Table of contents for December 2015 in PC & Tech Authority

Without doubt, the most common request we hear from readers is to do more on desktop PCs. And we wish we could! The issue is that we don’t feel we could do the industry justice, and in turn, provide you with genuinely useful information, because there are so many shops in Australia selling prebuilt systems, and the specs change frequently. I did a quick count, and the top shops like PC Case Gear, Scorptec, Aus PC Market etc each typically have 20-40 models at any one time. Then you have the Dell and HPs of the world. But! We think we have a solution, and it starts in this issue. After long and careful planning, we’re launching a new section in PC & Tech Authority. It’s called System News, and…

DOUBLE DUAL CARDS INBOUND The next major graphics releases we will see are the monster dual GPU halo products from both Nvidia and AMD. Word on the street is that Nvidia already has its dual GM200 cards ready to go and are waiting for AMD to make their move first before showing its hand. At this stage though nothing else is known about Nvidia’s card. AMD’s contender however we know a few more scant details about. It’s codenamed Gemini and will sport a similar Coolermaster AIO liquid cooling solution to the Fury X cards. We also know it will likely cost about the same as the R9 295 X2 at launch, about $1500 retail. With Gemini units having been produced now too, it seems it’s a waiting game to see…

Michael, Aus PC Market: “No-one is buying systems with discrete sound cards any more - neither ones that customers put together from parts they pick themselves, nor systems that we offer pre-configured on our site. The Realtek onboard audio chipset from the motherboard vendor has triumphed in this area, and as a result I can’t recall the last time I ordered a sound card. We built a $14k PC for a gamer last week, and that didn’t even include a sound card. The professional audio users, who would constitute the rest of the sound-card marketplace, tend to buy specialist sound cards that cost as much as a PC itself, usually from dedicated audio resellers rather than PC shops.” John, TI Computers: “I believe optical drive is still an essential part…

On 28 October 2015, Microsoft founder Bill Gates turns 60. During his life he’s been many things: a precocious student, an aggressive founder of a huge company, a super-smart coder and now a philanthropist aiming to rid the world of malaria. What’s been consistent in everything Gates has done, though, is his drive and will to succeed. As a businessperson, Gates looks to the outside world as if he knows no fear, taking on competitors, the US Department of Justice and now a disease. There have been many moments in Gates’ life that have shaped not only his future, but also that of the computer industry. No single person – not even Steve Jobs – has made a bigger impact on computing. Arguably, Gates’ work has affected more people than…

Some of my earliest memories of using a proper computer involve Microsoft Office. Since those heady days in the early 1990s, I’ve spent probably more time using Office apps than I have anything else. I’m not the only one who has spent more time than is healthy using Microsoft Office, though – it has been used by businesses across the world as the primary tool for productivity for nigh-on 20 years. That’s why, with the launch of Office 2016, the news that not an awful lot has changed shouldn’t come as a huge surprise. The biggest change you’ll see in Office 2016 is a fresh lick of paint, with all the various apps gaining toolbars coloured in their signature livery. Most of the apps have been made more searchable via…

WD are a huge manufacturer of hard drives, so to see them in the NAS arena isn’t a big surprise. However, they’re up against stiff competition from Synology, QNAP and even Asustor. The unit we are looking at today is the second generation My Cloud Mirror, which runs My Cloud OS 3 and packs a faster dual-core Marvel Armarda ARM based CPU. The unit itself is compact, relatively quiet and has a spiffy glossy white exterior. It has a single gigabit Ethernet connection and two USB 3.0 ports. The drives inside are user replaceable, just pop the lid off the top of the My Cloud and slide the drives out. Ease of use is the My Cloud’s main selling point and setting up the unit is simple. It arrives preconfigured…

You know the script. Apple releases an “s” upgrade to its flagship phone, with a faster chip, a few more features, and a better camera. Apple fanboys upgrade; everyone else releases a sigh. Well, the iPhone 6s is something bigger. It represents the biggest leap forward for smartphones since the very first iPhone back in 2007. 3D TOUCH TAKES A BOW The reason for this is 3D Touch, Apple’s new take on touchscreen interaction. Put simply, the iPhone 6s is designed to respond not only to where and how long you press the screen, but how hard you do it. in effect, Apple is attempting to sense “intent” to draw users into an entirely intuitive action. It’s the sort of intention that’s at the heart of all good interface and…

The sudden, massive, and accelerating evolution in monitors is as remarkable as it is rewarding. We have 4k screens getting bigger and cheaper, curved is now a thing, ultra-wide 21:9 aspect ratios are common, and for gamers it’s never been more exciting with FreeSync, G-Sync and AdaptiveSync smoothing out the frames. For gamers, this is one monitor we have been keenly waiting for with interest. It ticks many key boxes bringing together the most compelling new technologies and features. The Acer XR341CK’s panel is 3400x1440 resolution, and the ultrawide format works extremely well with shooters and racing games, but the relatively short height is still an issue for strategy and flight games. Still, I regard 1440 as the minimum acceptable vertical res and the benefits of curved immersion and 21:9…

Choosing a fitness tracker in 2015 is tough. There are hundreds of products vying for your attention, from apps to specialist devices for athletes. The SmartBand 2 aims to appeal by including a heart-rate monitor in a fitand-forget design that can even survive the swimming pool. To be precise, it’s IP68-compliant, making it fully waterproof. All of the tracking hardware, including the optical heart-rate sensor, is contained within a tiny, curved module that snaps into the rear of a soft, silicon-rubber wristband. The band’s design is attractive and minimalist, whether you choose the white or black version; pink and indigo versions are on the way. Sony has improved upon the design of the latch with the SmartBand 2, introducing a metal buckle that secures the tracker firmly to your wrist.…

FREE (with in-app purchases) • Android and iOS Having trouble getting incentivised to use all those fitness apps? Bounts to the rescue – it plugs into other fitness apps and devices including Fitbit, Moves, Jawbone, MapMyFitness, Strava, Runkeeper and more, and offers monetary rewards for your hard work. By connecting apps, Bounts translates your workout into points – capped at 15 per day for the free app, and higher for a paid subscription. Points can then be exchanged for vouchers for brands such as Amazon, WHSmith, Tesco and iTunes. You can even undo all your good work with Pizza Express vouchers.…

$129 • www.microsoft.com.au Microsoft’s leveraging its Surface tablet keyboard knowledge with a slim new product that works with any device, be it Android or even iOS powered. The Microsoft Foldable Keyboard simply connects via Bluetooth, and away you type. It’s certainly impressively small, making it perfect if you need a back-up keyboard for a mobile phone – it’ll easily fit into a large pocket. Unfolding it turns it on, and connection is a breeze. The chiclet-style keys are understandably short on travel, but is an undeniable improvement over onscreen versions. And a single charge will last for three months, making it just a great back-up to carry in case you really need to type something longer than the usual social media updates. That said, it can’t compete with dedicated keyboard-style…

$79.95 • www.aten.com This is certainly a bit of a niche product, but if you do find yourself constantly switching between your PC and a tablet or phone to stay in touch with various streams of work or communication, it could very well come in handy. The Tap is a Bluetooth powered KVM – you plug your keyboard into it, then it into your PC , and you can easily switch between normal typing, and typing on whatever device you’ve got connected. It’s a well-made little device, though it does only work with iOS. That said, it can connect two devices, and offers mouse support. Still, in use it’s just as convenient to type on your main keyboard, and then tap any needed touch controls. The only real drawback to…

$299 • www.bose.com.au Bose has been renowned for producing great consumer speaker products for years, and the SoundTouch range is no exception. The new SoundTouch 10 is a versatile Bluetooth powered speaker that delivers incredibly clear sounds, while still being able to fill a room with wonderful music. Bluetooth connectivity is simple, and the Bose APP lets you set up to six pre-assigned presets – playlists, music service, etc. – and these can be set on a per-device basis, making the SoundTouch 10 great to have across multiple rooms, for multiple users. And, one set, you’re not tied down to your phone to control them, either. Both the included remote and the speaker itself has six buttons that let you control the presets natively. A future update will add more…

Due to the sickly Aussie dollar, importing motherboards from Taiwan and China has become a whole lot more expensive of late. No wonder then that we received more Micro-ATX boards than we expected. At half the size of a standard ATX board, they’re much cheaper to produce, and the result are affordable motherboards like this $139 variant from ASRock. Obviously it’s not going to have as many PCIe slots as a full-sized board, with just two PCIe 3.0 x16 lanes and another two x1 lanes. Of the two full length x16 slots, only the first runs at x16 speed, with the second limited to x4 speed, which is a restraint of the B150 chipset. Like many Skylake boards, ASRock has opted to cover the I/O backplate with a metallic shell…

At just ten bucks less than the Asus H170 Pro Gaming, the Gigabyte G1.Sniper B7 has its work cut out for it. The Asus gaming board is a very tough act to follow, especially when we see that Gigabyte’s competing product is based on the more affordable B150 chipset. Thankfully Gigabyte has managed to pull out all the stops to deliver a board that comes very close to the Asus. The G1.Sniper B7 definitely has a gaming focus, as evidenced by the Heroes of the Storm artwork on the box (apparently Gigabyte supplied the motherboards for BlizzCon). It’s got the same striking green and black design of older Sniper boards. An interesting collection of PCI technologies deliver space for add-in cards; twin PCIe x16 slots, twin PCIe x1 slots, and…

The third of our Micro-ATX motherboards, the MSI B150M Pro-VD finds itself in cluttered waters. What has MSI delivered to make its miniboard worthy of mention? To put it bluntly, nothing. Just one PCIe 3.0 x16 slot is included, down from two on competitors. Twin PCIe 3.0 x1 slots sit just below it, and these in turn sit above the four main SATA 3 ports. Another two SATA 3 ports at the right edge of the board bring the total to six, the number supported by the B150. Given the preponderance of HDMI these days, its absence on this product is baffling. We can’t remember the last time we had to test with a DVI-D cable, though there’s also the option of VGA if you want to go really old…

At first glance, little has changed on HP’s Envy x360 from last year’s model. There’s the same faux-aluminium chassis, silver keyboard and black bezels around the screen, and the device remains a 15.6in hybrid with a 360-degree hinge. But instead of just rebadging the 2014 model and hoping the promise of Windows 10 will sell a few more units, HP has made subtle and obvious design changes to keep things fresh. There are the slightly creased and slanting edges of the keyboard tray, sharply cut edges near the screen hinges, and some of the buttons and ports have moved. The Touch Zone concept, a rubbish touchpad intended to make Windows 8 gestures easier, has been scrapped in favour of a traditional touchpad that actually works as expected. The keyboard remains…

Quickfire XTi is a class act with some charms, and a killer punch. Available in Cherry Red, Brown or Blue, the keystrokes on our test Brown unit felt oddly clackier than the normally semi-slushy Browns. So Cooler Master has done something to the mechanism, and I quite like it. It’s great for day to day typing, though is a little noisier than expected. But the killer party trick is that instead of the crappy, laborious, fiddly software most gaming keyboard impose on you, the Quickfire XTi uses a FN + F-key combo d media. Besides freeing up your PC of one more background app, this lets you make adjustments in game without alt-tabbing out. Good job, Cooler Master. At $189 it sits squarely against the likes of Corsair’s K-series, and…

When you flick through PC Pro, you’ll regularly come across exciting new gadgets and technical innovations – but these can come at a high price, in terms of both money and electrical power. For example, today’s high-DPI screens may be super-sharp, but they often consume more power than Full HD panels. A lot of work goes into driving down energy consumption – Intel’s newest Skylake processors are the company’s most efficient yet, thanks to the cuttingedge 14nm manufacturing process and a host of clever energy-saving design tricks. However, no matter how advanced our processors and screens become, or whether or not powerefficient SSD drives and graphics chipsets replace heavyweight spinning disks and graphics cards, our mobile devices remain hamstrung by the inescapable issue of battery life. Battery technology hasn’t changed…

The first generation of digital cameras sparked a race for more megapixels – Kodak’s debut model had a mere 1.3-megapixel sensor. How times have changed. While modern DSLRs such as Canon’s own EOS 760D will have around 24 megapixels, and upper-end models will top 50 megapixels, the company has unveiled a prototype camera with 250 megapixels, stuffed into a CMOS sensor smaller than a standard 35mm full-frame sensor. What can you do with such a ridiculous level of detail? Canon said that the sensor, when installed in an unnamed camera, could distinguish the lettering on the side of an aeroplane from 18km away. Plane spotters and spies rejoice – celebrities and other targets, it’s time to panic. Canon suggested it could also be used for surveillance, high-res measuring instruments and…

FEATURES + ASHAMPOO SLIDESHOW STUDIO 2015 + ABILITY OFFICE V6 + AUTOBACKUP 4 + HDR PROJECTS 2 + SSD FRESH 2015 DRIVERS + ATI CATALYST + NVIDIA FORCEWARE HELP + DISCLAIMER + DAMAGED OR FAULTY DVDS + USING THIS DVD + INSTALLING SOFTWARE EDITORIAL + BURNING AN ISO IMAGE + PC&TA EDITORIALS TROUBLESHOOTING + SERIAL CODES + BLANK REGISTRATION WEBSITE + CAN’T FIND A FILE? + INSTALLATION ERROR WINDOWS CCLEANER + CLASSIC SHELL + CUTEPDF + DEFRAGGLER + FOXIT READER + GREENSHOT + APPLE ITUNES + LIBRE OFFICE + OPEN OFFICE + MALWAREBYTES’ A/M + SANDBOXIE + VLC MEDIA PLAYER + FLUX + 7ZIP MAC + ALFRED + BETTERTOUCHTOOLS + APPLE ITUNES + DROPBOX + FLUX + GOOGLE CHROME + MOZILLA FIREFOX + PLEX + SKYPE + TEAMVIEWER + VLC…

Is it possible to build an ethical robot – one capable of choosing or moderating its actions on the basis of ethical rules? Three years ago, I thought the idea impossible, and said so in my book, Robotics: A Very Short Introduction. I’ve since changed my mind. In fact, I’ve not only altered my opinion but, with colleagues, I’ve even implemented and tested an ethical robot. So, what brought about this U-turn? It wasn’t an epiphany, but more a case of several ideas slowly coming together. First came the realisation that robots don’t need to be sentient to act in an ethical manner. In other words, we don’t need a major breakthrough in artificial intelligence to build an ethical robot. A relatively simple robot could behave ethically not because it…

He was exactly the type of person I normally go out of my way to avoid: talking too loud while in a foreign country, a couple of local beers past his best, and accompanied by a group of people he did his best to amuse by repeatedly reminding them they were in another country – reading out the signs on the restaurant wall, on the menu or on anything else that contained a word that might have sounded funny in English. Once. In 1947. As if that weren’t deterrent enough, he was evidently a sole trader who had redirected his home phone to his mobile number so that no vital call went unanswered. Don’t imagine that he had a subtle, polite ringtone – oh dear no, it was a recording…

BANDING TOGETHER As a mid-fifty year old, not many PC / tech publications are easy for me to read, and most importantly leave me more confused after reading then prior to the experience. I still see your magazine caters for the smart tech group, however you have more then enough articles to keep my level interested, educated and informed -well done, I shall be purchasing again. I was drawn to this publication re your cover story on “smart watches”, really enjoyed your article and in particular pages 58 & 59, comparing them against one another. One quick question, “are the bands extendable or come in sizes to suit Large Wristed People?” Looking forward to your next edition. Sean O’Brien Ben Mansill replies: Thanks Sean! After testing almost every smart and fitness…

A SOLID GAME BOX J&W Computers GMR Zeus Advanced Gaming System $2199 • http://tinyurl.com/JWZeus T his is a solid entry for budding enthusiasts to get their chops around something with a decent amount of gaming grunt, which they can overclock without breaking the bank. Nothing in this system is particularly new to market, or is high end but are definitely notable with the price/performance sweet spot in mind. The case is over three years old, and even back then wasn’t marked well for its aesthetics or thermals, but with lots of expansion for more fans or dual radiator setups this can be worked around. The system will come with a random H97 motherboard, so you might want to ask first if you can pick the brand/model to ensure you get…

You won’t find better reviews anywhere in Australia! It’s always nice to see relatively big leaps forward in areas usually a little dull. Like printers. Like you, probably, we respect these machines, but rarely does anything get us truly excited. No off ense, printer company people, but I think you know that ‘solid workhorse’ is as big a compliment that any printer will ever get. So when Bennett started raving about Espon’s new ink tech that delivers an astounding 11,000 pages from a single tank of ink, we stopped what we were doing and listened up. Check out the review of the Epson ET-4550 on page on page 35, if we can excite you about a printer, then we have done our job well. LITTLE BIG BOARDS Motherboards are a…

Every time a new monitor arrives on my desk, I’m asked the same questions. Is it 4K? Is it OLED? Does it do 3D? In the case of the 27in FlexScan EV2750, the answer to all of these questions is no. In terms of cutting-edge technology, Eizo’s latest monitor has little to show for itself. But then this is a display that’s designed for the office, and, as business monitors go, the FlexScan EV2750 is pretty special. The first surprise is how compact it is for a 27in monitor. Sat next to my everyday display, a Dell UltraSharp U2713H, the Eizo is far less imposing. A super-slim 7mm bezel runs around the panel, and the matte anti-glare screen coating even stretches over the bezel, which is surrounded by only a…

LG’s newest 4K display, the 27MU67, is designed to bring the best out of the modern game engines with 4K support. The killer feature here is AMD’s FreeSync, a technology designed to work with AMD graphics cards to pair up with compatible monitors and reduce frameskipping, tearing and overall smoothness of gameplay. Once you’ve taken the monitor out of the box, get your screwdriver out -you’ll need it to attach the stand to the screen. The stand is solid though and lets you rotate the display into portrait or landscape. But other than that, setup is straightforward and LG is even nice enough to include high quality Mini DisplayPort to DisplayPort and HDMI 2.0 cables. A relatively thin and basic bezel gets out of the way so you can concentrate…

While overshadowed by the iPhone 6s, the really big news from Apple this month is the 12.9in iPad Pro. I was fortunate enough to spend some time with the device – and it’s a colossal new product from Apple. To think of the iPad Pro as simply another iPad doesn’t do it justice. It has more in common with Microsoft’s Surface and represents a major step into the business market for Apple. Before I got my hands on the Pro, I was struggling with the question: “What can the Pro do that the iPad Air can’t?” However, after spending a brief period of time with the device, its forte became clear: multitasking. The iPhone 6s’ 3D Touch allows users to get a snippet of information without having to leave an…

FREE • Android and iOS Google’s Street View gets a standalone release with this app. As well as browsing Google’s own Street View images, the app lets you explore panoramic shots by users from all over the globe. If nothing else, the app is worth downloading for the tool that lets you make 360-degree photographs using your phone’s camera. After you’ve made a 360-degree photo, you can publish it to Google Maps as a spherical image or share it privately as a flat picture.…

$99 (500GB), $129 (1TB), $209 (2TB) • www.seagate.com/au Here’s another portable hard drive. It’s available in 500GB, 1TB and 2TB in capacities, has a nice metal case, isn’t awkwardly large, has a USB 3 connector and comes with 200GB of free OneDrive cloud storage for two years. You can have yours in black or silver, both look good. So, no big deal. It does, however, have a rather nice bit of backup software included which is quite nice to use. On a PC it’ll do backups continuously in the background, or, should you choose, run them on a schedule. For Mac it’s best to use Time Machine. It’ll also automatically save photos and videos from all the popular social media sites, including Facebook, twitter and, impressively, Youtube.…

$1499 • www.panasonic.com/au Panasonic’s latest compact system camera looks like a blocky, retro throwback, but still feels great in the hand, and offers all of the usual features we’ve come to expect from the Lumix family. It’s very well made, and its magnesium alloy frame will handle a lot of abuse. It’s a little weightier than some of its stablemates, but that does mean good real-estate for plenty buttons and controls, and nearly all of these are placed in easy reach of your right-hand thumb. The digital viewfinder can swivel up for shooting at odd angles, and offers great image quality, as does the OLED touchcapable rear screen. The 20.3 megapixel Micro Four Thirds sensor delivers great detail and low range ISO, with excellent RAW results. The GX8 can also…

A couple of issues ago we took a look at the high-end motherboards designed to house Intel’s new 6th Generation Core CPU, formerly codenamed Skylake. With an average price of well over $300, these premium performance motherboards all used the zippy Z170 chipset as their basis. Z170 is the most expensive chipset built for Skylake, and at the time of Skylake’s launch appeared to be the only chipset available. Fast forward a couple of months and this issue it’s time to check out the more affordable options for Skylake, examining eight new motherboards based on the B150 and H170 chipsets from Intel. Starting as low as $139, they’re a much more walletfriendly proposition, but what will you have to sacrifice in the move to a cheaper platform? BUSINESS BOARDS FOR…

Asus appears to have rather expensive Skylake boards at the moment, as the company struggled to supply us with products below the $200 mark. As a result, we let them stretch the price barrier a little with this gaming board, which costs around $220 on average at the time of print. Let’s see what that extra $20 gets you. This full-sized ATX board looks the goods, with solid heatsinks surrounding the CPU socket and covering the PCH. Twin full-length PCIe x16 slots can accept two AMD GPUs, though once again SLI isn’t an option thanks to the x4 speed of the second slot. Another four PCIe 3.0 x1 slots round out your peripheral options. As the name suggests, this is the only H170 board in the roundup. This delivers more…

The second of three identically priced Micro-ATX motherboards to hit our roundup, Gigabyte’s B150M-3DH claims to be the most durable of the lot, with the Gigabyte Ultra Durable branding splashed all over the box. However, it’s also the most feature-rich board of the three, which is why we’re giving it such a solid score. We certainly didn’t expect to see an M.2 port on this board, so were pleasantly surprised when Gigabyte included one. Even better, there’s also a SATAe port if you prefer that variety, and it doesn’t even cannibalise the existing six SATA 3 ports, unlike most affordable mobos. Four memory slots are included, twice that of the MSI m-ATX board, while CrossFire is supported thanks to the twin PCIe 3.0 x16 slots. Only one runs at x16…

While much ado has been made about Skylake’s support for DDR4 memory, it can also run DDR3 memory. This sounds like a massive win for those upgrading from older systems, who are already running oodles of DDR3 thanks to its incredibly cheap pricing. However, as we soon discovered, Skylake won’t play with any old DDR3 memory – it likes the lowvoltage variety. Plugging in standard 1.5V memory saw our single DDR3-powered board fail to boot, and it was only then that we discovered the platform’s requirement for DDR3L, which runs at 1.35V. Cue several urgent calls to Kingston, who delivered twin sticks of the low voltage memory. The motherboard ran perfectly with the new 1.35V memory, and we later read that running 1.5V memory can even fry Skylake processors. And…

Ruggedness is an oft-forgotten but important part of a laptop. If you take your computer with you every day, it needs to be able to withstand a few knocks. That’s why the colourful shell on the Acer R 11 is more than just a fashion statement. While our unit came “Cloud White”, there is also a “Sky Blue” model available, and both look great. The textured lid doesn’t have any give or pick up greasy marks. The rest of the laptop is inflexible and gives you the confidence to chuck the machine around without fear. The screen isn’t half bad, either. While its low contrast levels and 1,366 x 768 resolution are drawbacks, viewing angles are excellent and it uses Corning Gorilla Glass to keep it scratch-free. Flip the laptop…

A first glance can leave a lasting impression, which is a shame, because a first glance at the Lenovo Yoga 3 could put you off for life. The aluminium lid is as insipid as they come, but that’s hugely misleading: once you open the lid, the black brushed-metal chassis and backlit keyboard look a world away from the dull exterior. This 14in hybrid isn’t exactly unwieldy at 1.7kg, but when you swing the lid around to use the Yoga 3 in tablet mode, you’ll soon find yourself looking for a surface on which to rest it. It’s impressively thin at only 18mm, and feels every bit like an $1800 laptop. In this top-end model, you get a dualcore, Hyper-Threaded 2.4GHz Intel Core i7-5500U, 8GB of RAM and a 256GB SSD,…

While much ado has been made about the wide availability of USB 3.0 and USB 3.1 with the launch of Intel’s 6th Generation Core processor, it’s not the only high-speed connection to become mainstream in 2015. The Thunderbolt interface has been around for several years now, but only now is it starting to become a common component on today’s performance motherboards. Like USB it offers incredibly fast data transfer speeds, but it’s even faster than the latest versions of USB, which allows it to do things that USB simply can’t. Thunderbolt 3 is the latest version of this high-speed interface, and is the version that will appear on new motherboards thanks to its blistering transfer speeds. The maximum theoretical speed of Thunderbolt 3 is an incredible 5 Gigabytes per second,…

So Windows 10 has been out in the wild for a while now, and we’ve already been flooded with updates and fixes. It’s clear that a lot of things have needed attention and tweaks, together with the inevitable adjustments. And now the merry-go-round has started up again, with fast-track “Insider” builds starting to roll out for those who want to live at the bleeding edge of the build cycle. So, how well did Windows 10 land? I think that it’s in pretty good shape, barring a few fit-andfinish issues. Upgrading people’s machines has proven a bit of a bumpy ride, and I’ve had to take several machines back onto Windows 7. It appears that the 8.1 to 10 upgrade might have gone more smoothly, and perhaps there’s a logical reason…

The latest trends and products in the world of technology It makes us tired just thinking about it: the IFA technology show in Berlin has thousands of products scattered across 150,000 square metres of floor space. We sent a trio of writers to battle past the other 300,000 attendees to bring you this collection of the five best products unveiled during the week in September. While they ice their tired feet, cast your eyes over the very best of IFA 2015. BEST PHONE: SONY XPERIA Z5 PREMIUM A 4K television is one thing, but a 2,160 x 3,840 resolution on a 5.5in display is just a little insane. Sony’s managed to cram 806ppi into the display on its Xperia Z5 Premium, pipping rivals to the title of first 4K smartphone.…

AMD ON THE BRINK It seems that despite putting on a brave face and launching new products regularly, AMD is in a world of pain behind closed doors with a slew of bad news coming from the company this past month. The biggest news is that yet another top engineer has left the company. Phil Rogers having been part of AMD and formerly ATI for 21 years has moved on to Nvidia to take up the role of Chief Software Architect for Compute Servers. Rogers was basically the guy that forged AMD’s Fusion initiative which ended up turning into the (Heterogeneous System Architecture) HSA Foundation. In more bad news, during AMD’s recent third quarter earnings report it detailed that once again it had lost money, to the tune of $197…

Ten years ago, the discrete sound card and DVD burner were musthave parts of any new gaming system build. What audio capabilities your motherboard had, if it had any at all, were rubbish and with broadband still in its infancy at the time with now laughable download quotas and USB sticks still in the single-digit gigabyte range, DVDs were still a cheap viable way to move large chunks of data on and o your PC. OPTICAL ILLUSIONS These days with cheap USB 3.0 connected thumb drives, HDDs and even SSDs, not to mention cloud storage services via ubiquitous broadband and for those lucky enough, the NBN, the optical drive has fast become some what of a relic. Aside from the booty of free software on this magazine’s disc, just about…

2D TESTS We test desktop PCs, netbooks and laptops with our own, custom-built, 2011 Real World Benchmarks. We split the results into three categories: Responsiveness, Media and Multitasking, with the Overall score an average of the three sub-scores. For instance, responsiveness replicates light browser and productivity workloads. The Media test involves running iTunes for audio conversion, Photoshop CS5 to crunch large images and Sony Vegas 10 to edit home video. This then gets run simultaneously alongside Cinebench 11 in order to get a handle on the multitasking ability of the system. 3D TESTS We use pre-recorded demos in Crysis and DIRT 3 to test gaming performance where relevant. We have three standard test settings, depending on the power of the graphics card: Low, Medium and High. To test gaming performance,…

SSDs are all the rage, but sometimes you just need heaps of storage and to do that with SSDs will cost a fortune. This is where the WD My Book Pro excels. Two WD Black 7200RPM hard drives are inside a well built enclosure, featuring USB 3.0 and Thunderbolt connections. The enclosure also supports RAID, either in a RAID-1 mirror for data redundancy, or a RAID-0 stripe, for speed. JBOD is also an option if you’d like two separate disks. The front of the enclosure has two USB 3.0 ports, which act a traditional USB hub, even if connected via Thunderbolt. Each disk is replaceable, with easy to open bays. You could even use non-WD disks if you like, or upgrade to larger disks later. Out of the box the…

The original OnePlus One was an incredible bargain – a smartphone costing less than $400, yet capable of standing up to flagship phones from Samsung and Apple. The OnePlus 2 refines the formula, squeezing premium hardware into a phone that starts at a reasonable $520 or so. In the hand, the OnePlus 2 feels weighty and expensive. The buttons have a solid click to them; the magnesiumalloy frame doesn’t bend when you twist it; and the finish feels impressively luxurious. I tried the Sandstone Black version, which has a rough texture that I really like; there’s also a Kevlar option, plus wooden finishes in Bamboo, Rosewood and Black Apricot. Wake it up and the 5.5in touchscreen looks bright and even, thanks to an IPS panel, although colours can appear a…

We’re all familiar with CPU, GPU and memory overclocking, but over the last fewyears another PC component has been at the heart of a niche group of tweakers. It turns out that several very affordable Korean monitors are highly overclockable, with the ability to run refresh rates almost double that of their official standard. Asus has taken note of this trend, and has applied a factory overclock to its latest gaming display, the PG279Q. With an out-ofthe-box refresh rate of a rather insane 165Hz, it’s the fastest gaming display ever officially sold at this speed. But how fast is too fast? The panel used within this display is actually designed to hit 144Hz, but enabling the overclock option via the OSD brings it all the way up to 165Hz. To…

$5.99 • iOS Labs Apps I f you’re already counting your daily steps, tracking sleep cycles and monitoring metrics such as food intake to body temperature, you’ll be well acquainted with the idea of the “quantified self” – the notion that datagathering can help you achieve and maintain physical wellbeing. Thriveport’s Moodnotes is a simple tracking app that extends the idea to emotional states. Created by Ustwo, the development team behind the beautiful, mind-bending game Monument Valley, “The intuitive interface makes Moodnotes a friendly and attractive way to track your mental wellbein” its interface is very straightforward: opening the app reveals a friendlylooking graphic of a face. With a quick swipe up or down, you can match the face to your current mood. Then you’re asked to log how you’re…

$49 • www.gigabyte.com.au The new marketing buzzword is ‘4k-ready’. In mouse terms, that means a high DPI, because that enables greater fidelity across more pixel real estate. The Aire M60 hits a high of 3200DPI, and it’s no shallow marketing claim that this is a winner for high res screens. While it all depends on the sort of work you do, design and image manipulation definitely sees a benefit. Being a laser sensor, it will work well on any old surface, at the slight expense of the smoothness an optical sensor offers. It slides down to 1000 and 1600DPI, should you decide you like the look of this mouse for standard res. And for less than fifty bucks it’s very nice indeed, most notable is its claimed two-year operating life…

$125 (240GB) • www.adata.com This affordable SSD pairs a Jmicron controller with MLC NAND, which is the good stuff . We tested the 240GB model, which after formatting yielded 223GB of useable space. Read speed was very respectable at 519MB/s, which isn’t far short of what we would expect from an SSD closer to premium price-points, write speed, however, was unspectacular at just 409MB/s, using AS SSD. But of course this is a budget drive, and if you are looking at using one of these to speed up your system or replace a mechanical hard drive you certainly won’t be disappointed. Its closest competitor in the market is probably the OCZ Trion 100, which yielded similar read speeds but the OCZ blasted ahead with write speeds closer to 480MB/s. In…

$179 (2TB) • www.seagate.com/au Another portable hard drive! This one is actually a little interesting, which has tech reviewers around the world rejoicing. It’s for your Xbox, which if you’re of that persuasion, is something generally necessary. Half a dozen AAA games will saturate even a 1TB Xbox drive, so the additional 2TB this offers is most welcome. Performance seems snappy. Unfortunately we couldn’t bench test it because to function as intended it needs Xbox formatting. That means you can’t use it on both platforms, too. It’s a bit of a chore when you first plug it in to copy your games over one by one. Group selection would be nice, but that’s a failing of the Xbox UX, not this drive. And yes, you can buy any old non-Xbox-branded…

We imagined we’d be seeing a lot of the H170 chipset when it came to budget gaming boards, but it appears that our price constraints were a tad tight. Skylake has arrived with a double whammy of pricing pressure that makes its boards expensive; pricey chipsets and a weak Aussie dollar. As a result we end up with products like this, a gaming board built around a chipset aimed at businesses. Given the use of the B150 chipset, we were pleasantly surprised when performance of these boards averaged less than 10% slower than the far more expensive Z170 motherboards. Unfortunately this ASRock board trailed the pack in most of these tests, relying on features instead to appeal to buyers. Twin full-length x16 PCIe 3.0 lanes are present, along with three…

Skylake’s ability to run both DDR3 and DDR4 memory is one of its more unique features, though Intel would definitely prefer users to make the move to the newer memory type. Asus was brave enough to send us the only board in the roundup to support DDR3 memory, but before you go reaching for your old DDR3 memory kit, we should probably point out one major issue with Skylake’s support for it. Skylake can’t run the regular variety DDR3 that most of us have in our existing systems. Instead it needs DDR3L, the low-voltage version of DDR3 that runs at a mere 1.35V. Plug in 1.5V DDR3 and there’s a high risk that you’ll fry your new Skylake CPU. Then there’s the issue of performance… As our benchmarks show, DDR3…

Our final gaming board is the most affordable of the three, although it’s by the slimmest of margins when compared to the DDR3-powered Asus. At $30 less expensive than the excellent Asus H170 Pro Gaming board that we love so much, MSI has to deliver a rather exceptional product to stay in the running. Like Gigabyte, MSI has gone with a broad mix of slots for peripherals. Two each of the PCIe x16 and PCIe x1 type cater for your modern products, while three more legacy PCI slots will handle your old SoundBlaster or video capture cards. Unfortunately MSI is the only company to go for a Killer network solution, Killer’s E2400 chipset. We’ve had issues with the Killer software numerous times in the past, so always recommend Intel’s more…

Every device here comes with compromises. Unless you’re willing to pay $2,000 or more, you aren’t going to be able to tick every single box. However, in the case of the Asus Transformer Book T100 Chi, the compromise is a series of design decisions that we can’t make head nor tail of. The keyboard and the screen, despite being physically attached by two magnetic prongs, only actually interface over Bluetooth. This causes two problems: the keyboard will eventually run out of battery, and when it does, you’ll need to charge it separately from the tablet using a micro-USB connector. Second, there are no USB inputs on the keyboard section. This would be fine if there were ample inputs on the tablet itself, but there aren’t. There’s a microSD slot to…

The only place we’ve ever found a 15.6in 360-degree hinged laptop useful is on an aeroplane tray table or in bed. Yet there’s plenty more to like about the Satellite Radius 15, beyond those arguably niche use cases. The Radius 15 is one of the best-looking laptops that Toshiba has produced in a long time, with subtle styling tweaks lifting the Japanese company’s mid-range laptop firmly into premium territory. A grippy, backlit keyboard, a very sensitive touchpad and a bright, Full HD IPS touchscreen all combine to make the Radius 15 a terrific laptop for working on. The Radius 15 we are reviewing is a US model, but there’s a good chance this, or a revised Au-spec version will make it onsale in Australia. A 1TB mechanical hard disk will…

When Plantronics launched the RIG brand a few years ago they hit upon the right mix of prestige features and price point. With the new RIG 500, Plantronics has once again hit that sweet spot, albeit in a different manner. The RIG 500 headset is built for both value and comfort without compromising excellent stereo performance. Each of the ear cups sports a crisp 40mm driver that delivers solid sound from bass through treble with a small amount of accentuation on the lower register and the memory foam cushions don’t turn your ears into hideous sweat monsters within minutes. The fold up boom mic offers good clarity for skype and game chat, but more importantly it is set to mute when flipped up so won’t capture any noise when not…

Siri, Google Now, Cortana – whatever your smartphone OS, you have access to a smart assistant. But they’re only the beginning, as virtual helpers are moving off the smartphone. “[Virtual assistants] are not destined to sit in a phone like some kind of megawatt app,” said Dr Chris Brauer, director of innovation at Goldsmiths. “The greatest utility will come as they interact across domains – in your car, on your watch, on your TV, and in your home.” Virtual assistants (VAs) are already expanding: Amazon’s Echo sits in your living room, ready to answer any question you ask, while Siri is built into the newly announced Apple TV. At the moment, most virtual assistants are limited in what they can understand. Give Siri an easy question and it excels, but…

I ’ve just received an email from Amazon, promoting its current “Deal of the Day”, which is a SanDisk microSD card. It’s not just any microSD card, though, because this one holds 200GB. I’ll say that again: 200GB of storage space in a microSD card – one of those ultra-tiny ones, smaller than my little fingernail, and costing a shade over $200 (until midnight tonight, anyway). I find it utterly mind-boggling that we’ve got to the point where we can pack so much data into such a tiny package.   TIMES ARE CHANGING I realise that this will make me sound old, but the first hard drive I ever bought was a 5MB device made by CDC, which was a full-height model with a diameter of 5.25in. For those of…

I ’m in the market for a new smartphone, and will be making the move from Apple to Android, after several long and mostly happy relationships with iPhones over the years. I don’t want to upset the fanboys out there, but when my iPhone 5s contract expires next month, I can see no reason to upgrade to the new 6s, let alone last year’s 6 or 6 Plus models. For me, the iPhone has become a little too static in technical innovation, and far too dynamic when it comes to cost increases. Given the wider range of choice in prices and functionality, a move to Android makes perfect sense. However, choosing a handset has been less than straightforward, because my requirements primarily revolve around security. That shouldn’t come as any…

“I passed my driving test in 1981. In the 33-year time frame since then, vehicles themselves have moved on in an incredible way. Back then, the anti-lock braking system (ABS) was a new thing available on only the most expensive of cars. Airbags were just as rare, while the early crash-testing of cars highlighted the complete horrors that were being sold to unsuspecting customers every day. Today we have radar-based cruise control that can fire the brakes or perform an emergency stop without the intervention of the driver. The crash-testing and, most emphatically, the computer-based modelling of car structures, means the overall “crashworthiness” of cars is incomparable to those produced in the 1970s and 80s. Air conditioning is now a common feature, so the old-style fogged-up cars are a thing…