Free Software

At first glance, Screen2EXE seems much like any other free screen recorder. Set the program to record your desktop activity, edit the results, and save them as a video, ready to share with others. No great surprises.

Spend some time exploring what Screen2EXE has to offer, though, and you’ll uncover an array of powerful features.

BillP Studios has released WinPatrol 30.1.2014, the "Second Release" of the 2014 version of its snapshot-based security tool. The new build contains a number of minor tweaks and refinements over the first release, which was billed as a "preview" when it debuted last month.

Version 30.1.2014 opens by improving the setup file to provide the user with more helpful information and tips on using WinPatrol that are displayed during the installation process.

Google has updated its cross-platform browser with the release of Google Chrome 33 FINAL. The new release proves controversial as Google tightens control over the browser to the anger of some users.

In terms of new features, version 33 is rather disappointing -- despite debuting in the beta channel a few weeks ago, Google Now notifications have yet to make their way across to the stable channel. In fact, version 33 is little more than a bug-fix release, with 28 security fixes the only notable highlight.

Saving a document as a PDF has several advantages, in particular that it’ll be accessible on just about every device and platform around.

If you need to control exactly who can access your file, though, and what they can do with it, then you might be interested in Free PDF Protector.

Scalable Vector Graphics is a powerful image format with support for scripting, filters, animation, interactivity and more. But it’s also XML-based, and not exactly efficient: SVG file sizes can be much larger than you expect, an issue if you’re putting them online.

SVG Cleaner is an open source tool which optimizes SVG images, stripping out unnecessary elements and attributes, compressing whatever’s left, and usually making a real difference to their file size.

When it comes to playing video on your PC or mobile, the choices are vast and sometimes confusing. Do you restrict yourself to access from one device, or do you manually transfer media between devices as and when it’s required? Or do you invest in some cloud-based solution that gives you access wherever you have an internet connection?

You could try and combine a number of different solutions, or you could take a closer look at RealPlayer Cloud 17 and RealPlayer Cloud for Mobile, which offers a solution to all three scenarios in one app.

BitTorrent has announced the availability of uTorrent 3.4, the latest edition of its popular file-sharing tool.

The most obvious change is the (optional) integration of BitTorrent Bundle. Click in the left-hand sidebar and you can browse licensed content from Moby, Madonna and more, downloading whatever you like for free (although you’ll probably need to provide your email address).

Bookmarks, history, cookies, settings -- browsers store a great deal of valuable data, and backing this up occasionally could be a very good idea. But it’s not easy, as most browsers don’t provide any tools to help.

Hekasoft Backup and Restore provides a simple answer. It’s a straightforward free tool which makes it easy to back up and restore user profiles for all the main browsers, most of the minor ones, and a few other packages as well.

The FlightGear team has announced the availability of FlightGear 3.0, the latest edition of its powerful open source flight simulator.

A host of scenery enhancements mean the program looks better than ever. Smarter atmosphere rendering delivers more natural haze and fog, a global sea map ensures that ocean color now changes with depth, there are improved random building textures, and the new Scenery 2.0 delivers improved road and terrain data.

One small but welcome addition to Windows 8 is its support for ISO files. Right-click your image, select Mount, and it’s immediately available as a virtual drive, which you can browse, read or write like any other.

This is useful enough, but it’s a little basic. If you’d like more control, and support for many more file formats, then you might prefer the free Pismo File Mount Audit Package (PFMAP).

Panda Security has released Panda Cloud Antivirus Beta 2.9, a major revision of its popular cloud-based antivirus tool for Windows PCs.

The beta -- which will become version 3.0 on its final release -- includes a redesigned user interface based along Windows 8 lines as well as a new Wi-Fi Monitor module, and comes with the promise of improved protection and performance.

Installing a good antivirus package will protect you from most threats, but there are no guarantees. It’s always wise to have one or two "second opinion" tools around, just to help out if you think your system has been infected.

CrowdInspect is a portable tool which uses VirusTotal, Web of Trust and Team Cymru’s Malware Hash Registry to reveal (but not remove) malware which is currently active on your network.

PNG is an excellent graphics format which can achieve very good compression rates. We’ve regularly covered tools which can optimize them still further, though -- including PNGOptimizer, just last month -- and PNGmini is the latest contender.

The program installs easily (no adware), and looks great. There’s a sleek, black interface, flat buttons, red status bar and highlighting, while menus slide out smoothly with a click. It manages to be modern, without simply copying anything else.

Many people say we’re now living in a "post-PC world". The desktop is dead, they claim, or at least on the way out, while touch is the future. And all this might suggest that command line tools are entirely irrelevant, and best forgotten.

If you need to automate PC tasks, though, for yourself or others, then a little command line knowledge can still save you a vast amount of time. Especially if you extend the regular DOS commands with the cross-platform Swiss File Knife.

WindowsX has updated both of its skinning tools, Windows 8 UX Pack 8.0 for PCs running Windows 7, and Windows 8 Transformation Pack 8.0 for earlier versions of Windows, including XP.

The latest version of the tools, which aim to give users the Windows 8 look and feel in earlier versions of Windows, have been updated to better reflect the changes introduced in Windows 8.1 as well as provide a number of other tweaks and bug fixes.