Computer Shopperの May 2016 の目次

IN A WORLD WHERE it’s difficult or even impossible to do something as simple as replace the battery in your smartphone, PCs are rather refreshing. These humming boxes are all built from standard parts, and can be repaired or upgraded with little more than a bit of knowledge and one size of screwdriver. They’re also remarkably easy to build from scratch. Ordering the bits and putting them together yourself can save you money, but more importantly means you can get exactly the specification you want. It will also help you understand how your PC works, so you can fix it in the future. In this month’s guide we take you through building your own computer from its component parts. We’ve also put together three example builds to take some of…

While idly rummaging through the options in my newly installed Kaspersky Anti-Virus, I decided to check its opinion of the vulnerabilities on my Windows 10 computer. It claimed to find 14. Four of these related to autorun being allowed on discs and CDs, while the other ten items related to Internet Explorer 11. I’m not an AV expert but some of the vulnerabilities sounded potentially nasty: enabling caching of data received over a secure channel, loading of unsigned ActiveX elements, running programs and files in popup windows without user prompting. I don’t know how much of a real-world problem these vulnerabilities actually are but Kaspersky let me fix them. My machine was running the latest Microsoft updates so I wondered if I could solve any future problems by uninstalling Internet…

THERE’S A BIG space about to appear in the corner of the garage. Believe me, this will be a novelty. For 20 years it’s been home to a pile of ‘vintage’ computers that were put there when we stopped working from the home office and moved to a commercial property. The pile has also become a home, to lots of dust and generations of spiders. But Mrs R has recently been trying to educate me in the principle of decluttering and I’ve finally capitulated. The pile is an archaeological history of our company. There’s the remains of a Sinclair ZX81. When I say ‘remains’ I mean the main circuit board which, at one time, was mounted in a thirdparty case/keyboard affair that made typing much easier. The flashy case got…

£190 inc VAT • From www.vmall.eu/uk VERDICT The Honor 5X sets itself apart with its fast processor and fingerprint sensor, but its camera, screen and Android skin hold it back HONOR HAS MADE some great-value budget smartphones in recent years, and its latest is the Honor 5X, a £190 handset that has a large 5½in Full HD display, an octa-core 1.5GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 616 processor, a 13-megapixel camera and a fingerprint sensor. That’s an impressive spec at this price, and overshadows many of the 5X’s rivals, including the 3rd Gen Motorola Moto G. Its design borrows heavily from the Honor 7, with a square camera, a rounded fingerprint sensor and a dimple pattern at the top and bottom of the handset that look almost identical. You can tell that the…

£380 inc VAT • From www.johnlewis.com VERDICT With its great battery life, an excellent screen and superb performance, the Xperia Z5 Compact is Sony’s all-time high LAST YEAR, ‘PLUS’ was the new ‘Mini’, as more and more smartphone manufacturers ditched their smaller flagship models for jumbo-sized phablets. Not everyone wants a 5.7in slab in their pocket, however, and nor do they want to pay through the nose for the privilege. Enter the Sony Xperia Z5 Compact – the perfect antidote to phablet mania. Like Sony’s previous Compact phones, the Z5 Compact shares much of the same DNA as its big brother, the Xperia Z5, including its octa-core processor, 23-megapixel camera and flush fingerprint sensor. However, as its name implies, it’s all packed into a much more petite chassis and has…

£279 inc VAT • From www.amazon.co.uk VERDICT The menu system is rather fiddly, but the Sony FDR-X1000V is top-notch 4K action camera CLEARLY SETTING ITS sights on the GoPro Hero4 Black, Sony’s FDR-X1000V is a tiny action cam that can record 4K video at 30fps. Sony’s pint-size device can achieve this at bit rates up to 100Mbit/s, which makes it look very impressive on paper. For storage, it requires microSD cards rated both as Class 10 and UHS 3, or M2 memory sticks, so you’ll need to factor this in if you decide to buy one. The design is similar to that of Sony’s other action cam, the HDR-AZ1, with the same glossy white finish and a large shutter button on top the device. A pair of menu buttons sit…

£165 inc VAT • From www.box.co.uk VERDICT This Android-powered combo NAS-media streamer is a miserable car crash COMBINING A NAS and a media streamer into a single device isn’t as insane as it first sounds. If you’re going to store all your media files on your NAS anyway, connecting it to your TV to watch them isn’t such a big leap. The QNAP TAS-268 isn’t the first HDMIequipped NAS we’ve seen, but it’s the first to use Android to power its streaming functions. Although you interact with the TAS-268 via Android when it’s connected to your TV, it’s more conventional when used as a NAS. It has the same web-based setup wizard and configuration interface as other QNAP devices. Setting it up is easy enough, but there’s room for improvement.…

01 A basic PC costing around £350 will be able to run everyday office, multimedia and education software and will easily cope with surfing the internet. It might even be able to run some modern games. Many PCs can be sold either with or without a monitor. If you don’t like the display that the manufacturer is offering, you can always use your current one, or buy another one separately. 02 If you want to play games, you’ll have to upgrade the graphics card. Budget cards such as the Nvidia GeForce GTX 950 will cope well with many 3D games, but to play the latest 3D games smoothly (and enjoy the best-quality graphics) it’s worth upgrading to a more powerful card such as the Nvidia GeForce GTX 970. 03 All…

01 All tablets rely on an operating system (OS) to run apps. You have three main choices: Apple’s iOS, which runs on the iPad, Android, which Google licenses to various manufacturers, and Windows 10, which is slowly becoming more common in hybrid tablets and convertibles. If you own an Apple or Google smartphone, you can download your apps, music and so on to a tablet that runs the same OS, so it makes sense to stick with a compatible device. 02 It’s important to pick a tablet that has a good-quality high-resolution screen. Many budget tablets have 1,280x800-resolution displays, but better tablets have Full HD 1,920x1,080 panels, and we’re starting to see tablets that have even higher screen resolutions. Some are as high as 2,560x1,600 or even 4K. Entry-level tablets…

01 A 32in Full HD TV costs around £200 and will suit smaller living rooms. TVs look much smaller in the shop than in your home, so measure the space available before you buy. Curved TVs are becoming increasingly more common, but bear in mind that these typically take up more floor space than a traditional flat set. 02 A 1,920x1,080-resolution TV can display a 1080p image. You can still buy TVs with a 720p (1,366x768) resolution, but they’re no cheaper and the image won’t be as sharp. 3,840x2,560 Ultra HD resolution, or 4K, TVs are finally available at reasonable prices, although you’ll still pay a premium for one over a 1080p model. 03 Consider the number of inputs you’ll need to connect the rest of your equipment. Two HDMI…

01 You should be able to buy a decent inkjet printer for less than £40. High-quality printing is possible on such a printer, but it will be slow. The actual print speed of an inkjet can be half the quoted (maximum) speed for text documents, and even slower when printing graphics. Budget inkjet printers such as these are designed only for light use and can be expensive to run. 02 For £60 you can buy a much more capable printer that’s either faster and better built or better at reproducing photos. If documents are your priority, you’ll want a high minimum speed and low print costs. Look for inkjets that can handle all your office media, such as envelopes and labels. 03 If photos are your priority, speed is less…

01 You really don’t have to spend much to buy a decent graphics card that can drive multiple monitors. The AMD Radeon R7 250 costs less than £60, for example, and while it isn’t suited to playing the latest games in Full HD, it is perfect for watching videos, browsing the web and playing basic games. 02 You’ll need to spend more money if you want to play the latest games. A good mid-range gaming graphics card is the Nvidia GTX 950, which is powerful enough to play any of the latest games. High-powered cards tend to be more expensive, so expect to pay over £300 if you want to play games in Ultra HD at the highest quality settings. 03 Check that your chosen card has the graphics outputs…

AS WE DISCOVERED in Shopper 337, compact PCs can offer a brilliant alternative to full-sized desktop PCs. Despite their much smaller size, you don’t have to worry about poor performance and overheating thanks to clever case designs and efficient components. Building them can look like a challenge, though. Because the cases are so small, care must be taken when selecting components such as CPU coolers and graphics card, and you have to pay special attention to the number of drive bays available. Installing each component is trickier, too, because unlike ATX cases, many Mini-ITX cases require you to install things in a certain order. Our compact PC should be able to act as your media centre PC and games console replacement. It should have lots of room for storing games…

£219 inc VAT • From www.libratone.com VERDICT The Zipp can extend multiroom music even into your garden, and the 360˚ sound is great LIBRATONE’S NEW ZIPP speaker shouldn’t be confused with the older version, which only supports Bluetooth. The newest Zipp adds Libratone’s SoundSpace Link support (for multiroom audio), plus Wi-Fi, Apple AirPlay, Spotify Connect (which requires a Spotify Premium account) and internet radio. Otherwise, the new Zipp range looks the same: a cylindrical speaker with a detachable cover from which it derives its name. Unzip the cover and you can replace it with a different colour, either to customise the look or to distinguish one speaker from another. The Zipp is available in four different colours: deep lagoon (green), victory red, cloudy (light) grey and graphite (dark) grey. Additional…

Disk space puzzle Q My computer has a C: partition which, in Windows 7, was 120GB. However, after a fresh install of Windows 10 this has mysteriously shrunk to 60GB. I have a 1TB disk, which has data (H) and program (P) partitions. Using EaseUS Partition Manager I can see two internal disks with master boot records, as well as my external drives. Is there any way I can move extra space on to the C drive (shown as disk two) from disk one without reformatting the drive? I can’t find a tool that will work. Pete Clough, pete.d.clough@gmail.com A Your email and screenshot present a confusing picture. If we’ve read your email correctly, your understanding is that you have a single 1TB disk which contains your system (C), data…

Chris Finnamore “Former HP CEO Léo Apotheker, so my house can halve in value as soon as he walks in” David Ludlow “Oracle’s Larry Ellison dressed as General Zod” Richard Easton “Steve Ballmer, for a game of ‘throw the chair at the Google developer’” Seth Barton “Sir Clive Sinclair, so I can see what comedy form of transport he turns up in” Katharine Byrne “Valve’s Gabe Newell, who would be three years late and arrive wearing a thousand hats” Michael Passingham “Elon Musk would make the atmosphere electric”…

A GOOD FRIEND of mine made an interesting point the other day. His contention was that internet security practised by the retail banks was making his life as a cybersecurity and intelligence professional for a major corporation a lot more difficult that it should be. Allow me to explain. As a number of his critical business systems were being transferred to cloud-based solutions, my friend began beating the security drum in an attempt to introduce two-factor authentication (2FA) as a minimum security standard for a number of the soon-to-be implemented systems. However, despite explaining the many advantages to his company board, it was the fact that implementation of 2FA would slightly increase overall cost, together with (minimal) implications for staff training, that caused a response of, “Well, my bank doesn’t…

AMAZON IS A juggernaut in the retail world, and it doesn’t stand still. Not content with shaking up retailing, the company has also disrupted deliveries: for an annual fee, the Amazon Prime service offers free one-day delivery, and the company is experimenting with new services, such as Amazon Prime Now (which offers deliveries within an hour), and its own fleet of delivery drones. Given its dominance elsewhere, it would seem Amazon is unbeatable, but a recent, seemingly dull, technical announcement from taxi company Uber caught our attention. It suggests that Uber could be about to give Amazon a real run for its money. A RUSH AND A PUSH Uber isn’t simply content with ferrying about humans and picking fights with cabbies – it also wants to get in on the…

£700 inc VAT • From www.pcworld.co.uk VERDICT A capable all-in-one with an excellent processor and practical design, but the screen is a bit of a let-down THE LENOVO IDEACENTRE 700 is one of the best-looking all-in-ones we’ve reviewed in a while, with sharp corners, angular speaker grilles and a stylish but compact V-shaped stand. Not everyone will like the matt-white finish on the front, but it’s more attractive than glossy black. It also requires some assembly, but it’s a straightforward tool-less procedure that simply involves attaching the screen to the stand using the supplied thumbscrews. It’s easily accomplished by one person and takes no more than two minutes. We’d have preferred to see slightly smaller bezels around its 23.8in touchscreen, but at least there’s plenty of tilt, so you’ll have…

£300 inc VAT • From www.carphonewarehouse.com VERDICT Battery life and display are first class, but at this price the Galaxy S5 Neo faces stiff competition from the Nexus 5X THERE WAS MUCH complaint from some quarters when Samsung moved its Galaxy range of phones to a sealed-body design. Those people now have reason to rejoice, as Samsung has launched a new Galaxy phone with removable storage and user-replaceable batteries. Well, not quite – it’s fairer to say that Samsung has relaunched a phone with those features, as this is the second-coming of the Galaxy S5, the Samsung Galaxy S5 Neo. It isn’t just the same phone with a new name, though. This minor remix has a different design and a new Exynos processor inside. It’s not a particularly radical redesign,…

£150 inc VAT • From www.superfi.co.uk VERDICT The Airstream S150 is a stunning-sounding mains-powered Bluetooth speaker BRITISH SPEAKER MAKER Monitor Audio has been around for more than four decades, but recently it has been channelling all that expertise into making smaller, mains-powered Bluetooth speakers. The Airstream S150 is one of its latest products, and shares the same design as its similarly sized brother, the Airstream S200, although it lacks the S200’s Apple AirPlay support. The first thing you’ll notice is its distinctive design. Tower-shaped, with a top that slopes and angles backwards, it looks a bit like a loaf of bread that’s been squashed in the freezer. You have a choice of charcoal grey or white two-tone finishes. The white model we reviewed has a light grey speaker cloth on…

£10 inc VAT + £11-per-month on contract • From shop.ee.co.uk VERDICT The 4GEE Capture Cam’s life-logging is unreliable and the cost of ownership is too high EE’S FIRST FORAY into 4G-enabled video cameras – the 4GEE Action Cam – was arguably one of the worst action cams we’ve seen recently (see Reviews, Shopper 333). Its second attempt, the 4GEE Capture Cam, takes a different approach, positioning itself as a life-logging camera rather than an action cam. The device is square, with a built-in clip that lets you attach it to your clothing, but there’s also a bundled adaptor to use with GoPro-compatible mounts. However, when it measures 55x55x28.2mm and weighs 90.5g, it’s quite large and heavy for something that’s designed to be clipped to your clothes. It’s not very subtle,…

01 A basic laptop costing around £300 will run everyday office, multimedia and education software, but it won’t be suitable for 3D gaming or processor-intensive tasks such as video editing. Many laptops at this price have a 15.4in screen and weigh around 2.4kg, so they’re best used around the house and for occasional journeys. 02 If you want to play modern games, you’ll need a laptop with a dedicated graphics chip such as the Nvidia GeForce GTX 960M. Good gaming laptops tend to have large 17in screens and weigh around 3kg, so they’re best suited to use at home. 03 If you want a laptop that you can take everywhere, look for a model that weighs less than 2kg. For the best portability, buy one that has an 11in or…

01 A basic digital camera will suit someone who wants to take pictures to view on their computer and create 7x5in prints. It should cost around £80, but there may be hidden downsides such as slow performance and very basic user controls. 02 Spend a little more and you’ll get a higher resolution. A 16-megapixel sensor has the potential to produce sharp prints up to A3 size, but only if it and the lens are of a suitably high quality. Very high resolutions in compact cameras tend to boost noise more than detail levels, so many of the best models strike a sensible balance by using a 12-megapixel sensor. Back-illuminated CMOS sensors tend to produce less noise than CCDs, but check our reviews to find out how a particular model…

01 Bluetooth speakers come in all shapes and sizes, so you’ll need to decide what you want to do with the speaker before you buy. If you don’t plan to take your music outdoors or around the house, look for a wired speaker. These are typically cheaper than speakers with built-in batteries. If you do want a portable speaker, however, pay particular attention to how much it weighs. Ruggedised models should be able to survive accidental drops, water spills and unexpected rain showers. 02 Many of the cheapest Bluetooth speakers use the lossy A2DP Bluetooth protocol, which is prone to compressing your music and discarding detail compared with the original recording. It’s hard to tell the difference when listening to pocket-sized speakers, but if you’re looking for a speaker to…

01 Wireless routers each use a number of Wi-Fi standards, so you shouldn’t have any trouble connecting your computer or phone wirelessly if you get an 802.11n or 802.11ac router. Nearly all routers support 802.11n, so even a cheap model should provide decent performance. You can expect a transfer speed of around 40Mbit/s at a distance of 10m from any modern 802.11n router. The very latest routers use the 802.11ac standard, which provides tremendously fast transfer speeds. Some devices still don’t support the 802.11ac standard, so check the specifications before you buy. 02 If you subscribe to an ADSL broadband service, you should buy a wireless router that has a built-in ADSL modem. This will cost more than the equivalent cable router, but it allows you to connect your router…

Web design XARA Web Designer 11 Premium £60 inc VAT • www.xara.com/uk Web Designer was already excellent, but version 11 gets a slew of incremental updates that ensure it remains our favourite one-box web design tool. OS SUPPORT Windows XP or later • MINIMUM Intel Celeron/AMD Sempron • MINIMUM GPU DirectX 9 • MINIMUM RAM 500MB • HARD DISK SPACE 300MB • DETAILS www.xara.com/uk • FULL REVIEW Sep 2015 Photo management ADOBE Photoshop Lightroom 6 £102 inc VAT • www.ebuyer.com Lightroom 6 might be a relatively modest update, but Adobe’s photography toolbox still sets the gold standard for Raw photo processing and image enhancement. OS SUPPORT Windows 7/8 • MINIMUM CPU Intel or AMD with 64-bit support • MINIMUM GPU 1GB, OpenGL 3.3, DirectX 10 • MINIMUM RAM 2GB • HARD…

AS WE STRESS time and time again on these pages, a budget PC offers a lot more performance than a similarly priced laptop and, if you never move your laptop around the house and have space for a PC, there’s no reason not to plump for a custom budget PC instead. What’s more, by building it yourself you can gain valuable PC-building experience and have room for upgrades when new components come along. Although the price is low, you shouldn’t opt for bargain-basement components. While there is something to be said for buying the cheapest components available and sourcing secondhand kit, where possible you should try to build some future-proofing into even the cheapest PC. After all, choosing rubbish components now means you’ll have to upgrade sooner rather than later,…

£179 inc VAT • From www.libratone.com VERDICT Packs the same features as the larger Zipp into a slightly smaller package THE ZIPP MINI packs in the same features as its big brother, the Libratone Zipp, making it one of the most versatile multiroom speakers around. You can feed the Zipp Mini with almost any source, from dual-band 802.11n Wi-Fi, AirPlay, DLNA, Spotify Connect, Bluetooth and internet radio to 3.5mm mini-jack and USB flash drive. All of these sources can be played simultaneously across multiple connected Zipp-range speakers. The cylindrical Zipp Mini weighs 400g less than the Zipp (at 1.1kg), is 40mm shorter and 20mm thinner (224x100mm). Aside from the bulbous top, both speakers follow the same design principles. As standard, the Zipp Mini comes with a woven fabric cover in…

£350 inc VAT • From www.johnlewis.com VERDICT The Samsung R5 fills a room with sound and looks gorgeous, but its price holds it back SAMSUNG’S NEW ‘CLASSIC’ range of multiroom audio speakers carries over the omnidirectional audio of the old Wireless 360 range but does so in a cylindrical shape. The R5 is 313mm tall, with a diameter of 166mm at each end, and weighs 2.7kg. The all-black R5 could easily pass as a slightly abstract vase or item of furniture. Its design is certainly more subtle than the egg-shaped R7 and kettleshaped R6 of the previous range. The top of the R5 looks plain at first glance, but it is in fact a touch panel with an integrated OLED display. This lets you swap between the main modes using…

You have to work pretty hard to get noticed at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES). With thousands of exhibitors spread across several aircraft-hanger-sized halls, in venues dotted across Las Vegas, there are hundreds of interesting products and innovations that won’t have a single word written about them. Even though there are thousands of journalists on duty at CES, their attention is almost universally drawn towards the multinational brands who can afford the huge press conferences, the football-pitch-sized showfloor stands and the celebrities to launch products. In this feature, you won’t find any mention of the products announced by Sony, Samsung, Intel and the like. Instead, we’ve focused on the hidden heroes: the smaller players and startups that turned up at CES hoping for their big break. We’re not talking about…

LAST MONTH IN this column we showed you how to take photos of smoke from an incense stick to create abstract images with complex, rippling multicoloured shapes. Key to the success of this is an off-camera flash system that allows careful control of the quality and direction of light. An off-camera flash system is a great investment with lots of uses, and to prove the point, we’re using it again this month. High-speed photography is a broad term for capturing subjects moving at speed. We’re not talking about sports and wildlife, though. This is more about studio photography, where subjects are shot in controlled conditions. The objective here is to shoot with split-second timing to capture subjects in a phase of rapid change. This freezes motion to reveal shapes that…

IF YOU HAVE more than one network-capable device in your home, a NAS is an excellent way to share storage, printers, music, photos and more. Given how much these devices do, you’d expect them to be powerhouses inside, but take a look at even the Best Buy-winning Synology DS215j (Shopper 328) and you’ll be surprised at its lowly hardware: an 800MHz, 32-bit processor; only 512MB of RAM; and no Wi-Fi. What this means is that using cunning, hardware nous and freeware you can create a viable alternative for the same money. A drive-less Synology DS215j and a 2TB Western Digital Red hard disk cost roughly £200, but a Celeron-based, 2TB Acer Revo One Mini costs £190 (see www.ebuyer.com). While underpowered for a desktop system, the Revo’s Celeron 2957U runs at…

CONTACT LETTERS letters@computershopper.co.uk HUMBLEBRAG Virgin is supposed to be supplying a 200Mbit/s connection to us and then I get this (see screenshot, right). Should I complain? Chris Murphy That’s outrageous. Get Ofcom on the line. SECURITY LAPSE In Advanced Projects (Shopper 337) Clive Webster offers some great advice for making a Wi-Fi network less secure. He advises readers to reveal their SSID since there’s no point hiding it, and not bothering with MAC ID filtering since a hacker will get round that easily. I guess Clive does not live in the real world, where one’s children invite round irresponsible friends who all expect their smartphones and tablets to get a free Wi-Fi signal. The first line of defence is hiding the SSID, because if they can’t see the network name…

Do you wish your computer was faster when booting and loading applications? Thanks to Crucial, you can achieve your dream of a faster PC or laptop with the BX200 SSD. The writer of our Star Letter will be awarded one of these solid-state devices, which can be installed in a desktop PC or a laptop. This fast SSD is 15 times faster than a hard disk, and will make your computer boot incredibly quickly and make applications load faster. With 480GB of storage, there’s plenty of room for Windows and all your apps, too.…

Mel Croucher RAVES He may have invented the whole concept of adware – for which he is truly remorseful – but Mel hopes ad blockers have got him off the hook I WOULD LIKE to begin this month’s Rave with a public confession. I have inflicted untold misery upon the peoples of the world, and I deeply regret it. I make this confession as the pioneer who started harnessing computers for the purposes of advertising. And I am howling sorry. When I first dreamed up the notion of force-feeding consumers embedded adverts for rubbish they don’t need, I never imagined the consequences. When I registered the neologism ‘adware’ in 1988, I had no idea that by the time it got a dictionary definition six years later, the word would come…

£199 inc VAT • From www.oneplus.net/uk VERDICT Superb build quality and great battery life, but the OnePlus X isn’t the budget smartphone killer we were hoping for JUST WEEKS AFTER the OnePlus 2 went invitation-free (see Shopper 337), OnePlus announced that it would be doing the same thing with its latest handset, the OnePlus X. Posited as a kind of budget alternative to the OnePlus 2, the £199 OnePlus X isn’t quite the massive saving it once was, as the OnePlus 2 is now available for just £50 more at £249. Judging purely by the numbers, the OnePlus 2 is by far the better choice at this price, but the OnePlus X has some attractive features for those who want something slightly smaller. It’s available in either ‘onyx black’ or…

£150 inc VAT • From www.johnlewis.com VERDICT The Gibson Trainer Ti100 have plenty of runner-friendly features, but they’re less suitable for broader fitness activities AT FIRST GLANCE, Gibson’s Trainer Ti100 looks like a conventional pair of neckbandstyle wireless Bluetooth earphones. However, this pair has several clever design tricks that make them ideal for running. For instance, there’s an LED light in the centre of the cable that connects the two earbuds. Once activated, NightNav mode makes the light pulse, which is useful for night runners who want to be a little more visible on the roads. It’s reasonably bright, and certainly makes you easier to spot in a crowd. The light is positioned at the back of your neck, so it can only be seen by people and traffic approaching…

01 A smartphone’s operating system (OS) dictates its basic features and which third-party software you can install. There are three main contenders: Apple’s iOS, which is found on the iPhone, Google’s Android, which is used by various handset manufacturers, and Windows Phone, which is mainly used on Lumia phones. Apple iOS and Google Android have the most apps available but Windows Phone is slowly catching up. 02 All smartphones have colour screens, but their resolutions vary. Basic models have 800x480 pixels, but text can be indistinct. Look for a display that has at least 1,280x720 pixels so it’s easy to browse web pages. Don’t worry too much about built-in media players or Office document editors; you can always install apps to replace these with better versions later. The image quality…

01 A basic 24in LCD monitor costs around £100. It will be fine for typical Windows work but is likely to have poor viewing angles, so you’ll need to sit straight on for the best picture quality. Its colour accuracy may not be very good, either. 02 A VGA input lets you use the monitor with any PC, but the quality may not be as good as it is over DVI or HDMI. Both are digital connections and require a compatible graphics card but they avoid the need for digital-to-analogue or analogue-todigital conversions, which can reduce image quality. A digital connection achieves the best picture automatically, so you won’t have to adjust clock or phase settings as you do with analogue connections. Many DVI and all HDMI connections support HDCP,…

01 Action cameras are typically much smaller than a regular camcorder, as they are designed to be mounted to a bike, board or car, or worn on your person. As the name suggests, they are designed primarily for shooting action footage, but because of their small size they are ideal for strapping on to your pet’s collar or your children’s toys for a different perspective. 02 Almost all action cameras will shoot Full HD video, and some will even shoot 4K, but frame rate is arguably more important than resolution when it comes to action video. Higher frame rates will mean smoother clips, and super-high frame rate videos can be played in slow motion to emphasise exciting shots. Keep an eye out for 4k/30, 1080p/60 and 720p/120 models for the…

01 A basic 1TB internal hard disk should cost around £40. This will be fast enough for general use and will provide enough storage for most users. Make sure the hard disk you choose has the appropriate interface type for your PC. Some mechanical hard disks still come with SATA2 interfaces, but newer models and most solid-state drives (SSDs) have faster SATA3 interfaces. You’ll need a motherboard with a SATA3 port if you want to benefit from SATA3’s faster speeds; SATA3 disks will work with SATA2 ports but can only transfer files at SATA2 speeds. 02 SSDs can make the most of SATA3’s extra bandwidth for fast file transfers. They use flash memory similar to that in USB flash drives, and although they tend to provide less capacity than mechanical…

Open-world adventure Fallout 4 £24 inc VAT • www.cdkeys.com Exploring a post-apocalyptic wasteland has never been more fun. Bethesda has expanded the Fallout universe with base building and crafting mechanics, making this the definitive entry in the series. AVAILABLE FORMATS PC, Xbox One, PS4 • OS SUPPORT Windows 7/8.1/ 10 64-bit • MINIMUM CPU Quad-core 2.8GHz Intel, quad-core 3GHz AMD • MINIMUM GPU Nvidia GeForce GTX 550 Ti, AMD Radeon HD 7870 • MINIMUM RAM 8GB • HARD DISK SPACE 30GB • DETAILS www.fallout4.com • FULL REVIEW Feb 2016 Fantasy RPG The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt £20 inc VAT • www.cdkeys.com The Witcher 3 has an involving plot, an amazingly well-realised world and beautifully drawn characters. It’s the ultimate fantasy RPG for anyone that prefers action to turn-based strategy. AVAILABLE FORMATS…

Chat and Communication Digsby (Build 92) Access all your instant messaging services from one application; there’s support for Windows Live!, Yahoo!, AIM, Google Talk, ICQ and Jabber. Evernote 5.9.6 Store your notes, ideas and plans in the cloud, and synchronise them between computers. UPDATED Mozilla Thunderbird 38.6 A powerful email client from the organisation best known for the Firefox web browser. Postbox Express 1.0.1 An email client that provides a comprehensive array of tools to help you manage your messages more easily. Skype for Windows 7.18 Make internet voice and video calls for free, and buy credit to make calls to mobiles and landlines. Trillian 5.6 Use all your instant messaging accounts with one application; this program has support for Windows Live!, AIM, Yahoo! and Google Talk. Customisation 7 Taskbar…

YOUR DREAM PC doesn’t have to cost the earth. In fact, you can spec a fantastically powerful PC for under £900 if you choose your components carefully. We review lots of high-end PCs in Computer Shopper and, while the professional’s touch and a single warranty is certainly attractive, we enjoy building our own PCs as much as we do reviewing system builders’ efforts. System builders are able to buy components in bulk and therefore pay less than the average consumer, but you don’t get the full choice of components and the exact computer you want. By choosing every single item that you put into your build, you can ensure that you get the absolute best. PROCESSOR For this system, you need a mid-range processor. That would normally mean choosing between…

Email server keeps closing the connection Q I have several email accounts that I manage using Outlook 2010, including a new BT Openworld account that uses an IMAP server. The others use POP3/SMTP and work fine, but the Openworld account gives an intermittent error telling me that the IMAP server closed the connection. This is a really irritating message as it grabs the focus, appearing on top of whatever (usually much more important) task I’m attempting to carry out. How can I prevent the message appearing? Gary Martin A The best way to fix this is to alter the way Outlook includes the account in automatic send and receive. Outlook does a scheduled automatic send and receive, but you don’t need to do that with IMAP accounts because they’re ‘live’,…