Table of contents for January 2018 in PC & Tech Authority

Was it a good year for you? Someone just asked me that, and instead of handing back the quick-retort generic bit of positivity, I actually pondered and replied truthfully that 2017 was one of the strangest set of 12 months in my life. We’re a tech mag and the politics I’m about to mention in passing will be a rare bite of that apple, but the election of Donald Trump was a wake up call making it loud and clear that you just can’t relax into complacency, thinking that you know, in general terms, where the world is heading. It feels like we’re in an alternate reality timeline and that in turn has shaped my thinking as it applies to everything else. “NBN continues to be the hot topic amongst…

How do you determine what are the best PC products in a year? You could simply look at scores, or draw names out of a hat, but we have other plans. On the 22 March, 2018, PC & Tech Authority, PC PowerPlay, Hyper and Atomic will host the first annual Australian PC Awards, an event that will see you, the readers determine the best products on the market. Starting February 7, 2018 you, the most well informed, passionate and influential tech readers in Australia will have a chance to vote for the best products on the market. Here’s how it will work. The editorial teams of the nextmedia Technology and Gaming department will curate a list of nominees from the products we reviewed over 2017 as well as some of…

TI COMPUTERS ULTIMATE I9 GAMING PC $4,295 • http://tinyurl.com/zx6a8ol Ultimate gaming PC? This machine is certainly a powerhouse, but strictly speaking I wouldn’t call it an ultimate gaming machine, primarily because games for the most part still love higher CPU clock speeds than more cores. With ten cores available that only spool up to 4.3GHz under turbo conditions, the likes of the newer and (>50%) cheaper i7 8700K that clocks up to 4.7GHz I would argue is the current ultimate gaming CPU. With so much CPU grunt however, it’s ideal for people who will be doing compute intensive things other than gaming on the system, like compression, video encoding, rendering, compiling and the like. The fastest graphics card around assures this system gaming street cred though and with oodles of…

Lachlan S sends in a question which is “How do I extend my Wi-Fi network to the back of the house when my router is at the front, so that I can seamlessly move around without the signal still dropping out and reconnecting all the time?”. It’s a great question, and one that I hear almost every day. Traditionally, many people go to a retail outlet and purchase a Wi-Fi range extender, sometimes known as a repeater, and this device essentially copies your existing Wi- Fi network name (called an SSID), and simply adds an extension such as “-EXT” to it. An example would be if your main Wi-Fi network is called ‘HOME-WIFI’ then the extender would simply take that and add a separate network called ‘HOME-WIFI-EXT’. Of course, as…

2D TESTS Desktop PCs and laptops are tested using our own custom bench testing suite, which has been carefully designed to test all aspects of a system and rate them in a way that’s useful to you. Our benchtesting cover three main tests: a typical video editing test, a demanding 4K video editing test and a multitasking test that stresses all aspects of the system. We look at the time it takes for each test to run, which is then compared to our reference PC to produce a normalised result. This score is shown on a graph, and to help you understand just where the PC we’re reviewing sits in the grand scheme of things, we will often include other system’s scores. On occasion we will run publically available bench…

Say it quietly, but there’s nothing all that special about the Google Pixel 2 XL. It might be the search giant’s flagship smartphone for 2017 but there isn’t a single thing it does that rival manufacturers haven’t done already – and done better. You want a screen with barely-there bezels and curved corners? Take your pick. A phone that responds if you squeeze it? Yep, HTC got there first. How about water-resistance, an 18:9 aspect ratio display, and ridiculously high prices? So passé. Google will point to its image-processing technology and the exclusive Google Pixel launcher as features to mark out the Pixel 2 XL from the Android competition. And, in the absence of major problems elsewhere, those would be enough to push the LG-built Pixel 2 XL to the…

This is going to be a pretty boring review because the D-Link DWR-118 is a pretty boring router. That sounds like a negative, but it isn’t! The DWR-118 doesn’t pretend to maximise your gaming experience or cover itself in unsightly antennas. It’s simply a no-nonsense, easy to setup Wi-Fi router with a USB port that allows a 4G modem to be plugged in. Other than the USB modem feature, the DWR-118 is a bog standard 802.11ac Wi-Fi router. There’s 1x Gigabit LAN, 3x Fast Ethernet LAN and 1x Fast Ethernet WAN ports, 2x removable antennas, dynamic DNS support, basic URL filtering & QoS and the ability to modify Wi-Fi transmit power. On some routers, configuring the 4G modem can be confusing, but the DWR-118 can auto-configure most modern USB modems.…

Huawei has traditionally used its Mate series phones as the diagships of the range, and 2017 is no exception, with not one, but two devices: the Mate 10 and Mate 10 Pro. The Mate 10 – the subject of this review – continues the design language of last year’s P10/P10 Plus, with rounded edges and a piano black finish, in contrast to the Mate 9’s bevelled edges and brushed metal façade. What is decidedly up-to-date is its internals. Sporting Hislilicon’s latest Kirin 970 processor built on a 10nm fabrication process, complete with 8 cores. This is paired with a Mali-G72 GPU and – in a first for Huawei – a Neural Network Processing Unit (NPU), which boosts its AI capabilities (more on that later). 64GB of on-board storage and 4GB…

A VG is now owned by Avast, and although the parent company hasn’t officially confirmed it, we suspect that the two packages are built on the same antivirus engine. That’s fine by us, though, because it’s a highly effective engine. Just like Avast, AVG put in a strong performance in AV-Comparatives’ tests, blocking 99% of malware with just three false positives. It also proved quite nimble when it comes to performance. It scored a “fast” rating for browsing the web, and for the first runs of the file-copy and application-launching tests. On subsequent repetitions of those tests, it stepped up to “very fast”. But if AVG is internally the same as Avast, the look and feel is different, with a simpler and more clearly laid out homescreen. The software still…

Eset has a reputation for forensic accuracy and light-footed performance – and the company’s latest internet security suite makes a respectable fist of living up to that image. In AV-Comparatives’ tests, Eset repelled an excellent 99.7% of threats, wrongly intercepting just one false positive. That’s good enough to inspire confidence, but not quite as smooth as Bitdefender’s clean sheet. Similarly, in the performance tests, Eset proved fast for web browsing, and for file copies – even on initial access, when many suites stumble. Unfortunately, the same can’t be said for opening applications: here, AVComparatives rated first-run opening speeds as mediocre. The lightweight concept extends to the interface. As you click around, what chiefiy strikes you is how little there seems to be to Eset Internet Security. From the main tabs…

If you don’t like change, brace yourself. First, Microsoft’s simple, free antivirus tool has officially had its title elongated to include the word “Antivirus”. Second, the familiar Defender interface – which had gone basically unchanged since the launch of Microsoft Security Essentials back in 2009 – is no more. As of the first Windows 10 Creators Update, you interact with Defender Antivirus solely through a couple of Settings pages within the Windows Defender Security Center. There’s one thing that hasn’t changed, though: Windows Defender Antivirus yet again did worse in this month’s real-world protection tests than almost any other security suite. It didn’t fare quite as badly as McAfee Total Protection, but coming 12th out of 13 suites is nothing to be proud of. It’s also concerning to note that,…

Trend Micro Internet Security has a straightforward interface. It’s divided into four pages, dealing with protection for your device, privacy, data and family respectively – and there’s something useful on every one. Under Device, for example, you’ll find general antivirus settings, plus a toggle for “Mute Mode”, which suppresses all alerts and notifications. There’s also a PC Health Checkup tool, which automatically fixes security risks – such as unpatched applications – and disables unneeded startup items that could be bogging Windows down. On the Privacy page you’ll find a web-based tool that reviews your privacy settings on Facebook, Twitter, Google+ and LinkedIn, and alerts you to any potential for over-sharing. It’s powered by a browser extension for Chrome, Firefox and IE that also adds trust ratings to search results from…

FASTCUT 2 There are various ways of capturing video, but the rise in capturing with a drone, underwater or via an action cam, means you need to right tool to process the data. MAGIX Fastcut is a quick-fire video editor designed for people who have captured video using one of the above formats and wants to get it edited, exported and uploaded as soon as possible. As an example, if you capture a GoPro video at a local event, you want to get the content up on social media within minutes, not hours. Getting started is easy. Connect your device and choose the video you want to import. Next, Fastcut will offer you a number of preset music templates to apply to your video. These presets include ambient, pop, movie…

As any experienced IT professional will know, changing an IT system isn’t as simple as buying a new product and rolling it out to employees. There are many implications for users that, if acknowledged, will make for a much smoother and more positive go-live. An IT trainer’s role in the project may appear to be simply to learn how the new system operates and train the users in how to use it – rather naively, I approached my first role on this type of project with the attitude that it would be as easy as that! Rather, one of the upgrade trainer’s key roles is actually to communicate what the changes are, and how users will benefit. I don’t often get involved in the more nitty-gritty technical aspects of upgrade…

If Wikipedia is to be believed, then “Ipsa Scientia potestas est” first appeared in Sir Francis Bacon’s Meditationes Sacrae of 1597. Scraping the barrel of my O-level Latin, it means “knowledge itself is power”, which is my current train of thought. If you look at the wide range of illnesses that face the nation, type 2 diabetes (T2D) is arguably the most worrying. I’ve seen numbers that suggest up to a third of the population will end up with some sort of T2D, and the health cost for this is almost incalculable. I was diagnosed back in the summer of 2010. A year earlier, my blood picture and sugar levels were fine, but in that intervening 12 months my father’s health had taken a turn for the worst and died…

POWER ISSUES On page 20 of the October edition of PC & Tech Authority there is some discussion about batteries. In one of the paragraphs it says “Batteries operate by producing a chemical reaction that results in the creation of energy - electrical energy.” The reality is though that the chemical (potential energy) of the battery is converted into electrical energy. The use of ‘energy’ and ‘creation’ in the same sentence should be avoided! I enjoy the magazine very much. Please keep up the good work. WALTER THE COMPROMISE GAME How do we know if we’re eligible for some kind of refund? In my case I’m paying for the 100Mbps connection but due to reliability issues, I was offered the choice of keeping it at 100Mbps and getting circa 90-95Mbps…

Imagine it - you’re just about to move into your dream home when someone comes up from behind you. A cloth is pressed against your face and you fall unconscious. When you awake you’re in a house that doesn’t belong to you, but you can see your house. Someone else has moved in, and you know they’re doing something unspeakable in there. That’s the basic premise of Hello Neighbor, the upcoming, extremely unnerving stealth actiion/ horror game from tinyBuild. We recently had a chance to ask tinyBuild producer, Alex Nichiporchik, a few questions about the game... PCTA: In some ways, when I played Hello Neighbor I was reminded of a little known survival horror game from the early noughties, Gregory Horror Show, that featured cartoonish characters but still managed to…

ANKI COZMO W/ CODE LAB Last year Cozmo was the hot robot toy for Christmas so of course Anki wants another bite of the mince pie or whatever. How best to do this? Evoke the legitimising elixir of STEM and say that Cozmo now helps kids to learn how to code! WANTED: To be fair, he really does help kids learn how to code. Other robot systems focus on pointless Lego-like physical reconfiguration. Cozmo is a bulldozer, that’s what he is. Now make him dance for your amusement! NOT WANTED: At $320, this is not a cheap toy and Code Lab demands a fair bit of time to get the most out of. Schools will look on with envy as rich kids play with Cozmo for two hours on Christmas…

One of the biggest shifts in technology, over recent years, has been the desire to connect devices to the Internet. There can be value in this – having a printer automatically notify a service provider when it needs maintenance of when the toner is low makes sense. But in other cases, you could be opening yourself up to unwanted risk. A recent survey by security company McAfee revealed a troubling statistic. More than 70% of consumers don’t think connected toys, drones and other Internet of Things (IoT) devices need to be secured in order to be used safely. While the risks of some devices might neem trivial, there can be broader consequences. For example, a range of toys called CloudPets were found by Australian security researcher Troy Hunt to be…

SAMSUNG GEAR 360 (2017) $250 • www.samsung.com/au The 2017 version of Samsung’s 360-degree camera is a big improvement on last year’s debut e. ort. While the original Gear 360 had removable tripod legs that folded away when not in use, the new version is designed with the stand and hand grip built in. It looks smarter and is considerably easier to carry. More importantly, Samsung has relaxed its bloody-minded decision to only let the device play with its top-end phones, although check the list of compatible devices first. There’s also the ability to live-stream video straight to YouTube or Facebook. ASTROHAUS FREEWRITE US$500 • from getfreewrite.com If your nine-to-five is all about writing, you might want to add one of these “smart typewriter” E Ink word processors to your Christmas…

1. SET UP YOUR ENVIRONMENT The first thing you’ll need is a Linuxbased PC (or a hosted Linux server) running PHP 5.6 or later. In the configuration options, set the open basedir variable to none. Next, install MySQL, create a new blank database, and make a note of the database name, username and password. Download the ownCloud installer script (tinyurl.com/a4var45) and place it on your server in a webaccessible location. 2. INSTALL THE SOFTWARE Run the installer script by entering its URL directly into a web browser. This should complete in a couple of seconds, before presenting the login screen. Create a new username and password for your personal cloud, then expand the Storage and Database section, switch from the default database engine to MySQL/ MariaDB,and enter the credentials you…

Did you like the look of the original Pixel? If so, you’re in luck. The Google Pixel 2 looks almost identical to the original, which means no edge-to-edge display like the Samsung Galaxy S8 or iPhone X. If you aren’t familiar with the original Pixel, then the key things to know are that it’s thin, light and benefits from a textured aluminium back, which feels less slippery than the glass of its rivals. It’s an understated offering, with even the familiar Google “G” quiet: dark grey on a black background. The new Pixel is the same weight as last year, at 143g, but it now measures a svelte 7.8mm to the original’s 8.5mm. This isn’t the overwhelming positive it first appears, though – in fact, for some it’s the very…

The Fitbit Ionic has drawn criticism for its looks, but much of that was based on PR shots: in its metalesh, I grew to like the square face and minimalist design. It’s comfortable and light, with a curved body that hugs your wrist. During exercise, I simply forgot it was there, but it helps that the bright touchscreen is protected by scratch-proof Gorilla Glass: you needn’t worry about bumps during workouts. Brightness is also high enough to see all the on-screen details, even in direct sunlight, and this dims automatically when you’re indoors. Useful at night when you want to check the time. Or, for that matter, if you want to check messages, because the Ionic features Fitbit’s new OS – complete with apps and all the usual smartwatch notifications.…

A vira Antivirus Pro is a stripped-down antivirus scanner, with no ancillary features such as parental controls or file encryption. For an extra fiver you can get Avira’s full Internet Security Suite, but this isn’t much different: the main addition is the Firewall Manager module, which provides a friendly front-end to the Windows firewall settings. Unless you spend a lot of your time reconfiguring your network, it’s probably not worth it. Avira does give you the option of tacking on a variety of optional extras at install time. One is the free System Speedup module, which cleans up cookies, temporary files and so on. Note that it doesn’t do anything that’s likely to actually make your computer run faster: if that’s what you want, a button invites you to pay…

In terms of malware prevention, F-Secure’s internet security suite – known for the past few years as SAFE – does a pretty good job. Its protection score of 99.7% equals Kaspersky’s, and only misses perfection by the tiniest margin. Unfortunately, AV-Comparatives found that the score came along with a whopping 38 false positives – a dreadful result that’s miles behind any other contender. Maddeningly, there isn’t even a way to get the software to double-check with you before quarantining files: you just have to let SAFE do its thing, then go into the software and manually restore any items that have been wrongly removed. It’s a shame, because SAFE is quite an attractive security suite. As with Eset, the interface is clean and simple: the home tab offers literally two…

Panda Free Antivirus is one of the simplest antivirus utilities there is. In terms of malware protection, all you get is basic file scanning, a browser extension for Chrome, Firefox and IE, and a USB “vaccination” tool to protect your flash drives against infection. There are some secondary tools: Process Monitor details the programs running on your PC, and flags any that are unrecognised or unsigned. And in cases of severe infection, the Rescue Kit page lets you build a bootable USB flash drive, or download Panda’s portable Cloud Cleaner, to kill rogue processes and unlock files that otherwise can’t be scanned. Finally, and oddly, there’s a page dedicated to recent news stories about viruses. If you’re turned off by bloated security suites, this compact feature set may sound appealing.…

Many Windows security vendors offer companion apps for smartphones and tablets. But if you’re using an iPhone or an iPad, you don’t really have much to worry about. Thanks to iOS’ heavily lockeddown security model, there’s never been a major virus outbreak on the platform. On Android, things are less clear-cut. Its open design is inherently more exploitable than iOS – but what you may not realise is that Android comes with a number of smart builtin security measures. For a start, Android makes it impossible for any app to be installed without your explicit permission. That immediately limits the danger from “drive-by downloads” – if an installation alert pops up out of the blue, you can simply cancel it and carry on. Indeed, by default you can only install…

My suburb supposedly has excellent 4G coverage on Vodafone. I say “supposedly” because I just went to its Coverage Checker, entered my postcode, and its pin location on the map was a good eight kilometers away in the wrong suburb. Having poked the map to bring me back to my actual house, the diagram shows that I’m on the edge of a purple splodge of “4G Indoors and Outdoors” and a yellow splodge of “4G outdoors, variable indoors”. My iPhone 6 Plus gives me just one bar of signal when sat in my kitchen, so I think I’m more yellow than purple in my splodginess. The solution to up those bars? Hop on my motorbike to the nearest mobile emporium to buy one of the company’s Signal Booster devices. The…

Passwords are the perennial topic of the security consultant, continuing to provide food for thought and money in the bank year after year. Even with the inevitable progress of biometric alternatives, passwords and PINs form the basis of almost every login and authentication system out there. Keeper Security is the latest vendor to send me password-related research data. Having analysed some ten million passwords from 2016’s biggest data breaches, it reckons that 17% of folk still use 123456 as a password. That’s bad, but not as bad as the sites and services that let them. I continue to despair being faced with an outfit that restricts me not only to a string of no more than eight characters, but that also dictates the characters I can’t use (no special characters;…

There are a number of problems with playing a multiplayer game that doesn’t have servers in your local area - or at least set aside for your timezone. Lag is a big one, but the other is player count - you need a critical mass of players to make sure you’re not just waiting for the next map to fill up. This is has long been an issue for Australian players of World of Tanks, but Wargaming’s just announced something pretty cool - a part-time ANZ server, kicking o  from November 1 this year. “A local server is the number one request from our community and we are finally rolling them out on November 1, from 6pm – 12am AEDT,” said Travis Plane, Wargaming Australia New Zealand Country Manager, in…

The Apple Watch divides opinion. People either live by it, can’t see the point of it or baulk at the design (and the price). Yet, Apple recently announced that it now sells more watches than any other brand in the world. It shows no sign of relaxing its hold on that top spot either, with the Series 3 including one potential game-changer: 4G. Not that you can see much difference between the Apple Watch Series 3 and its predecessors. The 1.65in screen remains obstinately square, while the power button and Digital Crown again sit on the right-hand side of the face. Still, it doesn’t take Sherlock to spot this is a Series 3 versus the Series 2: that Digital Crown is now bright red, a move that’s surely more to…

The new Amazon Fire HD 10 is one of those products that doesn’t look all that exciting from the outside. It’s physically identical to the model it replaces, although it’s now available in blue and red along with the previous black, but there’s plenty of interest tucked beneath its humdrum exterior. Top of that list is Amazon’s digital voice assistant, Alexa. The Amazon Fire HD 10 represents the first time outside the Echo range of products that Amazon has introduced a hands-free Alexa mode; the other Fire HD tablets and TV streamers need you to press a button to activate voice recognition. Unlike the Echo family, it doesn’t have a far-field microphone array, but I found the tablet could pick up my voice accurately from 10m away. It doesn’t have…

Good news! If you want a 4x4:4 MUMIMO capable 802.11ac Wave 2 wireless router, D-Link’s new DIR-882 brings this previously high end feature down to a much more affordable price-point. What’s 4x4:4 MU-MIMO 802.11ac Wave 2 mean? Faster Wi-Fi! If your client devices support 3x3:3 wireless streams (e.g: the latest tablets and laptops), you’ll see improved speeds with the DIR-882. It’ll even support two simultaneous 2x2:2 streams or four 1x1:1 streams if you don’t have any 3x3:3 devices. Software wise, the DIR-882 is basic, but has everything you expect, including portforwarding, guest network creation, basic QoS and dynamic DNS support. Plug a HDD in to the USB 3.0 port and you can share files via SMB, FTP or DLNA. D-Link’s Quick VPN feature makes it relatively simple to start up…

TrackR’s Bravo and Pixel Bluetooth trackers theoretically help you find your lost belongings around your house or beyond. The reality is somewhat disappointing. Both devices are powered by a replaceable button battery (which only costs you US$2.99 in shipping if you order it from TrackR itself), and pair with the TrackR app on your iOS or Android device via Bluetooth. If you misplace the item the Bravo or Pixel is attached to, you use the app to initiate a beeping noise that emanates from the TrackR itself, allowing you to find it (assuming you’re in Bluetooth range). The app itself also gives you a set of bars, signifying how far away you are from the item you’re trying to find – the fewer bars visible, the further away you are.…

BLUEANT PUMP AIR $169 • www.blueant.com.au • Score: 4/5 There are a great many options when it comes to Bluetooth earbuds, with most being fitness oriented. The Pump Air’s are sort of such, but not quite. What’s missing is the obligatory app, and all its activity tracking whatnots. But as far as pure audio is concerned they’re very good, at least within the limitations of Bluetooth which hampers a full audiophile experience, nevertheless for most music lovers the sound is good, with a particularly full bass. It comes with a charging case that represents 12 hours of listening, plus the three hours the buds’ onboard battery contains equals use time well into the convenience zone. There’s a built-in microphone and the sides have one-touch control functionality. At an RRP of…

A ccording to Europol, ransomware has been 2017’s biggest online threat so far, eclipsing all of the other forms of cybercrime. As the name implies, ransomware is a type of malware that attempts to extort money from its victims. It does this by encrypting all the personal data and documents that it finds on your PC, then demanding that you send money (typically in the form of untraceable bitcoins) in exchange for the decryption key. If you don’t pay up, it may be impossible to recover your files. WHAT SHOULD I DO IF I’M HIT BY RANSOMWARE? Your first step should be to go online and see whether a free decryption tool is available. Kaspersky Lab is one security publisher that maintains an archive of unlockers for a wide variety…

BullGuard’s most distinctive feature has long been its cloud backup module, which included a handy 5GB of online storage. This year, though, the storage has been ditched. In an age when ransomware makes it more important than ever to keep safe backups of your files, that feels like a step backwards. It’s not quite as bad as it sounds, though. While BullGuard 2018 no longer takes care of your backups itself, it’s been revamped to include native support for Dropbox, Google Drive and OneDrive as backup destinations, alongside local drives and folders. It’s a canny use of free resources – assuming you haven’t already filled up all those services. Aside from that, all the familiar BullGuard features remain. Those include a standalone firewall, although we found the interface fiddly compared…

Since last year’s antivirus roundup, McAfee has parted ways with former owner Intel – and found a fresh new look. Gone is the clunky grey and green interface of yore, replaced by a more tasteful, modern design. The main functions now lurk at the bottom of the homescreen: from here you can scan for viruses, check your system for vulnerabilities and outdated apps, and clean up cookies and junk files. You can also set up True_Key – an advanced password manager that supports face and fingerprint recognition alongside regular passwords, and works across Windows, macOS, Android and iOS. The free version lets you store up to 15_passwords, but your McAfee subscription comes with unlimited access for up to five users – a nice touch that others could learn from. Browse…

The “Premium” in the name suggests extravagance, but the only difference between this and the single-user Standard edition is that you can install it on five devices (be they PCs, Macs or Android smartphones). There’s also a version of Norton Security Premium covering three devices available for $104.99 a year, which includes parental controls and a backup module with 25GB of cloud storage. Whichever version you choose, you get the anti-malware engine, and this blocked every virus that AV-Comparatives threw at it, for a perfect 100% protection score. Admittedly, this was undermined by eight false positives – Bitdefender achieved equally effective malware protection without a mistake – but that’s surely better than letting a malicious program slip through the net. Many of the suite’s secondary features come in the form…

Looking back at last year’s antivirus roundup, what’s most striking is how little has changed in 12 months. It may be no coincidence that the industry as a whole seems to be backing away from the traditional annual branding: it’s a bit hard to drum up excitement for the latest and greatest security suite when it’s plainly the exact same program as last year, perhaps with an anti-ransomware module baked in for good measure. That’s no bad thing, of course. It’s a sign that the industry’s maturing. Another sign is the way third-party firewalls have been falling out of favour in recent years. Too often in the past, software publishers have stuffed their offerings with unneeded features and utilities that just get in the user’s way – or, even worse,…

All the products recommended here have been tested as part of a PC & Tech Authority review, which includes comprehensive labs benchmarking. Many products here, too, are used by our editors on a daily basis and we prefer them over all others. PREMIUM LAPTOPS DELL XPS 13 Ultraportable from $1,699 Dell only needed to refine its brilliant XPS 13 design to keep top spot, and that’s what it does: it’s slightly quicker and adds more options, but it’s the edge -to-edge 13.3in display and compact chassis that lift it above the opposition. Oh, and it’s now available in Rose Gold. ALTERNATIVES APPLE MACBOOK PRO 13 (2016) The high price stops it from taking Dell’s top spot, but a nine-hour battery life, sleek design and – for a premium – the…

One of my favourite toys right now is my DJI Spark. It’s a drone, but not just any drone. What makes the Spark so special is its size. It’s small enough that you can easily carry it around in a coat pocket or a small bag, but the reduced size has other benefits too. The main one being that you don’t seem to get as many negative reactions from those concerned about privacy and spying as you do when flying a larger drone. It seems that, in this regard at least, size really does matter. Also, I find that a smaller drone makes far less noise than its bigger stablemates – which, again, seems to help when it comes to the anti-social aspects of drone flying. Don’t confuse it with…