Keeping your hard drive properly defragged is one of the easiest ways to speed up your system and ensure that everything runs smoothly and quickly.

You can launch the program either via shortcut, Start menu or the command line with "QREGDEFRAG.EXE -defrag". Other command line commands you can use are "-defrag" which operates defrag in "silent mode" and "-noprogresswindow" which hides the progress window during defragmentation. Finally, you can also use "-reboot" which automatically reboots the computer when defragmentation of the registry is complete. If you're using Vista, note that you'll also have to run the program in administrator mode. The big question, as with all defraggers, is does the program operate quickly and does it have a noticable effect? Whether it runs quickly depends on how badly un-defragged your hard drive is and of course, how big it is. Generally, the program runs at an impressive speed, especially under Vista but it doesn't seem to make any particularly impressive speed improvements. However, it does make programs open slightly quicker and presents a full report on defragged files.

A quick and speedy defragger that helps programs open faster and allows you to see at a glance, those files that are slowing your system down.

Download Quicksys RegDefrag 2.0 in Softonic

Sandbox-style games - games where you can freely explore a totally interactive universe and engage in secondary missions while following the main plot – seem to be quite trendy today. Just think about GTA IV or Saints Row 2.

Mercenaries 2: World in Flames follows this trend and presents you with a free-to-discover war zone immersed in chaos after a political coup in Venezuela. A corrupted, ambitious tyrant has overthrown the Government to grab hold of the rich Venezuelan oil supplies and the whole country is out of control. But don't worry, this is precisely your element.

Why? Because you're not a soldier, but a mercenary: and as such, you'll be willing to accept all kinds of dirty jobs, as long as they pay enough for them. There are no rules, no mercy, no morality and no remorse. This is a question of survival. This is war, and everything goes.

As well as the missions you have to complete as mercenary in order to earn money, there's a ton of other things you can do. There's a huge map you're free to explore, along with all kinds of vehicles and a extensive collection of weapons to try.

While the game's main story and the approach developers have taken to it are quite attractive, Mercenaries 2: World in Flames has one big drawback: controls. Like other titles we've reviewed before this game has been designed for consoles, and that makes it ridiculously difficult to manage with a keyboard. In cases like these, a gamepad is more than recommended.

Also note that you're going to need a very powerful machine in order to run Mercenaries 2: World in Flames as smoothly as possible and be able to enjoy the game's highly realistic graphics. Otherwise the image will be so clunky and full of glitches that you'll be dead before you can spot your enemies.

Mercenaries 2: World in Flames is an attractive, action-packed war adventure that unfortunately runs better on a console.

Download Mercenaries 2: World in Flames in Softonic

eToro is not a bullfighting game, although this is the impression you get from its name. In fact, it's a game about trading foreign currencies and making money out of it.

You can play eToro just for fun or for real money. In both cases, transaction values are authentic and obtained live from stock markets. However, we strongly recommend you to practice a little bit before putting your money into any real risk.

The game looks really complicated at first sight, but fortunately it includes a complete Help area with highly detailed tutorials. I particularly like having an embedded chat client to hang out with other traders while you wait for the right moment to buy or sell.

eToro enables you to learn the basics of Forex trading and make some real money.

Download eToro 1.3 in Softonic

If you've ever fancied yourself as a bit of a hairdresser then you you might enjoy this game. You're basically in charge of a beauty salon and have to do your best on all sorts of customers from punk rockers to old ladies.

You have to help Sally run a successful salon in 10 different locations that increase in complexity and difficulty according to how far you progress. Your aim is to wash, dye, cut and style hair in over 50 levels of "frantic but fashionable fun" according to the developers.

Once the punters start coming in and you make money, you can use your earnings to hire helpful employees and purchase salon upgrades to keep your clients looking and feeling their best. Your customers will rate your efforts and based on this rating, will decide whether you get paid or not. The graphics are not exactly great and it's a bit too easy to cheat because by lavishing your customers with all sorts of treatment, the game seems to equate this with quality, no matter what mess you make!

Download Sally's Salon in Softonic

If there were awards for weird originality, then Pozzo - Jello Crusade, would surely win. In this game, you play the role of a janitor named Pozzo who works for a jello restaurant.

His dream is to save enough money to escape the hell he finds himself in but unfortunately his manager has found out that the local health inspector is dropping by for an unscheduled check. Your task is to clean up the entire premises of rotten jellos but here's the catch - Pozzo has no limbs and can't help eating all the jello he finds (I told you it was weird).

Pozzo cannot retrace his steps once he has eaten jellos off a tile which is about the only little "challenge" that the game seems to offer. However, the levels are quite imaginative even if the graphics certainly are not. New blocks and tiles appear from time to time which attempt to block Pozzo's way. In later levels, you have to be much more careful about the routes you take as the pitfalls grow deeper.

Poor graphics and a dodgy soundtrack combined with a bizarre concept make Pozzo - Jello Crusade one of the more unusual and less satisfying puzzle games out there.

Download Pozzo - Jello Crusade in Softonic

If you've always dreamed of driving a Mercedes but can't afford one, this could be an intermediate solution while you're saving money.

Mercedes CLC Dream Test Drive puts you behind the steering-wheel of the awesome Mercedes CLC Coupé. The game is free though quite limited, as it only includes two gaming modes: a race against five other computer-controlled Mercedes through the streets of London and a single lap time trial against your personal best record. At least the scenarios are pretty realistic, giving you the opportunity to do some high-speed sightseeing around London or enjoy cool races at night.

The only choice of car available is obviously a Mercedes, but there are some customization options available such as changing color or getting new wheels. There are also three different difficulty levels that tailor the game to your driving skills.

That said, the truth is that Mercedes CLC Dream Test Drive is not a very fun driving game and it has some surprisingly odd characteristics, like the absence of driver or the fact that the car is not affected by crashes. In a way it feels more like an interactive ad than a real computer game, so unless you're a fan of the famous German car brand, I'd recommend downloading other driving games before this one.

Mercedes CLC Dream Test Drive is definitely a game for Mercedes fans: other people may find it too limited and a bit frustrating.

Download Mercedes CLC Dream Test Drive in Softonic

If you ever feel guilty about spending too much money in online shops, here's a way to redeem yourself.

AidMaker is a software app that grants you access to hundreds of online shops worldwide and automatically donates a given percentage of the money you spend on them to a charity of your choice.

The program is embedded as a browser toolbar that works with both Firefox and Internet Explorer. From this toolbar you can open the settings menu, check the list of available charities and keep track of how much money you have donated so far. AidMaker includes all sorts of organizations, dedicated to such diverse causes as children, animals, human rights, diseases and more, from many different countries (you can select yours during the installation process).

AidMaker lets you choose which charity you want to donate to, but the percentage of this donation is set by the shop. Needless to say, there's no extra charge for you. This is certainly the kind of software that should come bundled with your browser.

With AidMaker you can do your bit in making the world a better place by automatically donating part of your online shopping to your selected charity.

Download AidMaker 1.0 in Softonic

Trying to find a parking space is not fun - and it hardly makes for a great game, although Parking Dash makes an ambitious bid to do so.

Parking Dash sees you as a valet who has to park and return your customers' cars in the quickest time possible. You have two gameplay modes to choose from - Story (which follows some kind of bizarre "parking plot") and Endless shift which is a relentless barrage of customers waiting for you to collect and retrieve their cars.

There are 50 levels to make it through although the variation between each one is negligible. The big difference seems to be quite simply the speed at which you have to act. You can however improve your parking lot to make more money and attract more customers but this amounts to the rather unexciting prospect of adding donut vending machines or installing lifts into the car park.

Parking Dash features good graphics and sound but it's not the most inspiring game you'll ever play.

Download Parking Dash in Softonic

Wouldn't it be great if you could have WiFi access anywhere anytime? Of course, we're a long way from universal WiFi access for all but there are some networks that are already putting the principle into practice.

Whisher is one of those. Whisher is a small application which logs you on to the Whisher network and gives you free WiFi access where available. Of course, the key here is "where available" which at the moment, isn't many places, although it's not badly served by any means. It relies on users like you sharing your home WiFi internet connection with other users on the Whisher network.

However, you don't lose control of your WiFi network if you join in. All WiFi networks registered through Whisher are protected and the users have full control over who can access them. The principle of this app is superb - by aggregating all WiFi connections people have at home, it is creating the world's biggest free WiFi network. However, you still have to pay to use it - joining doesn't mean you're given free access to other users' networks. However, the more you share, the cheaper it is for you.

Whisher is an innovative solution to creating a universal WiFi network for all and if you're on the move a lot, it could save you a hell of a lot of money and hassle in finding internet access.

Download Whisher 3.0.09.03 in Softonic

Having a digital camera is great because you can take loads of photos without spending too much money. The drawback is that you must spend a while working on those photos if you want your album to be perfectly organized.

Image Converter One can lend you a hand with photo organization. This complete application features four tools in one, namely a photo resizer, a format converter, a watermark tool and a rotation tool. This means that instead of installing four different apps, you'll only need Image Converter One to perform the most common tasks with your photos.

Image Converter One is very easy to use. Simply select the images you want to work with and then choose the appropriate action. You can also decide whether you want to overwrite the original files or saved the images you just processed with a different name.

I found Image Converter One to be quite a handy program, mainly due to the fact that it includes several apps in one. However there are also a few flaws. The resizing tool, for example, lacks predefined profiles, which means you always have to enter the new size values by hand. As for the watermarking tool, I'd have preferred to see the watermark as it'll appear on my actual photo, not a sample image.

Image Converter One includes the four most basic tools to work with your photos, though they're not as complete as standalone alternatives.

Download Image Converter One 1.010 in Softonic

Managing your financial affairs can be a real drag and, unless you’ve got piles of cash stored in your basement, it can be easy to lose track of where your cash is going and ensure that all your payments are made on time. Unless you can afford to keep paying an accountant, it’s a good idea to invest in a decent home accounting application to help you keep tabs on your cash.

AceMoney is one of a number of apps designed to make it easier to track your income and spending than using a spreadsheet (or writing it all on the back of a beermat). The software is very simple to pick up and start using, thanks to its clear icons and navigation bar. Unlike many of its peers, the program includes a facility for viewing all of your money at once through its accounts overview feature, where you can check accounts, investments and pending bills from one place.

The banking features of the program are simple-to-understand and besides allowing you to view your accounts, an online facility gives you direct access, allowing you to make transfers, deposits and consult live details through AceMoney. This sounds great in theory, but in reality there are only a few banks registered with the system and no credit unions. Besides its banking facilities, there’s a useful portfolio manager for keeping a check on your investments and nine different reporting tools to help you better chart your financial progress.

Although these features are well executed, there are areas where AceMoney is somewhat lacking. For instance, its financial planning section is very sparse and basically amounts to a calculator for working out loan repayments and savings plans, rather than tools for helping you plan all your finances ahead. There are also no tax options, so these calculations have to be done in another app and copied in, which could lead to errors.

AceMoney is a good value program that offers a simple way to track your financial transactions in order to keep your head above water. However, if you’re running a business or need to plan your finances in great detail then the software is somewhat lacking and it’ll be worth splashing out for a more powerful application.

Download AceMoney 3.10.3 in Softonic

If you're a big fan of Wordpad but wish it was a little more advanced, then without doubt, TextPipe is for you.

With TextPipe you can specify all your text processing needs through one application rather than having to remember and manage several text editors, command line tools, custom scripts and Word and Excel macros. In a nutshell, TextPipe basically makes it fast and easy to convert, transform and re-form data in text files including HTML and XML documents. Probably the most outstanding feature of TextPipe is that it is very fast and can handle files of unlimited size. TextPipe is also remarkably efficient at handling multiple tasks simultaneously. The advantage of this is that you only need to learn how to use one tool rather than several to do multiple tasks. For those that have invested a lot of money or are planning to invest a lot of money in an editor, it's also a much cheaper solution. If the developers claims are right, it certainly packs an impressive punch when it comes to making corrections. They report that in a recent speed trial, TextPipe made the same number of changes to a document in seconds that took MS Word hours.

A very powerful all in one text editor, cleansing and conversion tool although it will only come into it's own if you're dealing with very large documents and tasks.

Download TextPipe Pro 8.1.10 in Softonic

If you've ever dreamed of moving to the country and living the simple life, then Farm Frenzy 2 might give you a taste of what you can expect.

Farm Frenzy 2 sees you assume the role of a budding farmer who starts with nothing and must build a successful business by managing lifestock and producing goods to export for money. It's all set in a wonderfully colorful cartoon world with great sound effects and a cracking hillbilly-style soundtrack.

Farm Frenzy 2 starts with you rearing a few chickens to produce some eggs and the levels progress to the point where you own bakeries, factories and keep cows, pigs and other animals. Each extra level adds one more thing to think about than the last, whether it's shipping products into town, flying resources in by plane, or caging and selling the pandas (?!) that prey on your animals. After a few levels things can get pretty frantic.

Luckily, the controls in Farm Frenzy 2 are simple and largely require nothing more than pointing and clicking on a part of the screen you want to apply an action to (i.e. clicking the well to fill it up, clicking an egg to collect it, etc.)

After a while, Farm Frenzy 2 starts to get a little too difficult to keep up with and after playing a few levels your head gets a bit scrambled from all the fast-paced action, the infectious looping soundtrack and the sheer repetitive nature of the game.

Farm Frenzy 2 is very well presented and great fun to play, although enjoyment quickly turns to frustration as the levels get more hectic.

Download Farm Frenzy 2 in Softonic

My sister, who actually works in a bank, is always saying that she would love to be a truck driver and travel all over Europe. I guess she's the kind of person that would love to play Euro Truck Simulator.

This driving simulator puts you behind the wheel of a powerful truck and entrusts you with several different missions. These usually consist on taking cargo from one place to another and getting paid for the delivery. Saving enough money you will eventually be able to buy better and faster trucks to be able to work more and earn more money.

I find the main idea in Euro Truck Simulator is quite original. We're somewhat used to car, motorbike and even airplane driving simulators, but not that much to trucks. Also, the game features excellent, highly realistic graphics.

So far, so good. The problem is that Euro Truck Simulator becomes a boring game quite easily. I don't know if it was due to the repetitive sound of the engine, the slowness of my driving or the lack of real action, I started feeling sleepy shortly after starting to play. Maybe if you could play your own music on the truck's radio, or get into some more action by delivering illegal stuff and occasionally being chased by the cops, Euro Truck Simulator would be more exciting. Also, I didn't like the fact that I can't choose the UK as the starting country for my career as truck driver!

Euro Truck Simulator is a pretty original game, with especially outstanding graphics, but which gets boring quite easily.

Download Euro Truck Simulator 1.00 in Softonic

If you'd like to travel the World but don't have the time, or indeed the money, to do so, then perhaps the National Geographic: World Journey Screensaver can help.

National Geographic: World Journey Screensaver brings the World to your desktop, displaying a number of high quality images of scenes from around the globe. Among the gorgeous vistas on show are the Taj Mahal, the Sydney Opera House and the Sahara desert.

The National Geographic: World Journey Screensaver manages to cover a really diverse range of places through its photos. Unfortunately though the photos are all branded with the National Geographic logo.

Nevertheless, National Geographic: World Journey Screensaver is an essential addition to your sceensaver collection if you're a travel fan.

Download National Geographic: World Journey Screensaver in Softonic

Orbz is an action/arcade game set in colorful 3D environments. The object of the game is to shoot your orb at targets located throughout 14 distinct courses in a race to score the most points. Game play contains both intense action and also strategy in planning the best scoring shots. Power-ups, like the "Money Shot" and "Curse of the Goober", are also available to either give you a scoring advantage or to slow down your opponents.

In Solo Mode, the player completes a series of progressively difficult challenges that focus on scoring the most points in different scenarios. Bronze, Silver, and Gold medals are awarded for scoring performance and high scores for each challenge are tracked world-wide against all other Orbz players. For every 5 gold medals achieved, the player will also unlock a fancy new Orb to use in Solo or Online mode. Finally, there is a tutorial mode that will teach the player basics controls and scoring strategies.

The Online Mode allows Orbz players to compete against each other over the Internet or Local Area Network. Up to 10 players, including computer opponents called Botz, can join a Lobby where the matches will be coordinated by selecting the course to play, number of rounds in the match, and a per-round time limit. A world-wide ranking system is also available for those who wish to compete for the ultimate title of Orbz Champion.

Download Orbz 2.1 in Softonic

Create your website and have it up and running on the Internet in just 4 steps presented in this overview of TOWeb.

To create your first website you need to enter its title and select the main interests you would like to start with. You may decide to start with a couple of topics like a homepage or a blog for instance. Your website menu will automatically be created allowing your visitors to easily navigate and access to your topics.

There is no predefined graphical theme with TOWeb. With the TOWeb's random theme generator and its easy customization of graphical parts, you do not need to be a designer nor spend money and months on learning about web development and complicated graphical tools before to get a unique professional design.

In the last step of TOWeb you can quickly verify and remove the spelling mistakes of your topics before transferring your website to your host with just one click. Then notify your contacts directly from TOWeb so they can see your work on the Internet!

Download TOWeb 2.62 in Softonic

FUNDimensions fundraising software is a database application for small non-profits and schools. It manages the entire fundraising process, helping these often understaffed organizations to raise more money, identify the best fundraising opportunities, and maintain a personal relationship with donors.

Download FUNDimensions 7.2.5 in Softonic

Controlling the amount of spending or outgoings from your household can be a full time job, especially if you have a large family.

That's why iMoney is an interesting application (despite to geeky sounding Apple name) which can help even those who are bad with money to control what's going in and out of their accounts and what they're spending and where. Everything is done for you so all you have to do is enter data such as your income, expenses and then the program automatically shows you where most of your money is going. In this way, you can easily identify areas where you need to tighten your belt or perhaps be careful with what you're spending.

The program generally monitors most kind of spending from bills to direct debits although you can create special fields for unusual costs and expenses. Ultimately, the pie charts and graphs are very useful in helping you manage your money. You can even track and analyse the performance of your investments and how they relate to your household spending.

For anyone who finds they've always got more going out than coming in but can't work out why, iMoney is an ideal tool for the non accountants out there.

Download iMoney Lite 1.30 in Softonic

TCExam is an assessment software system that enables educators and trainers to author, schedule, deliver, and report on surveys, quizzes, tests and exams. The software is used all over the world by universities, schools, companies and independent teachers. TCExam is open source and completely free to use.

TCExam screenshotAn e-exam (or CBT - Computer Based Testing)is an electronic exam that can be executed by using a personal computer or an equivalent electronic device (e.g. handheld computer).

The use of e-exam systems, instead of traditional paper-based tests, allows you to simplify the entire exam cycle, including generation, execution, evaluation, presentation and archiving. This simplification allows you to save time and money while improving exams reliability.

Download TCExam 5.4.003 in Softonic