It turns out that Microsoft [I]is[/I] bringing out Windows XP Media Center Edition in Australia, but until such time as it materialises -- and Microsoft Australia is being very sketchy on the dates -- those of us looking to integrate our PC media files with our televisions and hi-fi systems have to turn to bridging solutions.

PC-cillin 2000 is extremely easy to set up out of the box, particularly since there are few setup screens to wade through during installation. PC-cillin was one of the few packages that scanned memory and critical files before installing, thus ensuring that it did not further spread viruses on an infected system.

WinZip has become the most popular archival program used on the Windows platform, and it’s good to see some serious innovation in this revision.

Useful new features and a total interface overhaul make this the best Office ever.

A shift of focus to advanced CSS and JavaScript handling, but Dreamweaver is beginning to look old-fashioned

MACROMEDIA E-LEARNING STUDIO

Now a true all-in-one package thanks to file and folder backup, but it can’t match Acronis for value.

The HardKey/EG Pro is a combination of USB dongle and software together encrypting files or systems keeping your data safe from prying eyes.

Sexy, isn’t it? And it might just knock Apple’s iPod Nano off its pedestal.

Nick Ross used to have 20 copies of achybreakyheart.mp3 on his hard drive.

A few new features add to an already superb utility, and the price remains as low as ever

Refocusing on disc-related features makes Nero the top choice for optical disc authoring.

Adobe has been riding high on the success of the portable document format (PDF), and the Acrobat creation tools needed to generate them. Later in the year version 6.0 will be launched, but in the meantime we have a preview of Acrobat Professional 6.0 Beta.

Like its direct competitor Ulead DVD MovieFactory, Pinnacle Express can be used to create VideoCD and SVCD discs as well as DVD titles. Unlike Ulead's program, however, it supports slide shows as well as video...

Support for latest video formats and a batch-media encoder, but supporting apps have seen little upgrading.

We’ve all been warned a million times since the dawn of computing – but we’ll knock it into your head once more for posterity: save often.

Streaming is the process of taking large files, breaking them into smaller pieces and sending them to their destination where they are recompiled as they arrive, providing an audio, video or animated broadcast over the net.

Powerful and decent value, but ease of use could be better.

Store your precious data online, safely.