Even though it's an old app, Google Talk continues to be a really popular app. It's no wonder - it's reliable, easy to use and much simpler than some of the more flashy IMs out there. If you're just getting started with the app, or you have a few doubts, we've answered the top questions about Google Talk below. Take a look...

How to sign up

This couldn't be easier. You need a Google Account, which you can get here. If you have an email address that ends with gmail.com, googlemail.com or you've got a personalized Google domain, then you don't need to do anything - your login details are also your Google Talk login information.

Then, download and install the Google Talk desktop client. The installation process is very easy, and when you see the login screen appear, just enter the login details mentioned above. That's it! As soon as you see the main interface appear, you're free to start chatting!

Copy and paste is one of the most-used functions in Microsoft Word. In Word 2010, though, there’s a function called the Spike that might be even more useful for moving text and pictures around a document.

The Spike is an extended clipboard feature of Word 2010. It allows you to remove two or more items from different parts of a document and reinsert them as a group in a new location in the document.

This can be very handy for editing large documents, piecing together research projects, arranging agendas, compiling reports and more.

A while back, we showed you how to uninstall Windows Live Messenger 2011. However, if you are are still having problems uninstalling it or finding that components are left behind, there is another solution.

Here is a very simple step-by-step guide about how to completely uninstall Windows Live Messenger 2011 using Revo Uninstaller. Note that this method works for any version of Windows Live Messenger although older versions may not be listed on your system as "Windows Live Essentials".

Too much input may cause an out-of-control situation!

Microsoft Flight, the latest in the long running simulator series, will be released as a free to play download on February 29. We had an opportunity to play with the closed beta to see what's changed with this iconic game.

If you sign in with a Windows Live account, you get additional content, but from the off there is plenty to do in  Microsoft Flight. Setting off in an exclusive light aircraft, the Icon A5, you will be given a series missions around the island of Hawaii.

Read more »

There are three simple ways to check and control uTorrent remotely: two browser-based, and a little Android app that is just as easy to use as the uTorrent desktop client.

First of all, you need to open Preferences in uTorrent, click on 'Remote', then enable remote access. Give your computer a name and associated password and you're ready to go:

To connect remotely, use one of the following three methods:

Before iOS 5, I had no problems connecting my iPod Touch 3rd Gen or iPad 1 and 2 to my computer. Since iTunes 10.5, it sometimes didn't recognize my pair of iPads sometimes, they did't load in Windows 7, or a combination of both.

iTunes Wifi sync only gives you 5GB of storage, so isn't a good sync solution if you have lots of music or video. I looked through one of Apple's support pages and found that this didn't solve the problem. The second support page solution also led to a dead end.

If you have tried Apple's support pages and iTunes still doesn't recognize your device, the solution is to run a registry cleaner like CCleaner.

KMPlayer is one of the most powerful video players for Windows. The multimedia application has a huge range of settings that help you customize your entertainment experience.

One neat trick with KMPlayer is to watch multiple videos at the same time with picture-in-picture viewing. Rather than just having different player windows open, this feature embeds smaller videos over the top of a large one.

So if you don’t have time to watch four movies in one night, just watch them all at the same time using KMPlayer!

Watch the video tutorial or follow the steps below to enable picture-in-picture viewing in KMPlayer.

1. Download KMPlayer from Softonic and install it on your PC. Open the player and right click on the main window. Choose Options, then Preferences.

2. In the General Settings section of the Preferences menus, deselect Disallow Multiple Instances.

3. Load up your first video. This will become the one that appears in the background.

4. Pause the movie and right click on it. Go the Screen Controls option, choose On Top, then Never.

5. Open another video in a new window. Right click on this one and go to Screen Controls. Choose On Top, then Always.

6. Right-click on the video window and choose Skins, then Default Control (Auto Hide).

7. Repeat steps 5 and 6 for all of the videos you want to load.

8. Now maximize the first video to full screen and position all the other videos in front of it, resizing the windows as necessary.

9. You’re now ready to start enjoying the benefits of picture-in-picture viewing with KMPlayer!

There are now thousands of apps and extensions for Google Chrome. I've selected ten of the most interesting and useful to get you started. As you'll see, browser customization is no longer a Firefox-only affair, and Chrome makes installing apps and extensions incredibly easy, so try them out!

Evernote Web Clipper

Much easier than searching your history, and much more flexible, Evernote is an excellent way of keeping pages, links and articles you like. Evernote is like a well-organized web scrapbook, and can quickly become something you rely on. Download here.

M86 Security Secure Browsing

Have you or any of your friends ever been caught out by clicking a scam link on Facebook or elsewhere? This extension checks links on a page and tells you what is genuine and safe. Download here.

Awesome Screenshot

There are many reasons you might want to take a screenshot of a webpage, and Awesome Screenshot makes it really easy. It also features an annotate and edit function, so you can highlight or point to the important areas of the page. Download here.

So you've been making masterpieces on your camera phone...but when you get your hands on the video, everything's upside down! If you're using super-app VLC media player, you'll be really pleased to hear that rotating it back so you can watch it comfortably is really easy. Even better, VLC lets you rotate freely, so even if your video is at a funny angle, you're guaranteed to be able to watch it perfectly straight.

Rotating video in VLC;

1. Open your video in VLC and pause it so you can fix it without missing anything
2. In the menu, go to Effects and Filters > Geometry and enable the Rotate checkbox
3. You'll then be able to rotate your video in real time, so you'll be able to spot exactly when you've managed to turn it back to where it's supposed to be!

Bear in mind that this is a temporary solution. If you want to rotate your video and save it with the correct orientation, your best bet is to use a video editor like VirtualDub or Avidemux. If you'd like a tutorial on this, let us know in the comments!

The recent closure of Megaupload highlights the risks of using a cloud based service to backup and store data. Of course, backing-up your data to an external hard drive isn't without risks but there is one that's significantly reduced - the threat of losing access to your data due to sites being shutdown.

We've already compiled and compared a list of other cloud backup solutions so here are five of the best desktop backup alternatives for Windows and Mac:

TimeMachine

(Mac):

Apple's easy to use discreet backup solution. Constantly backsup your data without slowing down your Mac so that you can effectively "go back in time" and restore files and data. Note however that some people have found it unreliable at times - it may start-off well but may become erratic over time.

SuperDuper!

(Mac):

SuperDuper! creates exact clones of your Mac's hard drive so you have a full backup of all your data, including permissions, user profiles and private settings. Simply select the target and destination drives and start backing up. You can specify exactly which files you want to transfer and which you'd like to omit.

Carbon Copy Cloner (CCC)

(Mac):

Carbon Copy Cloner is free, simple to use and backsup only those files and folders that you want it to. Just connect your external hard drive to your Mac, CCC will automatically detect it and off you go. You can also schedule automatic backups at specific times and create disk images with it.

Norton Ghost

(PC)

Norton's Anti-Virus is a nightmare but its backup solution is a much better package. Norton Ghost is probably the closest thing to Time Machine on a PC and backs-up your entire hard drive – or just selected folders – to another partition, networked drive or an external storage device. Norton Ghost can also create an exact copy of your hard drive with all the existing files, programs and settings and provides restoration points.

USB Image Tool

(PC)

USB Image Tool is one of the simplest PC backup solutions you'll find. It's free, straightforward and automatically detects USB devices connected to your computer and scans them before asking you whether you'd like to create an image backup or restore a previously backed-up image. USB Image Tool can create images of USB memory sticks and MP3 players that are mounted as USB drives.

[Image courtesy of OnSoftware ES]

Need to take a screenshot of a video? One of the simplest ways to do it is with UMPlayer, an excellent media player that’s a worthy alternative to the popular VLC Player.

Whether you have a movie review web site and want to take some stills of a new film, or you just want a shot of your favorite movie to set as your desktop background, UMPlayer makes it dead simple.

Install UMPlayer

First, download UMPlayer from Softonic and install it on your PC. Launch the application and load a movie by dragging the file into the main interface or choose File from the Open menu.

Capture a screenshot

Go to the point of the movie you want to capture and press pause to freeze it. Now go to the Video menu, and you’ll find two screenshot options here. Select Screenshot to take a grab of what’s currently on screen, or choose Start/stop taking screenshots and UMPlayer will keep taking shots of the screen as the movie plays. Then choose this option again (or hit Shift + D) to stop the capture process.

Change output options

To find out where your screenshots have been saved go to the Options menu and select Preferences. On the General tab of the General options (which should load as the default menu) you’ll see a section called Screenshots. Here, you can change the destination folder of the saved screenshots, and enable/disable UMPlayer’s screenshot functionality.

Hiding your IP address while you're browsing the internet is a good move for anyone wanting an additional level of privacy online.

UltraSurf is a simple tool that's perfect for doing this when you're using Internet Explorer. It will help ensure security while you're shopping or banking by encrypting your personal information - your IP address gives information about you to third parties. UltraSurf is a great portable tool for people who don't want third parties to be able to view this information, as well as those who want to access websites that are blocked in their locale.

If you prefer Firefox to Internet Explorer, though, there's an add-on just for you. It's called UltraSurf Firefox Tool.

All you have to do to use UltraSurf on Firefox is download both UltraSurf and the add-on for Firefox. If you're currently running Firefox, you may need to restart befure UltraSurf will work.

Besides being able to hide your IP from third parties, UltraSurf can also automatically delete cookies and browser history every time you close it, an extra level of security that users are sure to appreciate.

Boldy going where many MMORPGs have gone before, Star Trek Online goes free-to-play this morning.

On its original release, Cryptic Studios' take on Star Trek had a generally lukewarm reaction. Despite the huge possibilities that the Star Trek universe offers, it felt bland and lacked character. Thankfully since then there have been lots of updates and episodic content to play through.  The Space combat was exactly what fans wanted, but down on planets, Star Trek Online felt like a bit of a grind. I was surprised by this, as Cryptic's super-hero MMORPGs are some of the best in the genre, and great fun to play.

We'll be taking another in-depth look at Star Trek Online later today when the Free to Play version is released - lets hope more fun has been injected into the game, as the camp humor of the series should be able to differentiate it from po-faced Star Wars The Old Republic!

You can sign up for a free Star Trek Online account here. Cryptic Studios' other MMORPGs, City of Heroes Freedom and Champions Online Free for All are still available to play for free, and are highly recommended!

Microsoft's hugely successful motion sensor technology Kinect is being released for Windows on February 1st. This will allow Windows 7 (and later Windows 8) users to interact with PCs without a keyboard or mouse.

As well as motion control, Kinect for Windows also includes voice control, which could make Windows 8 a really interesting and flexible operating system. Microsoft's Kinect for Windows SDK for developers has been available for a couple of months now, so developers can already get stuck into experimenting with Kinect integration into apps.

I am excited about the possibilities for Kinect for Windows - in recent years Apple's excellent trackpads have been my favorite navigation tools, but I can imagine Windows 8 with motion control being fantastic. Using gesture controls on an office desktop would be really comfortable as a replacement for a mouse if it's precise enough - for me motion control on a desktop makes much more sense than touchscreens, which are better used on portable devices.

With Kinect for Windows, 2012 has got off to a great start for PC users, and the potential for new software is huge.

Ever tried to watch AVI movies on your iPhone? Then you’ve probably already worked out that the Apple device sadly doesn’t support playback of AVI video.

Thankfully, there is a way around this issue and there are at least two ways to play AVI files on an iPhone, iPod touch or iPad. Here I’ll explain how it’s done, first by converting your video file and prepping it for your iOS device, or alternatively by using an app called Air Video to stream video files from your computer to your iPhone.

Do this…

Use a conversion tool to convert AVI movies to iPhone format. I recommend Format Factory because it’s free and it has built-in output settings for converting to particular mobile devices, including the iPhone.