PCWorld的May 2020目录

As American businesses are forced to shut down because of COVID-19 (the novel coronavirus), customers are anxious about their bill for internet access. Data caps, an annoyance in the best of times, suddenly can mean paying additional fees if a family sheltering in place goes over its limit. Think of it: you’re working from home, videoconferencing over Skype or Zoom, while your kids are playing games and chatting with friends. There’s streamed movies to watch in the evenings. Disney+ and Netflix may be in constant rotation, adding to the bandwidth strain. That’s a lot of data! In response, some ISPs and cellular service providers are providing relief for customers. Some are merely adhering to the FCC’s Keep Americans Connected Pledge (PDF), which asks the signees not to terminate a customer’s…

Many updates have passed since Chrome OS introduced a proper tablet mode for convertibles with version 70, and while Google has certainly refined the system, it’s done little to fix its core navigation issues. The main problem: It’s kind of confusing. But the next Chrome OS update will go a long way to fix that. With the upcoming version 81, Google is bringing a new way to navigate when you’re not using the trackpad. It’s similar to both Apple’s new gestures on the iPad Pro and the latest Android 10 navigation with three main components: Swipe from the bottom of the screen to get to the home screen. Currently, you need to bring up the shelf and use the button on the far left or minimize your current window to return to the…

Microsoft fully pulled back the curtain on the hardware powering the Xbox Series X, going deep in both a March 16 Xbox blog and an inside look provided to Eurogamer’s Digital Foundry. The disclosures didn’t divulge much beyond what we already knew or could discern (go.pcworld.com/dcrn) but they made one thing abundantly clear: Microsoft’s next-gen console will put most gaming PCs to shame. We knew that the Xbox Series X would feature AMD’s kick-ass Ryzen CPU cores, but now we know it’s the full monty. The console will come with an 8-core, 16-thread Ryzen implementation, running at a locked clock speed. That clock speed will vary depending on whether game developers want to tap into all those threads, or decide to stick to the eight physical cores alone for slightly faster single-thread…

If you’re squinting at this review from your tiny 13-inch laptop screen, you may be like the many people who started working from home a few weeks ago and realized that portability means nothing if you’re going blind using a tiny screen. Gigabyte’s Aero 17 has the answer, by offering superb performance and a gorgeous, 17.3-inch UHD 4K HDR 400 panel to boot. Never mind that the laptop also features Intel’s newest 10th-gen, 8-core, Core i7-10875H Comet Lake H CPU and Nvidia’s stellar GeForce RTX 2070 Super Max-Q GPU. A 4K LAPTOP THAT MAKES SENSE We haven’t been big fans of 4K displays on smaller laptops, as the hit on battery life typically hasn’t been worth the pixel-density tradeoff. With the Aero 17 though, we’re pleased to say battery life was…

Crucial’s X8 Portable SSD (1TB as tested) is affordable, fast with everyday tasks, and sports a classy design. It feels nice in the hand and looks good emerging from your pocket. But there is a performance caveat for those who work with very large files and data sets. DESIGN AND SPECS Crucial takes a slightly different approach to the design of its X8 Portable SSD by mixing materials. The main body is anodized aluminum, and there are plastic inserts running across each side, with grippier end caps. They’re all shades of black, and the overall effect is quite nice. The X8 is one of the larger portable drives I’ve tested. Measuring 4.33 x 0.45 x 2.08 inches (width/depth/height), and weighing just shy of 3.5 ounces, it’s not quite as husky…

As a long-time freelancer and work-from-homer, I’ve owned a lot of routers in my quest for the speediest and most pervasive possible Wi-Fi. I had the original Apple AirPort, followed by the AirPort Extreme, the Linksys WRT3200ACM, and most recently, the Netgear Orbi RBK50. Each time I replaced my router, the speeds and coverage boost was measurable but relatively muted. The jump from 801.11n (Wi-Fi 4) to 802.11ac (Wi-Fi 5) was noticeable, but not monumental. And upgrading to a mesh router was easy, but it didn’t deliver a huge leap in coverage over the bridged AirPort routers I was using previously (I had configured one AirPort as a router, and a second as a range extender). When I wanted a speed boost, I paid for a higher-speed tier from my ISP.…

When you’re ready to boost your Adobe Photoshop skills, try one of these features to work some magic with your images. We start with what to do when your Scratch Disk fills up, then dive right into tips for getting started with Content-Aware Fill, Clipping Mask, Brushes, and Vignettes. THE PHOTOSHOP SCRATCH DISK IS FULL Photoshop uses the Scratch Disk to store its temporary files, such as the working and history files. If your Scratch Disk is full, save your file, then restart Photoshop. The Scratch Disk is cleared when you exit the program. The default Scratch Disk is the C:\ drive. Adobe advises against using the operating system drive for your Scratch Disk unless it’s the only drive available. Here’s how to select another drive for the Scratch Disk.…

Intel’s 10th-gen Comet Lake-H mobile processors for gaming laptops aspire to something that, so far, AMD’s Ryzen hasn’t emphasized: pure clock speed. Announced April 2, Intel’s 10th-gen H-series chips go above 5GHz, a new frequency high for mobile PC processors. In fact, most of Intel’s six new 14-nm Comet Lake-H-series chips top 5GHz, including a “step up” Core i7 chip, the Core i7-10875H (2.3GHz base, 5.1GHz turbo). Intel has designed it as a slightly cheaper alternative to the new uber-premium Core i9-10980HK, though both chips include 8 cores and 16 threads. It’s this new Core i9 that sets a high-water mark for clock speed, cresting at a whopping 5.3GHz. All this potentially sets up a hot debate among mobile gamers: buy in to Intel’s claims that most games still are…

While its thousand-dollar-plus flagship phones might get all the attention, Samsung’s best-selling phone of 2019 wasn’t the Galaxy S10 or the Note 10+, it was the $350 A50. Now, with a global smartphone slump that has hit the Galaxy S20 hard, Samsung is doubling down on that strategy. Make that sextupling down. On April 8, Samsung announced six new Galaxy A phones coming to the U.S., ranging from the ultra-cheap $110 Galaxy A01 to the $600 Galaxy A71 5G. The handsets have an array of different features and specs, but they all have three things in common, which Samsung calls “everyday essentials.” That means you’ll get premium-grade displays, cameras, and batteries, and lots of storage at an affordable price. All six phones also have dual-, triple-, and quad-camera systems with ultra-wide,…

We reviewed Google Stadia in November, calling it “a glimpse of a future some other company will probably perfect.” The underlying tech? Solid. The platform and business model? Disastrous. Not much has changed in the ensuing months, except now it’s free. Ish. Kind of. Google announced April 8 that it’s no longer restricting Stadia to those who bought the $130 Founder’s Edition hardware kit. Anyone with a Gmail account can sign up. It’s a good and necessary step (and doubly good with everyone stuck at home right now). One of Stadia’s biggest hurdles is the try-before-you-buy aspect. It’s hard to know how much the latency will annoy you, or whether your Internet connection is strong enough, or if any of a dozen other factors will matter, until you’ve spent some time…

Plenty of Windows laptops try to position themselves as MacBook Pro alternatives, combining slick designs and vibrant displays with powerful PC performance, but the Lenovo Yoga C940 15 is no mere copycat. While the Yoga looks sharp and has a bright display, it also leans into its differences as a Windows PC. It has a touchscreen that flips around into tablet mode, a built-in stylus for writing or sketching, and—thank heavens—a full-sized USB-A port to complement its two USB-C connections. It even fits in a number pad without cramping its excellent keyboard. That’s not to say the Lenovo Yoga C940 15 ticks every imaginable box. Screen backlighting is a bit uneven, audio quality could be better, and limited configuration options will prevent you from turning this into a beastly desktop…

When I picked up the box, I thought it was empty. That’s how light Razer’s Viper Mini is, the latest mouse to vie for the featherweight crown. Coming in at a mere 61 grams, or 2.1 ounces, it feels less like a mouse and more like a prototype, an empty plastic shell. It’s hard to believe there’s actual hardware under the hood—and yet it’s a proper gaming mouse. And in this case, small size is paired with a similarly small price tag. The Viper Mini can be yours for just $40. That had us asking, “What’s the catch?” Is there a catch? Read on to find out. TINY TERROR Okay, caveat number one: It’s very small. Obviously that’s by design. It’s the Razer Viper Mini. I am not a small…

It’s as easy to make a custom Zoom background that’s silly to mess around with your friends and coworkers, as it is to make a serious Zoom background for business meetings. We’ll show you how. Normally, a webcam shows just what it sees: you, your kitchen table, maybe an unkempt desk in the background. But Zoom, like Microsoft Teams, can use custom backgrounds that completely obscure all that background clutter. After enabling that background, the only thing the camera will see is your face. We’ll show you how to enable that option and take advantage of Zoom’s built-in backgrounds. But there’s more: Zoom offers background video, too—a looping video that can replace the Zoom’s static background image. We’ll also show you how to select your own background video to replace…

Find yourself suddenly needing to be more productive? Good news! Windows 10 comes loaded with all sorts of tools designed to help you Get Things Done, along with deeper tweaks that can optimize the operating system for productivity even more. Now for the bad news: All those excellent productivity-boosting Windows tools and tweaks aren’t immediately obvious, with many of the most useful settings buried deep inside a maze of options menus. We can help. Taking five or ten minutes to tinker with Windows 10 can supercharge your setup, regardless of whether you’re trying to keep at work while stuck at home or setting up something more permanent. Let’s dig in. GET RID OF INTERRUPTIONS If you want to stay focused on a task, reducing your interruptions is key. That can…

After months of speculation and leaks, Nvidia’s long-awaited GeForce RTX 2070 Super and 2080 Super GPUs are coming to laptops, having launched on April 2 in unison with Intel’s “Comet Lake-H” 10th-gen Core processors for mobile gaming. That’s great! But believe it or not, it may be Nvidia’s least enticing announcement that day. The company also announced cheaper prices for gaming laptops across the board, and some massive upgrades to its energy-efficient Max-Q technology to let GeForce GPUs soar even higher when they’re paired with Intel and AMD’s latest notebook processors. Let’s look at the new GPUs and Nvidia’s pricing changes first, then dive into the Max-Q tweaks, since they’re worth deeper explanation. The Super-fied laptop incarnations revolve around the same underlying hardware as desktop GeForce RTX 2070 Super and RTX…

In a press release that was as surprising as it was terse, weather app and API purveyor Dark Sky announced that it had been acquired by Apple. Of course, iOS users will be fine and the Dark Sky will continue to be available for purchase in the App Store until it inevitably replaces the stock weather app in an upcoming iOS release. Android users aren’t so lucky. Dark Sky offered no promises or hope, saying plainly that the Android and Wear OS apps will no longer be available for download in the Play Store and service to existing users and subscribers will end on July 1.(Subscribers who are still active at that time will receive a refund for whatever remains of their $3 annual subscription fee.) What really hurts is…

We’ve tested the new ROG Zephyrus G14, which debuts with AMD’s stellar Ryzen 9 4900HS CPU, and we can safely say: Just give Asus your money. This laptop packs a stupid amount of performance into a stupidly small and stupidly light frame. To give you an idea of just how impressive this 3.5-pound, Ryzen 4000-based laptop is, you’re talking about a weight class that typically gives you lower-power CPUs and GPUs. Yet the G14 can hang in CPU performance with laptops that weigh 10 pounds. Obviously the star of the show is the Ryzen 9 4900HS CPU, which we review in detail separately. But the Asus ROG Zephyrus G14 as a whole package is nearly as impressive, so keep reading to find out more. SPECS AND FEATURES The ROG Zephyrus…

The NUC 9 Extreme NUC9i9QNX (also known as Ghost Canyon), like its forebears, showcases Intel’s latest, cutting-edge tech—and the most unpronounceable product names. It continues a tradition begun in 2016 with Skull Canyon and its 45-watt quad-core processor, followed in 2018 by Hades Canyon and its unique integrated graphics capable of modern 1080p gaming. This time, the newest Next Unit of Computing challenges preconceptions of mini PCs by swinging away from the silicon and over to its housing. Modularity is Ghost Canyon’s star attraction. Other tiny computers have soldered parts with restricted upgrade options, but not this NUC. Built around Intel’s Compute Element, it comes apart as big, easy-to-swap components. When you outgrow your processor, you simply replace the entire Compute Element with a more modern version. The same applies for the GPU,…

Now that AMD’s boffo Ryzen 4000 chips and Intel’s 10th-gen Comet Lake H are both out, laptop shoppers have to decide whether to wait for shiny new models to ship, or jump now to find some good deals on the current generation still available. The biggest surprise was the Ryzen 9 4900HS we reviewed in the Asus ROG Zephyrus G14 laptop (see page 47). We expected the CPU to be fast, but we didn’t know it would handle its acoustics and thermals so well, too. Ryzen 4000 and the ROG Zephyrus G14 have reset what to expect out of a gaming laptop for performance and portability. Not to be outdone, Intel’s new 10th-gen Comet Lake H also resets what to expect out of gaming and workhorse laptops with a Core i7. That’s…

If you’re sick of peeling the tape off your laptop’s camera every time you need to call in to a virtual meeting, look no further than the Android phone lying on your desk. That’s right, you can use your Android phone as a makeshift webcam for Zoom or Skype video calls—no cables required. There are a few different apps you can use, depending on your PC. If you have a Mac, your best bet is EpocCam, which also works well with an iPhone or iPad. For Windows or Linux users, we like DroidCam. Both offer free and paid tiers, depending on your streaming needs. No matter which app you choose, you’re going to need to install the app on your phone and a companion driver on your PC: EpocCam: www.kinoni.com…