Crenk » Software

Join Crenk on Facebook and Get The Latest News and Free Invites

Steven Finch — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 16:24:30 +0000

If you enjoy reading Crenk and have a Facebook account, be a fan of our Facebook page and join in on the fun! You’ll be rewarded with exclusives, invites and the latest reviews of web apps.

We will also use our fan page to occasionally inform you about premium software giveaways.

In addition to that, you’ll have the chance to participate in Crenk polls and discussions; and ask our Crenk writers technically-related questions or just tell everyone how much you love reading our site!

All My Apps: The Easy Way To Install Software on Your PC or Mac

Steven Finch — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 01:02:26 +0000

Allmyapps makes software installation a breeze. No matter how many applications you need, 1 click is all you need to have all your favorite applications installed on your PC. Allmyapps also keeps your applications safe! Would you need to reinstall your system, Allmyapps takes care of reinstalling all your favorite applications in the blink of an eye.

With Allmyapps, installing software applications has become so easy that you’ll soon find yourself installing a lot of great new applications! Be prepared to enjoy your computer like never before! Allmyapps provides some great application ideas that I have never even heard of, but I’m sure they can make me a lot more product, but on the other side there are a lot of time killers out there!

Windows 7 Edition Switcher

Augusto Alvarez — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 13:45:36 +0000

As many of you already should know, Windows 7 media, as it was for Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008, includes all the versions inside the same disc. But, the difference from Vista is that Windows 7 does not let you choose from the different versions available when you install the operating system.

Windows 7 Edition Switcher will let you easily do that, and the possibility, for example, to switch from Windows 7 Home to Ultimate.

This new and simple app will let you convert any Windows 7 ISO file to the version that you need, and it only takes a few clicks.

Just select the patch from the zip file that you downloaded from the website, select the ISO file that you wish to convert and done.

Oh, did I mention this app it is also portable?

Enjoy!

Top 4 Converter Programs from PDF to JPG for Mac

Steven Finch — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 09:45:43 +0000

A lot of people have big issues converting files from PDF format to any other format. Today, I wanted to run through converter programs which change PDF files to JPG (image) files for both Mac and PC.

Zamzar

Zamzar is probably the most well known file conversion site. The process is simplicity personified: Choose the file to convert then choose the format to convert to (e.g. JPG) then enter your email address to receive the converted file then convert. The minuses with the free service are that the file size is limited to 100MB with just 5 simultaneous conversions. Also, you might feel a wee bit uneasy uploading sensitive data without encryption support.

YouConvertIt

YouConvertIt is a new site that lets you upload 5 files at a time and then convert them from PDF to JPG format.

Neevia Document Converter

Neevia Technology has a web interface which facilitates the conversion of PDF documents to image files. Select the conversion settings and upload your file. The converted file can be rendered in the browser or can be downloaded via an email link. Two dropdowns further give you control over image quality and resolution. The only visible restriction is the 1MB file upload size limit.

If you are wary of uploading sensitive files over the net, you need to look beyond the online solutions to something much more local. Thankfully these three pieces of free software take up the task.

PDF-Xchange Viewer

PDF-Xchange Viewer is a light feature-rich PDF document reader. The free version of the software is a capable document handler with most of the standard features expected. Add comments and annotations, mark-up pages with texts and objects, type within the PDF document along with plug-ins for both IE and Firefox are also included.

But the feature which interests us is the ability of the software to export a file or a page to the supported image formats like JPEG, BMP, TIFF, PNG and more.

Open the PDF file in the viewer, click on File – Export to Image and the dialog opens up where you can set the pages to convert, the image type to convert to and the destination folder. More importantly, the ‘Export Mode’ setting allows you to designate the number of image files for the subject PDF file. The ‘Page Zoom’, ‘Resolution’ and ‘Page Background’ also allow added finishing touches.

One Installer for All Your Applications with Ninite

Augusto Alvarez — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 21:51:19 +0000

There are only a few things in your life that you are condemned to repeat it over and over, re installing operating systems it is definitely one of them. And this task never comes alone; you are condemned also to installing your common apps all over again. That’s where Ninite appears, providing you in one installer all the applications of your choice.

As simple as it sounds, Ninite will let you decide from several applications already loaded (don’t worry, I’m pretty sure that the 90% apps will appear there) and generates automatically one installer with all of them.

The another great thing I found is that you just need to visit Ninite home page, select your apps (no registration needed) and click on “Get Installer”.

In case you were asking, here are my selected apps:

Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Safari
Skype, Live Messenger
iTunes, VLC Player
Foxit Reader
Microsoft Security Essentials
Flash Player, Silverlight, Java JRE 6 Update 18
uTorrent
DropBox, ImgBurn
WinRAR
WinSCP, PuTTY

Keep Track of Expirey Dates With Expire Track

Dean Sherwin — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 08:16:50 +0000

Ever been surfing the net and you get a reminder telling you that your anti-virus software has just expired? Or how about work in/own a company and discover that a chunk of the stock has passed its sell-by-date? This is a common problem for everyone leading to useless products and lost cash.

Expire Track is a new web app that is specifically designed to track the expiry dates on products in the inventories of both companies and individuals. Accounts are free and it’s very easy to use. All you have to do is upload the product along with its expiry date and then set up reminders. When the date is approaching you’ll be sent a reminder by e-mail about the situation so you don’t find out too late.

This product can also be applied to individuals. Nowadays we have so many subscriptions, bills, taxes and the likes to pay that it’s so easy to forget. Using this product you can keep track of your car insurance, council tax, magazine subscriptions etc…

All of the tools there are extremely easy to use and managing a large list is simple given the great search function. Expire Track is available here.

TeamViewer – Free Remote Access to Computers

Dean Sherwin — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 08:18:45 +0000

One of the most common problems for customer support agents who take calls from customers with malfunctioning computers is not actually the technical problem, but the person who is complaining about it. The fact is that the person who rings customer support for advice will not be a technical expert and as such it will be difficult to guide them through the process of fixing the problem.

Team Viewer is a new piece of software that allows customer support to cut out the middle man completely. Basically, it allows customer support agents access to a customer’s computer to fix any problem. Not only this, but it’s incredibly easy to use. I tested it using my laptop and an older laptop that I have lying around for such tests like when I reviewed the first ever Warcraft game on WireNinja. I found it really easy to gain access with the installation only taking five minutes. Also, the customer’s computer (i.e. my old laptop) didn’t need to download any software; I just had to accept a small .exe file.

All you need is the users IP address and once you exchange an auto-generated password to allow access to the computer then you’ll have access to their machine via a window half the scale of theirs monitor. It looks just like it does on their end as you can see from the screenshot. Using this screen, you can easily fix a problem with little or no need to consult with the customer.

This program has other applications such as for office workers who need remote access to their computer. However, its main function is for customer support.

What’s more is it’s free and is available here.

Sync Your Mac and Other Devices with Sync-Mate

Dean Sherwin — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 03:48:46 +0000

Gone are the days when a humble mobile phone and a stand alone PC were all the high profile office worker, self-employed person or whiz-kid had. Now, we all have at least three or four devices ranging from laptops, to cell phones, to smart phones to MP4 players. And the demand for them all to work together has never been higher. This is where syncing come into question. Syncing same-brand and compatible devices may be easy but using generic programs to sync items such as MacBooks and Windows Mobile smart phones that are from two opposing companies is no easy task.

SyncMate, which is mate by Eltima is available at the domain www.syn-mac.com holds the answer to syncing you Macintosh with several smart phones such as Windows mobile and Nokia S-Series phones.

The software is downloaded to your Mac and used to sync organisers, meida, contact info, e-mails and other such useful data. One user, Ann Clifford said:

“I am using SyncMate mainly to synchronize my Todos, my Google calendar and my contacts. SMS Manager Function is very useful too. Oh, almost forgot! The new iTunes synchronization is very cool. It syncs all my music, which is very important to me. SyncMate is a total ActiveSync for Mac replacement.”

The software is available here and I highly recommend it for the power-users with a Mac.

Picok: Create Your Own Personalised Start Page from This Open Source Software

Steven Finch — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 08:24:27 +0000

Picok stands for Personal Information Cockpit. It’s an open source software package, aimed at enabling users to build their personal information dashboards. The interface is very similar to Netvibes and Pageflakes, in which allows users to loaded their own content into small draggable boxes.

There are a quite few standard portlets shipped with Picok, but since it is an open system, maintainers of picok installations can easily create portlets of their own.

Picok is written in PHP 5, uses the Yahoo User Interface Library and Zend Framework Components and supports MySQL, Microsoft SQL Server, IBM Lotus Notes and is ready to be integrated into your corporate intranet, website or community platform as well.

If you want to see a screenshot of Picok you can check it out here.

Download Skype 2.8 for Mac Free

Steven Finch — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 22:01:10 +0000

There has been a lot of news from Skype lately, Skype new headset, Skype Windows and iPhone improvements, and Skype 4.0 release. Just to jump on the bandwagon Skype has now released their 2.8 version for the Mac. This new version brings two totally new and unique features namely Screen sharing and Skype Access.

Screen Sharing is a key new feature in Skype client for the Mac which allows one easily to see/share all or a portion of their desktop with another Skype user during a call. And for those on the move, Skype Access allows them to pay for Wi-Fi hotspots using their credit.

More new features include:

Improved chat management
Quick Add
Mood message chat
Larger profile pictures
Hidden avatars in incoming contact requests
Add notes to contacts

To download this new version of Skype, simply head over to the Skype website.

Jolicloud – The Netbook OS

Dean — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 16:31:27 +0000

Netbooks are taking the market by storm. While they haven’t overtaken the laptop or notebook in many areas including sales they are ideal for family environments where each person has a netbook for e-mail, internet etc… and perhaps one central computer when you need performance and reliability. Syncing and even using those net-books with a Windows OS can be annoying because the screen is small and there isn’t a lot of RAM to keep you ticking over.

This is where Jolicloud comes in. It’s a new OS designed especially for netbooks. The desktop OS is designed like the main screen of a smart-phone with large icons taking you to your main programs and websites such as Twitter, Google, RSS feeds, E-mail and Skype. This is a great feature. Think about it. On a netbook you haven’t got a lot of things that need to be done. Just basic things so you might as well have them all up on the home screen along with some great search tools and tabs.

The netbook is based around the app idea. You can run a number of apps right on the desktop even if they are web based. For example, Wikipedia and Gmail are all available to open on the desktop. Twitter and Facebook are also available for your social needs. The interactivity and smart-phone feel of Jolicloud makes it so much better than what others would have left it at.

It’s also very easy to install and is designed to be installed on Netbooks with limited performance capabilities. The layout and the themes look great. Its basic but has great colours and is finished nicely. All in all, this is a great OS filled a gap in the market and I’m sure that many will flock to it. 8/10

Internet Explorer Under Critisism…Again

Dean — Sat, 18 Jul 2009 10:11:14 +0000

Have you ever downloaded a less than scrupulous piece of software only to discover the next day that you default browser has been changed and your homepage is some rubbish search engine based in North Korea? I have. So have thousands of others who were attracted by freeware never stopping to think of the scheming companies that lurked behind them. Such as Microsoft.

At the present, when users download IE8, the newest edition of Internet Explorer they will quite obviously have to install it. Now when you’re installing any piece of software you’re given a choice.

a) Quick Install

b) Custom install

In most cases the ‘Quick Install’ is already selected for you and most of us will go right on ahead and press ’Next’. Microsoft copped onto that so that when you install IE by choosing the quick install method your default browser and homepage are changed to please Bill Gates.

Microsoft recently came under fire about these practices you would expect from a smaller more desperate company. They responded by saying on their blog that they were making an update and that by August IE8 will ask your permission to become the default browser first.

“IE will never install, or become the default browser without your explicit consent. However, we heard a lot of feedback from a lot of different people and groups and decided to make the user choice of the default browser even more explicit,” Microsoft said.

IE8 has already been in the spotlight when they released the OMGIGP advertisement which Crenk covered here.

Firefox 3.5 Available June 30th

Augusto Alvarez — Sun, 28 Jun 2009 22:36:44 +0000

Finally after a lot of expectation and three release candidates (all were published within less that two weeks) Mozilla announced that the the final version for Firefox 3.5 will be available to the public on the morning of Tuesday, June 30.

Seems that development team is running against the clock, considering that on June 24 they’ve released the RC3 version for Firefox 3.5 and originally the announcement about the final version stated that “end of June” will be the date. Well they sure are keeping the promise, taking the last day of the month to release it.

Since RC1, the two other versions that were public basically focused in bug fixing, so if you installed were using any of these versions you shouldn’t expect greatest differences with the final one.

Download Firefox 3.5 RC3.

Firefox 3.5 RC2

Augusto Alvarez — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 01:49:10 +0000

We’ve announced earlier the release for Firefox 3.5 RC1, but the Mozilla development team already prepared a new build: Firefox 3.5 RC2. This new version has no bigger differences with the RC1, mostly fixing some bugs before making it the final version.

Company’s strategy it is quite interesting actually, releasing two RC versions in one week. They sure are very confident about the beta and RC stability, I can’t imagine Microsoft releasing release candidates versions of the same product in such short period of time.

That definitive version for Mozilla Firefox 3.5 it is expected in a few days more, ending June. You can check the release notes and improvements about the RC2 version here.

And you can download it from here.

Hulu Might Add Paid Subscription Model. Coming Soon!

Steven Finch — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 09:57:19 +0000

Over at Hulu all the content is free and ad-supported for the USA market. However, News Corp chief digital officer Jonathan Miller says that could change. Speaking at an event last night, Miller said some of the TV shows and movies on Hulu future could be made available only to paying subscribers in the future.

There are no plans to launch Hulu subscriptions at the moment, and Miller was just speaking in hypotheticals. But News Corp is one of Hulu’s two primary backers (the other being NBC), so if he thinks subscriptions are a good idea, it might be time to start throwing a little money in a piggy bank for a Hulu day fund.

Crunchpad Prototype from Techcrunch

Steven Finch — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 16:26:28 +0000

Over at Techcrunch they have released the new prototype images of their Crunchpad. So what do you think?

Wibiya: Social Networking Toolbars for Websites and Blogs

Steven Finch — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 15:01:47 +0000

Here at Crenk we are testing out a new product called Wibiya. Wibiya provides a tool bar in which you can see at the bottom of the Crenk, which easily allows our readers to navigate through our site and share articles they think are news worthy. Currently, Wibiya is in private beta testing but we thought we would preview their toolbar and see what our readers thought of their product.

Once you head over to Wibiya and get accepted into their beta program you are able to easily and quickly setup your toolbar.

You can first select the style of toolbar in which they have an option of about 20 to choose from. After that you can choose which additions you want to to add to the toolbar itself, twitter, facebook, recent posts, random posts, etc.

Once you have setup your toolbar you can simple add it to your wordpress, typepad or any other site with only one line of code. This is great for the blog owners who dont know too much about php or html.

Once everything is setup and your toolbar is running then Wibiya also provide some great stats on usage of your toolbar.

We are only testing the toolbar on Crenk for a limited time, and because it is in private beta we wanted to provide everyone a chance to see it and even use it. Any feedback would be great!

Downgrade iPhone 3G 3.0 back to 2.2.1

Steven Finch — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 13:32:57 +0000

Previously we have wrote a bit about upgrading and downgrading your Apple products. Today we wanted to run through the steps of downgrading your iPhone 3.0 firmware to 2.2.1.

Connect your iPhone to your Mac or PC and select your iPhone from the list of devices in iTunes. If iTunes does not detect your iPhone then you will need to put it in DFU (Device Firmware Upgrade) mode.

You can follow these steps to put your iPhone in DFU mode (this is required only if iTunes does not recognize your iPhone):

* Connect your iPhone to your computer.
* Turn iPhone off.
* Hold power and home together for 10 seconds (exactly).
* Release power but keep holding home until the computers beeps (observed on a PC) as a USB device is recognized.
* A few seconds later iTunes should detect your iPhone.

Browse the Summary Tab, For Mac user Hold down Option and press the “Restore” button. For Windows user hold down Shift and press the Restore button. Now you will be able to browse the folder where you have the iPhone firmware.Select the firmware & hit the restore button and cross your fingers for 5 minutes.

If you get error message like 1011, 1013, 1015, just ignore them(Actually the firmware 2.2 is already successfully installed). Fire Quickpwn 2.2.1 and jailbreak your iPhone use this guide

But if you encountered with error message like 1601, 1602, 1600 or anything else then try putting the iPhone into DFU mode and try again.

If you have an Unlocked iPhone then use pwnage tool to make a custom firmware then enter DFU and restore / downgrade to 2.2.1 if not works in first time done it again n again.

Destroy Twitter: Minimal Memory Twitter Application for Mac, Windows and Linux

Steven Finch — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 10:37:38 +0000

DestroyTwitter is a compact though robust Twitter application built to run on Mac, Windows, and Linux using Adobe AIR. It consists of a series of canvases that constantly update to keep tweets up-to-date using notifications that appear when a new tweet arrives. DestroyTwitter uses a minimal amount of memory compared to its AIR-based alternatives without sacrificing functionality and performance. As a result, it can easily run in the background as an automated process.

Destroy Twitter was developed in a similar way as Tweetdeck, with only having one guy come up with the idea and then develop the whole project. Jonnie Hallman is the designer and programmer behind Destroy Twitter, and he has definitely developed a lightweight Twitter client that is both very slick in design and functionality.

I have been playing around with Destroy Twitter and it is a great service that can just run in the background and not take up too much CPU usage. I think Destroy Twitter has a great interface with a nice slide action between replies, direct messages and other windows. It is easy to see why this product is used by a huge amount of the twitterati

You can download Destroy Twitter here.

FileHippo: How to Maintain All Your Freeware up to Date

Guest — Fri, 29 May 2009 09:05:41 +0000

FileHippo.com is a great web site from where you can download a lot of freeware and some shareware. The page is organized in the following categories of software:

- Browsers and Plugins

- Anti-Spyware

- Audio and Video

- File Sharing

- Firewalls ans Security

- CD and DVD Tools

- Messaging and Chat

- Anti-Virus

- Cleaning and Tweaking

- Desktop

- File Transfer

- Compression and Backup

- Imaging

- Office and News

- Benchmarking

- Drivers

- Developer Tools

- Networking and Admin

And also two interesting categories, one is Latest updates and the other is Most popular downloads, very useful.

You can apply the following filters to the software shown: No Beta versions(very useful if you need stability) and Freeware Only(useful in my case, I don’t buy software).

And the best of the site(but still in beta) is that you can download a Client Agent program(called Update Checker) to maintain all the software that you install from this page to the latest version. You can download the Update Checker in two versions, Installer and Standalone.

I found this web page very useful to maintain all my freeware tools up to date. I’m actually using it at work, and found no issues.

The GOOD:

- Has a RSS, e-Mail and Twitter notification system.

- Almost all the useful freeware is listed.

- Has few advertisement.

The BAD:

- Only software for Microsoft Windows systems.

- The Update Checker still’s in beta.

Wakoopa: The New Software Social Network

matt — Mon, 25 May 2009 11:15:35 +0000

Wakoopa is a social network that helps people discover the best software, games and web apps on the market. Developed by a team in Holland, Wakoopa could just be the next best tool you play with.

Do you want to know what apps you use on and off the web, and just how much you use them? Do you want to find new stuff that is useful for the tasks you undertake everyday? Do you want to be introduced to people into the same tools and products as you? Wakoopa can do all of this.

First, all you need to do is sign up and download their tracker program. Now usually I’d run a mile at this, but I couldn’t resist after having had a look at the tools on offer.

Like any data collation software, it takes a few days to get the best results, so it’s worth leaving the program running for a few days and then revisiting your profile and start looking at the graphs…

On your dashboard, you find out the top ten tools you use, how much you use them and what you use them for.

What’s really interesting though, is the ‘recommended’ section, which suggests other tools or services to try based on your overall usage. I was recommended to try Evernote, a service I’ve heard of but not investigated – this is something that appeals to me as it “is a software application that allows users to capture information of various types, including text notes, mobile phone snapshots, printed and handwritten text”. I’ll have to give it a go.

I like the interface, it’s intuitive and not too busy. Each piece of information available is put into a particular type of category and this helps to keep data overload to a minimum. There are also several widgets available, and they even work with the basic Wordpress.com blogs, as you’ll see to the side.

This is a great service and something that I would definitely recommend to try if you are fanatical about trying and finding out about new software on the web. You can follow the latest Wakoopa developments on their blog.

Google Chrome: Getting 30% Faster

Augusto Alvarez — Fri, 22 May 2009 12:27:35 +0000

Are you a Chrome user? I bet you are; because since last september, when the browser was released, the response from the users was fenomenal according to Google. This light weight browser easly slide away inside the market, bringing a high performance option for not only the “anti-IE” users, but for all users (including those who said that there was no match for Mozilla Firefox or Safari).

Well now Google hits again, they are planning to release a new Chrome version that will increase the browser performance up to 30%. How? New version for WebKit and a JavaScript engine (V8) update. They even have a benchmark report that was executed comparing the new and old Chrome version:

But that’s not all. This new beta build will also include:

Removing Thumbnails from New Page: A very requested feature (specially Safari users) that will let you to select the pages you want to see every time you open a new tab. I bet you were expecting this one, to remove “those” sites that you don’t want other people to know you visit a lot.
Includes a Full-screen mode.
Form Autofill.
Fixed around 300 bugs from previous versions.

The only thing I wonder if this build will be more stable on Windows 7; that would definitely place Chrome as my preferred browser.

One thing is for sure, this is not a good news for IE8 that just started struggling for user’s acceptance, and with the bonus that IE8 appears as a “selectable” feature on Windows 7, no longer a mandatory installation for Windows operating systems. Looks like it’s going to be a long and a painful trip for IE to continue at the top.

Polaris: Google Analytics Adobe Air Application Free

Steven Finch — Fri, 22 May 2009 09:41:27 +0000

Since the launch of Adobe Air we have seen a huge amount of very slick desktop based applications launched and Polaris joins this group. Polaris is a free AIR based application which allows users to manage one website profile on Google Analytics.

The dashboard gives you nice overview of total visits, pageviews and other useful metrics. Other than that, Polaris has 7 different individual reports: Visit Overview, Map Overlay, Traffic Sources, Referring Sites, Top Content, Keywords, and Goal Value.

For those who are managing multiple profiles, the upgrade to the full version is $15/year. Both the free and the full version will get regular free updates with new functionality and features.

RhoHub: Free Smartphone Development Framework

Steven Finch — Thu, 21 May 2009 19:21:53 +0000

Rhomobile and Rhodes smartphone development framework have announced the public beta of RhoHub. RhoHub is the world’s first Development-as-a-Service for mobile. RhoHub provides a web based service for both smartphone app development and hosting of mobile applications.

RhoHub makes native mobile applications easier to build, deploy and run on all smartphones including BlackBerry, Windows Mobile, Android, Symbian and iPhone.

RhoHub will allow developers to generate, compile and run smartphone applications through the web giving them flexibility in their build environment. With RhoHub no SDK is required thus making the build process faster and more affordable. The best part is that RhoHub is online so developers can work from anywhere in the world with an internet connection.

Visual Studio 10 Beta Free Download

Steven Finch — Thu, 21 May 2009 10:23:53 +0000

Microsoft has announced the availability of Visual Studio 2010 beta for public download. VS 2010 was made available to MSDN and TechNet users few days back and its now available for public download. Both MSDN/TechNet subscribers and the public are able to test VS 2010 Professional, Team Suite, Team Foundation Server and the .Net Framework 4.

Currently there has been no announcement of the shipping date of the final version but it will probably be int he final quarter of this year. Visual Studio 2010 ships in with lots of new features and changes. You can check out the complete list of changes here. VS 2010 also features better support for Silverlight and the Windows Presentation Foundation.

If you are interested in testing the new VS 2010 and .Net framework 4, then you can download them here.