Would you rather use 7-Zip, FreeArc, WinRAR, or WinZip? We put four of the most popular file archiving tools to the test, analyzing compression ratios and performance. Spoiler alert: WinZip 14, the latest version of this popular title, gets creamed.

WinZip – 7-Zip – WinRAR – Data compression – FreeArc

Think your Athlon or Phenom processor is already tuned to deliver the best balance between performance and power consumption? Think again. We show you how to tweak Cool’n'Quiet for more aggressive power savings at standard speeds using several AMD CPUs.

Advanced Micro Devices – Central processing unit – AMD Phenom – Hardware – Athlon

With three new Radeon HD 5000-series cards launched last month, older models being put out to pasture. And an upcoming next-generation launch from Nvidia later this month sees GPU prices fluctuating quickly. Check out this month’s recommendations!

Nvidia – Graphics processing unit – Radeon – Zune HD – GPU

SSDs might be the fastest storage option today, but by no means is it the most popular. Magnetic media offers high throughput and proven reliability for existing ecosystems. We looked at developments in four enterprise hard drive generations.

Solid-state drive – Hard disk drive – Hardware – Magnetic storage – Storage

If you’re the sort of power user who’s hard on technology, especially out in the field, then ruggedized mobile storage might be apropos. Today, we’re looking at a pair of portable disks that can take drops and spills, while serving up 500GB of capacity.

Today – Technology – Business – Hardware – Storage

We’ve put Apple Safari, Google Chrome, Microsoft Internet Explorer, Mozilla FireFox, and Opera through a gauntlet of speed tests and time trials to find out which Web browser is truly the fastest. How does your favorite land in our rankings?

Opera – Safari – Internet Explorer – Microsoft – Google Chrome

Intel has S-models for several Core 2 processors that offer lower power consumption and comparable performance. However, the first S-model in the Core i5 family is actually slower than its regular counterpart—and it’s even less efficient, overall!

Intel Core i5 – Intel Core – Intel Corporation – CoreI5 – processor