Table of contents for 649 in Computeractive

Property companies in England must guarantee that new homes can receive Gigabit (1Gbps) broadband under new laws that came into force on 26 December. The Government has encouraged the devolved administrations in Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales to follow suit. Recent Government analysis showed that around 25,300 new homes (12 per cent) still didn’t have full-fibre broadband in a typical year. The law amends 2010’s Building Regulations to ensure that homeowners avoid “the need for costly and disruptive installation work after the home is built”. Equipment required for 1Gbps speeds, such as ducts, chambers and termination points, must be installed even if Gigabit services aren’t yet available in the area. “This will ensure that homes are fit for the digital age, but may not be connected straight away,” the Government…

Netgear has released emergency firmware updates for nine of its routers to block a security flaw that could allow hackers access to your home network. Nearly all the routers are in the company’s Nighthawk range, including the RAX40 (£124 from www.snipca.com/44633) and X6S (£461 from www.snipca.com/44634). Visit Netgear’s site (www.snipca.com/44631) to see the full list. If your router is affected, visit www.netgear.com/support then type your router model number and click the correct result (see screenshot 1). On the following page click the blue Downloads button, and then under the Current Versions heading click Firmware Version, followed by the blue Download button 2. Once the update has been installed, Netgear recommends following the instructions in your “product’s user manual, firmware release notes, or product support page” to install it. To see…

Access the trees of your distant cousins Last issue we explained how to take a DNA test through Ancestry (www.ancestry.co.uk/dna), and how to connect your family tree with the results. As a follow-up, we’ll now explore how to use the results to dive deeper into your research. See your ethnicity and choose maternal or paternal cousins Click ‘DNA’ at the top of Ancestry’s home page, then select ‘Your DNA Results Summary’. Now click ‘Discover Your DNA Story’ to see your ethnicity in the left-hand panel, based on how many distant cousins around the world share your DNA. The results change annually, as more people test from different countries. This tool is particularly useful for adults who were adopted and don’t know the ethnic background of their biological parents. The results…

PC | £1,499 from Wired2Fire www.snipca.com/44481 Wired2Fire Predator X7 Box office This is our first look at a PC built around AMD’s Ryzen 5 7600X processor, one of four chips the company announced last autumn. It sits in a new type of socket on the motherboard, so can’t be used to upgrade a PC that uses an older AMD processor. It can handle the faster DDR5 memory, which comes with the X7, but all these cutting-edge components mean that the whole thing is fairly expensive. In office tasks it’s the fastest PC we’ve tested and powerful enough for the latest games Wired2Fire has opted for a mid-range motherboard, the MSI Pro B650M-A WiFi, but even this costs around £230. That’s almost two-thirds of the price of the processor (£349). With…

Q I am looking for a basic wireless keyboard that has an indicator or light that shows when the Caps Lock button is on. I used to have one, but have not been able to find one since. A We were surprised by how difficult a task this was. Logitech has a great range of keyboards, many of which come with a Caps Lock light, but none of those models can be considered basic. However, we did find one called the MK540 (£49 from www.snipca.com/44521, pictured), which comes with a wireless mouse, and doesn’t seem to be available on its own. You could always sell the mouse if you already have one or keep it as a spare. We did see a keyboard on Amazon called Arteck 2.4G Wireless Keyboard…

PHOTO-EDITING | £60 from Serif www.snipca.com/44625 Adobe’s Photoshop has maintained its position as the industry standard for photoediting software for decades now. However, its lofty status comes with a premium price tag – a subscription can cost around £20 a month. Even Photoshop Elements, the company’s stripped-back version for home users, costs £87 to buy. That’s one reason why Serif’s Affinity Photo program has proved so popular. This second version of the software is a direct rival to the full-blown version of Photoshop, yet costs only £59.99 for a lifetime licence with no subscription fees. Even better, if you get your skates on, you can grab it for only £35.99 until 25 January. A great-value photo editor with loads of new options and a friendly interface Affinity Photo 2 has…

TIP OF THE FORTNIGHT Make it easier to see devices using your Wi-Fi I wasn’t surprised to see Wireless Network Watcher (www.snipca.com/42076) among readers’ top 10 most-clicked links of 2022 (Issue 648, page 61). Like all programs made by the marvellous NirSoft, it contains plenty of ingenious features to make it easier to use. The setting I’d always recommend turning on is ‘Mark Odd/Even Rows’ (1 in our screenshot), found in the View menu. This shades the results alternately in white and grey 2, making it easier to distinguish between them. I always have trouble interpreting results produced by programs, so this is a great help. The other setting I’d advise activating is ‘Put Icon On Tray’ in the Options menu. Call me paranoid, but I check every day whether someone…

What is it? A new technology for ebook readers that should make reading in colour a much more enjoyable experience than it currently is. Is it particularly bad now, then? Yes, very. Colours on the few e-readers that can handle them look washed out and faded. They’re not worth the extra money they cost. How expensive are they? Significantly more than a typical monochrome e-reader. The PocketBook InkPad Color (www.snipca.com/44619), for example, costs £276 and gives you a measly 16GB storage. More expensive still is the Onyx Boox Nova 3 Color (www.snipca.com/44617, pictured below), at £420, though at least you get 32GB of storage. However, you can get that amount from our current favourite e-reader, the Kobo Libra 2 (www.snipca.com/40645, see page 32) – and that costs just £170. Amazon’s…

The code for open-source software is made freely available to other developers, so they can help improve programs by identifying bugs and suggesting new features. This collaboration often involves ‘forking’, which allows you to modify somebody else’s project, share the changes you’ve made and let the original developer decide whether to incorporate your modifications. But some ‘forks’ result in software being turned into a completely new project because users are unhappy with the direction the developer has taken. Privacy concerns are among the most common reasons for forking, which has resulted in some interesting open-source alternatives. Here we reveal the best private forks of popular tools. Switch to a Google-free Chromium browser If you want to stay private when browsing the web, Chrome is far from ideal. Even if you…

Microsoft appears to have scrapped plans to show recommended websites in the Windows 11 Start menu following complaints from users. The feature, introduced in November in Preview Build 25247, showed websites that Microsoft thought you might be interested in based on your browsing history. The sites appeared in the Recommended section of the Start menu. In the screenshot (right) that Microsoft used when explaining the feature, it recommended online retailer Etsy and Twitter. Critics claimed it gave Microsoft the opportunity to clutter the Start menu with adverts that would detract from more important elements shown in the Recommended section, such as recently opened files and installed apps – also shown in the screenshot. Microsoft is also axing the option that lets you search online for words you paste into Windows.…

HP has used recycled coffee grounds in the design of its new All-in-One (AIOs) PCs (pictured), as it aims to build more sustainable computers. Both the 24in and 27in machines have coffee grounds in the speckled design of the bezels around the screen. The company said that the computers use 40-per-cent “post-consumer recycled materials” in their chassis and 75-per-cent recycled aluminium in their stand arms and necks, while the felt bases are made entirely from recycled polyester. It also claims that the packaging has been sourced sustainably, is entirely recycled, and is 62 per cent smaller than previous boxes, allowing for more units to be placed on pallets when being shipped around the world. Both computers come with Windows 11 Home, are powered by the latest AMD or Intel processors…

The British public now know what to do when their broadband contract ends: haggle or switch. A new survey of over 5,100 customers from consumer group Which? shows that nearly 80 per cent of customers try to get a better deal by either negotiating with their current provider or shopping around and switching. The same survey shows that one strategy delivers much better results than the other. On average, broadband customers haggling saved £43 a year, while those switching saved more than twice as much (£92). It’s a similar outcome for customers on TV and broadband bundles – haggling saved £90, while switching saved £162. Broadband customers leaving BT saved the most money – an average of £127. Virgin Media customers made the biggest savings by haggling (£77). It was…

Feels natural to watch Christmas TV on catch-up It seemed appropriate that I read Issue 648’s ‘Question of the Fortnight’ (‘When will the BBC switch off its TV and radio broadcasts?’) a few days after Christmas because it highlighted just how profoundly festive viewing habits have changed. From the early 1970s to about 2015 we always watched the Queen giving her Christmas message at 3pm on the dot. During one recent Christmas Day we were unable to watch it live, but then realised we could simply watch it later on the iPlayer. Since then, we’ve never caught it live and have relied on the iPlayer to watch it a few hours later – as we did this year with the new King’s first message, and indeed all the special programmes…

LAPTOP | £1,050 from HP www.snipca.com/44496 There are several models in HP’s Pavilion Plus 14 range, with the same sleek design but offering different Intel processors and screen types. The model we’re reviewing here, however, hits something of a sweet spot. First up, it’s powered by a 12th-generation Intel Core i7-1255U processor combined with 16GB of RAM. This makes it a strong performer, ensuring a good showing in both processor and Windows benchmark tests. However, this doesn’t get as much out of its i7 processor as the slightly cheaper Acer Swift 3 14in (£999 from www.snipca.com/44367 – see page 30) does with the slightly faster i7-1260P chip. If performance is paramount for you, we’d suggest the Swift 3 over this one. A stunning screen that really pops, but it does…

Time required: One hour When data is sent across the internet, it rarely travels in one big chunk. Instead, every email, photo or streamed song heading your way is chopped down into smaller pieces, called packets, which bounce from one server to the next until they reach your PC. There’s no guarantee they’ll all take the same route, nor that they’ll arrive in the right order. Some may take a more convoluted route than others, while some servers might not be so quick at handing off the packets it receives to the next server in the chain. Therefore, each packet carries additional data, a bit like the address on an envelope, that makes clear which other packets it goes with, and where it fits in the overall collection. Your computer…

In December, BT published research that highlighted the importance of learning new digital skills among the older generation. Its report (see www.snipca.com/44641) found that 39 per cent of older adults feel they aren’t ‘tech savvy’, but are still keen to master new technology. It listed 40 digital skills that the over-60s have learnt in the past 10 years, which ranged from basic everyday activities such as online shopping, taking photos on a mobile phone and streaming TV shows to more advanced tech tasks including connecting to Wi-Fi, setting up a VPN and using QR codes. Most Computeractive readers should comfortably be able to tick off all 40 items in BT’s list, but technology is constantly evolving and there are always new skills to learn if you want to keep up…

PROBLEM OF THE FORTNIGHT How do I stop saved websites creating folders? Q When I save a website to my Windows desktop using Edge, the browser always saves an additional unwanted folder on the desktop. If I delete this folder, the saved site also disappears. What’s happening here? I’d also prefer it if the icon for the saved site was that of the website in question, but it’s always a blue and green globe. How do I get around these issues? Paul Rayner A What you describe is just the way this feature works in Edge and pretty much every other web browser. When you choose the ‘Save page as’ option, your browser downloads all the files that make up that web page and saves them into a folder (on…

Add Dynamic Island to his PC According to several tech news websites, Dynamic Island is the iPhone 14 Pro feature “everyone is talking about”. Perhaps I move in the wrong circles, because I don’t know anyone who can afford to pay over £1,000 for a high-end phone, and the people I do know certainly aren’t talking about Dynamic Island. Instead they’re bemoaning the price of a pint of milk, discussing the winter weather and contemplating Elon Musk’s latest crazy scheme. Besides, Dynamic Island is a silly name that brings to mind the 1970s series Fantasy Island and the song of the same title by cheesy 1980s pop group Tight Fit. But still, I was intrigued to find out what this supposedly much talked-about feature actually does, which is to provide…

TIVO TO LAUNCH OWN SMART-TV SYSTEM TiVo is building a smart-TV system to rival Google, Amazon and Roku. The company, well known for making digital video recorders, said TiVo OS will be available by the spring on sets made by manufacturers including Daewoo, Hitachi and JVC. UK MALWARE ATTACKS ROSE BY 77% IN 2022 Malware attacks on UK organisations rose by 77 per cent in 2022, according to security analysts Check Point, more than double the global average of 38 per cent. The education/research sector was the most attacked industry in the UK, suffering a weekly average of 2,653 hacks – up 237 per cent from 2021. Worldwide attacks reached an all-time high in the final three months of 2022. Read Check Point’s report at www.snipca.com/44670. TOMORROW’S WORLD This robot’s…

The world’s biggest ransomware gang has apologised for hacking a Canadian hospital that conducts research on helping sick children. On 18 December, Toronto’s Hospital for Sick Children – known as SickKids – said it had been attacked by the LockBit ransomware, causing problems with its internal computer systems, phone lines and website. On 29 December, the hospital said it had restored 50 per cent of its priority systems. Two days later the LockBit gang apologised for the attack, and gave the hospital the decryptor it needed to free itself from the ransomware. It said that the attack was carried out by a “partner” who had “violated our rules” and no longer works for them. SickKids said it was aware of the apology, stressed that it hadn’t made a ransom payment,…

WATCH OUT FOR… Fake Google results for popular software What’s the threat? Hackers have infiltrated Google’s results to show fake adverts for some of the world’s most popular programs when you search for them. The widespread scam, spotted by security firms Guardio Labs and Trend Micro, includes adverts for audio editor Audacity, privacyfocused browser Brave, password manager Dashlane, office suite LibreOffice, security tool Malwarebytes, remote-access software TeamViewer and email client Thunderbird. Google typically removes adverts that it detects are linking to sites containing malware. But the criminals behind the recent attack fooled Google’s automated checks by creating safe sites that sit in the middle between the advert and the malicious site. Clicking the advert takes you to this safe site, which then redirects you to a fake site that impersonates…

System Mechanic 23 www.snipca.com/44667 Price: £44.95 a year Free trial: 30 days What you need: Windows 7, 8.1, 10 or 11 Now in its 23rd year and 23rd version, Iolo’s System Mechanic is one of the best-known names in PC-optimisation software. It’s packed with useful features for boosting the performance of your machine by removing junk files and unwanted programs, detecting and fixing problems, securely wiping files and drives, and much more, and if someone bought it for you, we imagine you’d be delighted. Although you can combine several free tools to get all the options offered by System Mechanic, it’s handy to have them in one place and the redesigned interface in version 23 makes them even easier to access. Its scans are fast and thorough, and it deep-cleans…

MINI PC | £409 from Geekom www.snipca.com/44538 Anyone who liked the look of the Geekom Mini IT11 we reviewed in Issue 646 (£639 from www.snipca.com/43962) but doesn’t want to spend that much on their next PC should consider this affordable alternative. As its name implies, it uses a significantly older 8th-generation Intel processor instead of the 11th-gen chip in the IT11. However, this choice helps to bring the price down without significantly compromising basic Windows performance. As you’d expect, it still provides better performance than more up-to-date but less powerful processors, such as the 11th-generation Celeron processor in the budget Geekom MiniAir 11 we reviewed in Issue 641 (£199 from www.snipca.com/43212). The IT8 sits happily between the two. It is designed for office use, so is at its best with…

EBOOK READER | £330 from Amazon www.snipca.com/44519 We’ve reviewed ebook readers that you can write on previously, such as the Onyx Boox Note Air 2 (£470 from Amazon www.snipca.com/40896) in Issue 626. However, this is the first Kindle that comes with a stylus, letting you scribble handwritten information as well as reading books and adding notes with an onscreen keyboard At its core it’s still the excellent kind of ebook reader we’ve come to expect from Amazon. It has a large 10in E Ink screen with a highly detailed pixel density of 300dpi, so text and images look sharp and detailed. It also has a very bright LED backlight that can be adjusted for more comfortable night reading. You can access the full Kindle book library, which is great if…

LAPTOP PRICE DROP Acer Swift 3 14in £899 from www.snipca.com/44367 Tested Issue 648 Comes with a powerful 12th-generation Intel processor and 1TB SSD to make Windows tasks feel incredibly fast. Also has a decent 2560x1440-pixel IPS screen and comes with plenty of ports, including two Thunderbolt 4-compatible USB-C. ALTERNATIVE Lenovo Yoga 6 Gen 7 Also has a fast processor, long battery life and plenty of ports, but not as cheap as it once was. £652 from www.snipca.com/42509 ANDROID TABLET PRICE DROP Samsung Galaxy Tab S8 £529 from www.snipca.com/42211 Tested Issue 634 Samsung has replaced its own Tab S7+ to become our favourite Android tablet. It’s fast with a stunning 11in screen, and has a longer battery life than the iPad. This model gives you 128GB – you’ll need to pay…

What you need: Hasleo Backup Suite 3; external hard drive or SSD Time required: One hour In Issue 647 (page 51) we recommended Hasleo Backup Suite 3 as an alternative to Macrium Reflect Free, which is being retired. It’s a powerful yet easy-to-use backup tool with all the essential features available for free. In this Workshop, we’ll show you how to use Hasleo Backup Suite 3 to back up both individual filesand your entire Windows installation. The only other thing you’ll need is an external hard drive or SSD, but this needn’t be expensive. You can buy a 2TB Seagate hard drive for £58 (www.snipca.com/44605), or a 4TB Toshiba model for £90 (www.snipca.com/44606). Either is a small price to pay for peace of mind. STEP 1 Download Hasleo Backup Suite…

Make and send invoices for free Invoicing is not easy to get right, but there’s a great template-based service called Invoice Home that lets you create an invoice in a matter of minutes and send it via email. It also makes it easier to accept payments using various methods, including VISA and PayPal. The only catch is that you have to pay a £5 monthly subscription if you are invoicing for over $1,000 (around £821) a month. However, if your club has to send only the occasional invoice then you’ll find the free service is perfectly adequate. Create and verify your account Before you decide whether it’s worth creating an account at Invoice Home, visit www.snipca.com/44493 to browse its 100 invoice templates. There’s a great selection, so you should find…

Avoid fake SSDs from unknown brands In Issue 646 (page 7) we reported that Amazon was selling fake 16TB SSDs for under £100, which is several thousand pounds cheaper than we’d expect to pay. To put that into context, Samsung’s 870 QVO 8TB – with half the capacity of the rip-off SSDs – has a recommended retail price just shy of £700, and at the time of writing costs £570 on Amazon (www.snipca.com/44546). The only genuine 16TB SSD we’ve seen on sale recently is iStorage’s password-protected diskAshur2, and that costs a cool £4,198 (www.snipca.com/44627). Nearly six weeks after we warned about the fake SSDs, Amazon is still selling them. We won’t link to them in this feature, but you’ll find them by searching for 16TB SSD on Amazon and looking…