Table of contents for June 2016 in PC & Tech Authority

Ok. Listen up, readers. I’m about to blab on yet again about how VR will change the world. I know you know what it means for gamers, that’s a given. Immersion is what it’s all about for gaming. We’ve always wanted to be in-the-game, and now we are. So convincing is the reality in the virtual, that I am quite certain that within a year the only hardcore gamers that don’t have a VR headset are those held back by finances. But the big evolution – culturally at least – is VR’s penetration of the mainstream. This happened critically early in VR’s road to being a product, thanks in part to Facebook’s purchase of the Oculus company which raised eyebrows and turned the heads which had previously dismissed it as…

Samsung sometimes creates the impression that it’s an upstart company that’s battled the odds to compete with Apple’s iPhone. In fact, Samsung is big. Big with a capital B. The company might have started with only 40 employees trading groceries and making noodles in 1938, but it’s no small fry now. With some 80 companies within the group, Samsung employs more staffthan Google, Microsoft and Apple put together. It’s hugely important to South Korean industry, as the chart to the right shows. Its electronic empire alone claims market leadership across many categories of device (see below). Then there’s the small matter of its engineering, ship-building and military divisions. It’s a powerhouse, and only set to become bigger. Korean power No other technology company dominates a country’s economy quite like Samsung,…

Omate Smart Rise Smartwatch The Omate Rise Smartwatch looks like the do-it-all smartwatch. With a polycar-bonate case and carbon fiber bezel, it looks very cool. But what we are excited about most is what it does. According to Omate, the Rise has a built in micro-phone, speakers, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, 3G, 6-axis accelerometer, magnetometer, gyroscope and a capacitive touch screen. The Rise uses all these features to allow you to call, text, use voice searching, start navigation, set reminders, make voice memos, play music, get GPS support, see weather reports, check commuting times, get reminders, track fitness and more. MOST WANTED With all the amazing features of a modern smartwatch, it’s strange how many of them aren’t waterproof. The Rise claims 1ATM water resistance, which means it should be able to…

1 OFFICE FOR IPAD Free with Office 365 subscription (from $119/year) Technically several apps, but Microsoft’s suite – Word, Excel, PowerPoint and OneNote – is a must-have if you want to work with Office documents on any platform. The apps run on all iOS devices with iOS 8 or higher, and are optimised for the iPad Pro. Install the OneDrive app to manage your free Office cloud storage. Microsoft Outlook isn’t essential, since Apple’s default Mail app can handle all your accounts, but some users prefer it. 2 ENLIGHT $5.99 It has all the usual retro filters, decals and one-click image fixes, but this photo editor is winning plaudits for its maskable tone adjustments, warping and healing tools, creative blending modes and painted effects. You can recompose photos and add…

WE TESTED A SMALL BUT REPRESENTATIVE SLICE OF THE DDR4 KITS AVAILABLE TODAY Kingston HyperX HX421C14FB2K2 16GB Price: $101 If you’re looking for the most affordable DDR4 kit around, this one is hard to pass up. With decent memory timings, and the ability to run easily at 2400MHz, this offers damn good value. The price is surprisingly low, as the recommended price by Kingston is actually much higher – it seems retailers have a bit of margin to play with when it comes to the HyperX brand. Kingston KVR21N15S8K2 16GB DDR4 2133MHz Price: $99 We’re a little perplexed about why this kit is almost identically priced to the HyperX kit, also from Kingston. It’s got slower memory timings of CL15 versus the HyperX’s CL14, and lacks the fancy heat-spreader. According…

The top, front and bottom of the UMX4’s outer frame is actually a single piece of aluminium magnesium alloy that wraps around the whole chassis. With no seams or panel lines visible from the front coupled with the dark tinted tempered glass side panels make for one modern and chic chassis to adorn your computer desk with. Like the RM3, no 5.25-inch bays exist in this design and where you’d typically find the 5.25-inch bays instead you’ll find the PSU mount. Which is genius really, it allows the PSU fan to suck air from in the case and expel it out the removable mesh top. Having the PSU up there also allows the whole chassis to drop down in height further reducing the volume of the case, smaller than many…

$100 • www.philips.com.au Here’s the thing. You can buy Bose QC 25 noise cancellers for three times the price of these, and they’re a little bit better, or these Philips jobs for under a hundred bucks, and they’re almost as good. The comfort is neck and neck; and Bose QC 25’s are just about the most comfy headphones out there. These are easily pleasant enough for a long haul flight, with a single AAA battery good for about 33 hours of precious blissful noise cancelling. It’s a plus, too, that these use a simple replaceable battery. If you use Bluetooth while noisecancelling, battery life is about 16 hours. Sound quality is superb for the price. I occasionally rock out at my desk with these, and have done a few flights…

$89 • www.corsair.com The original Corsair M65 mouse has been my go-to, at-home gaming mouse since it was first released years ago. Sadly, the mouse does not live up to its forebear. It is just as finely designed, with a higher 12,000dpi sensor making mouse movements as smooth as butter on both the desktop and in game. But the RGB lighting adds some bling, if that’s your thing, and a useful weighting system lets you fine-tune the balance of the mouse so it’s just right. However, Corsair has moved the position of the Sniper button, so that it now sits right under the thumb, making a tight grip more or less impossible. In practice this results in a serious loss of performance as you’re either changing your grip, or accidentally…

H ave you ever tweaked a photograph to near-perfection on your PC only to find it looks terrible on your laptop or tablet, or makes for lacklustre prints? That’s because your monitor isn’t telling you the truth. Modern monitors might be capable of producing more than a billion colours, but if they display the wrong ones then all that judicious tweaking and painstaking editing is no better than guesswork. It’s something that photographers and design professionals have known for decades: if you haven’t got a colouraccurate monitor on your desk, then you simply can’t do your job properly. You need a screen that can display colours accurately across every one of its million or so pixels, in addition to providing the features you need to work comfortably and efficiently. PRO…

GIGABYTE Z170X-GAMING 7 MOTHERBOARD If you are looking for the ultimate gaming motherboard, look no further than this Gigabyte Z170X-Gaming 7 motherboard. Voted by PC PowerPlay Magazine as the ‘Motherboard of the Year’, there is plenty of technology and innovation to back that up. The motherboard is an ATX board, with USB 3.1 and Type-C, DDR4 support, and M.2 storage. The board supports Intel’s 6th-gen Core processors and it is Thunderbolt 3 certified! Networking is via a pair of Intel/Killer NICs, and there are six SATA 6GB/s connectors, and three SATA Express connectors for 16GB/s transfer rates. You can run up to 3-way SLI/Crossfire, you can customise the LED lights on the board. Lastly and most importantly, the board is equipped with a Creative SoundCore 3D Gaming Audio Chip with…

VALUE Asus T100HA PRICE $428 SUPPLIER www.asus.com.au Performance that delivers everything typical day to day computing demands short of intense gaming, combined with a fantastic screen and a solid and we think, rugged design makes this the value king. SPECIFICATIONS 10.1in IPS panel • Intel Quad-Core x5-Z8500 processor • 64GB eMMC SSD • 4GB LPDDR3 memory GAMING Metabox Prime P870DM-G PRICE $4,549 SUPPLIER www.metabox.com.au If you can handle the noise, the net result of all of this hardware is a speed demon of a machine, without doubt the fastest gaming laptop we’ve tested. SPECIFICATIONS 17.1in 1920 x 1080 G-Sync display • Intel 6th Gen Core i7-6700K CPU (quad-cored, Hyper-Threaded 4GHz) • 16GB DDR4 memory • 250GB Samsung EVO M.2 SSD and 1TB HDD PROFESSIONAL Microsoft Surface Book PRICE $2,299 –…

T he dvds holding your precious family photos may survive between 20 to 200 years, but researchers at the University of Southampton believe they can do better – raising that to 13.8 billion years. That’s roughly how long data stored in 5D nanostructures in fused quartz can last – essentially until the end of human time, according to scientists at the university’s Optoelectronics Research Centre. The storage discs themselves are small circles of glass with a capacity of 360TB each. They can withstand temperatures of up to 1,000°C and still be readable, and will last an estimated 13.8 billion years at temperatures below 190°C. Files are written in three layers of nanostructured dots that are five micrometres apart; data is read by how they change the way light travels through…

Normally readers contact me via Twitter, but the question behind this month’s column comes from my local barber shop. A fellow customer, who was having their hair cut at the same time, somehow recognised me from the microscopic picture above and struck up a conversation about various techie things. It made a nice change from the usual “Going away this year?” (no, but I wouldn’t tell you if I was), and “What team do you support?” (I can’t stand football) banter from the barber. My fellow customer explained that he currently uses a traditional desktop at work, a laptop at home (which is occasionally pressed into service when he travels to clients), and an iPad that’s mainly used for sofa surfing and watching Netflix in bed. All three devices are…

Last month I explained how to use Visual Studio to write Windows 10 Core apps to run on microcomputers such as the Raspberry Pi. Quite capable of running advanced operating systems, including Linux and Windows, these boards are overkill for many projects – particularly for wearables, where size, weight and power consumption are significant issues. Enter Arduino, which sparked off the whole arena of maker microcomputers. This comes in a variety of formats from the original Arduino Uno to the Micro and right down to the wearable clone, Gemma. These boards don’t have such luxuries as HDMI monitor outputs; in fact, they have no way of plugging a monitor into them at all, which is why a decent development tool is key to see what your code is doing. The…

It was one of those editorial email threads, where ideas were being kicked around. The boss asked what would one do to an iPad Pro to make it a better laptop replacement? One person decided that adding access to the file system would be a good idea. My response was, shall we say, somewhat sharp, harsh and less then complimentary. I know why he wants access to the file system. That’s the way we’ve been using computers since the days of the floppy disk. Even the cassette drive before that, if you want to be completely prehistoric. But my response was based on a view that this is 2016. Apps should be able to find stuff, work on it, ensure it’s properly backed up, and to handle a modern view…

NBNCO RESPONDS I read with much interest your editorial in the latest PC & Tech Authority and would like to follow up on some points you raised in the article. We now have close to 50,000 FTTN end-users and the lines to which they are connected are delivering average Layer-2 speeds of 76Mbps/35Mbps – and yet over 80% of end-users are choosing 12/1Mbps or 25/5Mbps services. Even on the FTTP network only 16% of end-users are choosing the 100/40Mbps plan with more than 80% of end-users choosing 12/1Mbps or 25/5Mbps. This would seem to refute the idea that FTTN is not good enough to support current end-user needs since end-users are ordering services three times lower than the average FTTN speed being delivered across the network. [In regards to your…

Ben Mansill visits a tank museum in Cairns What Wargaming is doing with its military restoration projects is so utterly unique that you just have to be impressed. The company doesn’t need to do this. It’s an immensely wealthy company and there are countless ways it could be spending its money. While cynics may say that this is all just marketing – and I don’t mind saying I held sentiments along those lines before this – it’s when you meet the Wargaming people and talk to them that it becomes clear their love of this equipment and the era is real. The passion is real and so is the pride. Here we are, in the Australian Armour and Artillery Museum in Cairns, witnessing the unveiling of a WW2 Sentinal tank…

Buying new PC parts to upgrade an existing system or to build an entirely new one from scratch is typically a pain-free experience, often bringing much satisfaction to those doing the upgrading/building. However, if you do it long enough, often enough, and even for other people, you start to see a trend. While the parts may be new, some types of hardware are more prone to being dead on arrival (DOA) or dying early on in their life more often than others. From personal experience over the decades RAM, hard drives, fans and power supplies are typically things that often turn up DOA or fail early on more often than others. Whereas things like CPUs, SSDs and optical drives (short of some incident in postage) I’ve never seen DOA or…

BEN MANSILL ON WHY IT’S A GOOD TIME TO BE EXCITED You won’t find better reviews anywhere in Australia! Professional monitors are on a higher plane than what passes as a top quality general purpose screen. Each year we do a pro monitors group test, and every time we see specialist manufacturer Eizo run away with it. The professionals who rely on perfect colour accuracy are often quoted (and by us, too) as your typical creative group, like designers, photographers of course, and videographers, too. They’re the ones that demand absolute perfection in what has to be, without fail; ‘what you see on screen is what you get when you print’ – or however the work is intended to end up. Edging close to these supreme beasts are a great…

W estern Digital certainly knows a thing or two about making hard drives, but building the enclosures to utilise them is a vastly different story. The new My Cloud EX2 Ultra is a Network Attached Storage (NAS) device, and faces incredibly stiff competition from the likes of Synology and Qnap, who offer 2-bay models, but at around $150 more. Is this refresh to 2014’s original My Cloud NAS up to taking on the competition? The prior model used a Marvell A370 1.2GHz single-core SoC and 512MB of DDR3 RAM, and as a result struggled to transcode HD videos. The major improvement in this year’s model is a boost in both areas. The processor been upgraded to a dual-core Marvell Armada 385 1.3GHz SoC, while the DDR3 memory has doubled to…

$185 • www.razerzone.com Razer is continuing to go its own way with mechanical switches, ditching Cherry switches in favour of its own mechanism. And while the new Chroma keyboard is an improvement, it’s still not on par with Cherry-equipped keyboards. It is cheaper, and the Chroma lighting is very versatile and even capable of being elegant, especially the subtly pulsing mode that slowly changes colour over time. And its chassis very sturdy and heavy – no matter how hard you type, this keyboard will not shift around on the desktop. But in actual practice, typing and playing games, the keys are a mixed bag. The alpha keys are a largely fine, albeit a little muddy in their action, as if too much plastic is in contact and causing subtle friction.…

$259 • www.aten.com We know that many graphic designers, animators, video editors and the like often use multiple PCs on a single screen, so the arrival of this KVM that can handle 4K resolution, thanks to its DisplayPort 1.2 connection, is big news. Video at up to 3840x2160 @ 60Hz is supported, along with HD audio, again thanks to the DP 1.2 port. You can also switch the keyboard, video and mouse independent to the audio stream for added convenience. The box supports power-on/off detection, so if you shut down (or send to sleep) one connected computer the other one (if it’s on) will automatically be selected. A remote control is included, too.…

It almost feels inevitable. Yes, we have a new smartphone champion and there’s no denying the incredible new Samsung Galaxy S7 its place here. While the Sony Xperia Z5 is still a favourite – particularly the Compact model – Samsung is kicking it out of the park with the S7. We’re not fans of the Edge model (that holds true for the Galaxy S6, too), because it’s tricky to hold it without accidentally triggering something on screen, and in general having to hold it so delicately is a pain that never goes away. But the standard S7 is gold. It’s this editor’s new favourite and in it goes. WHAT WE SAID: There’s no doubt that the Samsung Galaxy S7 is a superior phone to the S6: its camera and performance…

SMARTPHONE Samsung Galaxy S7 PRICE $1,150 SUPPLIER www.samsung.com/au It’s fast, sleek beautiful and packed with features. A wonderful handset you’ll love to own. SPECIFICATIONS Octa-core 2.3GHz/1.6GHz Samsung Exynos 8890 CPU • 4GB RAM l 32GB storage • 5.1in 1,440 x 2,560 Super AMOLED display • microSD slot • 12MP/5MP rear/front cameras TABLET Samsung Galaxy Tab S2 9.7 PRICE $599 (32GB, Wi-Fi) SUPPLIER www.samsung.com/au It’s neck and neck with the iPad Air 2, but the Galaxy Tab 2 gets it for a nicer screen, a faster CPU, microSD and being lighter. SPECIFICATIONS 1.9GHz Octa-Core CPU • 3GB RAM • 32GB storage • 9.7in 1,536 x 2,048 IPS display • 7,340mAh battery EBOOK READER Kindle Paperwhite PRICE $119 SUPPLIER www.amazon.com The premium Kindle goes the extra mile, with a more attractive design,…

FEATURES + MALWARE FIGHTER 4+ AUSLOGICS BITREPLICA+ JETDRIVE 8 PROFESSIONAL+ CYBERLINK PHOTODIRECTOR 6 DRIVERS + ATI CATALYST + NVIDIA FORCEWARE HELP + DISCLAIMER + DAMAGED OR FAULTY DVDS + USING THIS DVD + INSTALLING SOFTWARE EDITORIAL + CREATE AN ANDROID APP + BENCHMARK YOUR PC + UNDERSTANDING MALWARE 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 INTERNET + VUZE +…

I nstead of the “Dislike” button we all wanted, Facebook introduced a range of what it calls “reaction buttons” (but almost everyone else calls emojis). The idea is that rather than just Liking a post, you can now demonstrate sadness, anger, love or amusement – even gobsmackedness (also known as the “wow” button). I’d rather have just had “like” and “dislike”; these extra buttons don’t really extend beyond the cosmetic. This is important because when you hit “Like”, it does more than just show your appreciation of a post: it kicks offthe Facebook algorithm behind the scenes that determines “engagement”. Engagement is what helps Facebook decide which posts (and ads for that matter) will appear in newsfeeds – whenever you like a post, it’s more likely to be shown in…

CPU TIME FOR NEW-GEN CONSOLES ALREADY? AMD knew it was onto a good thing when it secured the SoC supply deals for both Sony’s PlayStation 4 and Microsoft’s Xbox One. It would also seem that Nintendo’s next generation console known simply as the NX will also have an AMD SoC inside. Word has it that the NX will feature a Polarisbased SoC putting it somewhere above the PS4 in terms of performance. Certainly it’s all conjecture at this stage but if its anywhere near the truth it can only be a good thing. With Nintendo’s console sales and market share in the dumps it cannot afford to have another underpowered system like the Wii or Wii U. The PS4 appears to have a refresh coming, internally known as ‘NEO’. Currently…

BACK TO BASICS PLE Computers AMD Custom PC System $679 • http://tinyurl.com/hvcymy9 Like the other Jonsbo cases we’ve reviewed this issue, the case used with this system has no optical drive bays, combined with an mATX design focus it has made this one mightily compact system build. Having one of AMD’s lower end APUs inside means you wouldn’t want to use this for anything other than basic office or home work duties. The compact design and sleek modern looks do however make this build a good contender for a home theatre PC. We would suggest upgrading the HDD at no extra cost to a 120GB SSD for that extra snappiness though. KEY SPECS CPU: AMD A6-7400K Cooler: OEM Motherboard: Gigabyte F2A88XM-HD3 Graphics: Integrated Memory: Kingston Value Series C11 DDR3L 4GB…

It wasn’t long ago that I was thinking to myself that with optical drives diminishing in popularity, why aren’t case makers removing the bays for them entirely to free up space inside? Low and behold shortly after this thought bubble two Jonsbo samples arrived on our doorstep for review. The smaller of the pair, the RM3, makes use of the removed 5.25-inch bays by pushing the front of the case closer to the motherboard section, only stopping to accommodate the largest of graphics cards up to 31cm long. A 32cm card is possible but it would simultaneously be touching both the front and the rear of the case as well as blocking one of the two SSD/HDD mounting points that sit flush to the inside of the front panel. Three…

$140 • www.kingston.com This little device can be incredibly useful. It’s a portable 6,700 mAh battery. It’s a wireless portable hard drive with 64GB of built-in memory, which you can also use to backup your phone. It’s an SD card and USB drive reader, which you can also use to transfer files between other devices including tablets and smart phones using the handy app. To put it simply, it’s a great multi-tool for anyone who uses modern technology. I personally record a lot of video on my phone. More often than not, I find myself chewing the phones memory and wishing I had more. The G3 allows me to utilize the 64GB of internal memory, freeing space on my phone. I can also film on my DSLR, then using the…

$149 • www.logitech.com In PCTA #221 (page 64) I reviewed Logitech’s new G810 Orion Spectrum keyboard. I loved it, I gave it a full whack of score-stars plus an award. For exactly the same reasons the newer G610 Orion Brown received identical accolades. The reasons being: it looks a treat in classy matte black with gloss black edging. It’s entirely free of design excess, instead being a most elegant slab that looks terrific on your desk. And lastly, that Logi’s proprietary Romer G key mechanism really is quite nice. For the Orion Brown, Logitech used exactly the same chassis and case, but now with the immensely popular Cherry Brown switches instead of Romers. The Orion Brown also has but one backlight colour; a simple white. It’s beautiful to look at…

Things seem to move pretty slow in the world of desktop monitors. While TVs grow ever larger and cheaper – adopting the latest features and technologies such as 4K, OLED and curved screens – the monitors here might look like they’re stuck in the past. The irony, however, is that although the cutting-edge display tech in the latest TVs and smartphones is theoretically capable of serving up perfect skin tones and natural, lifelike images, most manufacturers crank everything right up to 11 by default – because it’s what customers instinctively like. Given the choice between a screen that’s dripping with lurid, oversaturated colour and exaggerated bright and dark contrasts, or a technically accurate rendering of the same scene, most people opt for the enhanced image. But most people haven’t laid…

STEELSERIES SIBERIA 350 The Siberia 350 is built for total gaming immersion. Powerful, next-gen SteelSeries speaker drivers paired with DTS Headphone:X 7.1 surround sound deliver detailed sound for enhanced gameplay. The iconic Siberia suspension headband returns offering enduring, lightweight comfort for hours of gaming. When using the built-in USB connection on PC or Mac, and SteelSeries Engine 3 software, you can further customize the high-end sound and illumination options. Noise-reducing, memory-foam ear cushions aid in isolating the natural sounds and powerful bass. A retractable, flexible crystal-clear microphone can be muted with the flip of a switch behind the earcup. STEELSERIES APEX M500 The SteelSeries Apex M500 is a tournament-grade backlit mechanical gaming keyboard built entirely around the needs of professional gamers. By combining Danish design with German engineered Cherry MX…

They came. They saw. They Upgraded. On a lovely Melbourne night this week hundreds of PC & Tech Authority, PC PowerPlay and Hyper readers piled in for a fest of gear gawking, great gaming, prize fulfilment and beer and food consumerage. It was indeed a mighty night, and one and all got right into a most splendid display of incredible PC gear and fun stuff to do Intel brought along a machine that scanned people’s heads into a block of crystal. It was quite amazing. Intel also graced us with the presence of ANZ Technical Manager Graham Tucker who led the keynote and answered many questions from the crowd. There was also a bangin LAN there thanks to MSY with gamers head down and deep into the fun zone. Oh,…

SUPPLIER www.asus.com.au If you’re connecting less than ten devices to the twin 5GHz networks, this extra bandwidth isn’t necessary, but there’s no harm in future-proofing as more devices start including Wi-Fi. SPECIFICATIONS Tri-band router (2 x 5GHz and 1 x 2.4GHz networks); 802.11a/b/c/g/n/ac compatible; 4x4 antennae design; Combined rate of 5334Mbps DESKTOP STORAGE CalDigit T3 with Thunderbolt 2 SUPPLIER www.amazon.com The T3 is an expensive RAID device, but when you factor in the drives and the capacity included, it’s good value. SPECIFICATIONS 6/9/12/15TB external hard disk with RAID; Thunderbolt and Thunderbolt 2, 135 x 241 x 116mm 4.5kg. NAS Synology Diskstation DS415play SUPPLIER www.synology.com For most home users, the DS415play is very impressive. It’s an all in one box that can literally do it all. SPECIFICATIONS 4x SATA 3 2.5”/3.5”…

SECURITY Kaspersky Total Security SUPPLIER www.kaspersky.com Kaspersky Total Security is the only security package on test that achieved both perfect protection and falsepositives scores BACK UP Acronis True Image 2015 SUPPLIER www.acronis.com.au The 2015 version adds full-system backup and dual backup and unlimited cloud storage. OFFICE SUITE Microsoft Office 365 Home Premium SUPPLIER www.microsoft.com.au The easiest to use Office to date. WEB DEV Adobe Dreamweaver CS6 SUPPLIER www.adobe.com.au This edition makes PHP and CMS its core focus. AUDIO Cubase 7.5 SUPPLIER www.steinberg.net The addition of better filters solidifies this program’s continued place on the A-List. VIDEO Sony Vegas Movie Studio HD Platinum 11 SUPPLIER www.sony.com.au May not have the bells and whistles of other consumer editing packages, but its tools are efficient. PHOTO Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 6 SUPPLIER www.adobe.com.au Lightroom…

Keep your wallet in your pocket: you can now not only pay with your phone, but with a swipe of your shirt, your handbag, or even with your car. That’s how Visa and MasterCard believe we want to shop in the future, unveiling plans to embed payment systems into the most unlikely objects. The Visa Ready program lets partners embed retail abilities into any device with an internet connection. MasterCard launched a developer program for wearables with mobile payments firm Coin, and is working with WISeKey to embed payments into luxury watches. In partnership with Samsung, it’s also planning to build payments into devices such as smart appliances, letting your fridge restock groceries. The Visa system will first focus on wearables and cars, with Honda planning a one-click payment system…

My eyes lit up when I read the bugfix report. Finally, customisable buttons had come to Office for Mac. I could barely contain my excitement at downloading and installing the new 15.19.1 build. With sweaty palms, I slid my fingers across the trackpad and went searching for the new capability. Without wishing to descend into a “50 shades of UI design” theme, I started looking. And kept looking. And found almost nothing there. Here’s the problem. The full-fat Microsoft Office packages are supposed to be the best of the best. You pay a lot for these upper-tier versions, the ones designed for Mac and Windows, because they’re supposed to do everything. Below this sits a lower-level tier of Office, which runs on Windows, Android and iOS. Microsoft claims these versions…

Of all the terms I was expecting to hear while walking around the enormous, crowded halls of Bett, a local IT in education show, “anti-radicalisation” was way off my radar. This is in effect a new field in educational computing, and one that is unprecedented in terms of charging our industry to come up with results. How can manufacturers be expected to deliver products to meet this new type of need? Right now it’s hard enough to sketch out what the response should be, much less turn it into a box with an LED on the front and a load of code on the inside. For a moment, just try to grapple with the range of subjects that fall into this broad and overly long category of “things you would…

Virtual reality is now officially here with the much-anticipated consumer release of both the Oculus Rift and the Valve/HTC Vive. While in principle it’s nothing new – oldies might remember the Viewmaster – it’s taken this long for the right combination of technologies to create a real-time, immersive, and essentially mind-blowing viewing experience. The potential of VR is so large that already new applications and industries are springing up around it – which is, of course, what innovation tends to do – but VR is such a leap that most of the ways it will change our lives haven’t been realised yet. For now entertainment is the obvious application, with immersive games and simulations, but there’s a lot more to explore. Already the first ‘VR surgery’ has been broadcast, with…