Articles about Software

Do you really need separate applications to cover your design needs, whether photo editing, digital art or simple design tasks like producing flyers and scrapbooks? For those who want everything in one package, Xara has the answer.

Xara Photo & Graphic Designer can’t compete with the very best specialist tools like Photoshop, but it’s certainly a match for most. And that’s even after you realize that it’s effectively bundling two or three design packages in one for a very price. And for most people that will be enough.

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After almost 20 years developing multimedia software, it’s no surprise that CyberLink has some impressive products. But they can seem expensive. PowerDVD is definitely a versatile and feature-packed media player, but if you’re used to freeware then its $99.95 list price might send you elsewhere.

Fortunately CyberLink’s Media Suite 12 Ultimate offers a more value-for-money option, providing a big chunk of the CyberLink range -- a total of fifteen products -- for as little as $139.95.

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Belight Software has released Printworks 1.0 for Mac. Launching with a discounted price of $29.99 (normally $49.99), the app is a fully fledged desktop publishing and design tool aimed at the home and small business market.

The app’s main appeal is that it manages to wrap up all the core functionality required for designing a wide range of documents -- including flyers, newsletters and greetings cards -- in a user interface that’s simple to grasp and places all the key tools at the user’s fingertips.

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Kaspersky Internet Security 2015 is a capable product which delivers everything you’d expect from a security suite: antivirus, firewall, browsing protection, a spam filter and more. The technology scores highly with the independent testing labs, too, so we were interested to see what the new build had to offer.

Installation was quick and easy. Unlike some of the competition, you’re not forced to remove anything else vaguely security-related: Kaspersky warns you about possible conflicts, but whether you uninstall any problem programs is up to you.

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CyberLink has announced the release of CyberLink Media Suite 12, its vast and comprehensive collection of playback, editing and convent creation tools.

Highlights include new support for creating and playing back UltraHD 4K Video. The suite can now also play and convert H.265 content, and CyberLink claims new 64-bit video and photo editing engines deliver 3x faster rendering speed over the 32-bit versions.

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Xara Group has announced the release of Xara Photo & Graphic Designer 10, the latest incarnation of its all-in-one editing, illustration and design tool.

Top of the new features list is the inclusion of Magic Bullet PhotoLooks 2.0, a powerful plugin (sold separately for $199 as recently as 2012) which offers 100+ present lighting and color effects.

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SonicoMobile has launched iTranslate for Mac 1.0, a new addition to its stable of translation tools that includes iOS and Windows 8.

iTranslate allows users to quickly and easily translate words, sentences and phrases between 80 different languages, offering both written and spoken translations for text entered.

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Bitdefender has announced the release of its 2015 range, including Bitdefender Antivirus Plus 2015, Bitdefender Internet Security 2015, and the do-everything Bitdefender Total Security 2015.

The new builds add little to Bitdefender’s core security abilities, instead introducing what the company calls "OneClick Security", a strong focus on simplicity and ease of use.

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Symantec has unveiled the first public betas of its forthcoming Norton security products. Norton Security 2015 Beta and Norton Security with Backup 2015 Beta reveal the company’s attempt to harmonize its two main security products.

Both products sport a redesigned user interface based on the old Norton 360 product, plus sport a number of major new protection and performance improvements.

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Kaspersky Labs has announced its updated product range for home users, including Kaspersky Anti-Virus 2015 ($59.95) and Kaspersky Internet Security 2015 (also $59.95, 3 PCs, 1 year: offer expires 25th August 2014).

Both products now include an extra layer of protection from Cryptolocker-type ransomware. Kaspersky’s System Watcher now looks out for suspect processes trying to modify user files, and immediately backs up the originals. If the package finds the process was malicious then not only will the malware be removed, but you’ll get your documents back, too (or any tampered with in this session, anyway – backups are deleted when the program closes down).

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We're all familiar with software licenses. It's the bit you ignore when installing a new program, right? But what's less understood is the difficulty they cause for businesses. New research by IDC sponsored by Flexera looks at the latest trends in software licensing, virtualization and the compliance issues involved.

The report points out that the software license supply chain is one of the most opaque, difficult to understand and complex to manage. As a result, the relationship between application producer and customer has often suffered in the past.

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Backup specialist Acronis has unveiled Acronis True Image for Mac 1.0, a brand new build of its well-known drive imaging software for Macs running OS X 10.8 or later.

The new release is described by Acronis as offering "dual-protection data backup" for Mac, a reference to its ability to back up to both local drives -- including network attached devices -- and the cloud through its own Acronis Cloud service.

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When we first looked at AOMEI Data Backuper in January 2013 it was a capable free image backup tool with some limitations -- no scheduler -- but a lot of promise. Now at version 2.x , and renamed to AOMEI Backupper Standard, is the program worth considering again? We checked it out.

Installation remains quick and easy. It’s the free edition of a commercial product, but there’s no adware, no nag screens, no unmarked functions which display annoying "can’t use this until you pay" messages. Only an unobtrusive "Upgrade" link on the main page reminds you there are other options available.

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Emsisoft has released Emsisoft Anti-Malware 9.0, a brand new version of its dual-engine anti-malware tool for Windows users. Version 9.0 sports a major facelift, improved performance and "hundreds of detail improvements" for better usability.

To celebrate the release, users have a nine-day window in which to purchase 12 month’s protection for the special introductory price of just $9.99, a saving of 75 percent on the usual MSRP.

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Toronto security firm AgileBits has completed its round of major updates to its secure password storage service with the release of 1Password for Windows 4.0. With version 4, AgileBits has revamped the Windows build, significantly closing the feature-set gap between it and the more fully developed Mac version.

Highlights of this release include tighter security, a number of significant new features and the promise of vastly improved performance, and follow on from the recent Android update.

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