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Genie Timeline Free is designed to back up the stuff you want it to save and make it easy to retrieve it. It archives desktop files and folders, My Documents, e-mail, bookmarks, videos, music, pictures, Office files, and financial files. It's intended to be a set-and-forget solution for safeguarding your system. However, the freeware disables the critical Disaster Recovery feature that lets you recover your system after a disk failure or formatting. BlackBerry and iPhone/iPad/iPod also require a paid upgrade.

During its installation process, Genie Timeline asked for our full name and e-mail address, stating plainly that … Read more

I admit it. I enjoy a good firmware upgrade.

There's nothing like a software fix to make you feel better about your device, especially if it adds new features while eliminating bugs. But not every firmware upgrade is good. Sometimes things go horribly wrong. Which is what happened recently when I updated Jawbone's little Jambox Bluetooth speaker to version 2.0.

The update gave me something called LiveAudio, a "technological breakthrough" that would let me experience my music, games, video "like never before"--as if I was, "on stage, in the action, hearing it live." Furthermore, this immersive, three-dimensional listening experience brought "incredible depth, detail, and unprecedented spatial realism to everything from mp3s to special binaural recordings."

Based on the promo material, I expected a lot; I wanted in on the 2.0 LiveAudio action. Wanted it bad. … Read more

At first, 360Amigo System Speedup Free seemed to be of the more-tease-than-tool school of free system cleaners, and certainly its developers would like you to buy their premium package. But the free tool proved to be a good performer that will help many users keep their PCs running smooth and safe.

As with so many freeware versions of premium system utilities, 360Amigo's interface is stylish and heavy on the graphics and captions that explain what each feature does. The program consists of a system cleaner and a system optimizer, with a number of extra utilities, though some of the … Read more

One of the first things that any new Windows user learns is Control-Alt-Delete, the keyboard shortcut that brings up the Windows Task Manager and allows users to quit unresponsive programs and processes. The Task Manager is good for more than that, though; it can also provide valuable information about what's using up your memory or bandwidth. Auslogics Task Manager is a variation that provides even more information than the native Windows application. It's similar enough to be understood by non-expert users, but geekier sorts will find it useful as well.

Auslogics Task Manager has an attractive interface, with … Read more

Advanced Registry Clear is a free tool that scans the Windows Registry for invalid, leftover, and junk entries and cleans them out when you tell it to. It's designed to be easy enough for beginners and infrequent PC users yet provides enough information about the files it targets for advanced users to choose which files to clean and which to leave. However, as with many such tools, the "free" part only goes so far.

Advanced Registry Clear's colorful, easy-to-navigate interface is fairly typical of free system cleaners based on premium products, with a large Scan button … Read more

Tray Dictionary is a free desktop dictionary tool based on the Encarta online dictionary. With it you can look up words quickly without having to open an online dictionary site. It also allows quick right-click lookups in Internet Explorer.

We opened Tray Dictionary's Start Menu folder and clicked the program icon to open its System Tray interface, which is anchored by a dictionary icon. Clicking this icon called up a tiny search field for quick lookups. Since we park the Windows taskbar on the right edge of our wide-screen desktop, it covered Tray Dictionary's search button, and we … Read more

Matching puzzle games have become fairly ubiquitous, with a lot of themes employed to jazz up what is typically just the task of getting three or more jewels (or whatever) of the same color in a row and clearing them from the board. Jewel Quest 2 plants this popular puzzle format within some kind of seafaring adventure motif. We're not entirely clear what it is--the game's font is too small to be legible--but the puzzle itself remains the same addictive time-waster it always has been.

In order to play Jewel Quest 2, users must first download the Free … Read more

We should all know the dangers of browsing the Web without any protection. That's why it's best to take the proper precautions. One way to do that is to hide your IP address from prying eyes. Surf Anonymous Free offers a way to disguise your IP address while you browse. It worked as promised, though our browsing performance suffered, often with connections that timed out.

The program's user interface is basic and to the point. Your real IP address appears in the small window, and from there, you have two options: Hide IP and Select Fake Location. … Read more

You're probably familiar with online data storage sites that promise to store your critical data securely, but do you really believe your data is totally safe when it's in someone else's hands and online, too? And are you sure that your computer's Internet connection is totally secure from intrusion and even attack? Common sense suggests the answer to both questions is "No," and that's the rationale behind MyInfosafe. It creates an encrypted, password-protected "personal data warehouse" that stores your important documents and data securely in your PC, not online. It does … Read more