Detection is undoubtedly an important factor, but it is not the sole criteria by which you should judge an antivirus. A good detection rate and strong self-protection features should ensure that an antivirus is able to keep any malware at bay. But, there may be occasions when you have already been infected by a malware (possibly due to your carelessness). In such cases the security product’s cleaning abilities become absolutely vital.

Last year, Anti-malware.com had tested the cleaning abilities of all the major antivirus products. Dr. Web was the surprise winner. The only other antiviruses which performed commendably were Kaspersky and Avast. This year, AV-Comparatives.org has performed a similar test. Av-comparatives used 10 malwares – all of which were detected by all the participating antivirus products. G-Data – which was the best performer in detection comparatives, failed miserably when it came to cleaning up an already messed up system. Avira Antivir’s performance was also disappointing. In fact several well-known antiviruses performed poorly. ESET NOD 32, Avast, AVG and McAfee produced extremely mediocre results. Like last time, Kaspersky managed to remove most of the malware that was thrown at it. However, the best of the pack were Microsoft Security Essentials, Norton and e-Scan. Microsoft Security Essentials was the surprise package. Microsoft seems to have done a commendable job with Security Essentials, which is shaping up to be a big improvement over One Care. In a recent test conducted by AV-Test.org, Microsoft managed to detect 98% of the 545k malware samples used.

If you suspect that you have already been infected and are looking for a new antivirus to fix your system, it makes sense to choose an antivirus which performed well in this test. Microsoft Security Essentials would be a good first choice since it is free, simple, light weight and gets the job done. In case that doesn’t work try your luck with Norton. You can download an extended trial of Norton Antivirus from here.

Cameroid includes 36 different effects – from the mundane like photo frame to bizarre like alien spaceship and Mona Lisa. In order to use Cameroid, all you need is a web cam and a browser with Flash plug-in installed. The effects are grouped into four categories – Filter, Distort, Scenes and Frames. Using Cameroid is as simple as selecting an effect and clicking on the camera icon.

Once you have snapped an image, you can save it in the public Cameroid gallery (requires registration), download it as a JPG file or print it. Cameroid is similar to Apple Photobooth and Cheese. However, its biggest advantage is that it doesn’t require any special software (which also makes it multi-platform). It’s the easiest way to create and share groovy head shots.

Once you are done, let me know posting a comment below. If you participate via twitter you must post a link to the status update. If you participate by subscribing to my newsletter, you must post a comment using the same e-mail address. I will be giving away 7 invites on a first come, first serve basis (judged based on the time of submmission of comment). Yes, that’s right. You don’t have to wait for a week or pin your hopes on a lucky draw.

Legally or illegally, most of the popular music videos end up on YouTube soon after its release (sometimes even before their official release). Tech Dreams has created a wonderful mashup of YouTube and Apple iTunes Top Songs.

This mashup utilises iTunes RSS feed to fetch the top 10 songs (for the current week) from iTunes and generates a playlist of YouTube videos of those songs. To make things even more fabulous, Tech Dream offers separate playlists for different countries. Currently supported countries are USA, UK, Australia, Austria, Canada, Germany, Belgium, France, Italy, Japan, Netherlands, New Zealand and Sweden. Gopinath – the developer of this mashup also promises support for more countries (which are not covered by iTunes) soon. Support for Indian Music videos (Hindi, Tamil and Telegu) is on the cards.

Some of the songs have grainy videos, while few have only music but no video. However, the service works flawlessly in most of the cases. A majority of the videos are either HQ or HD. The other minor issue is that the layout breaks in Opera. On the whole, Tech Dreams Music aggregator is a simple yet brilliant service. It saves music aficionados the trouble of manually searching YouTube and allows them to enjoy the latest chartbusters for free.

There are 12 names in the list because akshayms and Anil Thomas (who won 2 entries for participating using both methods) featured in the top 10 twice. I have already nominated all the winners for Google Wave invites. Google doesn’t immediately send invites to those who are nominated. In their own words, “Invitations will not be sent immediately. We have a lot of stamps to lick.” However, the invites are generally dispatched within a week. Happy waving!

Sony Ericsson has finally removed the veil surrounding Xperia X10 (previously dubbed X3). Xperia X10 will be Sony Ericsson’s first Android based handset. SE has revealed that X10 will be the flagship phone in a family of Android handsets which it expects to launch during the first half of 2010. Xperia X10 itself is expected to launch in Q1 2010.

Official specifications of Sony Ericsson Xperia X10

Size: 119 x 63 x 13 mm
Weight: 135 grams
Phone memory: Up to 1 GB
Memory card support: microSD™
Memory card included: 8 GB
Operating system: Google™ Android Donut, version 1.6
Processor: 1GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon™ QSD8250
Screen: 262,144 colour TFT scratch resistant touchscreen – 4.0 inches with resolution of 480 x 854 pixels (WVGA)
Camera: 8.1 megapixel camera with Auto focus, Intelligent face recognition, Geo tagging, Image and video stabilizer, Photo and video light, Send to web (photo and video upload), Smile detection and Touch focus.
Connectivity: 3.5 mm audio jack, Bluetooth™ technology, Micro USB connector, Synchronisation, USB support and Wi-Fi™

Full specifications including a list of preloaded applications is available here.

One of the main highlights of Xperia X10 is the Rachael interface (now dubbed UX – user eXperience). Timescape and Mediascape makes managing your social stream and media effortless. Check out the leaked Rachael interface videos to get an idea.

Indian Prices for Sony Ericsson Satio, Aino and Yari

Sony Ericsson has also launched Satio, Aino and Yari in India. Check out earlier coverage for more information on these three models. In one line, Satio is the widescreen wonder with a jaw dropping 12.1 megapixel camera. Yari is SE’s gaming phone whose claim to fame is gesture based gaming. Aino is the multimedia powerhouse which includes Media Go and Remote Play (PS3 integration). The Indian launch price for Satio, Aino and Yari isr Rs. 35,950/-, Rs. 28,950/- and Rs. 16,950/- respectively. However, these phones may be available at slightly lesser prices in the market.

Good news for Symbian/S60 users. Earlier today, Opera Software released Opera Mobile 10 beta for Symbian series 60 handsets. The new release features the sleek skin introduced in Opera Mini 5 and is optimised for both phones with and without touchscreens. The new release retains the look and feel of Opera Mini 5 and builds on it. This is of course a good thing, since Opera Mini’s new interface is elegant and intuitive.

Performance was the priority in this release. Opera Software claims that the new beta is twice as fast as its predecessor. The new build introduces features like Tabbed Browsing and Speed Dials and retains existing features like Adaptive Zoom, Password Manager, Bookmarks, History and Turbo. Opera Mobile 10 beta also has a few goodies like kinetic scrolling and visual tabs available for touch screen users. The only missing feature is Opera Link – which will be included in the final build.

One of the major differences between Opera Mini and Opera Mobile is the rendering engine. AJAX is Opera Mini’s Achilles’ heel. However, Opera Mobile’s page rendering is almost equivalent to its desktop counterpart and it renders most pages effortlessly. The only disappointment being the lack of Flash support. Opera’s CEO, Jon von Tetzchner said, “Today’s powerful smartphones deserve an equally powerful browser”. And Opera Mini 10 certainly delivers.

Download Opera Mobile 10 Beta (4.00 MB)
License: Freeware
Operating System: Symbian Series 60

The new Orkut is considerably faster than its predecessor. But, that’s not the only change. Google has redesigned pretty much everything. The home page provides you quick access to friend suggestions, birthday reminders and your network’s activity stream. The new activity stream is an obvious imitation of Facebook’s activity stream (Stories) and finally supports comments.

Orkut has got a lot of things right with its new design. The new interface is a lot cleaner and simpler. There are five different colour schemes to choose from, but (at least for now) Google seems to have ditched the idea of themes. Navigation has been improved greatly and thanks to AJAX, now you can edit your profile, check out your scrapbook, chat with your friends or comment on your friend’s activity stream without leaving the home page. Everything just seems to work the way you would expect them to. Start typing your friend’s name in the “my friends” box and Orkut will instantly display the relevant results. Want to upload a photo? The days of waiting for the upload manager applet to load is over. Simply click on the “add photos” button and select all the files you wish to upload. The “About Me” page has also been pimped. You can now add some splendour to your profile page by embedding videos or adding OpenSocial Applications.

There is no doubt that the new Orkut is a huge improvement. However, Orkut’s problem has always been that its been too late. It always seems to be playing catch-up to Facebook. Does this update make Orkut better than Facebook? Not really. Will it help in winning over Facebook users? I doubt it. Will it help in stemming the outflow of users to Facebook? Probably, Yes. These are troubled times for Orkut. Facebook is beginning to get serious about markets like India and more and more users are deserting Orkut. This design may just provide the much needed boost to curtail Orkut’s decay.

As I mentioned before, the new interface is currently available only to a select few users. If you wish to get in on the action simply add me as a friend (necessary) and request an invite below in the comment (don’t forget to mention your Orkut name if its different). I will invite the first three person who request an invite. (All invites exhausted) You can also join the official community and participate in various activities to win invites.

Clicker debuted last month at TechCrunch50. Its aim is simple – to be your online TV Guide. Thousands of hours of video content is available online. And Clicker wants to bring it to your fingertips. It acts as a directory, search engine, wiki and entertainment guide. When Clicker launched it had mapped more than 300,000 episodes, from over 5,200 shows, from over 1,200 networks – in addition to 1,200 movies and 50,000 music videos from 20,000 artists. The number has certainly increased significantly since then.

Clicker makes it really simple for you to find want you want. The videos are grouped into four basic categories – TV, Web Originals, Movies and Music. Each category contains dozens of sub-categories (which can have its own sub-sub-categories). The organisation is top notch and finding anything you want is really easy.

If you don’t have anything specific in your mind, check out the “Trending” and “Popular video” section to find new videos. “Related” (video) is another tool you can use to discover interesting content. Due to licensing issues many of the videos aren’t viewable onsite. Instead, you will be taken directly to their publisher’s webpage. Also, most of the videos only work if you are in US/Canada (or are behind a proxy/VPN), but that’s not really Clicker’s fault.

Clicker is not the first video search engine. However, what puts it head and shoulders ahead of its competition is navigation and organisation. Finding new content as well as tracking your favourite artists and shows is really easy. You can subscribe to various channels and be notified whenever new content becomes available. The Web Originals section contains several relatively unknown gems. Clicker is currently in private beta. It will be launching later this year and has big plans for the future. It is a great place to hang out at, whether you are a music, movie or TV show buff. If you want to sign up just use this link. First five people will get instant access. If you do signup, don’t forget to share your impressions of Clicker.

Chasing Dreams by ~Pallab on deviantART

This is the desktop I have been using for the past thirty days. The wallpaper is Chasing Dreams by Skyway and the Visual Style (Theme) is Aero Reloaded by ozzy (more Windows 7 themes available here). The widgets used are all powered by Yahoo Widget Engine.

If you want to customize your desktop, check out my guide on Desktop Modding.

Last year, while reviewing TuneUp Utilities 2009, I had proclaimed that it is the only system optimiser you will ever need. I was thrilled with the large collection utilities offered by TuneUp. It could perform the task of a couple of dozen utilities, alone. TuneUp unveiled the successor to TuneUp Utilities 2009 yesterday. The major new features in this edition are:

Revamped Start Centre: TuneUp Utilities Start Centre has been completely revamped. The new start centre gives you a quick idea about the current condition of your computer and provides quick access to all the utilities. Undoubtedly, the new interface is a big improvement over the previous tabbed UI.

TuneUp Turbo Mode: Turbo Mode gives you an immediate performance boost by disabling unnecessary services and processes. It is functionally somewhat similar to GameBooster.

TuneUp Utilities Gadget: This is possibly the most useless component of TuneUp Utilities 2010. TuneUp installs a sidebar gadget for Windows Vista and 7, which displays your computer’s current status. It is possibly the most useless component of TuneUp Utilities 2010.

TuneUp Live Optimization: TuneUp 2010 keeps working in the background and intervenes whenever necessary to prevent sudden performance drops. Live Optimisation intelligently prioritises processes. It increases the priority of processes that may require more resources. At the same time, it decreases the priority of processes which are consuming extravagant amount of system resources. This can avoid system lockups or crashes. Live Optimization is potentially a great feature and is in fact similar to Process Lasso which I had reviewed earlier. However, I couldn’t find any way to turn this off. I definitely don’t appreciate the fact that TuneUp 2010 adds additional background processes, without providing the option to turn them off.

Optimisation Report: This new addition displays a simple summary of maintenance and optimisation tasks performed by TuneUp.

Improved Registry Defrag: Registry defragmentation has been improved. It is no longer necessary to reboot your system immediately after performing registry optimisation. TuneUp has also added a pre-boot module which optimises your registry before Windows is loaded.

Improved Drive Defrag: TuneUp defragmentation tool now offers two modes – i) Fast and ii) Thorough.

Support for Windows 7: TuneUp Utilities 2010 supports both 32bit and 64 bit editions of Windows 7. One point worth nothing here is that TuneUp no longer allows installation of Visual Styles (Themes) – at least not in Windows 7.

Others Improvements: Various other utilities including 1-Click Maintainence, Automatic Maintaince, and Disk Cleaner have been improved.

The full version of TuneUp Utilities costs $49.95 while the upgrade license costs $29.95. TuneUp Utilities is the best in its category. It offers everything you will need to optimise, customise and maintain your system. If you haven’t purchased TuneUp before and are looking for a system utility then go for TuneUp 2010. However, the decision is a lot more complex for owners of TuneUp Utilities 2009. The major additions to TuneUp Utilities 2010 are Turbo mode and Live Optimisation. Not everyone will need them. And even if you do need them you can simply use GameBooster and ProcessLasso. TuneUp 2010 doesn’t offer enough additional benefits to merit a $29.95 upgrade license. Heck, at that price you can get Apple’s Snow Leopard upgrade! The real deciding factor here is Windows 7. TuneUp 2009 doesn’t officially support Windows 7. The newer builds of TuneUp 2009 obstinately refuse to even run on Windows 7. The older builds do run on Windows 7 and all the major components (Registry Cleaner, Drive Defrag, Registry Defrag etc) seem to work properly. However, there are a few glitches here and there. More importantly, TuneUp 2009 doesn’t contain any Windows 7 specific optimisation and there is always the possibility that things may go wrong. Hence, if are using Windows 7 (or plan to migrate to Windows 7) you may not have a real choice.

Download TuneUp Utilities (20.2 MB)
Platforms Supported: Windows XP, Vista and 7(x86 and x64)
License: Shareware (30 days trial)
Cost: $49.95 (Upgrade license: $29.95)
Version Reviewed: 9.0.2000

While the major search engines are busy figuring out the best way to tap into the social web, a new start-up called Kikin has come up with their own solution. Kikin is a browser extension which integrates relevant results from Facebook, Twitter, Yahoo, eBay, Amazon and clipfish into your search results. Kikin is available for Internet Explorer and Firefox on Windows and Safari and Firefox on Mac. It works with Google, Bing and Yahoo search.

Kikin can even connect to your Facebook and Twitter account and display results from your personal stream. The Facebook and Twitter integration is fabulous. The results pane has in-built social abilities like retweet and reply (comment and like for Facebook).

Kikin is a real gem, which works because it allows you to choose what you want. It mixes the real time web and social web (and more) to produce stellar results. The integration is non-obtrusive and the interface is stylish, simple and effective. Once you get accustomed to Kikin, you would begin wondering, “Why can’t Google or Bing offer such harmonious integration of the social web?”

Earlier today, Opera Software released the first update since Opera 10, which was released almost two months ago. Opera 10.01 is a minor update which fixes three security issues along with numerous bugs. It is recommended that you update your Opera installation since one of the patched security vulnerabilities is extremely severe and could allow execution of arbitrary code. The full changelog is available here.


Opera has also been working diligently on Opera 10.10 which would include the much hyped Opera Unite. Opera 10.10 beta with Unite was released earlier this month. Stick with this version if Unite is important to you.

The other big surprise this month was the all new Widgets platform unveiled by Opera. One of the biggest problems with Opera widgets was that, in order to use them you needed to have Opera running. The new Opera Widgets for desktop fixes this problem by making widgets independent of the browser. They will still use Opera’s rendering engine, but will no longer rely on the browser itself. The new widgets have .wgt extension and can be downloaded using any browser. Double clicking the .wgt file will open up the graphical installer which will allow you to install the widget at a location of your choice. Widgets can be uninstalled using the Add/Remove Programs applet. In effect this makes Widgets as good as indipendent application and puts Opera in the same league as other widget engines (Yahoo Widget Engine, Desktop-X etc.).

If you are interested in checking this out, download the Opera Labs release from here.

Opera’s State of the Mobile Web report for September was released earlier in the week. Opera Mini continued its impressive growth and gained 4 million new users in September. Opera Mini users generated nearly 227 million MB of data for operators worldwide in September 2009. Data in Opera Mini is compressed up to 90%, meaning Opera Mini servers processed up to 2.1 petabytes of data this month. Interestingly enough this amounts to a saving of about 8 billion dollars per year. Yes, Opera Mini is actually saving a total of 8 billion dollars every year!

It seems that people are waking up to the benefits of Opera Turbo. Approximately three million unique users tried Turbo at least once since it was released. Not only does Turbo significantly improve browsing speeds on slow internet connections, it also helps users with pay-as-you-go plan save money.

Other Opera News:
Every week Opera Software will be giving away gift certificates and goodie bags to the best Unite application developers.
Last week, Opera Software logo was updated. The new logo seems similar to the new browser icon and is a big improvement over the thoroughly ugly previous logo.
Earlier in this month, Opera Campus Crew at Indian Institute of Information Technology (Allahabad) organised Opera Week. More details about the event is available at the Campus Crew blog.
Chrome, Safari and Opera gained market share in September at the expense of Internet Explorer and Firefox.
Earlier in the month Opera Mini servers were upgraded to 4.13.756. This upgrade fixed multiple rendering issues with Opera Mini.

Fortunately for you I received 20 Wave invites earlier today and I am going to give away ten of them on my blog. If you want to win a free Google Wave invite all you need to do is:

Either follow me and retweet this message on twitter (1 entry).
Or Subscribe to my blog’s e-mail feed (1 entry).
Or do both (2 entries).

Once you have completed the above process, don’t forget to leave a comment and let me know how you have participated. If you participate through twitter, you must include a link to the Twitter status update. If you subscribed to my newsletter, leave a comment using the same e-mail address. Winners will be chosen using Random.org. The contest closes at 6:00 am November 4 IST (+5:30 GMT). So hurry up!

One of my primary complaints against Google Chrome has been that it is too bare-bones. Chrome Plus partially solved that problem by adding a couple of much needed features. However, as the Google Chrome API continues to mature we are beginning to see more and more extensions/add-ons being developed for Chrome itself. Here are nineteen really sweet extensions which will take Google Chrome a step closer to being the perfect browser.

In order to use the extensions mentioned below you will need to download and install Google Chrome developer build. You can also use Channel Changer to ensure that you get updates from the developer channel.

1. AdSweep

This is the Google Chrome equivalent of Adblock for Firefox. It is a tiny JavaScript which hides all advertisements found in a page using CSS. AdSweep is fairly efficient and manages to block a vast majority of advertisements. You can also use Adblock+ for Chrome. The advantage of Adblock+ is that it allows you to chose which filter you want to subscribe to. You can even use your own filter in Adblock+.

2. LastPass

LastPass is a form-filler and password manager which truly kicks ass. In fact it makes RoboForm – the granddaddy of password managers, look shabby. An absolute must have in my opinion.

3. Session Saver

Sessions were pioneered by Opera in 1996. They provide a useful way to save a group of tabs which can be reopened at one go whenever required. Now, Session Saver brings the same feature to Google Chrome.

4. ChromeGestures

Mouse Gestures is another Opera Innovation. Gestures allow users to perform various tasks with simple mouse movements. ChromeGestures is a simple add-on which adds support for mouse gestures in Chrome. Mouse Strokes is another similar extension. However, it is slightly buggy and requires more polishing. Another promising plug-in is nkGestures. However, I haven’t tried it yet.

5. SmoothScroll

This tiny extension adds support for smooth scrolling in Google Chrome. SmoothScroll eliminates sudden jumps while scrolling and reduces eye strain.

6. ChromeTouch

This rather novel extension emulates touch-screen navigation in Google Chrome. Once this extension is installed, clicking anywhere on the page will activate the scroll mode which allows scrolling by simply moving the mouse up and down. Scroll mode can be disabled by clicking again.

7. Web Developer Mini

This is a rudimentary web developer tool for Chrome. It merely displays the source code and css for the selected webpage. While it can’t compete with web developer tools available in other browsers, it is useful none the less. Hopefully, more features will be added in the coming days.

8. Xmarks for Chrome

Xmarks is a bookmark synchronization tool which allows you to carry your bookmarks wherever you go. It currently works on Firefox, Safari and Chrome.

9. IMacros

IMacros allows you to record and replay repetitive tasks. This requires some work to get started. However once properly setup, it can be a huge productivity booster.

10. CheckMyLinks

It is a simple extension which goes through your bookmarks and ensures that they are still alive.

11. Cleeki

If you have ever used Internet Explorer’s Accelerators, you will feel right at home with Cleeki. It allows you to instantly search/publish/share text from a webpage.

12. Extensible Video downloader

This is a work in progress and currently supports downloading video from Youtube, Break.com and Blip.TV. The biggest shortcoming of this extension is that it doesn’t recognise multiple formats supported by YouTube. So, you may end up downloading the low quality version even when a HD video is available. If you only want YouTube support then you would be better served by Grabbit. Grabbit utilises KickYoutube.com and hence supports all the formats offered by YouTube (and some more).

13. Bubble Translate

Bubble Translate uses Google Translate API to provide inline translations in Google Chrome.

14. StumbleNow

I am sure that StumbleUpon will add support for Google Chrome in the future. But till such time StumbleNow is the best option for Chrome users.

15. Web Of Trust

Web Of Trust (WOT) is a community driven service which rates the trustworthiness of websites and warns the users about potential phishing sites. This add-on enables WOT in Google Chrome.

16. AniWeather

AniWeather stands for Animated Weather + Any Weather and is the definite weather extension for Google Chrome. It displays in-depth weather information for more than 77,000 worldwide locations.

17. Greasemetal

As you may have guessed from the name, this extension adds support for Greasemonkey scripts in Chrome. Greasemokney scripts are User JavaScripts which modify the appearance and behaviour of webpages. Be warned though, not all Greasemonkey scripts will work with Greasemetal.
[Note: Google Chrome Dev builds also include Greasemonkey support out of the box. However, it isn't enabled by default. LifeHacker has a nice article on enabling Greasemonkey in Google Chrome]

18. FlashBlock

A simple add-on which blocks all Flash elements present in a web page. While it works mostly as advertised, there is room for improvement. Support for whitelists is something I would like to see in the near future. You can also use BlockFlashPlus Usescript (userscripts must be enabled).

19. Chrome Extension Manager

Extension Manager isn’t really an extension. It is a separate application which allows you to enable, disable or even delete Google Chrome extensions. It even supports profile backup and restore. It also provides a convenient way to enable Greasemonkey Userscripts in Google Chrome. In case you don’t need to manage extensions and simply want a tool to backup profiles FavBackup should suffice.

Are you using Google Chrome extensions? If yes, what is your favourite extension? Did we miss your favourite extension? Don’t forget to let us know.