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Belkin on Tuesday is introducing a handful of gadgets designed to cut off the flow off of wasted electricity from electronic devices and to give consumers more data on home energy use.

The peripherals maker filled out its existing Conserve product line with a handheld power meter, timer, charging station, and power strip--all of which are meant to give consumers ways to lower power use at home.

The Conserve Valet is a charging spot for up to four mobile devices that cuts power to zero when electronics are fully charged. It's meant to address the reality that even when … Read more

With the enormous popularity of Apple's iPhone, more and more people are switching to Mac desktops and laptops to get the full Mac OS X experience. But as the popularity of the platform reaches unprecedented heights, Macs are beginning to be targeted by malicious attacks, often in the form of drive-by Web site attacks. This means that your Mac could download malicious code just by visiting a questionable Web site.

AVG LinkScanner for Mac (exclusive to CNET Downloads today) protects your computer from malicious threats by providing a shield against dangerous Web sites. This free program has no option … Read more

Taiwan-based Armorize knows something about keeping malware off Web sites.

Four years ago, Wayne Huang left his job researching ways to help secure the Taiwanese government's networks from attacks. He and his brother, Matt Huang, a Stanford MBA graduate, decided to commercialize the research and launched Armorize, which became an anti-malware leader in Asia.

Now the company is taking its malware expertise to the United States. This week, Armorize announced it is moving its headquarters to San Francisco while keeping most of its research and development in Taipei. Armorize also is announcing a new version of its cloud-based service … Read more

Having survived the crucible that is Apple's App Store approval process, CoPilot Live HD has become the first available iPad-specific GPS application. The app is a reworking of the iPhone version of the CoPilot Live app for iPhone, featuring a revised interface that takes better advantage of the iPad's larger screen.

The app features 2D and 3D maps of North America stored locally on the device, so users won't need to maintain a data connection while navigating from point A to B. However, the app will need to make use of the iPad's GPS antenna for … Read more

Decent-sounding records are becoming increasingly rare, so I'd like to point out the great-sounding ones that have come my way in recent months. For more good stuff, check out my previous "Top 10 must-have CDs" lists from 2009.

Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers, The Live Anthology

First, I have to admit I'm not a big TP fan, but I love this four-disc live collection culled from a database of 3,500 songs, including 169 takes of "American Girl" performed between 1980 and 2007. The tunes aren't arranged in chronological order, but the sound quality remains high from start to finish. Vocals are clear, dynamic range kicks butt, and you hear the fans whooping it up to good effect. Petty does a lot of covers, my favorites run from "Goldfinger" to the old Fleetwood Mac tune, "Oh Well."

Drive By Truckers, "Live From Austin, TX"

This show, from September 26, 2008, has something for everyone: it rocks, it smokes, and it's very easy on the ears and eyes. You can buy the CD or the CD packed with a DVD of the same show. That's what I have, and the band really does put on a terrific show. Sound is clean and clear; I don't think they mucked around with it very much, though I do prefer the CD's sound.

Owen Pallett, "Heartland"

Owen Pallett, aka Final Fantasy, isn't exactly your average rock musician. For starters he plays violin, and if you're a fan of Arcade Fire, Grizzly Bear, or Beirut, you've heard his sound. "Heartland" is an expansive work, with densely orchestrated tunes, but don't get nervous; it still appeals to an indie rock crowd. Sound quality, on CD and 45 RPM LP, is spectacularly good. You're going to see "Heartland" on a lot of best-of-2010 lists in December, but why wait?

The Doors, "Live in New York"

The Doors' "Live in New York" contains all of the Doors' performances at the Felt Forum in New York in 1970. All four shows were recently mixed and mastered by the band's longtime engineer, Bruce Botnick. Sound quality is, and not just for a 40-year-old recording, exceptional. It's very dynamic and totally vivid. This six-CD set ain't cheap, but Amazon is listing a "Live in New York" LP that'll come out in March for a lot less than half the price of the CD set. … Read more

1by1 is a no-frills audio player that lets users browse their music collections much as they would in Windows Explorer. There's not a lot to it, but we appreciated its simplicity and its unique design.

The program's interface is quite plain, with a tree-style directory on the left showing the contents of the user's computer, and a pane on the right showing selected files. Users can browse through the directory just as they would for any other file, or they can have the program search forward or backward for audio files. Despite its simplicity, the program's … Read more

Any GPS device worth its salt will come preloaded with a number of prerecorded voices for speaking turn-by-turn directions aloud. But how many words does your GPS device know; what if you don't like any of them; or what if your language isn't available? Traditionally, you'd be stuck searching for and purchasing professionally recorded voice packages, but if you own a Garmin Nuvi, you can use a free application from Garmin called Voice Studio to record your own voice prompts. Here's how it's done.

Before you get started, you'll need a PC running Windows … Read more

A lawsuit filed in California on Thursday alleges that a fatal crash in which a Toyota Camry accelerated out of control was caused by faulty electronics.

The lawsuit is centered on Toyota's "drive by wire" system, which is the technology underlying the electronic throttle control, the alleged cause of the uncontrolled acceleration cited in the lawsuit. That is a separate issue from the mechanical accelerator pedal problems that Toyota is addressing with its massive recall.

The suit claims that the crash killed Upland, Calif., resident Noriko Uno, 66, when her Camry suddenly accelerated to 100 miles per … Read more

LAS VEGAS--Even with the advent of robotic text-to-speech turn-by-turn directions, I still really enjoy playing with the different prerecorded voices on the GPS devices that I test. There's something about getting directions in a funny accent that's just comforting to me, which is why Garmin's new Voice Studio software is so intriguing.

The downloadable software will allow users to record and upload their own voice prompts to compatible Nuvi GPS devices, so that they can hear turn-by-turn directions in their own voices. The software guides users through recording replacements for the 65 words and phrases that the … Read more