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I like to think that, here on Windows 7 Help & Advice, we listen to what you have to say and respond in kind. Many of you are happy with the way your machine performs, though a lack of infallibility means that things inveitably go wrong even with us experts. By design, Windows will give you a hint as to what youre dealing with, but most of the time youre looking at something unfamiliar and unfathomable. While our resident Support Squad specialists deal with a high turnover of specific computer queries, they dont often apply to everyone, which is why in this issue I bring you the magic of our main cover feature: Solve 100 PC problems. Here we uncover the most general of Windows issues and tell you how to fix them, whether youre plagued by a slow startup, or witnessing mystical errors. Please, do get in touch if you think weve missed anything though well be happy to cover it in a future issue!
Welcome
Nicholas Odantzis Deputy Editor

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PROTECT YOUR TECH It can be worth investing in special insurance for your PC and mobile devices
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How to keep your tech safe and secure

ake a look around you and youll probably see more expensive tech than youve ever owned before. Its likely that you own a decent TV and a Windows computer, and you probably have a smartphone, too. They may well be the most valuable items in your home, and sometimes they hold precious photos and other content, too. In the event of a break-in, thieves will head for the living room rather than your grannys jewellery box, so its vital to make sure everything is secured, registered and insured. Your rst step should be to ensure your home is as safe as, well, houses, but its also worth taking the time to read the small print in case you need specic locks on your doors for your insurance policy to be valid. The next step is to come up with an inventory of all your gadgets. Its worth making a spreadsheet with each items model, manufacturer, serial number and a brief description, including distinguishing

The Knowledge

marks. Every mobile phone also has a unique number known as an IMEI, which you can nd by dialling *#06#. Once youve done that, visit www.immobilise. com. This is a police-endorsed database of property in the UK, so if your stuff goes missing but later turns up, you can be reunited with it. Its easy to use, and once youve set up an account you can add new items quickly. Its not just tech either you can also add jewellery, bicycles and more. If your kit is stolen, your home contents insurance should cover it, but its worth checking your policy to see if it covers your gear when its away from home. If not, you can compare gadget insurance at http:// bit.ly/IixYLu. Its also worth reading your policy to see whether your phone is covered. If not, contract customers can add an insurance bolt-on for a small extra charge each month. Bank accounts often come with add-on mobile insurance too. Its worth checking to see if that works out cheaper than buying insurance separately.
Intel Bay Trail

Ah yes, the bicycle and pedestrian link around the shoreline of the San Francisco Bay. I hate to disappoint you, but this is a technology magazine, not a travel one. The Bay Trail were talking about here is chip manufacturer Intels latest mobile processor, which is designed to sit at the heart of tablets and make them run quickly without draining too much precious battery power. Why should I care about a mobile processor when there are 500 miles of walking to be had? Bay Trail is rather important to Intel because it marks the companys rst proper push into Android tablets, a market that has until now been dominated by British company ARM. With desktop PC sales continuing to slide, Intel needs to get into the tablet game in order to stay on top of the competition. So what does it do that an ARM cant? Intels miniaturisation bons have shrunk a 64-bit chip into a tablet-friendly form, making Bay Trail far more powerful than the current ARM standard of 32-bit. It also includes Intels HD 4000 graphics, giving you roughly the same amount of power as youd nd in a modern laptop. How well does it work? Its an exceedingly powerful little chip, and all the more impressive considering its diminutive size. Intel says it runs Photoshop 40 per cent faster than Intels previous mobile chip, and it draws a lot less power. Yeah, but I bet Ill have to cancel my trip to San Francisco before I can aord one, right? Intels masterstroke lies in the relatively low cost of its chips, and it reckons that Android Bay Trail tablets will cost less than 100. Well see for ourselves when theyre released later this year.
HERES WHERE TO START Track your property

Having your laptop stolen can be a galling experience, but a small program called Prey can help you get the upper hand on thieves. Prey sits in the background, and if your laptop is nabbed you can activate it via a website. From here you can take photos using its webcam and triangulate its position using the nearest Wi-Fi access point. Its already been used successfully to catch gadget thieves red-handed. To get started, visit www.preyproject.com.
GET PREY Once youve downloaded the software, open it and follow the instructions to install it.
ACCOUNT MANAGER Sign up for an account, then click the link in the conrmation email you receive.
PREDATOR Prey is ready to go, and you can access your device from https://panel.preyproject.com.
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Multi monitors
Thanks to the power of modern graphics cards, you can now connect a multitude of displays to your computer, enabling you to watch a DVD on one while composing an email on the other. First though, you need to make sure youve got enough outputs take a look at the back of your computer where the monitor connects and see if you have more than one socket. If you do, its time to get started. Once youve got the relevant lead and connected the second screen, fire up Windows and press [Windows]+[P]. Youll see a menu so you can choose whats displayed on each screen, and holding [Windows]+[Shift], then tapping either the left or right arrow key will let you move windows from one screen to another.
Zoom raider
Running Windows on a larger than average monitor or TV screen can be problematic, especially if youre a sitting long way from it. Fortunately, you can zoom in on just about every part of Windows for a magnified view. The simplest way to zoom is to hold down [Ctrl] and move your mouse wheel up or down. If youre just using a keyboard, you can hold [Ctrl]+[Alt] and use the [+] and [-] keys to enlarge or shrink your view in Windows Explorer, or just hold [Ctrl] and tap the [+] and [-] keys in Internet Explorer or Google Chrome. Pressing [Windows]+[+] is a neat shortcut for the Windows Magnifier tool, which doubles the size of everything on screen to make navigation much easier.
In control
Windows XPs Control Panel contains all the necessary bits and bobs to customise your PC, but accessing it via the Start menu can be a bit of a hassle. However, you can create a Start menu for the Control Panel so that each setting and entry appears as an option there. Right-click the Start button, then choose Properties. Next, click Customize, followed by the Advanced tab. Tick Display as menu beneath the Control Panel heading and youll be able to access the intricacies of your PC in just a couple of clicks. Its especially handy if you want to uninstall programs, or if you need to set up a new printer.
Struggling to get something to work? Need a tip?

Then email us your woes (to windowsmagazine@futurenet.com with the subject line Windows Insider) and well share your perfect Windows tweaks in a future issue.
Tip of the month
Find it faster
Smarter, swifter search

With Windows 8, you just need to start typing to find results from your PC and the web
With Windows 8.1, Microsoft has drastically improved the search function, and its now one of the operating systems best features. The new version scours both your computer and the internet for results, so you can type Control Panel to access your PCs settings, or Facebook to go straight to the social networking website without opening your web browser and typing the address. To quickly search for something, simply tap [Windows] on your keyboard or select the icon on your screen, and then begin typing and results will be displayed instantly. To change the way it works, type search then choose Search settings. Here you can choose to use Microsoft Bing to search online, and modify settings such as personalised results and SafeSearch.
SEARCH HIGH AND LOW With Windows 8, you can get search results from the internet without opening your web browser
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Discover this
Discover Tech talk
Edward Snowdens whistleblowing has changed the publics perception of the internet
ecent tales of whistleblowers, surveillance and information leaks have made the front pages of newspapers on both sides of the Atlantic, and 2013 will surely be remembered as the year in which the term top secret lost all meaning. Our clandestine tale begins with Edward Snowden, a former CIA employee and contractor to the USs National Security Agency, who was privy to highly classied information. In late 2012, he anonymously contacted Guardian journalist Glenn Greenwald, saying he had sensitive documents he wished to share. The cache Snowden sent to Greenwald contained between 15,000 and 20,000 documents, which detailed the NSAs deep-rooted surveillance programs. The programs were capable of intercepting the phone calls and internet communications of over a billion people, and were run with support from other security agencies, such as Britains GCHQ and Australias DSD. The leak, published in the Guardian and the Washington Post, was a dramatic
Internet surveillance
Upworthy
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The internet can be a thoroughly depressing place at times. If, like us, youve got one eye permanently turned to news sites, youll have noticed that there isnt a lot of positivity in the world. Twitter, Facebook and online forums seem to be places where people have a great big moan about how bad their lives are and share grim stories. Upworthy is the antidote to the depressing parts of the web. It showcases human interest stories from around the globe on a sparsely-designed site with no advertisements or promotions, and its a great place to visit if you need a bit of a lift. While it doesnt shy away from the harsher realities of life, it more often than not oers a solution to these problems.
revelation, especially since companies such as Google, Facebook and Apple were found to have been subject to surveillance. Snowden was charged with espionage and is currently seeking asylum in Russia. The companies concerned immediately denied any ties with the NSA. In a statement, Google said, From time to time, people allege that we have created a government back door into our systems, but Google does not have a back door for the government to access user data. Facebook, Google and Apple are among those who signed a letter calling for reforms to the US governments surveillance programs. The letter applauds the USA Freedom Act a bill to end the collection of data. We urge the administration to work with Congress in addressing these critical reforms that would provide much needed transparency, the companies state. Its in internet companies best interests to keep your precious data out of government hands, and things will get better, but the internet has suddenly become a scarier place.
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Why have some people been banned from Xbox Live recently?
A) Gratuitous nudity B) Pretending to shoot people C) Excessive swearing
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A) Coins B) Tax C) Shillings
Which supermodel is behind gift exchange site Impossible.com?

A) Naomi Campbell B) Gisele Bndchen C) Lily Cole
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A) Airports and railway stations B) Police stations and hospitals C) Pubs and restaurants
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A) Boston B) Philadelphia C) Detroit
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hen you buy a new PC, it generally behaves very well. Your system boots and runs quickly, programs install without any problems and it all works just as youd expect. But then, quite often, things begin to change. Your computer starts to slow down. Odd things happen occasionally some features stop working, for instance, and you cant understand why. Some of your applications and maybe Windows itself may begin to display cryptic error messages, or perhaps crash occasionally. Some people say this is normal its just the way PCs are, and you have to put up with it but we say no. You dont have to live with poor performance, desktop problems,
misbehaving software and the many other hassles that might be troubling your system. You dont need weeks of spare time and a degree in computer science to solve these issues, either most can be tackled with surprising ease once you know where to get started. Thats where we come in. Weve put together a guide which deals with some of the most annoying PC problems out there, covering everything from sluggish speeds and desktop deciencies to boot problems, installation issues, confusing warning messages and more. So dont just put up with Windows annoyances take our advice, ght back, and youll soon have your system running smoothly again.
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Cover feature Solve any PC problem WorldMags.net
How can I tell whats tying up my PCs resources? Click Start, type resmon and press [Enter] to nd out whats using your PCs CPU, hard drive and internet connection.
Itll take ages to new PC! Easy Transfer is a tool supplied with Windows that makes this very simple. Search for Easy Transfer in Windows Help for more details.
Why is my Wi-Fi so slow? Run Xirrus Wi-Fi Inspector (from your free disc). If it shows interference from a nearby network, changing your wireless channel should help.
Navigating folders takes too long in Windows Explorer To see a folder youve used recently, just right-click the Explorer icon on your Taskbar and select it from your Jump List.
How can I browse the web faster? Using Namebench (http://code.google. com/p/namebench) to nd a faster DNS server can dramatically cut the time it takes to access websites.
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Some folders take an age to open Deleting any les you dont need can sometimes help speed things up, but sorting out the folders properties usually delivers the best results. Right-click the folder, select Properties > Customize, set the Optimize this folder for list to General items and see how this works for you. My Explorer windows close when I reboot In Explorer, click Tools > Folder options > View, then scroll down and check Restore previous folder windows at logon. When you next restart, any Explorer windows you had open before will appear again. The Windows desktop clock isnt accurate An incorrect PC clock isnt just annoying, it can also cause signicant problems with networks and some applications that rely on it. If you notice yours is out, right-click it and select Adjust date/time > Internet time > Change settings. Check Synchronize with an internet
time server, then click Update now to correct it. It takes me too long to To nd one le in a packed folder, you dont have to scroll through the entire list. Either enter its name in the Search box, or just click in the blank area to the right of the list of les and begin typing its name here. Every time you hit a key, Explorer will jump to the rst matching le. When the right one appears, you can press [Enter] to open it. Im having trouble with the Start menu If the Start menu is missing some feature youre familiar with, perhaps from another PC, then click Start, right-click the Shut down button and click Properties > Customise to see a host of useful conguration settings (you can add the Run box to the menu, for instance). Tweak these settings to suit your needs, or click Use default settings to restore the standard Windows behaviour if you prefer.
A FRESH LOOK There are hundreds of Windows themes available online
Im bored with my desktop wallpaper To change the look of your PCs desktop, right-click an empty part of it and click Personalize > Get more themes online. A browser window will open at the Windows Themes page, where youll nd hundreds of themes on all kinds of topics animals, art, games, movies, landscapes and more and theyre all free to download. the wrong size Click in the folder window, hold down [Ctrl] and spin your mouse wheel to cycle through every possible le view. Its much quicker than having to choose the right option from Explorers menus manually. A program window has just disappeared If you can see a programs button on the Taskbar but clicking it doesnt display anything, this could mean that its window has been accidentally moved o the screen somehow. Press [Ctrl]+[Shift]+[Esc] to launch Task Manager, right-click your program in the Applications list, select Maximise and it should reappear. Using the command line takes ages Typing something like CD\ This\Is\A\Very\Long\Path can take a while, but there may be an easier way. Hold down [Shift], right-click the folder in Explorer, choose Open command window here and
cmd.exe will open at that particular folder. How can I mute the startup sound? Click Start, type sound, and click Sound > Sounds. Clear the Play Windows Startup sound box if you dont want to be alerted when your system has booted. You can also add a custom sound here (click Browse and select it), and adjust other system sounds to suit your needs. Explorer opens at the wrong folder By default, Explorer always opens at the Computer folder. To choose another location, right-click the Explorer shortcut, select Properties, click in the Target box, press [Space] and enter your new path in quotes (itll read something like %windir%\ explorer.exe d:\). Snap annoying If you dont like the way windows reposition and resize themselves when moved to the edge of the screen, you can turn this feature o. Go to Control Panel > Ease of access and select Change how your mouse works or Change how your keyboard works. Check Prevent windows from being automatically arranged when moved to the edge of the screen and click OK. Explorer is showing the wrong icons Close Explorer, launch Disk Cleanup, choose your drive,
Extra programs appear when Windows starts

Start by launching these programs, checking their settings for an option like Launch at startup and turning that o. If thats no help, click Start > All programs, expand the Startup folder, right-click any applications youre sure you dont need and select Delete. Alternatively, install and run CCleaner from your free disc, click Tools > Startup > Windows, select any programs that are surplus to requirements and click Delete to remove them.
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Search is too slow
By default, Windows only indexes les stored in your user folders (Documents, Desktop, Pictures and so on), so searching elsewhere will take longer. Moving the documents you want to search into your user folders (from C:\MyFiles to C:\ Users\[Name]\Documents\ MyFiles) should speed things up, but you can tell Windows to index other folders as well. Click Start, type index and click Indexing options. Click Modify, expand the tree and check the folders youd like to be indexed (remember, the more les there are, the longer indexing will take). Click OK when youre done. make sure Thumbnails is checked and click OK. This will delete the Explorer thumbnail cache, which may get your folders displayed properly. setting I need If youre tired of browsing through Control Panel to nd a particular option, just click in the Search box, press [E], and youll see all the settings in a single list that should be much easier to navigate. What have other users done to my PC? If someone else has messed up your desktop then it can be useful to know exactly what they did, and LastActivityView (from your free disc or http:// bit.ly/TvSITZ) can help, showing you programs theyve run, les theyve opened or saved, folders viewed, programs installed, network connections, start and shutdown times and more. My Taskbars system tray is too cluttered Click the arrow to the left of the tray and select Customize from the menu that appears. If there are any icons here that youre sure you dont need, set their behaviour to Only show notications. If you decide you dont need the clock or other standard items, click Turn system icons on or o to disable them. I cant see thumbnails for Click Tools > Folder Options > View and make sure Always show icons isnt checked. If that doesnt help, install Media Preview (from your free disc or www.babelsoft.net/products. htm) and it will add thumbnail support for all the main video le types. inside a folder Hold down [Shift], then right-click the folder youre interested in and select Open command window here. Type dir /b | clip, then press [Enter] and the names of the les in your folder will be copied to the clipboard so you can paste them wherever you like (a Word document, for example).
I need more space on my Windows desktop

Right-click your desktop, select Screen resolution and make sure youre using the highest recommended setting. If you are, click Start, type personal and select Personalization. Click Window Colour > Advanced appearance settings, choose Border padding and select a size of zero. You can also cut the size of menus, scrollbars and more, but beware this might stop some programs working properly.
I accidentally If you make a mistake in Explorer (delete an important folder, for example, or move the wrong les), just press [Ctrl]+[Z] to undo your last action.
I dont want to use Windows Explorer Try Q-Dir (from your free disc or www. softwareok.com). It has browser-like tabs, you can use it to save all your open folders and restore them later.
My icons arent arranged neatly DesktopOK (on your free disc, or from www. softwareok.com) lets you save your icon positions and restore them whenever you like with a couple of clicks.
My desktop looks too cluttered Just select the main program you want to use, then press [Windows]+[Home] and everything else on the desktop will be minimised immediately.
Text appears too small on screen If you cant see some tiny detail, hold down the [Windows] key and press [+] to zoom in with the Magnier. Hold [Windows] and press [-] to zoom out.
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An old program wont run on my PC Hold [Ctrl]+[Shift], right-click the program, select Troubleshoot compatibility and Windows will launch a wizard to try to help. If youre having trouble running old DOS games, try DOSbox (from your free disc or http://dosbox. sourceforge.net). Its a great way to run ageing programs on modern hardware. Im seeing an error code what does it mean? Error messages are sometimes unhelpful, displaying some cryptic code like 0x00000653. Entering these into the Windows Error Lookup Tool (from your free disc or www. gunnerinc.com/welt.htm) can provide more information. Windows Update reboots my PC Launch REGEDIT and browse to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\ SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\ Windows\WindowsUpdate\AU (create the last two keys yourself if necessary). Create a DWORD (32-bit) value called NoAutoRebootWithLogged OnUsers. Double-click this, give it the value 1, and your PC wont be rebooted again. Internet Explorer refuses to start Click Start > All programs > Accessories > System tools > Internet Explorer (no add-ons). If IE now launches properly
then you probably have a broken add-on. Restore extensions as you need them by clicking Tools > Manage add-ons, then right-clicking and selecting Enable. When you nd the one responsible for your problems, uninstall or reinstall it separately. Im unable to close a particular program If you cant close an application from Task Manager, try Process Hacker (from your free disc or http:// bit.ly/OoURT). To close a process, right-click it and select Miscellaneous > Terminator > Run selected. Take care ending a system process could crash your PC. I cant defragment my hard drive Right-click a drive in Explorer and select Properties > Tools > Defragment now. If Explorer says no defragmentation tool is installed, launch REGEDIT, browse to HKEY_LOCAL_ MACHINE\SOFTWARE\ Microsoft\Windows\ CurrentVersion\Explorer\ MyComputer\DefragPath, double-click Default and set it to %windir%\system32\ dfrgui.exe to repair it. Windows wants to burn Your PC has temporary les that Windows thinks youd like to burn to disc. If youre sure you dont, right-click your hard
My PC suddenly says Windows is not genuine

You bought Windows, activated it and everything was ne. Then, suddenly, a message appeared saying that your OS is not genuine, demanding you activate it but activation doesnt work. Launch REGEDIT, expand HKEY_USERS, right-click S-1-5-20 and select Permissions. Click Network Service in the list. If you dont see it, click Add, type Network Service and click Check names > OK to add it. Make sure the Allow boxes for Full Control and Read are checked, then click OK. Close REGEDIT, restart your PC and all should be well.
drive in Explorer and select Delete temporary les. Some applications wont play sounds Click the system tray volume icon, click Mixer, and ensure any volume slider for your application is set high enough and not muted. Also launch Control Panel, click Hardware and sound > Sound, right-click your default playback device (it has a green tick) and select
Properties. Click Advanced and clear any settings in the Exclusive Mode box. Click OK, reboot and try again. I need permission to access a folder The folder probably belongs to another user on your PC. If you have an administrators account then Windows will say you can click Continue to get access. If not, you must ask the other user for the les.
I accidentally UndeleteMyFiles Pro (from your free disc or http://bit.ly/Zd3USw) is an excellent tool that makes it easy to recover apparently lost les, and even emails.
stopped working Click Start, type rewall, select Windows Firewall, then click Restore defaults to return it to its original settings and get it working again.
My system is really unstable Click Control Panel > System and security > Action centre > Maintenance > Check for solutions. Windows will check for problems and suggest xes.
My libraries have vanished Sometimes Explorer will forget its libraries, so if you click on the folder theres nothing there. Right-click Libraries and select Restore default libraries.
are broken ShortcutsMan (from your free disc) will scan your PC and tidy up shortcuts. It highlights any that are broken, and you can delete or x them in moments.
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Bootmgr is missing
Boot from your Windows disc, choose a language option and click Repair your computer. Select your operating system, click Startup repair and Windows will try to x the problem. If that doesnt help, boot to your System Recovery options, click Command prompt (instead of Startup repair as before) and enter the following commands: bootrec /xmbr bootrec /xboot bootrec /rebuildbcd Now close the command prompt, remove your Windows disc and try booting again. my documents Launch Control Panel, type Index and click Indexing Options > Advanced > Rebuild > OK to create a new index. A program has stopped responding Wait a moment the program may be busy. If nothing happens you can close it from Task Manager (press [Ctrl]+ [Shift]+[Esc], right-click the program and select End task). your computers memory problems to run a RAM test. A program is taking all of my CPU time Launch RESMON.EXE and nd the rogue process in the CPU box. Right-click it and select Suspend process to stop the program, then right-click and select Resume process to start it again. Beware, this might crash the program and your system, so keep it as an absolute last resort. I cant create a System Restore point To x this, click Start, then right-click Computer and select Properties > System protection. If protection is o for a drive, select it, click Congure, choose the settings you need and click OK. If protection is on already, or the change doesnt help, run QuickSystemRestore (from your free disc or http://bit.ly/ VzkzU1). This will try to create a System Restore point and repair any problems. My desktop has stopped responding Restarting Explorer may help. Launch Task Manager, click Processes, right-click Explorer.exe and click End process. Now click File > New task, type explorer.exe and press [Enter]. A buggy shell extension might also be to blame. Use ShellExView (from your free disc or http://bit. ly/3vpBOB) to nd and remove any unnecessary extensions. A system component doesnt work Serious Windows problems could mean some system les are missing or corrupted. Click Start, type cmd, right-click cmd.exe and click Run as administrator. Then type sfc / scannow and press [Enter] to detect and repair any issues. Im still having problems with Windows! There are lots more options you can try. For example, you can install any Windows updates, update your video card driver, remove plug-ins from applications or delete your temporary les. You can also right-click your drive in Explorer, then click Properties > Tools > Check now to check it for errors.
I see error messages when I install a program

Check that the application runs on your version of Windows. Dont launch a program directly from a web page; save it to your desktop rst, then run it as an administrator. Uninstall older versions of the program (or at least close them down) before you install the new one. Left over temporary les can sometimes cause installation problems too, so use CCleaner (from your free disc) to clean them up, then try again. The screen turns blue and I have to reboot Typically this means theres a driver problem on your PC, although you may have hardware issues as well. Enter any error messages that are displayed on the screen into Google for guidance; update your drivers (DriverIdentier, from your free disc or www. driveridentier.com, may be able to help); and launch Control Panel, search for memory and click Diagnose Why has a program locked up? Launch RESMON.EXE, right-click the process and choose Analyze process to see the threads in the process, and exactly what holds the resources that are making the program hang. You can then kill that part of the process if appropriate, but this is dangerous and may crash both the program and your PC. Only try this if its absolutely necessary.
WATCH AND WAIT If a program isnt responding, it might just be busy
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A website isnt being displayed properly Websites built for old versions of Internet Explorer may not display properly in the latest versions. To try and x this, click Tools > Compatibility > View settings, type the sites domain name (www.google. com, say) and click Add. I dont want to share a particular folder Browse to a folder youd like to make private, right-click it and select Share with. Choose Nobody and other network users wont be able to see it. How can I keep my kids safe online? Run DNS Angel (from your free disc) and click MetaCert DNS. This makes your PC use MetaCerts DNS servers, blocking most adult sites. I cant connect my PCs to one another If your networked PCs cant see each other, click Start >
Computer > Properties and look at the computer name, domain and workgroup settings. Each PC should have a dierent name, but the workgroup should be the same. If not, click Change Settings > Change. Enter and save your new details, reboot the PC and try again. to reach some websites If you cant see one specic website, check www.down foreveryoneorjustme.com to see if its a general problem, or just you. If you nd you cant reach several antivirus vendors www.avg.com and www. avira.com, say then that could mean youve been infected by a virus. Run a full system scan immediately. My PC connects to the wrong network If youre within range of two Wi-Fi networks then Windows may sometimes connect to the wrong one. To set it up
STAY SAFE DNS Angel will stop your kids seeing inappropriate websites
correctly, click Start, type wireless and click Manage wireless networks. Youll see a list of networks youve used. Use the Move up and Move down buttons to rearrange the list, with the most important at the top, and Windows should then connect to those networks rst. How can I access my router settings page? Download and run RCon.exe (www.nuetools.co.uk) and it will automatically open your browser at the right address. Alternatively, click Start, type nslookup.exe and press [Enter], then type the address it gives you into your web browsers address bar. A program says I have no internet connection If an internet program acts as though youre not online, open a command window, type ping google.com and press [Enter]. If you see several Reply from messages then you know your internet connection is working. If there are no replies, you should right-click the network icon in your system tray and select Troubleshoot problems to launch the Windows Network Troubleshooter. Malware has messed up my IE settings Install the Anvi Browser Repair Tool (from your free disc or http://bit.ly/S123Nh). Its an excellent tool which can repair many broken IE settings in just a couple of clicks.
A toolbar has taken over my web browser

Install some programs and theyll try to equip your PC with a browser toolbar or some other annoying piece of spyware, which may take over your home page, search page and more. To remove this, go to Control Panel > Programs > Uninstall a program. Click the Installed on header to sort your programs by date. If you see the toolbar, select it and click Uninstall. If that doesnt help, see if you can remove the extension manually. In Internet Explorer, click Tools > Manage Add-ons to look for it (click Tools > Add-ons if youre using Firefox, or Tools > Extensions in Chrome). If the toolbar is still there, run AdwCleaner (from your free disc or http://bit.ly/XJWrfY) to get rid of it.
I suddenly lose my network connection Launch Device Manager, expand Network adaptors, double-click your network adapter and select Properties. Click System idle power saver in the list. If this is turned on, set its value to Disabled, reboot and try again. If that doesnt help, return to the Properties dialog and click Power management. Turning o the power saving options might help, but bear in mind that it may also shorten the battery life of laptops. I want to deactivate IEs spell checker Internet Explorer 10 will regularly highlight words it thinks are misspelled. If you dont need this, click Tools > Manage add-ons > Spelling correction and clear the Enable spelling correction box to turn it o. One of my devices isnt working properly Run Devmgmt.msc to launch Device Manager. If Windows nds a problem, it highlights the device with a yellow icon. Double-click this for details, or click Driver > Update driver to try to x things.
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I need more hard drive space

There are many ways to free up valuable hard drive space and improve your computers performance. Start by using WinDirStat (www.windirstat.info) to nd the largest les and folders and uninstall programs you dont need. Run Disk Cleanup or CCleaner (on your free disc) to nd and remove junk les. Launch Explorer, right-click the drive and select Properties > Tools > Check now. This will check your drive for errors, and may recover lost space. If you dont use hibernation, disable it (run cmd. exe as an administrator and enter powercfg -h o ) to save drive space. My DVD drive isnt recognised by Windows Run REGEDIT, browse to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\ SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\ Control\Class\{4D36E965-E32511CE-BFC1-08002BE10318}, delete both UpperFilters and LowerFilters and reboot. If thats no help, click Start, type disk management and click Create and format hard disk partitions. Right-click your optical drive, select Change drive letter and paths, click Change, choose a new letter and reboot. If the drive is now visible in Explorer, you can repeat the process to change the drive letter back. settings that I need If you cant nd the hardware settings you need in Control Panel, open the Devices and Printers folder, instead. It will have icons for many of your devices, and just right-clicking any of these will list your available options. I accidentally hit my laptops touchpad Install Touchpad Blocker (which you can get from your free disc, or download from http://touchpad-blocker.com) or Touchfreeze (from your disc or http://bit.ly/5rvRbH). These programs disable the touchpad when youre typing, so if you accidentally brush it, nothing will happen. Im having problems with a USB device If your PC doesnt recognise a USB device or it just doesnt work properly then try plugging it into a dierent USB port. There may be a USB connector on your monitor or your keyboard, but youll often get better results with a USB port on your PC. My PCs disk drives are too slow Launch Device Manager, Expand Disk drives, doubleclick the drive youd like to speed up and click Policies. Checking both Enable write caching and Turn o Windows write-cache buer ushing should improve your drives performance, but take care if your PCs power fails then youre much more likely to lose data than if you leave these settings alone. How can I rename a USB Renaming your USB keys can make it easier to tell them apart, but the usual route (right-click, then select Rename) doesnt always work as it should. If this happens to you, make sure theres nothing you need on the USB drive, then reformat it (right-click, then select Format) and try renaming it again. My monitors colours arent accurate This is a very common problem. First, try adjusting your monitors physical controls (white balance, brightness, contrast and so on). If thats no help, click Start, type DCCW.EXE and press [Enter] to launch the Display Colour Calibration Wizard, which should help you improve the situation. I cant always see the cursor on my laptop Click Start, type pointer, click Make it easier to see the mouse pointer and check Disable pointer trails to make the cursor more visible. Alternatively, check Show location of pointer when I press the [Ctrl] key and click Apply. Now, when you press [Ctrl], Windows will highlight the mouse cursor for you. My laptops battery life is too short Click Start, type cmd, right-click CMD.EXE and select Run as administrator. Type powercfg -energy, press [Enter], and check the report it produces for problems.
SPELL IT OUT If your keyboard isnt working, try the on-screen version
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The wrong keyboard characters appear If you press some keys on your keyboard and the wrong characters appear, click Start, type region and click Region and language > Keyboards and languages > Change keyboards. If you dont see English (United Kingdom) in the Installed Services box, click Add and select it. Now click it in the list, then keep clicking Move up until its at the top. If theres a language in the list that you dont need, choose it and click Remove. Video quality on my computer is poor Click Start, type power options and click the Power Options link. Click Change plan settings for your current plan, click Change advanced power settings, expand Multimedia settings and make sure Playing Video is set to Optimise video quality. Text doesnt look clear enough on screen Launch cttune (the ClearType text tuning wizard) and follow the instructions provided.
The keyboard isnt working properly In an emergency, you can always click Start > All Programs > Accessories > Ease of access and launch the on-screen keyboard. Then simply select the program youre trying to control, return to the on-screen keyboard and click its keys as necessary with your mouse. Can I run a program as another user? Yes, if you have the right login credentials. Just hold down [Shift], right-click the programs shortcut and choose Run as dierent user. Enter the username and password for that account and your application will launch. What photo-editing program is best? If youre in a hurry and your needs are simple, give Windows Paint a try its better than most people realise. You can crop images, resize or rotate them, paint and draw, and even add some fun annotations such as thought bubbles.
PICTURE PERFECT For simple photo editing, dont underestimate Paint
My PC has been infected with a virus Before you try downloading a security tool, click Start, type MRT and press [Enter]. If its installed youll see the Microsoft Windows Malicious Software Removal Tool, which may be able to help remove the virus from your PC. How can I step through a video? Its not exactly obvious, but pressing [Ctrl] while clicking the Play button in Windows Media Player will step forward, while pressing [Ctrl]+[Shift] will clicking Play will step back. I cant install a new program on my PC Close all other programs before you run the installer. Uninstall the old version, if there is one, and use the Disk Cleanup tool to clear temporary les. If all else fails, create a new user account and install it from there. I need more screen grab options Windows can capture the entire screen to the clipboard if you press [Print Screen], or just the current window if you press [Alt]+[Print Screen]. If you want more, though, launch SnippingTool.exe. It can also grab rectangular or even freehand areas from any part of the screen you like. Drag and drop isnt working properly If youre running one program as an administrator and
another just normally, then youll probably nd you cant drag and drop les between them. Run both with the same rights, and drag and drop should work. Can I stop my kids installing software? If you want to prevent other users of your system from installing programs, give Installguard a try (get it from your free disc or download it from www.completelock.com). Free for personal use, it ensures only authorised users can install software, and only programs you permit are allowed to run on the system. What tool do I need to If you sometimes download a le and then dont know how to open it, install OpenWith Enhanced (from your free disc or http://extensions.frieger.
It takes too long to set up a new computer

When a new computer arrives, youll probably want to equip it with browsers, Flash, a PDF viewer, a zip manager, a media player and lots more. Normally youll nd these by browsing directly to each program site and looking for the download page. DDownloads (www.ddownloads.net), however, knows all about 900+ popular applications. Just choose a program, click Direct download from page and itll automatically open a browser window and begin downloading the le you need.
com/owdesc.php), right-click any le, select Open with, and the program will recommend applications that can open it. I lose data when I reboot my PC Launch REGEDIT, browse to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\
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I cant uninstall a program
Go to Control Panel > Programs > Uninstall a program, click it in the list and select Uninstall. If you dont see the program there, click Start > All programs, select its folder and look for an Uninstall option. If you nd the uninstaller but it seems to hang, be patient; removing an application can take a while. If the program doesnt work rst time, reboot and try again, or try uninstalling the program from Safe Mode. Sometimes reinstalling an application will allow you to uninstall it. If all else fails, Revo Uninstaller (www. revouninstaller.com) can remove many stubborn programs.
Software\Policies\Microsoft\ Windows\System, and look for the DWORD value Allow Blocking AppsAtShutdown. If you see this, and its set to zero, double-click it, set the value to one and click OK. Can I run a program as an administrator? Yes, and it isnt dicult. If you can see the program executable (or a shortcut), right-click it and select Run as administrator. If youre using the Run box, though, type the program name REGEDIT, for example then hold down [Ctrl] and press [Enter] to launch the program with administrative rights. How can I tell if I have 32-bit or 64-bit Windows? Some programs come in both 32- and 64-bit avours, so its useful to know which version of Windows you have. To nd out, click Start, right-click Computer, select Properties, and the System Type entry will tell you whether you have a 32- or 64-bit operating system. Ive lost a Windows product key Reinstalling Windows is generally very easy, but you will need your Windows product key. Its usually on a sticker thats attached to your PC or Windows disc box, but if you cant see anything then Keynder (from this months free disc or www.
magicaljellybean.com) will help you recover it. A program is hogging my CPU If an application has a high CPU usage but you dont want to close it, press [Ctrl]+[Shift]+ [Esc], click Processes, rightclick the process and select Set anity. Now clear All processes, select just one CPU core and click OK. The program is now unable to use your other cores, leaving them free for other applications.
Files are opening in the wrong program

If double-clicking a le on your desktop doesnt open it in the right application, dont worry this is easy to x. First, launch Control Panel and click Programs > Default programs > Set your default programs. Now choose the application youd like to open this le in the Programs list and click Choose defaults for this program. Check the le types youd like this application to handle by default (or check the Select all box if youd like to use it for everything). Clear the others and click Save when youre done. Your les should now open in the application of your choice.
Nicks verdict
Windows problems can seem extremely complex, but as weve seen, thats often not the case. Just tweaking a single setting or running the appropriate applet may be all it takes to get your system working again. When life isnt so straightforward though, youll need to apply a few more general strategies. If youre experiencing a new technical issue with Windows for instance, you could try using System Restore to recover your previous settings and system les. Some programs may need to be reinstalled afterwards but your data les wont be aected. Microsofts Fix it Centre (http://support.microsoft.com/xit) has a host of automated solutions to all kinds of problems. Check out the general Microsoft support site, too (http://support.microsoft.com). There are helpful text documents, tools to download, forums to get help from other users, and you can even chat live with Microsoft technicians.
Nicholas Odantzis Deputy editor
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Help & Advice |
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WINDOWS TIPS
INTERNET ADVICE
YOUR DISC SOFTWARE
Welcome
Whether youre stuck for inspiration or want to become a master of your Windows computer, our Explore section is the place to come. Each month we pack it with tutorials covering a range of subjects suitable for all levels of expertise. This month Christian shows you how to control your PC remotely using an iPad and some clever software, Matt helps you fix troublesome hardware issues, and James explains how to identify programs that are hogging your PCs resources. Theres never been a better time to see how your PC can make your life easier than ever! Nick Odantzis, deputy editor nick.odantzis@futurenet.com

24 Organise your schedule with Remember the Milk 28 Access your Windows PC from an iPad 32 Make your own mobile app toolkit 36 Keep your files in sync with Skydrive 38 Switch to a solid state boot drive 42 Publish blog posts with Live Writer

46 Free up storage with WinDirStat 48 Identify and repair common hardware issues 52 Get started with Amazon Cloud Player 54 Create a bootable Windows 8.1 installation 56 Make a folder system that works for you
With Amazon Autorip, you can purchase a physical copy of an album and have instant access to it while you wait for the CD to arrive
Our promise to you

Get more from Windows, software and all your favourite sites
Every issue, we guarantee to pack the magazine with great tutorials teaching you all the best things you can do with your PC. Each article features step-by-step instructions to make learning new skills fast and enjoyable. We all know how to do the basics but getting the most from Windows isnt always easy. Our dedication to the operating system means you get the very best tips and tricks for all versions of Windows.
Packed with informative tutorials
We all have our list of favourite sites but often we miss out on great features sight. Well show you how to do more online, for a more satisfying web life. Our exclusive industry access enables us to pack your free disc with full commercial software. From speed-up and security software to superb photo apps, theres always something new to try on your PC.
February 2014 | Help & Advice |
Get more from your favourite websites
Customise Windows to work your way
Use our full software to try new things
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Organise your schedule

Peel those sticky notes off your monitor Remember the Milk will make sure you never forget another appointment.
At a glance
SKILL LEVEL
Anyone can do it Straightforward Tricky in parts

TIME TAKEN
30
minutes
SUITABLE FOR
Windows 8 Windows 7 Windows Vista Windows XP
uthor Douglas Adams once said: I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they y by. If youre anything like me, that particular sound is like nails on a blackboard, but thankfully theres a free online service called Remember the Milk that will help you silence it. Remember the Milk can be as simple or complex as you like. At its most basic, you just type a list of things you need to do and check them o as you nish them, but there are dozens of handy little tools at your disposal if you want to delve a little deeper. You can add a due date and time, set a location, assign priorities and sort all your tasks into categories. Best of all, you can access your to-do list anywhere via your smartphone or tablet, and it all syncs seamlessly with your Google or Facebook calendar. So what are you waiting for?
ADD A TASK If theres something you need to do, just type it in here and press [Enter]. If you add a date and time, it will be added to your calendar automatically.
Step-by-step Make a detailed to-do list
up 1 Sign Open your web browser and go to www.rememberthemilk.

com. To make a new account, click Sign up at the top of the page and enter your details, plus a username and password. The form will tell you whether the username you have chosen is available. Click Sign up and youll be sent an email to confirm your account. Click the verification link in the email, and youre ready to start.
in with Facebook or Google 2 Sign If youd rather use Remember the Milk with your Facebook
or Google account instead, click the relevant icon on the top right. Youll be prompted to enter your username and password, then agree to let Remember the Milk access your details. Signing up this way has the advantage of automatically linking your Google or Facebook calendar to Remember the Milk more on that later!
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Explore Organise your schedule WorldMags.net

GET SORTED These tabs let you organise your to-do list into categories. You can add more if you want, and delete any that you dont need. ADVANCED OPTIONS The Settings link lets you update your prole, set up lists and tags, add reminders and connect Remember the Milk to your smartphone or tablet.
MORE INFO When you click a task, extra information will appear in this panel, such as the day its due, where you need to be, and the name of anyone youve shared it with.
YOUR TO-DO LIST Tasks to be completed will appear in this list. By default, high priority tasks will be listed rst, but you can also arrange them by due date or name.

started 3 Get Youll now see your to-do list. It looks pretty empty right
now the only task is Try out Remember the Milk. To mark that task as finished, select the checkbox on the left, then click the Complete button. The task will vanish from the list, and an orange box will appear, offering you the chance to bring it back if you didnt mean to remove it.
a task 4 Make There are various tabs to choose from Inbox, Personal,
Study, Work, Sent and All Tasks. These help you keep your list organised. Lets start by making a task in the Personal category. Type in something you need to do say, Buy birthday card and press [Enter]. Click the task then look at the panel on the left. Youll notice it has no due date, location or tags lets fix that!
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a deadline 5 Set You can add more detail to your tasks as you see fit. For
example, if you select the Work tab and enter Business meeting Friday, Remember the Milk will add the task Business meeting to your list, and mark its due date as Friday. Similarly, if you enter Business meeting Friday at 3pm, Remember the Milk will set the time, too.
Smart Add shortcuts 6 Use Smart Add is another handy way to add detail to your tasks.
Click the Personal tab again and enter a task, then press the [^] key before submitting it. A drop-down list will appear so you can choose a deadline for the task. If you type an exclamation mark, you can choose a priority level, from one to three. For a full list of Smart Add shortcuts, visit the help page at http://bit.ly/1a4PYCu.
up locations 7 Set Sometimes, you need to be reminded where youre meant

to be. Click the Location link and youll see a map. Type the name of a place in the box on the top left, and a drop-down list will appear. Select the correct place and a pin will appear on the map. Click this and enter a name (such as Work). You can then use the Smart Add shortcut [@] for tasks that take place there.
your tasks 8 Add Now you know how to add tasks, enter all the things you
need to do and appointments you need to keep. Use the tabs to arrange tasks into categories, and use Smart Add to include due dates and other useful information. Once youve finished, click the Overview link on the top right and youll see a quick list of all the tasks that are due today and tomorrow, plus any that are overdue.
connected 9 Get Click Settings and select the Services tab. Click Third-party
services and youll see a list of ways to connect Remember the Milk with your other accounts (such as Gmail, Twitter and Evernote) and devices (including Apple and Android phones and tablets). I recommend connecting your Gmail account, so tasks are added to your Google calendar automatically.
it off 10 Check If you want to edit one of your tasks, click it once to select it,
then make the necessary changes in the grey box on the right. You can also share a task with other people by clicking the More actions drop-down menu. Once youve completed the task, just check the Complete box, or select Postpone if, despite your best efforts, you need another day to get it done.
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Windows 7 Help & Advice is an internationally licensed title and is exported to another 22 countries. Future Publishing Ltd, 30 Monmouth Street, Bath BA1 2BW Tel: 01225 442244 Fax: 01225 732275 Email: windowsmagazine@futurenet.com Web: www.facebook.com/windowsmag
EDITORIAL
Deputy editor Nick Odantzis New media editor Jeremy Ford
In the next issue..
ON SAL Frida E 14 Febr y uary 2014
ART/PRODUCTION
Art editor Fraser McDermott Deputy art editor Mat Gartside Managing editor Catherine Emma Ellis
CONTRIBUTORS
Editorial Ben Andrews, Dan Grabham, Christian Hall, Nick Peers, Mayank Sharma, Henry Winchester Production Alan Stonebridge Design Cormac Jordan Photography Joseph Branston, Dave Caudrey, Philip Sowels, Thinkstock.com, iStockphoto.com, Gettyimages.com
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Group art director Steve Gotobed Group senior editor Paul Newman Head of computing group Ian Robson Group managing director Nial Ferguson Creative director Bob Abbott Editorial director Jim Douglas
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Back up essential files to the cloud

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Access your Windows PC from an iPad

Need to access your PC while away from home, or help someone else with their PC? Call on TeamViewer for speedy remote access.
At a glance
SKILL LEVEL

TIME TAKEN
15
minutes
SUITABLE FOR
ost of us use cloud computing services such as Dropbox and Microsoft Skydrive to sync les, but what if youve forgotten to upload your work to the cloud and the only way to get that precious le from your PC is to access it remotely? Dont worry with the brilliant TeamViewer, you can access your PC from anywhere with an internet connection. But what if you cant get to a Windows PC? No matter, as long as youve got the software installed on your home PC, all you need is the TeamViewer app for smartphones and tablets! In this tutorial Im using an iPad to get into a home PC. TeamViewer on mobile devices doesnt have quite as many features as the desktop version, but its been brilliantly designed to make the most of gesture controls with a virtual keyboard and mouse. Now lets get going!

Step-by-step Access your PC using TeamViewer for iPad
remote control 1 Allow First, you need to set up TeamViewer on your PC. Install
the free version from this months disc, or grab it from www. teamviewer.com/en/index.aspx. When you open it, the first screen will show two tabs. On the Remote Control tab youll see that youve been given an ID and a password (all in numbers). Youll need these to log in with your iPad.
your iPad 2 Connect To access your PC you have to enter the ID and password
on your iPad, so its important that you can remember them. You can either hit the Refresh button to generate a new password, or better still you can set a permanent one that youll remember. Avoid writing down your password you dont want someone to find it and access your PC without your permission.
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Explore Access your Windows PC from an iPad WorldMags.net
touch controls 3 Master As tablet control is very different from the traditional
keyboard and mouse, theres a special set of gesture controls that you can use to make navigation easier on a touchscreen. Youre introduced to them the first time you launch TeamViewer on the iPad. Remember that to right-click an object, you need to tap it and hold your finger there.
the desktop 4 Explore Youll now see your Windows 7 desktop displayed on your
iPad, adjusted so it fits perfectly to the iPads screen proportions. You can call up a black bar at the bottom by pressing the keyboard symbol, which provides you with access to further useful options such as the on-screen keyboard, mouse cursor options and the settings menu.
your options 5 Adjust The main options menu is split into a few different
categories. At the top, the Online Settings section lets you adjust your connection options vital if youre having problems linking your iPad to your PC. Under the Control heading you can change the image quality and screen resolution, as well as turn the remote cursor on or off.
the wallpaper back 6 Get When you first arrive on the Windows 7 desktop via the
iPad, your background will have been removed and replaced with a black one by default. This is done to speed up performance by removing what TeamViewer deems as unnecessary graphics. If youd rather have it back, look under Advanced Settings and select the option to reinstate your original wallpaper.
typing 7 Try Tap the virtual keyboard option to bring up the iPads
standard on-screen keyboard. Youll see some extra options at the top, including a handy Start button that provides quick access to the Windows 7 Start menu. Youll also notice that theres another keyboard symbol click this to open up a second, more detailed keyboard for better input via the iPad.
team viewing! 8 Enjoy You can now use touchscreen gestures and keyboard
controls to operate your Windows machine remotely. The TeamViewer console at the bottom can be hidden by clicking the tab. Most options here are for PC-to-PC use only, so you wont need them. To end a TeamViewer session, either tap the X on the iPad apps menu bar or terminate in the Session list on your PC.
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Make a mobile app toolkit

Keep all your apps and settings together in a single folder for convenient access across all your PCs.
At a glance
SKILL LEVEL

TIME TAKEN
hour
SUITABLE FOR
ortable applications have many advantages, the key one being that theyre contained within a single folder. That means you can carry that folder with you typically on a USB stick and always have the program and your carefully crafted settings to hand. Portable apps can also be used to keep your programs and settings in sync across multiple PCs. Simply store them using a cloud-based backup and sync service such as SkyDrive, Dropbox or SugarSync, and changes you make on one PC will be pushed to the others automatically. A third benet to portable apps is that they can survive a Windows reinstallation. Simply restore your portable apps folder, and all your apps and preferences will be there, ready to go. In this tutorial youll learn how to create your ultimate portable application toolkit so youll never be without your favourite apps.
BACK IT UP If your portable applications folder isnt stored in the cloud (where its backed up automatically), take the time to back up either the entire folder or just your app settings.
Step-by-step Create your own app toolkit
your drive 1 Prepare Browse to the location where you plan to store your apps
and their settings - either a USB flash drive for on-the-go access from any PC, or a dedicated folder on a cloud storage service (such as SkyDrive or Dropbox) if you want to sync between specific computers. Make sure you have sufficient free space for your desired apps up to 2GB may be required.
Portableapps 2 Install Next, install the PortableApps.com Platform tool from your
free disc. This makes it easy to add, launch and manage your portable applications from a single location. Follow the installation wizard, making sure you select the folder you created in the previous step when prompted. Once finished, leave Launch PortableApps.com Platform ticked and click Finish.
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Explore Make a mobile app toolkit WorldMags.net

TWEAK APPEARANCE Click the Options button to change how the launcher looks and behaves. Use the Themes tab to set the colour scheme, and the Advanced tab to customise other aspects.
Jargon buster!
Portable application Regular applications store their settings in various locations of your PC, including the Registry; portable applications ensure their settings are stored within the apps own folder.
PORTABLE DOCUMENTS PortableApps Launcher also creates a Documents folder within your portable folder, allowing you to easily store documents on the move too.
ACCESS APPS The PortableApps Launcher can display your apps in a number of dierent ways. To change how theyre shown, click Options and select the General tab.
MANAGE FREE SPACE Its easy to build up a large library of apps, so use this bar to measure how much free space is left on your USB drive.
and install apps 3 Browse After a short pause, the Portable App Directory window will
open, listing hundreds of apps divided into categories. Familiar and unfamiliar apps, games and tools will appear in this list. Scroll through the list, placing a tick next to those apps you wish to add to your toolkit, taking note of the Install size of each. When youve made your initial selection, click Next.
PortableApps 4 Access PortableApps will download and install the selected apps
into a PortableApps directory inside the folder you created look out for licence agreements that youll need to accept. Once complete, open the PortableApps menu via its icon in the Taskbar notification area (click the arrow if it is not immediately visible), or by double-clicking the Start icon inside your portable folder.
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apps 5 Launching The PortableApps Launcher which appears in the bottom

right-hand corner of the screen looks and works in a similar way to Windows own Start menu. By default apps are simply displayed in alphabetical order, but if you click the All portable apps shortcut at the bottom you can browse them by category instead. Launching an app is as simple as clicking its entry in the list.
more apps 6 Find Click the Apps button and select Get more apps to browse
for and install new applications from the Portable App Directory. You can browse the directory by category, title, release date or by how recently apps were updated. This method can also be used to check for updates to your collection of portable apps and to install them manually.
apps from elsewhere 7 Install Not all portable-friendly apps are found at PortableApps.
com check the websites of your favourite programs to see if they provide portable builds. If the file is provided in the .paf or .paf.exe format http://portablexapps.blogspot.co.uk is a source of these save it to your hard drive, then open the PortableApps. com Launcher and click Apps > Install a New App to install it.
manually 8 Install Other portable applications are provided as extractable

installers or zip files. In either case, the trick is to extract their contents into a dedicated folder inside the same PortableApps folder that contains the apps installed by the Launcher. Once done, open the Launcher and click the Apps button, then select Refresh App Icons to create a shortcut to that app.
applications 9 Manage Right-click an applications entry in the list to reveal more

options, such as uninstalling it, adding it to a list of favourites for easier access, or running it with administrator privileges. If youve just added a new application manually, you can rename it from here if necessary, and file it into the correct category to help keep your list of portable applications organised.
portable toolkit, complete 10 Your There you have it all of your key apps are now available in
portable form. If youre using a cloud folder, youll find that your apps and settings are automatically synced between all the PCs connected to that folder, while your USB stick allows you to take your apps with you on the road, plugging them into any PC for access wherever you are.
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Keep your files in sync with SkyDrive

I often need to jump from one computer to another.

At a glance
SKILL LEVEL

TIME TAKEN
30
minutes
SUITABLE FOR
wning a computer is no longer considered a luxury. In fact, many people or households, at least have more than one at their disposal. If youre one of those people who often nd themselves working with multiple machines - perhaps a desktop and a laptop, for example, or a couple of desktops in dierent places - youll be only too aware of the problem of ensuring that you have access to the les you need on the computer you are using. This is where SkyDrive is hugely helpful. It makes it possible to synchronise les between computers, and it even gives you the option of accessing them online. Its an amazing way to ensure that you can always work on your les no matter which computer you end up using. Read on to nd out how.

Step-by-step
SkyDrive 1 Download If you are using Windows 7, you will need to install a copy of
SkyDrive. Go to www.skydrive.com using Internet Explorer. You will need to sign into your Microsoft account. At the bottom left of the screen, click the Download button or the Get SkyDrive applications link. Now click Download the desktop app and save the setup file to your hard drive before starting the installation.
and get started 2 Install Click Yes if a User Account Control dialog appears and wait
while the installation runs its course. Once this is complete, an introductory screen will be displayed click Get started to continue. So that your files can be synchronised, you will need to sign into your Microsoft account, so enter your email address and password before clicking the Sign in button.
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your folder 3 Configure Although SkyDrive stores your files online for easy access,
they still need to be kept on your hard drive so you have a local copy. By default, a folder will be created for this purpose in your user folder, but you can click the Change button to choose a different location. When you are happy with the folder thats being used, click Next.
sync options 4 Set The SkyDrive folder includes sub-folders for pictures,
documents and shared files, all of which are synchronised by default. If you are happy with this, just click Next. Alternatively, select Choose folders to sync and tick the boxes next to the folders to synchronise. Leave the box labelled Let me use SkyDrive to fetch any of my files on this PC ticked and click Done.
files 5 Synchronising The beauty of SkyDrive is that you really dont have to do
anything. When you save a file that you want to access on other computers, just make sure you save it to your SkyDrive folder. You will need to install the SkyDrive software on other computers you use. You can tell your files are synced by the appearance of a green tick on folder icons.
on the web 6 Access As you save files to your SkyDrive folder on your computer,
they are automatically uploaded to the SkyDrive website. You can view them online at www.skydrive.com, where you can also keep an eye on the amount of online storage space thats available to you. These files will be downloaded automatically to any other computer with the SkyDrive application installed.
in Windows 8.1 7 SkyDrive If you have upgraded your computer to Windows 8.1, you
will find that SkyDrive is now built in as standard there is no need to install it separately. As well as integrating with Explorer just as in Windows 7, there is also a dedicated Windows 8 app that provides an extra means to access your files, but everything works in much the same way.
easy access! 8 Enjoy Thats all there is to it! Providing you remember to save your
files into the SkyDrive folder you need never think about moving files from one computer to another it is all taken care of for you! Some people worry that talk of working in the cloud is complicated, but it makes everything so much easier when you move between PCs. Give it a try for yourself and find out.
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Switch to a solid state boot drive

Installing a solid state boot drive is one of the best ways to make your PC start faster, and making the switch is much easier than you might expect.
At a glance
SKILL LEVEL

TIME TAKEN
hour
SUITABLE FOR
ave you seen how cheap it is to pick up a solid state drive (SSD) today? If youre not throwing solid state boot drives into all your PCs then either youre not saving enough of your hard-earned pennies, or youre terried by the prospect of reinstalling Windows. Well, be terried no more Ill show you the foolproof way to clone your existing boot drive to a fresh new solid state drive for free! The new drive must be big enough for all the data on the existing boot partition (the part of your hard drive needed for the operating system to start). Its best if the new drive is larger than the old one, but this isnt essential; it just makes life easier. This isnt a quick process if youre lucky, and it all runs without a hitch, it can take under an hour, but if there are issues or errors, this can extend to ve hours or more. Its not something to try when youre in a rush.
Step-by-step Migrating to a new boot SSD
discs 1 Recovery We usually find that the newly cloned drive needs to have
its bootloader (a small program that starts the operating system) rebuilt. We recommend creating a Windows emergency recovery disc (in Windows 8 its called a Recovery Drive). Open the Start menu, type Create a system repair disc and select it. Youll need a spare blank CD or DVD onto which you can burn this.
everything unwanted 2 Remove If youre lucky youll have a solid state drive larger than the
one its replacing, but if your SSD is a bit tight for space, remove any unnecessary programs to make room. You can also remove the large hibernation file: open the Start Menu, type Command right-click Command prompt, select Run as administrator, type powercfg h off and press [Enter].
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partitions 3 Resize Its possible to resize the existing boot drive. To do this,
right-click Computer and select Manage > Disk management. Right-click on the boot partition that youre going to clone and select Shrink volume. The Disk Management tool will calculate the amount of space that can be removed. If system files are causing issues, see step four.
sizing 4 Partition If youre having issues freeing up enough space and

shrinking the partition down due to system files, then you can try the EaseUS Partition Master software, which you can download free from www.partition-tool.com. This will physically shift the data to shrink the partition and its pretty bulletproof, but it will require a reboot into its exclusive mode.
the drive 5 Connect Were getting close to the copy session, so hook up the new
drive on a spare SATA or eSATA connection (if youre not sure what these are, check http://bit.ly/17co9Vj). This is easy on a desktop PC, but for a laptop youll need to use a spare desktop machine to handle the copying, or else use an external drive caddy. Ideally this should be running over eSATA.
and copy 6 Select Macrium Reflect is my favourite drive-copying tool, largely

because it has a pretty interface and Im easily distracted, but also because it plays very nicely with Windows. You can download it free from www.macrium.com/reflectfree.aspx. Simply select the boot drive and click the Clone this drive link that appears, select the destination drive and itll do the rest.
it 7 Recover Once Macrium Reflect has finished cloning the drive, power
down your computer, disconnect the old boot drive, permanently install the new one and boot. Whenever Ive run the clone process Ive always been tripped up by something. Usually Windows will get confused and want the bootloader to be rebuilt, so boot the recovery disc and let it run.
reboot 8 And Any recovery can be completed by the automatic system,

and should only take a minute to finish. When its done, the new boot drive will be ready to run. You shouldnt notice any difference when your computer starts because it should run as an identical system, although youll discover that its much faster if youre upgrading to an SSD.
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Blog with Live Writer

At a glance
SKILL LEVEL
Ditch those awful web forms and publish straight from your Windows desktop.
logging may have been the technology buzzword of 2008, but its still going strong. Its a fantastic way to express yourself, and it doesnt matter if you only get a few visitors; blogging is about reaching out and sharing ideas with like-minded people. Whether youre writing about classic cars, cooking, shing or something else, starting a blog is a great way to get more from your hobbies. The trouble is that most platforms use long and complicated web forms for uploading your blog entries to the site, which can be time-consuming when you want to publish something in a hurry. Thats where Windows Live Writer comes in. This handy Windows Live app lets you write your blog in a familiar-looking interface, so any Oce veteran will be right at home. Lets get started with Windows Live Writer, and nd out how to start blogging the easy way.
PUBLISH Hitting the Publish button will make your post live, but you can schedule it to appear later by setting a date and time at the right of the toolbar.

TIME TAKEN
30
minutes
SUITABLE FOR
PICTURE SIZE Once youve added a picture using the toolbar button, it is dropped into the page. You can then drag it around and change its size.
Step-by-step Publish posts in moments
Live Writer 1 Install Go to http://bit.ly/10iWHFw and click the green Download

now button. This will open the Windows Live installer, which you can use to install Live Writer, along with a selection of other apps from Microsoft. There are lots of great tools and its well worth having a look through them. We particularly recommend the Mail and Photo Gallery apps.
your service 2 Choose Windows Live Writer is a tool that makes it easier to write
blog posts, not a blogging service itself, so youll need an account with one of the main blogging services, such as Blogger or WordPress. If you already have a blog, choose your service from the list provided. If you dont have one yet, thats fine choose Start a new blog and click Next.
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LINKS Links are essential in blogs, so try to include plenty. They help to improve your blogs ranking in Google, and make online connections with other bloggers.
Jargon buster!
Blog Short for weblog, blog describes a website that shows the most recently added thing rst whenever you post a new article, it appears at the top of the site. SPELLING Dont publish a post thats full of typos. Before you press the Publish button, make sure you click Spelling to check what youve written. Hyperlink A link, usually taking the form of a piece of text or an image that can be clicked on, that takes you to another document or a web page.
DRAFT If you start writing a blog post, but then realise youd like to nish it later, just click Draft. This means you wont lose your formatting work, and you can pick it up again later.
the press 3 Start Microsoft has partnered with WordPress for its preferred
platform. If youre happy to use it, youll be guided through the signup process, which lets you register your blogs name. Simply complete the basic form and youre sorted. If youd rather use a different blogging service, youll have to visit its website and sign up there, then return to step two and choose it.
a template 4 Pick All your settings will now be imported into Windows Live
Writer, which may take a few minutes. Once all the templates have been set up, youll be asked to give your blog a name and save it into your Windows Live Writer profile. This enables you to blog to multiple platforms straight from Windows Live Writer, which is perfect if youre a new media guru.
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your bearings 5 Get Press Next and your blog will load in Windows Live Writer.
Unlike a normal web page, the Writer interface is all about adding content quickly and easily. Windows Live Writer will immediately prompt you to start a new blog post, which is a good way to begin. Dont worry about introductions just think of your best idea and get straight to the point.
a post 6 Write Add a headline for your blog in the top box, then type the
content for your blog post into the main pane below. When youre done, dont hit Publish straight away youve only just started! Its time for some fine-tuning. You can change the font, size and colour of your text or just portions of it using the top bar, just like you would in Microsoft Word.
some colour 7 Add Text alone doesnt make a great blog post, so add some
links and pictures too. To add a link, highlight some words, then click Hyperlink and paste in the address of a web page. Pictures are even easier. Just click Picture and choose an image from your hard drive. You can then drag it around the page, and alter its size by dragging out the corners.
it 8 Catalogue Your blog may cover a range of topics after all, who wants
to write about the same thing all the time? Categories help you organise your posts, and Live Writer makes it easy to create them and assign them to posts. Hit the Category drop-down menu at the top, type in a subject and click Add. Once youve entered a category, it is saved to reuse later.
your posts 9 Tag Tags are a very important part of any blog; as well as
helping people to find interesting posts that youve written, search engines such as Google will use them too. Try to add about three single-word tags to every post. You can enter them in the Live Writer toolbar. Youll naturally write about some topics more than others, so dont worry about using the same ones every time.
your work 10 Publish When youre happy with your blog post, select Publish
and it will be uploaded straight away. Alternatively, you can schedule the publication date by clicking Set post date in the top right, then changing the date and time before hitting Publish. Well done! Your blog is now up and running, so its just a case of keeping it updated regularly.
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Target and destroy storage hogs

Working out whats taking up all your PCs hard drive space can be frustrating, but not if you use WinDirStat.
At a glance
SKILL LEVEL

TIME TAKEN
30
minutes
SUITABLE FOR
eve all had that feeling. When you bought your PC, you had half a terabyte of storage spare a void of space that you never imagined could be lled. However, four years later, things are slowing down and Windows is telling you to free up some space. What can possibly be clogging up that much of your hard drive? WinDirStat is an easy-to-use tool that scans your drive to provide an exact map of whats using every byte of it. By studying this map, you can nd out whats taking more than its fair share of space, then make informed decisions about what programs and les you should archive, what you should keep on your PC and what should be banished into the digital ether. Read on to nd out how to install and use WinDirStat in eight simple steps. Your drive will be clean and tidy in no time!

Step-by-step Clean up your hard drive
1 Install Get WinDirStat from your free disc, or download it from

www.fosshub.com. Run the installer, follow the steps to install the tool on your PC, and choose to run the WinDirStat when prompted. Its not a program youll likely use often, so theres no need to have it pinned to your Windows 7 Taskbar or give it pride of place on your desktop.
2 Scan The first thing youll notice when you open WinDirStat is
its simple interface, which makes it very easy to use. First, the program asks you which of your drives to scan. The dialog box will list all of your drives, so just choose your main hard drive and press Scan. Most main drives will be listed as C, but if you have a different letter assigned, choose that.
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Explore Target and destroy storage hogs WorldMags.net
the picture 3 Get Now is the time to get yourself a cup of tea and a biscuit,
and let WinDirStat do its thing. The program will analyse all the folders on your computer, which can take some time. You can sit and watch the animation as it works through your system if you want, but its not necessary. The whole thing generally takes around five minutes to complete.
your folders 4 Explore Once WinDirStat has trawled through your system, an
impressive map of all of your files will appear in the bottom of the window. Looking at your system in this way can be overwhelming, and unhelpful, but its easy to drill down. Use the folder tree in the top-left pane to delve deeper into your system and, more usefully, to explore precise areas of your drive.
a block 5 Click Each block on the map represents a group of files, so

the bigger the blocks, the larger the group of files cluttering your hard drive. These big blocks are the ones you should start investigating first. Click one of these to identify it in the key in the right-hand pane. This helps you to identify the biggest clusters of non-essential files.
in depth 6 Explore Unfortunately the key is rather vague, so a big cluster

labelled JPEG image could mean a lot of things. Luckily, WinDirStat makes it easy to find out what these big clusters are. Right-click any square on the map and choose Explore here. This opens Windows Explorer for you to have a nose around and see exactly what is taking up all that precious hard drive space.
7 Delete If youre sure that a cluster is just wasted space or youve

archived its contents on an external hard drive WinDirStat can remove it from your computer. Click the offending cluster to highlight it, then choose Clean Up > Delete. You can either opt to send it to the Recycle Bin, or have it immediately and irreversibly deleted. Be careful with the latter option!
where to back up to 8 Select Congratulations! Youve identified and decimated the

storage hogs on your hard drive, leaving you with plenty of space for new files and programs. Remember that its highly advisable to defragment your drive after cleaning up your system to gain the full effects of your optimisation work, or all your diligent space-saving will be less effective than it should.
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Fix hardware problems

Most of us have encountered a hardware problem, but Windows will help you identify and correct them quickly and easily.
At a glance
SKILL LEVEL
CONFIGURE A DEVICE Click this option to get Windows to scan for hardware problems and attempt to x them automatically.

TIME TAKEN
30
minutes
SUITABLE FOR
ne of the most amazing things about PCs is that they come in all shapes and sizes, from slender Windows 8 tablets to portable and powerful laptops, all the way up to hand-built gaming PCs packed with the most powerful components known to man. The huge variety is fantastic, but it also means that we sometimes come across hardware problems. There are so many possible combinations of parts from dozens of manufacturers, sometimes they can have trouble talking to one another. This can be frustrating and its not always obvious where the problem lies, but dont worry there are a number of tools built into Windows that will let you nd out whats gone wrong quickly and easily, and help you x or replace any problem parts. Ill show you how to use them, and suggest some common problems and solutions. Lets get going!
TROUBLESHOOT AUDIO PLAYBACK If youre having trouble hearing sounds through your speakers or headphones, run this troubleshooter to nd out what the problem is.
Step-by-step Identify and resolve hardware issues
Device Manager 1 Open If your computer has started to act a bit strangely recently,
the first thing to do is see what might be causing the problem. As long as Windows will start correctly, you can check out the Device Manager by pressing [Windows]+[R] on your keyboard and typing mmc devmgmt.msc. You can also open Device Manager through Windows Control Panel.
your devices 2 View Device Manager lists all the hardware and components that
are currently installed. If there are any problems a yellow or red icon appears by the device, letting you know something is up. Right-click on a device and select Properties. Under Device status youll see a notification telling you whether the device is working properly, and if not, what the problem might be.
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Explore Fix hardware problems WorldMags.net

Jargon buster!
Control Panel A part of Windows that contains lots of useful and powerful tools. In Windows XP, Vista and 7 you can get to it by clicking the Start menu, and selecting Control Panel. In Windows 8, go to the desktop and bring up the Charms bar, then select Settings > Control Panel. You can also type control panel into the Start search bar. Troubleshooter A step-by-step guide that takes you through the process of identifying and xing any problems. RAM This stands for random-access memory, and is an essential part of modern computers. It lets Windows access stored information quickly, and the more RAM you have, the more data your PC can use quickly.
SEARCH BOX Use this to nd what youre looking for faster. From the main Control Panel window, type troubleshooting into the search box to see this window.
FIX PROBLEMS WITH WINDOWS UPDATE Although Windows Update deals mainly with software, its worth checking there were no Windows Update problems, as they can occasionally aect hardware.
update your drivers 3 Automatically Faulty drivers are the source of many hardware problems,
but you can easily update them from the Device Manager. Right-click on a device then select Update driver software. First, try Search automatically for updated driver software. Windows will check your computer and online for the best drivers, and install them automatically. If that doesnt work, try the next step.
your drivers manually 4 Update You can also install drivers manually. If your device came
with a DVD containing drivers, insert that. You should also check the manufacturer's website to see if there is a new driver available to download. Once done, go back to the Update Driver Software page and select 'Browse my computer for driver software'. Click 'Browse', then select your DVD drive or your Downloads folder.
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the troubleshooter 5 Open Another way to find solutions to hardware problems is

to use the Hardware and Devices Troubleshooter. Open up the Control Panel, then in the search box in the top-right hand corner of the window type troubleshooter and press [Enter] on your keyboard. Under Troubleshooting click Find and fix problems, then select Configure a device.
the steps 6 Follow With the Hardware and Devices Troubleshooter open,
click Next to begin. Windows will now scan your system and attempt to fix any problems it finds. When it does, youll see a list of changes it has made, and you should be able to continue working. You can also select Explore additional options or View detailed information for more clues about what has gone wrong.
memory problems 7 Solve If something is wrong with its RAM, your PC can be plagued
with problems. You can identify and fix these issues by opening the Control Panel and typing memory into the search box. Under Administrative tools, select Diagnose your computers memory problems. You can either restart Windows now and check for problems, or have it check next time you start your computer.
your network adapter 8 Fix Cant connect to the internet? Unplug your modem from
the power supply, wait 20 seconds, then plug it back in. Once it has restarted, try connecting again. If that doesnt help, type network in the Start menu (or the Start screen in Windows 8). Click Network > Network and Sharing Center > Change adapter settings. Right-click your network connection and click Diagnose.
serious issues 9 More Sometimes a hardware problem is so severe that Windows

wont start. When you turn on your PC, a long beep or a series of short beeps can inform you what is wrong. For example, one long beep tells you that the graphics card is not powered properly. It varies from manufacturers, so you may need to search the internet, or take it to a store to be fixed.
tips 10 Troubleshooting Following these steps you should now be able to fix any
hardware problems you encounter. Start with the most obvious problem, such as a driver error, then work your way through each step. Youll hopefully hit the solution as you go. Unfortunately, some serious problems may require the help of a professional to either fix or replace the faulty hardware.
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Turn your existing CDs into digital music

Discover how to easily play and download tracks youve purchased on Amazon
At a glance
SKILL LEVEL

TIME TAKEN
15
minutes
SUITABLE FOR
mazons Cloud Music service gives you access to more than MP3 music downloads youve purchased through Amazon. It also includes digital versions of many CDs and vinyl records you may have purchased through Amazon over the years too. Thanks to the new AutoRip feature, you can purchase a physical copy of music and have instant access to the tunes via Amazons Cloud Player while you wait for the CD or record to arrive. The music comes in 256Kbps MP3 format, which can be played back on many music players. Although you can access your digital music collection through a web browser, a far better way to manage and play your Amazonhosted music collection is with the dedicated Amazon Cloud Player application for Windows. Its simple to set up and use in this tutorial well show you everything you need to know.

Step-by-step Play and manage your Amazon Cloud Music
install and sign in 1 Download, Go to www.amazon.co.uk/cloudplayer, click Get started

and sign in with your Amazon account. If youve used Cloud Player with an Amazon.com account, follow the prompts to switch to using the UK version. At the top of the next page, click the link to download and install the Cloud Player app for Windows. Open the app and sign in using your Amazon account.
and play local music 2 Browse At the top left of the app, click Computer to see the music
stored locally in your Windows Media Player and iTunes libraries. Amazons player works in a similar way to those apps view your music in different ways using the controls at the top, and click an album cover to browse its tracks and play them. Create playlists by dragging tracks into the Playlists pane on the right.
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Explore Get started with Amazon Cloud Player WorldMags.net

Jargon buster!
Adobe Flash This means of delivering interactive content, such as games, video and applications, is built into some browsers, but for others it must be installed as a standalone plug-in. AutoRip The process whereby digital copies of selected physical CD or vinyl record albums are added automatically to your Amazon Cloud Player account after you purchase them through Amazon.
Cloud Music 3 Access If youve already purchased MP3 downloads

from Amazon or purchased CDs or vinyl that are covered by Amazons new AutoRip feature switch to Cloud view by clicking the button at the top left. Browsing and listening to your online music works identically to the previous step.
to PC 4 Download You need to be online to access your cloudbased purchases, but you can download them to your local library to play when youre offline. Either drag individual tracks into the Download pane on the right, or right-click an artist, album or track and choose Download to add it to the queue.
music 6 Upload to the cloud

You can store up to 250 music tracks online for free with your Amazon Cloud Player account, and at the time of writing the Cloud Player Premium service which stores up to 250,000 tracks is free for a year. You cant upload directly from the app, though. Click the icon at the top left of the app and choose Import Music to Cloud Library. Youll be taken to the Amazon website. Sign in with your Amazon account when prompted.
more music 5 Buy Click Store at the top right to browse the
Amazon MP3 Store within Amazon Cloud Player. Click an album to reveal its tracklisting, or use the search box to find a favourite artist. Highlight a song and click the play button for a 30-second preview, or click the price tag to purchase it.
music 7 Import At the top left, click Import your music to select and upload
songs from your computer. If prompted to install or enable Adobe Flash or AIR, follow the prompts to do so. Launch the Amazon Music Importer, then authorise your computer as one of your 10 permitted devices. Click Start scan and let it finish, then choose which detected songs to upload and click Import selected.
anywhere 8 Listen Amazon will attempt to match your chosen tracks with its
own library for speed, only unknown or unsupported tracks need to be uploaded. When finished, your tracks are accessible from the Cloud tab in Amazon Cloud Player, accessible on all of your authorised devices including phones and tablets and space can be freed on your computer. Its a win-win.
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Upgrade multiple PCs to Windows 8.1

The way Microsoft delivers the Windows 8.1 update is awkward for updating more than one PC. Heres a great way to make a bootable USB installation.
At a glance
SKILL LEVEL

TIME TAKEN
45
minutes
SUITABLE FOR
fter a prolonged preview period, Microsoft has nally unleashed its muchanticipated update to the latest version of Windows on the world. Right from the o there have been issues with it on Windows RT systems, resulting in the update application being removed from the store on Microsofts tablets. There are no such problems on the PC, beyond a few hiccups with USB devices slowing down the update process. However, as the update is primarily available from the Windows Store, updating multiple machines is a bit of a pain. As it stands, if you want to install Windows 8.1 on a new build, or reinstall Windows from scratch on your existing PC, youre looking at a lengthy process of installing Windows 8 rst, patching it, then installing Windows 8.1. When you also consider that people who took part in the Windows 8.1 preview period cant update their machines to the nal version directly, you start to wonder what Microsoft is really playing at. If you nd yourself in such a situation, in theory you can refresh back to the vanilla version of Windows 8, then update from there. Alternatively, you can follow this tutorial to create a USB stick that has
all your update needs answered. Theres a problem though, and that is in order to download the Windows 8.1 installation, you need a Windows 8.1 product key, which no one currently has. Luckily there is a solution, but its a little ddly: you must start the installation process for Windows 8, close it, then start the Windows 8.1 install assistant. Once you have updated your machines there should be no complex tweaking to do; it should just be business as usual. However, we would recommend downloading and updating your graphics drivers, as there have been problems gaming with older drivers, and you dont want to settle for using those that Microsoft provides with Windows 8.1 if youre looking to play games.

GET UPDATED The Windows Store is a poor option for updating multiple PCs
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Explore Upgrade multiple PCs to Windows 8.1 WorldMags.net

Step-by-step Update to Windows 8.1 with ease
your key 1 Find Start by locating your Windows 8 key, as youll need it
during installation. If youve bought a machine that comes pre-installed with Windows 8, you should find the key on a sticker on your case. Otherwise, system builders sometimes stick it to a piece of card and hide it with your motherboard manual.
plan B 2 Or If youre still drawing a blank, you need to grab a neat little
app called Belarc Advisor from www.belarc.com/free_download. html. Run it to perform a scan of your system which builds a profile page that includes your Windows 8 product key. Dont worry: this isnt uploaded anywhere its for your eyes only.
start 3 False Now start the process of grabbing the Windows 8.1 ISO. Visit
http://bit.ly/SCANcl and click on Install Windows 8 (dont click Install Windows 8.1). This will start the installer assistant. Enter your product key and select Install by creating media. Once it starts downloading, immediately close the installer.
again 4 Back Return to the Windows Upgrade website and click the link
labelled Install Windows 8.1 to launch the newer install assistant. Again, click the Install by creating media option, but this time dont cancel it. This option enables you to create an installation using a USB stick or a DVD.
wisely 5 Choose We recommend going for a USB installation here, simply

because it gives you the most options (you can upgrade machines that dont have an optical drive), and its much quicker than installing from spinning media. Youll need a USB stick with at least 3GB of space available. It will take a while to create the image on the drive (depending on your connection).
multiple machines 6 Update If you need to update several machines, its a good idea to
change the way the installer works so that it asks for the product key after installation. To do this, create a new file in the Sources folder called ei.cfg and enter the details shown in the screenshot above. Save the changes onto your USB stick and youre ready to start installing the update onto your machines.
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Master folders in minutes

Windows is the most customisable OS in the world, and you can even tweak the folders to work your way.
At a glance
SKILL LEVEL

TIME TAKEN
15
minutes
SUITABLE FOR
our folders are the backbone of Windows, and theyre one of the most frequently used elements of your computer. Folders contain your documents, music, videos, photos and other les, and most people use them every days without even thinking about it. What most people dont realise is that these folders can be subtly customised to the way you work, so its easier to nd the les you need. You can change the way the les are displayed, add special preview functionality so you dont need to open les to nd out what they contain, and even change the way Windows performs searches, so you can nd what you need faster. As youre about to discover, anythings possible with Windows 7, and changing just a few simple settings can save you time every day. Read on to nd out how you can start making Windows work your way.
GET ORGANISED You can ne-tune the folder settings with the Organize menu, which youll nd in the toolbar. This enables you to dig deep into the settings and make changes to the way Windows searches the folder, and how you navigate around your computer.
Step-by-step Use Windows faster than ever before
a folder 1 Open To begin making the folder system on your Windows 7

PC work your way, you need to open one up and get started. For the purpose of this tutorial, were going to be focusing on the Documents folder, but you can make changes to any of the folders and libraries in Windows 7. You can access the Documents folder through the Start menu.
a new perspective 2 Get The first change you can make to your Windows folders is
to adjust the way you see their icons. By default, document files (including text documents and spreadsheets) are represented by a small icon, and pictures with a thumbnail of the image. If you want to change the way they appear, you can do so by clicking the drop-down menu on the toolbar.
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Explore Master folders in minutes WorldMags.net

EXTRA INFO By default, your folders show les as icons, and pictures as thumbnails. If youd rather have more information about your les, you can change to Detail mode, which gives information such as when les were last modied. CHANGE VIEW This button reveals a slider, which you can use to adjust the way icons appear in the folder window. Move the slider up to make the icons bigger, and down to turn them into lists.
Jargon buster!
Libraries Single folders that pull in content from all over your computer. You can use your Documents library as a central place to access les, even if theyre stored somewhere else. Natural language Technology that lets you use real-world terminology to search, such as last week instead of numeric date ranges. Preview A quick look at a le before you open it. Perfect when youre hunting for a certain le, but dont want to open it to nd out if you have the right version.
PREVIEW PANE This area to the right of the folder enables you to preview les with a single click. Just click once on an icon and a large thumbnail appears here.
more details 3 See When you click the drop-down menu, a slider appears next
to a range of options. As you raise the slider, the icons in your folder will become bigger. If you go to Details, youll see a list of your files along with various bits of information, such as the date they were modified and the file type. This can be really handy if youre looking for something specific.
a preview pane 4 Add You can change the behaviour of the folders in Windows 7
at the click of a button, so they suit the way you work. The Preview pane button on the toolbar toggles an area of the screen to the right, so you can view documents, and even play snippets of audio files to make sure youve got the right one without having to load the whole file.
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your options 5 See If you want to fine-tune your folder settings even further,
you need to access the Folder options. Dont worry though theyre easy to get into and straightforward to use. In a folder window, select the Organize menu button, and a drop-down list will appear. Choose Folder and search options, and youll be taken to a new list of settings.
in a new window 6 Open As soon as you open the settings menu, youll find yourself
presented with two really useful options. The first is the ability to change the way folders behave as you browse through them. By default, when you browse folders, they open in the same window, but check the Open each folder in its own window option and each one will open in its own pane.
single clicks 7 Try Some people prefer to use a single-click to open folders,
rather than a double-click. If youre one of them, youll be pleased to hear that theres a setting that lets you do precisely that in the Folder Options menu. Check the Single-click to open an item box, and you can change the way files behave to something that makes it easier for you to work.
naturally 8 Search Windows Explorers Natural Language option enables

you to search your folders using real terms rather than having to remember complex search commands. Its much simpler to use and understand, but its not switched on by default. You can turn it on using the option in the Search tab; just tick the box labelled Turn on Natural Language.
files faster 9 Find Once youve activated Natural Language, you can use
normal conversational phrases such as pictures from January or documents this week to search your folders, which makes life a lot easier. You can perform these searches from the Start menu, or the search box, which youll find located in the top right-hand corner of each folder.
and experiment 10 Explore Youve now set up your folders so theyre easier to use
than ever before. Having options such as the preview pane and Natural Language search really make Windows 7 stand out from the crowd, and show how easy it is to customise your computer to work your way. Its worth taking a little time to explore all the options and discover which are best for you.
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eve all learned to think before we click. Will we really end up where URL implies? Does that address look a bit shy? Is this form safe to complete? Theyre all questions weve become accustomed to asking whenever were browsing the web, checking our mail or scrolling through a column of tweets. Yet the threats we face in our daily online lives are many and varied, and its easy for one or two to pass beneath the radar. As the worlds most widely used desktop operating system, every new version of Windows has seen massive improvements where security is concerned, much of it built in at the core. At the same time, add-ons like Microsoft Security Essentials, phishing detection for Internet Explorer and an improved permissions system that alerts you whenever a download is trying to execute a potentially harmful action on your PC have done much to ameliorate the
most potent dangers. Even so, theres still more you can do to keep yourself safe. Over the next 11 pages well explain the risks that we all face, whether through our browsers, inboxes or messaging clients. Well reveal the true scale of international phishing, what proportion of global email trac is made up of spam, and the clever ways in which social networking can be used to make you click a false link. Well explain how to verify whether an email really is from the sender it claims, identify when the site you think youre browsing is actually hosted on an unfriendly third-party server, and show you how to enable two-step authentication to protect your most sensitive data and online accounts. Some of the steps well be taking will require that you re-think the way you work and play online, but none of them need any third-party software or tools. They wont cost you a penny, either, but in the long run they could save you pounds by protecting your most sensitive data and, in the process, repay the eort of putting them into practice many times over.
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Phishing has a hook and a bait often a large sum of money. Trouble is, youre the prey
eve all seen them, and weve all probably received one. The so-called 419 scam named after the article of the Nigerian penal code that deals with fraud is perhaps the most infamous of all phishing scams. It oers the recipient untold wealth, if only theyd allow an even larger sum of money to rest in their bank account temporarily on its route out of a distant nation oh, and of course, to wire over a small amount to cover the senders expenses. It might sound tempting, but the reality is that no one, not even a desperate prince, is going to give you money for nothing. PhishTank, a collaborative clearing house for information about phishing on the internet operated by OpenDNS, had registered 1,198,703 veried phishing sites at the time of writing, of which 12,143 were still active. Google is going one step further and actively agging suspected phishing sites in users browsers. Were currently agging up to 10,000 sites a day, wrote Lucas Ballard, Google Software Engineer in June 2013, and because we share this technology with
other browsers, there are about 1 billion users we can help keep safe. We still cant aord to be complacent, though. Figures released by RSAs Anti-Fraud Command Centre indicated that in 2012, the UK was the number one victim of phishing scams, with losses of over 405m from close to 250,000 individual attacks. That was an increase over the previous year, in a period when gures for Canada and the US declined.
Far from the real deal

Increased public awareness means that phishers have to resort to subtlety. As recently as May 2013, the US Internal Revenue Service (IRS) was posting advisories to its website warning American taxpayers that scammers, passing themselves o as the IRS were hooking recipients with phony tax cuts and rebates. IRS Commissioner Doug Shulman called it a disgraceful eort by scam artists to take advantage of people by giving them false hopes of a nonexistent refund. Its UK equivalent, HMRC, maintains an extensive list of spoofed email addresses frequently used by phishing operatives making similar claims over here, with such likely candidates as service@, secure@ and customs@hmrc.gov.uk all in circulation and all fraudulent. Bookmark http:// hmrc.gov.uk/security/examples.htm, and check that any addresses that you might receive future emails from HMRC dont appear on its updated list. Phishers often go to great lengths to make their emails look like the real deal. Dont be fooled into thinking that just because an email includes logos from HMRC, your bank or PayPal that its been anywhere near those organisations servers. Watch out for clues, like spelling
NAMED AND SHAMED HMRC, like many other ocial organisations, maintains a list of addresses scammers have used to contact potential victims. Find it at www.hmrc.gov.uk/security/examples.htm
WHAT TO LOOK FOR This email is well put together but the use of the phrase we advice you is a big giveaway
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LOOK CLOSER Just because this email appears to carry an ocial logo doesnt make it genuine. In actual fact, apart from the matching colours its quite dissimilar to the genuine USPS mark
mistakes or grammatical errors that would less likely be made by a native speaker, as these too could indicate that the message might have originated from overseas. Be wary of emails that are too familiar (tax authorities and credit card companies are unlikely to open an email with Greetings or sign o with God bless), or which ask for too much information. Online banks will never ask you to provide your password or username, sensitive data such as maiden names or other login credentials. They usually conne sensitive communications to secure messaging areas within the account management
screens that can only be accessed after logging in with a username and password, so dont trust emails that appear to include a lot of sensitive nancial data. Be wary of emails purporting to come from your bank that incites you to click a link to access its site; phishers use this tactic to present an apparently genuine login page, which they use to harvest your access credentials. Even if you believe the email is genuine, open a new browser window, type your banks URL and follow the links to nd the page you need. Not all phishing scams immediately look like theyre after money or credit card details some are simply designed to win your custom without you realising that youre leaving an existing supplier. Less reputable domain registration agents are among those who might write to the owners of domains approaching expiry, inducing them to click a link and renew their online property. Rarely do they explain in anything but the smallest print that doing so will shift the domain away from your original registrar to themselves, leaving them free to apply new terms and conditions and potentially charge a higher price, either immediately or in the future. It can take up to a month to transfer a domain from one registrar to another, so be suspicious of emails of this type that arrive well in advance of your current registration period expiring its a sign that youre not dealing with your existing host. If in doubt, log in to the domain management system of your existing provider and renew your domain there.
irst of all, dont even think about clicking any links in a scam or phishing email. Thats the golden rule. Then, wherever possible, you should report it to any aected parties and in particular any organisations that its senders may be attempting to spoof. We live in a world now where most banks and other nancial institutions have dedicated email addresses to which you can report phishing scams (for HMRC, for example, its phishing@hmrc.gsi.gov.uk). Type the organisations name followed by phishing into Google, and the result youre looking for will almost always be in the top spot. Forward the email in its entirety to the reporting address complete with its full headers, because these show the route that the message took to reach you, which can be useful digital forensic evidence. Most email clients suppress these for clarity by default, but you can usually expose them by clicking a small arrow near the subject line of the email. Usefully, you can report phishing and spam emails directly in Gmail by picking those options from the Reply menu attached to each message.

UNCOVER THE TRUTH Hovering over the link in this email reveals that it doesnt lead to UPS at all. Be particularly careful of any embedded links in emails from senders you dont trust
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Even apparently benign data is a valuable resource to identity thieves
ed like to think that common sense kicks in when it comes to making personal information public knowledge online, such as never giving out any of your accounts password after all, you wouldnt divulge the code for your house alarm or allow a stranger to cut a copy of your door key now, would you? However, there is plenty of other information about you that, although it might appear totally benign to the innocent eye, should be treated with just as equal caution. Many sites use specic personal information combined with a password to verify your ID. That means personal data such as your mothers maiden name or your favourite colour could be far more valuable than you think. As well see later, pets names and favourite holiday destinations are also commonly used as passwords, so be careful when uploading pictures of either of these to social
networks and certainly think twice before adding tags or captions that could give the game away to prying eyes. Treat them with equal caution when using them in social media apps, like those that work out things like your pornstar name, for example (by combining the name of your rst pet with your mothers maiden name). While Fluy Cleghorn might make for a hilarious wall post, its also gold dust to the potential identity thief wholl do more than just Like it. Armed with this information, they can click the forgotten password link on a webmail service and use it to prove that theyre you and reset your password. After all, who else would know that thats what you called your rst rabbit?
Selling an old device

Dont fall into the trap of unwittingly passing on personal information when selling or scrapping an old computer, phone or tablet. Format your PCs hard
drive, or if youre scrapping the device, remove and destroy the drive separately. Make sure all accounts are removed from mobile phones and tablets, and that wherever possible theyre returned to their factory state. On an iPhone, iPad or iPod Touch, open Settings and tap General > Reset > Erase all content and settings. If youve logged in to any public networks, be sure to close any accounts associated with your device before selling it, because some use the unique device identier to associate browsing by the phones new owner with your credentials. Plan for the worst and set up your devices so that you can wipe all personal information from them remotely. On iOS devices, open Settings > iCloud and make sure the slider beside Find my iPad or Find my iPhone is set to On. Whenever its in reach of a Wi-Fi or 3G signal youll be able to track your device through www.icloud. com/#nd and, if necessary, remove your personal data remotely.

Just imagine if someone could detect every single thing you typed on your keyboard. Its certainly not something you would want hanging over your head from a security point of view. If a software keylogger is present on your system, it was almost certainly installed as a Trojan, bundled up with otherwise legitimate software. You can remove it using an anti-virus tool.
Tools that record every press of a key on your keyboard.

Hardware keyloggers are also available, so check for unfamiliar devices attached to your USB ports and remove any that you dont recognise particularly if they are connected to your keyboard cable. If you suspect that someone has installed an internal keylogger, use an on-screen keyboard instead of a physical device to enter sensitive info such as card details.
The on-screen keyboard

In Windows 7, you can access the on-screen keyboard by clicking Start, then selecting All programs > Accessories > Ease of access > On-screen keyboard. You can then click the keys to type, and any keylogging software installed on your PC will be unable to record what youre writing.
SAFER PASSWORDS Using an on-screen keyboard instead of a physical keyboard can help thwart keyloggers, which record what you type
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Most email traffic is spam dont let it dominate your inbox
pam accounted for a colossal 70.7% of all email in the second quarter of this year, according to Kasperskys Securelist, with 2.3% of all emails containing a malicious attachment. Trustwave puts the spam proportion slightly lower at 68.5%. Most spams are merely a nuisance, promising lower bills, more impressive erections and under-the-counter meds all of which wed recommend you steer well clear of, naturally. Enabling junk mail ltering is a good rst defence. In Internet Explorer 10, click the Tools (cog) button, expand the Safety sub-menu and click Turn on SmartScreen Filter. You should also enable junk ltering at the ISP level if possible, and if you own a domain disable any catch-all email addresses so that only specically addressed emails make it through. Spammers often add tracts of white text to the end of a message to help convince spam lters that the email is genuine. Multi-national computer security company, Kaspersky, noted an increase in the number of spammers spoong greetings cards from Hallmark through the early summer this year, while the companys head of content analysis and research, Darya Gudovka, highlighted that
spammers have begun sending out
TAKE CARE A good way to spot spam is to check for grammatical errors, and to mouse over the links to check that their destinations are correct
emails with malicious attachments designed to look like automatic delivery failure notications sent out by servers. Another common trick is to make malicious emails look like notications from well-known online resources, and include links to malicious websites.
Hover over links

Its not only online delivery failures that theyre spoong, either. Take the above example, advising of a failed parcel delivery. Initially it looks quite convincing,
but there are several problems. The US Postal Service logo uses the right colours, but the wrong font, and the address from which it was sent isnt USPS.com. The body of the email is missing an apostrophe and includes a couple of grammatical mistakes. Its also embedded as a graphic rather than plain text. The big give-away, though, is that hovering over the link to print a replacement delivery label shows that it leads not to usps.com, but a Russian investment site. Always hover over links before clicking them so you can see where they lead, and dont click them unless the destination is accurately described in the content of the email and matches the server from which the email was sent. If in doubt, open a fresh browser window and search for the page in question using Google. Whatever you do, dont open any attachments, as these could infect your PC with a Trojan or virus. Even something as innocuous as a Word le could include executable code. Resist the urge to use the Unsubscribe links on the bottom of an email as this will verify that your inbox is open for business, increasing the likelihood that youll receive more junk in the future as the spammer sells on your conrmed details to the next malicious marketer down the line.
What they are and how to get your email client to block them
HTML-based spam often includes links to remotely hosted images that, when loaded by your email client, confirm to the sender not only that youve opened their message, but also that your address is valid. This lets them more effectively target you in the future. The spammers server effectively mail merges a unique image URL for each recipient into a standard message and sends it to everyone on its list. Your PC requests the image from the server, which sends it out and simultaneously makes a note against your name, confirming that your address works. To protect you from this kind of attack, Outlook.com blocks images in emails by default. If you want to unblock pictures for a particular message, click the info bar at the top of the message, then select Show content.
REMOTE IMAGES Some spammers use images hosted on their own web servers to nd out whether youve opened one of their emails. This lets them know that the email address they have is real
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The webs address system is flexible, yet highly structured and logical
nderstanding the URL uniform resource Locator is key to keeping yourself safe online. More commonly known as a web address, the URL is the friendly, humanreadable equivalent of the numeric location of every device, folder or le on the internet. The rst part, running up to the rst single slash or port number (see below), is converted to a string of digits by a domain name system (DNS) server and is entirely case insensitive. Everything else is handled by the host server, which, depending on its conguration, may be case sensitive. This could allow hackers who gain access to the server to insert a malicious le called, for example, INDEX.HTM alongside an existing index.htm. Being directed to the capitalised le by an email, instant message or another web page could open you up to attack. Limit your exposure to scams by employing your browsers phishing protection tools. In Chrome, visit chrome://settings, click Show advanced settings and check the box beside Enable phishing and malware protection. In Internet Explorer 10, click the Tools (cog) button, expand the Safety sub-menu and click Turn on SmartScreen Filter. These tools compare your entered URLs against lists of malicious sites and pop up a warning if it nds a match.

The domain name (or host name), which is the name of the server on which the resource is located. Often preceded by www, which can sometimes be omitted. Port number. This directs your request to a specic position on the remote network if the default web trac port port 80 wouldnt resolve to the server you need. You dont often actually see this.
http://example.com:8080/pages/index.html
The active protocol. Browsers default to HTTP (HyperText Transport Protocol) so you can leave it o, but alternatives include, among others, FTP, SMB and HTTPS. Specic path to the requested resource. If the server is set up with default lenames, omitting the part after the nal slash loads the default le for the selected directory.

http://www.barclays.co.uk.stealingyourdata.ru/login
Subdomains can be used to redirect you to directories on a remote server. http://news.bbc.co.uk, for example, redirects to www.bbc.co.uk/news. Always read the complete domain to ensure you really are accessing the domain you think you are. A link to www.barclays.co.uk.stealingyourdata.ru, for example may look like its sending you to Barclays, and the pages to which it leads could be designed to reinforce that impression, but any data you enter will be captured by the owners of www. stealingyourdata.ru in this case. Look for the domain name immediately preceding the first slash (reading left to right, ignoring the double-slash in the protocol); thats what youre actually connecting to, and if its not what you expect, stop.
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Scramble your data to make it pretty much useless to hackers
he NSA and Britains GCHQ have adopted a battery of methods in their systematic and ongoing assault on what they see as one of the biggest threats to their ability to access huge swathes of internet trac the use of ubiquitous encryption across the internet, according to documents leaked to The Guardian by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden.
Check for the padlock

What this means, in eect, is that either of these agencies and likely their counterparts in other countries can now intercept your credit card details and other personal data, even over an encrypted connection. Before you panic, though, this is only possible because they have billion dollar budgets and banks of supercomputers, which means that in pretty much any other instance encryption still aords an eective level of protection against regular hackers for browsing, email, and Voice over IP (VoIP). You should therefore use an encrypted connection wherever possible and certainly when shopping online. Check your browser URL box for a padlock to verify this. Its on the left in Google Chrome, and the right for Internet Explorer. Safari for iPad puts it on the page tab, while the iPhone adds it to the browser title bar. Its not only shopping sites that oer encryption. Gmail, Yahoo Mail and Outlook.com all oer encrypted versions of their email services. Gmail has employed strict SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) as default since December 2012; Outlook.com switches to a secure connection as
soon as you visit the login screen; and you can enable it in Yahoo by clicking the cog icon in the webmail interface, picking Mail settings and switching to the security tab. There, enable the SSL option and click Save. The site will refresh to the secure version. SSL encryption uses a pair of keys one public key used to verify the identity of the server and a second private key thats used to scramble the data that passes between that and your own computer. Only when it reaches its destination will the data be decoded, which makes an encrypted shopping site an

Use an encrypted connection where possible certainly when partaking in online shopping
exponentially safer connection over which to pass your credit card details than plain email, since anyone who intercepted the data in transit would be unable to read it without the resources of GCHQ. The longer the encryption key in bits, the more secure it is. Strong encryption, at 128 bits, can calculate 288 times as many combinations as 40-bit encryption. Thats over a trillion times stronger, says Symantec. At current computing speeds, a hacker with the time, tools, and motivation to attack using brute force would require a trillion years to break into a session protected by [a 128-bit certicate].
The padlock symbol isnt the only clue that youre using a secure connection; the protocol identier at the start of the web address will also change to HTTPS, which stands for hypertext transfer protocol secure. Dont log in to any shopping site that doesnt include this prex, and dont become complacent later in your browsing session just because you saw it on the password page. An HTTPS-prexed page that redirects you to regular HTTP for any other page after youve logged in wont keep you secure because the rest of your session will be unencrypted. SSL certicates only last for a specied period, and need to be renewed by the certicate holder from time to time. They are issued by certicate authorities, in return for a per-year or multi-year fee. They can be revoked prior to the end of their life if theyve been compromised, in which case they are added to a blacklist that browsers can interrogate using the Online Certicate Status Protocol (OCSP) which allows the browser to throw up an alert if youre about to visit an unsigned or insecure site. All browsers since Firefox 3 plus all editions of Safari and Chrome support OCSP. You can check the validity of the certicate in use for your current session and its strength by clicking the browsers padlock icon. If youre browsing an online store and you cant see a certicate in place, then its either been revoked or its expired. If this is the case, then theres only one piece of advice we can oer you: shop elsewhere. Its just not worth the risk.
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A strong password is your first line of defence against data capture
ow many accounts do you have that require a password? Email, instant messaging, bank accounts, utility accounts, dating sites the longer you sit and think about it, the longer the list will become. If you use the same password for even two accounts, miscreants who hack into one account get easy access to the other and thats a big risk when we have so many tasks online. The average online Brit had 26 online accounts by the middle of last year according to research conducted by Experian a number thats set to increase, with most of us signing up to six or more new accounts every month. No wonder a quarter of us use the same password for each one, with the 10,000 most commonly used passwords likely to open 99.8 per cent of all online accounts a disturbing and worrying statistic according to data published by security researcher Mark Burnett at www.xato.net. It shouldnt be any surprise, then, that even those of us who take better care of our online defences often fall back on a rather predictable list. In the number one spot, according to August 2013 research conducted by Google Apps, is your current pets name, which considering how frequently cats and dogs pop up on Facebook and Instagram, shouldnt be
too hard for anyone else to uncover. The word password sits in the 10th spot, with such staples as a place of birth, childs name and favourite holiday destination in between each of which is very likely to be within reach of an identity thief after a short trawl through your social networking history. The answer is to pick a dierent password for each service however, remembering each of them would quickly become an issue, and although writing them down would help solve that problem it leads to another one: anyone who nds your written list has all the keys they need to your whole digital world.
machine on which youre running 1Password (or rival tools such as LastPass and KeePass) because you wont have memorised any of your passwords. However, that also means that it isnt always a suitable option, and it doesnt get around the problem of dealing with randomly requested data, such as a single eld that can change between login attempts to request dierent pieces of personal information, such as a place of birth, rst school or mothers maiden name. This is a tactic often employed by banks to keep your account secure.
Get a password manager

Password manager applications can help. 1Password for Windows, Android, OS X and iOS not only stores passwords and other form data such as credit card numbers for any site but can also generate super-secure random passwords that mix characters, numbers and punctuation. Theyre almost impossible to remember, but by delegating the task of storing and submitting them every time you need to log on, all you need to do is remember a single password to unlock the 1Password utility and itll take care of the rest. The problem comes when you need to log in to an account away from the
SAFETY IN NUMBERS When it comes to new password requirements, work within them, but be sure to include letters, digits and punctuation

Dig an extra moat around your castle of important data
a very similar manner. It calls the process 2-step verification. To set it up, start by logging in to your account at www. google.com, clicking your user icon in the upper-right corner and picking Account, followed by Security. Scroll down to 2-step verification and click the Edit link, followed by Start set-up. Youll need to provide a valid mobile phone number to which Google can send an authentication code. If youve previously provided a number through the general Account Security settings, itll be used to pre-populate the form. Choose whether youd prefer a text message or automated voice message containing the
wo-factor authentication adds a second level of security to your online accounts, requiring that you use a supplementary device to verify your identity when performing certain actions. If you have an online bank account youll almost certainly have come across it already, with many banks supplying customers with a calculator-like keypad that generates a unique sequence in response to a specific code that youll have entered from the banks website. Google uses a mobile phone to authorise changes to key account data and to restrict the computers through which anyone can log in to your account in
code and click Send code. When the code arrives, tap it into the new box on your screen and choose whether or not you want to permanently associate it with your current browser. If you do, you wont need to wait for a new code to be sent to your phone every time you log in, but anyone who tries to access your account from a different browser or machine will. Not all of Googles services can use twofactor authentication. Picasa, for example, isnt compatible, and you wont be able to access Gmail from an external client like Outlook until you create applicationspecific passwords for each one. Point your browser at https://accounts.google.
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The best advice, then, is to use a password manager for those services where it is an eective tool, and rely on traditional password selection methods in all other cases, perhaps employing a personal two-tier system with unique passwords for sensitive sites such as bank accounts, and half a dozen shared but personally memorable passwords for everything else. Wherever possible, mix regular characters with digits and punctuation and, where permissible, spaces and underscores, to build up phrases or even entire sentences. Dont fall into the trap of believing that swapping out letters for numbers such as 5 for S, 1 for I or L, and 9 for G is an eective remedy. This is a well-known trick and one to which the crackers are entirely savvy. Some sites require passwords to be constructed in a specic manner for example, a minimum of eight characters comprising both letters and numbers but where youre given the freedom to dene your own rules, go wild. If youre a procient typist it wont take you much longer to tap out a whole sentence to gain access to your email account than it would a regular eight-character password, but will take a hacker much longer to crack it. Conning yourself to eight characters would let you generate 6.1 quadrillion passwords, according to Deloitte research directors Paul Lee and Duncan Stewart on www.wsj.com, but unfortunately this still gives you less of a head start on the malcontents than you might expect. Reporting on the Passwords^12 conference in Oslo for www.security ledger.com, Paul Roberts wrote that researchers running password-cracking software distributed across ve servers were able to churn through a whopping 348 billion password combinations per second. At that rate, as conference organiser Per Thorsheim explained, a 14 character Windows XP password would fall in just six minutes. If the futurists get their way, the problem of choosing and remembering passwords might well soon solve itself anyway as we move closer towards using biometric identiers such as the new ngerprint recognition weve seen announced for the Home button on the new iPhone 5s. IBM fellow and speech CTO David Nahamoo wrote on the IBM Research blog in December 2011, Over the next ve years, your unique biological identity and biometric data facial denitions, iris scans, voice les, even your DNA will become the key to safeguarding your personal identity and information and replace the current user ID and password system.

As compiled by SplashData from lists of stolen passwords posted online by hackers, the most common passwords in use in 2012 were:
Dont fall into the trap of believing that swapping letters for numbers is a good way to make a secure password
1 ........................................ password 2 .............................................. 123456 3 .........................................12345678 4 ............................................... abc123 5 .............................................. qwerty 6 ............................................ monkey 7 ............................................. letmein 8 .............................................. dragon 9 .................................................111111 10......................................... baseball 11 ......................................... iloveyou 12 ......................................... trustno1 13 ......................................... 1234567 14 ........................................ sunshine 15 ............................................. master 16............................................. 123123 17 ........................................ welcome 18........................................... shadow 19 .............................................. ashley 20 .......................................... football 21..................................................jesus 22 .......................................... michael
com/IssuedAuthSubTokens and enter a name for the first service for which you want to create a password say, Gmail in Outlook . Click Generate password and Google will display a randomly generated character string. Use this to change the password for one of your Google services, and repeat the process for each one. Apple uses two-factor authentication to secure iCloud accounts. To set it up, you need a device that can receive four-digit codes by SMS, such as a mobile phone, or you can use Find my iPhone. Point a regular browser at http://appleid.apple. com, logging into your account and picking Password and security. Follow the instructions by clicking Get Started under Two-Step Verification.
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Beware of hijacked Twitter accounts, and dont click links in random spam mentions. These often come through almost immediately in response to something youve posted, and include your username so that they appear in your mentions and are visible not only to you, but also anyone following your conversation. If your Twitter client lets you report spam directly, get into the habit of doing this right away, and the sender will be simultaneously added to your block list.
Once youve hardened your online apps and services, do the same to your home network
Beware shortened links

Keep in mind that shortened links with obscured URLs like those appearing in Twitter posts wont always take you where the covering tweet might indicate, so click them with caution if you dont know or follow the person who sent them and, if necessary, copy the link and paste it into a browser using Private Browsing (on Safari) or Incognito mode (Chrome) or InPrivate Browsing Mode (Internet Explorer) so that the destination site cant write any permanent data to your computer. Once you reach the destination, examine it carefully. During the appeal for funds for the Japanese tsunami victims in 2011 for example, one widely shared link claiming to be for the Red Cross actually sent money to a private users webmail account.
afety begins at home, and nowhere in the digital world is there more truth in that statement than where your wireless network is concerned. A strong signal can pass well beyond your walls particularly if you happen to live in a at and stray into neighbouring properties or even out into the street, taking your network trac with it. Unless youve secured the connection, it would be all too easy for a third party to interrogate that data and extract from it whatever they choose. Start by enabling wireless encryption on your network. Most routers oer a range of options here, with WPA2-PSK (Wi-Fi Protected Access II Pre-Shared Key) the best option, and its predecessor, WPA, a viable fallback. Avoid using WEP, because this has been shown to have vulnerabilities. If this is the only option available on your router, however, its time to upgrade your hardware, either through a rmware patch or, if there isnt one available, by replacing it altogether. WPA and WPA2 employ a passphrase system to encrypt trac on the network.
This is commonly written on the side of the router if you havent changed the default, and is also the password you use to access the network when rst making the connection. As such, you shouldnt divulge this phrase to anyone who shouldnt have access to the network or the stu on it. If youre choosing your own passphrase, then ideally it should be at least 13 characters long to minimise the chance of it being cracked using automated means.
Stay hidden
If your router allows it, hide the network name, also known as its SSID (service set identier). It wont then appear in lists of detected networks on Windows, OS X or mobile devices, even though a network snier will still be able to detect the presence of a Wi-Fi signal in its vicinity. Dont stop there either, or youll leave the job half-done. Router manufacturers routinely recycle network names, so theres a fair chance youre running a network called linksys, belkin54g, ZyXEL, NETGEAR or something else
Think before you post

Regularly review your list of authorised client applications and be sure to deauthorise any of the ones that you dont use any more, in order to reduce the risk of your account being hijacked should any of them develop security flaws. The same goes for web-based apps, such as those that run inside your Facebook account. Finally, bear in mind that social media is far from a walled garden. Be careful what information you give out because it is, to all intents and purposes, a public forum. Posting lots of pictures to a social media account when youre on holiday, for example, may be enough to alert a potential housebreaker to the fact that your home is empty, and is easy prey.
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thats fairly generic. So well known are these names that you can nd a list of the most common Wi-Fi network names online. Unless you change your SSID to something unique, obscuring it will do nothing to prevent third parties cycling through the list until they nd a match. Next, turn your attention to the security guarding your routers admin pages. These are routinely protected by a set of easily-guessed credentials. Many usernames are set to admin or user, and the password is often admin too, if not password or pass. Once a third-party gains access to your network theyll be able to detect the router address from their internet settings, and by referring back to the default network name, theyll also be able to look up the default username and password and walk right in.
and change the login details to avoid this. Most routers are set up so that client devices are automatically assigned a local address on the network using DHCP (Dynamic Host Control Protocol). This makes it easy for rst time users of the network to start sending and receiving data straight away and also reduces the amount of work that the home user has to do to maintain their network. However, it also means that any rogue network interlopers will be assigned an address
each machine to ensure that only those that have been specically permitted are granted access. You can nd the MAC address of the network card in a PC by returning to the Network Connection Details panel from which we obtained the router address above and copying the six pairs of letters and digits beside Physical Address Once youve obtained your address, add it to the list of authorised clients on your router conguration screens.
Router address
To change your login details, you rst need to nd your router address you can do this in Windows 8 by opening Network and Internet in Control Panel, following the link to Network and Sharing Center, and clicking the option Change adapter settings in the sidebar. Doubleclick the active connection, then click the Details button on the dialog. The router address is the four sets of digits beside IPv4 Default Gateway. Typing this address in a browser will show you or a hacker the router login screen, allowing them potentially easy access if you havent yet switched away from the default settings. You need to log in yourself, navigate to the router settings
Amend the security guarding your routers admin pages; many default usernames are simply set to admin
along with legitimate users. Put another barrier in their way by disabling DHCP, and making a note of the router address and subnet mask that applies to your network from the router conguration pages so that in the future you can enter them manually on each machine that needs to connect. Also make sure to implement your routers MAC Authentication feature. This uses a list of unique identiers associated with the network adapter on
Disconnected
If you arent using any wireless devices, then consider shutting o the routers wireless connection altogether. Even if your desktop machines arent all in the same room as the router itself, its easy to pass data around your home without sending it through the air by turning your domestic electric cabling into a wired network. Devices conforming to the Powerline networking standard can transfer data between machines and access points at up to 500Mbits/sec, which is plenty for online gaming and HD movie streaming, and because the signal wont pass beyond your fuse box or a modern consumer unit it wont leak out into the world.
Get stronger network protection

Its easy to think of your network password as just that a password to grant access but its actually something far more important. All the data on your Wi-Fi network is encrypted using this phrase, meaning that even if someone could intercept sniff the traffic, it would be unintelligible gobbledegook unless they also had this key with which to decrypt it. WPA2 provides stronger network protection than WPA and WEP. It comes in two flavours: WPA2Personal (sometimes denoted WPA2-PSK) which uses a passphrase system to gain access to the network and encrypt traffic passing between the base station and its clients and WPA2Enterprise, which authenticates users with reference to a list maintained on a centralised server. Check for the Wi-Fi Alliances logo on any packaging or detail sheets when purchasing a new router.
WATCH OUT Look for the Wi-Fi Alliance logo on the packaging of any new router to ensure its compliant with WPA2 encryption
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Fort Knox or Hard Knocks? Test your defences with our safety quiz
W
1
eve run through a number of ways in which you can try to improve your online security, but how much of it have you actually downloaded? The following questions are aimed to analyse your awareness with regards to keeping your data safe from the sharks while surfing. Pick answers from the multiple choice options and add up your total using the scoring system at the bottom; no cheating now after all, it could be more than your pride thats at stake here.
How many of your passwords appear in the list of the 22 most commonly used passwords on page 33?
(a) More than half of my passwords. Is that a problem? (b) Fewer than half of my passwords, but thats not too bad, right? (c) Are you crazy? None of my passwords are on that list. (Or: I use a password manager.)
Youve received an email from customs@hmrc.gov.uk. What should you do?

(a) Ignore it if you havent bought anything from abroad. (b) Deal with its contents before the end of the tax year. (c) Report it to HM Customs and Excise as soon as possible.
How can knowing your MAC address help you keep your wireless network secure?
(a) Irrelevant; I dont use any Apple devices, so it doesnt apply to me. (b) It helps me to identify my machine on a network. (c) It lets me authorise my Mac to connect to my router and blocks all other wired or wireless devices.
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When selling an iPhone or iPad, what is the most important step to do?
(a) Back up all of your personal data. Losing it is unthinkable. (b) Research the best prices on eBay. People will pay top dollar for one, so why miss out on some easy money? (c) Restore its default settings.
WHATS YOUR SCORE?
Ive just worked out what my pornstar name is. It is:
(a) Pretty funny, actually! Tell me yours and Ill tell you mine? (b) A potentially useful tool for hackers who could use your mothers maiden name to reset your passwords. (c) Available for everyone to read on my blog, Facebook wall and Twitter stream.
Which of the following should I not make public on my wireless network?

(a) The password. (b) The SSID (network name). (c) Both of the above.
11-20 1-10 0
Top notch. Your security set-up could give the Alcatraz a run for its money. Why not treat yourself to a little reward while youre at it? (Be sure to check for the browser padlock if youre buying it online but you already knew that.) Good, but not great. Youre pretty savvy, but still a soft target for a hardened hacker. There are still a few extra steps to take thatll do a lot to bolster your defences. Poor show. Security doesnt only apply to jobs and blankets, you know. Check out our tips again and think again about the simple changes you can make to keep yourself and your computer safer online.
When should you check for a padlock in your browser address bar?
(a) Whenever youre shopping or doing online banking. (b) When looking at mucky sites youd rather not have made public. (c) When working with sensitive data or logged in to a password-protected site.
Which of the following is the most appropriate kind of wireless security for a home or small office network?
(a) WPA (Wi-Fi Protected Access). (b) WPA2-PSK (Wi-Fi Protected Access Pre-Shared Key mode). (c) WEP (Wired Equivalent Privacy).
(a) A 40-bit key. (b) A 128-bit key. (c) A 256-bit key.
(b) The complete set of headers associated with the email. A (c) covering note explaining why you believe the note to be spam
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Score 2 points each if you selected: 1c, 2b, 3c, 4c, 5c, 6c, 7b, 8b, 9c, 10c Score 1 points each if you selected: 1a, 2a, 3a, 4b, 5b, 6a or 6b, 7a, 8c, 9b, 10a Score no points for any of the following: 1b, 2c, 3b, 4a, 5a, 7c, 8a, 9a, 10b
Which of the following options would offer the most secure level of encryption?
When reporting spam to a sender s ISP, what should you include:

(a) Your full system spec and details of your email provider.
ANSWERS
THE PERFECT READ FOR THE PERFECT READ!

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REASONS YOU SHOULD UPGRADE TO WINDOWS 8.1

Left cold by Windows 8? The new 8.1 edition is a much better proposition!
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SMART SEARCH
By default, the new Smart Search in Windows 8.1 includes relevant results from Bing alongside les from your computer and SkyDrive. It wont work for every search and you can disable it if you dont like it but its a useful tool to have at your disposal. Music searches show tracks on your computer as well as band information pulled from the web, for example, and there are better image search capabilities and improved website previews. You can now see images of sites in your search results, which helps you see which are most likely to be relevant. All search results are presented in a neat visual way that makes it easier than ever to nd what you need.
FIND IT FAST With the new Smart Search tool, youll get relevant information from Bing alongside your usual search results. Why waste time opening a web browser?
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IMPROVED APPS
FIND A FILM The new Netix app lets you swipe through lms easily, and you can start watching on one device, then resume on another
Microsofts own built-in apps, including Mail and Photos, are getting better all the time, and third-party developers are also starting to up their game. The Start screen Netix app is actually an improvement on the web interface, for example particularly if youre using a larger screen. App docking has been improved in Windows 8.1 too, making it easy to have Start screen and desktop apps running alongside each other. You can even have three or four apps running simultaneously if you have a larger display.
CLOUD CAPABILITIES
SkyDrive might not be called SkyDrive for much longer thanks to a legal challenge, but no matter what you call it, the service is here to stay. Microsofts cloud-based le storage system is better integrated into Windows 8.1 than Windows 8, which was something of a halfway house. You no longer need to download a Skydrive app the updated operating system has eortless syncing and backup built in, and makes it easier to share les online too. If you prefer to use Dropbox to store and share your les online, there are free ocial desktop and Start screen apps available that will work with Windows 8.1.
CLOUD COVER Its easier than ever to store les in the cloud, so you can access them on any device with an internet connection
DESKTOP TWEAKS
If youre using Windows 7, Vista or XP you may well want to spend most of your time on the desktop, and youll be pleased to know that Windows 8.1 has made improvements here too. Microsoft has introduced a Desktop Display Scaling function to enhance performance on larger and smaller screens (or systems with two displays of diering resolutions), simplied the File Explorer utility with a This PC view that replaces Computer, and added extra commands to the right-click Start menu (including Network Connections and Shutdown).
LOOK AND FEEL
You now have far more control over the look and feel of your Start screen than you did in the original release of Windows 8. There are more colour and background choices, additional tile sizes, and the option to have a slideshow instead of a static image on the lock screen. You can even replace the Start screen with the Apps page, if youd prefer to see all your programs at once rather than scrolling through their tiles. You can make your desktop applications appear rst on the list too, if you prefer. On the desktop, you can change the functions of the hot corners if you dont like the way they work by default.
THINKSTOCK.COM
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BOOT TO THE DESKTOP
The iconic Windows 8 Start screen isnt going away any time soon, but Microsoft has acknowledged that its not to everyones liking, and you can now bypass it when you log in Windows 8.1 lets you boot up to the Start screen, the Apps page or the desktop. Whats more, you can keep the same wallpaper on both the desktop and the Start screen if you want to make the change less drastic. If youre on a tablet, its easier to stick to the Start screen; if youre on a traditional computer, its easier to stick to the desktop.
TAKE YOUR PICK Find the apps you want in seconds with the new look Windows Store
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A BETTER STORE
When it was rst introduced, the Windows 8 Store felt a little half-baked and wasnt always as intuitive as we would have liked. In Windows 8.1, it works and looks much better. Having all of your software under one roof is a convenient way of working, and apps update automatically now as well. The Store has a new look too, with at-a-glance descriptions and ratings that make it easier to sort through recommended programs and games so you can spot the best of the new apps on the platform.
SKYPE FRONT AND CENTRE
EASIER CONFIGURATION
Like SkyDrive, Skype is an essential part of the Windows experience in 8.1, bringing together video calling, audio calling and instant messaging under one virtual roof thats only a click or a tap away and replacing the Messages app at the same time. Its easier than ever to search for your contacts, and you have more control over how much of your screen the app uses. Microsoft promises that Skype will now be front and centre. That might sound either appealing or o-putting depending on whether you prefer Google Hangouts!
More tech-savvy users who enjoy having a poke around in their computers settings may have decided to give Windows 8 a miss because of the hodgepodge created by the combination of the Start screen PC Settings app and the familiar desktop Control Panel. Windows 8.1 has a much more comprehensive Settings app, so most of the options youre going to need are available from both places, and tweaking your machine is more straightforward, whichever interface youre using. There are lots of new options to explore, too.
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FUTURE TECH
CUTTING EDGE Windows 8.1 is packed with exciting new features that will help you keep up to date with new technology, including 3D printing and much more
Windows 8.1 includes a host of more minor improvements and tweaks that make it future-proof, including built-in 3D printing capabilities. This means you can use 3D rendering software to design an object, then simply connect a 3D printer to your PC and select it as you would any other printer. Theres also support for Wi-Fi Direct printers, so you can hook up your wireless device without any extra software. Its also worth checking our the updated and enhanced Fresh Paint digital artwork app that Microsoft has been showing o recently. If youve been wondering whether to upgrade to Windows 8, now is the perfect time to make the jump!
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WINDOWS HELP HARDWARE FIXES SOFTWARE SOLUTIONS INTERNET TIPS

Windows
MOVING TEMP FOLDERS

Q I would like to make my main
Do you have a PC problem? Get in touch

Email full details of your problem to the support team and well do our best to help windowsmagazine@ futurenet.com
Windows 7 partition as static as possible in order to keep the junk o it, as well as to help reduce the size of the snapshots I take using a program called RollbackRX. Is there some way to relocate such items as temporary internet les and other non-essential functions to another drive? Ken Wood
Adams solution The answer to this question requires you to tread a ne line, moving genuinely non-essential les o the system partition without going too far and potentially causing major problems further down the line. Ken is correct in assuming that temporary internet les can be safely moved away weve answered this question separately in the step-by-step guide on p80
TEMP SHIFT Move your temporary folders to another drive by changing environment variables
but weve identied four more areas worth exploring. First, disable the Hibernation feature if you dont need it. To do this, open a Command Prompt as an administrator from the Start menu or Quick Access menu, then type powercfg.exe /hibernate o and press [Enter]. Second, switch o System Restore if its not required (RollbackRX replaces this anyway in Kens case) via the System Protection tab of the System Control Panel. Third, move the paging le to another physical drive. To do this, click Advanced system settings in the System Control Panel. Click Settings under Performance, switch to the Advanced tab and click Change under Virtual memory. First, untick Automatically manage paging le size for all drives. Select your system partition (typically drive C) and choose Custom size. Set both initial and maximum sizes to the same gure 200MB if you have 4GB RAM or less, 400MB if you have 4-8GB, and 800MB if you have more than 16GB and click Set.
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FIND THE SOLUTION! WhoCrashed This free program available from www.resplendence.com allows you to view Windows crash logs in more detail.
Support Technical help WorldMags.net

Quickfire questions
About a month ago, a friends Thunderbird client started printing out two pages of unwanted information at the top of every email. Reg Marshall Open the View menu in Thunderbird and check the Headers entry. Setting this to Normal reduces the amount of header information printed along with the email itself. For the last couple of months Ive not been able to get any Windows Updates for my laptop. It just keeps spinning the little blue circle. Emma Clark Emmas issue was xed with our rst suggestion: open Action Center, then click Troubleshooting and select Fix problems with Windows Update. Running this as an administrator (click Advanced) found and solved the problem
COMPATIBLITY SOLUTION VueScan lets you keep using your trusty scanner in Windows 7 and 8
Now select your second drive, choose System managed size and click Set followed by OK. Follow the prompts to reboot your PC. Finally, return to the Advanced tab and click the Environment variables button. Youll see TEMP and TMP entries for both your own user account and for the system itself. Select each one in turn and click the Edit button to type in the location where youd like these folders to reside (youll need to create these folders on your second drive manually before doing so). All of these actions will help free up space on your system partition, thereby reducing the size of the snapshots taken by RollbackRX.
Hardware
a virtual machine using VMWare Player (available to download from www.myvmware.com/ web/vmware/free registration required) and then connect the scanner through that. A simpler solution but one that will cost you around 25/$40 for a years free upgrades is to use VueScan, a trial of which youll nd on the cover disc. This works with thousands of older scanners, and could be a cost-eective alternative to purchasing a new scanner. Keith opted for the VMWare Player route, and was pleased to report that it allowed him to access his scanner once more.
Security
Jargon buster!
DoD 5200-22.M This is a special algorithm, approved by the US Department of Defense, for securely deleting les.
NO EXTRAS Unchecky helps you avoid accidentally installing unwanted tools
UNWANTED TOOLBARS
Q I have three unwanted
RUNNING OLD DEVICES IN WINDOWS 7

Q Ive just upgraded my PC from
Windows XP Pro to Windows 7 Home Premium. Could you help me get my old HP Business Inkjet 1200n printer with duplexer to work correctly in Windows 7, please? The automatic duplex function isnt currently working. Ive also got an old scanner that no longer works (it was designed for Windows 2000, but did work in XP). Keith Hooker Simons solution By the time I got in contact with Keith hed solved his rst problem by tting a parallel port add-on card to his new PC once the printer was connected via that rather than the USB port, it was able to print automatically on both sides of the paper again. When it comes to getting older scanners to work with newer versions of Windows, you have a few options. If you have a spare, unused copy of Windows XP around, you can install that into
toolbars on my laptop that are giving me grief in Google Chrome: Certied Toolbar Search, Amazon Smart Search and Metacrawler Search. Every time I close them in Chrome they come back on the next launch, and I cant nd any reference to them in Programs and Features to allow me to uninstall them. Microsoft Security Essentials doesnt nd any infections, either. Theyre slowing down my PC and I hope you can help me remove them permanently! Bill Richards Nicks solution Thankfully, all three toolbars although installed sneakily by other programs proved relatively easy to remove once I pointed Bill in the right direction. Open the Chrome menu and choose Settings, then select Extensions in the left-hand pane. The toolbars should be visible from here my guess is youll see an Installed by a third-party notication next to them on the right. Getting rid of them should be as simple as
Duplexer A device that makes it easy to print on both sides of a sheet of paper by feeding through a second time.
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Quickfire questions
Ive just upgraded my RAM to 32GB, but Windows 7 Home Premium says Installed memory (RAM) 32GB (16GB usable). What does this mean, and how do I x it? Mark Sadly its a limitation of Windows 7 Home Premium upgrading to Windows 7 Pro or Windows 8 will lift this restriction. Windows 8 Standard supports up to 128GB RAM for example. How do I stop HP Photo Gallery asking for a disc every time I try to open some photos on my computer? Kevin Lawson As HP Photo Gallery comes pre-installed, you should be able to resolve the problem by looking for a repair option under the All Programs entry on the Start menu. Ive received some les from a friend in MSG format how do I read them without Outlook? Adam Eaves MSG les can be read outside of Outlook using a free program called MSGViewer, which requires Java see http://bit.ly/18kcw2k for details, and to get started. clicking the trash can next to an unwanted toolbar and clicking Remove when prompted. Repeat for the other toolbars and then restart Chrome on doing so, Bill conrmed all three had removed themselves from his PC. To avoid this happening again in the future we recommend installing a free, unobtrusive program called Unchecky from the cover disc (ignore any warnings that your security program may ag up its completely safe). Unchecky sits quietly in the background looking out for program installers that attempt to sneak these types of add-ons on to your PC and will alert you should you be about to install one. You can, of course, ignore the warning, but it does at least mean you wont accidentally install one potentially unwanted program (PUP) on your PC.
Security
SECURE WIPE Always clear data completely from your PC before passing it on
CLEARING OLD DATA FROM HARD DRIVE

Q Im about to dispose of an old
HP touchscreen machine, and would like to know what program I should use to safely clear it of data before I dispose of it. Something ecient and simple to use, but not too expensive please! Tessa Davies Adams solution To keep things simple, wed recommend you use a Windows-friendly data-shredding tool to delete existing data on the drive, and wipe any free space to ensure previously deleted les are destroyed too. Install File Shredder from your free disc, then launch the
program. Click Shredder settings and select to the Algorithms tab to make sure DoD 5200-22.M is the selected algorithm. Click OK. From here you can add les or folders still present on your hard drive, then click Remove all to delete them securely after clicking Shred les now. Finally, click Shred free disk space to securely wipe all empty space on the drive, which should remove all traces of previously deleted les. Once complete, restore Windows to its factory settings using your recovery partition or discs, then consider installing File Shredder and running Shred Free Disk Space one last time to wipe any other free space left over.
Hardware
CANT USE COMPUTERS LINEIN SOCKET

Q Im trying to connect my
old music centre to my Windows 7 64-bit computer in order to record some old vinyl discs. Unfortunately, despite the presence of a line-in socket on my
MOVE BROWSER CACHE

space on my system partition by moving my temporary internet les onto another drive. Can this be done easily? Jeremy Sixsmith Matts solution Yes, although the method obviously depends on the web browser you use Chrome users should visit www.essayweb.net/ miscellany/chrome.shtml for a detailed guide, and users of other browser users should check out the step-by-step tutorial instead.
Q Hi, Id like to free up some
Explorer 1 Internet Click the Tools button and choose

Internet options, then click Settings under Browser History. Click Move folder to choose where the new Temporary Internet Files folder is created. Finally, click OK > OK > Yes to log off and move the files.
2 Firefox Install Configuration Mania from http://

addons.mozilla.org/firefox/addon/4420, then choose Options > Configuration Mania from the Firefox menu. Select Browser cache under Browser and click Browse to pick a new folder before clicking Select folder > OK.
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Support Technical help WorldMags.net

motherboard, no line-in option appears under Control Panel > Sound > Recording. It seems the computer doesnt recognise it. Hopefully you can help. Simon Rutter Jamess solution This can usually be traced to the sound drivers in Simons case, he had an Intel D945PVS motherboard that had been designed pre-Windows 7. The standard Windows 7 sound drivers had been installed, which is ne for basic use, but he needed dedicated drivers to unlock the features he required. A quick trip to the Intel website revealed Windows Vista 64-bit drivers, but no dedicated Windows 7 driver. I pointed Simon to the free DriverEasy tool, which you can nd on your free disc, or download from http://www.drivereasy.com. This scanned his system and found 27 driver updates, including the all-important sound drivers. Once installed, the line-in socket appeared in the Sound Control Panel and Simon was able to access it in Audacity (http://audacity. sourceforge.net) to start digitising his record collection.
Security
has now been discontinued, so I will either have to renew my subscription to Norton or choose another product. My regular antivirus scans only turn up adware cookies, and I use the internet daily, but not continuously. My question is, can I rely on Microsoft Security Essentials to give me all the protection I need from viruses and malware, or are there weaknesses that would make a commercial product a better choice? Thanks very much. Alan Elsegood Nicks solution My personal view is that free antivirus software is adequate only if you take precautions to minimise your risk of infection, whether thats vetting websites before you visit
using a free browser plug-in such as MyWOT (www.mywot.com), or downloading and installing programs only from reputable websites and after investigating them thoroughly. As for Microsoft Security Essentials, there are better, more thorough free tools out there, such as Avast (www.avast.com). However, if you want added protection, then I still recommend paying 25 a year for a Norton subscription (www.norton.com) after all, Ive been using it for the past six years! Additional features such as automatic screening of all downloads and warnings when youre about to visit potentially dangerous websites means its there to catch you when you slip up, but if you trust your own vigilance, then free software is perfectly sucient.
Do you have a PC problem? Get in touch

Email full details of your problem to the support team and well do our best to help windowsmagazine@ futurenet.com
IS FREE PROTECTION ADEQUATE?

Q Im running Windows 7, and
have been using Spyware Doctor as my antivirus protection for several years. The product
EXTRA PROTECTION Norton vets all downloads and warns you if it spots anything suspicious
My personal view is that free antivirus is adequate only if you take precautions to minimise your risk of infection
Jargon buster!
Environment variables Specially named variables that point Windows to specic system folders. Paging le A place where Windows can temporarily store items that arent currently being used. PUP Potentially Unwanted Program an additional program or add-on oered when installing an application on your PC.
(new) 3 Opera In the new version of Opera, locate the

program shortcut, right-click it and choose Properties. Click inside the Target: box and add the following line: --disk-cache-dir=D:\ Folder, where D:\Folder points to where you would like the cache to be stored.
(old) 4 Opera If youre still using Opera 12.16 or

earlier, type opera:config into the address bar, then search for cache directory4. Change its value to the location of your desired folder (which you must have already created) and click Save to finish.
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NEW HARDWARE
ESSENTIAL ACCESSORIES
LATEST GAMES
The days of your computer being a grey box on your desk are long gone. You can now take your PC with you everywhere you go, ready for whenever you want to type out a report or relax and have fun. If youve just bought a new album or one of the latest games, youll want to make sure it sounds as good as possible. Weve got a roundup of the best new headphones that will be music to your ears. Weve also put two new portable PCs through their paces Microsofts new and improved Surface 2, and HPs chic but budget-oriented Pavilion 15. Enjoy! Nick Odantzis Deputy editor nick.odantzis@futurenet.com
84 Gaming headsets
Comfortable and stylish headphones that deliver fantastic sound whether youre playing a game or enjoying some music.
86 Microsoft Surface 2
The successor to Microsofts first Windows tablet has arrived, with more power and fantastic battery life for working on the go.
88 HP Pavilion 15
If youre looking for an affordable laptop and dont need too many bells and whistles, this simple offering from HP could be ideal.
92 Batman: Arkham Origins
The Dark Knight goes back to his roots in this prequel. Expect a cracking story featuring Gothams infamous villains.
Our review guarantee

We use only acknowledged experts to review products, so you can use our ratings with full confidence to make your buying decision
Our awards
Only the very receive our Best On Test Award. These will have excellent marks for quality. Our Best Value Award is given to products that quite simply represent the best value for your money.
How we review
One of the key tenets of our review philosophy is that hardware should be compared against like products wherever possible. It is only when you pit type against one another at the same time that you can
verdict as to which is the very best in that category. The pace of development in computer hardware means that it is very from today with those from, say, six months ago. Magazines and websites that review a new product on its own run the risk of confusing or misleading.
Superb Very good
We guarantee to test every piece of hardware rigorously and thoroughly, using only acknowledged experts to establish the worth of a product. We always review from the viewpoint of our readers; the day-to-day practicality and quality of a product is paramount.
Good Disappointing
RATING EXPLAINED
Poor
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WorldMags.net Whats inside

84 Turtle Beach XP510 84 Creative Sound Blaster Evo Zx 84 Tritton Kunai 85 Razer Kraken 7.1 85 Plantronics Rig 86 Microsoft Surface 2 88 HP Pavilion 15 90 Battlefield 4 86 Microsoft Surface 2: a second-generation Windows tablet with a sleek new look 92 Batman: Arkham Origins 94 Assassins Creed IV: Black Flag 96 Call of Duty: Ghosts
Upgrade
88 HP Pavilion 15: an affordable laptop that would be perfect as a second PC for the family
You play a rogue who loves money enough to leave his girlfriend in port and sail to the West Indies in search of a vast fortune

Our promise to you

The Upgrade section is your key to finding out about the latest products, all designed to help you get more from your PC
Well introduce you to new stuff
You can trust our reviews
Our expert reviewers are 100 per cent independent, with years of experience in the world of computing. Our rigorous testing procedures mean that only genuine, high-quality products are awarded high star ratings. Further, very few are handed our Best Value or Best on Test Awards. If you see an item of hardware bearing one of these marks, product. Always check when the award was given, to ensure it is still up-to-date.
We choose the best products
Thousands of new products for your computer are released every year and choosing between them can sometimes be an impossible task. Our experts select only the best hardware and software to feature in this magazine, making your decision on which one to choose easier. Even better, our awards and star rating system make it needs, with our recommended products section giving you a fast, trustworthy guide to a wide range of hardware and software.
Wherever we can, we review new hardware comparatively, pitching it head-to-head against other similar products. (Full details of our policy can be found in the opposite page, under Our review guarantee.) Of course, this isnt always possible with new products and part of our duty to you is to introduce you a wide range of fascinating new hardware, software, services and games. The reviews of standalone hardware and software are just as thorough as our comparative reviews. However, we do not allocate scores to them because this can often be misleading. The only exception to this rule is on our games reviews, where the pace of change is a lot slower and single scores can be genuinely useful.
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Tritton Kunai Turtle Beach XP510
Price 50 | $60 (www.trittonaudio.com) The Kunai is Trittons entry-level wired headset, but offers solid build quality and sound that easily rivals some higher-end headphones. The in-line remote lets you mute your fellow players if you need to give the game your full concentration. The Kunai is compatible with PCs and almost all games consoles but it can be fiddly to set up, and long stretches of use prove uncomfortable due to the small ear cups.
Price 230 | $290 (www.turtlebeach.com) Other wireless headsets will happily pipe the sound of gunfire to you, but if you want to chat to your mates youll need a wired connection. Not so with the XP510. A Bluetooth dongle plugs into your PC so you can enjoy full 360-degree surround sound and talk at the same time. The XP510 can also connect to your phone, and has the oomph to deliver quality sound for movies and music. Its perhaps a little light and plasticky, but in terms of features, theres little better.
Creative Sound Blaster Evo Zx
Price 160 | $250 (www.creative.com) This PC-only headset connects simply via Bluetooth and NFC, with some nifty playback controls tucked away on the side. The sound quality from the 40mm drivers is decent enough you are able to feel the boom of battle but its not mind-blowing. You can customise the balance to suit your tastes, but overall it remains a bit too polite. The ear cups are a little on the firm side too, leading to some soreness after a few hours. Theres good connectivity here, but a little more sonic attack would be nice.
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Upgrade Gaming headsets WorldMags.net
Whether youre rallying the troops or organising a heist, these gaming headsets will make your voice heard
Razer Kraken 7.1

Price 90 | $100 (www.razerone.com) A typically militaristic-looking Razer product aimed directly at PC gamers, this is remarkably well built for a sub-100 headset. Its a bit weightier than youd expect and can become rather sweaty after several hours of gaming, but the ear cups remain comfortable long-term. The main selling point here is the virtual 7.1 surround sound, which can be adjusted using Synapse 2.0 software. Its good, but very bass heavy great for noisy games, but less ideal if you want to watch a Woody Allen film or listen to Allo Darlin records. The retractable mic is a nice touch, though.
Plantronics Rig
Price 120 | $130 (www.plantronics.com) The Rig is a wired headset, so you cant wander far from your computer, but its so comfortable, with a large ear cup design and soft felt cushioning, that you wont mind the reduced freedom of movement. An optical digital audio input is a welcome addition, even if the ability to feed your smartphones audio into the mix is interesting but somewhat less necessary (unless you cant live without those Twitter alerts). Hook the Rig up to an Xbox 360, PS3 or PC, and the sound is all-encompassing thanks to the digital input and great audio processing. Strap them on; load up your favourite game; dont unplug for many, many hours.
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Microsoft Surface 2
359 | $449 www.microsoft.com
Can Microsofts new Surface make Windows RT a joy to use?
ack in 2012, Microsoft launched its Surface devices and just about succeeded in bringing Windows to the tablet form factor. They were as thin as an iPad, came with full-size USB ports and almost the whole Oce suite, had kickstands to hold them up, and could be clipped to amazingly thin keyboards. Sadly, they lacked the range of apps available for iOS and Android, and the impressive feature set didn't translate into impressive sales. Now, Microsoft has launched its next-generation tablets, the Surface Pro 2 and this, the successor to the Surface RT. The Surface 2 has a new screen, a two-position kickstand, USB 3.0, a faster processor and new keyboard options. It has the new features of Windows 8.1, including Internet Explorer 11, SkyDrive integration and more Snap window sizes. There are two versions of the Surface 2. Both have a 1.7GHz Nvidia Tegra 4 chip with 2GB of
RAM behind the 1,920 x 1,080 pixel, 10.6-inch screen, but you can choose between the 359 32GB model we tested and a 64GB version for 439. Those prices compare favourably with iPads of equivalent capacity, and Microsoft is keen to point out that as well as its hardware having superior connectivity, you also get Oce, which now includes Outlook. If you need more storage space, Surface 2 still has a microSD slot. It also provides 200GB of SkyDrive storage thats free for two years, along with a year of free Skype landline calls and hotspot access.
Looks familiar
The Surface 2 retains much of its predecessors style, with a big black bezel, angled sides and rounded corners, but the matte blastedmagnesium alloy chassis is a pale silver-grey rather than almost black. It attracts marks that wouldnt be noticeable on the original Surfaces
black edge. Making the Surface 2 thinner has also led to the removal of the lip of metal that ran along the top of the old models screen, between the plastic and the glass. The Surface 2 is much the same weight as the original Surface RT. At 676g it's a tiny bit heavier than last year's iPad 4 (which has a smaller 9.7-inch screen), but its positively hefty compared to the new 478g iPad Air. It feels well-balanced though, and is reassuringly sturdy. It's comfortable to hold in one hand or two. Its light enough to carry around without weighing you down, and it still packs more useful ports into the case than just about any other tablet. As with the original Surface, the power button is on the top right (or bottom right in portrait mode), and is conveniently placed in either orientation. Thanks to the twin speakers, headphone jack and tiny Mini-HDMI port in the top corners, the volume keys are a little further
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Upgrade Microsoft Surface 2 WorldMags.net

KEY FEATURES
Microsoft Surface 2
Supplier www.microsoft.com Operating system Windows 8.1 Processor Nvidia Tegra 4 quad-core 1.7GHz Storage 32GB or 64GB RAM 2GB Graphics Nvidia Tegra 4 T40 Connectivity 802.11b/g/n Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 4.0, HDMI, USB 3.0 Weight 676g Screen size 10.6-inch touchscreen Display resolution 1,920 x 1,080 Full HD
down the left-hand side than you might expect. The most useful port is the full-size USB port, which is now the speedier USB 3.0 variety. Network options again come from Bluetooth 4.0 and 802.11n Wi-Fi. However, the latter features an extra-powerful antenna that can nd more wireless access points than the original Surface. It can get online when even laptops can't nd a connection. Models with 4G connectivity are expected soon. The new kickstand gives you the choice of having the screen
although text is crisp and smooth, it can be a little small on the 10.6-inch screen. The stereo speakers crank out impressive sound given how thin the Surface 2 is; volume is good and details are crisp. The original Surface rarely felt slow until you tried a demanding game, but the Surface 2s 1.7GHz quad-core Tegra 4 chipset and 2GB of RAM make even the 32GB model feel much speedier. This Surface 2 runs Windows RT 8.1. Windows RT has been much maligned, but apart from not being
Windows RT remains a problem. Things just arent joined up yet because of the limited app support
mostly upright or leaning it a bit further back. This can help you avoid glare from an overhead light, touch the screen at a more comfortable angle, and balance the device more securely on your lap. However you look at it, the new full HD screen is beautiful, though not obviously in the same category as Apple's Retina display. It's brighter, crisper and more vivid than the original Surfaces screen and the original Surface Pro. Reds and greens are more intense but yellows and whites stay bright and clean, and the colours you see are more accurate. The screens 1,920 x 1,080 resolution is great for movies, but it also means youll keep the DPI and zoom settings turned up, because able to install any desktop software (beyond the built-in Oce desktop programs and Internet Explorer), it's indistinguishable from the full-fat Windows 8.1. Overall, Windows RT isnt that bad, but the major problem is that were all used to the way desktop programs work and the functions they perform. The apps available from the Windows Store don't yet ll the gap left by that the lack of desktop software. Measuring battery life is always dependent on what you're doing; are you using Wi-Fi, running a lot of web pages, transferring gigabytes of data or playing Solitaire? Microsoft claims the device can play video for up to 10 hours on a single charge, and we got 12 hours of playback in some of our tests.
You can get nine or 10 hours of web browsing, depending on the sites you visit; multimedia content consumes more power than simple text pages. When the battery runs down, recharging is fast; you get about one per cent charge a minute, so you have well over half your battery life back after an hour. The cameras on the original Surface and Surface Pro werent that impressive, but the 1080p Surface 2 cameras are a denite improvement, especially in low light, thanks to the much larger sensor on the 3.5-megapixel front camera. Since youre most likely to use the front camera for making a Skype video call, that's probably the most important improvement, but the picture quality is also substantially better. The rear 5MP camera is also improved, but it is a basic phone camera. Surface 2 is priced as a premium tablet, especially when you have to buy Type and Touch Covers separately. Thats fair, but there are far cheaper options (if you dont count the value of Oce and 200GB of SkyDrive storage). The new screen, the improved kickstand, the much-better battery life and software with far fewer rough edges add up to an impressive product. But Windows RT remains a problem. Things just arent joined up yet because of the limited app support. However much you think you won't need desktop apps, you will undoubtedly nd something that compromises your experience. Thats a shame, because the hardware is superb. A fantastic device thats held back by the limitations of its pared-down operating system.
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HP Pavilion 15
349 | $765 www.hp.com
This budget, general-purpose laptop is more than enough for most needs
he HP Pavilion 15 is a budget machine designed for everyday computing. Its a straightforward proposition, yet an area of the PC market that is extremely competitive, with a huge number of options to choose from. The selection includes everything from tablets (of all guises) through to Googles new Chromebooks and netbooks (which some say are set to make a comeback), and a healthy chunk of budget laptops, just like this one, all jostling for your attention and access to your wallet. The benet of the HP Pavilion 15 over many alternatives is that it runs Windows specically Windows 8 so you can use all the applications that you are familiar with. And unlike something like HP's own Pavilion 14 Chromebook or any of the Windows RT tablets, you're not limited to a tiny range of apps either. You can run everything from Microsoft Oce to Photoshop and other high-end tools.
This is a budget-focused laptop from the ground up though, and as such sacrices have had to be made. It certainly isn't a machine that will answer every single one of your computer needs. Even so, if you're looking for a general machine for the home, then there's nothing wrong with such a goal in the rst place.
Quality components
Key to a low-cost laptop like the HP Pavilion 15 is the processor at the heart of the machine, which is also budget-orientated. This is the second machine we've looked at recently that is built around AMDs A4-5000 APU, with the rst being the Lenovo G505. This is an APU as opposed to a CPU, which is AMD's way of highlighting the fact that it boasts a graphics core inside the chip alongside the more traditional processing component. The A4-5000s architecture boasts four logical cores and an
operating frequency of 1.5GHz, with 2MB of cache to help keep those cores full. These cores arent powerful enough to compete with those in Intel's latest-generation Core processors, but the chip is considerably less expensive than anything Intel has to oer. The graphics processor is a Radeon HD 8330. Its specications paint a positive enough picture, and it will happily handle the latest games at least in theory. There are a few problems though, which well come to shortly. Theres 4GB of DDR3 RAM, which is frustratingly all on one of the APU's two channels, providing only half the memory bandwidth that you should get. The machine is also home to a 750GB hard drive, a DVD+RW drive and plenty of USB ports, so theres enough storage space for your photos, music and other les. The 15.6-inch screen is bright, although as it is a TN panel it suers
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KEY FEATURES
Asus Transformer Book TX300
Supplier www.hp.com Operating system Windows 8 Processor AMD A4-5000 Storage 750GB HDD RAM 4GB DDR3 Graphics AMD Radeon HD 8330 Connectivity 802.11b/g/n Wi-Fi, HDMI, USB 3.0 Weight 2.35kg Screen size 15.6-inch Display resolution 1,366 x 768
from polarising when not viewed at the perfect angle. The resolution of 1,366 x 768 should be seen as the bare minimum for laptops today, but you can use the integrated HDMI connector to show things on a Full HD television or monitor. Build quality is reasonable, although tapping the chassis produces hollow rattles, especially around the optical drive. The Pavilion 15 doesn't feel as solid as many more expensive machines, though it is pleasing enough to look at. The metallic red nish
latest DirectX 11 games in theory. Unfortunately this APU lacks the raw power to handle demanding titles at anything like smooth frame rates. Of course this is a budget machine, so how does it fare when you knock the settings down a little? Not brilliantly. Even with every setting as low as it will go, you're still looking at less than 20fps in the vast majority of titles in our suite of games. But its not all bad news. In general use, the machine is very responsive. The battery life is also
Theres not enough power to do the kind of tasks that you might expect from a modern machine
helps it stand out from the crowd, and system cooling doesn't get too loud while the laptop is in use. incredible. In testing under PCMark08, which stresses the machine's capabilities in website creation among other things, you're looking at ve hours and 22 minutes of continued use, which is incredible. When you consider that you should see double this when you're out and about, then you're looking at a system that will last a day's commute easily. If you need to travel away from a power connector for long periods, this alone might tip your decision in the Pavilion 15s favour. Anyone in the market for a budget laptop, either as a generalpurpose machine for the family, or as a PC that will handle school work, should certainly consider the HP Pavilion 15 simply because on
Modest performance
In our tests we found theres not a lot of power going spare. In fact there's not enough to do the kind of tasks that you might expect from a modern machine. Youll be waiting for your videos to output, for your photos to get that nal layer of polish, and for pretty much anything that takes serious processing power to nish. Still, for many simple computing tasks youll nd that it does enough. As we mentioned earlier, HP has built the Pavilion 15 around an AMD APU, and as such it boasts a graphics core that will handle the
the surface it oers such great value for money. The processor and graphics performance arent stellar, but if you set your expectations a little lower than normal, youll be pleased with what it has to oer. The general styling is to be commended too. While theres not a lot of cash for ourishes at this price point, this is an interestinglooking laptop. The screen is bright, but shift your head slightly and youll lose colour reproduction and contrast will go out of the window. With Apple redening what we expect from portable devices thanks to their IPS screens, this is one aspect that holds the Pavilion 15 and other budget laptops back. The fact that HP has populated only one of the machines memory channels is frustrating, because it means the APU has to wait for data unnecessarily. Our advice here is to upgrade the laptops RAM as soon as you receive it. Overall, the HP Pavilion 15 isnt a machine for everyone. We think it would work best as a second PC for the home that everyone can grab as needed. It isnt powerful enough for a primary machine unless you only need it for simple tasks, but if thats all you demand of it, and youre looking for a straightforward laptop on a tight budget, this is one of the best. Admittedly you won't be playing the latest games on it, and doing anything else that is processor-intensive will take a while, but its not a bad little machine at all. And at this price, some might say its a steal. Its performance wont set the world alight, but if your demands are modest, it could be ideal.
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Play this
Four new games available to play on your Windows computer
Feel those engines roar
Beams of light are dazzlingly beautiful in BF4
Battlefield 4
A lot of buildings get broken, but not much new ground
Price 45 | $60 Developer DICE Publisher EA Multiplayer Up to 64 players DRM Origin, Battlelog Web www.battlefield.com Recommended specs Quad-core processor, 4GB RAM, GeForce 680 or Radeon AMD 6850
B attleeld 4 wants you to break it. Demolition has been, to varying degrees, the series distinguishing feature ever since Battleeld: Bad Company 2. In BF4 it takes the form of massive, shatterable centrepieces in each multiplayer map. A concrete dam you can ruin. A dentable radar telescope. A crippled navy destroyer that can be run aground in Paracel Storm. At some point though, we stopped caring about toppling tower blocks. The sky scrapers we love are the jets.
The sound they make is the best sort of distracting. Its a ragged crackle of bass, like a thunderstorm being dragged against its will. Eects such as this continue to be one of Battleelds most enjoyable traits. The disastermovie destruction is initially novel, but its the incidental moments of wonder that hold up over time. The blur of wind as you base-jump o a roof. The growl of an ATV as its tyres chew grass. The clink of an M40A5 bolt shifting back into place. DICE is the Mozart of war, and its mastery of sound continues to dene
Battleelds moment-tomoment richness.
Dj vu
But this is nothing new, and neither is a lot of BF4. Its still a 64-player, infantry-driven FPS fought on expansive outdoor maps, with a garage of air, ground and sea vehicles to taxi you between capture points, and the weapon roster is essentially untouched. We understand why DICE wouldnt deviate from its design why change weapon handling that continues to rest comfortably between accessible and nuanced? Why
throw out modes that already suit the maps and mechanics? All the same, you should factor in this familiarity if you tired of BF3 quickly. BF4 will probably age faster than its predecessor. Keeping some of that sameness at bay are features like Commander mode a strategic role returning from BF2142 that one player per team can assume instead of ghting. Commanders view the match omnisciently through a fullscreen map, issuing attack and defend orders while phoning in what are essentially killstreaks as theyre earned by squads. These commander assets are powerful in the right hands, as they can do everything from air-dropping ammo and health to temporarily spotting all enemy infantry or summoning an AC-130 gunship. The latter makes you feel like Zeus: lobbing cannon rounds from on high is a wonderful break from being boots on the ground, and it takes real skill. Outside of this strategic role, theres a new hybrid bomb-
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The insurance companies will never pay out on this one
Upgrade Play this
BF4 carries on the series tradition of combat across expansive maps
Wheeeeeeeee!
In-game hand signals are restricted to pointing
Paracel Storm is a sight to behold
planting and capture-point mode that we like. Obliteration joins the compact Rush, longer-form Conquest and team deathmatch modes. Its a meat-grindery back-and-forth that occasionally resembles rugby more than it does Battleeld, but in a good way. The vehicle set is mostly unchanged, save for a neutral MLRS truck that spawns on a few maps. Controlling it gives your team mobile artillery to knock out hunkered-down defenders or disrupt vehicle advances. The truck is balanced with a limited ring arc and long ammoregeneration timer, and by separating the driving and ring positions. BF4s Levolution moments, as EA calls them, are presented as the main attraction. These scripted setpieces only subtly inuence matches, which we appreciate. One of the better events in Paracel Storm isnt the wrecked warship that you can run aground, but how the sky shifts from a clear, tropical postcard to an oily hurricane.
The ocean gets choppy, and travelling on jet skis and boats becomes more of a chore. At the less ambitious end of the Levolution spectrum is Golmud Railway. Its dynamic element is a small train thats also one of the six capture points. This mightve been a nice idea on paper, but the train is easily intercepted and has almost no strategic value.
Hotel Hainan
Gimmicks aside, the layout and look of BF4s maps is great, with some standing alongside the series best. Hainan Resort is a highlight a tropical bay overlooked by a hotel. LAVs inevitably stack up in the courtyard at the resorts lip, generating excellent cat-andmouse between armour and engineers while gunboats harass from the shore. Naval combat is more abundant in BF4, expressed in maps such as Flood Zone, where you ght on the rooftops of apartments submerged in 50 feet of
swimmable water. And Golmud Railway, while a drag in Conquest, is fantastic in Rush, which shrinks the map to a concentrated attack-anddefend format. The exception to the well-designed map rule is Operation Locker a at, bottlenecked bunker. If you enjoyed BF3s Operation Metro youll love it, but we believe that BF doesnt play well in compact spaces. Even with just 28 players, an Obliteration round on Locker devolved into a 40-minute meat grinder, with small crowds gathering at narrow tunnels to die in piles. The campaign is better than BF3s dismally generic oering, although its still singleplayerby-numbers. Youre a marine, leading an elite team of tactical experts who all continually need your help to open doors. Amid political strife in China, youre sent to extract a VIP. It goes awry, sparking open conict with the US. The action never deviates from the whack-amole game of plunking down
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pop-up guards, punctuated by cutscenes and the odd helicopter or tank kill. On the technical side, it was frustrating that we couldnt widen the eld of vision from around 70. We also found the inclusion of kill counters in singleplayer strange. DICE is certainly guilty of taking an if it aint broke attitude, but BF4s renements and excellent maps make it one of our favourite FPS games. A cynic would call it a map pack in sequels clothing. If thats your judgment, know that BF4 has enough variety, depth and quality to survive a year of intense play. Very similar to Battleeld 3, but improved by Commander Mode and diverse maps.
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The cinematic camera when you take out the last goon in the room never gets old
Batman: Arkham Origins

The Dark Knight plays it safe in a disappointing prequel
Price 40 | $50 Developer WB Games Montreal, Splash Damage Publisher Warner Bros Multiplayer Up to 8 players DRM Steam Web www.batmanarkhamorigins.com Recommended specs Intel Core 2 Duo, 1GB graphics card, 4GB RAM
A rkham Origins joins Batman in his angsty teenage years. Hes not the stoic, Kevin Conroy-voiced Bats of Asylum and City, but a hot-headed vigilante who punches rst and asks questions later. Its an interesting twist on the Arkham formula, but despite the change of tone and era, this is a timid retread of Rocksteadys games. Its Christmas Eve, and skull-faced mobster Black Mask has given the caped crusader an early present in the form of a $50 million
bounty on his head. Eight assassins have been hired to claim the prize, including Bane, Deathstroke and Killer Croc, plus a parade of low-rent DC villains. You also see Batmans rst encounter with a youthful Joker, and other cameos that we wont spoil. Rest assured, youre never short of people to punch or be punched by. The city is noticeably bigger than before, but less visually interesting and less fun to navigate. There are too many dead ends that break your ow as youre gliding, and the new island is a grey,
uninspiring industrial sprawl. To compensate for the increased size, youre able to fast-travel with the Batwing, but transit points have to be unlocked by hacking communication towers. Otherwise, getting around involves liberal use of the grapnel boost, which pings you into the air when you grapple onto something.
Odd jobs
The Riddler is back, known to Batman as Enigma, and has scattered extortion les (basically the same as previous games Riddler trophies)
around Gotham. Reaching some of them involves solving environmental puzzles, but none as complex as those in City. Other side quests include defusing bombs set by terrorist Anarky, destroying weapon and drug caches, and intervening in street crimes. A lot of it feels like the usual open-world game ller, and it varies in quality, but theres a good chunk of stu to do between missions. The world-building is much better indoors. Locales are nicely crafted, with the same clutter and richness of detail that pervaded Rocksteadys worlds. The level design doesnt match the strength of the art, though. The missions are formulaic and linear, with none of the previous games careful pacing. Theres too much ghting, and not enough exploration of those beautifully-detailed
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Batman inltrates the Gotham PD building
Upgrade Play this
The crime scene reconstruction is nice-looking, but shallow
How do we make this sinister illegal drug lab even more sinister?
New villain Copperhead receives some bat-justice
environments. You feel like youre being hastily pushed between predator challenges and ghts, rather than progressing organically, at your own pace. At rst the combat seemed unchanged, but the more we played, the more aware we became that it is worse. The controls and animations are the same, but the tempo is wrong. Rocksteadys original system was inuenced by rhythm action games, the enemies attacking almost to a beat, but in Origins, their attack patterns are more sporadic, which has destroyed that precise, rhythmic ow. A likeable new feature is the Devil May Cry-inspired rating system. After each ght, the amount of XP awarded is dictated by your performance. If you used a lot of variety, mixing gadgets and combos, youll earn more. Then there are the boss battles. Facing o against this shopping list of famous Batman baddies should have
been a highlight, but theyre probably the worst thing in the game. Most involve learning and exploiting a handful of very basic patterns, while regular enemies are occasionally thrown into the arena in a half-hearted attempt to add variety. But theyre frustrating, repetitive, attritional slogs. Thats not to say theres no new content. Detective mode has been reworked, enabling you to reconstruct crime scenes with holograms and scrub through them for clues. It looks great, but its pretty shallow. Youre still just holding a button to scan things. Batman does the detecting; you just tell him where to look. Multiplayer sees two three-man teams of thugs battling each other while a third team, Batman and Robin, tries to take them out. The thugs ght over Battleeldstyle control points, and can call upon Bane and the Joker to help out. Its enjoyable
enough, and the predator system works well against real players, but after only a few hours we didnt feel any urge to return to it. New gadgets join old favourites. The shock gloves can be used in combat to deal extra damage, and to charge up generators to open doors. They only make your strikes slightly more powerful, but zapping enemies with electried punches is very satisfying. Its never explained why Batman has access to gadgets he only started to use in Asylum and City, so try to suspend your disbelief. The best thing in Origins utility belt is its story. Its nothing we havent seen in a thousand lms, games and comics before, but its condently written and well-acted, and it takes inuence from established mythology without copying it.
Steam forums continues to grow, some of which corrupt saves or halt progress. One bug, seemingly isolated to the PC version, trapped us in a room, and required the use of another bug to bypass it. The leap from Asylum to City was dramatic, if not entirely successful, but Origins is so similar to City (to the point of repeating some moments verbatim) that it feels more like an elaborate expansion pack than a proper sequel. Yearly sequels can bleed a great concept dry, and the Arkham series deserves better treatment. Enjoyable but blighted by bad bosses, sloppy design, and a lack of new ideas.
Bugged out
As we go to press, a playercompiled list of bugs on the
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Set captured men free to lower your wanted level
Diving kills from a ships rigging is endless fun
Assassins Creed IV Black Flag

The grand pirate adventure youve been waiting for
Price 40 | $60 Developer In house Publisher Ubisoft Multiplayer Four player co-op DRM Steam, Uplay Web www.bit.ly/AssFlag Recommended specs Dual-core CPU, Nvidia GeForce GTX470 or Radeon HD 5850, 4GB RAM
Assassins Creed IV Black Flag doesnt really want to be an Assassins Creed game, and we dont blame it. It seems keen to shrug o the convoluted lore surrounding the aeon-long Assassins vs Templars power struggle, which reached new peaks of ludicrousness even after that bit in the second game where you punch the Pope unconscious in order to access an alien hologram.
You play as Edward Kenway, a rogue who loves money enough to leave his girlfriend in port and sail to the West Indies in search of a vast fortune. In the opening scenes he steals an Assassins hooded garb and wristblades and accidentally falls in with a crowd of Templars a team of comically evil caricatures led by a bearded grand master and backed up by a platearmoured man-ogre who throws axes at people. Theyre
searching for the Observatory, an ancient device that enables its user to see the location of anyone in the world at any time. The Templars desire it to make coups easier, the Assassins want it to stop the Templars, and Kenway wants it because its the most valuable thing on the planet. If that sounds a bit removed from piracy and plunder, dont worry. After the two-hour tutorial mercifully shorter than in previous games the
story refocuses on building the pirate paradise of Nassau. Kenway isnt exactly an Assassin. He has all the free-running, jumping and killing skills of the sect a genetic bonus, its implied but his relationship with the morally ambiguous order of murder-monks is fractious. That keeps the plots severest absurdities at arms length and lets you just be a pirate and do pirate things. Sail across the ocean, rob ships, ght the British, capture forts, harpoon whales, explore coastal cities and raid Aztec ruins for treasure. All this in a beautiful tropical open world thats at its hyper-detailed best on PC.
Treasure islands
On land, much is familiar. Hubs such as Havana and Nassau are large, but there are no urban spaces to match the size and spectacle of Rome or Constantinople. A shame, but theres still a huge amount to explore. As always, you have to climb to high perches to scout sections of towns, revealing chests, stores and
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Kenways killing blows double up as dance moves
Upgrade Play this
Freerunning through Black Flags jungles is a joy
Flaming vessels wont sink until you deliver a nal shot
You see a manta ray, Kenway sees a new belt
sidequests. These objectives lie in open areas patrolled by British or Spanish forces, and youre invited to solve problems creatively. Stealth has been tightened up too. Jungle foliage oers constant cover and targets can be marked using Kenways Eagle Vision mode, which lets you track guards through walls a serious advantage, yes, but you no longer have access to the silent, ranged instant-kill throwing knives that made similar challenges trivial in previous games. Instead you have the blowpipe, which can temporarily render enemies unconscious, or send them into a berserk rage. Snipers are a pain, perched on high guard towers with long-range muskets. The blowpipe is the obvious counter, but the short duration of its sleeping eect can lead to comical races to kick its victims back into unconsciousness before they raise the alarm.
Cannonisation
Theres plenty to do on land, but youll spend half your time
on your ship, the Jackdaw. The archipelago map operates in a similar way to the smaller city ones, in that youre unable to see all of the available activities in an area until youve conquered a regions fort. Once thats done youll be able to identify whaling spots, convoys and sunken shipwrecks. You can use a diving bell to investigate these underwater ruins, while dodging sharks to reach the treasures within. Sailing is lifted almost wholesale from Assassins Creed III, with some concessions to accessibility by which we mean your boat handles like a bus. Wind direction has little meaning, and you can stop without dropping anchor and magically taxi sideways into ports when docking. We say this to pop any assumptions you might have about Black Flag as an authentic sailing sim, rather than to suggest that it isnt good fun. You improve your weapons and armour using materials and money earned through
piracy and by hunting animals. Upgrades enable you to take on larger ships, which present dierent challenges at the naval and close combat level. Bigger ships come with advanced weaponry, and carry captains, crows nest snipers and other tough enemies. As you commit more acts of piracy, your wanted level increases and youll be pursued by hunter ships with ominous red sails. At the highest level, you can take on huge legendary ships hidden on the map. Its a good system, designed to gate a series of escalating challenges, not to provide padding. Black Flag will try to waste your time a little bit. The near-future sections make an unwelcome return, and are more pointless than ever. The gormless Desmond Miles is gone. Now you wander around the smug oces of evil corporation Abstergo in rst person, as an employee tasked with digging through Desmonds genetic memories to nd fun pirate exploits to stick into its latest
February 2014 |
entertainment product, which you happen to be playing. It isnt half as clever as it thinks it is, but thankfully these bits only take up about ve minutes for every few hours of main-mission progression. Black Flag is best regarded as a collage of the many games and technologies Ubisoft has cultivated over the past decade. By brute force, those varied components merge beautifully to create a rich and constantly interesting world. Forget the Assassins, the Templars and their nonsense war. Spend your time looting, pillaging and stealing instead. The rewards are so much greater. A gorgeous, open-world piracy simulator packed with interesting rogues.
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The space stu is fantastic, but is over too soon
Call of Duty: Ghosts

Stay frosty and keep moving
Price 40 | $60 Developer Infinity Ward Publisher Activision Multiplayer Up to 18 players DRM Steam Web www.callofduty.com Recommended specs Dual-core CPU, 8GB RAM, DirectX 11 graphics card
The multiplayer is about anking, out-anking, and milliseconds of animation that determine who lives and who dies. The maps are circular arenas dressed in grey military garb, pulling assets from the dullest bits of the campaign. Instead of a space station or tropical shipwreck, the maps are Busted Up Train Yard and Overcast Snowy Place.
Call of shooty
Call of Duty: Ghosts will be damned if you peek away from your screen. Boredom is absolutely not allowed as it pelts you with action vignettes including a scene ripped from the opening of The Dark Knight Rises and repeats its mantra ad nauseam: Keep moving! In rare instances, we were able to part from our squad, ank the enemy and wipe them out with the advantage, but that kind of tactical planning was a sparsely present treat. It appeared once more in a jungle mission that separated us from our squad with a columns of guards, and providing only a silenced pistol and sensor to detect nearby enemies. That was also the only time we were given a goal without explicit instructions to achieve it. It was the only occasion on which we were equipped with a magic bad guy sensor. Thats another of the campaigns failings: it res o interesting ideas, then forgets them. Near the start we were introduced to our canine companion, Riley, and able to mark targets for him to de-jugular. We did that once, when ordered to, but never again. Later, we used a remote-controlled sniper rie to clear out a stadium. Its a great gadget, but it failed to rematerialise too. Both tools are like toys you can play with in a shop, but never take home. But we get bored of toys that we acquire, whereas if we stay in the shop, poking at everything that requires batteries, nothing needs to do more than light up and make noise to keep us entertained. Ghosts novelties are similarly loud and bright, and they are whisked away before they can be broken open. The guns are plentiful and nuanced, but every vital stat is experienced in milliseconds of surprise action. Players swirl around like ies, and you either catch glimpses of feet under collapsed steel girders, or run face rst into foes as beelines intersect, reacting with spasms more often than cool tactical awareness. At a pub-game level, Ghosts multiplayer is whack-a-mole to Counter-Strikes chess. An exception is Search and Rescue, which gives teams bomb and defend objectives, and players one life per round unless a team member collects
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Its okay, CoD jumped this a long time ago
Upgrade Play this
A lot of multiplayer happens at a distance
Riley likes to stick his head out of the tank
So yeah, this is a thing that happens
their dog tag to revive them. That encourages teammates to stick together, generating group engagements at range that are preferable to darting around like an armed insect. We enjoyed the Ground War mode. It features bigger maps with 12-14 players, giving you more room to breathe and more teammates to rely on. Still, even in the modes that we liked, we didnt want to stay for long. In previous Call of Duty games, the drive to unlock a new weapon might have kept us going, but thats been replaced with Squad Points. Accrued through good play, these can be spent to unlock any weapon at any time. This is more respectful of players time, as well as returning CoD fans desire to get right to the gun theyre happy with, but it nullies any sense of accomplishment that used to be provided by the progression system. Just like the campaign, multiplayer is about constant momentum, and matches go
by too fast to develop a rhythm or personality. We never encountered a nail-biter, witnessed heroics, or developed a rivalry during a round. There were no brilliant shots that were eager to show o on YouTube, with the exception of one accidentally impressive grenade throw. The cooperative Extinction mode is much better: four players versus waves of aliens, where you earn money for each kill, and there are weapons and defences to buy. Its a healthy application of a formula were used to, but it doesnt do anything we wouldnt rather do in Left 4 Dead or Killing Floor, and it feels like a side note compared to the eort put into the campaign and competitive multiplayer modes. When we began, the keys used to buy special items werent even bound. Options were shown with a four-way cross that looked like it was intended for a D-pad, and when we bound the keys, the
menu referred to them as killstreak rewards.
Call me maybe
That doesnt damn Ghosts as an icky console port though. The only technical problem we encountered was sudden frame rate dips in the menus it didnt happen during play, though. Weve heard that some people experience sudden spikes in mouse sensitivity during multiplayer, but we didnt see this. The netcode in multiplayer is as robust, but no better than previous Call of Duty games. There were still a few times where we swear a hit registered before we saw our opponents character model round a corner. These details have become a part of serious CoD play some complain, but others master the nuances to gain an advantage. Whats bothersome is how cold Ghosts feels. We havent touched on the campaigns story much, but its attempts to tug heart strings with the boys
February 2014 |
and their Ghost dad are cringeably cheesy. And even the multiplayer seems bored with itself, changing systems just so theyll be dierent from Modern Warfare. We dont doubt that every gun, perk and reward in Ghosts was implemented and tweaked with ne-brush precision, but painting in every eyelash of the Mona Lisa wouldnt make it a better picture. With a broader brush, Activision might stop noodling around in the corners of Modern Warfares greatness and paint something that is actually modern. A passively entertaining but forgettable campaign, and multiplayer is perfunctory.
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