or video files, but the glare
can be troublesome when
youre working in bright
l i ght on document s
such as Microsoft Word
or Excel les.
The components you get
on the Satel l ite are very
similar to those of its close
competitor, the HP Pavilion
dv4000, for about the same
price. The Satellite comes
loaded with a 2.0-GHz Penti-
um M 760, 1GB of RAM, and
integrated Intel graphics.
Unlike with the HP, however,
you cant upgrade to a dis-
crete graphics solution.
Toshiba will let you up-
grade to a 120GB hard drive;
by contrast, you cant go
above 100GB on the dv4000.
If you plan on doing some
heavier video editing while
running other tasks, you may
want to consider a dual-core
system, such as the Dell In-
spiron E1705.
On our SYSmark 2004 SE
benchmark tests, the Satellite
and the dv4000 were very
cl ose r i val s,
with the Satel-
lite narrowly
e dg i ng out
t he dv4000
on t he over-
all score (153
ver sus 1 5 1).
Bot h scores
are good, sig-
ni fyi ng that
these systems
are effective
at handl i ng
media appli-
about 3 hours, according to
the company.
A set of media buttons
(Play/Pause, Stop, Rwd, and
FFWD) controls DVD and CD
playback in Windows and the
Toshiba Express Media Play-
er. Express Media Player is a
more stripped-down instant-
on interface than HPs Quick-
Play 2.0, so you can access
only content from the optical
drive. (With QuickPlay, you
can access any multimedia le
on your hard drive). The built-
in Harman Kardon speakers
offer crisp MP3 playback. The
touchpad is responsive, but
we found it a bit too small.
One important note: This
system does not offer an op-
cations such as Adobe Photo-
shop, Adobe Premiere, and
those from Macromedia.
Unfortunately, the sys-
tems also shared unimpres-
sive battery life, though the
Satellite managed to last 17
minutes longer (2 hours 28
minutes) than the dv4000
(2:11). Toshiba does offer an
eight-cell battery pack ($145),
which weighs a little less
than half a pound and lasts
ANALYST'S TIP
Cisco Cheng , Lead Analyst
Dual-core processing is the latest craze in notebooks. The performance gain of a system with an Intel Core
Duo processor compared with a Pentium M system is astounding. If youre in the market for a new laptop and
demand high performance for your work (or just for fun), investing into a Core Duo laptop is a smart move.
The list of vendors offering dual-core portables is growing by the week, and prices are very competitive.
THE TOSHIBA A105
has many multimedia extras.
PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com 56
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F I R S T L O O K S
Software
Five New Approaches to Photo Sharing
to browse photos already
on your PC, and its also a
means of sending and receiv-
ing digital images. Much like
Flickr, it lets you swap pics
with strangers as wel l as
with loved ones, fostering an
online community of photo
enthusiasts.
Whereas other apps orga-
nize photos into virtual al-
bums, FilmLoop sorts them
into loopslong strips of
images that scroll endlessly
across your screen. You can
view one loop at a time or
string them together. Natu-
rally, the scrolling images are
thumbnailsnot full-size
photosbut when you see
one you like, you can blow it
up to full size, print it out, or
attach comments.
Creating your rst loop is
as simple as dragging a few
pictures onto the FilmLoop
ticker and dropping them. As
you do, the client automati-
cally uploads your loop to
the companys servers, and
youre free to share with oth-
BY CADE METZ
W
hats the best way
to share di git al
photos? Thats a
matter of opinion. There are
many tools to choose from,
and each has its meritsnot
to mention its drawbacks.
Here, we review five of the
latest products. If you cant
f i nd somet hi ng you l i ke
among these six, youre ter-
ribly hard to please.
AOL Pictures
AOL Pictures, open to
anyone, gives you un-
limited online photo
storage, simple photo-
editing tools, and professional
printing and gift services. Its
also delightfully easy to use.
Af ter downloadi ng an
ActiveX control, you can up-
load photos simply by drag-
ging them into your browser
window and dropping them
there. The photo-manage-
ment tools arent unusual, but
theyre powerful enough
and straightforward enough
for the average user.
Whats unusual is the way
the service shares photos.
With most such sites, you
simply upload images to the
Web and mail out a URL that
friends and family can visit
to view the shots and order
prints. You can do the same
for friends or family who
arent AOL Pictures users.
But for fellow AOL Pictures
users, you can go one step
further and have your pho-
tos posted to their AOL Pic-
tures accounts, right beside
their own photos. If youre an
AOL member, you can even
use AOL Pictures from your
mobile phone or PDA.
AOL Pictures
Free. America Online Inc.,
www.aol.com/pictures. lllhm
BubbleShare (beta)
BubbleShare is billed as the
first zero-registration, pri-
vate service for sharing photo
albums with voice captions
over the Internet. Thats not
exactly trueyoull have to
enter your name and e-mail
addressbut this is one of
the Webs most elegant and
intuitive photo sites. You can
share impressively slick on-
line photo albums in minutes,
dragging pics straight from
Windows Explorer and drop-
ping them into the app. And,
yes, you can even tag your
pictures with voice captions.
The built-in editing tools
are surprisingly dynamic.
You can change the albums
title, for instance, simply by
double-clicking on it and typ-
ing straight onto the page.
And you can drag and drop to
reorder images.
To share your album with
others, simply hit the button
marked Share Album, then
key in the e-mail addresses
youd like to send a link to.
The company touts Bub-
bleShares zero-registra-
tion setup, but in the end,
this is the services one draw-
back. The service doesnt
create an umbrella account
that lets you access all your
albums. Instead, each time
you create one, youre sent
a new link where you go to
continue editing and manag-
ing. But saving and keeping
up with all those different
links can be a pain.
BubbleShare (beta)
Free. BubbleLabs,
www.bubbleshare.com. lllhm
FilmLoop (beta)
FilmLoop is a free download-
able app that scrolls picture
after picture across your
desktop. Its a terrific way
PICTURES YOU RECEIVE from other AOL Pictures members are
automatically added to your AOL Pictures folder.
FILMLOOP USES a ticker format
to exhibit photos. Your images are
added to a loop that acts as a sort
of scrolling slide show.
BUBBLESHARES EDITING TOOLS are surprisingly dynamic,
letting you input your edits right on the page and drag and drop
images to adjust their order.
PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com 58
F I R S T L O O K S
Software
ers. You can list your new
loop in the FilmLoop Public
Directory, giving access to
anyone, or you can key in a
few e-mail addresses, sharing
only with people you know.
If you like, you can even
give friends and family the
freedom to edit your loops
with their own comments or
pictures. If ten people attend
the same party, for instance,
they can create a single loop
of party photos, uploading
from their own cameras, and
anyone can comment on any-
one elses pictures.
FilmLoop (beta)
Free. FilmLoop Inc.,
www.lmloop.com. llllm
Phanfare
Phanfare is not for everyone.
Some will take issue with the
way it straddles the line be-
tween local app and
Web service; others
may feel it needs bet-
ter photo-manage-
ment tools. But for
sharing photos and
videos, its wonder-
fully quick and easy.
Typically, such a
sharing tool is either
a pure browser -
based Web service
or a downloadable
app (l i ke OurPic-
tures) that the per-
son vi ewi ng t he
content must also
downl oad. Though you
download and install Phan-
fare locally, it shares your
photos by posting them to
the Web. For $54.95 yearly (or
$6.95 per month), the compa-
ny provides a sharp-looking
personal site where you can
post up to a gigabyte of con-
tent each month. You simply
drag pictures or videos and
drop them onto the client
app, which seamlessly up-
loads them to your Web site.
When so many other ser-
vices are Web-only applica-
tions, why go through the
trouble of installing software
locally? The client makes or-
ganizing pictures and videos
into various albums a snap.
And, since it uploads to the
Web in the background, you
dont have to thumb-twiddle
waiting for pictures to post.
With the local app, you
can do basic photo editing,
add captions, change the look
of online albums, and send
e-mail notif ica-
tions about new
postings. If you
like, you can even
send notications
via RSS feed.
Phanfare auto-
matical ly com-
presses photos
a nd pr ompt l y
post s t hem, so
several seconds
after youve set
up an album, your
pictures show up
on your site. Once this low-
res version posts, the client
also sends a high-res copy
to the Web servers, creating
a backup for your photo col-
lection and also letting you
order high-quality prints.
(The service integrates with
online printers Kodak, Shut-
tery, and SnapFish.)
Phanfare
$54.95 per year, $6.95 monthly.
Phanfare Inc., www.phanfare.com.
llllm
SnapJot (beta)
Storytelling is part of the fun
of sharing photos with loved
ones, and SnapJot is an effort
to bring this to the Web. You
dont just post photos and
videos to the site, you post
them as part of a running nar-
rative, adding descriptions,
explanations, anecdotes, and
other memories. As
people browse, they
can i nclude t hei r
own photos, videos,
and stories. The ba-
sic service is free
and provides up to
1 00MB of onl i ne
storage each month.
Once you si gn
up, you can launch
your f irst SnapJot
story with a mouse
click. You begin each
with a title, a short
description, and a
cover picture, then
you build a list of Jotsa
series of events that make up
your narrative. Each Jot is a
separate Web page you can
fill with photos, videos, and
rich text. One disappointment
is that rather than uploading
files en masse, youre forced
to post them one at a time.
Once your story is f i n-
ished, you can send private
links to friends and family or
open the story up to the en-
tire SnapJot community. You
can give viewers the power
to post comments, add their
own media and text, or even
create new Jots.
If youre not willing to put
a healthy amount of time into
the service, your finished
product wont be that com-
pelling. But if youre a story-
teller, SnapJot could be just
what youre looking for.
SnapJot (beta)
100MB storage per month, free; 1GB
per year, $24.99; 2GB, $39.99. SnapJot
Inc., www.snapjot.com. llhmm
Photo Finish
AOL PICTURES The site for the
masses, AOL Pictures gives
users smooth photo sharing,
whether or not their friends are
members.
BUBBLESHARE This service
gives you a quick-and-dirty
way to edit and post your im-
ages for friends to see. Its as
close to zero-registration
as you can get.
FILMLOOP The scrolling ticker
is addictive, and FilmLoop lets
you view your own Loops,
Loops from friends, or Loops
from the community at large.
PHANFARE Phanfare is easy to
use, and youll get great-look-
ing results. Just upload images
using the local app and send
your friends online to view and
download hi-res images.
SNAPJOT SnapJot is a way to
share memories, not just pic-
tures. It takes more time and
effort than the other services,
but if youre a storyteller, this
might be the way to go.
WITH SNAPJOT, your photos become part of a
narrative made up of Jotsgroups of pictures
and captions that tell a story.
www.pcmag.com APRIL 11, 2006 PC MAGAZINE 59
PHANFARE TAKES an interest-
ing approach, letting you up-
load and edit your online photo
albums using a local app.
Slim and Versatile LCDs
NEC MultiSync 90GX2
The 90GX2 ($480 street)
is NECs latest addition
to its MultiSync line.
Fast pixel response,
a USB hub, and
solid image qual-
ity will make this
1, 280-by-1,024,
19-inch monitor
appeal to gamers
and multimedia buffs.
The 90GX2s off-white
case and thin silver bezel
provide a welcome change
from the standard black. Less
welcome, in some situations,
is the panels high-gloss, anti-
reective coating. It produces
a crisper image but is too re-
ective under bright light.
The monitor t i lt s and
swivels but does not allow
height or pivot adjustment.
A removable panel on the rear
hides DVI-D and analog con-
nections, an upstream USB
port, and two downstream
USB ports. Two additional
downstream USB ports are
on the left side of the screen.
A removable shroud on the
mounting arm keeps the vari-
ous cables tucked away.
We were generally pleased
with the 90GX2s motion
display. The 4-ms pixel-re-
sponse rate worked wel l
for displaying fast-action
3D graphics. Colors were
bright and movement owed
smoothly, although we saw
sporadic ghosti ng. Some
motion artifacts appeared
during DVD viewing, but im-
age quality was quite good.
The 90GX2 did have some
trouble, however, displaying
small font sizes.
Those who work with de-
tailed images or a lot of text
should look elsewhere, but
gamers and video buffs will
appreciate the NEC Multi-
Sync 90GX2s performance.
NEC MultiSync 90GX2
$480 street. NEC Solutions (America)
Inc., www.nec.com. lllhm
BY JOHN R. DELANEY
A
re you sti l l getti ng
by wi t h t he same
bul ky, dusty, beige
CRT monitors? Its time to
put them out to pasture. The
new generation of LCD moni-
tors is slender, versatile, and
affordable. And the best part
is, they work equally well in
the ofce as they do at home.
Here, we review three top
contenders that conserve
precious desktop space,
offer good performance, and
even ease eyestrain. (Flick-
ering CRTs are to blame for
manythough not allend-
of-day headaches.)
Some of todays business
displays include more video
input options, integrated USB
ports, and fast pixel-response
times. If blasting aliens is
your idea of kicking back after
a tough day at the ofce, these
monitors are ready to rumble.
You know what they say about
all work and no play.
HP LP2065
The new f lagship business
display from Hewlett-Pack-
ardthe HP LP2065 ($649
di rect)bri ngs style and
functionality to any setting,
home or office. And its
relatively fast pix-
el-response rate
will even make
this monitor ap-
peal i ng to some
gamers.
The 2 0 . 1 - i nc h
screen has a resolution
of 1,600 by 1,200 pixels
and includes a built-in
USB hub. The black rectan-
gular stand tilts 35 degrees,
swivels 90, and lets you ad-
just the height by 5 inches.
The panel pivots 90 degrees
counterclockwise and comes
with Portrait Displays Pivot
Pro software. A quick-
release latch at the rear
of the di splay lets you
remove the panel from its
pedestal for wall or swing-
arm mounting.
If you prefer not to use the
on-screen display (OSD),
HPs Display Assistant soft-
ware lets you play with the
i mage vi a a wi zard. The
monitor also comes with
four downstream USB ports,
two DVI-I connectors, an
upstream USB port, and a
cable-lock slot. And while we
like the displays dual DVI-I
connectors (most dual-input
LCD monitors come with
only DVI-D and RGB), we
wish it included S-Video or
composite video inputs.
The LP2065s performance
is much better with a digital
signal (instead of analog),
but it did an excellent job of
displaying small fonts (down
to 5.3 points) in both modes.
Viewing angles were very
good in both vertical and
horizontal planes. It also did
a ne job of displaying fast-
motion sequences on our
DVD and gaming tests, with
only occasional artifacts and
ghosting.
There are less-expensive
20-inch LCD monitors out
there, but the LP2065 is a
good deal for corporate or
home users who demand
high-end performance and
require exibility when con-
necting to their various PCs.
HP LP2065
$649 direct. Hewlett-Packard Develop-
ment Co., www.hp.com. llllm
THE 90GX2 has
a sharp image
that sometimes
feels too bright.
THE HP LP2065 offers a vari-
ety of connectivity options.
PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com 60
F I R S T L O O K S
Small Business: Displays
F I R S T L O O K S
Small Business: Displays
Lenovo ThinkVision L201p
The classic business-black
Lenovo ThinkVision L201p
monitor will blend into any
ofce environment, particu-
larly those already equipped
with IBM/Lenovo systems.
But even die-hard IBM buy-
ers may want to think twice
before making the leap with
this monitor. Although it has
good image quality and wide
viewi ng angles, you can
nd better and lower-priced
alternatives.
The 20. 1-inch, 1,600-by-
1, 200 resolution LCD panel
is framed by an ultraslim
bezel that widens slightly at
the bottom. The monitor can
pivot up to 90 degrees clock-
wise, tilt 30 degrees, swivel
90, and move as much as 4.3
inches vertically. The screen
doesnt come with image-ro-
tation software, however, so
unless your graph-
ics card supports
rot at i on, you l l
have to shell out
another $35 or so
to use the pivot
capability.
The L201p pro-
vides digital and
a na l og i nput s
and comes with
cables for both
connections, but
thats the extent
of the connectiv-
ity optionsno USB
ports or multimedia video
i nputs as seen on the HP
LP2065.
The L201ps performance
on our DisplayMate tests was
better than average. Results
in analog and digital modes
were nearly identical, and
grayscale performance was
good across the board. But
we were disap-
pointed with the
way the panel dis-
played small text;
fonts below 6. 8
points were very
difcult to read.
Our DVD movie
and gami ng tests
revealed that the
monitor had a mod-
erate tendency to
produce ghost trails
and artifacts (which
we expected, since
the panel has a 16-ms
pixel-response time).
The Lenovo Think-
Vision L201p is a very capable
20-inch LCD monitor. It per-
forms well but is priced sig-
nificantly higher than other
top performers.
Lenovo ThinkVision L201p
$799 direct. Lenovo Group Ltd.,
www.lenovo.com. lllmm
THE LENOVO L201P is
outtted in classic black and is
business-ready, yet it is also a
bit pricey.
www.pcmag.com APRIL 11, 2006 PC MAGAZINE 61
Sometime this year Windows Vista, the next incarnation of Micro-
softs operating system, will appear. And during roughly the same
period, Microsoft Ofce 12 will show up. Should you upgrade?
Not if you can help it. Operating-system upgrades are particu-
larly difcult, because your machines arent equipped for them.
Your PCs were congured specically for the version of Windows
they came with. Pushing a new, more demanding OS onto them
will almost certainly cause heartaches, because every PC in your
company is different. Despite your best efforts at standardiza-
tion, every employee has a slightly different software suite and
often different hardware as well. After an upgrade, some systems
will work and some wont. Even when they do, you'll likely be left
with performance problems, because the upgraded machines
probably lack sufcient processor power, memory, or disk capac-
ity to cope with the new operating system.
But believe it or not, applications upgrades can be even trickier,
because employees may not have the same
set of applications. Even if they do, they

often have different versions. So the effects
may be unpredictable. Here are just a few
examples of problems from my own experi-
ence and from the experience of others.
When PayCycle customers tried to up-
grade from Quicken 2004 to Quicken 2005,
they could no longer download their payroll transactions because
Intuit abandoned the QFS le-transfer format.
Quicken 2005 lost track of my own online payments, and In-
tuit tech support could not gure out how to get it to remember
them. Their recommendation was to revert to Quicken 2004.
Outlook 2003 disabled my Sony Cli's ability to communicate
with Outlook. It took a serious effort at reverse kludging (not the
same as reverse engineering) to x the problem.
Symantec's Norton Antivirus 2005 disabled my Netgear
MP101 digital music player's ability to nd its disk database on my
server. It also blocked the ability of installation programs, such
as Hewlett-Packard's multifunction printer programs, to commu-
nicate with the computers on a network. Finally, a senior tech at
Symantec advised me to disable the product's worm protection,
which he said is safe to do because the product's AutoProtect
feature provides more than adequate protection.
I could go on, but I'm sure you could
as well. If there is a bottom line here, its
that if your users don't absolutely need
to use the features in a new version of
a product, don't upgrade. And when it
comes to operating systems, if you feel
compelled to upgrade, bite the bullet and
buy new computers, too.
>
MORE ON THE WEB
For reviews, tips, and advice,
all with a focus on small and
medium businesses, visit
www.smartcompany.com
Why I Hate Upgrades
John Dickinson
F I R S T L O O K S
Small Business: Software
BY KATHY YAKAL
T
he most signif icant
change to QuickBooks
Online Edition is the
new payroll preparation sys-
tem, though there are tons
of other additions, like new
customi zation, i nvoices,
billable time tracking, and
multiple user-permission
levels. The online version is
a far cry from Intuits top-of-
the-line small business pro-
duct, QuickBooks Premier
($399.95), but its anywhere/
anytime access makes it a
capable tool.
Tracking money in and out
is fast and easy. You can man-
age your nancial accounts;
keep contact records for
customers, vendors, and em-
ployees; and pay bills. The
site also handles invoices,
estimates, and sales receipts,
and generates reports. An in-
teractive graphical owchart
divides primary tasks into
income and expenses. Nu-
merous links take you to vari-
ous tasks and transactions, as
well as to overview pages for
your company and employ-
ees, customers and vendors,
banking and reports, lists
and help. Each of these cen-
ters are exceptionally well
designed and effective.
QBOEs biggest decits? No
inventory, meaning theres
no way to keep track of your
product levels and need for
reordering. And QBOE lacks
purchase orders, online bank-
ing and bill-pay features, and
any true job-tracking tools.
Support is handled through
the Web site, with responses
within 30 minutes to help re-
quests made between 6 a.m.
and 6 p.m. Pacic time, Mon-
day through Friday).
Businesses with modest
needs can get by with the basic
package ($19.95). Online Pay-
roll, implemented simply and
well, is an extra $14.95/month;
budgeting and class track-
ing, $7.95/month; and sales-
related tools, $9.95/month.
Online Edition Plus wraps
this all up for $39.95/month.
Wed be happy to see a low-
er price, especially consider-
ing what this current iteration
lacks, but if your financial
processing needs are fairly
modest and you need remote
access, this is your only really
viable choice.
QuickBooks Online Edition
$19.95/month, plus numerous ad-
ditional charges for three users and an
accountant; $39.95 for Online Edition
Plus, which includes all extras. Intuit
Inc., www.qboe.com. lllmm
Keep Your Books on the Web
Disappointing Defender
BY NEIL J. RUBENKING
L
aplinks new PCdefense
includes real-time pro-
tection against spyware
and keyloggers, on-demand
scanning for malware, di-
saster recovery, and repair of
system settings, but this rst
release doesnt succeed.
We installed PCdefense
on a clean system
and tried to install
our standard col-
lection of spyware
and keyloggers,
with disappoint-
i ng results. One
of the 6 commer-
ci al keyl oggers
wiggled past Key-
logger Prevention,
logging keystrokes
and other activ-
ity with impunity.
PCdefense tried
to block the other 5, but all
installed at least partially.
PCdefense did detect all 15
of our spyware samples, but
even so, it fully prevented in-
stallation of only 3.
After a signicant malware
alert, youll want to scan the
system to clear out all traces.
Unfortunately, though PCde-
fense offers three distinct
scansfor viruses, spyware,
and rootkitsthe results
were disappointing here, too.
PCdefense repeatedly locked
up Windows Explorer on one
test system and did a dismal
job of locating, disabling, and
removing the malware.
The Rootkit Scan turned
up suspicious ele-
ments in several
of the infested sys-
tems, but it didnt
offer to remove
them. A help tech-
nician suggested
either searching
the Internet for a
specific removal
tool or using Di-
saster Recovery
to back up, refor-
mat, and restore
the system. This
is Laplinks recommended
technique, but it would be
a lot faster to use a product
with rootkit removal built in,
such as Spy Sweeper 4. 5 or
Spyware Doctor 3.5.
The Disaster Recovery
module does offer impres-
sively si mple backup and
restore of the enti re sys-
tem. Its similar to a Norton
Ghost-style image backup,
but it omits hardware-specif-
ic elements that could cause
problems. Backup is an im-
portant part of data security,
but PCdefense needs to han-
dle malware more effective-
ly. And while some problems
that we encountered, such
as Explorer locking up, were
fixed, more improvement is
needed. We cant recommend
this version, but keep an eye
out for updates.
Laplink PCdefense
$44.95 direct. Laplink Software Inc.,
www.laplink.com. llhmm
QUICKBOOKS ONLINE EDITIONs anywhere/anytime access
makes it a good choice for many small businesses.
LAPLINKS PCDEFENSE combines security with
backup, but the security doesnt succeed.
PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com 62
Lenovo recommends Windows

XP Professional
It looks like a revolutionary. But
dont let the titanium cover fool you.
Underneath, its all ThinkPad. The
Lenovo ThinkPad Z60 titanium with
Intel

Centrino

Mobile Technology.
New Thinking. New Thinkpad.
Lenovo recommends Windows

XP Professional
Availability: All offers subject to availability. Lenovo reserves the right to alter product offerings and specications at any time, without notice. Lenovo is not responsible for photographic or typographic errors. *Pricing: Prices
do not include tax or shipping and handling or recycling fees and are subject to change without notice. Reseller prices may vary. Warranty: For a copy of applicable product warranties, write to: Warranty Information, P.O. Box
12195, RTP, NC 27709, Attn: Dept ZPYA/B676. Lenovo makes no representation or warranty regarding third party products or services. Footnotes: (1) Mobile Processors: Power management reduces processor speed
when in battery mode. (2) Wireless: based on IEEE 802.11a, 802.11b and 802.11g respectively. An adapter with 11a/b, 11b/g or 11a/b/g can communicate on either/any of these listed formats respectively; the actual con-
nection will be based on the access point to which it connects. (3) Included software: may differ from its retail version (if available), and may not include user manuals or all program functionality. License agreements may
apply. (4) Memory: For PCs without a separate video card, memory supports both system and video. Accessible system memory is up to 64MB less than the amount stated, depending on video mode. (5) Hard drive:
GB = billion bytes. Accessible capacity is less; up to 4GB is service partition. (6) Battery: These model numbers achieved Battery Rundown Time of at least the time shown during testing. A description of the testing is available
at lenovo.com/pc/ww/thinkpad/batterylife. Battery life (and recharge times) will vary based on many factors including screen brightness, applications, features, power management, battery conditioning and other customer
preferences. (7) Activating Verizon Wireless Service: Lenovo customers will be contacted after purchase to activate service; requires separate agreement with Verizon Wireless and is subject to the Customer Agreement,
Calling Plan and credit approval. Service and airtime charges will apply; $175 early termination fee. Verizon Wireless, not Lenovo, is solely responsible for service. Service not available in all areas; purchaser is responsible for
verifying that service is available for the intended location before purchasing a computer equipped with WAN card. Network details, coverage limitations and maps at: http://www.verizonwireless.com/b2c/mobileoptions/broadband/
serviceavailability.jsp?opener=b2b (8) Client Security Solution: preloaded on select models; requires software download. (9) Travel Weight: includes battery and optional travel bezel instead of standard optical drive in
Ultrabay bay, if applicable; weight may vary due to vendor components, manufacturing process and options. (10) Thinness: may vary at certain points on the system. Trademarks: The following are trademarks of Lenovo:
ThinkPad, ThinkCentre, UltraConnect, Access Connections, Rescue and Recovery, ThinkPad Part Replicator II, Active Protection System, ThinkPad dock, ThinkVantage and ThinkVision. IBM and the IBM logo are registered trademarks
of IBM and are used under license. Microsoft and Windows are registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation. Celeron, Celeron Inside, Centrino, Core Inside, Intel, Intel Core, Intel Inside, Intel SpeedStep, Intel Viiv, Intel Xeon, Itanium,
Itanium Inside, Pentium, Pentium Inside, the Centrino logo, the Intel logo and the Intel Inside logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Intel Corporation or its subsidiaries in the United States and other countries. Other company,
product and service names may be trademarks or service marks of other companies. 2006 Lenovo. All rights reserved.
Visit www.lenovo.com/safecomputing periodically for the latest information on safe and effective computing.
To shop or locate
your local reseller
It takes all kinds to make up a family. Well, here are some members
of ours. Serious machines for serious business. Lenovo ThinkPad

notebooks and ThinkCentre

desktops for the creative, practical,


ambitious, nomadic, thrifty and even clumsy members of your
family. Each featuring the kind of world-class technology that
continues to make ThinkPad and ThinkCentre the envy of the
industry. Just part of a whole line of Lenovo PCs.
ThinkCentre E50 Tower
distinctive innovations
Rescue and Recovery one-button
recovery and restore solution
system features
Intel

Celeron

D 331 Processor (2.66GHz)


Microsoft

Windows

XP Home
256MB DDR memory at 400MHz
40 GB Hard Drive, CD-ROM
6 USB 2.0 ports (2 Frontside)
think express model
$
379PN 9214A1U
Option
17 ThinkVision

Flat Panel L171 Monitor


$
319PN 9417AB1
ThinkPad T60
distinctive innovations
Active Protection System Airbag-like
technology to help protect your hard drive
system features
Intel

Centrino

Duo Mobile Technology


Intel

Core Duo Processor T2300


Intel

Pro/Wireless 2915abg
Microsoft

Windows

XP Professional
14 XGA TFT (1280x768)
512MB DDR2 memory at 667MHz
60GB Serial ATA Hard Drive, CD-RW/
DVD Drive
think express model
$
1499PN 1953D6U
Option
512MB DDR2 memory at 667MHz
$
94PN 40Y7733
ThinkPad X60
distinctive innovations
ThinkVantage Client Security
8
Strong
security as a standard feature
system features
Intel

Centrino

Duo Mobile Technology


Intel

Core Duo Processor T2300


Intel

Pro/Wireless 2915abg
Microsoft

Windows

XP Professional
12.1 XGA TFT
60GB Serial ATA Hard Drive
4.1lbs travel weight
9
and only 1.1 thin
10
think express model
$
1499PN 170947U
Option
ThinkPad X60 Series Extended Life Battery
$
179PN 40Y7005
ThinkCentre E50 Tower
distinctive innovations
Rescue and Recovery one-button
recovery and restore solution
system features
Intel

Pentium

4 519 Processor (3.06GHz)


Microsoft

Windows

XP Professional
512MB DDR memory at 400MHz
80GB Hard Drive, CD-RW
6 USB 2.0 Ports (2 Frontside)
think express model
$
699PN 921525U
Option
Lexmark X7170 All-In-One printer
with USB cable
$
149PN 40Y8260
ThinkPad Z60 notebook available with
Intel

Centrino

Mobile Technology
ThinkPad Z60m
distinctive innovations
ThinkPad Productivity Center ThinkPad
help at your ngertips
system features
Intel

Centrino

Mobile Technology
Intel

Pentium

M 740 Processor (1.73GHz)


1
Intel

Pro/Wireless 9215ABG
2
Microsoft

Windows

XP Home
3
15.4 SXGA Widescreen (1280x800)
512MB
4
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5
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think express model
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6
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179PN 40Y6797
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distinctive innovations
Active Protection System Airbag-like
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system features
Intel

Pentium

M 740 Processor ( 1.73GHz)


Microsoft

Windows

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Integrated BT and Verizon WWAN
7
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Call 1 866 426-7853
Go to lenovo.com/newthinkpad/m100
F I R S T L O O K S
Software: VoIP
Talk Gets Cheaper for Small Businesses
mail after a certain time.
Hunt groups let calls be dis-
tributed to a team simultane-
ously or according to criteria
such as whose line is free.
To prevent t he system
from choking, administra-
tors can limit mailbox stor-
age to anywhere between
1KB and 5MB. A good over-
view screen shows how much
space each user is occupying,
and Web access to messages
lets users easily manage their
voice mail accounts.
We were amazed at the
breadth of features packed
into the DVX-1000, like the
CDR capabi l ity that l ists
every call handled by the
system along with the calling
parties, date, time, and dura-
tion. We were also impressed
by the ease of system setup
and conguration.
The DPH- 1 40 phones
could use a more automated
conf iguration and tighter
integration into the overall
system, but the DVX-1000
lets you outt your company
with a feature-packed IP te-
lephony solution for under
$2,000 (plus $139 per seat).
If you run a small shop, that
should put this PBX at the top
of your shopping list.
IP Telephony DVX-1000
DVX-1000, $1,599 direct, plus $139 per
seat. D-Link Corp., www.dlink.com.
llllm
BY OLIVER KAVEN
R
ecently D-Link intro-
duced an IP PBX for
busi nesses with 25
or fewer employees: the IP
Telephony DVX-1000 ($1,599
direct). The product is part
of a complete line called the
xStack IP Telephony Solution,
which consists of the DVX-
1000, an analog trunk gate-
way (the DVG-3004S), and
DPH-140S VoIP telephones.
The DVX-1000 is a SIP
(Session Initiation Proto-
col) telephony switch that
includes an auto-attendant,
a call-forwarding and hold
capability, IVR (Interactive
Voice Response), voice mail
with Web-based user access,
and support for up to 25 ex-
tensions. The integrated con-
ferencing bridge has a Web
interface that lets you sched-
ule conference calls, issue
invitations to participants,
and restrict access via PIN
authentication.
EASY TO CONFIGURE
Setup is no harder than for
any other network-attached
device that uses a Web inter-
face. You can give the DVX-
1000 a static IP address or
have it obtain one from your
DHCP server. Once the unit
has an IP address, you can
use the Web interface for
all configuration, including
the setup of the gateway, DNS
parameters, and SMTP-deliv-
ered system alerts. To ensure
date and time accuracyes-
pecially important since time
stamps for voice mail and
Cal l Detai l Reporti ng
(CDR) rely on the PBX
clockyou can point the
DVX-1000 to two external
NTP (Network Time Proto-
col) sources.
Adding a new user or a new
extension merely requires a
few mouse clicks in the Call
Server section. Registration
involves nothing more than
assigning the new username
and extension to a valid SIP
ID on the network.
Once configured with an
ID and extension, a DPH-140
($134.99) phone is available
to the DVX-1000. This is
the only part of the solution
that requires advanced know-
ledge of SIP and the workings
of an IP telephony system.
The DVX-1000 can use
multiple gateways. This en-
ables administrators to send
certain trafc over the PSTN
(Public Switched Telephone
Network) and other traffic
over the Internet using SIP.
Connecting the DVX-1000 to
the PSTN requires a bridge
between the local PSTN and
your IP network. The $699
D-Link DVG-3004S can do
the job. It offers four RJ-11 an-
alog FXO (Foreign Exchange
Ofce) ports for connecting
to the local PSTN and one
10/100 Base-TX connector
for attaching to your local
Ethernet network.
ROUTING CALLS
Auto-attendant with f ul l
IVRa feature usually found
only in higher-end systems
lets administrators config-
ure the PBX to greet callers
and direct them to different
departments, specific user
extensions, or a prerecorded
message. You can also create
rules that route callers based
on your companys working
hours or observed holidays.
Upload any voice prompts
you want as WAV les.
The DVX-1000 supports
user groups and hunt groups.
Both allow a set of names or
extensions to be treated as a
whole for easier administra-
tion. A rule applied to the
sales group, for example,
could shunt calls to voice
www.pcmag.com APRIL 11, 2006 PC MAGAZINE 65
D-LINKs solution has features that youd
expect only from higher-end systems.
MESSAGES TO BE PLAYED for callers can be set up in the Auto-attendant conguration menu.
PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com 66
More jaw-dropping technology resides in the Mercedes-Benz S550 than
in any other car today. The COMAND cockpit-control knob on the console
outdoes similar systems from Acura, Audi, BMW, and Inniti. Voice input
works well; we like the way possible phrases show up on the center-of-dash
COMAND display. Night View Assist sees 500 feet into the dark and dis-
plays a bright monochrome image on an LCD panel. Two front-ring radar
units assist your braking and bring all 4,270 pounds to a safe stop. The 600-
watt, 14-speaker Harman Kardon audio system has a PC Card for inserting
your own tunes. The 2007 S550 is technological perfection, 2006-style.
Pioneer AVIC-N2
In the space usually taken up by your radio/CD player,
the Pioneer AVIC-N2 ts a CD/DVD player, an XM radio,
a navigation system, XMs NavTrafc real-time trafc
updates, and a jack for a $100 iPod adapter. You can
load needed routes into memory and display them on
the motorized 6.5-inch screen, then play standard,
MP3, or WMA CDs or show a movie to backseat pas-
sengers. The AVIC-N2 ts in any car with a standard
removable radio.
$1,800 street. Pioneer Electronics (USA) Inc.,
www.pioneerelectronics.com. llllm
CARS
www.pcmag.com APRIL 11, 2006 PC MAGAZINE 67
Bill Howard
If GM Goes Bankrupt,
Will Anyone Care?
MERCEDES-BENZ S550
$86,175 TO $110,000
The Mercedes-Benz S550 bypasses
the Audi A8L and BMW 750Li as the
worlds best ultrapremium sedan. It
features an active infrared Night View
Assist system, radar-assisted braking,
and the best cockpit controller. The
options are so enticing youll have a
hard time staying under $100K. An all-
wheel drive model is due this fall, and
a gas-saving diesel one in 2007.
Mercedes-Benz USA LLC, www.mbusa.com.
lllll
New OnStar Nav
Expected this spring, OnStar Turn-By-Turn
Navigation provides spoken directions
without requiring the driver to enter a
destination manuallythe system calls
a live operator who asks where youre
going, but you wont need continued op-
erator involvement (unlike current OnStar
directions). Also, theres no navigation
display. It will require a 2007 GM car and
cost about $10 a month more than current
basic OnStar service.
www.technoride.com
Former General Motors presi dent
Charles Wilson is famous for his (slightly
misquoted) 1953 statement: Whats
good for the country is good for General
Motors, and vice versa. But how good
would it be for America if the nations
biggest automaker turned out the lights?
There are two GMs: One is the your
fathers Oldsmobile GM that fought
emissions and safety standards, cel-
ebrated road-hugging weight as if
Madison Avenue had repealed the laws
of physics, and to this day turns out
too many cheap-looking dashboards.
The other is the GM that builds some
world-class cars and has U.S. produc-
tion facilities that match the Asians for
assembly-line quality.
Then theres GMs tech-
nology. The company and its
partners have OnStar, by far
the biggest wireless safety,
information, and routing sys-
tem for cars. GMs Magne-
Ride shock absorbers, which
adjust to road conditions by
applying magnetic force to
the iron particles inside, are a brilliant
invention. GM was the first to take the
plunge with its PhatNoise entertainment
system, with a 40GB hard drive you just
fill with digital media from your PC and
dock in your car so you can stream multi-
ple channels of audio and video. And GM
was also rst with head-up displays.
Furthermore, the Corvette is a world-
class sports car with sophisticated
engine and suspension technologies, for
half the price you'd pay for other similar
cars. (Funny how the Corvettes tangen-
tial failings, such as uncomfortable seats,
are called crude; on a Porsche or Fer-
rari, theyd be part of the cars inherent
charm.) GMs Saturn brand wasnt the
rst to use plastic body panels that dont
rust and can withstand parking-lot dings,
but it helped to popularize them. Finally,
GM established a dealer channel where
the sales reps treated customers decently
(not technology, but still important).
Other automakers also offer tech-
nologies such as automatic braking,
lane-departure warnings, and blind-spot
detection. But GMs problem is figuring
out which car to put all this good stuff in.
Because of costs$2,000 isnt uncom-
mon for any single leading-edge tech-
nologythese tech features need to be
incorporated into a vehicle that's priced
at $50,000 to $75,000 and already has a
leading-edge image.
GM has precious few of these: the Cadil-
lac STS, Cadillac Escalade, and Chevrolet
Corvette. The ideal car to serve as a tech
platform would be a big brother to the
STS, competing with the Audi A8L, BMW
7 Series, Lexus LS430, and Mercedes-
Benzs awesome new S-Class.
If I owned General Motors, Id tell all
hands to pay attention to the everyday
cars, too. First, make Blue-
tooth and line-in jacks stan-
dard; a year later, do the
same for PC Card slots and
USB jacks (which let you con-
trol any music player from
the radio). The rich arent the
only ones who drive with cell
phones and iPods. The next
step would be to make the
interiors more inviting and to add more
style to the exterior. Design statements
like that of the Cadillac CTS go a long way.
GMs biggest challenge lies outside
technology. The company has too many
indistinguishable brands selling undis-
tinguished vehicles by dealers that buy-
ers would rather not deal with (GM is
not unique in that). And like Ford and the
Chrysler part of DaimlerChrysler, GM
has a ton of retirees with medical ben-
ets, which adds something like $1,500
in costs per car. Something that might
save GMand would also benefit self-
employed entrepreneurs and people in
the high-tech sector whose jobs come
and gois national health insurance.
Whats good for General Motors. . . .
>
MORE ON THE WEB
To check out the full reviews for
these products, navigate over to
www.technoride.com,
the car site for tech fans.
How good
would it be for
America if its
biggest auto-
maker turned
out the lights?
HARD DRIVE
Maxtor OneTouch II
Small Business Edition
(SBE)
Maxtor Corp.; $599.95 direct
One-touch data back-up.
Works with Windows
2000/2003 Server and
Small Business Server.
Unattended backups. Can
be removed and locked
down easily.
go.pcmag.com/
MaxtorOneTouchIISBE
SOFTWARE
BACKUP SOFTWARE
NTI Shadow
NewTech Infosystems Inc.; $29.99
Fast, simple, continuous backup.
go.pcmag.com/NTIShadow
ANTISPYWARE
Spyware Doctor 3.5
PC Tools; $29.95
Best version yet. Removed more spyware
than other tested products.
go.pcmag.com/SpyDoc35
FINANCIAL SOFTWARE
TurboTax Premier 2005
Intuit Inc.; $14.95$69.95
Excellent coverage of personal tax top-
ics. Top-notch interface and help. Free
deduction-tracking application and a
rewards program can add value.
go.pcmag.com/TurboPremier05
HOME NETWORKING
Buffalo LinkTheater
Buffalo Technology (USA) Inc.; $300
Streams digitized content from PC to
entertainment center.
go.pcmag.com/LinkTheater
CONSUMER ELECTRONICS
LOW-COST LCD HDTV
Proview RX-326
Proview; $949.99 list
Widescreen 32-inch display.
Pleasing picture quality.
Good image quality with
analog/digital inputs.
Inexpensive.
go.pcmag.com/RX326

SMART PHONES
(KEYBOARDLESS)
T-Mobile SDA
T-Mobile; $3,299.99 direct
Wi-Fi. Dedicated music buttons.
Excellent screen. Syncs with Outlook.
go.pcmag.com/SDA
ULTRACOMPACT DIGITAL CAMERA
Canon PowerShot SD550 Digital Elph
Canon U.S.A. Inc.; $449.95 list
Quick performer. Excellent image quality.
Unique My Color feature. Good ergo-
nomics. Sleek and attractive.
go.pcmag.com/SD550
TRAVEL SPEAKERS
Creative
TravelDock 900
Creative Labs Inc.;
$79.99 direct
Very compact. Good
sound quality and power.
Good battery life with
alkaline batteries.
go.pcmag.com/
traveldock900
HEADPHONES
Etymotic ER6i
Etymotic Research Inc.;
$130 street
Great sound quality and
sensitivity. Good bass
performance. Comfort-
able. Effectively blocks
outside noise.
go.pcmag.com/er6i
HARDWARE
DEDICATED PHOTO PRINTER
Canon Selphy CP510
Compact Photo Printer
Canon U.S.A. Inc.; $99.99 direct
Very affordable. Fast performance and low
running cost. Very good photo quality for
the price. Prints on a variety of paper sizes
up to 4 by 8 inches. Battery option.
go.pcmag.com/canoncp510
LAPTOP
Dell Inspiron 6000 (Media Center)
Dell Inc.; $968.80 direct (E-Value Code 1111-i6004pc)
Media Center OS. 15.4-inch widescreen
display. Very good performance.
go.pcmag.com/DellInspiron6000MCE
DESKTOPS
Apple iMac (Intel Core Duo)
Apple Computer Inc.; $1,699 direct, $1,799 as tested
Dual-core processor. Front row. Mini-DVI
port for true dual-monitor usage.
go.pcmag.com/appleimacintel
Dell Dimension E310
Dell Inc.: $746; with 17-inch LCD, $929
Windows Media Center Edition. DataSafe
option for added storage protection. Great
bang for the buck.
go.pcmag.com/dellE310
ALL-IN-ONE PRINTER
Canon Pixma MP500
Canon U.S.A. Inc.; $199 street
Prints, scans, and copies. Fast perfor-
mance. Excellent paper handling.
go.pcmag.com/
CanonPixmaMP500
LCD MONITOR (21-INCH)
Gateway FPD2185W
Gateway Inc.; $599.99 direct
Excellent image quality. Lots
of video connections. Highly
adjustable.
go.pcmag.com/GatewayFPD2185W
T-Mobile SDA
Canon
Selphy CP510
WHAT TO BUY
69
go.pcmag.com/whattobuy F I R S T L OOK S
www.pcmag.com APRIL 11, 2006 PC MAGAZINE
Proview RX-326
Find tools and guidance to defend your network at microsoft.com/security/IT
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ON STUPI D USERS
Ive been a faithful reader for years and have
owned one PC or another since 1980. Thus,
Im the guy everyone comes to when their
computer gets slow or wont boot, etc. Your
article on Stupid Users (The Sorry State
of Security, February 21, page 78) is dead on.
Ive spent countless hours xing stupid user
mistakes for friends, neighbors, and people
at work. I agree with the article that every-
oneusers, publishers, hardware manufac-
turers, and the mediais to blame, but you
can avoid most problems by some simple
daily and weekly maintenance.
When I tell folks how to protect their data and hardware,
they get a glazed look in their eyes and wait patiently for me to
remove all the junk that has built up in their PCs over months
of neglect and ignorance. As you can get pretty good protection
from a variety of sources for free, I dont see why anyone should
fall into these traps. I realize you can do everything right and
still end up with a virus or spyware problem, but keeping your
protection up to date lessens the likelihood of this. Thank you
for putting into words the frustrations Ive felt over the past
couple of years.
Bill Barnes
I wanted to say how much I agree with your assertion that
the stupid consumer is responsible for many of the problems
related to PC security. After all, setting up and maintaining
security on a PC is so simple! Users need to do only the follow-
ing easy tasks:
Install a security suite and deal with its complex settings.
Congure the rewall and grant the correct programs ac-
cess to the Internet. Congure the antispam tool to integrate
with an e-mail client like Outlook. Deal with the time- and
system-resource-consuming software upgrades and scans.
Install and congure a good antispyware tool (which may
conict with the security suite andif not set correctly
may block some legitimate programs on start-up). And again,
deal with upgrades and system scans.
For broadband, install a router and con-
figure the firewall. Configure the wireless
security settings. (Online gamers and others
will need to set up individual port access and
perform advanced router configuration.)
Users should also set up wireless security
on all wireless devices in the network: print
server, home laptop, ofce laptop, entertain-
ment server, etc. (This could entail several
hours on the phone with tech support for
each device.)
And in addition: Congure browser se-
curity settings. Deal with Web privacy is-
sues (including managing cookies, temp
les, history les, and so on). Be alert for programs that want
to install themselves on your PC (and then report your ac-
tions back to some database not easily identiable as spyware
because the programs seem to come from a legitimate ven-
dor like Google or Logitech or Sony). Also: Keep Windows up-
dated with the unending series of MS security patches. And
stay informed about new threats, like rootkits and ash cook-
ies, that seem to appear almost weekly.
Im sure Ive forgotten something, but you get the idea. This
security business is childs play, and only stupid people dont
keep their PCs secure!
Steve Chapman
THAT PESKY MS MESSENGER
The way Jim Louderback replied to Talha bin Hamid (Feedback,
February 21) was ne, but Jim could at least have told him how
to solve the problem. After all, you are a PC magazine.
Basically, all you need to do is open MSN Messenger, then
go to Tools | Options, then select General, uncheck Automati-
cally run Messenger when I log on to Windows, and click OK.
No more MSN Messenger starting up when youre on Win-
dows start-up.
Even if you remove MSN Messenger from start-up, it will
just re-add itself if the above option remains checked.
Elliot Svec
Jim Louderbacks response to the reader complaining about
Microsofts AntiSpyware beta program allowing the start-
up of MSN Messenger was way out of line for a couple of rea-
sons. The purpose of antispyware applications is to put the
user in control of which applications get installed or run. MS
AntiSpyware smacks of the safe computing initiative: Well
decide whats best for you. Also, the fact that the software is
currently free is a red herring. Its a beta version, and Micro-
How to Contact Us
We welcome your comments and suggestions.
When sending e-mail to Feedback, please state in the subject line of your
message which article or column prompted your response.
E-MAIL pcmag@ziffdavis.com. MAIL Feedback, PC Magazine, 28 East 28th
Street, New York, NY 10016-7940.
All letters become the property of PC Magazine and are subject to editing. We
regret that we cannot answer letters individually.
MS AntiSpyware smacks of the safe computing
initiative: Well decide whats best for you.
www.pcmag.com APRIL 11, 2006 PC MAGAZINE 71

FEEDBACK
go.pcmag.com/feedback go.pcmag.com/feedback
PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com 72
Neil and Loyd are a formidable duo that Ill enjoy
reading for as long as PC Magazine prints them.
soft has every intention of charging for it once the beta testers
are done being lab rats.
What a snotty reply to a reasonable complaint.
Mark Scardiglia
MOTOROLA S NAME COMPRESSI ON
The whole Moto phone nomenclature (phonenclature?)
cracks me up. The name SLVR makes me think of pain un-
der a ngernail. Does it have a companion phone called the
TWZR to remove a SLVR? One can surmise that they used
RAZR because KNFE was taken. Had they used KNFE in-
stead, imagine the product tie-in with the Victorinox folks: A
Swiss Army KNFE. I dont know about you, but I could use a
phone with a corkscrew for my next bottle of Kendall-Jackson
cabernet sauvignon.
As for the PEBL, you would think they have a tie-in with
Hanna-Barbera. Whats next, cell phones for couples? They
could make a FRD and WLMA or a BRNY and BTTY, or even
a ruggedized phone called the BMBM. And maybe a GPS-en-
abled phone for pets calledyou guessed itthe DNO. Now
that would add a new dimension to calling your dog.
Frank Goad
Somebody please buy this company a vowel. (But rst check out
our SLVR review on page 32 of this issue.)Jim Louderback
THE DYNAMI C DUO
I was totally geeked when I saw your new Solutions section.
It is one of my favorite sections of PC Magazine. First, I came
across Ask Loyd, accompanied by Loyd Cases photo. Ive
been a fan of his since his days at Computer Gaming World.
Ive wished many times I was in Loyds shoes testing some of
the hottest new tech on the market. Then I turned the page
and stared in awe at the photo of the tech guy I most aspire to
be like: Neil J. Rubenking. No set of initials in PC Magazine
carries as much credibility as NJR. To nally see the face be-
hind the writing is an absolute treat and provides some well-
deserved recognition to a true PC Magazine hero. Ill miss the
fact that Neil wont be initialing his responses now that he
has his own column, but Ill deal with itcongrats to Neil on
getting his own space at last.
Neil and Loyd are a formidable duo that Ill enjoy reading
for as long as PC Magazine prints them.
David Rosa
PCS FOR REAL POWER USERS
The Name Game (Feedback, February 7) resonated with me.
Gamers seem to be the only folks that the trade magazines ad-
dress for performance. Rick Altmans letter pointed out one set
of users who require serious speed: digital video creators.
I agree with him that the majority of magazines seem to ex-
pect that all business users just use e-mail and Word and are
happy with the mainline systems provided by the vendors.
I sure know Im not. I write software for a living and manage
other software engineers. The last thing I want is to be paying
a high-priced engineer to watch an hourglass spinning during a
compilation. It is getting worse, as modern systems not only re-
quire a compiler but also usually start up an application server,
a JSP container such as Tomcat or Resin, and talk to a back-end
database. In the words of ToolTime Tim, we need more power.
I would appreciate some reviews and discussion of how the
new systems compare. Does it make sense to buy the hottest
single CPU or a hot dual-core? Or do we still have to go to the
expense of getting dual Xeon systems (nominally for servers) to
deliver the desktop performance that professional developers
require?
Pat Farrell
These days, the reason for getting a workstation desktop over a
high-end multimedia PC or performance desktop PC mainly
boils down to support: driver support for specialized hardware,
technical support for specialized apps (CAD/CAM/CGI or
nancial/database/development, and such), and hand-holding
for your IT guys. This support can be life or death in the face of
a looming deadline. That said, dual-core and multiprocessor
PCs and workstations help only if your key program is written
to take advantage of multithreaded processing. This is true for
graphics programs as well as compilers. Unlike general-purpose
PCs, individual workstation congurations (memory, storage,
CPUs, graphics) are more closely tied to the task. Since worksta-
tion congurations are specialized for niche tasks, you rarely see
them in general media magazines. What might be a great work-
station for software development may be a poor choice for a dig-
ital photonishing rm, and vice versa.Joel Santo Domingo,
Lead Analyst, Desktops and Workstations
Corrections and Amplications
In our First Looks piece Dual-Core for Your Mobile Lifestyle (February 21, page 32), we
incorrectly reported the percentage of improvement of the two reviewed systems (the
Acer TravelMate 8204WLMi and the HP Pavilion dv1000t) over the comparison system
(the Gateway NX850XL). On SYSmark 2004 SE, the Acer system performed 45 percent
better than the Gateway system on Ofce Productivity (OP) and 58 percent better on
Internet Content Creation (ICC). On the same tests, the HP system performed 34 percent
better than the Gateway system on OP and 46 percent better on ICC. For the multimedia
tests, the Acer system performed 78 percent better on Windows Media Encode (WME)
and 111 percent better on the Photoshop CS2 Action set (PS2). The HP system was 72
percent better on WME and 35 percent better on PS2.

FEEDBACK
go.pcmag.com/feedback
J UMP TO NEXT PAGE >>
www.pcmag.com APRIL 11, 2006 PC MAGAZI NE 89
A
look at the white papers and articles ar-
chived on the Center for Digital Democ-
racys Web site reveals paper after paper
on how the telecom companies want to
make the Internet into a tiered service,
so that your 1.5-Mbps service is not the same as my
1.5-Mbps service.
These companies are preoccupied with deep-
packet analysis. Instead of just routing trafc, the
new routers will also determine the nature of the
packet. This isnt for security or spying, but to ag
Skype and other VoIP calls so you can be charged
extra for making them. You can assume that IPTV
trafc will be charged differently, too. One of the
more shameful aspects of this is that Cisco seems to
be promoting some of these ideas so that it can sell
more specialized (and expensive) gear.
If they were serving the public interest, the telcos
and cable companies would simply provide a very
fast connection, and services would ow over those
connections in ways determined by the user
everything IP-driven. But these companies would
like to use gangland tactics to get into every part of
your business. You buy the 1.5-Mbps link, it costs a
xed amount. You actually want to use it, it costs
more. How about putting a server on it? Nope, you
have to pay extra. Can you make a VoIP Skype call?
No way, costs more. So youre not getting a real 1.5-
Mbps line at allyoure getting scammed, in fact.
This reminds me of the early era of Internet
connectivity, where an ISP would buy a 1.5-Mbps
T-1 line from the phone company and resell it over
and over and over to hundreds of customers, with
the rationalization that the line was magically
multiplexed and was providing T-1 service to 500
people. When you read the ne print, you discov-
ered that you couldnt really use the whole capac-
ity of your T-1 at all. This sort of scam is still with
us, only now the big boys are doing it. The state
and local public utilities commissions say nothing.
The Federal Communications Commission says
nothing. Nobody says anything.
It seems to me that if you buy a 1.5-Mbps con-
nection, you should be able to redline the connec-
tion, to use the full capacity without being charged
more. And you should also be able to use it for
whatever you want to use it for. Otherwise, its like
selling public-utility water to people and making
them pay more to use it for washing dishes.
As this fiasco unfolds, I blame the Telecom-
munications Act of 1996. Its apologists still claim
that its working, when it has clearly resulted in the
consolidation of the phone companies and the lu-
dicrous fact that the original monopoly, AT&T, is
actually re-emerging as a big clunky ogre, despite
its 1984 court-ordered breakup. Where is Judge
Harold Green when you need him?
This was made clear when SBC grabbed a slew
of the one-time Regional Bell Operating Companies
created by the breakup, including Pacic Bell. Then
SBC merged with AT&T and is now called AT&T.
In just six years, the name of the fabulous baseball
stadium in San Francisco has gone from Pac Bell
Park to SBC Park to AT&T Park. Just the expense
of changing the signage and promotional collateral
tells you that someone is making plenty of money.
The entire nations telecom infrastructure will
consolidate, probably into three monopolies: land-
line, cellular, and cable. The Internet will change
drastically. Just look at a list of the documents
archived by the Center for Digital Democracy
(www.democraticmedia.org) to see where all this is
headed. The guys who run these telecom compa-
nies have no qualms about openly discussing their
plans to ream the public. With weak public utili-
ties commissions and an FCC that is not serving
the public, what is the point of being secretive?
Apparently nobody cares. The folks in Congress
are technophobic and clueless; they just listen to
the lobbyists who work for the big telecom compa-
nies. The FCC is out to ruin the country by giving
the big companies anything they want. The execu-
tive branch is all about corporatism at the expense
of the public. And the public itself seems not to
care, or these jokers would be voted out of ofce.
Meanwhile, Western Europe and Asia will glide
along the Net at 30 to 100 Mbps with IPTV, VoIP,
and slick services with a reasonable connection fee,
while we struggle to get a solid 1 Mbps while paying
all sorts of usage fees. Soon well be comparing our-
selves to Bolivia or Paraguay and patting ourselves
on the back saying, Were number one.
And sure, in the Western Hemisphere well be
number oneif you leave Canada out.
John C. Dvorak
Hijacking the Internet
The original telecom
monopoly, AT&T, is
now re-emerging
as the big clunky
ogre that was once
broken up.
MORE ON THE WEB: Read John C. Dvoraks column
every Monday at go.pcmag.com/dvorak. You can
reach him directly at pcmag@dvorak.org.
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Memorizes your passwords and Logs You In automatically.
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www.pcmag.com APRIL 11, 2006 PC MAGAZINE 91
J OHN C. DVORAK
Inside Track
I
ntel has made an exclusive deal with Skype so
that PC users cannot use Skypes VoIP telecon-
ferencing capabilities with more than ve people
unless theyre using Intel microprocessors. This
had to be a pure cash deal, and it had to be for a lot
of money, since it will certainly annoy current Skype
customers and tarnish Skypes reputation. These
sorts of exclusionary deals are generally seen as un-
fair and creepy.
Its not as if the Intel processor is better at Skype.
There is no real reason for this partnership except to
screw AMD. This is nothing new. Whats new is the
partnership. Essentially, the system will incorporate
some code that looks for the CPU identier. To me,
this scheme amounts to building a public highway
that doesnt allow Chevys to drive on it because Ford
did a deal with the transportation board. I wonder
how that would y.
There are a number of image problems with this
deal. First, Intel is already being investigated for
antitrust and unfair practices. An AMD-promoted
legal raid by Korean authorities on Intels Seoul of-
ces took place recently, and Intel would like to get
revenge. But this Skype move is an amateurish way
to go about it.
The way to pull off a deal like this is not by mak-
ing it obvious that you are simply disabling features
for anyone using your competitors processors, as
Intel is doing. Instead, it should have released Skype
Special Edition and distributed the software itself
for its customers. Intel could then claim that there
was so much demand for the special edition that it
would go into the wild so that anyone could down-
load it. The company could claim that it was devel-
oped for its own chips, and that it locked out other
chips because it simply wasnt tested for them. Intel
could say, We can guarantee it only for our own
chips. Why should we be doing work for AMD? and
act puzzled.
Skype could have then called it Skype 2.0 and left
it at that. Instead Intel looks nefarious and Skype looks
sleazy. Not that they wouldnt have been nefarious
and sleazy with my approachthey just wouldnt
look it.
That said, I see no reason why someone cant de-
sign a spoof to make an AMD system look like an In-
tel system to Skype. I suspect such a patch will be
rolled out quickly.
This situation is somewhat reminiscent of the
hassle caused by Web sites that will work only with
Internet Explorer. This is a ridiculous annoyance.
But once a handful of these sites began appearing,
Opera put a patch in its browser so that when asked
by a Web site what browser are you? Opera would
say it was Internet Explorer. Im sure Microsoft con-
sidered suing Opera, but that would have opened up
a whole new can of worms.
The only drawback to Operas false claim of being
IE is that so many people have implemented this x
that its difcult to get a handle on how many people
actually use Opera. This x inates the number of IE
users on the Web stat programs.
Crash and Burn Dept.: One of the hot topics of late
has been the buzz around a Wi-Fi startup called
FON, the brainchild of the affable Spanish entrepre-
neur Martin Varsavsky. This idea isnt new, but hes
added a new twist to the concept of sharing our Wi-
Fi connections so that people can park outside your
home and download their e-mail. This idea has been
tried in various forms for years and hasnt gained
traction. Whats really different about this attempt?
The marketing.
Varsavsky has managed to schmooze a slew of
high-prole bloggers and even a few columnists into
becoming paid advisors to the project. But instead
of just advising, they are promoting the FON con-
cept on various blogs and publications, essentially
becoming PR people. Some people are saying that
this is a conict of interest, but it seems transparent
enough, and it is obvious what they are up to with
this boosterism. In fact, this situation provides an
interesting marketing laboratory. These folks, who
are mostly bloggers with an inated sense of pur-
pose, have always believed that if you can put to-
gether a critical mass of the sharpest people (which
they have arguably managed to do here), you should
be able to shape and manipulate public opinion to
an extreme. Thus they are convinced that they can
make this FON idea y despite the failure of similar
ideas in the past and the numerous drawbacks of the
system.
So far the FON folks have scored about $21 million
in venture funding. Well see where it goes. It will be
fun to deconstruct the process when its over. I per-
sonally expect to hear a thud.
Sex Text Messaging Dept.: Now theres some-
thing called short-message sex, which is suppos-
edly emerging on mobile phones. This is according
to a Jack Kapica column in the Toronto Globe and
Mail. Can anything be so silly? Heres the kicker: Ac-
cording to Kapica, Virgin Mobile Canada recently
asked TV sex kitten Pamela Anderson to write a book
called The Joy of Text, to be sold in bookstores and
given away with a cell phone kit that Virgin calls its
Pleasure Pack. In it, Ms. Anderson talks about tex-
tual intercourse and offers Canadians advice on how
to spice up their text lives. Are people that bored in
Canada?
The Intel/
Skype scheme
amounts to
building a
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www.pcmag.com APRIL 11, 2006 PC MAGAZI NE 93
H
aving just returned from DEMO 2006,
held in Phoenix this year, Im stoked on
new technology. Some of the new prod-
ucts I saw there were entertaining, some
practical, a few were electrifying, and
one was delicious. The delicious one was MooBella,
a box the size of a soda machine that mixed up a fresh
cup of ice cream, with any of 11 different avors and
a handful of different toppings, in less than a minute.
Its in beta test now; the machines could be ubiqui-
tous in a year or two.
Too many of the products, however, left me with
a sense of dj vu. Even some of the more impres-
sive ones, like Riya, were as much clever mash-ups
of existing technologies as breakthroughs. Riya is
face- and word-recognition software that helps you
tag your photographs by whos in them and where
they were shot. It appears that its recognition code
is nely honed, so it reads billboards, placards, and
street signs to help you nd and categorize your
photos. Riya can go one step beyond your existing
photo organizer softwareand anything that can
make sense out of the digital shoebox that your
hard drive has become is welcome. But the good
guys were spotting the bad guys with face recogni-
tion software back at Super Bowl XXXV, so chalk
one up for progress, not revolution.
New search engines were everywhereno
surprise, considering Googles stock price and
Yahoo!s resurgence. As a group, I thought they
were rather overspecialized. And the big search
companies generally have the technology to do all
that any successful upstart might do (and more),
or they can just acquire the edgling. But maybe
thats the idea.
I always guess wrong about community applica-
tions, and Im always amazed when they take off.
I cant gure out why Id want a site that tells me
what my buddies are watching on TV, but thats
what eVoke TV does. Bet against me. History is
on your side.
When it comes to saving money, though, I get it
right. Eqo (pronounced echo) extends your Skype
phone to your cell phone, bringing big potential sav-
ings over roaming charges. Again, Eqo has a trendy
community angle, Take your buddies with you,
but the real message here is Save a bundle. You
may need a different calling plan that can handle
the background data trafc, though. Check it out.
Youve probably read about Pleo, the cuter-
than-cute robotic dinosaur from the inventor of
the Furby. Do I need one? No. Do I want one? Oh,
yeah. And I both need and want an iGuitar, a fully
analog and digital guitar with USB output. It plugs
right into music recording programs, and its a re-
ally nice electric guitar in its own right. I mean no
disservice to the 60 or so products that I havent
mentioned, but lets move on.
Sometimes the journey is the destination, and I
had some interesting traveling companions in ad-
dition to my wife. One was the iGo charging sys-
tem, the one you see in Radio Shack and in travel
and laptop catalogs. The single charging brick runs
on AC or DC and can simultaneously power your
notebook and your choice of personal electronics:
cell phone, MP3 player, Walkman, CD player, and
more. The TSA screeners gave the charging unit
the hairy eyeball at the airport, but they ultimately
decided it wasnt a threatunless I were to drop it
on someones toe.
The iGo will charge just about anything; it has a
wide selection of adapter tips, and more are becom-
ing available all the time. The tips play an active role
in setting the correct voltage and current settings
for each device. Unlike some adapters that simply
burn off voltage with a crude resistor or (better) a
voltage regulator, the iGo senses a tips unique iden-
tity and programs itself accordingly.
I also had a loaner Verizon phone, a Motorola
V325, which has GPS capabilities. It was loaded with
VZ Navigator, an excellent mapping and directions
system that uses the Navteq database. After the con-
ference, we took in the Heard Museum, Frank Lloyd
Wrights Taliesin West, and the Apache Trail. VZ
Navigator talked us through every twist and turn,
and displayed the route on a very readable screen.
Turn-by-turn instructions are a little hard on the
battery, however, so I ducked into a strip mall Ra-
dio Shack and picked up an iGo tip that worked with
my phone. With the 12-volt cord, the iGo kept the
phone charged, and we stayed on course. Back on
notebook duty, the iGo didnt even get warm when
it charged my depleted IBM T42p and N-Charge
auxiliary battery simultaneously. Good stuff.
Technology Travels
MORE ON THE WEB: You can contact Bill Machrone
at Bill_Machrone@ziffdavis.com. For more of his
columns, go to go.pcmag.com/machrone.
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over roaming
charges.
Bill Machrone
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O
ddly enough, no one has come up with the perfect PC with
the perfect operating system and the perfect applications
that make everyone happy all the time. Crazy world.
Thats why we turn to utilities, from the little ones
that show you the weather forecast and keep you from making common
e-mail faux pas to the far bigger ones that search your system at the speed
of thought and back up your hard drive. And as the pace of major software
development slowsyes, it really has been five years since Windows XP
shipped, and three since Microsoft Ofce 2003 arrivedfamiliarity begins
to breed contempt. Imperfections are magnied, and we search out better
ways to get things done.
At PC Magazine, were lucky to have an expert group of editors, writers, ana-
lysts, and contributors who are constantly searching for a better way, both at
work and at home. For this years Utility Guide, we asked them to share their
discoveries, reviewing and presenting their favorite utilities. We also spoke
with three utility developers: Mark Thompson, founder of the free utility site
AnalogX; Steve Gibson of Gibson Research, which produces some of the best
SPEED!
POWER!
in this story
PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com 96
[ ]
14th Annual Utility Superguide
COVER STORY
98 Incredibly Useful Utilities
100 For Home Networkers
101 For Microsoft Ofce Workers
104 Make It Pretty
106 For Photo Enthusiasts
108 For Video Enthusiasts
112 For Audio Enthusiasts
114 For Web 2.0 Addicts
116 For Your Browser(s)
118 Top 10 PC Magazine Utilities
99 Q&A: Mark Thompson
100 Q&A: Steve Gibson
114 Q&A: Mark Russinovich
LOOKS!
FUN!
online network security test utilities; and Mark Russinovich,
cofounder of Sysinternals, which brought us Filemon and
Regmon. We also sneak a peek inside the system trays of
other utility creators and users. Whose is the biggest? Well,
correcting for screen resolution and blatant
tray-padding . . . its PC Magazine editor
Lance Ulanoff, who boldly predicted the out-
come from the get-go.Sarah Pike
Our Experts Pick the Best
Illustration by Daniel Pelavin
and send it along. SnagIt goes far beyond simple screen cap-
ture. It can capture the full content of a scrolling window or
Web page. You can grab all the images on a Web page, capture
menus using a time delay, snap full-screen graphics-intensive
games, and even make a video of on-screen actions. Save the
result in any of a zillion formats, including PDF, and directly
send it off via e-mail, IM, or FTP. This screen-capture program
does it all. (TechSmith Corp., www.techsmith.com. lllll)
DIRECTORY OPUS 8 ($64) makes Windows Explorer obso-
lete. DOpus fanatics typically let it replace Windows Explorer
completely; if you get past the initial learning curve, you
wont go back. Common tasks such as managing ZIP archives,
setting le attributes, and moving les from one folder to
another are all easier in DOpus. Among its many, many
Once X1 DESKTOP EDITION ($74.95 direct) indexes your sys-
tem, you can locate an elusive le, e-mail message, attachment,
or contact as quickly as you can type. The initial indexing takes
a while, but after that, X1 updates in the background on a user-
dened schedule. It has advanced search options, but we usu-
ally just start typingeach character narrows the results. On a
budget? Yahoo! Desktop Search (desktop.yahoo.com) uses X1s
engine and offers nearly all of the same features free.
(X1 Technologies Inc., www.x1.com. llllh)
ROBOFORM PRO 6.6 ($29.95) lls Web forms and manages
your innumerable passwords. It memorizes each username
and password the rst time you log into a site, then automati-
cally supplies them when you return. All you have to remem-
ber is one master password to decrypt your data; for other
passwords youll use strong (and hard-to-remember) pass-
words from the built-in Password Generator. RoboForm will
print out all your data for offsite storage, just in case, and its
also available in a portable version for USB keys.
(Siber Systems Inc., www.siber.com. llllm)
Windows XP includes basic ZIP file management, but a
proper ZIP utility does much more. We use WINZIP 10.0 ($29.95).
It integrates nicely with Windows Explorer and offers numer-
ous context-menu itemswe especially like Zip and E-mail.
WinZip can encrypt archives with 256-bit AES, save ZIP les
directly to CD/DVD, split large les for storage or sharing, and
store repeated tasks. Best of all, you can launch a le inside a
ZIP archive, edit it, and save the changed le back to the archive.
(WinZip International LLC, www.winzip.com. lllhm)
Next time you respond to Uncle Clems e-mailed plea for
help, snap a picture of the solution with SNAGIT 8.0 ($39.95)
GOOGLE EARTH
BY NEIL J. RUBENKING
DIRECTORY OPUS 8
X1 DESKTOP EDITION
PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com 98
ure, we test hundreds of new software programs each year to help you
choose the best ones. But when we see ones that will make our lives bet-
ter, they get permanent homes on our own PCs. Editors Ben Gottesman, Jim
Louderback, Michael Miller, and I compared our lists of these drop-dead
useful utilities. They overlapped a lot; some utilities showed up on three or even all four
of our lists. We boiled them down to this collection of gems youll denitely want to try.
INCREDIBLY USEFUL UTILITIES
S
S
high-end abilities are nding duplicate les, changing
date/time stamps, handling FTP transfers, preview-
ing almost any type of le, and splitting and rejoining
large lesthe list is almost endless!
(GPSoftware, www.gpsoft.com.au. llllm)
More and more people find instant messaging
handy at work as well as at home, but not everyone
uses the same IM system. You dont have to put up
with the ads and annoyances of multiple IM cli-
entsjust load up TRILLIAN BASIC 3.1 (free). It will
communicate with your buddies on AIM, ICQ, IRC,
MSN Messenger, and Yahoo! Messenger, keeping
them all in one handy list. You can audio-chat with
buddies whose service supports it, log conversa-
tions, and set your away/back status for all servic-
es at once. The $25 Pro version supports additional
IM services and adds a host of advanced features.
(Cerulean Studios, www.ceruleanstudios.com. llllh)
Microsofts TWEAKUI (free; not supported) pulls to-
gether an amazing number of Windows XP tweaks in
one small package. For example, you can bypass the
Welcome screens password prompt to log in automat-
ically, change the location of special folders such as My Pic-
tures, add user-dened locations to the Places Bar in standard
le dialogs, and set specic applications (say, Solitaire) so they
wont appear in the Start menus most-used programs list. The
one thing TweakUI wont do is help you nd a specic tweak,
so youll want to step through the entire list and get a feel for
whats available. (Microsoft Corp., www.microsoft.com. llllm)
Travelers who cant live without full access to their home-
base computers will pay for a high-end remote-access solution.
For the rest of us, the remote control provided by LOGMEIN
FREE (free) should be enough. Just set up an account and install
the software on your base computer. Now you can securely log
in from any other Internet-connected computer to run pro-
grams and access data. Youll have to upgrade to the Pro ver-
sion to get le transfer and synchronization, but LogMeIn Free
still lets you copy/paste between the local and remote systems
or remotely control your e-mail or IM client to send yourself a
le. (3AM Labs Inc., www.3amlabs.com. lllmm)
You dont often need PARTITIONMAGIC 8.0 ($69.95), but
when you do, its irreplaceable. For example, to install the still-
changing Windows Vista prerelease without losing your exist-
ing OS, youll have to create a new partition for it. PartitionMagic
can move, copy, resize, create, and delete drive partitions, and
even merge multiple partitions into one. Best of all, you can de-
ne a complex series of partitioning tasks, conrm the sequence
visually, and then let it execute all those lengthy actions while
you take a break. (Symantec Corp., www.symantec.com. llllm)
Sharing editable documents via e-mail makes sense when
youre collaborating on the result, but not when you aim to
broadcast a nished document such as a press release. With
an inexpensive tool such as PDF995 ($9.95) turning a document
into stable, noneditable PDF format is as easy as printing it.
Just send the document to the PDF995 printer instead of your
regular printer. If even $9.95 seems too steep, you can use the
product free and pay by viewing an advertisement each time
you use it. (Software995, www.pdf995.com. llllm)
Is GOOGLE EARTH (free) incredibly useful? Possibly, possi-
bly not, but it is drop-dead gorgeous. Who wouldve imagined
touring the world from your desk chair? It offers satellite- photo
views of the entire world, often at an amazing level of detail.
You can impress friends by dropping them into the Grand Can-
yon or zooming in on their roofs. (Google, www.google.com. llllh)
Neil J. Rubenking has been with PC Magazine since 1986, serv-
ing as technical editor, User-to-User answerer, and PC Maga-
zine Labs lead analyst. He continues to answer questions for
readers in the ongoing Ask Neil column and in PC Magazines
online discussion forums.
WINZIP PRO 10.0
After years as a contract programmer and a
stint at Motorola, Mark Thompson now runs
a small tech incubator known as The Avi-
ary Group. But hes better known as a utility
writer. Hes the brains behind more than a
few PC Magazine utilities, and since 1998,
his site, AnalogX, has served up free utilities
touching on everything from digital music
editing to DNS caching.
AnalogX has more than 30 million
registered users, and not a banner ad
in sight. Why?
The computer industry has given me a lot,
so its nice to give something back to the
general user for free. But its also fun. And
its a challenge. Its fun to write programs
and solve things without having to worry
about anything else. I can make a program
that only ten people want, and thats ne. Or
I can make a program that tens of thou-
sands of people want, and thats cool too.
How did the site begin?
It started out as a band site, a place where I could put my songs. But
then I started writing small utilities and putting them up there, and
more and more people started to use them.
Were these tools you wrote for yourself? Or were you look-
ing to reach an audience?
The very rst utility I put up was a delay calculator for digital mu-
sic. When you do echoes and things like that, if you want them syn-
chronized to the tempo, you need to know how many milliseconds to
set the delays to. So I wrote this command utility for myself. Then I
thought, Someone else might want this too, and I just put it up.
Ever tempted to sell ads?
I want to keep AnalogX completely free. Ive had offers to do more
with it. But thats not really why I started, and its not what I want it
to be.
www.pcmag.com APRIL 11, 2006 PC MAGAZINE 99
How many utilities are running in
your system tray? 5.
Whats the rst one you reinstall
after a reformat? MultiEdit (a text
editor).
How many have you written?
120 plus.
What do you develop in? C.
Q&A with Mark Thompson
2006 UTI LI TY GUI DE
and WWW.SPEAKEASY.NET/SPEEDTEST (llllm).
ISPs generally use dynamic IP addresses, so chances are
yours will change. Typically, your router gets the public IP ad-
dress and assigns your computer a private one so command-
line utilities such as ipcong wont tell you your WAN address.
Should you need to nd your IP address, for example, to con-
nect to a webcam or nannycam from a remote location, go to
WWW.MYWANIP.COM (free), which will report the public IP
address for your network. If you prefer, you can download an
executable version that runs in your system tray. (lllmm)
Craig Ellison is a real networking kind of guy. Hes been design-
ing networks for years, and has had networks in his home for
over 20 years. He loves inexpensive (and free) utilities to help
him manage networks at home and at work.
If you have more than one computer on your
network and have tried to share files between
them, or share a printer, you know how frustrat-
ing the setup can be. NETWORK MAGIC from Pure
Networks ($29.95 for up to 5 computers) solves
those problems for you. Network Magic creates
a map of your entire network, shows the status
of each device on your network, and constantly
monitors your Internet connection. If you have a
supported router, the integrated Net2Go feature
allows you to share les or photos on the Internet.
(Pure Networks Inc., www.purenetworks.com. llllm)
Naturally, you have a router as well as a per-
sonal firewall, but is it really working? Gibson
Research (www.grc.com) has several free utili-
ties that can help you assess the security of your
network. Gibsons most popular utility by far is
SHIELDSUP!!, which can scan your public IP ad-
dress for either common ports or all ports. Excellent tutori-
als on the site help you understand the results. LEAKTEST is a
simple program that attempts to connect to GRCs Web server.
Its intended to test whether your rewall will block unknown
outbound connections that could leak data out of your net-
work. Its free to use and worth trying out. (Gibson Research Corp.,
www.grc.com. ShieldsUp!! llllm; LeakTest lllmm)
Though GFIs LANGUARD NETWORK SECURITY SCANNER 7.0
(free for ten days for up to 25 IP addresses) is primarily intended
for corporate networks, running it on your home network could
prove eye-opening. Languard N.S.S. 7.0 will scan your entire
local network for hundreds of known vulnerabilities and pro-
duce a comprehensive report for each computer or device it dis-
covers. It shows missing patches (with references to Bugtraq
reports), open ports, and any security vulnerabilities it nds.
After the ten-day trial the price is quite a bit steeper, starting at
$495 for up to 32 IPs. (GFI Software Ltd, www.g.com. llllm)
Ever wondered about what happens in the background
when you enter an address into your browser? TCPVIEW
(free), from Sysinternals, gives you a birds-eye view of all
of the network communications on your computer. The site
also has other free networking utilities worth checking out.
(Sysinternals, www.sysinternals.com. lllmm)
Who owns that domain? How is my trafc routed across the
Internet? How long does it take to do a DNS lookup? Answers to
these questions and many more are at DNSSTUFF.COM. DNSstuff
.com is a site full of free utilities that let you look up domains,
run traceroutes, and even check out your ISPs DNS. (llllm)
Youre paying for a fast broadband connection, but just how
fast is it? Are you getting the speed youre paying for? A num-
ber of sites will test the speed of your Internet connection for
free. These include: WWW.DSLREPORTS.COM/STEST (lllmm)
BY CRAIG ELLISON
FOR HOME NETWORKERS
PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com 100
To many, Steve Gibson is famous for publicly
questioning Microsofts approach to Windows
security. Just recently, he claimed that the
Seattle software giant had intentionally planted
Windowss infamous WMF vulnerability. But
Gibson also writes extremely popular PC utilities,
including SpinRite, a data-recovery tool that
debuted in 1989.
What was the inspiration for SpinRite?
I rst wrote it when a hard drive belonging to
my girlfriends business crashed. It had never
been backed up, and it had several years of the
companys accounting data on it, and she was
devastated. Well, I liked her, and she was desper-
ate. So I quickly wrote something that basically
recovered the data on her drive.
Once you write a tool like this, how do you sell it?
I wrote my rst program for Gibson Research, FlickerFree, in the
evening while I was working as a consultant; printed up the manu-
als; and sold it at software swap meets. Around the same time,
I made a deal with InfoWorld magazine to write a column called
TechTalkwhich ended up running for eight yearsand I did an ad
trade. I said, I dont need to be paid, but I do need to run an ad.
Today, SpinRite sells for $89, but the rest of your utilities
are free. How come?
Everything else drives trafc to our Web site. Then people en-
counter SpinRite and say Thats still around? Holy s***! Theyll
upgrade their old copy, or it will just plant the seed in their mind
that its there if they ever have a problem with their hard drive. The
other stuff is just marketing material for SpinRite. SpinRite has
paid all of our bills for 17 years.
early every PC Magazine reader has a broadband Internet connection, and most
have a local area network at home. But are you getting the most out of your home
network? Are you sharing resources between multiple computers? Is your network
safe from outside intruders? Is your connection as fast as its supposed to be? Here
are some of our favorite utilities that will let you proudly say, Im a network admin!
How many utilities are running in
your system tray? 5.
Whats the rst one you reinstall
after a reformat? Gravity news-
group reader.
How many have you written?
1,000 plus.
What do you develop in? Intel
Assembly Language.
Q&A with Steve Gibson
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www.pcmag.com APRIL 11, 2006 PC MAGAZINE 101
Picking up where ASAP leaves off
(but with some feature overlap), POWER
UTILITY PAK V6 ($39.95) offers 120 utili-
ties and functions from its drop-down
menu, including batch printing and
elaborate column- and row-combining
functions. Spreadsheet-polishing func-
tions include resizing all charts to the
same dimensions. (J-Walk & Associates Inc.,
www.j-walk.com/ss. lllll)
MICROSOFT OUTLOOK
Many add-ins display RSS feeds in
Micro soft Outlook, but ATTENSA FOR
OUTLOOK (beta; will be $20 per year)
stands out for its implementation and
feature set. Add-in toolbars for Firefox
and Internet Explorer make adding feeds easy, and the program
can insert tagged pages and feeds to your existing tags at del
.icio.us. (Attensa Inc., www.attensa.com. llllm)
The elegant YOUPERFORM 1.1.4 ($29.95) lets you create ap-
pointments by sending yourself an e-mail or insert boilerplate
text using hotkeys. It warns you before sending any Reply to All
message or if you forgot to add the les you said were attached,
and gives much more. (You Software Inc., www.yousoftware.com. llllh)
Low-priced, high-powered BELLS & WHISTLES FOR OUTLOOK
2.5 ($19.95) shares many features with YouPerform, including
warnings for missing attachments and Replies to All. The pro-
gram also includes some unique conveniences, such as message
templates and an exclusive e-mail tracking features. (DS Develop-
ment, www.emailaddressmanager.com. llllh)
Edward Mendelson stops using Ofce only long enough to teach
English classes at Columbia University. After more than 14 years
reviewing Ofce tools, he knows a keeper when he sees one.
MICROSOFT WORD
Dont let Microsoft Word give away
your secrets: Use Microsofts free RE-
MOVE HIDDEN DATA to save a copy of an
open le with all revisions, reviewers,
comments, and other hidden data re-
moved. (Microsoft Corp., www.microsoft.com;
search for rhdtool.exe to download. llllm)
Word users may hunt through a
dozen menus for settings that seem
to have taken over their documents.
CROSSEYES 3.0.45 ($49.99; less per copy
for multiple licenses) displays a reveal
codes pane in Words window that
shows exactly where format settings,
language markers, bookmark codes,
and every other Word feature begins
and ends. (Levit & James Inc., www.levitjames.com. llllm)
Instead of Microsofts clunky equation editor, try RAPID-PI
1.2 ($50; $20 for students). It lets you type equations by using
intuitive abbreviations or by selecting symbols from a toolbar.
Note that people who receive your les will need to install the
free Rapid-Pi fonts. (Trident Software Pty Ltd., www.rapid-pi.com. lllhm)
WORDPIPE 4.9 ($99 home edition; $499 unlimited) searches
and replaces text and metadata in multiple les automatically,
and can even replace graphics with an image that you place in
the Windows clipboard. Other functions abound; this is the ulti-
mate automator for Word. (DataMystic, www.datamystic.com. llllh)
MICROSOFT EXCEL
Freeware ASAP UTILITIES 3.11 provides two-click access to 300
convenient features. Most are simple time-savers, such as com-
bining pasting in values and formatting them, removing empty
sheets, inserting the lename in the page header, or putting the
lepath in the title bar. (ASAP Utilities, www.asap-utilities.com. lllll)
BY EDWARD MENDELSON
FOR MICROSOFT OFFICE
ost veteran Microsoft Ofce users will admit that the suite has far
more features than they know aboutbut theyll also complain that it
doesnt have the features they need. Enter the add-ins, small programs
that t into the Ofce interface and get jobs done that are otherwise dif-
cult or impossible. Here are some of my favorites.
YOUPERFORM 1.1.4
M
M
In 1993, while still a graduate student, Mike Kronenberg started Mijenix,
a utility company. By 1999, when he sold it to Ontrack Data Recovery, its
revenue topped $10 million. Today, he runs two new software firmsone
dedicated to desktop security, the other to online photo-sharing.
These are the connectors between my
PC and my BlackBerry, and synchro-
nization software for the BlackBerry.
Ive probably tried every password
reminder and online form-completion
software. RoboForm is my favorite.
This is Cyberhawk, our behavior-based
security software, currently in beta.
Mike Kronenberg: Whats in your tray?
2006 UTI LI TY GUI DE
2005 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved. Microsoft, the Windows logo, Windows Server, and Windows Server System are either registered trademarks or trademarks of
Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/or other countries. The names of actual companies and products mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners.
CAN IT REDUCE COSTS
AND SHOW AN EARLY RETURN
IS IT LINUX
DECREASE TIME TO MARKET
OR WINDOWS SERVER
GET THE FACTS.
SWITCHING FROM RED HAT LINUX TO WINDOWS SERVER WILL SAVE
TOMMY HILFIGER AN ESTIMATED 2530% IN IT COSTS.
Our migration to Windows Server
TM
will reduce our IT costs by an estimated 2530
percent, but thats only the start. Our efforts are improving our competitive advantage.
We developed a full e-commerce site within six months, in time for the 2005 holidays,
and well continue to benet from compressed product design times and an
optimized supply chain. Eric Singleton, CIO
For these and other third-party ndings, go to microsoft.com/getthefacts
oes it really matter whether your Windows desktop is nice to look at?
Of course it does. Ignoring appearances is incredibly shallow. Thank-
fully, there are more than a few PC utilities designed to spruce up the
old desktop. You can change colors, fonts, and icons, add new screen-
savers and widgets, even replace your entire GUI. Yes, some of these tools are con-
cerned with more than just appearancesbut dont hold that against them.
Yahoo!s picture-frame widget (see next page) is nice. But its nothing
compared with FILMLOOP (free). FilmLoop acts as a kind of photo ticker,
scrolling picture after picture across your screen. Its a wonderful way to
liven up your desktop. But its also a way of sharing photos with others.
Each time you create a new album, the client automatically uploads it to
the companys servers, and you can instantly send it to friends, family,
and colleagues anytime (FilmLoop Inc., www.lmloop.com. llllm).
Want something more from a screensaver? Try the new MSN SCREEN-
SAVER (beta, free). It too displays your personal photos, but it also serves
up the date, time, and current
news and weather, or just
about anything else avail-
able through RSS. You can
also use it to track your MSN
Hotmail and MSN Messen-
ger conversations or even
search the Web from a built-
in dialog box (Microsoft Corp.,
screensaver.msn.com. llllm)
D
D
With CHANGERXP ($18.95), you
can apply any digital image to
your boot screen, Windows XP
log-on screen, desktop wallpaper,
Internet Explorer skin, or screen-
saverand, you can set these im-
ages to change as often as you like
automatically, perfect for those
with big photo collections. You
can download the full version
without paying the registration
fee, but our feeling is that if you
want to use it, you should open
up your wallet. (Nihuo Software, www
.nihuo.com. llllm)
I
L
L
U
S
T
R
A
T
I
O
N

B
Y

M
Y
L
E
S

T
A
L
B
O
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PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com 104
BY CADE METZ
MAKE IT PRETTY
While still in college, Brad Wardell wrote ObjectDesktop for OS/2, a way
of revamping IBMs less than user-friendly interface, and it soon became
the platforms best-selling third-party app. Now a Stardock property,
ObjectDesktop is an even bigger seller as a Microsoft Windows utility.
Thank goodness youre
doing this story, because if
it were PC World, the
Startup Cop thing wouldnt
go over so well.
Stardocks WindowBlinds,
of course, to make my
system look whichever
way I want it to look.
KeepSafe is a new program
Stardock is going to release
in March. It does real-time
data backup/archiving at
the file-system level.
Google Desktop is a killer
application for me. It lets
me find stuff in my e-mail
much faster than anything
else I've foundthat I like.
Brad Wardell: Whats in your tray?
Tired of the same old Windows desktop?
Check out the SPHEREXP beta (free). It re-
places Windows two-dimensional desk-
top with a stunning three-dimensional
interface. The idea is that youre in the
middle of a sphere that carries your ap-
plication windows. To get from one app
to another, you spin aroundvirtually,
of course. You can also move objects for-
ward or push them back. It takes some get-
ting used to and its still a bit buggy, but it
sure is fun. Microsoft .NET 2.0 required.
(SphereSite, www.hamar.sk/sphere. lllmm).
The YAHOO WIDGETS ENGINE (free) lets you
run all sorts of handsome mini-apps from
anywhere on your desktop, at any time. You
can run an animated clock, a calendar, or a
day planner. Or a stock ticker. Or a notepad.
Or a virtual picture frame. And thats just
the beginning. Thousands of widgets are
already available from the Yahoo! Web site,
and if you dont see what you want, you can
build your own. These little oating tools
are wonderfully useful, but, more impor-
tant, theyre so much fun to look it (Yahoo! Inc.,
widgets.yahoo.com. lllll).
One of our perennial favorites is
WINDOWBLINDS ($19.95; free, limited
version available), a tool capable of
customizing almost every nook and
cranny of the Microsoft GUI. Natu-
rally, you can change the look and
feel of ordinary application windows,
but you can also make changes that
arent usually accessible: You can cus-
tomize log-on and log-off dialogues,
progress animations, and Control
Panel backgrounds. And you neednt
use the same skin across all win-
dows. You can mix and match, using
one visual theme here, another there.
(Stardock Corp., www.stardock.com. llllh).
www.pcmag.com APRIL 11, 2006 PC MAGAZINE 105
Cade Metz joined PC Magazine in the fall of
1994, and his rst byline appeared in the 1995
Utility Guide. He reviewed a product from
Xerox called TabWorks, a $49 facelift for the
Windows GUI. His desktop looks fabulous.
2006 UTI LI TY GUI DE
RAWSHOOTER ESSENTIALS 2005 (free) offers strong tools for viewing
and processing RAW format images at an unbeatable price. The pro-
gram supports more than 50 RAW formats, including DNG. The un-
obtrusive gray interface lets you ag and prioritize images and view
them in a slide show. Image-correction tools include controls for
temperature and tint, shadows and highlights, and noise suppression.
The program also offers fast batch-converting of RAW les to TIFF
or JPEG formats. The $99 upgrade to RawShooter premium 2006
gives you image comparison modes, support for Curves and Levels,
and additional controls. (Pixmantec ApS, www.pixmantec.com. lllhm)
MACHINE WASH IMAGE FILTERS I, II, and III
($32 each) fly in the face of traditional im-
age-enhancement software. Machine Wash
is image-degradation software, dedicated to
distressing your photos and graphics in amaz-
ingly realistic ways. Give a photo that faded
T-shirt appliqu look, or blast your logo onto
a wooden surface or brick wall. Effect names
include Crackle, Scrape, Mangled, Old Bag,
Sandblast, Abusive, and Sweat60 per CD.
These lters are actually recorded Photo-
shop Actions that work only in that program.
(Mr. Retro, www.misterretro.com. llllm)
BY GALEN FOTT
s more camerasand camera usersbegin to take advantage of
RAW-formatted images, programs and utilities are appearing to help
in handling those high-quality les. Here are eight of our favorite
new imaging utilities for managing and editing your photos, and of
course, some specically designed for use with RAW photos.
FLUID MASK ($249) is the best solution weve seen
yet for one of the most difcult and time-consuming
tasks in image editing: isolating the subject of an im-
age from its background. This plug-in for Photoshop
and compatible programs works along the same lines
as Photoshop Elements 4s new magic selection
tools, in that you loosely define areas to keep and
areas to remove, and the plug-in sorts out the edges.
But Fluid Mask easily outstrips both Elements tools
and Photoshops Extract command. Its pricey, but
worth the money if you do a lot of masking. Version
2.0 should be out by the time you read this.
(Heligon, www.vertustech.com. llllh)
FOR PHOTO ENTHUSIASTS
A
A
PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com 106
PHOTOZOOM PROFESSIONAL ($129) is an excellent standalone program dedi-
cated to upsampling, the process of enlarging digital photos by increasing the
pixel count so that you can make large, attractive prints from low-resolution
les. Though almost any image editor can upsample, PhotoZoom Professional
gives you greater control than youd get from Photoshop CS2s bicubic inter-
polation choices. The program relies on patented S-Spline technology (though
other interpolation options are available), and also includes sharpening controls
for crisp, clear output. PhotoZoom Professional can help you get the most from
those tiny camera-phone photos. (BenVista, www.benvista.com. llllh)
SHARPENER PRO 2.0 ($170 Inkjet Edition; $330 Complete
Edition) is a plug-in for Adobe Photoshop and compatible
programs. It provides a blissfully easy alternative to the
tricky Unsharp Mask command usually found in image
editors. You simply tell Sharpener Pro what size print you
want and specify a couple of specs about your printer and
paper, and the plug-in automatically analyzes your image
and sharpens it. The Inkjet Edition is quite sufcient for
most users; only professional printers should need the
Complete Edition. Version 2.0 features support for 16-
bit images and lets you selectively paint sharpening into
your image. (Nik Software Inc., www.nikmultimedia.com. llllh)
ADOBE DNG CONVERTER (free) brings
welcome consistency to the confusing
world of RAW-formatted images. DNG
Converter translates RAW les from 113
different cameras into Adobes open-
standard DNG (Digital Negative) RAW
format. RAW images contain exactly the
pixels captured by the sensors of higher-
end digital cameras, without the inter-
nal processing and compression found
in JPEGs. But almost every camera uses
its own proprietary RAW format. DNG
Converter lets you rename images and
even allows you to embed the original
RAW le inside the DNG.
(Adobe Systems Inc., www.adobe.com. llllm)
Just the thing for photographers whove
been dragged grudgingly into the digital
world, EXPOSURE ($199), a time-saving
plug-in for Photoshop and compatible
programs, specializes in mimicking the
classic looks of specic lm types. The
program includes more than 40 film-
stock presets, from the luscious color of
Fuji Velvia 100 to the distinctive grain of
the black-and-white Ilford Delta 3200.
From the presets, you can customize the
color, tone, and focus of your images, as
well as control the plug-ins realistically
rendered lm grain. (Alien Skin Software LLC,
www.alienskin.com. llllm)
Galen Fott (can you nd his picture here?) is a con-
tributing editor of PC Magazine and the coauthor
of eight books on computer graphics. Hes also
an animator whose rst lm, Roberto the Insect
Architect, was just released by Scholastic/Weston
Woods. His Web site is www.grundoon.com.
MICROSOFT RAW IMAGE THUMBNAILER AND VIEWER FOR WIN-
DOWS XP (free, unsupported) is a PowerToy that provides
thumbnails, previews, printing, and metadata display for RAW
images from supported Nikon and Canon cameras. You wont
nd any image-processing tools here, but this utility makes or-
ganizing and viewing supported RAW images in Windows Ex-
plorer just about as easy as working with JPEGs. Theres a slide
show feature to boot. (Microsoft Corp., www.microsoft.com. lllhm)
www.pcmag.com APRIL 11, 2006 PC MAGAZINE 107
2006 UTI LI TY GUI DE
We know we should use a tripod
when shooting video, but its not
always practical. STEADYHAND
from Gooder Video ($66. 66)
removes the shakes from your
hand-held footage, so friends and
family can watch without getting
seasick. If you accept the default
parameters, which worked well
in our tests, operation is simple;
just load the video le and press
Start. The program automatically
detects minor shakes in the video, and minimizes horizontal, vertical, and ro-
tational motion. SteadyHand works well on videos from cell phones and digital
cameras, which are hard to hold steady and generally dont offer onboard stabi-
lization, but youll probably need a video-conversion utility to convert videos
from these devices into one of SteadyHands three input formats, AVI, MPEG,
and ASF. (Gooder Video, www.goodervideo.com. llllm)
Most video editors can import and output a limited number of le types, so
if your productions include video from digital cameras, cell phones, or the
Web, or you need to output video in iPod-compatible or DivX formats, you
may need a video-conversion utility. We like two programs here. Xilisofts
VIDEO CONVERTER ($35) successfully input seven of eight videos from still-
image cameras and DivX, AVI, WMV, MPEG, MOV, and MP4 test les, and
output les in iPod-compatible MP4, DivX, and MPEG formats. But the pro-
gram lacks a DV output preset. DV format is the Switzerland of video for-
mats, compatible with virtually all video editors and authoring programs.
For converting your videos to DV les for further production, we like River
Pasts VIDEO CLEANER ($29.95). It cant produce MPEG, MOV, or MPEG-4
les, but it input all test les and output usable DV les.
(Video Converter: Xilisoft Inc., www.xilisoft.com/video-converter.html, llllh. River Past Video
Cleaner: River Past Corp., www.riverpast.com/en/prod/videocleaner/index.php, llllm)
If you work with video long enough, sooner or later youll need to split
your les, whether to meet e-mail transfer limits or to store them on
CDs, DVDs, or other media. For fast, simple, and accurate operation,
its tough to beat ACCUSPLIT ($12). In Standard mode, AccuSplit creates
multiple les of the specied size, each with an .seg extension, which
the program uses to recreate the original le, bit for bit. If you send the
SEG les to third parties, however, theyll need AccuSplit to recreate
the original. With AVI or MPEG-1 les, however, you can use Video
File Smart Split mode, which splits the le into smaller, independently
playable video les, though you cant recombine those les back into
one. (Joseph Flynn, members.cox.net/accusplit_support/index.htm. llllm)
Usually you have to be online to play
the Internets vast store of audio/visual
content. Applian Technologies RM RE-
CORDER and WM RECORDER (for RealMe-
dia and Windows Media, respectively;
$29.95 each, $49.95 together) avoid this
limitation by capturing streaming audio
and video to disk. You navigate to the
streaming le in your browser, click Re-
cord in the respective Recorder program,
then play the streaming le via VCR-like
controls. You can even change the name
of the video le before recording to sim-
plify retrieval. Both Recorders store the
entire streaming le to disk, even if you
stop playback, so you can record multiple
streams simultaneously.
(Applian Technologies Inc., www.applian.com.
llllh)
BY JAN OZER
FOR VIDEO ENTHUSIASTS
ll home video producers have one or more pri-
mary programs for editing and/or producing
DVDs, but a range of inexpensive utilities pro-
vides features that extend these capabilities,
often dramatically. Here are our favorites, all of which you
can download as trial versions.
A
A
Jan Ozer has worked in digital video since 1990. When not chasing his daughter
with a camcorder, he makes videos and DVDs for local music groups.
PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com 108
2004 NVIDIA Corporation. NVIDIA, the NVIDIA logo, and The way its meant to be played logo are registered trademarks or trademarks of NVIDIA Corporation in the United States and/or other countries. All rights reserved. * PC Mark 2004 System Benchmark
performance comparison between Integrated Intel Extreme Graphics 2 and NVIDIA GeForce FX 5950 Ultra. All prices are subject to change without notice or obligation. CyberPower is not responsible for any typographical and photographic errors. Copyright
2006 CyberPower. All rights reserved.
- LG 16X DVD-ROM
- NVIDIA

nForce4 7.1 3-D Surround Sound


- Creative Cambridge Inspire P7800 7.1
Surround Sound System
- Logitech Ofce 104 Keyboard
- Microsoft

Optical intelli Explorer Mouse


- Asus Vento 3600 Xtreme Gaming Case
w/ 500Watt Power Supply
- Xtreme Liquid Cooling System
- Free First Year On Site Service
plus 24/7 Tech Support
- Free 802.11G Wireless
PCI Network Adaptor
- NVIDIA

nForce4 SLI Chipset MB


with Dual 16X PCI Express
- GENUINE Windows

XP
Media Center Edition 2005 with SP 2
- Microsoft

Works 8.0
- Corsair 2048MB PC3200 DDR400 Memory
- 250GB 7200RPM SATA-II 3.0Gb/s
8MB Cache Hard Drive
- (2) NVIDIA

GeForce 7900GT 256MB,


DDR3 16X PCI Express Powered by eVGA,
Up to 2X the performance of a single
graphics card solution
- LG 16X DVD+-RW Drive
AMD Athlon 64 FX-60 Processor $ 2535
AMD Athlon 64 X2 4800+ Processor $ 2059
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AMD Athlon 64 3500+ Processor $ 1599
GAMER ULTRA SLI PRO $ 1599
- NVIDIA

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- Logitech X530 5.1 Subwoofer Sperakers
- 19 Super Slim LCD Display
- Logitech Ofce 104 Keyboard
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- Turbo X-Cruiser Case 420Watt
with See Through Windows
- 6 Cool Custom Colors to Choose From
- Free First Year On Site Service
plus 24/7 Tech Support
- NVIDIA

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with Dual 16X PCI Express
- GENUINE Windows

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Works 8.0
- Corsair 1024MB PC3200 DDR400 Memory
- 160GB 7200RPM SATA-II 3.0Gb/s
8MB Cache Hard Drive
- NVIDIA

GeForce 7300GS 256MB, DDR,


with TV-Out Powered by eVGA
- LG 16X DVD+-RW Drive
- LG 16X DVD-ROM Drive
AMD Athlon 64 FX-60 Processor $ 1939
AMD Athlon 64 X2 4400+ Processor $ 1315
AMD Athlon 64 X2 4200+ Processor $ 1209
AMD Athlon 64 X2 3800+ Processor $ 1149
AMD Athlon 64 3500+ Processor $ 1055
AMD Athlon 64 3200+ Processor $ 999
GAMER ULTRA 7500SE $ 999
CYBERPOWER RECOMMENDS WINDOWS

XP
TOLL FREE 800. 707. 0393 or WWW.CYBERPOWERPC.COM TOLL FREE 800. 707. 0393 or WWW.CYBERPOWERPC.COM TOLL FREE 800. 707. 0393 or WWW.CYBERPOWERPC.COM
PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com 112
navigate to your music folders, where ID3-TagIT gives you
instant access to the tag information. You can edit individual
les, a group, or the entire folder. You can also edit lenames,
update them from FreeDB, and add sequence/track numbers
for players that require tagged songs to maintain album order.
The program even corrects capitalization and removes special
characters from lenames. (ID3-TagIT, www.id3-tagit.de. llllm)
The podcast receiver formerly known as iPodder has a new
name: JUICE 2.1. Its still free and still one of the best ways to
receive and manage your podcast subscriptions. Youll appre-
ciate new features such as auto cleanup, and the utility now
works with feed managers such as PodNova. The tabbed in-
terface moves you easily from downloads to subscriptions to
the podcast directory, and from the cleanup tab you can re-
move old podcasts from the downloads folder or your players
library. Juice doesnt get bogged down, even with gigabytes of
audio. Its available for Windows and Mac, with a Linux ver-
sion due soon. (The Juice team, juicereceiver.sourceforge.net. llllm)
What Juice is to podcasts, REPLAY RADIO is to Web radio.
You can use the built-in Replay Media
Guide to nd specic stations or shows.
Replay Radio will record by download-
ing or as you listen, and will schedule
downloads for shows when youre not
around. The search function lets you
find shows easily. Replay Radio will
also download podcasts (in fact, the
free demo version is just for podcasts)
and will automatically check for new
updates. It supports all the popular
streaming formats, interfaces with an
XM receiver, and can save shows to
a CD or your MP3 player. This ones
worth the $49. (Applian Technologies Inc., www.replay-radio.com. llllm)
Satisfy your inner geek with this function-limited version
of Yoshimasha Electronics highly regarded DSSF3 audio
analysis package ($83), which turns your PC into a precision
audio-measurement lab. The spectrum analyzer shows you
frequency response, harmonic distortion, even energy distri-
bution by frequency. Better, you can log the data for further
analysis in math/spreadsheet programs. The oscilloscope has
autotrigger and automatic ranging and oversampling, and the
signal generator can crank out just about any kind of waveform
imaginable. Cut through the confusing Web site: You want
DSSF3 Light. (Yoshimasha Electronic Inc., www.ymec.com. lllll)
Bill Machrone lives in a noisy place between analog and digital
audio, using his computer as a virtual recording studio and modi-
fying his beloved Fender Blues Junior ampliers to play louder.
How much would you pay for a 16-channel audio editor that
can record at up to 32 bits/96 kHz, re-
move hum and hiss, read and write
WAV, AIFF, and MP3 les, and has en-
velope editing, equalization, mixing,
resampling, and unlimited undo/redo?
You dont have to pay a thing: AUDACITY
is free, and its spectacular. It can also
alter playback speed without pitch shift,
shift pitch without changing the speed,
and includes a host of other effects. Au-
dacity cant edit WMA, AAC, or other
proprietary formats, but it accepts stan-
dard VST plug-ins in case its built-in ef-
fects arent enough. It runs on Windows,
OS X, and Linux. (Open source, audacity.sourceforge.net. lllll)
Your old vinyl records may not be picking up any new
scratches these days, but theyre not getting played, either.
MILLENNIUM ($59) is the entry-level product from Diamond
Cut, which also makes those forensic audio ltering programs
that you see on CSI. With hundreds of presets, Millennium can
remove ticks, pops, scratches, hiss, rumble, and more from
your records and tapes so you can transfer them to CD. You
can even do speed corrections and punch up the dynamics of
the nished track. Youll feel like a professional sound engi-
neer with this oneand youll get great results. For $59, its the
best investment you can make in your old records.
(Diamond Cut Productions Inc., www.diamondcut.com. llllh)
You can nd many freeware ID3 tag editors, but you wont
nd a better one than ID3-TAGIT (free; PayPal contributions ac-
cepted). Using a standard Windows Explorer hierarchy, you
BY BILL MACHRONE
FOR AUDIO ENTHUSIASTS
he brilliant, underlying truth of the PC is that its anything you want it to be, and
thats especially evident with audio. The audio utilities available are dramatically
different, but you can use them synergistically, too. And you can harness them at
any level, from just listening to sophisticated audio engineering. These utilities al-
low your PC to receive, store, organize, analyze, and improve audio. They will never demand
more from you than youre ready to give, but theyll also be ready to take it to the next level.
AUDACITY
MILLENNIUM
T
T
Prices shown are HP Direct prices; reseller and retail prices may vary. Prices shown are subject to change and do not include applicable state and local taxes or shipping to recipients address. Offers cannot be combined with any other offer
or discount, are good while supplies last and are available from HP Direct and participating HP resellers. All featured offers available in U.S. only. Savings based on HP published list price of congure-to-order equivalent ($1177 - $100 instant
rebate - $100 instant savings = SmartBuy price $977). Certain warranty restrictions and exclusions may apply. For complete warranty details, call 1-800-345-1518 (U.S.). 1. For hard drives, GB=Billion Bytes. Actual formatted capacity
is less. 2. Optional Remote Insight Lights-Out Edition II (RILOE II ) sold separately. 3. Service levels and response times for HP Care Packs may vary depending on your geographic location. Restrictions and limitations apply. For details, visit
www.hp.com/go/carepack. Intel, the Intel Logo, Xeon and Xeon Inside are trademarks or registered trademarks of Intel Corporation or its subsidiaries in the United States and other countries. 2006 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P.
HP ProLiant servers offer expandability to better adapt to your business needs.
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hats all this talk about Web 2.0? Its really quite simple. Web 2.0 is what the
cool kids use. Its things like blogs, RSS mashups, and tagging sites. If you
plan on joining the Internet in-crowd, most of what you need can be accessed
through an ordinary Web browsersites such as Blogger, Flickr, and del.icio
.usbut there are several Web 2.0 tools that run on your local PC, interfacing with various
services across the Net. These will make you even cooler.
If you really want to surf the cutting edge, replace your
browser. The new FLOCK browser (free) is designed specically
for the Web 2.0 aficionado. It dovetails nicely with popular
blogging services such as Blogger, TypePad, and WordPress,
letting you quickly and easily post information to online dia-
ries. In much the same way, it hooks into del.icio.us, so you can
tag your browser favorites and share them with others. And
it ties into Flickr, allowing for the quick upload and download
of tagged digital photos. Based on the same code as the popular
Firefox browser, Flock also includes a built-in RSS reader, giv-
ing you instant access to online news feeds. Unfortunately, it is
still in beta and far from polished (Flock, www.ock.com. lllhm).
Theres something to be said for handling RSS news feeds
straight from a browser such as Flock or Firefox, but you might
be better off tracking, reading, and organizing your feeds from
a dedicated application. Our favorite is FEEDDEMON ($29.95).
When you first run it, a simple tutorial walks you through
the apps basic layout. It comes preloaded with several popu-
lar feeds, and the interface is wonderfully intuitive: Even the
greenest of computer users can pick up the RSS game in no
time. (NewsGator Technologies Inc., www.bradsoft.com. llllh)
Another good option is SHARPREADER. Though not quite as
intuitive or as handsome as FeedDemon, its free and relatively
easy to use. We particularly like the alerts that pop up over your
Windows system tray whenever a new feed arrives. And if this
sort of thing matters to you, its more compact than FeedDemon
and easier to run alongside other apps. Donations from happy
users accepted. (SharpReader, www.sharpreader.net. lllhm)
You can also install a dedicated blogging client. These give
BY CADE METZ
FOR WEB 2.0 ADDICTS
you the freedom to compose off-lineor post the same ma-
terial to multiple blogs running on multiple services. Were
most impressed with QUMANA (free). The coolest feature is
the Qumana DropPad, a transparent window that oats above
your desktop. You can drag and drop text, photos, and graphics
onto the DropPad, and theyll automatically appear in the main
Qumana editor, where you compose your blog entries. You can
instantly upload these to several popular blogging services,
including Blogger, TypePad, WordPress, BlogWare, Movable
Type, and more (Qumana Inc., www.qumana.com. llllh).
Cade Metz recently moved to San Francisco. When he lived in
New York, RSS was a way of keeping up with current events.
Now its a way of keeping up with the Joneses.
PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com 114
FLOCK BROWSER WITH FLICKER BAR
In the mid-1990s, during off-hours,
Mark Russinovich began writ-
ing Windows utilities with Bryce
Cogswell, an old graduate-school
buddy. Ten years on, their freeware
site, Sysinternals, receives over a
million unique hits a month, and
the enterprise software company it
spawned, Winternals, serves over
70,000 organizations worldwide.
In the early years, were you
writing free tools just for fun?
It helped us get a business started.
We were drawing trafc to Sysin-
ternals, attracting people interested
in the free tools, and then we put a banner on the home page that
pointed people to Winternals. Except for this one link, Winternals did
no advertising for the rst two years. But it was kind of an accident.
Its not like we said, Lets make a free site, put free tools there, then
do a commercial site and bootstrap ourselves.
So, where does the inspiration for a new utility come from?
When I started out, I expected Id be driven a lot by people sending in
suggestions and comments. It turns out I might get a useful sugges-
tion every now and again, but the direction of the tools is driven by
my own experience.
Such as?
The rst two tools we developed were Filemon and Regmon, which
are still among the ve most popular tools on the site. Theyre both
real-time monitors. Filemon lets you see all le-system activity and
shows you what process is accessing what le and other detailed
information. Regmon is the same, except it shows Registry access.
Q&A with
Mark Russinovich
How many utilities are running
in your system tray? 8.
Whats the rst one you
re install after a reformat?
VMWare.
How many have you written?
70 plus.
What do you develop in? C
or C++.
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nternet Explorer 7.0 might be just around the corner, but for more browser
power right now, check out some of these indispensable IE extensions, which
add a variety of features you cant get with your basic IE6 installation . Theyre all
free (unless otherwise marked). And the many users who have turned to Firefox
for its stripped-down, streamlined operation (and because its less of a target for mal-
ware than IE) can take advantage of one of the open-source browsers benets: a huge
aftermarket for add-ons that extend its feature set. The basic browser works ne by
itself; add some of these and you can truly harness the Internets power.
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PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com 116
GOOGLE TOOLBAR adds a
number of new features
for its Version 4 beta.
You now get suggestions
for your searches as you
type, along with the abil-
ity to add and position
bookmarks and toolbar
buttons. This is on top of
its already full-featured
toolbar, which gives you an on-the-y spell-checker for web-
mail and forum posts, as well as Googles PageRank tool. (Google
Inc., toolbar.google.com. llllh)
The rst thing that strikes you about DOGPILE is its scroll-
ing ABC News ticker: Newshounds will want it for that feature
alone. Otherwise, Dogpile gives you metasearch capability for
using multiple search engines simultaneously. It also includes
its own pop-up blocker, scrolling search terms entered by oth-
er people, and a hot link to Dogpiles Yellow Pages. (InfoSpace Inc.,
www.dogpile.com. lllhm)
Click the Stumble button in the STUMBLEUPON toolbar and
youll be transported to a random site that matches one of your
(preselected) interests. You can vote to indicate whether its
up your alley and/or add descriptive tags, to help fine-tune
the sites relevance for everyone else. A great way to nd high-
quality sites that match your interests, and an absolutely ter-
rible way to be productive. (StumbleUpon, www.stumbleupon.com.
lllmm)
Get denitionsand pronunciationson the y with the
useful MERRIAM-WEBSTER ONLINE TOOLBAR. Quick-launch
Lance Ulanoff is editor, reviews, for PC Magazine, where he oversees
all product and review coverage for the magazine and for PCMag.com
and also writes a weekly online technology column. Lances musings
on his system tray can be found at go.pcmag.com/lancetray.
I know how people feel about this
utility, but I love having the Live
WeatherBug icon in my tray. I always
know the temperature outside.
Google Desktop is one of the most
useful tools I have for finding anything
on my desktop, though X1 does a better
job of finding older e-mail messages.
Probably the best thing I ever did for
my overstuffed system tray was to
install Startup Cop Pro 2. It made the
whole tray a lot more manageable.
Lance Ulanoff: Whats in your tray?
INTERNET EXPLORER EXTENSIONS
YAHOO! TOOLBAR WITH ANTI-SPY includes a search box, a pop-
up blocker, an antispyware utility, and loads of quick links to
various Yahoo! properties (My Web, Yahoo! Sports, News,
Yahoo! Mail, and more). Theres also a nifty highlighting tool
for Web pages: Light up some text and run a search or IM it to
someone, all from a pop-up icon that appears next to the text
you highlighted. (Yahoo! Inc., toolbar.yahoo.com. llllm)
MSN TOOLBAR WITH WINDOWS DESKTOP SEARCH will now,
as the name indicates, search either your computer or the In-
ternet from inside IE, Outlook, or a separate Deskbar that sits
neatly in your Windows XP Taskbar. It also adds a form-lling
tool and even tabbed-browsing capability, a sorely needed fea-
ture for the aging browser. (Microsoft Corp., toolbar.msn.com. llllm)
BY JAMIE LENDINO
FOR YOUR BROWSER(S)
SURFSAVER AND THE GOOGLE TOOLBAR
GOOGLE TOOLBAR OPTIONS
buttons to a thesaurus and a word of the day feature round
out the package. (Merriam-Webster Inc., www.m-w.com/toolbar. llllm)
AM-DEADLINK 2.7, a flexible bookmark manager, isnt re-
ally a built-in extension for IE, but it should be. DeadLink
goes through all of your bookmarks (including those for other
browsers on your system) and gets rid of links that no longer
work. (Martin Aignesberger, www.aignes.com/deadlink.htm. lllhm)
Have you ever tried to save a Web page you liked? If you use
IE, chances are you were disappointed when you tried to read
it later. SURFSAVER ($19.95) to the rescue! It lets you save indi-
vidual pages in cabinets you specify in a toolbar along the
left-hand side of your browser. You can also save multiple link
levels, grabbing the page you need and every single page its
linked to. (askSam Systems, www.surfsaver.com. lllmm)
MAXTHON is a shell that adds tabbed browsing to IE. It also
gives you an enhanced drag-and-drop feature, an RSS reader,
privacy protection and better extensions management. Its like
having a whole new browser, but it doesnt affect your original
IE install; you can still run an untouched version of IE sepa-
rately. (Maxthon International Ltd., www.maxthon.com. lllmm)
MOZILLA FIREFOX EXTENSIONS
GOOGLE TOOLBAR, our Editors Choice for browser toolbars,
nally works with Firefox. This isnt huge news, since the
browser has included a Google search box since Version 1.0.
But Google Toolbar is still a more-than-worthy download,
because of its comprehensive spell-checker, form ller, and
map-linking features. (Google Inc., toolbar.google.com. llllm)
FOXYTUNES works with a number of popular MP3 players, in-
cluding the obvious (WMP 10 and iTunes) and not-so- obvious
(Yahoo! Music Engine, jetAudio, Musicmatch), letting you con-
trol them without leaving the browser interface. You can ar-
range icons in several ways, such as by artist or song title, and
there is a row of convenient player control buttons. Its oddly
convenient. (Alex Sirota, www.foxytunes.org/refox. llllm)
FASTERFOX speeds up your Firefox browsing experience. You
can turn on a special prefetching feature that increases the load
on Web servers but turns up pages faster on your machine. The
basic options box includes choices such as courteous, opti-
mized, and turbo charged. One neat bonus: a timer display
in your Firefox status bar tells you how long it took to load the
current page. (Tony Gentilcore, fasterfox.mozdev.org. llllm)
With FORECASTFOX, you get icons for the current weather
in your ZIP code and to forecast the next few daysall this is
congurableas well as an AccuWeather map. Rolling your
mouse over the icons gives more information, such as sunrise
and sunset times, low and high temps, and more. You can add
information for other places as well and switch between loca-
tion proles. (ForecastFox, forecastfox.mozdev.org. lllhm)
With GOOGLEPREVIEW, a graphic thumbnail showing a min-
iature version of the target Web page appears to the left of each
search result. Its a boon when youre running lots of Google
searches, and it doesnt seem to detract at all from Googles
fast results engine. (GooglePreview, ackroyd.de/googlepreview. lllmm)
Ever close a tab by accident? Wish you had an undo button?
To get this much-needed feature, try TAB MIX PLUS. It includes
a host of tab-management capabilities, including duplicating
tabs, and a session manager that can restore your tab congu-
ration even after a crash. (Tab Mix Plus, tmp.garyr.net. llllm)
INFOLISTER lets you manage installed extensions, themes,
and plug-ins in one place. You get active hyperlinks to each
extensions host site (though not to plug-ins sites), and you can
save lists to take to another machine, along with the dates you
last updated each extensionand most important, you can
save the le locally. Its a stopgap until the day when we can ac-
tually save Firefox congurations and not have to go through
the hassle of reinstalling our many extensions and themes.
(Open source, mozilla.doslash.org/infolister. lllhm)
ADBLOCK blocks nearly all ads on the Internet, including
ash animations. You may need to train itright-click on any
ad you see and choose Adblock. Better yet, download the Ad-
block Filterset.G Updater from addons.mozilla.org along with
Adblock; this will automatically congure it to block the most
common kinds of ads. (Open source, adblock.mozdev.org. lllll)
FLASHGOT powers up download managers so that they work
with Firefox, even if they were originally designed for Internet
Explorer. Consequently, youll need to have a download man-
ager (such as GetRight or FlashGet) in place; by itself, Flash-
Got does nothing. Once you get one, use Ctrl-F2 (FlashGot
Selection) or Ctrl-F3 (FlashGot All) and youre in business,
though we would have appreciated a cancel function half-
way through a batch-download command.
(InformAction, www.ashgot.net. lllhm)
In addition to reviewing Internet tools for PC Magazine, Jamie
Lendino creates sound effects and music for games. Hed give any-
thing for an Adblock extension that works on highway billboards.
www.pcmag.com APRIL 11, 2006 PC MAGAZINE 117
FASTERFOX
INFOLISTER
2006 UTI LI TY GUI DE
PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com 118
Tim Smith is the manager of PC Magazine's Utility Library. Hes been in
the software industry for over a decade, both as a writer and a software
developer. Tim ran his own software and development company and
before that worked in Ziff Daviss Internet division from 1993 to 2001.
HD HeartBeat monitors the health of
your hard drives. Among its features, it
displays the temperature of your drives
when you hover over the tray icon,
which I do every few hours.
I love having Media Monkey running in
the tray, because every time a new MP3
track is played, it pops up and shows
me the track name and artist.
I dont have an overwhelming number
of tray icons. I use Startup Cop Pro to
eliminate a lot of programs that launch
on Windows start-up.
Tim Smith: Whats in your tray?
your drives capacity, partitions, and sizes
and, if its supported by the drive model,
the temperature.
5
REGISTRYMASTER improves on Win-
dows Registry Editor with a more
powerful search tool, simpler Registry key
navigation, and a History tab for undoing
changes and reverting to previous states.
4
WMATCH is a classicit started out in
1989 as a DOS utilityand it remains
at the top of our download charts. With
WMatch 3 you can compare les in differ-
ent folders, including network and local,
compare contents by date and size, and
schedule synchronizations.
3
DUPELESS 2 scans your drives and shows all the duplicate
les it can nd in the directories you specify, grouped by
the criteria you choose: les with the same names and sizes,
les of the same sizes (even with different names), and les
with the same names, sizes, and dates.
2
TASKPOWER 2 is a powerful replacement for Windows
built-in Task Manager. All processes can be easily viewed
to nd critical information about each process, such as which
modules it uses, its memory and CPU usage, who developed it,
a description of what it does, and more.
1
STARTUP COP PRO 2 puts you in control of the Windows start-
up process. You can easily enable, disable, and delete startup
entries. You can specify exactly when a program launches: on
a time delay, at a specic time, on a specic day, when another
program is running, or when your live network connection is
detected. It will also monitor your system, warning you when a
program is trying to add itself to the system start-up. E
10
With DISKPIE PROs cus-
tomizable pie charts, you
can see where your overweight
folders and les are, and even see
what le types are eating up your
drive space. Disk Pie Pro then
helps you clean up, and it moni-
tors the disk (or network drive)
in the background.
9
In this age of computer virus-
es and short attention spans,
it pays to know every detail about
a file before you double-click on
it. FILESNOOP 2 makes exploring
Windows not only safer, but also
much more efcient, giving you snapshot information about
every le, including executablesand quick previews of com-
mon le typeswithout having to open them in their some-
times slow and bulky parent programs.
8
PORTSNOOP monitors applications with network connec-
tions. It gives you detailed information and bandwidth us-
age levels on each running app, alerts you when unauthorized
apps use connections, and terminates network connections
and applications.
7
INSTABACKs genesis was the desire for a backup solu-
tion that was easy to use and always on. As you save les,
InstaBack instantly backs them up. You can maintain up to ten
versions of a backup, and compare versions.
6
HD HEARTBEAT communicates with hard drives that are
equipped with S.M.A.R.T. (Self-Monitoring Analysis and
Reporting Technology), and pops up warnings or even sends
you e-mail alerts about the drive. It also shows you info on
BY TIM SMITH
ince its inception, PC Magazine Utilities has grown to include more than 140 utili-
ties, addressing everything from screen cosmetics to network monitoring. In March
2003, we began charging for utility downloads ($19.97 per year for unlimited access,
or $5.97 for a single download), letting us devote more resources to development. Here
are the top ten downloads, in descending order, since you started ponying up for the privilege.
Youll nd our utilities, with detailed usage instructions, at go.pcmag.com/utilities.
TOP 10 PC MAG UTILITIES
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DISKPIE PRO
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BUILD IT:
A DIY BACKUP SERVER
Dont throw out that old PC!
Save yourself from hours of work,
lost business, and thousands of
dollars in lost revenue by using
it to back up your network.
We show you how.
By Bill Machrone
Illustration by Brian Stauffer
120 PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com
TURN THE PAGE
...and open the gatefold for
detailed parts and plans.
Jhe Righl Jechuology. Righl ^way.
JM
C0w.cou

800.399.4C0w
|u Cauada, call 888.898.C0wC

C0w.ca
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The question is not whether youre
going to lose data, but when. And the
more machines you have on your net-
workhome or small businessthe
greater your exposure. But that same
network can also be the key to regu-
lar, reliable backups: With the current
low price and phenomenal capacity
of disk drives, you can put a chunk of
storage on the LAN, and that will be
the backup repository for all your ma-
chines. Its called network-attached
storage, or NAS, but it can be much
more than a disk drive with an IP ad-
dress or a shared drive letter visible
from all of your computers.
Backup servers and personal serv-
ers have become a hot item, offered
by Mirra, Netgear, and others. They
go beyond network-attached storage
by having enough onboard smarts to
run backup software and other func-
tions. These are solid, turnkey solu-
tions, but its both cheap and easy to
build your own server from an old
PC. There are many ways to do this,
and ours is only one of many valid
approaches. But you can duplicate it
easily and have a powerful, reliable
backup server of your own.
Tower systems have loads of room
and a power supply large enough for
big hard disks, and if the system can
run Windows XP, itll easily run the
backup software, too. You should
start with a clean i nstall of XP;
theres no sense in burdening your
backup server with the leftovers from
dozens or hundreds of applications, a
clogged Registry, and a dogs break-
fast of processes that start at boot-up,
whether you want them to or not.
We chose a Dell Dimension 4100 as the foundation for our
backup server. Its over ve years old, but its 1-GHz Pentium
III was actually more than we needed. The 384MB of installed
memory gives XP some elbow room, and for most tasks, well
take memory over clock speed. Remember, you cant buy a
machine this slow, even if you wanted to. Its obsolete, but
just right for our project. This one was kicking around in our
labs, but if you actually have to buy one, you shouldnt spend
more than $100 or so.
The 4100 had a fresh copy of XP SP2 on the 40GB hard disk,
but we wanted to have it back up four machines, with a total
of around 30GB of active storage. This problem was solved
with an 80GB Western Digital WD800. We popped it in,
formatted it, and gave it a drive letter. We wanted a dedicated
drive for backups, even though most of the C: drive would
be unused. We bought a second WD800 for more storage
or possible mirroring but decided to start with one drive
while we tested various software solutions. The Dell 4100s
motherboard doesnt support mirrored drives, but we gured
wed nd some too-clever way to do it. The Dell already had
a network card, so at least for our single-drive version, we
were all done, other than making some nice mounting rails
for the drive.
When you congure your own machine, make sure it has at
least 256MB of memory and several times more disk storage
than the total amount you want to back up. Remember that
you probably need to back up only data; in case of disaster,
applications generally need to be reinstalled from their CDs.
HARDWARE
1
Dont use a
magnetic
screwdriver. It
might just lead to
bigger problems.
logy brands. (In other
1
This old PC This project
is perfect for an old tower
PC you were going to get
rid of. Just keep in mind that
you may need to upgrade the
operating system if its really old.
2
Storage is cheap Large-
capacity hard drives are
coming down in price faster
than a skydiver in trouble. Such new
drives are great for a DIY project
like ours. But before you buy, check
to see whether your old PC has IDE
connectors or the newer SATA.
WHAT YOULL NEED
2
Disconnect
the power
cable and remove
the old hard drive.
3
Be very careful
when removing
the IDE cable. Hard
drive pins bend easily.
5
The IDE cable
is notched and
will t only one way.
Dont force it.
6
Hard drive screws
are different from
other screws used in
the case. Dont mix
them up.
words, everything you need
3
More RAM Your server will
work ne just the way it is,
but adding $40 worth of RAM
will improve performance notice-
ably. You can spare that, right?
Again, be sure to check whether
youre using SDRAM or DDR RAM
before you leave for CompUSA.
4
Software choices Another
great thing about this proj-
ect is how easily you can per-
sonalize the server for your needs.
Some NAS units are designed for
quick personal backup, while others
are made to integrate quickly with
a complex corporate network.
SOFTWARE
The array of software for network backup is mind-boggling, but we
settled on Cobian Backup 7 (www.educ.umu.se/~cobian /cobianbackup
.htm). The current version has some nice features. Its not your typical
backup-and-restore software; it makes security copies of the les
and folders you select, as often as you schedule them. It doesnt use
proprietary le formats and wont compress les unless you tell it to.
But it can compress them using standard ZIP algorithms and encrypt
backed-up les. You restore les or folders from Cobian Backup simply
by copying them back to the original drive. It will do full, incremental, or
differential backups. And the price is a DIYers dream: free.
One of the things you have to decide when designing a network
backup strategy is where you want the backup software to runon
BACKING UP THE BACKUP
Our venerable Dell Dimen-
sion doesnt support RAID,
but what if you want a second,
identical copy of each backup?
No problem: Just run Cobian
Backup against itself. Periodi-
cally copy the entire contents
of the backup drive to another
drivetheres your mirror.
If you are worried that theft
or re could wipe you out, never
fear. Since Cobian Backup also
supports FTP backup, you can
send your backups to a remote
FTP server or, as above, back up
your backups to an FTP server.
You can also get fancy, leaving
your local backup unencrypted
but your FTP backup encrypted.
8
Once youve formed the parti-
tion, you can format the drive.
The New Partition Wizard under the
Computer Management utility takes
care of business.
7
Before you throw
out that old
hard drive, make sure
its been completely
wiped clean.
4
Make sure that
the new drives
jumpers are set to
Master before you
install it.
d.)
Jhe Righl Jechuology. Righl ^way.
JM
C0w.cou

800.399.4C0w
|u Cauada, call 888.898.C0wC

C0w.ca
INCREMENTAL VS.
DIFFERENTIAL
Different kinds of backups
serve different purposes.
You need to decide whether
or not to overwrite exist-
ing backups, and how many
copies to keep. You can store
many backups that let you
recreate month-end, year-
end, or other snapshots.
Full backup All specied
les and folders are backed
up in their entirety.
Incremental backup Only
the les that have changed
since the last backup are
archived.
Differential backup Only
the les that have changed
since the last full backup are
archived.
the individual PCs or on the backup server. We wanted ours to
be a true backup server, with all of the centralized le manage-
ment options that entails, not just a repository drive for data
dumped on it by the client machines, so we opted to run Cobian
Backup on the server.
You then choose how you want Cobian to access the les
on the client machines. The rst step, of course, is to turn on
le- and print-sharing. From there, set the sharing permission
for each folder you want to back up or simply drag the folders
you want to back up into the Shared Documents folder. Cobian
can see that folder on every machine that has le- and print-
sharing turned on.
TIME TO SPLIT
Another way to archive
important les, such as
full monthly backups,
is to move them to opti-
cal discs that can be
stored off-site. Cobian
Backup will split back-
ups into CD-, DVD-, or
other-size chunks, with
or without compres-
sion or encryption.
MORE ON THE WEB
Make an external hard disk!
go.pcmag.com/diy
This works best in a friendly environment, where individual
users dont need to keep les secret from one another. If you
want to minimize exposure of client PCs to one another, run
Cobian on each machine and encrypt the backups to the central
drive. In any case, you probably dont want to turn on sharing
for the entire drive on the client PCs: Youd be opening the door
to inadvertent damage as well as malicious mischief.
Tasks in Cobian Backup are extraordinarily easy to set up.
A tabbed menu lets you choose the type of backup; select the
les and folders; schedule the backup; choose compression or
encryption; include and exclude specic les, le types, or fold-
ers; and perform scripted events before and after each backup.
NAS VS. SAN
Our backup server, built for network-attached storage
(NAS), is limited to le storage and management tasks.
A storage-area network (SAN), by comparison, ofoads
the main network, moving large amounts of data
among storage devices, usually with many-to-many
connections between servers and storage. A full copy
of Windows XP is overkill for NAS tasks, but the user
interface and familiar tools are convenient.
We see your brain working. Youre thinking, If I can
build my own NAS, can I build my own SAN? In a word,
no. While there are some open-source SAN projects
that are available, theres nothing easy and reliable out
there. Yet.
9
Cobian Backup makes it easy to
create and modify tasks. Our rst
task backs up three major folders on
a laptop computer. In this case, weve
selected a weekly full backup.
10
Backup scheduling is very exible.
You can set backups to occur on a
regular schedule, on any given date, or
even every couple of minutes.
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The army runs on its stomach, but businesses run
on their data. In most SOHO networks, a wealth of
internal services (such as file and printer sharing
and any intranet tools) run off a central server.
Additionally, most businesses have a handful of
external servicessuch as the company Web site,
e-mail, and remote-access or even VPN
capabilitiesthat may or may not run from the
same server. Take a few minutes to map out your
company network and determine which parts of the
operation need to be backed up. File servers usually
contain mission-critical data that should be
archived as regularly as your employees data. Back
up the site, user accounts, and mail files, too. E
ISP/Internet
Firewall
Server
Cable/ADSL
Printer
Internal services:
File sharing
Print sharing
DHCP
Backup:
NAS
Internal
users
PCs
Remote
employees
External services:
Web site
DNS
FTP
Mail
Router
NETWORK NEEDS
DIY BACKUP ALTERNATIVES
OTHER DIY BACKUP SOFTWARE
For our backup server, we went with Cobian Backup 7, but
youll nd quite a few other software choices to use for your
own server.
BACKUP2006PRO ($65 street)
Pros: Simple UI. Uploads via HTTP or FTP to
remote servers.
Cons: Designed for single user, not network.
HANDY BACKUP ($30 street)
Pros: Well-regarded. Provides FTP support and
encryption.
Cons: Requires add-ons for Registry, Outlook,
and other special functions. Can back up over
network but is intended for single machines.
VICE VERSA PLUS/PRO ($30/$60 street)
Pros: Comprehensive backup and scheduling.
Easy, attractive UI.
Cons: Restrictive licensing. Additional multius-
er cost.
NASBACKUP (free/SourceForge)
Pros: Uses rsync and Perl scripts to do differen-
tial network backup. Simple client UI.
Cons: Usually needs a Linux server to run rsync
but can be run on Windows servers with addi-
tional software. Overall setup can be complex.
The product with the most appealing name:
AMANDA (Advanced Maryland Automatic Network
Disk Archiver)
Pros: Free. Can back up Unix and Windows
machines.
Cons: Requires comfort with console commands and mod-
ding for different congurations.
OFF-THE-SHELF NAS
Looking to save a little time but still need to back up your
business? Dozens of commercial NAS devices are available.
Here are some recent offerings from some of the top names.
BUFFALO TERASTATION HOME SERVER (1TB, $900 street)
The Buffalo TeraStation is currently the unparalleled giant
of low-cost NAS. Offering a terabyte of storage, this device
should meet or exceed the storage needs of nearly any small
business.
IOMEGA STORCENTER (250GB, $289.95 direct)
Primarily a wired solution, the StorCenter can be set free
with a wireless option for an extra few bucks. Its also a
print server for up to two printers, and it comes with a
full suite of backup software. You can expand the devices
capacity easily by adding USB 2.0 hard drives.
LINKSYS ETHERFAST NAS EFG250 (250GB, $700 street)
A exible le server with print sharing, the EtherFast is eas-
ily expandable via a spare drive bay. Its easy to install on an
existing LAN and performs DHCP; plus, the drives are in
lockable, removable carriers. The wireless option is handy
as well.
MAXTOR SHARED STORAGE PLUS (500GB, $499.95
direct)
This small-footprint NAS device can be added quickly
and easily to any Ethernet network. Print-sharing is a
plus, as is expandable USB 2.0 disk storage.
MIRRA PERSONAL SERVER (400GB, $499.99 direct)
The Mirra backs up and restores les from multiple PCs
effortlessly. Attach it to your Ethernet network, and soft-
ware on each PC communicates with the Mirra to perform
continuous backups, with up to eight versions stored for
each le.
BUI LD I T!
plasma screens dont provide native
HD resolution (a minimum of 720p, aka
1, 280-by-720 pixels) at sizes under 50
inches. Within our budget, 32-inch LCDs
were the best option.
Because these sets lack over-the-air
HD tuners, wed have to buy or rent a sep-
arate box, but wed probably do that any-
way to watch cable channels like ESPN
and HBO, rather than just the dinosaur
networks. With a list of about half a dozen
possibilities at four major retailers, we hit
the streets to see our picks in person.
WHATS IN-STORE
Costco Membership has its rewards, but
shopping help isnt one. Still, in a change
from the past when the warehouse store
seemed to be a dumping ground for end-
of-life TVs, it had late-model Pioneer
plasmas and Sony Bravia LCD TVs (too
expensive for us). All the screens at our
local branch were hooked up via their
component video connectors and played
the same loop of challenging HD video
clips that included detailed scenic vistas
SHOPPING RETAIL is hell. Big-box
outlets, awash in ill-informed clerks,
underpaid salesmen, and poorly labeled
products are, in a word, useless. No won-
der people are turning to the Internet in
droves. Still, for big purchases, many of
us feel the need to try before we buy.
So we set out, cash in hand, to nd the
best HDTV deals at brick-and-mortar
stores. With dozens of brands and hun-
dreds of models, it was a challenge. Get-
ting the features you want at a good price
requires preparationand patience.
We decided to focus on at-panel dis-
plays. (Tube systems, at over a hundred
pounds and several feet deep, seem very
last-century.) We demanded at least one
digital and one component video input so
we could plug in a minimum of two high-
definition sources. And we capped the
price at $1,000spending more than that
on a television seemed, well, extravagant.
We started our search online, perus-
ing the sites of local stores to see what
was available. Our thin-and-at prereq-
uisite directed us toward LCD TVs
SQUEEZE PLAY Maybe you
could stop photographing for
a few seconds and help?
By Robert Heron
SHORT STACKS? Ordinary
TVs wont do for Mr. Heron.
He likes em big.
130 PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com
Real-World Testing:
and fast-paced sporting action, which
aided our comparisons.
Amid the visual feast, our eyes settled
on a 32-inch Proview RX-326 LCD TV
for $950. The set had the required A/V
inputs, and dark detail such as the ne
shadow gradients around a persons eyes
showed up clearly. We snatched it up,
fearful of being convinced otherwise by
an employeenot that we saw any.
Wal-Mart Our next stop: Americas fa-
vorite store. Buried in a corner of the cav-
ernous emporium was a sparse selection
of TVs. None were models we had picked
on the companys Web site. Undaunted,
we found a lone set that met our criteria.
We were immediately struck by the rot-
ten picture quality. But the TV wasnt to
blame: The store distributes video to ev-
ery set over composite cablesthe low-
est order of video lifeor an RF cable
connection (possibly the second worst).
When the perpetually busy cashier even-
tually determined that the chosen set was
sold out forever, we enthusiastically took
our business elsewhere. Lesson learned:
Dont shop at Wal-Mart for an HDTV.
CompUSA Here too, we encountered a
small selection connected to composite
or RF cabling. The overall image quality
wasnt as bad as on the Wal-Mart sets,
but this location had nothing in our price
range that t our needs.
Best Buy Our last stop offered a de-
cent choice of TVs and had an outlet of
the high-end audiovisual equipment
and accessory retailer Magnolia Home
Theater, where we could admire HDTVs
most certainly not in our price range.
Best Buy conveniently uses the same HD
feed (apart from the commercials) as
Costco. This proved very useful, as we
were already familiar with the videos.
The looped feed included a scene of
four people sitting behind a news desk,
one of them wearing a sweater in a shade
of coral . . . probably. We were uncertain
of the sweaters exact color, as every TV
displayed it slightly differently. It looked
more reddish on some, more pinkish on
others, and a few were so far off the mark
that we never gave them a second glance.
The TV that caught our attention on
Best Buys Web site was sold out. A sales
A PERFECT FIT! This backseat ts
three comfortablyor a 32-inch
square from Japan.
SHOPPING CARTE BLANCHE
Will you take a postdated, third-
party, out-of-state check?
JUNK IN THE TRUNK
Dude, youll never t that
monster back there!
www.pcmag.com APRIL 11, 2006 PC MAGAZINE 131
REAL- WORLD TESTI NG
$900 LCDs
rep (call him Jim) claimed hundreds were
in a warehouse, but delivery would take a
few days. We couldnt wait, so we found
an alternative: a 32-inch Westinghouse
LTV-32w1. The set was $100 over our
budget but had the features we were look-
ing for. We asked to have $100 knocked
off, and the sales rep agreed. Flush with
triumph, we bought the unit.
As it turned out, the LTV-32w1 had
been on sale the previous week for $200
off, so our savvy bargain was no big deal.
Furthermore, most stores guarantee that
theyll refund the difference if you nd
the same TV elsewhere for a lower price.
Had we not rushed, we could have easily
saved another $100. Lesson number two:
Keep track of competing prices.
UNBOXING DAY
With only two TVs in our possession
after visiting four retailers, we wanted
another set to see how our purchases
compared, so we chose the recently re-
leased 32-inch Visio L32 LCD. Its list
price was within our budget and like the
Proview and Westinghouse, it provided
the A/V connections and the resolution
we wanted.
Unpacki ng and setti ng up these
LCDs justified our decision to exclude
CRTs. The Proview RX-326 was about
55 pounds, and the Westinghouse LTV-
32w1 was 34 pounds. A 32-inch CRT
(which has less viewable area) can weigh
substantially more; one at Best Buy was
166 pounds. But as LCD screens arent as
tough as CRTs, we still needed a friend
to help ensure a safe journey from the
Styrofoam-packed box to the TVs new
perch. Setup complete, we were ready to
put our new LCDs to the test.
After eyeballing the sets just as a reg-
ular user would, we put them through
our extensive lab tests. None left us in
high-def heaven, but the Proview was
the best of the bunch. Its picture qual-
ity was pleasing, movie scores rumbled
nicely, and the TV was attractive yet un-
derstated. The Visios bright and even
picture wasnt without flaws, but its a
relatively inexpensive at-panel TV and
a good value. The Westinghouse LTV-
32w1 impressed us with its digital image
quality, and its contrast ratio shattered
records. Too bad the display quality
with analog input wasnt half as good as
with digital.
With any digital set, broadcast analog
TV will appear fuzzy and soft, at best.
Even with a rooftop antenna that had
a direct line of sight to the broadcast
tower, we still got noisy, ghost-lled im-
agery. Luckily, an FCC mandate now re-
quires manufacturers to include digital
(ATSC) tuners in all mid-size TVs, so fu-
ture models will be able to receive over-
the-air HD and provide better images
with standard-denition broadcasts.
As for purchasing from stores, Best
Buy and Costco offered the best experi-
ences. Keep track of whats on sale and
what just came off sale, and dont be
afraid to bargain! And if you see Jim at
Best Buy, tell him we said hi. E
Robert Heron runs PC Magazines
HDTV lab and hosts DL.TV. For full rat-
ings and reviews of these televisions, turn
to page 26 in our First Looks section.
SPOTTING THE ELUSIVE
HIGH-QUALITY TV
Follow these tips and your hunt
for a at-screen TV will be brief.
Shop at a store that provides HD
content and familiarize yourself with
it. Best Buy and Costco show the
same looped video feed, so you can
compare across stores. Cool!
Pay attention to black levels. Do they
appear inky dark or grayish? Convinc-
ing blacks provide better image quality
in a home theater environment.
Compare shadow and color detail,
with an eye to natural imagery. In the
Best Buy/Costco video loop, watch for
that coral sweater to compare colors.
DIGITAL HERNIA Lift
with the legs, and
always bring a friend!
I SEE DEAD PIXELS Youll never ana-
lyze effectively from the couch. But
its hard to watch from this close.
OUR PRESCRIP-
TION Take two
of these and
see you Monday
morning.
OUTSIDE THE BOX Gotta
hurry! Only 30 minutes
until American Idol is on!
132 PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com
REAL- WORLD TESTI NG
YOUR VOICE COULD BE
600,000
TIMES STRONGER
YOUR VOICE COULD BE
600,000
TIMES STRONGER
*as ranked by Fortune magazine
While youre running your business, were
fighting for it. Thats why you need to join
today. Because NFIB does two things for
small business that no one else no trade
group, no chamber and no grassroots
committee can match. We keep bad
ideas from becoming law and we partner
with great companies to help you cut the
cost of running your business. No other
small-business organization can match
NFIB.
To join or learn more about the
countrys no. 1 business lobby*,
call (800) NFIB-NOW or visit
www.NFIB.com/join.
ITS THIS SIMPLE.
P
H
O
T
O
G
R
A
P
H
S
:

(
T
O
P
)

G
E
T
T
Y
;

(
B
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T
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)

F
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I
S

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I
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I
/
C
O
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E



APPLE CORE HOTELS
5 locations in Midtown
www.applecorehotels.com
A well-kept secret, these ve
tidy budget hotels have rates
as low as $99.99 per night
and free Wi-Fi. We advise go-
ing with the La Quinta or Red
Roof Inn, both on a fascinating
block of Korean shops and
restaurants.
TRIBECA GRAND iSTUDIO
2 Sixth Avenue
www.tribecagrand.com
The Grand can outt any
suite with a Mac G5, iPod, and
editing software.Bring a video
camera and make that indie
lm youve been dreaming of.
$434 and up per night.

HOTEL GIRAFFE
365 Park Avenue South
www.hotelgiraffe.com
A cozy boutique hotel in Mid-
town, with a real attention to
guest service and free wireless
for all. $339 and up per night.
MERCER HOTEL
147 Mercer Street
www.mercerhotel.com
Celebrities roam the corridors
of this super-hip minimalist ho-
tel in fancy SoHo; see one and
blog your ndings with free
Wi-Fi. $440 and up per night.
OMNI BERKSHIRE PLACE
21 East 52nd Street
www.omnihotels.com
A classic business hotel in the
heart of Midtown with free
Internet access. Room rates
are $319 and up, but specials
can go as low as $199.
BEST WIRED
HOTELS
SILICON ALLEY: More NYC
residents work in the infor-
mation industry than resi-
dents of three major Silicon
Valley counties combined.
PHONES: Verizon has the
best voice coverage. Both
Sprint and Verizon provide
high-speed EV-DO data net-
works all over the city.

Wi-Fi in the Parks: Down-
town Alliance (www.down
townny.com) runs eight free
hot spots near Wall Street.
There are also hot spots
in Bryant Park (Google-
sponsored), Tompkins
Square, and Madison Square .
FAST FACTS
HOOKED UP IN NYC
Alt.Coffee
139 Avenue A
An old-school
early-1990s-style
coffeeshop with
comfy couches, a
student crowd, and
of course, free Wi-Fi.
DT/UT
1626 Second Avenue
A coffeeshop on
the posh Upper East
Side a few blocks
from museums,
with big couches
and lots of free Net.
EasyInternetCafe
234 W. 42nd Street
Youre sure to nd
space at one of the
648 PCs in what
may be the largest
Internet cafe in the
world. Yowza!
GETTING AROUND: Dont take a cab. Fly into JFK Airport and
take the new AirTrain (for just $5), a brand-new monorail
which zips to Jamaica Station in Queens over the congested
Van Wyck Expressway. There you can switch to the subway
($2) or the slightly plusher LIRR train ($5 to $7) to Manhat-
tan. Even the billionaire mayor rides the fast and safe subway
in New York City; daily passes cost $7. Manhattan subways
arent wired for cell phones yet, but Verizon customers have
luck in the shallower stations, such as the 23rd Street station
on the 6 line. Noise-canceling headphones work surprisingly
well to kill the bone-rattling subway rumble. Sascha Segan
TOP TECH ATTRACTIONS: Get old-school with the Digital Play: Reloaded exhibit at the Mu-
seum of the Moving Image, a set of classic arcade and console games that you can play for free
until your ngers bleed. 35th Avenue and 36th Street, Astoria; take the R train to Steinway
Street. $10 admission; www.movingimage.us. The Sony Wonder Technology Lab is loaded with
interactive exhibits where kids can pretend to produce TV shows or music videos. 56th Street
and Madison Avenue; www.sonywondertechlab.com. Tech and art nd common ground at
Chelseas Bitforms gallery. 529 W. 20th Street; 212-366-6939; www.bitforms.com.
THE CONNECTED TRAVELER
New York
WHILE YOURE IN TOWN Hit the Pennsylvania Hotel from July 21-23, when
one of the nations biggest hacker conventions, HOPE NUMBER SIX,
takes over. Get more info at www.hopenumbersix.net. Get hands-on
experience with all the hot new products for the upcoming holidays at
DIGITAL LIFE. October 12-15 at the Javits Center, www.digitallife.com.
S OL UT I ON S go.pcmag.com/connectedtraveler
PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com 134
S P E C I A L
O F F E R
FOR PC MAGAZINE
DIGITAL READERS
Get eWEEK
FREE
TO
APPLY
FOR A FREE
SUBSCRIPTION
Only eWEEK provides news,
analysis and real world reviews to
help senior IT decision-makers
reach the right decisions in building
their enterprise infrastructure.
S P E C I A L
O F F E R
FOR PC MAGAZINE
DIGITAL READERS
Get eWEEK
FREE
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FOR A FREE
SUBSCRIPTION
Only eWEEK provides news,
analysis and real world reviews to
help senior IT decision-makers
reach the right decisions in building
their enterprise infrastructure.
135
ExtremeTech.coms editor Loyd Case
tackles your toughest hardware problems
each issue. Send him yours at
askloyd@ziffdavis.com.
Graphics Card Compatibility
If you have a motherboard with an nVidia
chipset, can you use a graphics card
from ATI? Can you use two of them in
CrossFire mode? And if you use a mother-
board with an ATI chipset, will there be
a performance loss in either graphics or
motherboard performance?
TIM MCGLYNN
You can certainly use a single PCI Express
ATI graphics card in an nVidia chipset
motherboard. You can also
install two of them, but only
if you plan on driving two
separate displays. Mother-
boards with nVidia chipsets
do not support ATIs Cross-
Fire dualgraphics card
technology. If youre using
an AMD Athlon 64 proces-
sor, then youll need a moth-
erboard with an ATI chipset,
such as the Asus A8R-MVP
or DFI RDX200 CF-DR.
Our experience has
shown that the ATI chipsets
result in slightly lower CPU
performance than nVidia
chipset boards, but the
difference is less than 4
percent, so its statistically
not signicant. However,
its been documented that
the ULi south bridge chip
used in most ATI chipset boards does
register slightly slower USB 2.0 through-
put. Whether thats a problem or not is
something only you can determine.
Note that if you have an Intel processor,
motherboards using Intels 975X chipset,
such as the Intel D975XBX or Asus
P5WD2-E motherboards, fully support
ATIs CrossFire technology.
Choosing a Digital Projector
Ive been asked by a client to buy and set
up a projector for showing PowerPoint
presentations. Id like to know what to
look for and how to set one up.
JEFF GRIM
Digital projectors come in a variety of form
factors, price points, and targeted environ-
ments. So the rst thing you should do is
investigate how the projector will be used.
For example, will the projector be
installed into a xed location and never
moved? In that case, portability isnt a fac-
tor, but ease of installation and manage-
ment may be. On the other hand, if your
client is looking for a projector to carry to
different locations, then weight and ease
of setup become major considerations.
Second, what projection surface will
your client use? While a white wall may be
suitable in some cases, a dedicated screen
is often a far better solution. Images will
your client plans on using the projector to
show video or movie content, features such
as component video inputs or sophisticated
video processors are unnecessary.
Most projectors today have VGA inputs,
so connecting a laptop or PC to the projec-
tor is straightforward. Laptop users will
need to know how to switch the output
from their laptop screen to the external
displaythe projector in this case. Most
mobile PCs have the option of showing
the image on both the PC and the external
display at the same time,
which can be convenient
if the user is working from
a podium in front of the
screen.
Users may also need to
know how to switch display
resolutions if their note-
book PCs resolution isnt
the same as the projectors
native resolution. Of course,
the users should be familiar
with creating and running
PowerPoint presentations.
Are more mega-
pixels better?
I cant decide between a
digital camera with 5 mega-
pixels and its exact twin
with 7MP. What advantages
does 7MP have over 5?
KEN ELM
Our ip answer would be 2MP, of course!
The issue of megapixels with digital
cameras really comes down to how large
you want to print the nal images. Five
megapixels is generally enough to look
pretty good at page sizes up to 8-by-10. If
you plan on printing to larger paper sizes,
then more megapixels may be better. More
megapixels also gives you the exibility to
crop your photos and still make fairly large
prints. Note that cameras that seem to be
identical except for the pixel count often
perform very differently, so read reviews
on both models. (You can nd our camera
reviews at go.pcmag.com/cameras.)
go.pcmag.com/askloyd S OL UT I ON S
ASK LOYD
www.pcmag.com APRIL 11, 2006 PC MAGAZINE
look crisper and brighter on a high-quality
screen. Screens can be portable, perma-
nently mounted on a wall, or retractable
(this type can be rolled up into a ceiling
xture). Also, projectors in permanent in-
stallations can be mounted onto a ceiling. A
ceiling-mounted projector can be turned on
with a remote control or wall switch (which
will mean an added installation cost). Some
projectors may be controlled directly by a
PC over an Ethernet connection.
Once you understand the environment,
then you can select the projector based
on the features needed. Note that prices
tend to scale dramatically with higher
resolution, light output, or lower weight. For
PowerPoint presentations, we recommend
a resolution of at least 1,024-by-768. If the
projection area is large, youll need brighter
output (more lumens). Smaller facilities
may not need very bright projectors. Unless
ALTHOUGH A 5-MEGAPIXEL image is usually ne for 8-by-10 prints,
you may be limited to smaller-sized prints if you crop it much.
5 megapixels
1.9 megapixels
S OL UT I ON S go.pcmag.com/solutions
Clear XP Unread Messages
On my XP system, ve different users
each have their own account. The log-on
window shows the number of e-mails
that are unread, but its totally inaccu-
rate. One time it reads 30, the next 2, the
next 10, and so on. But actually all e-mails
have been read and are marked as such.
How do I turn this useless thing off?
DAN PHILLIPPY
Various e-mail clients put information
on unread messages in the Windows XP
Registry, but this information isnt always
correct. To clean up the situation, youll rst
clear the existing information and then con-
gure the system so it doesnt add more.
Launch RegEdit from the Start menus
Run dialog and navigate to the key
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\
Windows\CurrentVersion\UnreadMail.
Youll nd one or more subkeys below
this key. Select each subkey in turn and nd
the value MessageCount in the right-hand
pane. Double-click that value and set its
data to 0. Now look for a value named Mes
sageExpiryDays. If you dont nd it (and
you probably wont), choose Edit | New |
DWORD Value from the menu, name the
new value MessageExpiryDays. Set this
values data to 0. If there are multiple user
accounts on this computer, youll need to
log on as each user and repeat this process.
Just to cover all bases, navigate to
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Micro
soft\Windows\CurrentVersion
and look for a subkey named UnreadMail. If
you dont see it, go to Edit | New | Key to cre-
ate it. Open the Unread-Mail key and nd
or create the MessageExpiry-Days value as
before. Set its data to 0. This needs to be
done only once, not once per user.
Mouse-Wheel Mess
The type that appears on my display
is very small, almost unreadable. This
happened as I was surng the Net. One
minute it was ne, the next it was very
small, and it has been like that since.
What can I do?
THOMAS CALICCHIO
Youve run afoul of what can be a use-
ful feature of your mouses scroll wheel.
Many apps change the displayed text size
when you turn the scroll wheel while hold-
ing down the Ctrl key. Among these are
the Micro soft Ofce programs, Internet
Explorer, and most e-mail clients. The size
range controlled by the wheel varies from
program to program. Internet Explorer
and Outlook Express have just ve size
levels, matching the ve sizes under View
| Text Size in IEs menu. Ofce programs
can change zoom level almost indenitely.
The direction varies toorolling the wheel
toward you makes text smaller in Microsoft
Word, larger in IE. Its easy to accidentally
make a size change by pressing Ctrl while
using the wheel, but its just as easy to re-
store the desired size once you know how.
Color-Coding Contacts
in Outlook
In Microsoft Outlook 2003, how do I set
an e-mail in my Inbox from a specic
person to a colornot the entire e-mail
but only the line that appears in my In-
box? For example, if I get an e-mail from
Joseph Blow, I want that line to be red.
LOU MICKLER
This is surprisingly easy to do. Select a
message from the person in question, then
choose Tools | Organize from the menu.
Click the item titled Using Colors. Pick a
color from the drop-down list and click on
Apply Color. From now on, the Inbox line
item for any message from that sender will
be displayed using that color. This format-
ting is specic to the active message folder;
if you move the message to another folder,
the formatting will be lost, unless you spe-
cically dene it for the other folder as well.
For more control, you can click the Auto-
matic Formatting link at the top of the Ways
to Organize panel. The resulting dialog
lets you dene conditions and associate a
typeface, style, size, and color with it. For
example, you could specify that all e-mails
that include attachments and whose sub-
ject line contains Bjork will be displayed in
blue 16-point underlined Arial. You can also
reach the Automatic Formatting dialog by
choosing View | Arrange By | Current View |
Customize Current View from the menu and
clicking the Automatic Formatting button.
ASK NEI L
Each issue, PC Magazines software
expert Neil J. Rubenking answers your
toughest software and Internet questions.
Send yours to askneil@ziffdavis.com.
TO CLEAR faulty unread message data and disable the feature in Windows XP
requires a Registry tweak.
PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com 136
S OL UT I ON S go.pcmag.com/askneil
ITS VERY EASY to set Outlook 2003 to color-code messages that meet your criteria.
The Wireless Snare
Right now your laptop could be wirelessly connecting
to any available network. Thats unsafe. BY ROBERT LEMOS
central computer to assign network ad-
dresses to each member of the network.
This all makes it possible for attackers
to join and control ad hoc networks. Be-
cause a laptop believes its part of a net-
work, it might check for e-mail, letting
the attacker get the owners username
and password. The attacking computer
can also advertise its connection as an
Internet gateway and scan trafc sent by
other laptops for useful information, such
as passwords to automated accounts.
More aggressive attackers could use
the network to try attacks on specific
vulnerabilities in a potential victims
laptop. In many cases, the laptop will
connect to the wireless network, believ-
ing that it is the users home network.
Thus, the conguration may allow le
sharing and printer sharing.
How can you protect yourself? First,
turn off your laptops wireless when not
attempting to connect to a known net-
work. Also, make sure your laptop doesnt
turn on its wireless when it cant nd an
Ethernet connection. Most important,
disable ad hoc networking, by clicking
the Advanced button of the Wireless Net-
work Connection Settings control panel
to change it from Any available network
(access point preferred) to Access point
(infrastructure) networks only.
As with children, the best advice for
laptops is to not talk to strangers.
The issue isnt a vulnerability per se;
its a cascade failure of a set of default
congurations that Microsoft has set to
make creating wireless networks easier.
Many laptops are configured to at-
tempt to connect to both infrastructure
networks and what are called ad hoc net-
works. In an infrastructure network, the
laptop is a client that connects to a base
station, similar to the client-server net-
work design. In ad hoc networks, many
individual laptops form a peer-to-peer
network sharing connectivity. This ad
hoc networking is done in the back-
ground on Microsoft Windows 2000 and
Windows XP (up to Service Pack 1). Win-
dows XP Service Pack 2 noties the user
that its connecting to an ad hoc network.
Other factors come into play as well.
Many peoples home networks connect
through a base station identied by the
default name, such as linksys. More-
over, a laptop that connects to an ad hoc
network of a different name adds that
name to its list of possible networks, pos-
sibly advertising that network name to
other computers in the future. Further-
more, Microsoft has a default address-
ing scheme that results in each computer
getting a valid address, even without a
T
he situations all too common:
Youre at the airport and your
ight is delayed, so you open your
laptop and start working. Unbeknownst
to you, your laptops wireless could be
putting your computer in danger.
Recent real-world experiments sug-
gest that the default wireless settings
on many laptops could leave them vul-
nerable. During recent travel, researcher
Mark Loveless started poking into the
reasons why a large number of laptops
Robert Lemos is a freelance technology
journalist and the editor-at large for
SecurityFocus.
A security researcher finds many people
vulnerable via ad hoc networks at 35,000 feet.
The Unfriendly Skies
Aircraft 1:
MD80
Aircraft 3:
MD80
Aircraft 4:
757
Aircraft 2:
MD80
NUMBER OF LAPTOPS IN USE ON FLIGHT
NUMBER OF VULNERABLE LAPTOPS
NUMBER OF AD HOC NETS
S
o
u
r
c
e
:

M
a
r
k

L
o
v
e
l
e
s
s
,

V
e
r
n
i
e
r

N
e
t
w
o
r
k
s
at any given airport were broadcasting
common network names, or service set
identiers (SSIDs), such as linksys or
dlink. He gathered similar data on four
ights. He found a signicant portion of
laptops are congured by default to seek
out and connect to common SSIDs. If no
such network is around, many computers
create their own wireless network using
one of those names. Without any sort of
malicious intent, wireless laptops were
connecting to each other, he found.
KEEP YOURSELF SAFE! Subscribe to our
Security Watch newsletter and get
up-to-date info on the latest threats
delivered to your inbox automatically:
go.pcmag.com/securitywatchletter.
SECURITY WATCH
go.pcmag.com/security watch S OL UT I ON S
www.pcmag.com APRIL 11, 2006 PC MAGAZINE 137
Life Without Exchange
When it comes to working collaboratively, Microsoft
Exchange isnt the only game in town. BY MATTHEW D. SARREL
L
isten up, recruits: Therere plen-
ty of reasons small businesses
might want to eliminate (or never
even start with) Microsoft Exchange for
e-mail, group calendaring, and more.
Though theres no doubt that Exchanges
integration with the Microsoft Outlook
client, groupware features, and shared
contact lists are handy, companies may
object to its cost and complexity. The
cost of running Exchange includes Win-
dows Server. Unless you like paying
Microsoft a small fortune (up to $8,000
for 25 user licenses for Windows Server
and Exchange), you might consider a
Linux solution.
Some alternatives work both in Out-
look (via a client plug-in) and through
webmail interfaces. Many of the open-
source alternatives require customiza-
tion (a code word for programming).
Replacing Exchange may be an excellent
way to save money, but youll need to
plan for the transition to avoid unneces-
sary downtime. Youll need to replicate
server settings and deploy and config-
ure plug-ins to all Outlook clients on
your network.There are many Exchange
alternatives; here are our favorites.
Gordano Messaging Suite. Wizard-
driven installation and Web-based man-
agement make GMS a good Exchange
alternative. Its a solid e-
mail server, and optional
modules add group calen-
daring and collaboration
from within Outlook after
installing the appropriate
plug-in. A full-featured web-
mail interface can easily re-
place the Outlook client; a
version for mobile devices is
also available. Gordano of-
fers many optional compo-
nents, such as antispam and
antivirus, which you can
customize for your outfit.
GMS runs on Windows or
Linux. Cost: $45 per seat.
Scalix Email and Calendaring Platform.
Scalix is a Linux-based Exchange alter-
native with powerful administrative fea-
tures more complicated than Exchanges
or Gordanos. Those with basic Linux ad-
ministrator skills should be able to han-
dle it. An easy-to- deploy Outlook plug-in
provides Exchange functionality, includ-
ing real-time free/busy lookup for sched-
uling and off-line support. The webmail
client works equally well in Internet Ex-
plorer or Firefox, and it supports mail,
calendars, contacts, and public folders
via a drag-and-drop interface. Scalix eas-
ily scales as your company grows. It also
has hooks for third-party antispam and
AV solutions. Cost: $60 per seat.
Novell SUSE Linux Openexchange Serv-
er 4.1. Painless installation and a power-
ful Web-based administration interface
almost make you forget this is a Linux
product. But youll remember when you
edit text files to configure the open-
source AV and antispam modules. More
groupware features are enabled through
the Web client than through Outlook,
so you might ditch Outlook. In addi-
tion to scheduling and shared contacts,
Openexchange has discussion forums,
shared folders, project and task tracking,
and document versioning. Cost: $1,249
for server license; free webmail clients;
groupware client, roughly $50 per seat.
OpenGroupware.org. This Exchange
alternative (aka OGo) provides con-
tact management, group calendaring,
resource planning, task management,
e-mail, document and project manage-
ment, news, and Palm syncing, all avail-
able via a Web interface. An Outlook
plug-in is available. You can manage
accounts, groups, and server congura-
tions using a Web interface. The Projects
application lets you share documents and
link projects with contacts, tasks, notes,
and appointments. The server runs on
Linux or Windows. Cost: Free.
Open-Xchange. This open-source app
includes portal services, a group cal-
endar, contacts, tasks, project manage-
ment, document management, webmail,
a knowledge base, shared bookmarks,
and bulletin boards. Like
OpenGroupware, Open-
Xchange lets you organize
your content into projects.
OXtenders support inte-
gration of Outlook and the
Pal m desktop. Hooks to
open-source antivirus and
antispam modules round
out the product. The server
runs on Linux only. Cost:
$35 per seat.
Matthew D. Sarrel is a
consultant and former PC
Magazine Labs technical
director.
I
L
L
U
S
T
R
A
T
I
O
N

B
Y

A
L
E
X

E
B
E
N

M
E
Y
E
R
PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com 138
10
20
30
40
50
2009* 2008* 2007* 2006* 2005 2004 2003 2002 2001 2000
Corporate Messaging Software Market Shares
Exchange alternatives count as Others. Numbers are percentages. Yearly totals may not add up to 100
because of rounding. *All figures from 2006 and beyond are projections. Source: The Radicati Group
MS Exchange
Others
IBM Lotus
Domino/Notes/Workplace
S OL UT I ON S go.pcmag.com/smbbootcamp
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EMC2, EMC, CLARiiON, Retrospect, RepliStor, and where information lives are registered trademarks and eRoom, Visual SRM,
and EMC Storage Administrator are trademarks of EMC Corporation. Copyright 2006 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved.
Regaining Trust
Lets face it: Microsofts security record isnt impressive.
BY JOHN CLYMAN
There are a lot of other ways in which
Vistas improved security is readily ap-
parent: an expanded Security Center,
integrated Windows Defender anti-
spyware (which well cover in more de-
tail in a future issue), and simpler ways
to detect and correct security oversights,
to name a few. Parents get controls that
let them limit and track how their kids
use the PC, a feature well also expand
on in an upcoming issue. And of course,
Microsoft is enhancing the security
of Internet Explorer, a major target for
spyware, adware, and phishing scams
(see go.pcmag.com/IE7security).
Will Microsoft get it right this time?
Were still working with beta-quality
software that isnt functionally complete
or fully testednor widely available for
hackers to target. But the initial signs
are promising.
C
orporate IT departments know
it, individual users know it, and
Microsoft knows it too: Com-
pany representatives regularly assert
that Vista has to get security rightall
the interface and usability bells and
whistles that the new OS can offer are
irrelevant if it cant keep customers ma-
chines and data safe.
How does Microsoft plan to achieve
this goal? To start with, the company is
building Vista atop the same code base
used for Windows Server 2003 Service
Pack 1, a better-secured successor to
Windows XP. Core Windows services
have been hardenedtheir privilege
levels and points of access to sensitive
OS capabilities reduced so that even if
they are compromised, the damage that
an attacker can wreak is more strictly
limited. And Vista makes it much more
practical to perform day-to-day tasks us-
ing a reduced-privilege user account, as
has long been possible on Unix variants
and Mac OS, with a provision for admin-
istrator privileges only when necessary.
VISTA REVEALED
JVISTAS SECURITY
center, like its
counter part in Win-
dows XP, provides a
centralized spot for
monitoring the secu-
rity status of a sys-
tem. Vista integrates
Microsofts Windows
Defender antispy-
ware software and,
as with antivirus
software, lets third-
party antispyware
developers plug their
utilities into the
Security Center.
VISTA SIMPLIFIES K
and claries the UI
for tasks such as
sharing les and
printers, which can
have signicant
(and not readily
apparent) security
implications. File
and printer sharing
gets its own control
panel applet, which
includes links that
let you see all your
open shared items
at a glance.
LFOR SOME SECURITY changes, Vista
lets you apply reasonable settings with
a single clickfar better than walking
through a passive help le.
go.pcmag.com/vista S OL UT I ON S
www.pcmag.com APRIL 11, 2006 PC MAGAZINE 141
Scanning Made Easy
Two hidden Microsoft Ofce tools could save you
hours of work. BY HELEN BRADLEY
S
canning and managing a multipage
paper document can be an exer-
cise in frustration. If scanning a
20-page document leaves you juggling
20 individual les, its time to get help.
Microsoft Office Document Scanning,
shipped with Ofce 2003, could be your
next best friend.
The Document Scanning tool joined a
document-imaging component that has
been around in Office for many years.
Youll nd both of the programs in the
Microsoft Ofce | Micro soft Ofce Tools
folder in your Start menu. The two pro-
grams are interlinked, and in combina-
tion they offer a one-stop shop for many
typical and otherwise complex scan-
ning tasks.
SOFTWARE SOLUTIONS
YOU CAN ANNOTATE your scans, which is
useful for completing forms and working
collaboratively. Tools for that, available
from the Annotations toolbar, let you
draw or write on the document. For larger
pieces of text, drag the cursor to add a
text box over the document and type text
into it. The text box can have a colored
background (with a variable transpar-
ency level). To add a picture over the
top of a page, click the Insert Picture
tool, or you can paste text or graphic
objects from the Windows Clipboard
by choosing Edit | Paste. Annotations
are saved on a separate layer over the
page and can be displayed or not by
choosing Tools | Annotations and then
Hide Annotations or Show Annotations.
2. Write On Your Scans
1. Document Scanning
MICROSOFT OFFICE Document Scanning
uses any installed scanner and includes
a range of scanning presets. If none
suit your needs, click the Preset button
and choose Create New Preset to select
scanner and le settings such as scan
resolution, type of scan (monochrome,
8-bit gray, 24-bit color), whether to save
the images as multipage TIF les or MDI
les, and the level of compression used.
You can also congure the scan page size,
the save directory, and which automatic
le-naming system to use.
Document Scanning
uses OCR to recognize
your scanned text, and it
can automatically rotate
and straighten a scan if
the preset is congured
to do so. If you want, you
can choose to view the
scanners own dialog
before scanningor by-
pass it and let Document
Scanning do the work.
WHEN YOURE DONE scanning, all the
pages in the le appear in the Microsoft
Ofce Document Imaging tool. Choosing
View | Thumbnails displays page thumb-
nails down the left side of the screen. To
reorder pages, drag and drop them in the
thumbnail area.
S OL UT I ON S go.pcmag.com/solutions
PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com 142
MarketLink
your technology connection!
Kathy Pavlak
212-503-4847
kathy_pavlak@ziffdavis.com
Aberdeen Inc. www.aberdeeninc.com 146
Advanced Search www.advancedsearchbar.com 155
Affordable Host www.affordablehost.com 150
Aleratec www.aleratec.com 143
Athena Institute www.athenainstitute.com 150
AuraOne Systems www.auraone.com 150
Automation PC America www.pcamerica.com 148
AVI www.projectorpeople.com 153
Berkeley Varitronics www.bvsystems.com 147
BesTrade www.BesTradeUSA.com 150
Blue Genesis www.bluegenesis.com 151
Bitdefender www.bitdefender.com 144
Cybernet Manufacturing www.cybernetman.com 149
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Disc Makers www.discmakers.com 151
DT Search www.dtsearch.com 154
ESS Data Recovery www.savemyfiles.com 153
Fat Cow www.fatcow.com/now 147
General CADD www.generalcadd.com 150
Hot Seat www.hotseatinc.com 151
IAV www.iav.com 154
Ink Farm www.inkfarm.com 153
Jotto Desk www.jottodesk.com 151
Logicube www.logicube.com 145
On The Go www.onthego.com 150
PC America www.pcamerica.com 148
Small PC www.smallpc.com 153
Systor Systems www.esystor.com 151
Talking Technologies www.tti.net 151
Transition Networks www.milan.com 147
Wiebetech www.wiebetech.com 147
MarketLink Sales 1-877-267-2315
Ginger Serifovic
212-503-5120
ginger_serifovic@ziffdavis.com
www.pcmag.com APRIL 11, 2006 PC MAGAZI NE 143
144 PC MAGAZI NE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com
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PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com 156
known. What was almost as important
was its distribution method. Players
could download Wolfenstein from a
number of FTP sites and BBS le areas
and play free. The game spread virally,
and id built a stake on gracious players
payments that would carry it through
the even more popular shareware title
Doom and on to big releases, beginning
with Quake.
The pitfalls of the shareware method
are obvious. Even then, col lecti ng
money was a dicey prospect. Some stu-
dios would release demos and require
payment to see the rest of the game.
When id released Return to Castle
Wolfenstein in 2001, a decade after the
T
he digital revolution, instead of
a violent and bloody overthrow,
has been a long, creeping pro-
cess. Take media on demand: In case you
havent noticed, its already happened.
iTunes and Napster have brought music
downloads into the mainstream, and
though Hollywood still bites its nails in
anxiety at the thought of video down-
loads, Google Video and iTunes are
bringing TV down a road that movies
will inevitably plod down themselves.
Games are part of this new para-
digmthe difference being that game
studios have little of the queasiness that
has marked the music and movie indus-
tries efforts to get with the 21st century.
Instead, having pioneered digital deliv-
ery, games have a tradition to look back
to and build from.
SHAREWARE
Before t he MP3 for mat
made it feasible to share entire
songs back and forth on the Inter-
net, small shareware programs were
the only thing it was possible to trade
across dial-up Internet connections.
The killer game app was Wolfenstein
3D, introduced by id Software in 1991.
The story of how Wolfenstein 3D rev-
olutionized rst-person shooters is well
original game, anyone suggesting that
it be distributed online, by the same
method as the series roots, would have
sounded crazy. Times have changed
again, however, and new services are
making downloadable games a real-
itybut for full price.
STEAM
The original Half-Life, which grafted
extensive use of scripted events onto
ids Quake engine, was a huge inuence
on just about every shooter game. But
its sequel set off an even bigger change
by being the agship release for devel-
oper Valves new digital delivery ser-
vice, Steam.
Steams birth came with some con-
troversy, though, because of Valves
style of digital distribution. The retail
version of Half-Life that Valve shipped
to stores was more like a formality to
appease Vivendi Universal Games, its
behemoth publisher: For their $50, gam-
ers got a box containing ve discs inside
a sleeve. If players wanted a manual,
they had to refer to the PDF version on
the disc, and the irritation at this was
nothing compared to what came next:
Half-Life 2 wasnt playable
until you had created a
Steam account and reg-
istered the game. Both the
retail and digital versions of it
had to check in with Steam to verify
the games legitimacy at each play ses-
sion, and the burden on the Steam serv-
ers led to long load times.
All this was very annoying at the
time. The key, though, is that Steam
got better quicklyand bigger. The
service now hosts several games, most
by independent third-party develop-
ers. When software publisher Strategy
First signed a deal with Steam, Tycho
of Penny Arcade noted the event, say-
ing, Watching Steam move from The
Thing You Get Half-Life 2 From to a
more complete content channel has
been a real relief.
Strategy First agreed, saying, We
believe Valves delivery system is one
of the best methods of connecti ng
gamers to top software titles. Other
studios have also joined in, with indie
A klEF Hl5T0kY 0F
0NLlNE 00WNL0A05
|d software re-
|eases wo|fenste|n 30
|nto the w||d. N||||ons of
d|g|ta| Nat|s are mown
down. 30 gam|ng |s born.
5hawn |ann|ng
re|eases Napster I.0.
N||||ons of song f||es are
(|||ega||y) down|oaded.
kecord|ng |ndustry w|nces.
ba|f-||fe 2 re|eases 5team
on an unsuspect|ng commun|ty.
N||||ons are more or |ess forced to
s|gn up.
N|crosoft re|eases
Xbox 360 ||ve Arcade.
N||||ons w||| be earned.
5ma|| pub||shers ga|n
access to |arge markets.
FORCED ENLISTMENT Half-Life 2 isnt
playable without an online account.
Digital Delivery
Downloading games isnt just for pirates anymore.
BY NICH MARAGOS, 1UP.COM
go.pcmag.com/gaming-culture
GAMING + CULTURE
www.pcmag.com APRIL 11, 2006 PC MAGAZINE 157
games from Darwinia to Rag Doll Kung
Fu popping up on the service.
XBOX LIVE ARCADE
What about consoles, where its always
been a hard world for small game devel-
opers? Until recently, there werent
many options.
In 2005, though, the unlikeliest friend
of the small-time operator stepped
forward: Microsoft. When the com-
pany debuted its new Xbox 360, one
of its most intriguing aspects was an
expanded version of the existing Xbox
Live Arcade. Arcade became a much
bigger part of the next-gen system, inte-
grated directly into the new Xbox Live
Marketplace.
Although only hard-drive equipped
Xbox 360s have storage space for the
downloadable items and games in the
Marketplace, the experiment seems to
be taking off. The real star of Arcade
has been Geomet r y Wars: Ret ro
Evolved, which has seen 45,000 paid
downloads.
Digital downloads of cheap and legal
emulated games could ll a niche that
no retail channel has, and could ensure
that yesterdays seminal games sur-
vive. The most important aspect of
the digital-delivery revolution may be
not just a change in the way games are
consumed, but one in the way they are
made. After years of ballooning budgets
and massive development teams, we
might see a revival of the spirit of the
shareware days, when it was possible to
make a game by yourself, release it into
the world, and watch it y.
PAY TO PLAY Puzzle Pirates is free, but
extra features require a subscription.

1
GRAND THEFT AUTO: VICE CITY
New options, new vehicles for the famous game.
2
GRAND THEFT AUTO III
Guns, gear, and cars. Need we say more?
3
METAL GEAR SOLID 2: SONS OF LIBERTY
Highly cinematic sequel to the original action game.
4
RESIDENT EVIL 4
Get reacquainted with an idealistic cop in a ruined city.
5
GRAND THEFT AUTO: SAN ANDREAS
Soon, therell surely be 31 avors of GTA.
6
GOD OF WAR
Deep combat with erce enemies. Scale mountain cliffs!
7
TONY HAWKS PRO SKATER 4
Possibly the best skateboarding game ever.
8
VIRTUA FIGHTER 4 EVOLUTION
Challenge a steady stream of opponents, easy and tough.
9
BURNOUT 3: TAKEDOWN
For racing gamers and adrenaline addicts.
10
NCAA FOOTBALL 2004
Captures the spirit and intensity of college football.
TOP 10 l Highest-Rated PS2 Games
ON THE
AUCTION
BLOCK
You never know what
kind of booty youll
nd on the block.
ITEM:
Yep, thats an
original Atari
Pong machine
from the 1970s.
EBAY PRICE:
$91
ITEM:
Wanna sport a
Legend of Zelda
gray T-shirt? Sure
you do.
EBAY PRICE:
$11.85
ITEM:
We found
ten Logitech
Wireless PS2
controllers.
EBAY PRICE:
$0.99
Source: Gametab.com. Ratings, out of a possible 10, are averaged from many reviews.
GOOD THINGS come
in small packages. So
reader Jeffrey Stephen-
son created the pico-
Cluster. Its a three-node
cluster with a 50-watt AT
power supply and a ve-
port switchlike three
computers all within a
6-inch cube. It has 21
LEDs that put on quite a
light show when its cal-
culating pi to eight billion
places, Jeffrey says. The
pico-Cluster also has a
fanless CPU and a Com-
pactFlash hard drive.
MOD WORLD

9.6


9.6


9.6


9.6


9.5


9.5


9.4


9.4


9.4


9.4

Heads up, Harley fans! Out of the Box Computers rst revved
its engines a couple of years ago with PC case mods inspired
by motorcycle tanks (www.thinktankpc.com). Now the com-
pany is branching out into customized, hand-painted cases
that house PCscourtesy of well-known artist Jason Prouty.
The system seen here contains an MSI MEGA 865 system
with a Pentium 4. You can provide your own wish list for what
you want on the outside of your simulated cycle tank. The
custom creations are part of the companys American Chopper
program. Prices start at $1,450, with a P4 system on board.
Fire up your own design!Sebastian Rupley
MORE ON THE WEB
For more cool products, like this dancing
and cartwheeling Robonova, head to
www.gearlog.com
A F T E R HOU R S go.pcmag.com/afterhours www.gearlog.com G E AR L OG
www.pcmag.com APRIL 11, 2006 PC MAGAZINE 159
GEARLOG
GET YOUR PC RUNNING . . .
HEAD OUT ON THE HIGHWAY
PC MAGAZINE APRIL 11, 2006 www.pcmag.com 160
WHEN ITS TIME TO CHANGE, YOUVE GOT TO REARRANGE!
Edited by Don Willmott
PC Magazine, ISSN 0888-8507, is published semi-monthly except monthly in January and July at $44.97 for one year. Ziff Davis Media Inc, 28 E. 28th St., New York, NY 10016-7940. Periodicals postage paid at New York,
NY 10016-7940 and at additional mailing ofces. POSTMASTER: Address changes to PC Magazine, P.O. Box 54070, Boulder, CO 80328-4070. The Canadian GST registration number is 865286033. Publications Mail Agree-
ment No. 40009221. Return undeliverable Canadian addresses to P.O. Box 503, R.P.O. West Beaver Creek, Richmond Hill, ON L4B 4R6, Canada. Printed in the U.S.A.
If your entry is used, well send you a PC Magazine T-shirt. Submit your entries via e-mail to backspace@ziffdavis.com
(attachments are welcome) or to Backspace, PC Magazine, 28 E. 28th St., New York, NY 10016-7940.
Ziff Davis Media Inc. shall own all property rights in the entries.
Winners this issue: Jon Austin, Paul Christensen, Norman Dotti, Mark Ericson, Eric Schnaufer, and Dick Sisson.
<<
Is there anything
you cant do with a
USB port?
<<
Another perfect combination!
<<
Computer equipment only . . .
plus one bright-orange vacuum
cleaner.
>>
You gotta wonder what this caption,
which describes a TV, said in the original
Japanese. (Google translation of Sony
Japan Web site)
>>
Among the many cool features at online magazine PingMag (www
.pingmag.jp) is a ten-step lesson on Web site development . . . demon-
strated by tiny toys.
>>
Yum! The Internet is smelling
good in Pushkar, India.
>>
The sushi was only
so-so. (Google News)
BACKSPACE

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