Inhoudsopgave van December 2023 - Tech Advisor

If you haven’t looked at the consumer PC market lately, maybe don’t – it isn’t a pretty picture. Of course that’s bad news for companies like Intel, whose bread and butter is selling the chips that almost literally run the industry. But Intel’s higherups see hope on the horizon, in the form of a ‘Windows refresh’ coming in 2024. This appears to be more than the yearly update we’ve become accustomed to…maybe a lot more. The statement comes from Intel’s Chief Financial Officer David Zinsner, speaking to a financial analyst at Citigroup for Citi’s Global Technology Conference last month. The transcript has been posted to Seeking Alpha (fave.co/3Fcfr27). Here’s the relevant bit of the conversation, emphasis mine: We actually think ’24 is going to be a pretty good year for…

If the era of the AI PC is here, Microsoft and Windows 11 are leading the charge. But to where? It’s worth stepping back and figuring out where everyone is headed. Just two days after Intel’s Pat Gelsinger helped make the case for integrated AI on PCs with new AI-infused Core Ultra ‘Meteor Lake’ processors, Microsoft unveiled new Surface hardware (see page 15) and its upcoming Windows 11 feature update (see page 26) at an event in New York. Windows 11’s big autumn 2023 update, will be led by Copilot, formerly known as Windows Copilot. Now, everywhere that Microsoft has sprinkled AI inside Windows (from Windows to Edge and other places) will be known just as Copilot. And AI is everywhere within Windows 11 and its apps now. Copilot. File…

The Surface Laptop Go 3 allows Microsoft to take a another crack at the budget laptop market. It remains virtually unchanged from its earlier offering, simply providing an updated 12th-gen Core chip inside of it. Its predecessor, the Surface Laptop Go 2, always struck us as a struggle for Microsoft to establish a budget laptop in a competitive market, but with the premium Surface name attached. The Surface Laptop Go 3 tries again, this time moving from a Core i5-1135G7 to a Core i5-1235U. The trouble is that Microsoft is again trying to convince you that a sub‑1080p screen (12.4-inch, 1,536x1,024 touch-screen) is satisfactory. And to be fair, it kind of is, at least in our earlier reviews. The trouble is that back-to-school laptop deals and just general laptop deals…

Microsoft Paint is gaining generative AI powers with Paint Cocreator, a new feature debuting in conjunction that arrives in Windows 11 23H2. It’s a big win for Paint, which was on its deathbed as late as 2017. Now, Paint will essentially become a launcher and editor for Microsoft’s Bing Image Creator, a lovely AI art tool that creates AI-generated images from text prompts. After adding trivial features like dark mode, Microsoft wowed users by adding Photoshop-like transparency and layers to Paint, too. This doesn’t appear to be an overly complex update: A new ‘Cocreator’ button appears on the toolbar. Click it, and a sidebar opens to the right. There, you can simply add a text prompt, select a style, and Cocreator will create the resulting image in Paint for you…

While the features, prices and images had already been mostly leaked, Google has finally launched the Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro. The bad news is that both phones are getting a price hike. However, there are some interesting features coming to the phones, with advancements in camera tech, AI and performance. We’ve rounded up all the specs, prices and release dates for the Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro, so you can decide whether one of these models is the next Android flagship for you. RELEASE DATE Google’s new handsets are available to buy now. PRICE Pixel fans may be disappointed to hear that both phones will be getting a price hike. The base model will be jumping by £100, and the Pro model will be increasing by £150.…

Price: £899 from fave.co/3tkw3C2 While the flashy Asus Vivobook 16X and Vivobook 16 OLED might be hogging the headlines with their stand-out screens, that’s not the end of the story with this laptop family. There’s also the Vivobook 16, which seems to give you a more basic set-up with a more modest 16-inch IPS LCD. According to Asus, the Vivobook 16 is “the best everyday laptop for college”. With stand-out features such as a physical webcam shield, large 16-inch display and flexible 180-degree hinge, it might be onto something. However, underwhelming battery life, a somewhat dim and drab display, and a not-inconsiderable £899 for the range-topping i7 model that I’m reviewing here might give you pause for thought. Especially with laptops like the flexible and accomplished Lenovo Yoga 7i 16…

The printer always goes on strike when you need a printout very quickly. You probably first focus on the hardware to troubleshoot. But often your printer or multifunctional device is not responsible for the problem. Rather, it’s the last Windows update turns out to be the cause. It can destroy the printer driver, change the basic settings of the Office software or add driver versions to the system without your active intervention, which then lead to unforeseeable printing problems. Apart from Windows, consumption costs are a perennial issue with printers – at least if you have an output device that is supplied with cartridge ink or standard toner cartridges. But here, too, there are solutions with which you can noticeably reduce the follow-up costs right down to the paper. You…

Google has given an alreadyknown security vulnerability a new CVE ID with the highest severity level. The reason for this is that the vulnerability, originally classified as a Chrome bug, affects significantly more applications, because it’s a WebP vulnerability instead. The WebP image file format is particularly popular on the web because it offers a good balance between storage size and quality. But the vulnerability allows attackers to use a specially crafted WebP image to create a heap buffer overflow and execute malicious code. To do this, the image must be opened in an application; in browsers, simply calling up a website is sufficient. The code executed in the background can then install malware, for example. NUMEROUS KNOWN APPLICATIONS AFFECTED The vulnerability, which was discovered by Apple’s Security Engineering and…

Microsoft’s Surface Laptop Studio 2 is an update to its dynamic, unique predecessor, refreshed with a 13th-gen Intel Core chip and a dedicated AI processor, too. The tech giant updated three of its Surface laptops with new components recently, adding the Surface Laptop Studio 2, the Surface Laptop Go 3 (see page 20), and the Surface Go 4 (see page 18) for Business to fill various niches in its line-up. Microsoft also quietly announced a Surface Hub 3 for businesses. While none of the hardware updates are hugely noteworthy, some of the circumstances surrounding the event are. For one, the soul of the Surface brand, Panos Panay announced he would leave Microsoft just this week, days before Microsoft’s Surface launch took place. And none of the new Surfaces will include…

As we’ve already seen, Microsoft has added three new models to its Surface line-up. We were lucky enough to get an early look at the low-price Surface Laptop Go 3 and the high-end Surface Laptop Studio 2. Both offer the latest Windows 11 AI-focused features, and a few exterior touches that might be hard to spot at first. SURFACE LAPTOP GO 3 The Surface Laptop Go 3 gets an extremely gentle update – in fact, it would be hard to tell at a glance that this is a new product at all, aside from some of the colour choices. Underneath, the laptop is running a 12th-gen Intel Core processor, with the i5-1235U being the sole choice at launch. The base model will use 8GB of DDR5 RAM, more capacious and…

Windows users will soon have a way of sampling new games without downloading them, a new feature called ‘Instant Games’ that will be introduced as part of the upcoming Windows 11 update. The new feature is rolling out in preview, apparently as part of a Microsoft Store update that will coincide with the Windows 23H2 release. The new Instant Games appears to work similarly to a feature already in Android: Instant Play, part of a feature called Google Play Instant. In both Android and Windows, the ‘Instant’ portion means that selecting a new supported game to play will bypass the typical download and install process for immediate gratification. Not surprisingly, the Instant Play feature requires a game to be relatively small – less than 15MB, in the case of the…

It’s no surprise, considering Google confirmed it ahead of the Made by Google launch event, that the Pixel Watch 2 is here. Here’s everything you need to know about Google’s flagship smartwatch. The Wear OS device comes a year after Google’s much anticipated Pixel Watch and, like many second-gen editions, doesn’t rewrite the rulebook. Instead, it comes with a slew of small tweaks and upgrades as well as a slight price bump too. This might mean existing Pixel Watch owners are unlikely to upgrade but Google hopes the Pixel Watch 2 will better compete with the likes of the Apple Watch, Samsung Galaxy Watch and other rivals. RELEASE DATE Google’s latest smartwatch is available to buy now. PRICE The price of the Pixel Watch 2 has gone up compared to…

Price: £699 from fave.co/46wLh5g Xiaomi is one of the most popular smartphone makers on the planet, but do you really need one of its flagship phones? As impressive as the Xiaomi 13 and 13 Pro are, they’re also very expensive. You might not even need all their premium features, so it’s worth considering some of the Chinese company’s cheaper phones. And while the Xiaomi 13T Pro is significantly more affordable, you wouldn’t know it from most of the specifications. The MediaTak Dimensity 9200+ chipset used here is powerful enough to rival the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2, and there are no real weaknesses from a hardware perspective. But after using the Xiaomi 13T Pro as my main phone for a week, a few familiar shortcomings came to the fore. Here’s my…

The AI PC, propelled by Intel’s Meteor Lake, is almost here. So why should you care? It’s the billion-dollar question. Intel is building NPU AI inferencing engines into its processors beginning with its 14th-gen Core chip, Meteor Lake, also known as the Core Ultra. Robert Hallock, an AMD veteran now overseeing technical CPU marketing for Intel’s microprocessors, said that Intel’s goal by 2025 is to ship 100 million “AI PCs”, a term Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger began using in July. Intel announced the architecture behind the 14th-gen Core Ultra chip on Tuesday, the same day as Intel’s Innovation conference began in San Jose. Intel used the conference to pitch developers both on what an AI-powered future will look like, especially one powered by Intel. Intel’s Core Ultra is notable for…

It seems Microsoft has decided to make the Surface Go line of tiny tablets a purely business device, announcing the Surface Go 4 for Business but without a consumer option. What’s new? The lack of Arm options and a new Intel processor. Three versions are available, priced £529, £629 and £729. Microsoft updated three of its Surface laptops with new components at its autumn event, adding the Surface Laptop Studio 2 (see page 15), the Surface Laptop Go 3 (see page 20), and the Surface Go 4 for Business to fill various niches in its line-up. The biggest change to the Surface Go 4 is the new Intel N200 processor. Because of its relatively low price, we assume that the Surface Go sells rather well. The problem is that the…

Microsoft’s latest huge Windows 11 feature update, codenamed Windows 11 23H2, has a big addition: AI. The tech giant is readying for the era of the AI PC with the addition of Windows Copilot, powered by Bing Chat. It’s the closest thing to a theme that we’ve seen within a Windows 11 update in some time. AI will power Windows Copilot, of course, but also recommended files in File Explorer and Start as well as a designated AI-specific section within the Microsoft Store app. You should also expect various small improvements across Windows, both in terms of ease-of-use and functional updates, like the ability to restore apps from a backup. Microsoft unveiled the new update during press event in New York City, showcasing some of these new features. However, there’s…

A new major version of Android is released every year, and it’s no different in 2023. Predictably, the follow-up to Android 13 is known as… Android 14. Google has long since ditched the dessert names for new versions, even if they’re still used internally. Android 14 isn’t a huge overhaul, but it does introduce several useful new features. And with the update beginning to roll out to compatible devices, here’s everything you need to know. We now know all of Android 14’s main new features, and it’s rolling out to compatible devices. Here are all the key details you need. RELEASE DATE Google officially announced Android 14 and revealed several new features at its I/O event in May 2023, but didn’t announce a release date. Despite several beta versions, it…

Price: £799 from fave.co/3RUjh7M Price is as big a differentiator of laptops as specs are, and probably the first thing you look at when choosing a new machine. With many gaming laptops reaching into the thousands of pounds, this update of the GF63 Thin remains cheap, though not as cheap as it once was. While you get a spec bump to an Intel 12th-gen processor and one of Nvidia’s 40-series graphics chips, the laptop hasn’t been improved in other areas, and still rocks a 1080p screen and only 8GB of RAM. DESIGN MSI knows how to put together a gaming laptop, and while the GF63 has been built with its budget price in mind, it manages not to show it too much. It’s not the slimmest laptop out there, despite…

An attack on your Wi-Fi network is not like a bank robbery: instead of masked robbers blowing open the vault with a loud noise, a hacker inconspicuously approaches the router, searches for weak points and tries out several attack paths. Or he exploits a known security hole by unleashing an attack on the router that has been prepared for this purpose. Because you never know when and where your router will become a target, you should always ensure that the device is protected against hacker attacks: Increase the protection level of the router with suitable settings so that an attack is too costly for the hacker. And keep yourself regularly informed about security gaps so that you can plug them with firmware updates. We show you how the most dangerous…