Table of contents for 629 in Computeractive

Asus has urged people using its routers to install firmware updates after they were attacked by Russiabacked hackers. The attack was detected by US-Japanese security firm Trend Micro, which said the routers had been infected by the Cyclops Blink botnet malware. This is controlled by the Sandworm group of hackers, which is thought to be run by Russian military intelligence, and has been blamed for disrupting Ukraine’s power grid in 2015. Trend Micro said that Cyclops Blink is similar to VPNFilter, which hacked 500,000 Asus, D-Link, Linksys, Netgear and TP-Link routers in 2018. It’s thought Sandworm was behind that attack too. Asus has listed affected routers at www.snipca.com/41390 – scroll down and click the ‘Security Advisory for Cyclops Blink’ heading (pictured), dated 17 March, 2022. Like VPNFilter, the Cyclops Blink…

Chrome has reintroduced the option to turn the sound off in a tab with one click, though you need to activate a hidden ‘flag’ to make it work. It appears in version 100 of the browser, released in late March. To use it, first make sure you’re running Chrome 100. Click the three dots, top right, then Settings, followed by About Chrome on the left. If there’s an update pending it will automatically install. You’ll see the version number in the centre. With Chrome 100 installed, type chrome://flags into its address bar (1 in our screenshot), then search for tab audio muting 2 and select Enabled in the dropdown menu 3. Restart Chrome, and you’ll now be able to click the speaker icon in a Chrome tab to stop it…

My conscience won’t let me keep using Kaspersky I feel I am uniquely placed to comment on Kaspersky, having started using it before it was available in the UK. Back in the early Nineties it was only available in Europe, and all updates had to be downloaded as a file and then installed. When it did finally arrive in the UK, I immediately rang the London office to ask for a proper licence, and whether I could become a reseller. I was pleased to say that it was a ‘yes’ to both requests. I used Kaspersky to keep my computers, and those of my friends and customers, from the 1990s to the 2010s. If I ever had a problem, I had a direct line to the help desk in the…

Q The built-in DVD drive in my Packard Bell PC has stopped working and is no longer recognised by Windows. I have acquired an internal Hitachi GH24NASD5 DVD drive and I wanted to use it as an external drive, but I can’t seem to find an enclosure with the necessary connector that lets me plug it into a USB port. Terry Steels A As you may have now realised, most external drive enclosures are designed to accommodate hard drives, and don’t provide access via the front. However, when using a DVD drive, you need the front to be open so you can flip out the tray and pop your disc in. Your best option is an OWC Mercury Pro enclosure (pictured here with a drive installed), which costs £59 from…

The Philips Hue brand is best known for its colourful smart light bulbs, which you can control via your smartphone or voice assistant. However, some table lamps and bedside lights use fittings that aren’t compatible with Hue bulbs. If you want to control these from your smartphone, you need to use a separate controller. This is where the Hue Smart Plug comes in. By sitting between the lamp’s plug and the power socket, it lets you control the basic operation of these devices via the Hue app. “A great addition to an existing Hue system, but there are cheaper alternatives” It’s a compact, unassuming white plastic unit, with a discreet LED in the right-hand corner that indicates when the smart plug is switched on, while a power button on the…

What you need: VT4Browsers extension Time required: 30 minutes Google has just updated its VT4Browsers extension, which tests the security of your downloads by uploading them to the VirusTotal server and running them through 60 antivirus tools, including AVG, Avast and Sophos. The benefits of checking files online is that the antivirus engines are always up to date and they won’t conflict with any security software you’ve already installed on your computer. The extension is available for Firefox and Chromium-based browsers, including Chrome, Brave and Edge. STEP 1 If you’re running Chrome, Edge, Brave, Vivaldi or any other Chromium-based browser, visit www.snipca.com/41356. Click the ‘Add to…’ button (this will say ‘Add to Chrome’ 1 if you’re using Chrome or Edge). Confirm that you want to add the extension to your…

1 Go to the Chrome Web Store and find the extension ‘Search by Image’ (www.snipca.com/41362). Click ‘Add to Chrome’ 1 then ‘Add extension’. When you right-click an image you’ll see a new ‘Search by Image’ option 2, with several search engines listed. 2 Select ‘Google’ and the extension will search for the image on Google Images, just like Chrome’s built-in option used to. You can then find different sizes of the image 1, view visually similar images 2 and visit pages containing matching images. 3 To search with Google Images by default, right-click the extension’s toolbar button and choose Options. Untick all the search engines except Google Images 1, then choose ‘Select image’ in the ‘Search mode’ menu 2 and ‘From context menu’ 3 in the ‘Search all engines’ menu.…

According to Recycle Your Electricals (www.recycleyour electricals.org.uk), you could circle the Earth five times with the cables hiding in UK homes. We can believe it. If you’re anything like us, you’ll have bags full of old leads that you’re keeping ‘just in case’ they come in useful. Tied together, they’d probably stretch to Canada. What’s maddening is that many of these cables probably became obsolete years ago. So, which ones can you safely dispose of, and which should you keep? DITCH THESE CABLES… Apple’s 30-pin connectors and FireWire Apple no longer uses the 30-pin connectors that were common on older iPods and iPhones, while FireWire (pictured at www.snipca.com/41432), which featured on the very first iPods and some high-end drives and camcorders, has largely been replaced by Thunderbolt and USB. FireWire…

Leaving your logins in an encrypted digital locker is the simplest way to let your family access your online accounts when you’re no longer around. Storage service SecureSafe (www.securesafe.com, pictured) has a ‘Data inheritance’ feature that lets you bequeath files, passwords, PINs, two-factor authentication details and other account data to chosen beneficiaries. You give each beneficiary a different activation code that grants them only the access you choose for them, and only works when you die or are incapacitated. SecureSafe requires several documents to certify that this has actually happened. Any data you haven’t assigned to a specific person is securely destroyed. A free SecureSafe account lets you name one beneficiary and gives you 100MB of storage for up to 50 passwords; paid-for plans increase these limits and cost from…

Why can’t I install Windows 11 Fixer? Q I’ve made repeated attempts to install Windows 11 Fixer, which you recommended in Issue 627’s Best Free Software (page 18), but nothing happens. I download the ZIP file, extract the EXE file, allow it to ‘Run anyway’, but then nothing. I can’t see it anywhere. What am I doing wrong? Frank Bowering A As Frank points out, installing Windows 11 Fixer requires you to run an EXE file from the extracted ZIP folder. The first potential problem is that the Windows 11 Fixer.exe file in the extracted folder is, in fact, a shortcut that simply throws up an error message if you double-click it. The genuine Windows 11 Fixer.exe file is hidden inside the Data subfolder – so run this instead. The…

Microsoft is finally letting you switch the default browser from Edge in Windows 11 with a single click, following complaints from users who say the current process takes too many steps. It has made the change in a new update (KB5011563) available to all users, after testing it in preview versions of the operating system. Until now, there was no quick way to change the default browser. Instead, you had to change it for each type of file you want it to open (such as HTML) and which internet protocol you want to use (HTTPS, for example). Selecting these options required you to open the Settings app (by pressing Windows key+I), then Apps on the left followed by ‘Default apps’ in the centre. You then had to type the name…

DIALOGUE ON ROKU TO SOUND CLEARER Roku has updated its operating system to make dialogue in programmes stand out more against background noise such as music. Version 11 of Roku OS will also let you create screensavers of your photos (pictured). It’s launching in the next few weeks, but not initially on every Roku device. Read more at www.snipca.com/41503. THUNDERBIRD ADDS IMPROVED TOOLBAR A major new version (102) of Thunderbird is set for release in June, adding a new toolbar, new address book and ‘link preview’ cards in emails. The changes were announced on Thunderbird’s Twitter account (www.snipca.com/41499), along with screenshots of the new tools. You can try some of them already in Thunderbird beta (www.snipca.com/41501).…

More than 10 million emails have been reported to the Suspicious Email Reporting Service (SERS) since it was launched by the UK’s National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) two years ago. The service was set up in April 2020, amid the first Covid lockdown, and received 5,000 emails in its first day. That figure has now grown to 10.5 million, the NCSC says, leading to 76,000 online scams being investigated and taken down. These include scams by criminals impersonating the NHS, delivery companies and cryptocurrency investments. The NCSC released the figures to help promote a new advertising campaign (pictured) urging people and small businesses to bolster their defences by using two-factor authentication (2FA). Lindy Cameron, head of the NCSC, said the public’s response to the emailreporting service has been “incredible”, but…

As well as letting you build a family tree, FamilySearch www.familysearch.org) is home to the largest collection of free records from around the world. You can also use it to upload your own images, stories, and even audio recordings (though not video). These files can be tagged and connected to individuals in an online tree, and can even be searched for as items on the site within their own right. Here, we’ll show you how to upload an audio recording and attach it to a photo. Add ‘topic tags’ to your photo In this case I want to narrate a short story about my great-grandfather, David Hepburn Paton, who died in Brussels in 1916, as a British civilian hiding during the German occupation of Belgium. If I click on a…

Eagle-eyed readers might have noticed that we reviewed an Acer Swift 3 back in Issue 617. However, that particular model has a 14in screen. This one comes with a 16in screen and is powered by an 11th-generation i7 processor, but manages to come in at about £100 cheaper. If you’re looking for a large-screen laptop, it’s an appealing proposition. “A larger screen at a cheaper price than its predecessor, but there are compromises” There are a couple of reasons for this lower price. The first is that this 16in model comes with a smaller SSD drive, (512GB rather than 1TB). It also uses a slower processor – an i7-11370H instead of the earlier version’s i7-1165G7. However, in our benchmark tests, this didn’t make a significant difference in levels of performance,…

If you use your webcam frequently – such as for regular work or club meetings, as well as keeping up with family and friends – then you may want to consider upgrading to a model that improves the whole video-chat experience. While it’s fairly expensive, the Nexigo N970P fits that bill, with its ability to film in 4K resolution at 30 frames per second, capturing crisp detail and vibrant colour. The adjustable, foldable mount provides a firm grip on your monitor, though there’s also a tripod mount on the bottom, if you prefer. On the back there’s a USB 3.0 port for connecting directly to your PC or laptop. It also comes with a remote control for the zoom, pan, focus and backlight. We recorded a test video using Microsoft’s…

What is it? A sturdy, adjustable arm you can use to mount either a laptop or a monitor. If you currently have your equipment resting on books or boxes, this alternative is simple to set up and use. What does it do? It holds your laptop while you work, freeing up desk space. It can also hold your monitor making it easier to adjust its angle throughout the day, such as when the sun starts streaming through a nearby window on to your screen. What’s the catch? To accommodate heavy equipment, it needs to be robust and well made. StarTech’s new arm (£120 from Amazon, www.snipca.com/41457, pictured) delivers on both counts, but it’s not cheap. So can I do without it? Probably. It’s a lot of money to pay to…

What you need: AMD Radeon RAMDisk software Time required: One hour If you’ve ever upgraded from a hard drive to a solid-state drive (SSD), you’ll know what a difference it can make. Your computer takes less time to boot, programs start more quickly, and files open in a flash. Now imagine if we told you there was an even faster option than SSD, called a RAM drive, and that it’s completely free. The fastest storage in your computer isn’t your hard drive or SSD. It’s actually a very tiny amount of memory built into the processor, which is used to hold data on the cusp of being processed. This memory is crucial to the smooth running of the processor itself, which is why it’s locked off from the rest of…

Shut Up: Comment Blocker Chromium, Edge & Firefox www.snipca.com/41366 If you often bristle at the inflammatory, offensive and inane comments below online articles, social-media posts and videos, then you need Shut Up: Comment Blocker. This extension automatically hides comments on sites including YouTube, Mail Online, The Guardian, Facebook and many more, so you’ll never even know they’re there. If the temptation to see what people are saying gets the better of you, simply click the speech-bubble button on your browser’s toolbar to reveal what the developer calls the “vitriolic, idiotic wasteland” of the comments section. Shut Up remembers which sites you’ve enabled comments on and lets you switch them on or off by right-clicking the page and selecting Toggle Comments. You can also set up a keyboard shortcut by going…

Use Excel to agree a meeting day There are plenty of handy online tools for trying to work out which particular date suits everyone (or most people) for a one-off club meeting, but it’s more difficult to decide the most convenient day for a regular meeting. One method is to use several formulas in Excel, as we’ll explain. Work out the number of people who can attend on each day In our example, we want to choose the day that most members can make. First, in cells C1 to I1, we type the days of the week (1 in our screenshot above). From cell A3 down we’ve added the names of our members, and put a ‘y’ in the days they can make. Next, we counted the number of people…

Our reviews are based on criteria such as whether the antivirus software was easy to use, if it slowed our PCs while scanning, how well it detected and removed malware, and whether it offers useful extra tools. For malware-detection scores, we used the results of three independent testing labs: AV-Test (www.av-test.org) in Germany, AV-Comparatives in Austria (www.av-comparatives.org) and SE Labs (https://selabs.uk), whose main testing lab is in Wimbledon, London. Each lab subjects the major antivirus brands’ products to tests involving thousands of pieces of malware, including hundreds of previously unseen samples, to award it an overall protection rate as a percentage. The labs also test the software for false positives to ensure they’re not wrongly flagging safe files as threats. As you can see from the tables below, the difference…

1080p Of the common types of high-definition video, this is the best quality: 1920x1080 pixels. 4K Video with a resolution of at least 3840x2160 pixels. Adware Unwanted adverts that come with software. AMOLED Active-Matrix Organic Light-Emitting Diode. An alternative technology to LCD for creating flat-panel displays. Most commonly used in smartphones, tablets and smartwatches. Antivirus engine The core component of an antivirus program that detects malware. 32bit/64bit A measure of how much data a PC can process at once. Most older computers are 32bit, more modern ones are 64bit. Batch file Commands that are processed in sequence, often without requiring input from the user. Benchmarking Comparing software and products with an accepted standard. BIOS Basic Input-Output System. Software built into every PC that connects the vital components. It’s visible for…

The UK’s cyber-security chiefs have said individuals are safe to use Kaspersky antivirus software, though it has advised certain businesses and organisations to assess whether using Russian software poses a risk to them. In a blog post titled ‘Russian technology products and services following the invasion of Ukraine’ (www.snipca.com/41498), Ian Levy, technical director at the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC), wrote: “It almost certainly remains the case that nearly all individuals in the UK (as well as many enterprises) are not going to be targeted by Russian cyber attack, regardless of whether they use Russian products and services”. However, he added that Kaspersky customers may have to switch to another antivirus if the company becomes subject to sanctions because it would probably stop getting updates. He also said that for…

TALKTALK’S NEW TV BOX NOW AVAILABLE TalkTalk has made its new TV 4K Box (pictured) available to both new and existing broadband customers. The device, made by French tech firm Netgem, comes with 70 channels, including Amazon Prime Video, Netflix and YouTube. It’s available for £4 a month – see TalkTalk’s site for details: www.snipca.com/41375. UPDATE YOUR HP PRINTER TO FIX FLAW HP has released two security updates for its printers to fix a “critical” flaw that could let hackers control them. It affects hundreds of models, including those in the DeskJet and OfficeJet range. Instructions for the updates are on HP’s customer support pages, at www.snipca.com/41417 and www.snipca.com/41418. Look under ‘Affected products’ to see if your printer is at risk.…

You can now search over 400,000 aerial photos using Historic England’s free Aerial Photograph Explorer Tool, which contains images dating back to 1919. To search these, visit www.snipca.com/41382, then type a location in the top bar and click the magnifying icon. You can also zoom into the map using your mouse wheel, then click a hexagon to see how many photos an area has (pictured below). The darker a hexagon, the more photos there are. If a hexagon is missing, it means there are no images of that area. Among the images are remains of Iron Age forts in Dorset, and abandoned medieval villages such as Old Sulby in Northamptonshire. Many of the most interesting photos come from World War 2, such as images showing allotments in Greenwich Park and…

Cutting £144 off your annual broadband bill is a decent result even when the economic climate is looking rosy. But when times are as tough as they are now, it’s the type of saving that could make a real difference to whether you eat or heat. That figure comes from Ofcom, which says it’s the average amount customers would save by moving to an internet provider’s social tariff. These are discounted packages offered to households that receive Universal Credit. BT’s Home Essentials, for example, costs £15 a month for 36Mbps and £20 for 67Mbps, while Virgin charges £15 for 15Mbps (see all the deals on Ofcom’s site: www.snipca.com/41521). And yet despite these savings, only a fraction of those eligible have switched. Of the estimated 4.2 million households who get Universal…

While there are more high-quality Android tablets becoming available these days, for many people Apple’s iPad remains the best option. With an affordable basic model (the £319 iPad, www.snipca.com/41373) and a range of more expensive, higher-spec iPad Pro devices, there’s something in the range for everyone. The iPad Air sits between the basic and Pro models in terms of price, making it a great choice if you’re looking for more performance without paying top dollar. This is essentially a refresh of the 2020 iPad Air, with a similar appearance but upgraded internal components, and available for the same base price (£569 for the 64GB version). It’s light (461g), beautifully made, and the 10.9in screen is big enough for viewing apps, emails and films. It’s also bright, with an upper limit…

Not everyone’s requirements include the ability to produce colour photos that rival high-street printing services. If all you want is sharp, business-like letters churned out quickly and efficiently, then a simple mono laser printer might be a better option than the latest multifunction inkjet. “Graphics are crisp and detailed, photos free of banding, and black text is very smooth” The Oki B432dn is a compact device that can connect straight to your router via its Gigabit Ethernet port – an option that makes setup very easy. Simply install the Windows drivers and you’re good to go. Wi-Fi is an optional extra (that adds around £40), but a USB connection is available if you prefer a direct connection. The printer dispatched our 25-page test text document at a rate of 31.3ppm…

If you’ve bought a laptop recently, you might be wondering how you’re supposed to connect peripherals to it. Many – particularly slimmer, lightweight models – simply don’t have room to accommodate loads of inputs, and may even be restricted to one or two USB-C ports. If that sounds like your laptop, Kensington may have the answer. This hub plugs into the USB-C port on your laptop and provides various ports for connecting your other devices. It’s small and light, making it portable and a good match for a smaller laptop. To test the device we connected it to a Dell XPS 13 laptop. We added a keyboard and mouse to the two USB 3.0 ports, a 4K monitor to the HDMI port, and an Ethernet cable to the RJ45 port.…

LAPTOP Lenovo Yoga Slim 7 (256GB) £665 from www.snipca.com/41099 Tested Issue 601 Weighing just 1.16kg, this is an excellent lightweight laptop with a great screen and an AMD processor faster than many Intel rivals. It has two USB-C ports, two USB 3.0 ports and a microSD card reader. Battery lasts nearly 16 hours. ALTERNATIVE Dell XPS 13 New Intel CPUs and a taller screen make this a more powerful, all-round slim laptop. Prices start at £849 from www.snipca.com/40042 ANDROID TABLET PRICE DROP Samsung Galaxy Tab S7 £629 (256GB) www.snipca.com/41100 Tested Issue 623 This performed so well in our most recent tests that it has ousted the Lenovo Tab P11 Pro as our favourite. It has a stunning OLED screen, with perfect contrast and superb colour reproduction, and comes with Samsung’s…

We performed some standard tests on our RAM drive and the internal SSD of our test machine using CrystalDiskMark (free from www.snipca.com/41318). The table below shows the best result achieved using AMD Radeon RAMDisk when reading and writing 256MB of both sequential data (unfragmented) and random data (fragmented). In each case, the test was repeated five times using default settings, and the result is an average of the readings taken. On our machine, the RAM drive was faster than our SSD in each test, often by a significant margin – and would have been even faster than a hard drive if we had one. The biggest difference was in the sequential tests, where the RAM drive ran at 3.4 times the speed of the SSD when reading data, and 8.6…

What is it? Hmm, you don’t know what Internet Explorer (IE) is? Are you sure you’re reading the right magazine? OK, so I know it’s that browser I once used. Is it still going? Yes, though not for much longer. Nearly 27 years after IE launched, Microsoft will “retire” it on 15 June. That’s an early retirement! Why is Microsoft ditching it? Because it wants you to use its Edge browser instead – and has done since it launched along with Windows 10 in 2015. What version of IE are we on now? The 11th, which arrived as far back as 2013. It’s been sliding down Microsoft’s priority list ever since, and is now about to drop off. Visit IE’s download page (www.snipca.com/41410) and you’ll see the confirmation message pictured…

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So much of our life is now spent online that it’s increasingly important to decide what happens to our accounts after we die. Securing your digital legacy allows loved ones to access your photos, videos, emails and other personal files when you’re no longer around to share the content yourself, preventing it from being lost forever. It also means you can bequeath specific data to different family members and close friends without compromising your privacy by revealing your passwords while you’re still alive. Here we explain the digital-legacy policies of the big tech companies. GOOGLE Google offers a virtual funeral plan in the form of Inactive Account Manager, which gives you full control over what happens to the various elements of your Google account – including Gmail, YouTube, Drive and…

I’d like to think I set the trend for lagging behind trends. I clung on to my CDs and DVDs long after most people switched to streaming, I’m still not sure what the point of TikTok is and last month I had my first positive Covid test – two years after everyone else started catching the virus. Thankfully, my booster jab and the relative mildness of the Omicron variant prevented my symptoms from becoming too severe, but it wasn’t the best of birthday presents. A much nicer surprise was that DuckDuckGo messaged me to say that I’d been added to the beta test of its new App Tracking Protection feature, which blocks the third-party trackers hidden in mobile apps. I joined the waiting list when the feature was announced last…