Microsoft’s own product testing guidelines seem at the same time the major problem why so many Microsoft products leak to the Internet. We have seen numerous Windows 7 builds hit the web only days after they have been build by Microsoft. The latest product to leak was codenamed Morro and renamed Microsoft Security Essentials in the last days. Microsoft Security Essentials is a free antivirus program and not a security suite. Microsoft is offering other products like the Windows Firewall, Windows Defender or Windows backup for that.

The security software requires a genuine Windows operating system which is checked during installation. The leak is available for 32-bit and 64-bit editions of Windows XP, Windows Vista and Windows 7 and can be downloaded from various P2P networks already.

Microsoft Security Essentials comes with a basic interface that can be used to scan the computer system for malicious software. Options are available to run a scheduled scan and exclude files, filetypes and processes from the scan. It is yet unclear as to how effective the security software is. It will probably take some time until the first comparisons are published.

Microsoft Security Essentials is loading two processes into computer memory after execution. The first is called msseces.exe and uses roughly 8 Megabytes of computer memory, the second on the other hand – called MsMpEng.exe – uses 40 Megabytes by default which can rise to 60 when it becomes active.

Features:
- Real-time protection. Microsoft Security Essentials uses real-time protection to help address potential threats before they ever have an opportunity to become a problem.

- Dynamic Signature Service. In addition to taking advantage of daily signature downloads, Microsoft Security Essentials is able to validate suspicious files against newly identified malware in near-real time by querying the Dynamic Signature Service. Actions from unknown sources such as unexpected network connections, attempting to modify privileged parts of the system or downloading known malicious content all trigger requests for updates from the Dynamic Signature Service.

- Rootkit protection. Microsoft Security Essentials includes a number of new and improved technologies to provide additional defense against rootkits and other aggressive threats. These technologies include live kernel behavior monitoring for monitoring the integrity of kernel structures, support for direct file-system parsing to help identify and remove malicious programs and drivers hidden from the file system, and improved live rootkit removal that dynamically loads a new kernel mode driver as part of the cleaning process so that it can help successfully remove some of the more advanced rootkits.

- Lightweight design. Because Microsoft Security Essentials is core anti-malware only, it doesn’t carry the weight of the suite products and has a much smaller download size.

- CPU throttling. CPU throttling helps ensure that the user’s system remains responsive to those tasks the user is likely to be performing such as opening files or browser windows, launching programs, editing documents, saving files, etc.

- Idle-time scanning. Scans and updates are scheduled to run when the PC is idle and use a low-priority thread.

- Smart caching and active memory swapping. Signatures not in use don’t take up space in the available memory, making Microsoft Security Essentials friendlier toward older PCs as well as today’s smaller, less powerful form factors.

Download: Microsoft Security Essentials

Instructions:
- You need genuine Windows, as a Windows Genuine Validity check is done during the installation
- Remove any antivirus you already have
- Open the zip file
- Use mssefullinstall-x86fre-en-us-vista1.0.exe for Windows Vista or Windows 7 (32 bit)
- Use mssefullinstall-amd64fre-en-us-vista1.0.exe for Windows Vista 64 bit
- Use mssefullinstall-x86fre-en-us-xp1.0.exe for Windows XP.

After Apple made such bold claims about Safari 4 during their WWDC keynote last week, it was only a matter of time until another browser company came along and claimed to “reinvent the web”. Opera have done just that with Opera Unite, a cloud-based system integrated with the company’s browser, that synchronizes all your files, music and photos, which you can access through any web browser across the globe. It bridges the gap between a client and a server by turning a computer into both, without the need for third-party servers.

The free Opera Unite service gives you a unique URL which you can use to access files as well as stream music and view photo galleries. There’s also an IM chat service, called Lounge, which has its own private address which you can share with friends and family. The online interface allows you to make certain folders and files public.

That’s all available through any browser; if your friends or colleagues are also using Opera Unite, you’re able to post virtual notes on their systems.  Opera Unite can also work as a mini server, offering up content from your home PC, Mac or Linux/Unix system.

How to set up: Install Opera or download the Opera Unite build for Windows, Mac or Linux/Unix. Log in with your Opera ID, located on the left-hand corner of the browser. Once all set, you can access your services from the Opera Unite panel of the browser. You can also install new services.

If you read over our guide on turning spare thumb drives into feature packed giveaway drives and you wished there was a huge pack of portable software you could just download, this is it. While we didn't put this package together—you can check out our favorite software picks in the thumb drive guide mentioned above or check out the Lifehacker Pack 2009—but it serves the same purpose and has many of the applications we recommended and then some. LiberKey is a portable software package with an accompanying menu that includes hundreds of portable apps like ImgBurn, UnderCoverXP, TeraCopy, GIMP, Google Chrome, Revo Uninstaller etc. Features:

• Updates are made regularly (History). Updates of the main LiberKey software can be downloaded directly via Internet.
• You can temporarily associate files extensions (.avi, .jpg, .doc, etc.) with LiberKey software. Wherever you are, you may launch any file whether from your desktop or from a directory or an email attachment.
• Thanks to compression techniques, the launching of the applications on slow peripherals (such as USB key) was accelerated. It also allowed to optimize the installed size.
• Installation is completely automated and the LiberKey menu is extremely user friendly. All the applications are neatly divided into categories with sub-categories distinguishing their uses. You get everything you want for your flash drive in one click.

You can download LiberKey in three flavors, Basic (20 applications, 56MB setup, 179MB installed), Standard (106 applications, 144MB setup, 410MB installed), and Ultimate (202 applications, 197MB setup, 575MB installed). The installers are setup as all or nothing installations, you can't pick through the list of software and selectively exclude things.

In addition to all the software included in the three versions of Liberkey they maintain a huge list of portable software available here. The software on the list is flagged to indicate if it is included in the Basic, Standard, or Ultimate package but there are many portable applications that aren't included in the installation but are included in their master list for you to download. The list is an excellent resource for finding additional portable software to add to your flash drive toolkit.

The jukebox in the sky is a reality. When I started this blog two years ago, it was all but impossible to open a Web browser, type a song name, and have that song start playing immediately. Now, it's commonplace.

I still like the simple approach of Grooveshark--the other night, my brother and I set up a running DJ battle on it to reminisce and introduce each other to new tunes--but Meuzer is an interesting alternative. Search on a song or artist name, and Meuzer pulls results from YouTube--very similar to the Muziic app I looked at earlier this year--as well as Imeem and other third-party sources. Click any of the results, and you get a four-arrow widget that lets you play, share, rate, or add the song to a playlist. Hit "play," and the song begins playing in an embedded window depending on the original source (a YouTube result begins playing a small YouTube video, for instance). Other features require you to log in, and currently the only way to do that is with a Facebook ID.

Meuzer seems to have a broader selection of music than Grooveshark: a search on Roy Harper's "The Game"--a song I couldn't find on Grooveshark for the DJ battle with my brother--got several results from YouTube. But I don't like the forced log-in, particularly for the essential playlist feature, and the search results aren't organized nearly as well. For instance, searching for the dub artist Scientist returned multiple results for "The Scientist" by Coldplay (eww) but no Scientist. On Grooveshark, I simply selected the Artists tab and the top 10 results were all Scientist tunes. Still, Meuzer could be a useful fallback for songs I can't find on other services. Try it out yourself: Search Meuzer.

If your primary browser is Google Chrome, chances are you’ll have plenty of bookmarks saved in the browser and you probably want to back them up for obvious purposes. Backing up bookmarks in Google Chrome is pretty easy. Let’s explore the methods that can be used to backup bookmarks in Chrome:

#1. Backup Chrome bookmarks using the bookmark manager

You can use the bookmark manager in Google Chrome to backup your saved sites as an .html file. All you need to do is hit Ctrl + Shift + B when you’re in Google Chrome and a bookmark manager will pop up. Go to ‘Tools’ > ‘Export Bookmarks’ and specify a location where the bookmarks backup file should be stored.

#2. Backup Chrome bookmarks and restore them in another browser

Transmute (the ultimate bookmark converter from Darq Software) can be used to backup bookmarks from Google Chrome and restore them to another browser in a matter of seconds. Launch the program and specify the source as Chrome and the target browser where your bookmarks should be restored and hit ‘Start’ for the process to begin.

#3. Backup your entire Chrome profile

Google Chrome Backup is a neat little app that backs up your Google Chrome profile that contains your modified settings and preferences. The profile also includes your bookmarks and browsing history. In case you’re doing a reinstall of Google Chrome, make sure you backup your profile using this application. Download here.

Several torrent applications such as uTorrent provide access to a torrent search that originates in the client software. Most launch the search on a website in the default web browser instead of displaying the search results in their own interface. TorrentFetcher, a desktop Torrent search engine, offers torrent search capabilities right from its interface. Everything that is connected to the search is handled in the software program.

The user needs to enter a search term and can optionally select a category, change the number of results and the download directory for the torrents. The interface will then be populated by search results after a short time. It will list the title, seeders, peers, the size and date of each torrent that has been found during the search.

A double-click on any search result will automatically download that torrent to the directory specified in the header of the torrent search engine. It should be noted that TorrentFetcher will not download the contents the torrent is linking but only the torrent itself. This means that it has to be used in conjunction with torrent clients that automatically monitor a directory for torrents and begin downloading the files automatically after finding a new torrent file in that directory.

The software developer does not reveal the torrent search engine that is used to populate the results. An option to reveal that information and probably even exchange that torrent search engine with another one would come in really handy. The search in its current stage seems to be concentrating on English torrents. It would also be nice if the results could be sorted by clicking on a column so that the search results could be sorted by date for example.

Windows Live Messenger 2009 Final (build 14.0.8064.0206) is the successor to the previously released version 14.0.8050.1202, but there was no full/standalone installer available for the new build. Users who wanted to download it had to rely on the Windows Live Essentials web installer. If you were looking for an offline installer for Live Messenger, we have some good news.

The offline installer will be useful for people who have multiple computers, limited bandwidth internet connections, unstable internet connections etc. The idea is to download the entire setup file to hard disk and then use it to install on any number of computers whenever, wherever you like.

By the way Microsoft have again refrained from releasing a changelog for this latest update – there is no official word on what has been changed/fixed/improved in build 14.0.8064.0206. I could not find any notable changes between the two versions but upgrading to the latest available build of WLM is highly recommended.

So far I’ve not been able to find a direct download link to the Standalone/Offline installer on Microsoft download center. However, I managed to find one on Softpedia which is just as reliable: [Click Here] to download Windows Live Messenger 2009 Final build 14.0.8064.0206 Standalone/Offline/Redistributable installer.