There have been so many new threats emerging in the form of viruses, trojans, spyware, key loggers, you name it. With the internet being available to practically almost everyone on the planet, these threats even get more and more dangerous (and smartly concealed). I’ve received more and more unsafe attachments claiming from Facebook, Twitter, and even the “Bank of America” (Mind you, I live in Australia and why would I receive a “forgot your password” email from Bank of America?). I’m already “trained” not to open questionable attachments and even learned to always check a URL correctly before clicking on them. But how many people can comfortably do this?

Kaspersky Internet Security 2010 provides an all in one solution to your computer’s security, no matter what you do. It gives you protection from viruses, spyware, spam emails, phishing sites, and hacker attacks. Preventing the harm from ever being done to your computer is always better than trying to recover your computer from it.

Kaspersky Internet Security 2010 is full of bells and whistles, but they are not there just for the show. Alas, it’s not possible to entirely cover every single piece of feature it has on just a single review post.

Just look at this screenshot from the official Kaspersky Internet Security 2010 page about what it protects you against:

Suffice to say, it covers almost every single imaginable threat out there!

KIS 2010 main menu -Click to enlarge-

Antivirus

Kaspersky Internet Security 2010 includes one of the most popular and widely recognised antivirus, Kaspersky Antivirus 2010. Kaspersky antivirus is one of my top three recommended commercial antivirus for the last few years and it hasn’t changed, if not better. The antivirus sits in the background, monitors and catches any unwanted threats in your system. The most common thing to happen is that you normally get a virus or two from an external USB flash drive. I got that very often since I’ve been plugging my flash drive in and out of different computers. You’ll be amazed by how many different viruses and trojans you can collect that way! Thankfully, every time you plug-in an external flash drive into a USB slot, Kaspersky quickly pops up a message and nags whether you want to scan the drive first before accessing it.

You can either choose a Full scan or a Quick scan from the pop-up. Very handy! Even if you ignore this, it doesn’t mean that Kaspersky will automatically set the drive to be safe. However, I’d always recommend you to quickly scan the files since it takes merely seconds in my experience.

Scanning my whole system took about 4 1/2 hours:

Firewall

Kaspersky Internet Security 2010 firewall can be set to replace the default Windows firewall or you can choose to use the Windows firewall instead.

I was having a problem earlier when I tried to install Seesmic for Windows and the installation could continue only after I turned Kaspersky Firewall off. At times, you may need to add a new application as a “trusted” application in the firewall.

Antispam

Tired of spam? Kaspersky Internet Security 2010 also includes an antispam and it works along nicely with my Microsoft Outlook 2010 Beta. The antispam will add a “spam rating” to a potential spam email such as “!! SPAM”, “?? Probable Spam”, and so on. This is done because you will be able to “train” the antispam and train it you must. I’ve had several occasions where legitimate emails were being tagged as spam.

Game mode

There is nothing more frustrating than getting killed in a multiplayer action because all of a sudden your computer starts thrashing. Turning on the game mode will make sure that the application will suspend any alerts, updates, and scans while you game. A big plus to gamers like me!

Secure Virtual Keyboard

If you normally have this dodgy feeling every time you are entering your login credentials on the net, then you’ll love this feature. The virtual keyboard allows you to securely enter your login credentials on the web and safely fight against keyboard loggers (threats that monitor your keyboard presses and steals your credentials secretly). I just wish every internet cafe has KIS 2010 installed for this very reason.

Safe Run

This is new in Kaspersky Internet Security 2010. Safe Run allows users to test new software and downloads in a sandbox (contained) environment and can be terminated safely if it poses a threat. If you are the type who likes to download and try “unheard-of” software, then Safe Run will be your best friend. The Sandbox will have its own virtual space so whatever happens in it will not compromise your system.

Kaspersky Internet Security 2010 Review Conclusion

Look, to be honest here, Kaspersky Internet Security 2010 has so many features that it may take thousands of words to actually describe, test, and review them one by one here in detail (I haven’t even mentioned and covered the Parental Control, ProActive Defense, Network Attack Blocker, and many others!)

Note this: If you are concerned about the security of your computer but don’t really understand the technical details of a security application, pick Kaspersky Internet Security 2010.

These screenshots below will definitely answer your questions whether it is worth buying Kaspersky Internet Security 2010. Here are some threats that Kaspersky caught while I was using my computer:

Have these screenshots convinced you yet? Some of these threats went through my email inbox and some were from my daily web browsing routine! If you are simply looking for a “set it and forget it” security application, look no further than Kaspersky Internet Security 2010! I highly recommend it! You can even dig down deeper through each module settings if you want to tweak the advanced configuration settings.

Kaspersky Internet Security 2010 Pros
+ Low in resource, doesn’t bog down the system.
+ Comes with one of the best antivirus out there.
+ Has so many features that protect you from every single intrusion you can name.
+ UI is not everything but it’s easy to use.
+ You can simply install and forget it.

Kaspersky Internet Security 2010 Cons
- Can be annoying when you need to approve every single application when you first run one
- You will be nagged with “Some components are disabled” and the yellow security risk warning if you disable one of the major feature (such as the firewall or the antispam).
- Might be a bit too much if you are only looking for an antivirus and a good firewall bundle. But more means better here!

Purcase Kaspersky Internet Security 2010 @kasperskyanz.com.au

Today, Microsoft has finally launched Microsoft Office 2010 Beta download, available for the public. It includes popular Office applications such as Microsoft Word 2010, Microsoft PowerPoint 2010, Microsoft Excel 2010, Microsoft Outlook 2010, and many more.

New icons, UI retouch, stability, and bugfixes seem to be main focus on this build since the Microsoft Office 2010 Technical Preview months ago.

Visit Microsoft Office 2010 Beta Official Site to download and to find out more about Office 2010.

Why everything has an "HD" tag nowadays..?

Well at least, for now. There is no “fastest” or the “most powerful” term in Technology. Things always get better, cheaper, and…smaller.

This video card actually supports up to 7680 x 1600 resolution O_o. I wonder when I’ll ever have that kind of luxury to own an LCD that big. Not that I want to anyway. Check out the press release below.

Sydney, Australia - November 19, 2009 - AMD today announced the flagship installment in the award-winning line of graphics cards, the ATI Radeon™ HD 5970, the fastest card ever created. The new ultra high-end model joins a growing list of the world’s first and only graphics cards to fully support Microsoft DirectX® 11 technology and ATI Eyefinity multi-display technology.

Designed to support the most demanding PC games at ultra-high resolutions and image quality settings, the ATI Radeon™ HD 5970 has unlocked overclocking potential, granting access to every bit of power the card has to offer through ATI Overdrive™ technology.2  Now shipping from retailers and available in the channel, the ATI Radeon™ HD 5970 also launches today in new Alienware Area-51, Area-51 ALX and Aurora desktop PCs.

Record-breaking overclocking capabilities take Dragon Platform technology to the forefront for users that demand the utmost control in performance tuning. The unrivaled overclocking capabilities of the ATI Radeon™ HD 5970 are enabled by the unique design of the card, which features advanced fan and vapor chamber technologies and a fully vented exhaust to keep the card cool and ensure overclocking headroom using ATI Overdrive™ technology.2 The formidable combination of AMD Phenom II processors, AMD 7-Series chipsets, and ATI Radeon HD graphics deliver comprehensive tuning, immersive entertainment, and outstanding value.

Enthusiasts can expand their field of view, ATI Radeon™ HD 5970, driving up to three displays at once, delivering an unmatched maximum resolution of 7680×1600 and creating an unparalleled game play experience.3 For the first time ever, ATI CrossFireX™ technology leverages the power of multiple graphics processors to deliver even more game performance in 20 of today’s popular titles when using ATI Eyefinity technology, with more to come.

The ATI Radeon™ HD 5970 graphics card delivers nearly 5 TeraFLOPS of compute power, ensuring superior performance in the latest DirectX® 11 games, as well as in previous versions of DirectX® and OpenGL titles.  With the world’s most powerful graphics core built on 40nm process technology harnessing up to 3,200 stream processors, gamers can enjoy DirectX® 11 games now, such as EA Phenomic’s BattleForge™ and S.T.A.L.K.E.R.:Call of Pripyat from GSC Game World, with many more titles on the way, including:

• Battlefield Bad Company 2 from EA DICE
• DiRT™ 2 from Codemasters, arriving December 1, 2009
• Aliens vs. Predator™ from Rebellion
• Update to The Lord of the Rings Online™ from Turbine
• Update to Dungeons and Dragons Online® Eberron Unlimited™ from Turbine

New features and functionality of ATI Stream technology allow users to harness the ATI Radeon™ HD 5970 graphics card to enhance their computing experience, helping to improve the performance of enabled media, entertainment and productivity applications.4  ATI Stream technology and the HD 5970 support both Direct Compute 11 and OpenCL industry standards for application acceleration.

Delivering full-fledged performance when needed, the ATI Radeon™ HD 5970 also leads in power efficiency by automatically powering down unused GPU resources when not in use, resulting in idle desktop power consumption as low as 42 watts.5

The ATI Radeon™ HD 5970 is supported by a wide range of add-in-board companies, including ASK, Asus, Club 3D, Diamond, Gigabyte, High Tech, MSI, Sapphire, Tul/Power Color, Visiontek and XFX.
To celebrate the launch of the ATI Radeon™ HD 5970 and to conclude a series of contests created to celebrate AMD’s 40th anniversary year, AMD is announcing the third and final contest designed to give back to AMD fans and supporters. Starting today, fans of AMD on Facebook will be able to enter to win one of 10 Microsoft Xbox 360s or one of 10 Wiis from Nintendo. One gaming system will be given away every weekday for four weeks. Full contest rules and details available online: www.amd.com/40years

“With the arrival of the ATI Radeon HD 5970, the fastest graphics card in the world, we’ve cemented AMD as the unquestioned graphics leader,” said Matt Skynner, vice president and general manager, AMD Graphics Group. “With the holiday shopping season right around the corner, the new card, coupled with the awesome power of ATI Eyefinity technology, is the ultimate setup for serious gamers.”

“The extraordinary performance of the ATI Radeon HD 5970 is a perfect match for the Alienware Area-51, Area-51 ALX and Aurora desktops,” said Frank Azor, senior product planning manager, Dell Gaming. “By offering this level of graphics capability as well as the visual and performance enhancements made possible by DirectX 11 hardware, gamers will benefit from enhanced image quality enabling an incredibly intense gaming experience”.

Seesmic for Windows is a desktop Twitter client but it is not the same as the “Seesmic Desktop”, even though they practically do the same thing. The Seesmic Desktop is an Adobe AIR application whereas Seesmic for Windows is a Windows native application. If you don’t understand what it means, it means that installing and using the new Seesmic application is better in terms of system performance and more familiar look-and-feel to a Windows user.

Seesmic for Windows is still in the Preview stage and it was announced on Microsoft’s PDC (Professional Developer Conference) by Loic Le Meur in L.A. some time earlier today.

From the Seesmic for Windows Preview release email that I got today:

Seesmic for Windows is a simple, yet powerful client application:

• Manage and posts from multiple twitter accounts
• View aggregated Home, Replies, Private and Sent columns.
• Create and save searches
• View your Twitter lists and create your own groups
• Create unlimited columns
• Enable choice of multiple image and url shortening services
• Manage notification of your messages.

It’s also optimized for Windows 7 which is a good thing:

Drag and drop to add user lists

• Sleek and Smooth User Interface
• Increased performance
• Full panel Twitter user profile
• Tabbed view of Accounts and Twitter lists

I encountered an error when I tried to install Seesmic for Windows earlier:

It turned out to be my Kaspersky Internet Security 2010 firewall. As soon as I turned the firewall off, the application could be installed and launched.

Seesmic for Windows looks fantastic on Windows 7:

click to enlarge

It also supports multiple twitter accounts:

and the Twitter Lists!! It automatically grabs your Twitter Lists from Twitter’s server. Unfortunately at this stage there’s no way to add new Lists from Seesmic for Windows yet.

You can add or remove services such as the URL shorteners:

Overall, this replaces my TweetDeck for now Somehow I never really like TweetDeck. I hope Seesmic for Windows will be updated often and perhaps has more options to play around with. If you want to give it a try, download Seesmic for Windows Preview.

As always with a non-final software release, be prepared to see a few bugs here and there:

I was playing around again with my Google Chrome just now and noticed that on the Developer Channel (version 4.0.249.0), a new “jigsaw puzzle” image appearing on the bottom right corner. There was also a notice at the bottom of the browser:

“New! Google Chrome now has extensions and bookmark sync”

Even though we’ve seen the Extensions menu before on Google Chrome, there was never a clearer indication than this, that Google Chrome Extensions’ coming is imminent!

The extensions and jigsaw puzzle link to https://chrome.google.com/extensions but at this stage, it’s just being forwarded to the Google homepage. What a bummer!

If you are already on the Developer channel, you can play around with some Google Chrome Extension samples (which are not very exciting at this stage yet):

• Google Mail Checker
• Subscribe in Feed Reader
• BuildBot monitor

It won’t be long for the official ones then. Let’s hope that it comes quicker than we thought. How to switch to Google Chrome Developer channel?