PC Pro August 2020

too lazy to read this? i was almost too lazy to write it

TRY AS I MIGHT to find a nice way to dress this up, I can’t: we’re lazy. All of us. You, me, that driver who never thanked you for letting him pass. It’s human nature to follow the path of least resistance, which is why there’s always such a land grab when a new technology appears. Get there first and inertia will do the rest. Eight years ago, that technology was file sharing in the cloud and the company that swept to market dominance was Dropbox. I don’t have mystical powers, but I’m willing to bet that you (and that rude driver) still use Dropbox today. It’s the Coca-Cola of cloud storage. So, in a spirit of wild adventure, I urge you to read through our selection of Dropbox “killers” from p106.…

virgin and o2 to marry and move out?

New chips from Intel… We take a first peek at Intel’s tenth-gen Core offerings p12 …and new chips from AMD too How the new Ryzen Pros stack up against Intel’s vPro processors p12 PC Probe Gun-shy ICO “pauses” inquiry into real-time bidding ads p14 THE PLANNED MERGER of Virgin Media and O2’s UK operations may still not be enough to prevent the companies from leaving the UK market, an analyst has warned. Liberty Global, the parent of Virgin Media in the UK, and O2 Telefonica announced they would combine their UK operations in a fifty-fifty joint venture that creates a service provider worth more than £30 billion. However, there are many obstacles to overcome, not least which brand the new operator will work under and whether the parent companies are even committed to continuing their…

news in brief

Oppo spots European opportunity Oppo is pushing into European markets through a partnership with Vodafone that it hopes will bring its handsets into the mainstream. Chinese manufacturers have been hungrily eyeing European consumers due to the impact of the US trade ban on Huawei. Oppo has rushed to take its place. Vodafone said it would stock a wide range of Oppo’s handsets from May, with a focus on 5G. According to analysts, the bold move could prove timely, especially if further arrangements follow with other carriers. “Securing a pan-European agreement with Vodafone is a significant milestone for Oppo,” said Ben Wood, a mobile analyst with CCS Insight. “It underlines the company’s global ambitions and is a clear signal that it plans to take advantage of Huawei’s current difficulties. For Vodafone, the deal brings new handsets…

new chips on the block

Who has the need for Intel’s tenth-generation speed? INTEL HAS LAUNCHED its tenth-generation Core processors for desktops, with its biggest claim being that the rangetopping i9-10900K is “the world’s fastest gaming processor”. It can dial up its frequency to a staggering 5.3GHz, albeit on a single core. What Intel isn’t shouting about is that the tenth-generation chips (codenamed Comet Lake) rely on its 14++nm process, while its nemesis AMD sits pretty on 7nm – and offers Ryzen desktop chips with up to 16 cores. Poor old Intel must make do with a maximum of ten. Whether this matters boils down to what you want to do with your PC. In truth, only a fraction of us would ever push a ten-core PC to its limits, and when it comes to games, it’s peak…

amd steps up battle with intel in business laptops

BUYERS OF BUSINESS laptops have had it easy for too long; the decision was less “should I buy AMD or Intel?” and more “which Intel chip should I buy?” Now the battle is on, with Intel launching a refreshed version of its vPro technology and AMD hoping to lure businesses with its new generation of Ryzen Pro processors. It’s no coincidence that both launches happened within days of each other. It’s also no surprise that AMD is hoping its multicore processors will give it the edge. The top-end Ryzen 7 Pro 4750U features eight cores and 16 threads, which AMD’s testing suggests gives it a 32% boost compared to an Intel Core i7-10710U with six cores and 12 threads in PC Mark 10’s Digital Content Creation tests. But it’s telling that…

freedom of information frozen

If failure to investigate industries that the Information Commissioner’s Office has already accepted are operating unlawfully is frustrating, the commissioner mothballing action on Freedom of Information (FoI) requests is even more concerning, according to tech legal experts. As part of the ICO’s role to “uphold information rights in the public interest”, it is charged with overseeing the Freedom of Information Act. It has, however, stated it will take a relaxed attitude to enforcement of requests in the wake of Covid-19. We will take a pragmatic approach… keeping engagement with the public authority to a minimum and being guided by them as to whether they are able to respond to our requests or require more time to do so,” the ICO said in a statement on its plans.”We understand that there may be…