Auslogics Internet Optimizer is a free tool that tweaks several system and application specific settings to improve the speed and reliability of the Internet connection.

Before you use it to tweak your connection, you should consider running speed tests to see if there is room for improvement. See the articles Internet Connection Speed Analysis, Internet Connection Reliability Test and the Speedtest review for programs that can aid you with the task.

The program, that is also part of Auslogics’ commercial performance software BoostSpeed, offers two modes of operation. Inexperienced users can let the program handle all the optimizations by simply selecting an Internet connection speed from the list. Available for selection are Slow (128 kbps or lower), Average (1 mbps or lower) or Fast (over 1 mbps). The program optimizes the system and applications for the selected speed in this case.

The manual atomization mode reveals all settings and values the program can make changes to. The Internet Optimizer displays the most important settings at the top, followed by detailed global and application specific parameter listings.

Internet Explorer, Firefox or Opera users can for instance change the number of total and per server connections easily.

A click on a browser listing opens roughly ten parameters that can be modified to speed up the Internet connection. This includes disabling prefeteching or IPv6 in Firefox, the network buffer size in Opera or enabling TCP Autotuning in Microsoft’s Internet Explorer.

Most parameters are listed with descriptions that aid the user in the configuration. Inexperienced users will however have difficulties picking the optimal value for their Internet connection.

Auslogics’ Internet Optimizer is a useful program for users who experience Internet connection speed or reliability issues. Automatic and manual modes make the program interesting for users of all experience levels.

Windows users can download the latest version of the program from the Download Crew website. (via Techdows)

A comparable program is TCP Optimizer.

Benchmark software is used to make those comparisons. These programs usually run a series of taxing tests to calculate the performance of specific PC components. This includes components like the processor, RAM, hard drive or video card.

Auslogics Benchtown is a new benchmark for the Windows operating system that is currently available as a beta release. It is not clear at this point in time whether it will remain free after its final release.

The program has been designed to rate the following PC components:

• 2D Desktop Graphics
• 3D Game Graphics
• HDD Performance
• Memory Speed
• CPU Calculations

It is possible to customize the tests in the program settings. Here it is possible to remove subsystems from the test and to swap the hard drive that is used during tests. The selected hard drive needs to have at least 100 Megabytes of space.

You can run a test with a click on the Rate Now button under Benchmark. Tests take less than five minutes to complete and display progress information on screen all the time.

More important than the direct feedback during tests is the benchmark results page at the end. Auslogics Benchtown displays separate values for each subsystem that has been tested as well as an overall score on screen.

A compare with friends button is displayed, but that did not work on our test system. A short message about uploading data was displayed but nothing else happened afterwards.

Several of the menus at the top did not work as well. The all my benchmarks link for instance did not do anything after activation. This could be a beta issue or an incompatibility with our test system.

Auslogics Benchtown can be used to display detailed system information. A click on the menu opens environment and hardware information after a short scan.

The program is easy to use and to handle. That’s a big plus. As is the less than five minute benchmarking process. Windows users who are looking for a new benchmarking program should take a closer look at Auslogics Benchtown. Cautious users and those in productive environments should wait until the final version of the program gets released by the company. The application is compatible with all 32-bit and 64-bit editions of the Windows operating system. It can be downloaded from the developer website.

The Duplicate File Finder by software developer Auslogic is one of the duplicate file finders available for the Windows operating system. The interface has been designed with ease of use in mind. It begins by selecting folders or hard drives that should be checked for duplicates. It is possible to select multiple folders and drives or just one.

The options of the duplicate file scan are configured in the next screen once the folder and drive selection has been made. The options are divided in the three categories matching criteria, advanced criteria and file types.

Matching criteria defines the aspects of the files that should be matched with each other. These are the name, date and time and size by default with the option to add contents as well (resulting in a slower scan) or remove one of the other criteria.

Advanced criteria can be used to filter out files with a size lower than the size specified in this section of the configuration. File types finally makes it possible to only scan specific file types or all files in the selected folders.

A list of results is then displayed after the program finished the scan. File names, sizes, locations and last modified dates are displayed with the option to select some or all of the files so that they can be deleted. The Duplicate File Finder can be downloaded from the Auslogics website.