Tony Lima, Yardena Arar

Netgear R6300 802.11ac routerNetgear's first 802.11ac router, the R6300, will go on sale next week for $200, the company announced at a news conference yesterday. Touting the benefits of the next-gen Wi-Fi standard, the company also announced two more 802.11ac products: a lower-end router and a USB adapter for notebooks, both due this summer.

Netgear officials continue to maintain that the company is the first to bring 802.11ac products to market, even though Buffalo Technology's first 802.11ac router and an 802.11ac media bridge are already on sale on Frys.com and Newegg.com. A Netgear official at yesterday's press event said he had ordered a Buffalo unit from Newgg in order to verify actual availability, but that he had not yet received it.

Staying on top of one social network is tough enough. Keeping tabs on two, three, or more is nearly impossible if you try doing it the old-fashioned way--by opening a window for each and toggling between them. Who's got time for that?

Enter Engagio (www.engag.io), a browser-based service which creates a universal inbox for your messages from popular social networking sites (at this writing, these include 4Square, Disqus, Facebook, Google contacts, Google+, Hacker News, LinkedIn, Tumblr, and Twitter).

Buffalo AirStation WZR-D1800H 802.11ac Wi-Fi routerBuffalo Technology says its first 802.11ac AirStation products--a router and a wireless media bridge--are on sale now at Fry's, Frys.com and Newegg.com, making Buffalo the first to market with next-generation gigabit Wi-Fi gear.

At this writing, I was not able to verify the claim (this blog entry was written based on an embargoed news release). But if true, Buffalo will have snuck past Netgear, which last month said its R6300 router would be the first based on the new standard. Netgear said the R6300 would go on sale in May, but as of Sunday night it did not turn up in a Google Shopping search, or in searches of a couple of Netgear's major retail partners. (I'll update these results as needed.) Update: I've since found the Buffalo router and media bridge on Newegg.com.

CloudOn, my favorite of three web services I recently reviewed that let you run cloud-hosted versions of Microsoft Word, Excel, and Powerpoint on an iPad, now supports Android tablets as well.

CloudOn also announced integration with Google Drive, meaning you can save documents to accounts on Google's new cloud storage service (the service already supports Dropbox and Box accounts).

D-Dlink's DIR-605L is unique and inexpensive, but not exactly cutting-edge. As Wi-Fi routers go, the D-Link Cloud Router (DIR-605L) isn't a top performer--it has the basic 2x2 antenna array required for 802.11n certification, and its LAN ports support only 10/100 (not gigabit) ethernet. But it boasts some easy-to-use remote-access features that should appeal to small businesses and consumers who want to keep close tabs on network activity without spending a lot of money.

Street-priced at a modest $40 (as of May 1, 2012), the Cloud Router supports iPhone and Android apps that let you log in over the Internet and see what devices are connected and what websites they're accessing. If you don't like what you see, you can also use the apps to block connected devices from getting online.

WordPerfect's Windows Explorer preview tool has improved, but using it still isn't especially easy.Talk about the loyal opposition: Corel WordPerfect Office X6 continues a long tradition of competing with Microsoft's powerhouse Office suite by giving particular groups of users assorted features (some new, some simply popular) that they won't find in Office, while maintaining compatibility with Microsoft's ubiquitous formats. Its slightly lower prices (for comparable editions) don't hurt, either.

For all the buzz about Web-based productivity alternatives, many people (and businesses) are still more comfortable with desktop software, and Corel clearly courts such users who are looking for a Microsoft Office alternative. WordPerfect Office X6 isn't a major overhaul--the new features, including multiple-monitor support and the ability to create ebooks in the Amazon Kindle .mobi format within WordPerfect X6, are hardly jaw-dropping. But the suite has a slew of tweaks that certain users will welcome.

Cisco today announced a refresh of its small business networking line, including routers and access points that (finally) support the current generation of Wi-Fi. The products are available immediately.

While many small businesses use consumer-grade networking gear, the Cisco products announced today cater to those who demand greater support and security for both remote and local users, voice-over-IP phone systems, and cloud applications. The products may not be as inexpensive as their consumer counterparts, but they aren't outrageously costly either.

If you've ever tried to work with a Microsoft Office document on a mobile device, you know that the traditional tools--mobile productivity suites such as Documents To Go and Quickoffice, or Web apps such as Google Docs and Zoho Office--are imperfect. They often lack features found in the native applications, or they mess up the document's formatting.

But several new services take a different approach to helping you do real work on tablets and smartphones: They run Microsoft Office or other productivity programs on remote servers, delivering to your mobile device a version of the traditional user interface optimized for the device's capabilities.

OnLive Desktop uses technology developed for its parent OnLive gaming service, which lets you stream high-end video games (that you rent or purchase) to your PC in much the way you'd get an on-demand movie from Netflix. Instead of games, OnLive Desktop streams a virtual Windows desktop outfitted with Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Adobe Reader, Internet Explorer, Windows Paint and Calculator, and Microsoft Surface Collage.

Like CloudOn, OnLive Desktop runs the applications on its servers, sending to its mobile apps only the data that Windows sends to a PC's graphics subsystem. That display data is tweaked to fit on the iPad or on an Android tablet screen. You simply install the OnLive mobile app and log in, and a Windows desktop appears.

The day after its January 5 debut, CloudOn became the number one app in the iTunes App Store, says CloudOn CEO Milink Gadekar. That's not surprising: It was the first app to let you run virtualized versions of Microsoft Word, Excel, and PowerPoint on the iPad, and it was free. It still is, at this writing, but since CloudOn is paying software-as-a-service licensing fees to Microsoft, it will have to generate income somehow, so don't expect the free ride to last forever.

But even if users had to pay for it, CloudOn would get my endorsement for its simple, straightforward design and its seamless integration with the Web-based file-storage services Box.com and Dropbox. Setup is painless: You download the app, create an account, and link it to your Box or Dropbox account, and you're in business.

Because Nivio is still in by-invitation beta, with elements such as a native iPad app not ready in time for this article, it's a bit premature to develop a formal opinion on Nivio. An ambitious attempt to adapt Windows--and Windows applications--for mobile devices, Nivio could turn into a powerful service, but right now it's just too darn complicated to use.

Even launching Nivio is a hassle. While the developers put the finishing touches on its iPad app (which I'm hoping will streamline the process), beta testers are directed to a third-party virtualization app, Wyse PocketCloud. Once you install it, however, you don't actually run it to use Nivio; rather, you open Safari and navigate to the Nivio website. (Nivio uses the Wyse technology behind the scenes to power its system.) Once you've logged in, Nivio brings you to a home page from which you can launch the Nivio Desktop app (which requires a second login).