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First Look video: Photoshop CS3 (Mac)

Photoshop CS3 for Mac is still your top choice if you're serious about image editing. Loaded with features for color-correction, photo enhancements, filters, effects, and layer management, Photoshop is the pro-level image-editing software to measure all others by. If you'd like a closer look at some of the features Photoshop CS3 has to offer, check out our First Look video to see if you're ready to download the trial.

Nvidia conference is all about the other processor

SAN JOSE, Calif.--Nvidia is making a case for the graphics processing unit, the other chip inside the PC, at the Nvision conference that opened on Monday.

In his inaugural keynote--this is first Nvision conference--Nvidia CEO Jen-Hsun Huang reminded the audience that the graphics processing unit (GPU) has come a long way. In short, the GPU has evolved from the simple fixed-function graphics accelerator (e.g., the IBM 8514 that debuted in 1987) to the modern graphics chip, a computing engine capable of almost one teraflop of processing power. (A teraflop is equal to one trillion floating point operations per … Read more

Featured Freeware: Process Monitor

Imagine Regmon on steroids, and you'll have a glimpse of this home-run hitting process watchdog. Process Monitor's simple spreadsheet-like interface displays processes through a user-created filter. The interface lacks simple single-click column sorting, however, columns are easily shown or hidden.

Process Monitor displays an extensive amount of information that will appeal mainly to advanced users. Context-clicking a process offers a pop-up menu of options to display additional information or affect the process. The pop-up is also available as the toolbar Event menu. Other pull-down menus manipulate the great amount of information to highlight trends. A button bar offers … Read more

IBM to acquire ILOG in $340 million deal

IBM announced Monday that it plans to acquire business rules management software maker ILOG in a deal valued at $340 million.

Under the deal, IBM will merge ILOG into its WebSphere brand, in a move to expand its middleware software footprint. Middleware is a layer of software that helps servers running databases and Web site software talk with servers running applications.

By combining its business process management (BPM), business optimization, and service-oriented architecture (SOA) software with ILOG's business rules management technologies, IBM is aiming to provide customers with the ability to gather up all relevant information spread throughout their … Read more

Featured Freeware: Security Process Explorer

Security Process Explorer is a freeware replacement for the Windows native Task Manager. It comes with some useful functions, but the simplistic layout doesn't adapt well when displaying deeper investigations into the relationships between different processes. Still, it's worth looking at.

It offers many of the same functions that other process-managing programs offer. You can explore the connections between different processes, block processes, end them, and view in-depth information about a particular process. You can even search on the Web for a particular process, but unlike other programs, Security Process Explorer takes you to a proprietary page to … Read more

Spyware Horror Story: Confounded by hosts

Published by Mesila; San Francisco, CA

I recently had unknown malware that was causing Windows to keep rebooting at odd moments. Another thing it did was install a kazillion services and then have all of them running at once. It wasn't something that any scanner would pick up--and being big on file sharing, I've made it a point to keep a whole army of antimalware programs around. I'm assuming the culprit was either one that was new at the time, or a variant that had morphed itself from an older version. Eventually, after a lot of fussing … Read more

Power Downloader shows you What's Running

One of Power Downloader's big concerns is that the average user lets his computer get away with too much. How many of us, Power D asks, truly know exactly which programs and processes are active at all times? There are several programs that can help you answer that question, and one of Power Downloader's favorites is What's Running.

What's Running is similar to Windows Task Manager, except far more informative and useful. The cramped multipane interface can be hard to read, but even it has its good points: it lists processes in a parent-child hierarchy--incidentally, not … Read more

Featured Freeware: Process Explorer

If you've ever tried tracking down a process in Windows Task Manager, you know it's like looking for a needle in a haystack. Process Explorer makes the job a lot easier. This utility displays running processes in an intuitive tree format that includes not only process names, but also program icons and other data, such as description, image, and processor time.

It also can identify the process for a given application window or look up a process name in Google--a handy way to spot spyware or just to drill deeper into what your computer's really doing when … Read more

The world's 50 most innovative companies

BusinessWeek has published its annual The World's 50 Most Innovative Companies list, a survey put together in collaboration with the Boston Consulting Group (BCG). Of course Apple is the no.1. Yet there are some surprises:

- Two Indian companies made the top 20: Tata is #6 and Reliance came in at #19.

- General Motors made it on the list (for "products"), thanks to "concept cars like the electric Chevrolet Volt and the Detroit auto maker's renewed focus on design."

- For the first time, a Wall Street firm made the top 25: … Read more

IBM: Faster, not hotter, 32-nanometer chips coming

Chips in 2009 will run faster but not necessarily hotter. That's the gist of what IBM, along with its joint development partners such as Samsung Electronics and Toshiba, announced Monday.

The IBM alliance is using "high-k/metal gate" technology to achieve this, the same category of process technology that Intel currently uses in its 45-nanometer processors. The alliance says it is seeing performance improvements of up to 35 percent over 45nm technology at the same "operating voltage" or power levels.

This allows alliance chipmakers such as Samsung, Toshiba, and Freescale Semiconductor (formerly an arm of … Read more