Firefox 157 is out for Windows, macOS, Linux, and Android and the biggest change in this version is the new Nova design, which brings a more modern look to the browser. Mozilla has also fixed over 70 security vulnerabilities, and updates are also available for the Firefox ESR versions.

The release of Firefox 158 is scheduled for October 13th, 2026.

What’s new in Firefox 157?

Now that Firefox has adopted a two-week release cycle, major new features are growing fewer and farther between. With Firefox 157, the focus is on the new Nova design, which has heavily rounded corners and subtle color gradients on surfaces. You’ll find 12 themes, each in light and dark variants.

Mozilla has also brought back the popular Compact Mode, which groups elements together to save space—great for smaller screens.

You can learn more about the Nova redesign and what it entails in this announcement post by the Mozilla team.

Security fixes in Firefox 157

In the security advisory for Firefox 157, Mozilla lists 76 vulnerabilities that have been fixed, 30 of which were discovered and reported by external security researchers.

Mozilla classifies 38 vulnerabilities as high risk, 29 as medium risk, and nine as low risk. Among them, 32 are use-after-free (UAF) vulnerabilities, some of which could be exploited to inject and execute code, and 15 of which could be exploited to escape the browser sandbox.

Firefox ESR updates

In addition to Firefox 157, Firefox ESR releases 153.4.0, 140.17.0, and 115.42.0 are also now available. However, the latter are only available for Windows 7 and 8.1 and macOS 10.12 to 10.14 until March 2027.

In the ESR versions, Mozilla has fixed the aforementioned vulnerabilities that were also present in the code of these earlier browser generations. That amounts to 62 vulnerabilities in Firefox 153.4.0, 43 in Firefox 140.17, and 31 in Firefox 115.42.

Firefox ESR 140 received its final update on September 29th. In two weeks, this version will finally be replaced by Firefox ESR 153. If you haven’t already done so, it’s time to start planning the switch.

Price When Reviewed

$25 perpetual license I $16 per month subscription

Best Prices Today: Ashampoo Backup Pro

Despite the somewhat odd name, Ashampoo peddles some very effective software. Not the least of which is Backup Pro 27. For the average home user, it’s a friendly and solid backup solution.

However, the program is still missing a couple of features that would make it truly “Pro” and ditched another — real-time/continuous backup — for version 27 .

Read on to learn more, then see our roundup of the best Windows backup software for comparison.

What’s new in Ashampoo Backup Pro 27?

Other than the aforementioned deprecation of real-time/continuous backup, Backup Pro 27’s biggest morph is a rather significant alteration to the workflow and the way it’s presented — i.e., there’s a new, friendlier look that can operate in both light and dark modes.

Gone is the division between simple and comprehensive wizards. Now there is a single approach with all pertinent options packed into a couple of scrollable pages. It’s simple enough for anyone, and offers easy access to all the bells and whistles that advanced users might utilize.

However, as mentioned above and shown below, missing in action this go-around is the “real-time” backup I tested last time. I used quotes because it was more continuous backup than real time, backing up at granular intervals (continuous), not as files changed (real time).

However, even that continuous granularity is gone. While I found a way to back up hourly, or even every few minutes, defining it was exceedingly tedious — requiring a “New Time Entry” for every additional occurrence. Why? I suppose someone thinks that users never want to back up more than a couple times a day.

Beyond that, the major functionality remains intact. Additionally, the program as a whole is more mature and stable. Indeed, I suffered none of the installation and operational bugs I did with version 26, which admittedly, was only a day old at the time I first tested it.

What are Ashampoo Backup Pro 27’s features?

Backup Pro 27 lets you image entire partitions and drives (incremental and full — no differential), back up files and folders with versioning (keeping older copies), and disaster recovery — including boot media. In case the term “imaging” is new to you, it’s copying all the data blocks on a drive into a container file. Generally, empty sectors are bypassed.

Backup Pro 27 uses the relatively common .vmdk format as its backup container. This, however, is a feature that could be considered “pro” as it is the native virtual drive format for VMWare. The free VirtualBox also can open this virtual drive for browsing.

However, browsing using VM software is only possible if you don’t encrypt the images (you can compress). If you do encrypt, you must use Backup Pro to mount the image and restore files. I think Microsoft’s VHD would have been a better choice, as you could mount those with nothing more than Windows itself. Just saying.

Backup Pro must also be used for file/folder backups that are encrypted and/or compressed. File/folder backups that aren’t encrypted may, of course, be browsed using nothing but Windows Explorer.

While Backup Pro will create a rescue USB stick or CD/DVD, the usual option for creating an ISO image doesn’t exist. But what I also find less than “pro” is that the rescue disk is restore-only — i.e., there’s no facility for creating new backups when you boot using it.

Many users will only want to restore, but backing up before attempting to solve someone’s software or hardware issues is something most pros do religiously.

Note that even if your subscription (see the pricing section below) expires, the rescue media will still restore backups.

Conspicuously missing from the cloud destinations are Amazon S3 and S3 compatibles, which often offer the best value. To utilize these with any backup software, use one of the utilities in our roundup of cloud managers. But this lack, again is not “pro.”

One thing I’d like to see is Backup Pro show physical drives with their numbers and partitions grouped together in some fashion rather than separated as you’ll see below (the first two hidden partitions are on the same disk as Windows, but inexperienced users might not realize this.

There is an info box saying pertinent hidden and system partitions will also be backed up when you select any partition on a bootable disk, the Windows drive in this case. A good thing, as disaster recovery requires all of them.

Back on the sunny side…. A couple of the very useful Backup Pro features are the ability to trigger backups on media insertion, and support for network locations as both sources and destinations. These do drift towards the “pro” side of the equation as many end-user targeted backup programs only back up to network locations.

There’s also a handy “Check Disks” utility so you can determine the health and status of your local media.

How does Ashampoo Backup Pro 27 perform?

Unlike my first look at Backup Pro 26, version 27 performed flawlessly from the jump. Of course, this time I didn’t have the older version installed which is what caused issues last time.

Backup Pro 27 never glitched during any of the multiple tasks I threw at it: Imaging and file backup, local and online, encrypted/compressed, unencrypted/uncompressed, plus restore of all.

Speed-wise, all was about par for the course given the media used for the destination. When I say par, backup software generally operates at around half the maximum transfer rate of any given media.

How much is Ashampoo Backup Pro 27?

A perpetual license for Backup Pro 27 was available at the time of this writing for $25, discounted from $66. You can also rent it for $16 per year, though I’d stick with uncompressed, unencrypted backups if a subscription is your choice. Otherwise you’ll only be able to restore those compressed/encrypted backups from the recovery disc if and when the subscription lapses.

Those discounted prices are lower than I saw last time when the perpetual version was $33 and the yearly was $18.

Should you buy Ashampoo Backup Pro 27?

Backup Pro 27’s support for so many common backup chores, plus its comprehensive, easy-to-understand interface are major selling points for less-experienced users. If it meets your needs (there’s a trial), at $25, heck yeah.

But the lack of backup from the recovery disc, no differential backup, and the newly limited scheduling are definitely not “pro” in my book. I’d balk big time at the full $66 retail.

I strongly advise that you don’t rent (pay yearly) Backup Pro as the program seems to be shedding features rather than gaining them. The pace of development in the backup space in general is so slow, not to mention largely unnecessary, consider that general advice. Unless there’s online storage involved, that is.

If you’re moving your data to the latest version of Microsoft Outlook, it’s important to know that your calendar and contacts may need to be handled separately from your email.

Classic Outlook can export your data in a PST file, but New Outlook does not restore calendar and contact information in the same way. Instead, you need to first export your calendar as an ICS file and then your contacts as a CSV file, then you need to import those files to the new version.

Restoring your calendar

To restore the calendar, open New Outlook and click on Add Calendar underneath the monthly view. Next select Upload from File, then Browse. Find the ICS file and select Open. Under Select Calendar, pick the calendar you wish to restore. Once you’ve clicked Import, Outlook will add the stored data to your current calendar.

Restoring your contacts

Now your contacts.

Save your contacts as a CSV file. In New Outlook, open Contacts on the sidebar. They will appear there under the People tab. Next, click Export Contact in the ribbon, then Export.

Outlook will then compile the CSV file with your contact information and save it to your local Downloads folder. Now open Contacts and click on Import Contacts. Next click on Select Browse for a File and upload the CSV file. Finally, select Open and then Import in the next window.  

Phones and computers don’t always play nice together, especially when you’re bouncing between the two–it can be super annoying. KDE Connect is a handy app that helps fix this issue by linking your devices and letting them share files and notifications, while also allowing you to control your PC from your phone (or vice versa).

File sharing is probably what people use KDE Connect for most. It allows you to send files straight between your phone and computer—think AirDrop, but for PCs. And while KDE Connect does this perfectly well, I still recommend something like LocalSend if file sharing is your only goal. LocalSend is a bit more intuitive and easier for quick tasks.

However, KDE Connect sets itself apart thanks to its deeper device integration and remote control tools. The app mirrors your phone notifications on your desktop, which is great for those times when you’re in the middle of something at work and can’t check your phone. On supported devices, KDE Connect lets you reply to text messages from your computer, too.

The remote control aspect will appeal to power users in particular. I use it to control music on my PC, and even the virtual trackpad option can be useful. There’s also the ability to turn your phone into a presentation remote if you ever forget your clicker. You can even set up custom commands to do things like lock or shut down your computer from your phone.

KDE Connect is free and open source, with versions for Windows, macOS, Linux, Android, and iOS.

For more fun and helpful tips, tricks, website and app recommendations, be sure to subscribe to our PCWorld Try This newsletter.

TL;DR: Microsoft Project Professional 2024 is a full project management tool for Windows, and a lifetime license is on sale for $49.97 (reg. $1,129.99) through October 4.

Most of the good project management tools are locked behind a monthly or yearly subscription. Microsoft Project Pro used to have the same problem, but it doesn’t anymore. Instead of paying monthly, you can now get a Project Pro lifetime license on sale for $49.97 (reg. $1,129.99) during this September Flash Sale.

Instead of muddling through the early stages of a complex project, you can use Project Pro’s pre-built templates to get a new plan moving fast. Start and end dates even auto-populate from task dependencies, so moving one deadline updates the rest of the schedule. Multiple built-in timelines show how a complex project fits together, and task path highlighting in Gantt charts makes the links between tasks easy to follow.

Reports like Burndown and Resource Overview give stakeholders a clear read on progress, and baselines let decision makers compare where things stand against the original plan. What-if scenarios test different task assignments before you commit to them, and timesheets record hours on both project and non-project work for payroll and invoicing. For teams already running Project Online or Project Server, the desktop app syncs with both.

One license gives you Project Pro on a single Windows PC indefinitely. Just make sure to redeem your code within seven days of completing your purchase. Updates are also included.

Until October 4 at 11:59 p.m. PT, you can get a Microsoft Project Pro Lifetime License on sale for $49.97.

Microsoft Project Professional 2024: Lifetime License for WindowsSee Deal

StackSocial prices subject to change.