Software Reviews

After countless hours of campaign style games like War Craft and first-person shooter games, I still enjoy a good puzzle game. Lobstersoft Games makes an addictive timewaster in the form of Arcade Lines. What is Arcade Lines? Arcade Lines is a ... puzzle game requiring players to line up five or more game pieces in horizontal, vertical, or diagonal rows to prevent the board from filling up. Arcade Lines Rules of Play Pieces may be moved to any spot on the board as long as there is a clear path. Game pieces move horizontally and vertically, but not diagonally, making the game more challenging as ... (view more)

Last month, I emphasized the importance of backing up files in my review of Eazy Backup. Eazy Backup Review Even with regular backups, files can still get lost or deleted accidentally, especially when they are stored on the Compact Flash or Secure ... Digital cards commonly used in digital cameras. Fortunately, Recover represents an affordable solution for restoring files when they are unintentionally deleted from your system. What is Recover? Recover is a utility for recovering deleted files and files missing due to disk failure from FAT 12, FAT 16, and FAT 32* formatted drives. Side Note: FAT ... (view more)

Infopackets Reader Peg M. asks: " Dear Dennis, Yesterday, I read your article on RoboForm. I use the Mozilla Firebird browser and was wondering: how can I install RoboForm installed on Firebird instead of Internet Explorer (which is used by ... default)? " My Response: For those of you who are just tuning in: RoboForm is a free web Browser 'plug-in' replacement for Internet Explorer's AutoComplete form feature. Some features of the free version include: Save / auto fill password info from login form, Automatic login to online accounts, Fill long online forms from Identities, and more. ... (view more)

Just recently, I discovered another totally cool screensaver. Quebec based Esm Software makes Active Media Player Screen Saver, an application designed to play streaming video while your computer is idle. What is Active Media Player Screen Saver? ... Active Media Player Screen Saver (AMPSS) is a screensaver application capable of playing live video streams in MPEG, AVI, ASF, WMV, or QuickTime format. AMPSS also plays full motion video from your hard drive, giving you unlimited choices for video playback. Active Media Player Screen Saver: Features Play local or remote files: Play video files from ... (view more)

Recall -- Last week, I asked Infopackets Readers to send me their top picks for a freeware DVD player. Below are some of the responses I received (in no particular order). Jeff 'MrPianist' recommended DSPlayer: " DSPlayer is a free skinable DVD ... Player, which plays other multimedia formats as well. 100% no Spyware! Full compatibility with win 2000/XP; Supported formats avi, mpeg, mov, DVD, mp3, mid, wav, cda (AudioCD) ... requires Windows 9x/Me/2000/XP, DirectX 8 or higher. " http://www.freewarenetwork.com/description/dsplayer.html Keith, a retired Techie says: " Cinemaster DVD ... (view more)

Screen captures are useful for documenting error messages, showing other people how to perform a specific task, and for proving you really did get the high score. Using the key combination of Alt-Print Screen may work for situations where you want ... to paste your screenshot into Word, but sending screens via e-mail is tedious without a helper application. Capture&Send 2003 is a great application for quickly e-mailing screenshots. What is Capture&Send 2003? Capture&Send is a program designed to make screen captures and e-mail them to other computer users. The program runs in the ... (view more)

Today's visitor feedback is based on the fact that I received two similar emails from Readers on the same day. Infopackets Reader Ric J. writes: " Can you please tell me a good DVD Decoder program to download, because the two I've tried didn't work. ... I'd like to find one that does so I can watch DVD's on my system. Thanks! " And, Felicitaz C. writes: " I have WinDVD 3.1 DVD player and cannot play DVD's anymore. Nothing happens when I try to play a DVD. I tried Help -> Troubleshoot and WinDVD suggested that I install a decoder or upgrade. When I did a little more searching I ... (view more)

Have you ever turned your computer speakers loud enough to hear some of your favorite .MP3s in another room -- only to come rushing back to your computer to turn the volume down because the next song playing is just too loud? That's what happened to ... me today. And with that in mind, I pondered whether or not there existed a freeware program that could normalize the volume of all my MP3s. As usual, I headed over to Google for the answer. I searched for "freeware mp3 normalize" and managed to find a fantastic little program called MP3Gain. From the Webattack.com web site: " ... (view more)

On October 2nd, 2003, I asked Infopackets Readers for some Freeware Picture viewers: Missing Picture Viewer for Windows 98? I am happy to say that I received many responses. In fact, a great deal of readers highly recommended a program called ... IrfanView. From the web site: " IrfanView is a very fast, small, compact and innovative freeware (for non-commercial use) graphic viewer for Windows 9x/ME/NT/2000/XP. It is ... simple [enough] for beginners, and [yet] powerful [enough] for professionals ... Some IrfanView features: Many supported file formats, Multi language support, Thumbnail/ ... (view more)

Editing home movies with a PC is possibly one of the greatest achievements of modern computing. Over the years, families across the globe have collected untold hours of video footage. Until digital editing became affordable, an easy way to share ... those movies didn't exist. Only a few years ago, the software and hardware required for video editing cost thousands of dollars, which didn't include additional costs for training. Prices for entry level video editing apps are now well under $100, but product quality varies greatly. One of the best and most affordable video editing apps for beginners ... (view more)