Table of contents for April 2015 in PC Pro

GENERALLY - AND THIS is one of those crucial things that the staff of PC Pro are yet to grasp - it’s best to agree with your boss. Your instinct should be to nod in appreciation at their immense wisdom, smother them in praise, fetch them a cup of coffee, and then say nasty things about them later. So when our CEO tweeted me during the Windows 10 press conference (see p10) to explain that he’d moved from Windows to Apple, I didn’t call him a prize fool. No, I politely enquired why. His answer was surprisingly persuasive: he needs to provide technical support to his whole family - and, like it or not, Apple just works. Now, James Tye is no Apple fan boy. He’s actually a former editor…

* Best laptop HP EliteBook Folio 1020 Forget what you consider to be a business laptop: the Folio is part of a new breed of sleek, sexy ultraportable, with Intel’s Core M processor taking a starring role. It’s this, along with a CNC aluminium chassis, that helps the 1020 to a sub-1kg weight. All this would mean nothing if it weren’t a pleasure to use in practice, but a top-quality keyboard and vibrant IPS screen ensure this won’t be a problem. Pricing and availability are still to be confirmed as we go to press, and we’ll have to wait until we get the laptop into our labs before can determine if its battery lasts the nine hours HP claims – but so far, so fantastic. * Best phone Asus ZenFone…

LAPTOPS Apple MacBook Pro 13in with Retina display Laptop, from £999 apple.com/uk Gram for gram, the MacBook Pro 13in is a powerhouse of a laptop. An Intel Has well CPU delivers strong performance and great battery life, the PCI Express SSD is lightning quick, and the sumptuous Retina display is a pixel-perfect delight. REVIEW: pcpro.link/almb13rd ALTERNATIVES Lenovo IdeaPad Yoga 2 A versatile hybrid laptop with the best IPS screen in its price range – now available at an irresistible price. £400; johnlewis.com REVIEW: pcpro.link/alyoga2 Dell XPS 12 (2013) Sturdy build and a great all-round design make this an Ultrabook to lust after. The Full HD touchscreen is excellent, as is battery life. £899; dell.co.uk REVIEW: pcpro.link/aldell12 Asus X552CL A capable 15.6in desktop replacement. Battery life is merely okay, but there’s…

I’m more than a touch peeved that Darien stole my thunder this month, by writing about VR in his column. The Samsung Gear VR is the most interesting piece of hardware I’ve seen for an age; it’s technology that demands to be written about, discussed and debated, so you’ll forgive me if my new topic doesn’t quite match up when it comes to excitement and intrigue. However, this subject is one that’s close to my heart. It’s car tech or, more specifically, in-vehicle communications and entertainment systems (dubbed by some as infotainment systems). And I’m sad to say this is not one of those positive columns; I’m here to have a moan. A moan about how far behind the motor industry lags when it comes to the tech available in…

How do I make Windows Search find the files I’m actually looking for? Windows stores a database of files and folders on your hard disk, so that when you search for something, the results can be returned instantaneously. However, for speed and efficiency, only the most common file types and personal folders are included by default. There are two ways to get Windows to search outside of your user folders: one is to open the target volume or folder in Explorer and use the search box to search directly from there. This will prompt Windows to ask if you want to add this location to its index. Alternatively, open Indexing Options from the control panel, and click the Modify button in the dialog that appears. This will bring up a…

PRICE £454 (£545 inc VAT) from dell.co.uk (pcpro.link/246dellven) The Venue 11 Pro 7000 won’t win any awards for groundbreaking design. Dell has barely deviated from the format of previous Venue 11 Pro models, save for moving a few ports around the tablet’s edges, and it’s fair to say the look remains more “functional business tool” than “funky Windows hybrid”; between this and the Microsoft Surface Pro 3, there’s no contest in terms of looks. It’s well built, though. At 757g, it’s light enough to wield in one hand, and the rubberised plastic rear stops it slipping. It feels like a quality device, and, if our Venue 11 Pro from last year is anything to go by, it should be more than capable of surviving day-to-day knocks and scrapes. As ever,…

PRICE £67 (£80 inc VAT) from argos.co.uk (pcpro.link/246bush) Back in 2013, Intel’s Paul Otellini boldly promised that the Bay Trail Atom processor would power Windows devices priced “as low as $200”. It was an ambitious claim, but now the Bush MyTablet goes one better: this fully featured 8in Windows tablet costs just £80. The headline specifications are impressive. You get an 8in, quad-core tablet running 32-bit Windows 8.1 with Bing, Microsoft’s fully functional version of Windows designed for low-cost devices. You also receive a year’s subscription to Office 365 Personal and 1TB of OneDrive cloud storage. On paper, it almost looks too good to be true. In the hand, surprisingly, the MyTablet doesn’t look or feel cheap. There’s no give or flex in the 9mmthick body, and the narrow bezels…

Each package’s core anti-malware features are tested at the state-of-theart facilities of Dennis Technology Labs. Rather than artificially infecting our target systems, we set them up in an environment that mimics how our PCs become infected in the wild, to get an accurate picture of how each security package fends off malware in real-world situations. We look at whether the package provides protection, and also how it handles each threat. The resulting data informs a protection rating of up to 100%. Meanwhile, we also install legitimate software to see what the security packages block and where they prompt for user intervention, factoring in the obscurity or otherwise of the application. We award a score for false positives (100% represents a perfect record) and combine this with the protection rating to…

PRICE Free from pcpro.link/246avast Avast Free Antivirus was our pick of the free packages last year, and this year we see little reason to change our minds. With a wealth of useful features – including strong anti-malware protection – it keeps your PC secure, while its relaxed approach to flogging premium features and skill at identifying legitimate software make it a pleasure to live with. If you don’t want to pay for security software, it’s the most balanced proposition. It gets off to a good start. The package downloads the latest signatures during the initial install, then performs a quick scan as soon as setup is complete. The UI is equally straightforward, exposing all the major features in a clean, pane-based interface. The main Overview panel reveals what’s protected at…

PRICE 3 PCs/1yr, £13 (£16 inc VAT) from pcpro.link/246bitdef If Bitdefender has one major selling point, it’s the range of innovative features it offers. Aside from basic antivirus protection and an intelligent firewall with easy-to-use rules, it crams in a rescue mode to reboot, clean and fix your system, and web protection with an optional browser toolbar. You also get anti-fraud and anti-phishing protection, a whole raft of privacy tools, a hardened browser for banking and shopping, parental controls and built-in optimisation utilities. It even has a battery mode for use on laptops,cutting back on non-essential security activities when you’re low on charge. Sometimes it goes overboard: there are seven clean-up, optimisation and Registry tools from which to choose, which is odd given the prominence of the one-click optimiser. And…

PRICE Free from pcpro.link/246mssecess If you use Windows 8, then you may already be using Microsoft’s anti-malware package without knowing it; in the guise of Windows Defender, it’s the operating system’s default antivirus solution. For Windows 7, Vista and XP users, it’s a quick and easy download from microsoft.com. Security Essentials is designed to work with the other security features baked into Windows, including the Windows firewall and the SmartScreen website and download filter, and its biggest selling point is that you normally wouldn’t know it’s there. It updates automatically through Windows Update, and sends the few notifications you might see through the standard Action Center in the Windows system tray. It protects in real-time, but also allows scheduled and manual scans, and there’s little reason to ever open its…

There’s plenty of reason to feel cheerful about the results from this test. While the malware and internet threats keep coming, antivirus software seems to be developing at a rate that’s fast enough to cope. Of the ten packages tested here, six were able to fend off more than 95% of attacks, while four managed protection ratings of 99% or 100%. Given how hard Dennis Technology Labs works to simulate real-world threats, those are excellent results. Opt for Kaspersky Internet Security, Norton Security, Eset Smart Security or Avast Free Antivirus and you can feel confident that your PC will be infection-free – although you can aid the cause by behaving intelligently and adopting good security practices yourself. Sadly, some security suites – particularly the free ones – are still struggling.…

PRICE £235 exc VAT from printerland.co.uk Think inkjets are only good for low-demand use? Epson’s WorkForce Pro WF-5620DWF shatters this myth, with a monthly duty cycle of 35,000 pages. What’s more, it uses the same PrecisionCore print-head technology as Epson’s commercial printers and its high-capacity cartridges keep it running for longer. Epson has a firm eye on costs too. That £235 exc VAT price is no typo, while running costs for the XXL cartridges (each with a 4,000-page capacity) are among the lowest in this class: expect to pay only 1p per mono and 4.4p per colour page. Epson’s installation software has every angle covered. It provides a tutorial on setting up the printer and, when we were ready, it loaded the drivers, downloaded the latest firmware and installed an…

PRICE £308 exc VAT from printerland.co.uk At £308 exc VAT, Ricoh’s SP C252SF immediately scores points for price, but you only need to glance at its mono LCD control panel to see that features aren’t its strong point. What you do get, however, is a competent colour A4 MFP with 4-in-1 print, copy, fax and scan options, wired and wireless operation, and exceptionally low running costs. Even using standard high-yield inks, print costs are reasonable: mono and colour pages cost 1.6p and 7.5p respectively. These numbers improve if you use Ricoh’s new ultra-high-yield cartridges, which reduce costs to 1.1p and 6p. The printer sits comfortably on a desk, and claims speeds of 20ppm for colour and mono prints. Its 250-sheet paper tray has a single-sheet bypass slot and can be…

There’s a very wide set of tasks that come under the umbrella of customer relationship management, depending on your market sector, size of business, number of customers and so forth. This leads to a dilemma: do you try to squeeze your perfectly formed, well-run business into whatever shape your chosen CRM system demands? Are you prepared to change your workflow, and your way of talking to customers, in order to bow down at the Temple of the Great CRM? Or, do you try to get something written or customised to fit your business, in the hope that it will help you to do what you do already without getting in the way? For many businesses, the reality falls between the two: you end up with some significant changes to the…

Kofi Annan, former secretary general of the United Nations, once said “knowledge is power, information is liberating”. This certainly applies to technology, even more so the technology in your hand. Are you aware of the permissions you’ve granted apps on your smartphone and tablet, and what they’re doing with those permissions? Chances are, you don’t – and liberating those apps to do what they like greatly diminishes the power you have over your privacy and data security. What set me thinking about this was some advice that recently appeared on the PC Pro website, the aim of which was to help readers to better understand their data allowance under iOS 8 (pcpro. link/246dw). This isn’t something that’s of great concern to me, since I’m on true unlimited data plans for…

Digital Catapult has been asked to help start-ups apply for government contracts. Despite the government pledging to cut use of huge contractors in favour of SMBs, and its support for tech start-ups, public sector bids remain difficult for smaller companies to apply for, let alone win, according to Jonathan Raper, founder of Transport API, one of the start-ups supported by Digital Catapult. He said the public sector is very “risk-averse”, so bid applications have set scoring factors: you receive more points if you have a healthand-safety advisor and environmental accreditation, and are a certified considerate contractor. It’s unlikely that a start-up will have such qualifications, which are surely overkill for merely supplying a data stream to city planners? As a result of such barriers, Raper has already decided not to…

Exo Finger Mouse What is it? The Exo FingerMouse is a tiny touchpad that sticks to an Android smartphone, tablet or a set-top box. Why would you want that? Its makers point out that fingers smear your touchscreen and block your view of what you’re trying to see – and it’s sometimes awkward to use your touchscreen to flip pages or take a selfie. And this solves that? You can stick the Exo FingerMouse to the back of your device, and use its tiny touchpad to flip through pages on your smartphone one-handed or take a selfie by tapping the rear of the device. Or you can pair it with an Android-powered set-top box to use as a remote control. How does it work? It connects over Bluetooth to whatever…

Nicole Kobie Could you, or your neighbour, create the next Google? The government is providing support to tech start-ups around Britain. Nicole explains how on p124 David Hunt Computer science tutor David sets our monthly coding challenge (see p129), so who are his programming heroes? Find out as part of our feature on p42 Dave Mitchell Printers are a vital part of keeping businesses around the world running smoothly. Dave’s rigorous testing of MFPs will help you choose the right one. See p96 Nick Dale A mix of open-source software, determination and lateral thinking helped Nick and friends to create a highly aerodynamic prototype car. Read his story on p116…

1 Sky’s parental controls on by default Sky will automatically censor web connections for adult content unless requested by customers to turnoff parental controls. The UK’s second-largest ISP has offered network-level filters since 2014,with new customers given the option over whether they want the filter on. Sky will now give existing customers the same option over email–failure to reply will result in your broad band being automatically filtered. 2 Google stops Glass sales Google has stopped selling its augmented reality head set Glass. It said it wasn’t the end of the technology, with future versions to be launched “when they’ re ready” .The £1,000glasseshittheUSmarketin2013, but arrived in the UK only last year, with Tesco launching an app just days before Google’s announcement to pull the product. 3 Silk Road trial…

Tech firms have a vision of how we’ll live in the near future – and what we’ll buy from them to make it happen. If the products on show at CES in Las Vegas at the beginning of January (see p14) are any indication, within the next year or so, we’ll have smartwatches on our wrists, fridges that restock themselves, TVs that know what we want to watch, and heating systems in our homes that are aware of how warm we like it. To make this exciting world of the future happen, manufacturers and their engineering geniuses have innovated in numerous areas, reimagining everything from batteries to data analytics, and all at prices that we can actually afford. What they haven’t done, however, is to address the problems that exist…

For many years, my advice to online buyers has been to purchase with a credit card. This way, if something goes wrong you have someone on your side who has a legal imperative to refund your money, even if the original vendor disappears. Now PayPal and Apple are marketing themselves as ubiquitous payment systems for purchases. You can buy anything from anyone, even from physical vendors, using such services – but they aren’t covered by the Consumer Credit Act. Although PayPal highlights its “Buyer Protection”, my experience is that, unless the details of the transaction and the procedure you followed fall within its defined small print, you won’t be covered. With credit card transactions, the Consumer Credit Act provides consumer protection first and foremost, with no burden on the consumer…

If you’re storing addresses in your database, it’s important to understand what information you actually need. Although county information can be useful for marketing – and may be needed for some overseas addresses – it’s no longer officially used in UK addresses. The reason is that UK postal addresses rely on the concept of a “post town”, where post for you is sent and sorted before it’s delivered to your door. Not all towns or villages are served by post towns in the same county – for example, Melbourn (in Cambridgeshire) gets its mail through Royston (in Hertfordshire) – so specifying a county in the address doesn’t necessarily help anyone. To avoid confusion, the Post Office stopped using counties in addresses back in 1996, relying on postcode information instead –…

Sir Tim Berners-Lee With almost 15% of the vote, the British inventor of the World Wide Web was the single most popular figure in our poll. “Without Berners-Lee’s pioneering work, I’d know a lot less about cats and Jedi,” wrote Chris Timms. Readers praised Berners-Lee’s motivations, as well as his achievements: Richard Taylor thanked Berners-Lee for “choosing to share his revolutionary technology for the use of humankind, rather than going down the corporate ‘it’s mine’ trademark and profit route”. Alan Turing and Tommy Flowers In recent years, wartime computing innovator Alan Turing has begun to receive the recognition he deserves. As Andrew Earle succinctly put it: “Turing devised a revolutionary machine against the odds, and saved countless lives in the process.” Many readers also remembered Tommy Flowers (see p44), who…

PRICE £158 (£190 inc VAT), pre-order from clove.co.uk (pcpro.link/246gearvr) The concept of virtual reality has arguably been around for as long as computers themselves – but a really persuasive implementation has always seemed frustratingly out of reach. Now, though, a host of companies are introducing new technologies that promise to immerse you into the digital world, and the Gear VR is the first fully realised product of this new generation. For such a pioneering product, the Gear VR makes an unassuming first impression. It’s made entirely of white plastic, and has the appearance of a rather bulky pair of ski goggles. You may also be surprised to find that the Gear VR lacks a display of its own: similarly to Google’s Cardboard concept, it works in conjunction with a Galaxy…

PRICE £520 (£650 inc VAT) from johnlewis.com (pcpro. link/246envy) If you can’t beat them, join them. That appears to be the mantra for HP with its new Envy x2 13. Where the previous Envy x2 partnered an 11.6in tablet with a keyboard dock, 2015 sees it grow into a larger 13.3in model replete with a built-in kickstand and a thin, clip-on keyboard; a design clearly inspired by the Microsoft Surface Pro 3. If you’re hoping to be bowled over by a futuristic, super-svelte hybrid, however, we suggest you look away now – this simply isn’t what you’ve been waiting for. The main problem is that it’s far too big, especially given that it’s powered by one of Intel’s latest Core M processors, purposebuilt for thin-and-light devices. In fairness, the Envy…

PRICE £916 (£1,099 inc VAT) from chillblast.com (pcpro.link/246nano) If you didn’t think it was possible to squeeze serious gaming power into a compact case, take a look at Chillblast’s Fusion Nano – a pint-sized performer that brings together Nvidia’s new GTX 970 graphics, a water-cooled Intel Core i5 CPU and a premium mini-ITX motherboard. It’s tough to argue with Chillblast’s choice of case: the Raijintek Metis is a handsome example of the breed. It comes in a choice of grey, red, green, blue, black and gold, and our blue sample looked very smart indeed The finish feels top-notch, too, with classy brushed metal all around, and a window on the right-hand panel. There’s room inside for a full-sized ATX power supply and a 120mm fan at the rear – essential…

PRICE £133 (£159 inc VAT) from amazon.co.uk (pcpro.link/246linx) With the mobile world still dominated by Android and iOS, Microsoft’s new tactic is to push production of ultra-cheap Windows tablets. We’ve already been impressed by the Bush MyTablet 8in; now comes the Linx 10 – a 10in Windows tablet for only £159. Just like the MyTablet, the Linx runs full Windows 8.1 32-bit “with Bing”, and includes a one-year subscription to Office 365 Personal. Inside, there’s a quad-core Intel Bay Trail Atom Z3735F CPU clocked at 1.33GHz (with burst speeds up to 1.83GHz), and 2GB of RAM – twice as much as the Bush. This allows Windows 8.1’s tile-based touch interface to whizz around without a hitch. Scrolling and panning in Internet Explorer is smooth; in the Geekbench 3 mobile benchmark,…

PRICE Free from pcpro.link/246safe The 360 Safe Internet Security suite nearly has it all, with great protection, useful features and a simple, intuitive UI. Unfortunately, it has an Achilles heel that prevents it from snapping up an award. What’s most interesting about this software is that it uses a combination of antivirus engines, with 360’s own cloud engine backed up by QVM II and Bitdefender technologies. Those who upgrade to the Total Security package receive Avira’s engine too. The free version’s features are focused on security, with a sandbox where you can drag programs to run in isolation of the OS, and a cleaner that wipes all traces of activity from your browser history, Windows history and Microsoft Office. You’ll also find internet protection, with URL and download filtering, plus…

PRICE 1 PC/1yr, £32 (£40 inc VAT) from pcpro.link/246eset Eset may not have as broadranging a feature set as Norton or Kaspersky, but it makes up for this with an efficient UI, exceptional protection, and a host of security-focused tools that power users will appreciate. The basic anti-malware tools and firewall are backed by anti-theft protection, unobtrusive web-access protection – with anti-spam and anti-phishing. The package’s parental controls are optional. There’s a gaming mode that halts pop-ups and pauses scheduled tasks until you’ve finished playing, and a social media scanner to protect accounts on Twitter and Facebook. Optimisation and cleanup tools aren’t included. The UI adopts a pane-based approach that places the most important information upfront. Malware scans include a basic smart scan that makes intelligent decisions about custom scans…

PRICE 5 devices/1yr, £29 (£37 inc VAT) from pcpro.link/246norton Norton’s security product might not be the cheapest of the major security suites, but it protects up to five devices in one household, including Windows and OS X systems, and iOS or Android smartphones and tablets. It’s also one of the more slick-looking packages we’ve seen: animated slideshows during installation showcase all its advanced features, and its interface is attractive, functional and accessible. The package certainly crams a lot in, from firewall and anti-malware tools to anti-spam protection, social network protection and a web-based password generator. There are also optimisation tools for your hard disk, a file cleanup tool and a startup manager. Norton’s Safe Web browser toolbar verifies web pages and links while you’re searching and browsing, without pushing you…

PRICE £136 exc VAT from misco.co.uk You might not expect low-cost inkjets to hold much appeal for businesses, but HP’s Officejet Pro 8620 turns that perception on its head. Despite its low price, this A4 inkjet prints, scans, faxes and copies; it has web and mobile printing abilities to rival its more expensive brethren; and it does all of this with far lower running costs than a laser. HP’s XL ink cartridges deliver a mono page for 1p and a colour page for 4p, similar to those of the Epson WorkForce Pro (see p99). The only potential irritation is that HP’s cartridges last for around half the page count of those of Epson. The 8620 can’t compete with the lasers for speed: it’s rated at only 21ppm for mono and…

PRICE £434 exc VAT from printerbase.co.uk The 6605DN is one of the longest-serving members of Xerox’s Work Centre family of colour laser MFPs, but with age has come wisdom: it’s beautifully built; it’s fast and cheap to run; and busy workgroups will love its hefty 80,000-page maximum monthly duty cycle. Tipping the scales at almost 33kg, moving it is a two-person job – but once on the desktop, we had it up and running inside 30 minutes. After loading the PS3 and PCL6 drivers, we visited the printer’s Centre Ware web console to set up scan, fax and email functions. Via the console you can also set up address books, covering fax speed-dial lists, users, groups, email addresses, network shares and FTP sites. These are stored on the printer, so…

Virtual reality (VR) is one of those strange areas of tech that’s been knocking around for ages, perpetually about to explode into the mainstream but never quite managing to achieve it. The idea can be traced back to science fiction from the 1930s, while the first crude and clumsy devices appeared in the 1960s. One of these first VR incarnations, created by the influential computer scientist Ivan Sutherland, dangled above the user’s head in such a precarious fashion that it was nicknamed the “Sword of Damocles” (see more about Ivan Sutherland in our feature on tech heroes, p42). At various times since then, mass-market adoption has seemed just around the corner but never actually happened. It was almost 25 years ago that Sega promised the Sega VR headset for its…

I don’t know whether to laugh or cry. Literally, such is the state of life in the information technology business at the start of year 2015. On one hand, I’ve just witnessed a classic story of hardware failure that’s enough to make you despair for the whole industry. On the other, I’ve been able to use some clever software to get out of trouble – in ways that give me hope for the future, not only of our own business, but of the multitudes of businesses that have become painfully dependent on us (in ways that, even two years ago, nobody saw coming). I know that everybody loves a rant and a disaster story, though, so let’s start with that part. In what follows, I may perhaps be accused of…

iGeolise iGeolise is a new way of searching for locations: it makes maps searchable by travel time, pulling in data on public transport, driving, walking and even cycling. Co-founder Peter Lilley told us that 40% of web searches are for items with a location, such as a shop or property. “If you’re going to travel, you care about time.” The technology is already used by VisitBritain as well as home-hunting websites Zoopla and Countrywide. For example, you can look for a new flat based on neighbourhoods that are no more than 30 minutes from your place of work. Cycling is the hardest to figure out, Lilley added, since it’s tough to average travel times of the “basket brigade versus Lycra louts”. CueSongs Some bright ideas are very specific: CueSongs makes…

Saving space with an invader The amount of data stored on computers continues to increase – as does the desire to transfer it over the internet. So it’s beneficial to squeeze our information into the smallest space possible. To see how this might be achieved, let’s use an image as an example. Imagine a 16 x 16 monochrome bitmap, such as the space invader image to the right. Each pixel can be represented by a black or white pixel, so the entire thing can be expressed as 256 bits of data. Can we devise an algorithm to store this image in a smaller space, in a way that can be easily reversed to recreate the original image? The first thing to specify is that we want to recreate the image…

MICROSOFT HAS REVEALED more details of Windows 10, including the Spartan browser and the HoloLens headset (see opposite). Windows 10 will be a free upgrade for users of Windows 7 and 8 – news that may cheer those unhappy with Windows 8. But will the changes and new features (see p70 for our preview) be enough to convince customers to stick with Windows? Fresh Start At a press conference at the end of January, Microsoft confirmed that, during its first year of release, Windows 10 will be free for those upgrading from Windows 7, 8 or 8.1 – but not Vista. Plus, the updates will keep coming. “This is more than a one-time upgrade: once a Windows device is upgraded to Windows 10, we will continue to keep it current…

Following the shootings at Charlie Hebdo magazine and a Jewish grocery in Paris, Cameron said: “Are we going to allow a means of communications which it simply isn’t possible to read? My answer to that question is: ‘No, we must not’.” Cameron hasn’t clarified what this means in practice, but his words have sparked speculation that the government may try to force tech firms to drop encryption, particularly for messaging apps such as Snapchat. It could also force sites and apps to include a backdoor for security services. A number of internet experts have responded: Liberal Democrat MP Julian Huppert said the plan to ban encryption was “technologically illiterate”; sci-fi writer and digital-rights advocate Cory Doctorow said it would “endanger every Briton and destroy the IT industry”; and Ladar Levison,…

As I manoeuvred Samsung’s new Gear VR headset over my spectacles, my expectations weren’t high. I didn’t see any reason why this latest implementation of “virtual reality” should succeed where countless antecedents had failed. Still, I pressed the button to wake it up, and the binocular displays leapt into life. My colleagues at their neighbouring desks were naturally unable to see what I was experiencing – but anyone watching closely would have noticed my indulgent smirk turn rapidly into the hanging jaw of astonishment. Inside, I was trying out my first virtualreality app of the modern era, an odd creation called The Blu VR. On paper, it’s an unambitious concept: you’re an underwater observer, drifting around the ocean as fish and other marine creatures swim by. You have no control…

For several years, my major digital pastime has been photography. I joined Flickr eight years ago, and have now posted more than 1,500 pictures there (you can find them at pcpro. link/246dpflickr). During this time, the digital imaging market has been through a technical revolution, and now faces what tech gurus love to call “disruption”. A generation now prefers to use a smartphone to take pictures, rather than a proper camera – and the quality of the results has improved extraordinarily, thanks to sensors and image processors from real camera manufacturers such as Sony. Camera makers meanwhile are striking back with retro designs that recall the golden age of the Leica, with premium £1,000-plus prices aimed at separating “real photographers” from selfie-snappers. As for me, I’ve resisted both trends. I…

■ What is your job? I’m a search-engine optimisation (SEO) expert, and pay-per-click (PPC) specialist. Very simply, I help brands to be discovered online. I work in a creative marketing agency that handles promotions for clients of all sizes, and that might also include leaflet drops or magazine advertising – but my role is specifically online. ■ What does your day look like? I spend a fair amount of time checking analytics, which enable me to stay on top of the trends among visitors to the sites we look after. There’s a lot of work involved in maintaining a site’s online presence: there are more than 200 factors that Google looks at to decide where you should rank for a given search phrase, the weighting of which is changed regularly,…

The Core M processor inside the Envy x2 is one of the first chips we’ve seen based on Intel’s new Broadwell microarchitecture – but it will soon be joined by a new family of fifth-generation mobile Core i3, i5 and i7 processors. Broadwell desktop chips aren’t due until this summer, but anyone using a Haswell laptop right now is about to find themselves running last-generation hardware. Does this mean your current laptop is obsolete? Absolutely not. According to Intel’s “Tick-Tock” model, Broadwell is a “Tick” – a scaling down of a previous architecture, rather than a new one. Specifically, Broadwell uses the same CPU core as Haswell, but shrunk from a 22nm manufacturing process to 14nm. This brings a minor performance benefit: smaller chips generate less heat, so they can…

PRICE £166 (£199 inc VAT) from pcworld.co.uk (pcpro.link/246zenwatch) Android Wear has yet to reach its first birthday, but we’ve already seen a healthy selection of hardware. The Asus ZenWatch is the latest, and it joins an increasingly capable crew. Of all the Android Wear devices we’ve seen so far, the ZenWatch takes first prize for looks. Its slim, stainlesssteel body – complete with “rose gold” inlay around the edges and a curved Gorilla Glass 3 touchscreen – lends it a touch of class; the tan leather strap and metal clasp, in combination with a selection of slick custom watch faces, top off the look nicely. It’s light and comfy – not something all the wearables we’ve tested recently can claim – and the hinged clasp is both secure and easy…

PRICE 3 devices/1yr, £17 (£20 inc VAT) from pcpro.link/246kaspersky Having held on to a place on our A-List with its 2014 edition, Kaspersky Internet Security isn’t about to relinquish it. Like previous versions, the 2015 edition hits a sweet spot between the features and in-depth configuration options of Eset and Norton, and the set-andforget usability of Microsoft Security Essentials and Avast. The default configuration neither requests nor needs much user input, and it’s both unobtrusive and smart when handling legitimate software; it was the only paid-for package on test that permitted every legitimate application to install without user intervention. All the same, it has plenty of features. The Safe Money browser is particularly useful, providing extra security in a hardened version of your current browser, protecting against such exploits as…

PRICE Free from pcpro.link/246avg AVG’s free antivirus package seems to have lost its way in the past few years, focusing too heavily on upselling to its paid-for products, and too little on ensuring it’s the best of the free tools. Sadly, this continues in the 2015 release. Even during installation the software tries a pre-emptive bait-and switch, asking you to choose between installing a free trial of AVG Internet Security, or the free product you previously selected. Guess which is the default? Meanwhile, every page of the UI features an advert suggesting that you “maximise your protection” by upgrading to the paid-for suite. The line-up of features is basic. Firewall and anti-spam are paid-for extras, while the web protection features add AVG Secure Search and an extension – AVG Web…

PRICE 3 PCs and 3 mobile devices/1yr, £14 (£18 inc VAT) from pcpro. from pcpro. Once Norton’s biggest rival, McAfee has been struggling to maintain the pace over the past few years, producing software that hasn’t performed well in our malware tests. This doesn’t look set to change in the near future. Features in the latest release are limited by Norton and Kaspersky standards, but McAfee still crams in a firewall, web-protection, anti-spam, parental controls, plus cleanup tools, a vulnerability scanner and a home-network scanner. These features are individually pretty good. The parental controls, for example, make short work of setting up internet content and search restrictions for specific Windows accounts, and can also be used to restrict access to specified times. The vulnerability scanner does a great job of…

PRICE £33 (£42 inc VAT) for 1yr, 3 devices from pcpro.link/246trend There aren’t many internetsecurity packages that you can describe as beautifully designed, but Trend Micro Maximum Security qualifies. The installation is slick, with an animated progress meter surrounding explanations of the package’s key benefits, and this continues into the UI, which is all oversized buttons, intuitive displays and tasteful fonts. At times form threatens to get in the way of function, but the more you use the package, the more sensible it seems. It’s full of features, too. Even the more basic Internet Security package packs in anti-malware tools, family protection features, anti-phishing protection and scans to check privacy settings in the major social networks. The Maximum Security edition throws in a secure browser for online shopping and banking…

PRICE £169 exc VAT from printerland.co.uk The MFC-J5720DW is the largest model in Brother’s new J5000 Series of inkjet MFPs, and it packs in a superb range of features at a giveaway price. It touts fast mono and colour speeds, laser-trouncing running costs, wired or wireless operation and automatic duplexing. Its dual 250-sheet lower trays are partnered by a rear multipurpose tray, and the real clincher is that all three support A3 paper. Brother has also improved build quality: the trays are sturdier than the manual feed supports we criticised on the MFCJ4710DW (pcpro.link/246brother). Forget any preconceptions you may have about inkjets being more expensive than lasers: so long as you opt for the XL ink cartridges, mono and colour pages work out at 0.8p and 3.8p per page. The…

PRICE £471 exc VAT from printerland.co.uk Businesses wanting to see the big picture will love Oki’s LED printing technology. It uses fewer moving parts than a laser and the flat paper path in the MC562dnw allows it to handle heavier 220gsm media and print banners up to 1.32m in length. To realise your banner headlines, you open up the front multipurpose tray and rear output slot to allow a clear run straight through the printer. It works well. Another plus point is that the MC562dnw delivers the characteristic vibrancy and high levels of detail we’ve seen with other Oki colour LED printers. Text quality, even at the smallest sizes, is pin-sharp, while colour photos and graphics are punchy, with excellent contrast and detail. Oki’s PS3 driver produces vibrant colours, although…

SaaS Originally “Software as a Service”, now often stands for “Security as a Service”. Generally speaking, a software service that’s delivered via a central host and paid for on a subscription basis. DDoS Distributed denial-of-service: an attack whereby online business resources are taken offline by overwhelming them with “junk” traffic from multiple sources. Perimeter security Network defences provided via firewalls and intrusion-detection systems – a well-established model, but one that doesn’t necessarily suit the modern Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) approach. Threatscape The overall security threat environment, comprising both attack methodologies and attacker profiles.…

From time to time, we all find ourselves looking out of the window and daydreaming. Among the fast cars, holidays and lottery wins, there may be the occasional “Wouldn’t it be great if…”, quickly followed by, at least in my case, “How hard can it be?” This is one such story. It’s a tale of ambition, teamwork and talent (mostly other people’s). And it’s also the story of how modern PCs and largely open-source tools can solve problems that a generation ago weren’t only difficult but, by all practical measures, impossible. By personality and training, I’m an engineer. Many years ago, when BBC Micros were cutting-edge, a fascination with aircraft led me to study aerodynamics. On qualifying, my career quickly took me in other directions, but the fascination with all…

The government is fascinated with the potential of start-ups, investing millions into schemes to help kick-start the next Google. Efforts have largely focused on East London’s Silicon Roundabout (also known as Tech City), but start-up support is beginning to spread nationwide thanks to new Digital Catapult Centres. While that name may sound like it was created by an Old Street marketing team, the first centre opened its doors last November near King’s Cross station in North London; now further centres are to follow in Bradford, Brighton and Sunderland. Digital Catapult is funded by the government’s Innovate UK quango, which provides support to companies with IT-themed ideas. Neil Crockett, CEO of Digital Catapult, explained the aim is to help “small guys overcome development challenges” so they “don’t have to go to…

DATA RACES OVER fibre broadband cables to your computer, only to slow to a comparative crawl as it’s converted to electrical signals. This could be set to change, with researchers at the University of Surrey and University of Cambridge creating new materials to build the first all-optical computers. The latest breakthrough sees the types of glass used in CDs and DVDs, know as amorphous chalcogenides, altered via a technique called ion doping, to form a material that can create, guide and detect light – and can therefore be used to build optical computing components. Dr Richard Curry of the University of Surrey has been working to develop such materials for more than a decade. We spoke to him to find out what breakthroughs need to happen next, and how far…

It sounds idyllic: extend your Christmas holiday by popping over to Las Vegas for the first week in January. Yes, I’m talking about CES, that industry melting pot where anyone who is anyone in tech will be there. Well, if you exclude Apple. And Microsoft. And Google. Each year, CES gets bigger, louder and, supposedly, better. But some are claiming this year’s event was a letdown, referring to the lack of a “kaboom!” industry announcement by someone huge. This follows last year’s CES, which was mostly progression based upon existing work. That said, the sight of Michael Bay, Hollywood director of the Transformers franchise, stumbling off stage during the Samsung keynote, apparently due to an autocue failure, is something I will remember for a long time. This year, however, even…