2.5

Duplicate files can take up a lot of valuable space on your hard drive, and they accumulate all too quickly when you frequently download, import, edit, and rename numerous files. Duplicate Commander is a simple utility that can help you identify and delete duplicate files. It has more features than some similar programs we've encountered, making it appropriate for both novices and more advanced users.

Duplicate Commander has a plain interface, and the first time the program is launched a pop-up instructs users to click the Search button to get started. We selected a folder that we wanted to … Read more

The WD My Passport, the first-ever 2TB portable drive WD introduced last week, turned out to be pretty impressive.

Despite the fact that it offers the top capacity for 2.5-inch-based drives that use the current perpendicular recording technology, the drive is also compact and light. In fact, it's more compact than the My Passport Studio that offers just half of its storage space.

Originally, it was predicted that for 2.5-inch internal drives -- those housed inside portable drives like the new My Passport -- to reach 2TB, a new recording technology would be required. WD's My … Read more

Hitachi Global Storage Technologies and Western Digital (WD) announced today a mutual and definitive agreement of property divesting between the two.

Under the agreement, Toshiba will acquire from WD manufacturing and related intellectual property for 3.5-inch hard drives (HDDs), used in desktop PCs and consumer applications, and near-line HDDs for server applications. Near-line storage is a type of data storage supporting larger capacity and with higher reliability than HDDs for desktop PC applications.

"The purchase of part of Western Digital's 3.5-inch HDD manufacturing equipment and with it the capability to produce 3.5-inch HDDs for desktop … Read more

Hitachi GST announced today that it's now shipping the Travelstar Z7K500 hard drive. The company says this is the first low-profile (7mm) 2.5-inch hard drive that spins at 7,200rpm, supports SATA 3 (6Gbps), features 32MB of cache, and can handle shock up to 400G.

The new drive uses only one platter and offers up to 500GB, meaning it has a data density of 626 gigabits per square inch. Despite being much thinner, the Z7K500 drive supports standard power and data connectors and can replace existing 9.5mm standard 2.5-inch hard drives, as well as working in … Read more

Speak now, or forever hold your chance to win this week's Crave giveaway. The prize: Nuance's Dragon Dictate 2.5 for Mac. The speech recognition software boasts some enhancements over earlier versions, including full support for Microsoft Word 2011 and new Facebook- and Twitter-sharing capabilities.

Dragon Dictate 2.5 also takes advantage of the recently introduced Dragon Remote Mic App, a free application that lets you use an iPhone, iPod Touch, or iPad as a wireless microphone for Dragon via Wi-Fi.

Normally, Dragon Dictate 2.5 would cost you $179.99, but you have the chance to get it for nada, nothing, zip, zilch. So how do you go about snagging this week's freebie? There are a few rules, so please take a moment to stop talking and read them carefully. … Read more

Registry cleaners always make us a little nervous; too often they contain entirely too little information about what they're doing and the potential risks involved in tinkering with the registry. Occasionally we encounter registry cleaners that do a particularly good job of helping users make wise decisions about their use, but unfortunately Genuine Registry Doctor is not such a program.

Genuine Registry Doctor opened and immediately began scanning before we had a chance to even realize what was going on. When the scan was done it listed the number of problems found in each of four categories--Registry Clean, Privacy … Read more

People sometimes don't exercise the best judgment when exchanging personal photos and messages. Human nature being what it is, the answer isn't to stop doing it, but rather to use software to do a better job of hiding it. Our Secret is a free tool that lets you attach, hide, and unhide images, videos, songs, and other files to send to "that special someone" who has the password to unhide the files. While it seems to be the perfect solution for classroom note-passing, it can hide and unhide any private or sensitive files or messages. But … Read more

Building a vocabulary is an important part of learning a foreign language (or learning more about your own language) yet it can be difficult for students to get the practice and reinforcement they need to make new words stick. Lingoversity is a language-learning tool that focuses on building vocabularies. It uses nontraditional learning methods designed to stimulate students into learning instead of simply repeating lessons. It can create voice-supported personal vocabularies, lessons, and podcasts. While its technology is unique, it's also somewhat less than intuitive to use, which compromises its effectiveness.

Lingoversity's startup procedure could use some work; … Read more

As passwords have gotten more secure, they've also gotten increasingly complex and harder to remember. As a result, a crop of password-management programs has sprung up to help users keep track of their passwords without resorting to sticky notes on the sides of their monitors. Easy Password Keeper is a very simple, and not particularly intuitive, option for this task. It's not awful, but we've seen other programs that are both easier to use and more secure.

The program's interface is somewhat sparse, with a tree hierarchy down the left side with categories for passwords, Web … Read more