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Web browsers and bandwidth feel the pinch as online video formats get better and better (and bigger and bigger, too). SpeedBit's Free Video Accelerator for YouTube is designed to work with your Web browser to improve how it downloads and plays online video, especially high-quality formats streamed over broadband connections. It buffers and smooths audio and video playback and reduces or eliminates freezing, crashing, dropouts, and distortion. It's freeware, though a premium upgrade adds HD playback, iTunes acceleration, and automatic setup.

SpeedBit's setup wizard lets you choose between installing the freeware and the shareware version, which includes … Read more

Process Blocker is a simple utility that lets you block access to specific programs or processes. If you need to keep children or employees off of chat, solitaire, and other time-wasters, this is an easy solution. It's also an effective way to block some types of malware while you figure out a more permanent way of dealing with the attack.

Process Blocker has a simple interface that's easy to navigate. The blocked applications list displays a list of everything that the program has been set to disable; to add to the list, click the Add button and then … Read more

If you happen to be a Windows XP, Windows Vista, or Windows 7 user, you can implement tweaks to system areas and applications such as Windows, Internet Explorer, and Windows Media Player by using a single tool. Tweak Me from Wecode is a very easy-to-use, free tool that provides options for tweaking these areas and improving your computer's overall performance.

Tweak Me requires no installation, but it does require Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5 or higher. You simply run the program, choose your preferred language, go over the list of tweaks, and tick those that you want to apply. … Read more

Most Windows users know that you can right-click on any file to view its properties, such as its file type, size, location, and dates that it was created, modified, and last accessed. If you wish the Windows properties menu included more information, try MediaInfo Lite. While it doesn't display full metadata, it does let you quickly access a little more information about your files, especially videos.

Once installed, MediaInfo Lite can be run as a standalone program or accessed via the context menu. We tried the program with several image files, and it displayed the file size and format, … Read more

When you pull out one of your spiral-bound notebooks, do they all come out at once? And not in a good way, but snared by the dangling ends of their spiral bindings? If so, try KeepNote, a simple but effective tool for saving and using notes for class, lab, meetings, papers, accounts, journals, and more as XML or HTML files. You can insert or attach images, spreadsheets, and other files, too. KeepNote offers a lot of flexibility, but it leaves out bells and whistles like contact managers, task schedulers, and other distractions from the job at hand. Its main job … Read more

Facebook is everywhere these days, we hear, but it really only exists inside your browser. If that browser happens to be Google Chrome, you're in luck: BuildAGadget's Facebook Dashboard Extension makes it easier than ever to access the world's largest and most popular social networking site. You can instantly check messages, update your status, and post likes and comments, even while you're doing other things.

After downloading and installing this extension, we were prompted to sign in to Facebook via the extension's Chrome page, with an option to stay signed in. When we'd logged … Read more

Picnik is a great online image-editing tool that makes it easy to make basic tweaks to your photos. The Picnik extension from Google Chrome seems like a great idea at first glance, providing a way for users to quickly snag images from the Internet and start editing them in Picnik. Unfortunately, the add-on doesn't quite work as it should.

Picnik installs easily in Chrome and appears as an icon to the right of the address bar. When the icon is clicked, a menu with three options appears: Go to Picnik, Send the Visible Page to Picnic, or Pick an … Read more

Voice search is improving all the time, and Google brings the best we've seen to date. Its stellar iPhone app uses the accelerometer to activate search. When you hear a beep after lifting the phone to your ear, start speaking your search term. The accuracy of the listening software combined with the MyLocation feature brings (mostly) spot-on search results that are localized to your whereabouts. As with versions of the Google Mobile App on other mobile platforms, this one also includes a tab of shortcuts to other Google services, including Talk, Reader, News, and Photos (Picasa Web).

While the … Read more

It used to be that creating PDFs required a big, expensive program like Adobe Acrobat. Nowadays, PDF creators are a dime a dozen, and they range from the bare bones to the feature-packed. 7-PDF Maker is a simple program that makes quick work of PDF creation, but we can't say that anything about it really sets it apart from the crowd.

The program's interface is quite plain, just a big gray box with tabs for settings and security. Most file conversion programs follow a certain series of steps; typically you choose the file you want to convert, adjust … Read more