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

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

Acoo Browser is a powerful multi-tabbed Internet browser based on the Internet Explorer engine (IE 5 or greater required). Acoo Browser provides a user-friendly GUI interface, including tabbed document windows, dockable panel groups and customizable toolbars.

Acoo Browser allows user to surf multiple Web sites within one browser window. It also includes many advanced features such as Mouse Gestures, built-in syntax highlighted HTML source viewer, powerful built-in Web page analyzer, recoverable Popup Blocker, Ads Filter, script error suppression, Cleaner, external tools, web page zooming, URL Alias, Integrated search engine support, and much more...

Acoo Browser can block annoying pop-ups, banner Ads, flash Ads and other Internet Ad annoyances automatically without interfering your surfing. There is also detailed logging record in Acoo Browser, and you may know the Ads sites killed by Acoo Browser so as to improve your setting. Acoo Browser makes your surfing experience easier, quicker and more comfortable.

Download Acoo Browser 1.89.690 in Softonic

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 9.52 in Softonic

There's nothing more annoying than your personal inbox getting filled with spam trying to sell you viagra, financial services and all manner of other things you don't want.

Mailwasher Free is an easy solution for those that want to try and stop the avalanche of spam that may be clogging your inbox. These programs can be hard to setup but Mailwasher is refreshingly free of jargon and will help you get setup on just about any mail client in a matter of seconds. The program has even received glowing write ups by the BBC and CNN so you know you're getting something pretty decent here. Mailwasher has a clever preview utility which allows you to preview spam before downloading it onto your desktop - this is especially useful if it's malicious mail that could do damage to your hard drive. You can customise it to make it more sensitive to your needs too such as by adding friends to your contact list and also instructing it to bounce suspicious mail back to the sender. This is particularly useful as it will make the sender think your address is no longer active so your name is removed from their list meaning they won't be bothering you again.

A very simple but highly effective and powerful spam management tool that makes sure your inbox stays junk free.

Download Mailwasher Free 6.1 in Softonic

If you're being constantly hassled by pop-up ads, then you'll know how annoying it can be. Adblock blocks annoying popup windows although it's specifically designed for Internet Explorer. The advantage of blocking pop-ups are numerous. Firstly, it enables you to speed- up page loading as ads usually take-up valuable bandwidth and RAM. Secondly, it can make your page much clearer without annoying ads in the way and finally of course, it stops you being hassled by casino and viagra companies all the time.

Adblock blocks a range of different ad types including Flash ads to save bandwidth and RAM, Activex object ads to make your browser more secure, fly-in ads and rich media/banner ads so that your page is clearer to read. The other good thing is that the developers are constantly updating the software so it's always up-to-date with the latest ad tricks.

Adblock is particularly useful if you live in a rural area and rely on a slow dial-up modem for the internet. The most useful feature is that you can choose any image on the web page and right click to add it to the blocked list.

This is a powerful Adblocker although still not as effective as simply switching to the Firefox browser which blocks far more pop ups automatically.

Download Adblock Pro 2.6 in Softonic

MyProxy helps dramatically accelerate your internet connection, save your Internet costs and make your web surfing more enjoyable. In order to achieve these targets the whole sequence of functions is implemented in this software: ad stopper, pop up blocker, caching, money and traffic records, internet connection speed meter, integrated dialer, sharing dialup connection between other computers of your LAN.

An average web page contains 5-7 banners and 3-4 pictures. Your internet connection is being freed by caching pictures and blocking ad banners for loading useful information. Statistics shows that every 1 megabyte of useful information contains about 100-150 banners and 100-200 kilobytes of static graphics.

MyProxy works as a proxy-server between your Internet browser and your Internet Service Provider (ISP). So all your internet requests go through it. This means it is not dependent on the type of browser you have installed. Just install the program and MyProxy will do the rest.

Download MyProxy 8.9 in Softonic

Quero Toolbar is an address bar replacement with an integrated ad blocker for IE making your daily work on the Web more efficient. Choose from a number of predefined profiles each containing over a dozen of useful search engines and online services.

The entries are grouped by category and include such famous sites as Google, MSN Search, Wikipedia or Amazon. New profiles will be added in the future. If your favorite site is missing, let's make a suggestion.

Quero Toolbar will help you to find the information you are looking for once you have arrived at a promising Web page. You can use highlighting to instantly recognize the search term occurencies of your last query or alternativley click on the magnifying glass icon to start your page-wide search.

Download Quero Toolbar 4.0.10 in Softonic

The best way to stop malware infecting your system is to catch it before it strikes. Yes, if George Bush has spyware or adware protection installed on his PC, you can bet it will be pre-emptive like STOPzilla. STOPzilla provides real-time protection, detects, blocks and removes spyware and adware, stops pop-ups, and erases cookies and history. It's constantly updated against the latest threats so you're guaranteed round the clock protection as long as you are connected to the net.

The thing I most appreciate about this program is that it's really easy to configure. The cartoon logo may give the impression that it's not a serious piece of software but it is actually very easy to use yet pretty solid. Although Firefox, and even IE, now have pretty good pop-up blockers, it's particularly effective in this area blocking almost everything that has not been assigned to your safe list.

STOPzilla is easy to use, powerful and requires little configuration - what more can you ask for from an anti-malware program.

Download STOPzilla 4.4.4.16 in Softonic

AdsCleaner is a powerful ad blocking software designed to stop ads (block banners ad, kill popup), guard your online privacy. But keep in mind - AdsCleaner is not only an effective ad stopper and pop up blocker, but a very useful, multifunctional tool that can give you much more than any other ad killers.

AdsCleaner is an excellent ad killer & pop up stopper that seamlessly integrates into the Internet Explorer browser and enhances it with a number of neat features:

• AdsCleaner makes it possible to block ads (ad killer abilities)
• AdsCleaner allows blocking banners, which have specific dimensions (468x60, 88x31, etc).
• AdsCleaner allows shrinking the area previously occupied by blocked banner. Such a flexible approach to ad blocking guarantees comfortable work with web pages with our ad killer software
• AdsCleaner makes it easy to avoid loading graphics from other web sites
• AdsCleaner an effective pop-up stopper
• AdsCleaner allows you to clear all the traces of your web surfing that Windows automatically stores on the hard drive – just with a single mouse click
• Scheduled cleansing of all traces of your online activities

Download AdsCleaner 4.3.52 in Softonic

Ad Annihilator is an ad and cookie blocker and offline browser that rids you from advertisements and pop-up windows. The application protects your privacy while you surf the web; spares your online time, bandwidth and money; speeds up your browsing; supports offline browsing; supports Web document versions; shares retrieved documents with other people and computers; organizes retrieved documents; explores Web documents structure; and searches for downloaded documents.

Download Ad Annihilator 2.4.9 in Softonic

The scourge of spyware has been well documented for some time now, and the problem isn’t one that will go away in a hurry. Thankfully, there are plenty of tools around that help you detect and remove evil, privacy-raiding code from your machine, with BPS Spyware and Adware Remover being one of the more effective. Unlike many of its peers, the application offers real-time protection to help you ensure that once you’re system is clean, it stays clean.

Scanning for spyware using the app is a doddle thanks to an intuitive interface, which, despite looking a little tacky and garish, allows you to perform a quick scan, full scan or a deep scan with the minimum of fuss. Although the scan takes a little too long compared with many other spyware removers, it makes amends for this by being very thorough, picking up traces of spyware that even apps like AdAware couldn’t touch. However, the application lacks somewhat when it comes to informing you what the malware detected is, and there are no descriptions of the spyware elements included in the database, which is a bit of a shame.

The great thing about BPS is that it isn’t just a spyware remover. The utility also includes a system hijack scanner, a Winsock repair tool and a rather neat pop-up blocker which is compatible with any Web browser. As a result, it can help protect you from all the various bugs that lurk on the net without any hassle. You’ll be able to find plenty of tools that can scan faster than this one, but the program still boasts an impressive range of options and is very simple to get to grips with.

Download BPS Spyware and Adware Remover 9.3.0.11 in Softonic

It seems somewhat ironic that Internet Explorer’s reign should be undermined by Firefox. After all, this is a browser that rose from the ashes of the team that developed Netscape Navigator, a program which IE ousted to claim the monopoly on the web.

It’s somewhat bizarre that a non-for-profit developer should be in a position to strike fear into world’s biggest software producer, especially while still in the 1.x stage of development of its product. Yet, as many predicted, this eagerly-anticipated release represents a real threat to Microsoft’s dominance of the browser market, with the Mozilla team pumping plenty more into the program and thus upping the bar for IE7.

Firefox was already a class product, delivering a fast and simple way to browse the web in comfort. So much so in fact that existing users might be wondering why they even need to upgrade when the current version is so much better than anything else out there.

Picture it like sitting in business class and being offered another pillow. The app now allows you to browse the web faster and more securely than ever, while retaining the incredible simplicity of previous versions of Firefox. Cosmetically, you won’t notice much difference between this and the last incarnation, but the changes that have been made are quite welcome, if not essential.

First up, is a new-and-drop facility for browser tabs, allowing you to sort and reorder your tabs just by clicking and dragging. The Preferences menu also gets an overhaul, making the options clearer and easier to access. The developers have also tweaked the ´Back’ and ´Forward’ tools, preloading cached pages to speed up surfing.

However, the main changes to the program are all hidden within the back-end of Firefox 1.5. The app comes armed with a series of security fixes, making it the safest surfing tool on the block. What’s more, all updates and security patches, including extensions, now take place in the background, meaning that you don’t have to manually install every new release – a process which can become pretty tiresome.

There’s also a new extension management system which makes it a lot easier to manage the expanding wealth of cool plug-ins for the browser. On the down-side, the new version renders many extensions and themes redundant as they are incompatible with version 1.5. That said, we all know how keen Firefox developers can be to keep up with technology, so it shouldn’t take long for the updates to these extensions to be completed.

Of course, the application retains all of the cool features that have helped make it so popular including integrated searching (now with support for Answers.com), tabbed browsing, pop-up killer, live bookmarks and support for the latest web technology.

While the tweaks within this release are reasonably subtle, Firefox is making incredible strides towards conquering the browser market. I development continues at the current pace then Microsoft is going to have its work cut out, especially as we haven't seen a release of IE since before Osama Bin Laden went missing.

Download Firefox 1.5.0.7 in Softonic

HtmlFilter goes beyond traditional popup blockers by also blocking inline text ads served by major ad networks. This includes ads from Google, Yahoo! and MSN. HtmlFilter works with all sorts and web browsers and RSS clients. It installs on limited user rights environments. Popups, pop unders, inline ads, javascript, animations, transient ads, all are blocked. HtmlFilter goes even further by actually letting you replace referrers while you surf, thus making you more anonymous.

Download HtmlFilter 1.0 in Softonic

Super Ad Blocker blocks all forms of advertising including Flash, Rich Media, fly-in, slide-in, pop-ups, pop-unders, spyware ads, messenger ads, and much more. The application has the ability to block and removes thousands of major spyware/adware applications.

Super Ad Blocker includes advanced privacy cleaning and automatic updates so the product is never out of date. What's more, it provides detailed statistics for the number and type of ads blocked. You can play a fun sound when an ad is blocked to celebrate your victory over the horrors of the Net. Super Ad Blocker never interferes with e-mailing, banking, surfing, chatting or any other Internet experience.

Download Super Ad Blocker 4.1.1004 in Softonic

WorldWebAccess is designed to help you speed up your Internet connection with the minimum amount of fuss, allowing you to surf the Web and send and receive email up to 10X faster. Accelerator also includes advanced pop-up and banner ad blockers, privacy protection, application cleaning tools, and anti-spyware option.

Accelerator works its magic by utilizing a vast network of caching servers around the US and a compression algorithm to increase the speed of your dial-up connection. Accelerator instantly compresses web pages, images, animations, and documents. The program speeds up FTP downloads, web browsing, and email (POP3, SMTP, and IMAP). It supports all major browsers: Internet Explorer, Netscape, Opera, Firefox, and Mozilla. It supports all popular email clients: Outlook, Outlook Express, and Eudora.

Download WorldWebAccess Accelerator 3.21 in Softonic

Pop-Up Stopper Free Edition - Panicware's Free PopUp Blocker, is a power ad blocker. This pop-up blocker features a powerful, yet easy to use, interface which allows quick access to its wide variety of features. Pop-Up Stopper Free supports Internet Explorer, Netscape & Mozilla only.

Pop-Up Stopper runs in the system tray next to your clock for instant access. Simply right-click the white hand and you will be presented with the menu on the right. From this menu you may access the preferences, monitor your Privacy Report and identity theft risk assessment, check for product updates and more!

Download Pop-Up Stopper Free Edition 3.1.1012 in Softonic

Emsa Port Blocker is a TCP blocking utility. What it does, is blocking unwanted tcp access from/to your computer. It is not a firewall, but up to some extent it could be regarded as a similar tool. Its purpose is to prohibit TCP access on certain ports and ip addresses. IT can also be used as a TCP monitor because it shows TCP connections currently active on the machine.

This program works two ways. It can be configured to block access to certain local ports, but it can also prohibit access to specified remote ports as well. For example, you may try adding the port '80' to remote blocked ports. You'll immediately notice that you have disabled your browser's capability from accessing the www. You can use this program to block unauthorized access to certain ports on your computer, for example network ports like TCP 135 or 139 and so on. You can also use the configuration to permit connections between local IP's, or block even those as desired. The program comes with a function allowing to detect local ip's and adding them to the 'allowed' IP list.

Download Emsa Port Blocker 1.0.15 in Softonic

Firefox 1.5 has been released and is available for download here.

We'll leave this one up for a while in case people want to downgrade if they are having troubles with the new version. So far, we have not had any problems and you can read our full review on version 1.5.0.2's information page.

Download Firefox 1.0.7 in Softonic

Super Popup Blocker is a pop-up killer that can clean all traces of your Web activities, including Internet Explorer cache files and typed URLs. It also can help you clear Windows activities, including your document history and temporary files.

Download Super Popup Blocker 4.4 in Softonic