Following the release of new versions of both Internet Explorer and Firefox, the infamous 'browser wars' are flaring up again. Despite both Firefox 1.5 and the Beta of IE7 making significant strides, it would be be foolish to think this was a two-horse race. While gaining a good reputation with geeks and power users, Opera has long been a bit-part player among the big boys of the browser world. However, if this preview release is anything to go by, the Norwegian-built browser could finally be ready to punch with the heavyweights.

Opera has been pioneering new ways of browsing the web for some time. It has had tabbed browsing since the days before tabbed browsing was cool and developed the innovative 'mouse gestures' control system, where you navigate through the web just by holding the mouse button and flicking your wrist. The developers even dabbled with a multi-pane interface for viewing several pages within one interface.

The good news is that Opera has lost none of its appetite for innovation, and version 9 is packed with new goodies that will have the programmers at Mozilla and Microsoft choking on their doughnuts. For starters the app runs much quicker than the previous release, making it arguably the quickest browser around (except perhaps for Safari) at rendering pages. Incredibly, despite this boost in performance, the program appears to use less memory than version 8.5, making it far less draining on system resources than Firefox and IE.

In terms of features Opera is the gift that keeps on giving. New to the program comes OSX Tiger-style 'widgets', allowing you to check news, convert currency, view the weather and so on through a series of draggable pop-ups which anchor themselves in front of the browser. Although there aren’t many widgets to choose from at present, this is sure to change once the tech-minded Opera fans start developing more.

Another great addition to Opera 9 is BitTorrent support, allowing you to download torrents directly within the browser – a feature that amazingly no one had thought of before. This system works very smoothly, which makes us wonder why RSS feed reading support in Opera is still so poor.

Among the other new treats within the program is a nifty new search feature which lets you add any search engine to the search bar in the main toolbar. This means you can instantly access searches within your favorite online destinations (Softonic, for instance).

Tabbed browsing remains, although some users may be annoyed to discover that Opera has added close tab buttons to the tabs themselves rather than as a separate button. Having said this, the new web page preview thumbnails that appear when you rollover a tab are a real masterstroke. Mouse gestures are still there too, along with the addition of Total Recall-style voice commands – another example of how cutting-edge this browser is.

Opera's developers have been keen to ramp up security features too, and although they aren't highly original, the new content blocking and pop-up blocking functions serve their purpose effectively. What's more, it's refreshing to see a browser that embraces the latest web standards so freely, with the latest release boasting support for CSS 2.1 and CSS 3 tags.

The browser is remarkably stable and is far better behaved than Internet Explorer 7. Combined with its speed, innovative features and standards support, Opera is undoubtedly web software's best-kept secret, and the final release may prove to be even better than Firefox. Don't say anything though, or everyone will want it.

Download Opera 9.60 in Softonic

Tab Mix Plus completely enhances Firefox's tab browsing capabilities. It includes such features as duplicating tabs, controlling tab focus, tab clicking options, undo closed tabs and windows, plus much more. It also includes a full-featured session manager with crash recovery that can save and restore combinations of opened tabs and windows.

Features:

• Undo close tab
• Duplicate tabs
• Open selected links in tabs
• Drag and drop reordering of tabs
• Display unread tabs in red

Download Tab Mix Plus Extension 0.3.7 in Softonic

If you've already adopted Google Chrome as your default browser, here's a small tool that you're going to find really useful.

Google Chrome Backup lets you create a backup copy of your Chrome user profile, that is, all the data you collect and save for your personal usage while using the web browser. This user profile includes saved passwords, bookmarks, browsing history and cookies, among other personal elements.

The whole process is done through a three-step wizard that limits user intervention to choosing a target folder where to save the backup copy. Easy as pie! Unfortunately, Google Chrome Backup doesn't really let you choose which elements should be added to this backup and which shouldn't: either you backup the whole thing or not.

The good thing though about Google Chrome Backup is that you can not only backup your existing profile, but also create new ones. This comes in specially handy when you want to run some tests or install new add-ons that may be dangerous for your current profile. It's also a great way to share the browser between users: each one of them can have their own profile.

With Google Chrome Backup you can create backup copies of your current Google Chrome profile as well as create new ones, all in a very easy way.

Download Google Chrome Backup 1.4.0.65 in Softonic

For a while now, computer users have been waking up to the real threats that exist while browsing the web. Every day, more turn their back on the established vulnerabilities of Internet Explorer and opt for the hottest open source project on the net, Mozilla’s Firefox. But there are plenty of alternatives that offer great features, and one of those is Avant Browser.

Based on Internet Explorer, Avant will import all your favorites automatically and also keep your settings intact. As such it makes a good alternative to the popular Firefox browser, which shuns all things IE, and may seem slightly too foreign from the conventions that many users have built up while using Microsoft’s browser. Although Avant Browser is based on the Internet Explorer engine, it doesn’t fall victim to the same security vulnerabilities (although no-one is claiming that it’s invulnerable), and while it’s at it, adds some great tools designed to enhance your browsing experience.

The Flash blocker is an effective way to keep memory usage of the browser to a minimum or to simply cut out those over-elaborate ads that invade and take over many web sites. To appeal to a wider audience, there are quick links that let you quickly translate pages to a wide selection of languages, or you can customize the look of the browser using the many skins that are included by default. Of course, no modern browser could claim to be complete without tabbed browsing and Avant really delivers the goods with a system that allows you to even reload tabs after you’ve closed them.

In fact, this browser has some of the best extras that we’ve seen to date, in particular the system whereby tabs can be resized like normal program windows letting you display multiple site windows side-by-side, within one browser window. There‘s also a useful toolbar item that displays tags describing the page that you’re on. Click on a tag and you open a list of site that result from a search using that tag or keyword; brilliant! And the piece de résistance is an automatic session saver that lets you open up all the sites you were browsing when you last closed the program.

Avant Browser is relatively unknown as a mainstream browser and as such is not restricted from experimenting and taking the best ideas from the big hitters, as well as adding its own nuggets to the mix. What you get is a very impressive selection of tools in a browser that will even run your Microsoft update without objections. Definitely worth consideration if you are thinking of changing browser.

Download Avant Browser 11.7.15 in Softonic

Tor is one of the most widely used anonymous surfing proxy servers used on the web and as the name suggests, OperaTor is designed for the specific needs of the Opera browser.

OperaTor is a portable software bundle which allows you to browse the web anonymously and actually combines Opera, Tor and Polipo. The developers assure that no privacy data is stored on the computer that you plug your OperaTor pendrive into. You'll experience no difference in browsing other than every HTTP request will be conducted from an anonymous IP - great if you want to hide surfing habits or prevent yourself being tracked.

The application is pretty much a plug-and-play design although note that the only protocols which OperaTor anonymizes are HTTP and HTTPS. This means that it's wise to turn off other Opera features such as Java, JavaScript and other integrated elements. In addition, some sites simply won't accept anonymous surfing via Tor. This is obviously a real pain if you want a to visit a Java enabled website and something that should definitely be fixed in future releases.

If you use Opera regularly but want to ensure your privacy then OperaTor is a quick, easy and portable solution.

Download OperaTor 3.2 in Softonic

A general homepage hijackers detector and remover. Initially based on the article Hijacked!, but expanded with almost a dozen other checks against hijacker tricks. It is continually updated to detect and remove new hijacks. It does not target specific programs/URLs, just the methods used by hijackers to force you onto their sites. As a result, false positives are imminent and unless you are sure what you're doing, you should always consult with knowledgable folks (e.g. the forums) before deleting anything.

Download HijackThis 2.0.2 in Softonic

IECookiesView is a small utility that displays the details of all cookies that Internet Explorer stores on your computer. In addition, it allows you to do the following actions:

• Sort the cookies list by any column you want, by clicking the column header. A second click sorts the column in descending order
• Find a cookie in the list by specifying the name of the Web site
• Select and delete the unwanted cookies
• Save the cookies to a readable text file
• Copy cookie information into the clipboard
• Automatically refresh the cookies list when a Web site sends you a cookie
• Display the cookies of other users and from other computers
• Open the IECookiesView utility directly from Internet Explorer toolbar
• Change the content of a cookie
• Export your cookies to Netscape/Mozilla cookies file
• Block specific Web sites from using cookies through the cookies blocking mechanism of Internet Explorer 6.0

Download IECookiesView 1.73 in Softonic

When Google suddenly entered the battle of the browsers with Chrome, many users expressed their concern about security and privacy issues. If you're among them, you'll be happy to learn about the launch of Iron.

Iron is a modified version of Chrome's source code that removes all the components in the original browser that collect usage data. This means that Iron blocks the unique user ID, doesn't send user-specific data to Google, disables the report-on-crash feature and doesn't connect to Google to check for updates.

Personally I don't see that much danger in leaving those features enabled, but I can understand there are people who might be worried about their privacy when surfing the web. As for the rest, Iron remains pretty much a Chrome clone, with the same clean interface, the Omnibar, the thumbnails homepage and even the Incognito function. In fact, the only problem you may find with Iron is language: the program runs in English, but the developer's website, installation and documentation are all in German.

If you don't agree with Chrome's privacy policy, get Iron: a web browser with Chrome's look and feel but without all the data-collecting elements.

Download SRWare Iron 0.2.152.0 in Softonic

The worst part of buying a new computer is the fact that you have to backup your stuff in the old PC and move it all to the new one. Luckily there are some software apps that can help you with that.

One of them is FEBE, which stands for Firefox Environment Backup Extension. As it name states, this Firefox add-on lets you create a backup copy of all the important information in your browser (bookmarks, extensions, preferences, themes, cookies and more) and restore it in a different location, all in a very easy way.

With FEBE you can then have a perfectly synchronized copy of Firefox in each one of your computers, be it your desktop and laptop or home and office computers. It's also a great tool to have a backup copy of your browser just in case it crashes or if you want to test new versions without taking any risks. And if you can't be bothered creating a backup copy by yourself, use FEBE's scheduling tool and let the extension take care of it.

FEBE is seamlessly integrated into Firefox interface: open the Tools menu and you'll be able to access the extension's options menu and main functions. The only drawback we could find to the extension is the sounds played by the program when displaying any warning: they're a bit annoying so remember to turn them off in the settings menu.

If you want to have a complete backup copy of all your Firefox data or need to move Firefox settings from one PC to another, this is the tool you're looking for.

Download FEBE (Firefox Environment Backup Extension) 6.0.3 in Softonic

Mozilla Firefox is a fast, full-featured web browser that's easy to use. It has lots of great features including popup-blocking, tabbed-browsing, integrated search, improved privacy features, automatic updating and more. Plus, thanks to the PortableApps.com launcher bundled in Mozilla Firefox - Portable Edition, it leaves no personal information behind on the machine you run it on, so you can take your favorite browser along with all your favorite bookmarks and extensions with you wherever you go.

Intelligent Start

Firefox Portable now uses an intelligent start system that keeps track of where you're running it from. That way, if you run it a second time from the same location or move to another PC that happens to give you the same drive letter, it won't have to do as much to start Firefox up.

Alternate INI Locations Dropped

To improve startup time, the alternate directory layouts for the FirefoxPortable.ini file have been dropped. It will need to be placed next to FirefoxPortable.exe. If you use an INI, you'll also need to update it with the new INI options.

Most Alternate Directory Layouts Dropped

To simplify the launcher, all alternate directory layouts have been dropped except placing the launcher one directory above the FirefoxPortable directory.

Improved Unicode Support

Firefox Portable has improved support for unicode, so you can drop a file with non-ASCII characters right on FirefoxPortable.exe and open it up.

Improved Live CD Support For Windows 95/98/Me

Live mode has been improved for better compatibility with most Windows 95, 98 and Me systems.

Download Firefox Portable 3.0.3 in Softonic

Firefox, the world’s most significant web browser has finally unveiled its new version, and with it a slew of improvements. If you’re not already using it to browse this page, then read on to learn all about its new features before getting a hold of it.

Firefox 3 has undergone a significant makeover, with sleeker icons and a cleaner look. The ‘Go back one page’ button is bigger and elements in the location bar, like titles and URLs, are more easily recognizable. I was also impressed that it finally passes the Acid2 Test, so Firefox can be guaranteed to render any web page out there.

Mozilla have worked on improving the bookmarking system in Firefox. To add a new bookmark all you need to do is star a site from the address bar. Firefox also lets you search bookmarks and history straight from the bar itself. Places, the system for handling your bookmarks and history, now shows all sorts of information like recently starred pages, most used tags or most visited pages. I’m not sure everybody will make use of all that info, but it’s still nice to find it there.

The download manager in Firefox 3 is improved and not only will it remember your downloads even after quitting the browser, it will also allow you to pause/start/stop downloads at any time. Similarly, Firefox will automatically look for updates to your add-ons and features a built-in search box to browse the Mozilla add-ons site for new extensions. However you’ll find most add-ons still don’t support the latest version of Firefox.

In terms of performance you’ll find that Firefox loads pages much faster and seems to handle memory usage much better than before. This is a big improvement considering that that was the main concern in previous versions.

Security has also been improved in Firefox, with one-click site info and malware protection. You can also set specific permissions (like text size, image blocking or cookies) for each website you visit. You’ll find Firefox 3 also interacts with Windows CardSpace and OpenID, two services which unify your identity online, whilst securing it.

Firefox version 3 really feels like a big step up. It includes lots of improvements, notably in the design and in improving the whole user experience, with a better download manager and improved bookmarking system. I’m not sure everybody will use Places or tags that much, but they’re a welcome addition. True to its roots, Firefox has also bettered its security features. But for me the real highlight of this new release has to be the performance enhancements. We’ll have to see as soon as add-ons are supported, but this new version should fare much better than previous ones. If you’re a Firefox user, make sure you update now.

Download Firefox 3.0.3 in Softonic

FoxTab is an innovative new way to organize your tabs in Firefox in order to view what's on them and what you've got open at a glance.

FoxTab is probably best utilized by those that have way too many tabs open to, excuse the pun, keep tabs of. It can spread your tabs in five different ways depending on which view you prefer - inevitably you'll end up preferring one or the other so four of the views very quickly become redundant.

The five layouts that you can choose from are "Stack" - tabs which are stacked in 3D form one behind the other; "Wall" which are tabs are displayed on a wall (basically your desktop); Grid means that tabs are aligned on a grid; Row means tabs are arranged horizontally and finally Circle where tabs are placed around a 3D circle. To change views, you simply use CTRL+TAB (or a key combination of your choice) to cycle through them one by one. If you've ever used CoverFlow on the Mac, then FoxTab is based on the same principle

FoxTab is an innovative way to view the number of tabs you've got open and what's on them. However, it does tend to put quite a load on your RAM so make sure you've got plenty free otherwise it's more hassle than it's worth.

Download FoxTab 0.9.9 in Softonic

If you're a die hard IE7 fan then you'll probably be a bit bored with the default setup. IE7Pro spices-up Internet Explorer with a ton of features and tweaks to make IE "friendlier, more useful, secure and customizable" in the words of the developers.

So what does it offer? Well, it may be nothing new but it includes Tabbed Browsing so you can have multiple windows open within one window. If you don't have the Google Toolbar, then it also incorporates a useful one-click Spell Check plus Inline Searching, Crash Recovery in case you lose a session and a Proxy Switcher if you use your browser on different networks.

There's also a rather dodgy Web Accelerator which in reality, doesn't seem to speed-up anything. In addition to all this, you'll find a Webpage Capture utility and Flash Blocker and pus a few more script plugins. In reality, half of these you can install via other plugins or won't need anyway. However, if you can't be bothered searching around for alternatives, it does pack the most important plugins into one package. By loading your browser with so many additions too, it can actually slow down the loading of some websites.

Download IE7pro 2.4 in Softonic

Since Firefox exploded onto the web-browsing scene in 2004, it has been downloaded an incredible 200 million times according to its developers, Mozilla. Since then, apart from some minor changes, visual teaks and security fixes, there haven’t been any radical changes – that is until now. Firefox 2.0 is finally here and brings fans a whole host of integrated functions that were previously either unavailable or needed plug-ins.

Note that many of the existing themes and extensions will not work with this beta release although you can try forcing them with the “Nightly” extension – at your own risk of course.

Amongst the security highlights of 2.0 are anti-phishing support which helps the browser discriminate between genuine websites and those intended to store and retrieve your personal information. Other goodies include enhanced tabbed browsing (each with their own close option finally), the ability to un-close tabs, search plug-in/add-on manager, and much, much more. One of the most useful features we found was a predictive search function within the Google toolbar that would suggest potential phrases and popular search terms as you typed. The automatic session retrieval option (previously available with the Tab Mix Plus plugin) is also a tonic when your system crashes or you’ve got too many tabs open and Firefox cripples under the strain.

The extension incompatibility issue is the main drawback although this will change as developers update their plugins over the coming weeks and months. The legendary memory leak also still doesn’t seem to have been fixed as Firefox continues to guzzle processing power. This resulted in frequent crashes, keyboard head-banging and violent swearing.

Whilst the recently released Internet Explorer 7 is only just introducing tabbed browsing, Firefox 2.0 is already taking internet surfing to a new level. Although many of the new features are available with plug-ins anyway, this is still a rip-roaring browser and consolidates Firefox’s position as the best browser on the market by miles.

Download Firefox 2.0.0.17 in Softonic

After having successfully launched their own webmail service, RSS reader, online suite and many other apps, having a Google web browser was only a question of time.

Google Chrome has joined the so called web browser battle with a neatly designed web browser which, in spite of being still at a development stage, already shows a lot of potential.

The first thing that caught my attention when launching Google Chrome for the first time was its minimalist design. Besides a couple of bars and a couple of buttons, there's nothing else on the interface to steal screen space from the websites you visit – not even a status bar, as it automatically shows and hides whenever it's necessary.

Another feature I loved is the fact that Google Chrome uses the same keyboard shortcuts and mousewheel combinations as Firefox. With a zero learning curve, you immediately feel at your element and there's no need to start testing new shortcuts or reading the documentation. Other similarities to Firefox in Google Chrome include a complete download manager (which reminded me a lot of the Download Statusbar extension) and a handy password manager.

If you don't want Google Chrome to track down your browsing movements, try the incognito window. This special window won't save anything about your session (no browsing history, no cookies, etc.), so no breadcrumbs will be left after you close it.

But if there's a feature that makes Google Chrome really stand out, that's having separate processes for each one of the tabs you open. That means that you can check the amount of system resources used up by each tab, and close any of them in case of trouble without having to shut down the whole browser.

That said, I don't think Google Chrome is perfect yet. Like I said before, it's still in development so there's still plenty of room for it to grow and improve. I must say I had some stability issues when trying to install the Flash plug-in, and that I was totally unable to make the Java Virtual Machine work – which eventually prevented me from using certain web services. Despite these flaws, I really liked Google Chrome and I think it may become a serious option when choosing your web browser. Only time will tell.

Google Chrome, Google's web browser, mixes a clean, minimalist interface with a variety of powerful tools that can easily turn it into a great web browser.

Download Google Chrome 0.2.149.30 in Softonic

Why use text bookmarks when you can access your most frequently visited websites though much more appealing thumbnails?

Fast Dial is a Firefox add-on that creates a local webpage with thumbnails of your favorite websites. You can then set this site as your homepage and have these selected links always at sight every time you launch the browser.

The best about Fast Dial is undoubtedly its degree of customization. You can personalize just about any detail, from the number of sites displayed on the page to the colors shown for thumbnails, including also their size and even assigning a keyboard shortcut for each one of them. The Fast Dial thumbnail gallery opens with a button on the browser's toolbar, so you can use it as an alternative to your traditional starting page.

On the downside, the truth is that Fast Dial sometimes is a bit unstable, meaning it may unexpectedly change the thumbnail layout or even erase some of them. Hopefully these flaws will be fixed in future versions.

With Fast Dial you can create a nice customizable thumbnail gallery with links to your favorite websites

Download Fast Dial 2.9 in Softonic

NoScript provides extra protection for your Mozilla/Firefox or Flock browser: this extension allows JavaScript and Java execution only for trusted domains of your choice (e.g. your home-banking web site).

This whitelist based pre-emptive script blocking approach prevents exploitation of security vulnerabilities (known and even not known yet!) with no loss of functionality.

You can enable JavaScript/Java execution for sites you trust with a simple left-click on the NoScript status bar icon (look at the picture), or using the contextual menu, for easier operation in popup statusbar-less windows.

Download NoScript Extension 1.8.1 in Softonic

If you liked Google Chrome's interface but prefer to use Firefox as your main web browser, Chromifox is exactly what you need.

Chromifox is a visual theme for Firefox that applies the Chrome appearance to the Mozilla browser. In other words, you'll get a minimalist design, slick layout and a thin cote of blue all over Firefox interface. The theme basically changes icons, tab appearance and the overall window color.

The new design does look good on Firefox, but after trying out Chrome I must say it doesn't feel like the real thing. Google Chrome still has that aura of cleanliness that apparently not even this visual theme can achieve.

In spite of not being a realistic Chrome clone, this visual theme still adds a slick, blue appearance to Firefox

Download Chromifox 1.0 in Softonic

Firefox extensions add loads of different functionalities to the browser, and the latest one we've come to know is managing files with Firefly.

Firefly transforms Firefox into a full featured file manager with which to browse the contents of your hard drive. The extension adds a new toolbar to the browser's interface and works on the same tab-based scheme.

Firefly offers several viewing possibilities (from thumbnails to a detailed list, like in Windows Explorer) and features the most basic managing editing tools like copying, moving, pasting or renaming. It even displays an photo preview when you hover your mouse over image files.

What I specially liked about Firefly is the choice of layouts: you can have the classic one-window view, but can also choose to have a double-pane view that makes file management even easier. On the downside, despite Firefly works fine, I found it a bit glitchy.

Firefly adds a handy file management functionality to your favorite web browser, though I think it still needs a bit more development.

Download Firefly 0.4.1 in Softonic

So you want to develop your own portal or community website? XOOPS is an easy to use dynamic web content management system based on PHP. It's mainly aimed at those that want to develop small to large dynamic community websites, intra company portals, corporate portals and weblogs.

For a free application, this is a great piece of software. The lite version of XOOPS can be used as a personal weblog or journal. For this, you just perform a standard installation and use the 'News' module only. For a slightly more advanced site, you can add the Forum, Download and Web Links modules which are excellent for community sites. For an advanced large site, you can even develop your own modules such as eShop and use XOOP's uniform user management system to seamlessly integrate your modules with the whole system. Modules can be installed/uninstalled/activated/deactivated with a click using the XOOPS module administration system.

XOOPS also allows users a huge amount of customisation once they are registered. Registered users can edit their profiles, select site themes, upload custom avatars amongst other things. If you've never had the time or patience to learn how to develop a website, XOOPS is an excellent free solution although it still takes a considerable amount of time to learn how to use it, especially for bigger sites.

Download XOOPS 2.0.18.2 in Softonic