The free backup utility EASEUS Todo Backup Home has been updated to version 2.5, seeing the addition of a number of important new features. What started life as a fairly simple disk imaging tool has gradually evolved into a complete backup solution suitable for use by experts and beginners alike. As backing up data is a task that no one can claim to enjoy, anything that helps to simplify the process is to be welcomed, and Todo Backup Home may be just the tool you have been looking for.

Version 2 of the program saw a move to image-only backups to file and folder based backups, and added the option to add to backup incrementally to help speed things up. We took a look at this version of Todo Backup at the end of 2010. New in version 2.5 is the ability to create incremental backups of not only files and folders, but also entire disk and partition backups.

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After a quiet start to the week, today saw a rush of new releases and updates to popular software. This week Google Chrome 11 FINAL was introduced to the stable channel. The primary new feature is the addition of speech support, plus a brand new flatter icon. Exciting times. Still, it's good to see healthy competition between the four primary web browsers.

Paragon Software released Hard Disk Manager 11 Professional, and it's our disk management and maintenance suite of choice. Everything you need to backup, copy, partition, restore or manage your drive or disk partition. There's also cheaper Hard Disk Manager 2011 Suite. If you only need to backup your files, EASEUS ToDo Backup 2.5 is a simple free backup tool.

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Security firm BitDefender's report for Q1-2011 highlighted autorun-based exploits as one of the most exploited PC security vulnerabilities. But there's no need to panic, just yet. The company has conveniently just released a free USB Immunizer tool that promises to address the issue.

The program is easy to use, essentially just creating an Autorun.inf folder on your chosen drive, which in turn contains additional files and a hidden folder. So if you plug the device into an infected PC, and something attempts to write a new Autorun.inf file, then it won't be able to do so. Or, at least, that's the plan.

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Surely everyone likes the idea of saving money -- and if it can be coupled with doing something that might help to save the planet, so much the better. It is this philosophy that helps to explain the success of energy saving light bulbs; as well as helping to reduce energy consumption, and, therefore, carbon production; they also help to reduce electricity bills. The same philosophy may help the energy-saving app Granola to succeed.

Despite the name, this is not an app that has been designed to appeal solely to the crunchy granola brigade. The notion of being green and helping to do one's bit for the environment is universally appealing, particularly if it involves very little effort. Granola makes it as easy as it can possibly be to reduce the energy consumption of your computer.

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CyberLink's PowerDVD has long been many people's DVD and Blu-ray player of choice. But that's no longer enough for CyberLink, which boasts that PowerDVD 11 "is the world's leading universal media player for the PC", so powerful that it can "play any media format, from any source." Universal media player? Any media format? Big claims, then, but has CyberLink delivered? We took PowerDVD 11 for a spin in an effort to find out.

The interface hasn't changed too much, with simple tabs allowing you to play particular content types. And the core DVD and Blu-ray functionality is also similar to PowerDVD 10, though there are a few useful additions dotted throughout the package. The program doesn't only play DVDs, Blu-ray and Blu-ray 3D discs, for instance: it can now also handle recorded 3D TV.

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Earlier this week, Google updated its popular web browser Chrome to version 11. The latest stable release, which sports a new "flattened" version of the program icon, has one major headline feature: support for text-to-speech in supported web pages. This new feature, designed for those who have difficulty using keyboards, is based on HTML5 technology -- and works on web pages where a microphone icon has been embedded into a text or form field. It currently only supports English as a language.

The feature works by the user clicking the microphone icon before speaking into their mic. Chrome then converts this into text and pastes it into the field. Supported websites are currently thin on the ground, but it can be tested at HTML Rocks or by selecting English as the "From" language at Google Translate.

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A huge percentage of home computer users have a small network setup, and the same is certainly true for many small businesses. Setting up a network means that it is possible to share files and resources such as an Internet connection between multiple computers, but it is vitally important to keep an eye on how bandwidth is being used to ensure the best possible performance and to eliminate bottlenecks. Rubbernet is a network monitoring tool that enables you to do just that with your Mac.

The app can be used in a variety of ways, but at its most basic it can be used to monitor which applications are making use of your network connection. This can be useful when it comes to analyzing network performance, but also acts as a useful security tool as you will be able to see the activity of unknown applications.

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Paragon's Hard Disk Manager Professional has long been one of the most comprehensive collection of hard drive tools around. The new version 11 extends even further, though, making it straightforward to manage even more types of drives.

Plug one of the new 3TB drives into an XP system, for instance, and normally you'd find you can only use the first 2.2TB. Hard Disk Manager 11 Professional includes a GPT Loader, though, that will give you complete access to the full capacity of the drive. The program can now work with Apple HFS+ formatted partitions, too, allowing you to create, format and resize them to suit your needs (and you get read-only access from Windows systems, too).

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CheckPoint Software has introduced a new member of its ZoneAlarm product family. ZoneAlarm SocialGuard has a narrow focus: its sole aim is to monitor children's Facebook accounts in order to alert parents to suspicious activities such as cyberbullying, Internet grooming and inappropriate content.

SocialGuard works alongside existing security software, including ZoneAlarm's own free firewall software, to provide real-time alerts should potentially dangerous activity be detected on up to five monitored Facebook accounts. The parent can then review the alert and take whatever action he or she deems to be appropriate.

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TweetDeck, the popular cross-platform Twitter client, has been reborn for the iPhone. While it is quite common for an app to undergo makeovers and updates, TweetDeck has been completely rebuilt from the ground up. This is a serious redesign rather than a simple update, and there is a great deal to look forward to in the new app.

One of the most interesting and innovative new features of TweetDeck 2 is the new navigational gestures that are supported. Even on the iPhone's limited screen, the swiping motion used to view tweets, view tweeter details and discover new people to follow works incredibly well.

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Hot on the heels of its iPhone app, SugarSync Inc has released a new mobile Android version of its SugarSync online backup application for Windows and Mac. SugarSync for Android sports AutoSync technology, which makes it simple and easy to back up and synchronize content on your Android phone with your computer without having to plug it in.

SugarSync offers online backup, sync and file-sharing for PCs, Macs and mobile devices. A free 5GB account is available, or users can upgrade to one of a number of paid-for plans, with prices starting at $49.99 a year (or $4.99 a month) for 30GB storage space.

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The game-console area on the Endpoint spectrum is a place I rarely visit, but Sony's huge PlayStation Network outage misstep has finally caught my attention. What is this company thinking?

Letting the PlayStation Network go down for five days with no resolution in sight, or even indication when there might be one, is sorely trying the nerves of the 70 million PSN users.

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Troubleshooting software issues can be difficult, as applications rarely provide enough information on what they're doing. If you're lucky, you might get a helpful error message that explains a particular problem, but all too often you're left guessing, or trying to use a technical tool like Process Explorer to try and figure out what's going on.

Some applications, however, do send useful information to the Debug device that describes exactly what they're doing in many key situations. This is intended to help the developer troubleshoot problems, and if there's an issue, he can run a debugger on his system and immediately see what's going on. But regular users can see these messages, too -- and all it takes is a free copy of DebugView.

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iObit has released version 4 of its flagship PC maintenance and optimization tool, Advanced SystemCare. The program comprises a number of system maintenance, cleaning, repair and optimization modules, and version 4 introduces a number of new components, including Disk Scan and Vulnerability Fix, plus a redesigned interface.

Version 4 opens with a greatly simplified user interface, designed to help the novice quickly get his or her PC optimized via Quick Clean and Deep Clean options. An enhanced Turbo Boost module is capable of disabling more unnecessary background services to reclaim precious system resources and speed up the computer.

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Some malware infections are straightforward. They're known threats, cause little damage, and your regular antivirus engine can detect and remove them in seconds: easy. Other situations can be a little more complicated, though. Maybe you've run into a brand new threat that your security package doesn't recognize. Some malware will hijack Windows settings, perhaps disabling Task Manager or the Registry editor. Solving an issue like this may require some specialist help from a tool like Hijack Hunter.

Just launch this handy free portable utility, click "Scan," and it'll crawl all over your system looking for anything that might be suspicious. There are no signatures involved here, the program is purely highlighting items that seem interesting or out of the ordinary (which is why it might be able to pick up even previously undiscovered threats).

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