Table of contents for 548 in Computeractive

How polite are the British? Microsoft says we’re the most civil country online (see page 8), which may surprise those who think our national discourse has become more aggressive in the past few years. I’ve always suspected that beneath our good manners lies a fierce determination to get what we want. When talking to companies for example, we can tell when we’re being messed around, and will fight our corner – perhaps using more pleases and thank yous than citizens of other countries. This good-natured persistence will serve you well when following the advice in our Cover Feature (page 50). Your ISP may fob you off at first, but calmly stating your desire for a new router, while shrewdly pointing out the attractive deals on offer from rivals, should make…

DVLA scams hit phones I’ve noticed many scams I used to get by email are now being sent as messages to my phone. The latest was the classic scam supposedly from the DVLA saying my car tax payment has failed. It tells me to click the ‘Update and verify your billing details’ link in order to avoid a £1,000 fine. The message is well written, with no spelling or grammatical mistakes (none that I could see anyway). I think therefore it could fool many people, particularly those who don’t realise scammers now target phone users as well as PC users. Here’s DVLA confirming it’s a scam: www.snipca.com/30522. Warn your fellow readers about scams at letters@computeractive.co.uk…

I was delighted to see the article, ‘Do I Really Need a 17in Laptop?’ (Issue 546, page 25) because it answered a long-standing question for me. At present I have a four-and-a-half-year-old Dell Latitude E6530 laptop (pictured) with Windows 7, which I am very attached to and use like a desktop PC. It does everything that I require of it quite effortlessly, such as running Office programs and photo editing. However, because support for Windows 7 ends in 2020, I had decided to buy a replacement, possibly halfway through this year in order to familiarise myself with Windows 10 before I actually had to start using it. I went on to Dell’s website (I’ve always had Dells) to buy a 17in replacement but found to my dismay that unless I…

Last July after I switched from Scottish Power to British Gas. I became aware that my direct debit payments were insufficient to cover my usage. I emailed them several times asking to increase my payments, but nothing happened. My saviour came in Issue 542’s Letters, when reader Dean Stockton explained how to contact company bosses via CEOemail (www.ceoemail.com). I did this, and received an email from a British Gas employee, who asked me to send photos of my meter. Two days later he said the problem was that I had two meters when I was with Scottish Power, and British Gas thought I still used these. The assistant was apologetic and wrote off my debt of £588. He also added me to the British Gas Priority Services Team, which has…

OFFICE SUITE LibreOffice 6.2 www.libreoffice.org What you need: Windows 7, 8/8.1 or 10 LibreOffice is a free office suite that provides everything most people need. Writer (documents) and Calc (spreadsheets) are the two stars of the show, but it includes presentation, drawing, maths formula and database tools. The developers say version 6.2 of LibreOffice provides “a familiar interface for users coming from proprietary office suites”. Make no mistake, they’re referring to Microsoft Office here. And the new Tabbed toolbar (available within the User Interface section of the View menu) does indeed bear more than a passing resemblance to Microsoft’s version. LibreOffice veterans will be pleased to hear the new design is optional – if you don’t like it, you can revert to the old toolbar. Our only complaint is that…

WARNING: JUNK AHEAD Junk offender: Windows 10 games Until recently, I had forgotten quite how much I dislike the way Microsoft preinstalls Windows 10 PCs with apps I don’t want, and then uses prominent areas of the operating system to try to sell me things I also don’t want. I vaguely recall spending quite some time uninstalling a range of useless apps and switching off advertising options on my own PC when I installed Windows 10 several years ago. It all came flooding back when I recently installed it on the old laptop my 10-year-old son uses for his homework. Initially, all went well. The clean install of Windows 10 seemed to make the ageing laptop boot faster and run more smoothly than during its Windows 8.1 incarnation. The upgrade…

HP encourages you to sign up for an Instant Ink plan, where they post new cartridges to you whenever ink gets low, using your internet connection to monitor your printing. Paying up front (from £2 for 50 pages) should save you money if you often use colour. The best feature is ‘free photo printing’ when you print from your smartphone (not a PC) on paper up to 7x5in (see www.snipca.com/30425). However, you are warned (in small print) that this offer could end. Another way to save on ink would be to buy third-party refills. But HP builds chips into its cartridges, for ‘security’, that others can’t duplicate, and the Tango won’t print without them. Only a very few companies sell refilled official cartridges, and they won’t show ink levels correctly.…

LAPTOP HP Envy 13 £750 from www.snipca.com/29555 Tested Issue 539 The combination of an eighth-generation quad-core i5 chip and MX 150 graphics makes this an excellent all-round laptop, let down only by the poor colour reproduction of its Full HD touchscreen. Seven-hour battery life is adequate, and it’s nicely made. ALTERNATIVE Dell XPS 13 This premium laptop starts at £1,200, but the best deal is with the brand new quad-core i7-8550 and QHD touchscreen. £1,300 from www.snipca.com/26796 PRICE DROP ANDROID TABLET Samsung Galaxy Tab S3 £399 from www.snipca.com/30707 Tested Issue 501 Now discounted and with a stylus included, this full-size HDR tablet is a better deal than the new Tab S4 (see Issue 540). Apple’s faster £319 iPad with optional £89 Pencil is superior, but lacks microSD expansion. ALTERNATIVE Amazon…

Aside from compiling important documents like we’ve done here, I use ebooks to keep track of notes, ideas and half-written creative efforts. Because they can be quickly exported from Google Docs, it’s easy to update them over time, either by adding to them, or removing notes once I’ve used them in a project. I keep these creative journals on my phone so that if I need inspiration when I’m out I can dip in and find something to spark my imagination. Which method do you use to digitise documents? Let us know: letters@computeractive.co.uk…

Email newsletters and subscriptions are a modern-day scourge, much like junk mail lying around at home that piles up for years. To take myself off mailing lists in the past, I’ve had to click Gmail’s Unsubscribe button, which takes you to the relevant website, where you need to enter your email address, state your reason for unsubscribing, then read a message saying telling me the company is sad to see me go. What a waste of time and energy! Thankfully, I found a useful website called Cleanfox that saves you from all this palaver. Once you’ve granted the website access to your email account, it automatically scans your inbox for email subscriptions and newsletters. You’ll then see the option to delete all emails from a specific account, or delete all…

ANDROID & iOS Use typing shortcuts in SwiftKey keyboard One of the best features of our favourite keyboard app SwiftKey is the option to save text you type often so you can add it quickly when you need it. What’s more, you can create shortcuts that will insert the text quickly. For example, you can save your entire address, then create a shortcut for this (say, the word ‘address’). From then on, whenever you type address it will display your address as an autosuggest option you can select. Install the SwiftKey Keyboard app (Android www.snipca.com/30655; iOS www.snipca.com/30656). You then need to set it as your default keyboard. On Android, open Settings, tap ‘Apps & notifications’, ‘Defaults apps’, Keyboard, SwiftKey Keyboard, then tap Yes to confirm. On iOS, tap Settings, General,…

WINDOWS 10 Automatically delete unwanted files The Windows 10 October 2018 Update (version 1809) added a useful new scheduling feature to ‘Storage sense’ - Microsoft’s tool that automatically deletes unused files to recover storage space on your PC. To use it, click your Start menu, the settings icon (cog) at the bottom left, System at the top left, then click Storage in the left-hand panel. You’ll see an overview of how much storage space you’ve used up and how much is free. Make a note of this. Next, click the ‘Change how we free up space automatically’ link below the ‘Storage sense’ slider, then switch on this slider. Previously, you could only switch Storage sense on or off, but you can now choose when you want it to clean things…

What are they? Rectifying antennas, which convert electromagnetic energy (such as radio waves) into direct current (DC) electricity. They were invented in 1964 by US engineer William C Brown, who demonstrated the technology by powering a model helicopter using microwaves transmitted from the ground. This method has been proposed as a way to power military drones from the ground, but a recent breakthrough could see rectennas also being used to charge phones, laptops and other gadgets. It involves technology described as an “electronic tablecloth”. What’s that? A semiconducting material just three atoms thick that, with an antenna attached, absorbs Wi-Fi signals (which are radio waves), then converts them into an electrical current. You could store this energy in a battery to use later. So you wouldn’t eat your dinner off…

If you can’t persuade your ISP to upgrade you to its latest router for free – or you simply don’t want the stress of arguing your case – there’s usually the option to buy an upgrade instead. ISPs such as BT and TalkTalk make their routers available to anyone (not only their broadband customers), but as an existing customer you can get a significant discount. BT’s Smart Hub, for example, is listed as £129 on its website, but existing customers can buy it for £65. TalkTalk offers a more generous discount to its customers, selling its Wi-Fi hub for just £25 instead of the standard £120. Sky doesn’t make its Q Hub router available to non-customers, but if you do currently use Sky Broadband you can get an upgrade for…

Prioritise your connected devices By creating separate SSIDs for your router’s 2.4GHz and 5GHz frequencies, you can ensure devices that need faster connections use the 5GHz frequency. Stop guests accessing your entire network By splitting your networks (as above) you can use the 2.4GHz just for guests. With all your PCs on the 5GHz network, their shared folders won’t be available to visitors. Enjoy faster wireless With the latest routers having between five and seven antennas, you can stream HD video to multiple devices without slowing Wi-Fi. Transfer files using faster wired connections Older routers only support 100Mbps wired networking, but newer models have much faster Gigabit ports, meaning a 2GB film takes 18 seconds instead of three minutes to transfer. Make it more secure Your new router may come…

Apple TestFlight www.snipca.com/30614 Test paid-for iOS apps before they’re released. Windows Insider https://insider.windows.com Try future Windows features, including business tools, for free. Also join Office Insider (https://insider.office.com) and developers’ playground Microsoft Collaborate (www.snipca.com/30619). Affinity Publisher Beta www.snipca.com/30617 Save around £50 on the next version of Serif’s pro desktop publishing tool. Minecraft Beta www.snipca.com/30622 Test new versions of the wildly popular block-building game for free. Kaspersky Beta www.snipca.com/30618 Most antivirus (AV) companies let you test for free, but tread carefully - a buggy freebie is no substitute for a paid-for stable AV.…

Virtually install Linux Linux users are showered with free and sophisticated programs, everything from video editor Pitivi (www.pitivi.org) to website-builder Silex (www.silex.me). Linux is also safer and open-source, so anyone can fix bugs. So why don’t more of us use it? It seems geeky and difficult, I suppose. Installing Linux to dual-boot with Windows is indeed an almighty hassle. But there is an easier way: install Linux in a virtual PC inside your actual PC, using software such as VirtualBox (www.virtualbox.org). In Issue 547, I balked at using VirtualBox to create a Windows sandbox because I’d have to clone my existing system or cough up for a new one. But creating a virtual Linux system is relatively easy. Versions of Linux (‘distributions’, or ‘distros’ if you’re really into it) are…

Govt tells Ofcom to stop ISPs ripping you off Telecoms watchdog Ofcom has been told by the Government to fix the problem of loyal phone and broadband customers being ripped off by higher bills. It has been set this challenge as part of the Government’s first ever Statement of Strategic Priorities (SSP) to get “a better deal for consumers”, as well as boost mobile coverage and increase broadband investment. Typically, customers who stick with the same ISP or mobile provider after their contract ends pay more than new customers attracted by discounts. It’s estimated this “loyalty penalty” costs customers £1.3 billion a year. The Government said it will consider passing stronger laws if Ofcom believes its current powers don’t go far enough. The regulator recently proposed that ISPs should be…

WATCH OUT FOR… Scam voice messages as .EML files What’s the threat? Sophisticated criminals are sending phishing emails containing voice messages as attachments, with subject lines such as ‘PBX Message’, ‘Voice:Message’ and ‘Voice Delivery Report’. The voice message is saved as an .EML attachment (see screenshot), which is itself an email. Clicking it shows a message that claims to come from RingCentral, an online phone system used by many companies. The message lists details about the voice message to make it appear genuine, including the time it was made, how long it lasted, the caller’s country code and part of the caller’s number. It appears as a preview in Outlook, making it look more legitimate still, while the ‘Terms of Use’ link goes to RingCentral’s actual website. To hear the…

LEAD CASE Can I get a refund for goods stuck at customs? Q I bought a Xiaomi Mi Note 2 phone for £241.68 from GearBest (www.gearbest.com) at the end of August last year, which appears to be stuck with German customs. Initially, GearBest insisted I’d received the phone but accepts now that I didn’t. But until it investigates with the courier DHL, it won’t give me my money back. PayPal refused my claim for a refund because GearBest said the phone had been delivered. What can I do? Phil Skelton A We’ll contact PayPal on Phil’s behalf with the proof he’s given us from GearBest that it’s now admitted the phone was never delivered to him. Luckily, he’s still within the 180-day time limit to make a claim. We’ve also…

Transfer files to a new program In an ideal world, you’d never change the program you use to record your family history. But time moves on, and eventually you may decide – or be forced, in the case of reader John Roderick-Milne – to switch to new software. John emailed us for help after discovering his program Family Tree Legends wasn’t compatible with Windows 10. Transfer files in GEDCOM format The most straightforward way to move your research from one program to another is via the universal GEDCOM file format (.ged). Almost all family-history programs let you both export and import your family tree as a GEDCOM file. It’s a relatively straightforward process – in theory. In practice, not all programs handle GEDCOM files correctly, which can lead to parts…

What can I use to create QR codes? Q l would like to make QR codes for myself and my family. Can you please tell me what is the best free program for this? Edward Bailey A For anyone unfamiliar with QR codes, they’re the square, black-and-white boxes that sometimes accompany adverts (particularly those on public transport). Scan them using your phone and you’ll be directed to whatever website the advertiser wants to push you to. But you can also make them for everyday use, such as to label jars of homemade produce; scanning the code could reveal the ingredients, date it was made, and any other information you want to include. ‘QR Code for Windows 10’ is one of the simplest programs to create your own codes. As its…

If you hate nuisance callers and mobile spam (and, frankly, who doesn’t?), I’ve some good news for you. Last month, the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) helped ban the bosses of two companies known to use illegal marketing tactics from forming new businesses. Aaron Stalberg, managing director of The Lead Experts, received a six-year directorship disqualification, following his company’s failure to pay a £70,000 fine for making 115,000 illegal automated marketing calls. Similarly, Keith Nicholas Hancock was handed a four-year ban after his company, Lad Media, sent more than 393,000 text messages, including to people who had specifically removed their consent. Since December, amendments to the Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations have meant that company bosses can now be found personally liable for abusing privacy laws. Not before time.…

Anyone who owns a PC and a printer should think about owning a paper shredder. No doubt somebody makes these with screens and Wi-Fi and apps, but that would be silly, so we’ve just reviewed regular units here. The point of a shredder is to erase printed documents before disposing of them. This may be required if you handle sensitive information for work, but it’s also sensible when getting rid of any papers that contain your own personal data, including bank statements, bills and official notices. Of course, criminals aren’t lurking behind every bin, waiting to steal your identity. But it does happen, and chucking out the exact kind of data that you’d use to apply for services, pay bills or pass security checks doesn’t make a lot of sense.…

What does it do? Commonly sold in the form of a plastic sheet that fits over your monitor, a privacy filter makes your computer screen illegible except from directly in front. At the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in January, HP announced a number of monitors, laptops and all-in-one desktop PCs with the third generation of its Sure View privacy feature (pictured), which can be turned on and off at the click of a button. So when you need to work on something confidential, you can prevent others peeking, but at other times you can make the screen fully visible. Why would I want it? Many of us handle sensitive data at work, or when travelling with a laptop, whether it’s our own bank details or passwords, or other people’s personal…

PHONE | £60 from Vodafone www.snipca.com/30674 It’s hard to imagine why anyone would bother selling an Android phone for 60 quid. Even with very basic specs, there can’t be much of a profit margin on that. It’s almost as if they’re trying to do you a favour. But why would Vodafone, often voted the UK’s worst mobile network and with an average Trustpilot score of one star (www.snipca.com/30690), practically give away hardware just to attract customers? It’s a mystery to us. “It’s very cheap, but that’s where the benefits run out” Anyway, the Smart N9 Lite is currently Vodafone’s cheapest own-brand model and one of the least expensive smartphones sold in the UK. That’s pretty much what you’d guess by looking at its unashamedly plasticky chassis, but compared with something…

Solwise’s Edimax Office 1-2-3 is a simple, secure, complete and expandable Wi-Fi system designed to meet the needs of small to mediumsized offices. It delivers industrial-grade performance, combining ease of use with super-fast wireless speed. It boasts the latest 802.11ac Wave 2 technology for dual-band speeds up to 1,300Mbps. You can use ‘beamforming’ to boost your signals by directing them precisely where you need them. Its three ceiling-mounted access points can cope with up to 100 people simultaneously using the system. Setting up is easy using Edimax’s PC software or smartphone apps. To enter this competition, email your address to cacomp@dennis.co.uk with ‘Edimax’ in the subject line by midnight Tuesday 12 March. You can buy the Edimax Office 1-2-3 priced £397.97 (free delivery) from Solwise’s website (www.solwise.co.uk/wireless-ed-office). Visit the site…

1 Launch Text Fairy, then tap the top-right camera icon and frame your document on your phone’s screen. Press the shutter button icon 1 and, as long as the result is sharp and evenly lit, tap the tick to accept it. 2 Drag the corners of the blue frame so they enclose the text you want 1, then press the blue arrow 2. Text Fairy will crop the image. Confirm that you want to use English and tap to select either one or multiple columns. 3 Tap Start and Text Fairy will scan the image, converting words into plain text. Tap Copy 1 to capture the text on the Android clipboard and, optionally, tap PDF 2 to save a copy of the original scan.…

Satnav ✓ I generally used my satnav unit for longer trips and Google Maps for shorter ones. One reason I stuck with my satnav for so long is because it shows me speed cameras along my route and tells me the speed limit. However, I constantly need to connect the unit to my PC to update it, especially before a long trip. And what I use instead… Last week, I was driving to a friend’s house using Google Maps (default on Android; iOS www.snipca.com/30702) when I saw the speed limit pop up at the bottom left of the app’s window. I also heard an audio notification whenever I was approaching a speed camera. I later read that Google trialled the feature in a few US cities last year and it’s…

ActionDash Free* Android www.snipca.com/30661 Google’s Digital Wellbeing tools, which show you how much time you spend on apps, are limited to the company’s own Pixel phones. ActionDash bypasses this restriction by bringing Wellbeing tools to all Android devices. VHS Camcorder Lite Free* Android www.snipca.com/30662 iOS www.snipca.com/30663 Last year, VHS Camcorder released a £3 app that let you add 1980s retro-style effects (glitches, wobbly scan lines, etc) to your videos. This Lite version limits recording time to 20 seconds, which is perfect for shorter video messages. ZipScan Free Android www.snipca.com/30664 iOS www.snipca.com/30665 ZipScan lets you scan documents by pointing your device at the relevant item. You can turn on the device’s torch if the lighting is low. After taking the scan, you’ll see options to edit or add filters, then save…

POWERPOINT Display long lists as multiple columns in one slide If you add (either by typing or copying/pasting) a long list of items to your presentation, the list will display as a single column above or below your slide (depending on the layout of your template). The easiest way to display this list so that it fits in one slide is to divide it into multiple columns. To do this, first highlight your list. Next, click the ‘Add or Remove Columns’ button in the Paragraph section. By default, it’s set to One Column, but you can set it to Two or Three Columns (see screenshot below). If you need more than three columns, click the More Columns button, type the number of columns you want in the Number field, then…

Is your router out of date? Research has shown that over one million UK broadband customers are using routers that are several generations old. If you’re one of them, you’re not only likely to be suffering poor wireless coverage and slow speeds, but you’re also exposing yourself to hackers. Older routers that are no longer receiving updates or don’t have the latest security features (such as WPA2 wireless encryption) can be easily infiltrated by criminals. But before rushing out and buying an expensive new router, why not try to get one for free? In this feature, we reveal the best ways to get a free upgrade from your internet service provider (ISP). Even if your router is relatively new, the very latest models will still improve your Wi-Fi coverage and…

In most cases, you can simply unplug your old router and plug the same cables into the matching ports on your new one - however, always use the new mains adapter supplied. Before doing this, it’s worth running a few tests on your old router to make sure your new model is all it’s cracked up to be. First, connect a laptop to your old router and run Google’s speed test. Search for Speed test in Google, click Run Speed Tests in the results, then make a note of the download and upload speeds. Next, test the wireless signal in rooms that are furthest from the router. Click Start, type control panel press Enter then, in Control Panel, click ‘View network status and tasks’. Click your wireless network (it will…

GOOGLE RELEASES ITS FIRST CHROME THEMES Google has released the first ever official themes for its Chrome browser, letting you change its colour. The 14 styles include ‘Just Black’, ‘Banana’, ‘Honeysuckle’ (pictured) and ‘Pretty in Pink’. You can install them from the Chrome Web Store: www.snipca.com/30686. UPDATE iPHONE TO FIX FACETIME FLAW Apple has updated iOS on iPhones and iPads to fix a FaceTime security flaw that let people listen to and see you without you even accepting their call. If you’ve yet to install the update (12.1.4), do so by tapping Settings, General, Software Update, ‘Download and Install’ (pictured). THREE OFFERS UNLIMITED 4G DOWNLOADS Phone network Three has launched its first home mobile Wi-Fi package to offer unlimited downloads. Called HomeFi, it provides broadband to the home via 3G…

Boosting your privacy online requires compromises. If you block all online trackers and cookies, for instance, you’ll stop some websites remembering who you are, forcing you to type your login details every time. On the plus side, they won’t know where else you’ve been online, so you’ll see fewer personalised adverts. This is the balance you need to consider when deciding which trackers to allow in Firefox. The browser’s updated Content Blocking options come in three levels of strength (see screenshot): the default ‘Standard’ setting, which will be right for most people; the ‘Strict’ level, for users “who want a bit more protection and don’t mind if some sites break”; and ‘Custom’, for those who want “complete control” over what trackers do. To access these settings, click the small ‘i’…

I was most grateful to read about the Sony MDR-1000X headphones fault in Issue 542’s Consumeractive. I bought these headphones (pictured) and about four months later one side broke off and on careful inspection I could clearly see stress lines on the joints. I contacted Amazon and advised them of your report. Two days later I got a brand new pair with a free return label for the old pair. If these also fail, I will ask for a credit note that I can put towards a different make of quality headphones. This one piece of information has saved me more than my subscription to Computeractive for two years, so many thanks. CA SAYS Our pleasure Michael. The best thing about Consumeractive is that the advice we give isn’t useful just…

Despite channeling our inner Miss Marple, we failed to solve the case of the missing graphics card, but reader Phil Duscovitch-Davis has now received a full refund from Amazon (see Issue 546). Last year he ordered the PNY GeForce RTX 2080 8GB XLR8 card for £738, along with a Linx Windows tablet. When the parcel showed up, there were two boxes inside – one with the tablet, the other with an empty space where the graphics card should’ve been (and presumably once was). We think it’s odd that a passing thief would take the graphics card but not the tablet. Yes, the former is worth more, but the tablet would be easier both to use and sell. At first Amazon refused to accept responsibility, saying that because the package had…

My cousin has developed an interest in family history and would like me to pass on my research (currently stored in RootsMagic). Is it possible to save only the shared portion of our heritage with him? Francis Davies Yes, most programs let you export only a specific part of your family tree as a GEDCOM file. In RootsMagic, click File, Export, then choose ‘Select from a list’. Select your cousin and click the ‘Mark group’ box to bring up a dropdown menu and choose ‘Ancestors of highlighted person’. Click ‘Ancestors and descendants’, set the number of descendant generations to ‘2’, then click OK to mark common family members for sharing. Have a genealogy question for Nick? Email letters@computeractive.co.uk with ‘Grow Your Family Tree’ in the subject line.…

In Issue 547’s ‘Download the web’s best-kept secrets’ Cover Feature (see page 53), we revealed how to download astonishing, high-resolution images of outer space as seen by the Hubble Telescope. Keen to find out just how detailed the photos were - and create some new artwork for my lacklustre lounge - I downloaded a huge 1GB TIFF of the Triangulum Galaxy. I opened the image using my usual image editor GIMP (www.gimp.org), but the file’s sheer magnitude made loading and editing painfully slow. And so I abandoned GIMP and opened the same image in Paint.NET (www.getpaint.net). The improvement was immediate. While GIMP took 25 seconds to load the image, Paint.NET did the job in eight. And so on to the editing. Paint. NET breezed through a 90-degree rotation of the…

PC | £1,605 from PC Specialist www.snipca.com/30584 All the best premium PCs need to look like a fairground and have a name torn from the pages of 1970s pulp sci-fi. With its glass side and top panels and twin programmable multi-coloured LED fans kaleidoscoping away behind its mesh front, the Vortex Adonis doesn’t disappoint. But what does it actually do to justify a price 60 per cent higher than the traditional thousand-pound desktop PC? “It costs a lot of money, but you get a lot for your money” The list of specifications isn’t short of answers. Top of this list is Intel’s i7-9700K, which is an overclockable ninth-generation processor. In this case it comes running at the factory rate of 3.6GHz, but if tweaking is your thing, you’ll be pleased…

How can I best navigate audiobook chapters? Q I used to listen to audiobooks on cassette, and could quickly rewind to find my place after falling asleep. But with CDs it’s hard to find a previous chapter, and using an MP3 player I’ve found the files for each book get jumbled. Is there a better way? Alan Stevenson A This is a frustrating problem. For historical technical reasons, CD audiobooks are split into tracks that rarely correspond to chapters. Although some CD players have ‘resume’, and will start from where you stopped, this is no help if you fall asleep and need to rewind. Audiobooks in the compressed MP3-CD format (requiring a compatible player) can in theory be properly chaptered, but often aren’t, and this also applies to MP3 downloads.…

CueCat What was it? Today, QR codes can be scanned by a mobile phone to enable various functions, such as opening a web page. Back in 2000, an inventor called J Jovan Philyaw had a similar idea. His slanted barcodes were printed in magazine articles and adverts, enabling users to reach the associated website without having to type the URL. This required a CueCat, a mouse-like scanner (pictured) that was given away free. It only worked when connected to a PC. Why did it die? Despite investors sinking $185m into CueCat, the system had no obvious purpose except potentially enabling partners to track which barcodes each user was scanning, which provoked a very modern data-privacy scandal. The project folded in little more than a year. In 2005, someone put two…

14 pages of easy-to-follow workshops and expert tips What you need: A smartphone running Text Fairy (Android) or Prizmo (iOS) Time required: Half a day So much for the paperless future. If we’re living it now, we’ve been sold a lie. Every day brings another bank statement, insurance certificate, income tax reminder or document that needs to be kept for future reference. On top of this we have letters from friends and family, our own travel journals and half-written biographies, stories we’ve clipped from newspapers and magazines… if you’re anything like us, you’ll be drowning in paperwork, and wondering how to make sense of it all. That’s why we’ve devised a way to quickly and easily digitise the paperwork that’s such a large part of modern-day living. We’ll make it…

1 Launch Prizmo Go, then tap the cog to open its Settings. Tap the switch beside Read Text Automatically 1 to turn on OCR, which will save you a couple of taps later on. Tap Done 2 to return to the scanner. 2 Hold your camera over the document you want to capture and keep it steady until Prizmo Go has underscored each line in blue 1. Tap the blue shutter button 2 to capture the text and the app will automatically convert it. 3 Either tap the Copy button 1 to copy the text to the iOS clipboard, or tap Share 2 and select the app you’d like to export it to. You can also attach it to an email from the Share menu, or export it to a…

FILE EXPLORER Remove EXIF data using Windows Explorer ✓ In Issue 547, you included a useful Workshop (‘Remove location details before uploading your photos’, page 40), which explained how to use the free program EXIF Pilot to remove location data from image files before uploading them online. I’m very careful about what I post to my Facebook page and have tried various free programs that let you strip out personal data before uploading, and never realised there’s an easy way to do this in Windows Explorer. One point worth mentioning is that none of my cameras record GPS information, so I can’t be certain it strips out location data – but it’s worth a try. To remove EXIF data in Windows Explorer, right-click your photo, then click Properties in the…

Kasa Smart Wi-Fi Plug by TP-Link £22.99 from Amazon www.snipca.com/30713 ✓ Over the Christmas holidays, I saw an advert for the Kasa Smart Wi-Fi Plug on my Facebook news feed. Considering how cheap it is (£23) and the great reviews, I decided I had nothing to lose and bought one. After using it for a few days and being so impressed, I ordered another one, and then another. I now have about six connected to various devices around my home. Using the Kasa mobile app, you can connect a plug to your Wi-Fi in under a minute. After that, you can turn all the plugs off and on instantly with the touch of a button, which I do when leaving the house. I’ve set up ‘schedules’ to turn on the…

Speedcheck Speed Test Free* Android www.snipca.com/30666 iOS www.snipca.com/30667 Check for any lags in your home Wi-Fi network, and find out what your download and upload speeds are. You can also schedule the app to scan your network at certain times. Results are saved in a list, so you can compare your speeds over time. Best for: Monitoring Wi-Fi speeds Network Analyzer Free Android www.snipca.com/30668 iOS www.snipca.com/30669 This app lets you scan all the devices on your network and displays the strengths of the signal they’re receiving as a graph. It also lists IP addresses, tells you whether your device is encrypted and which ports are closed, open and secure behind firewalls. Best for: Getting detailed information about devices on your network Wifi Analyzer Free Android www.snipca.com/30670 Wifi Analyzer scans all…

Record a podcast for your members The word ‘podcast’ was coined by British journalist Ben Hammersley as a portmanteau of the words ‘iPod’ and ‘broadcast’ in 2004. Today, podcasts are one of the easiest forms of media to consume because you can listen to them while cooking, doing household chores, on a commute, and even while working. Producing a podcast can seem challenging, but there are many ways to make it easy. In this issue, we’ll show you how to record and edit a podcast episode for your club members and upload it online, so they can listen to it on any device. Buy a good microphone When choosing your podcast's name, make it generic (like The Computeractive Podcast) or more specific, depending on your content (for example, Southend Wellbeing…

If you’ve reached the end of your contract’s minimum term (or gone beyond it), you only have to give the standard notice period (usually 30 days). But if you’re only part-way through, your ISP is likely to charge a cancellation fee. There are ways to avoid this… PRICE RISE If your ISP informs you they are raising their prices, you can leave your contract without paying an early termination fee within 30 days. Last month, BT announced it wouldn’t be increasing its broadband charges until March 2020 at the earliest, but Sky recently announced price increases. SWITCH ISP Rival ISPs may be willing to cover any cancellation fees charged by your current ISP. We were offered this by EE Broadband when we spoke to it about switching from BT (it…

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In a word, yes. However, you have to be considerate. You can’t actively film your neighbours’ houses, for example, and you need to make sure that the area you’re monitoring isn’t unreasonably encroaching on nearby public land. So, if you live beside an alley, you’re within your rights to set up a camera that monitors your front door, but shouldn’t also be filming comings and goings in the alley, even if it is a focus of anti-social behaviour. You’ll find the government’s official advice at www.snipca.com/28926, which includes recommendations to put up a notice warning that you’re using a camera. This is hardly onerous and may well act as a deterrent in itself.…

GIS (geographic information system mapping) software is dazzling stuff. It converts Excel spreadsheets of geographical data (say, your world travels) into rich, interactive, encyclopaedic maps. But with global corporations happy to pay “from $1,500” for leading GIS tools like ArcGIS Pro, developers have little incentive to release free versions for us hoi polloi. So to get free versions you have to look to open-source alternatives - notably QGIS (https://qgis.org). QGIS is less slick but just as powerful as ArcGIS, and now includes 3D features. And it’ll never demand your cash.…

PROBLEM OF THE FORTNIGHT Can I put an SSD in my music player? Q Prompted by some of your articles on PC SSDs, I was wondering if I could replace my Cowon iAudio X5 music player’s 60GB hard drive with an SSD? It’s not full but it’s beginning to stagger a bit when playing music – tracks will 'hang up' occasionally, requiring a restart. Other than taking the screws off the back, I wouldn't know where to start on this venture. I have learned so much over the years since I first started my subscription to your superb magazine and long may it continue! Peter Colven A This isn’t impossible but, for a variety of technical and practical reasons, we’d say it’s almost certainly not worth the time or cost.…

What went wrong with Macrium? Q I installed Macrium Reflect Free with a view to making a system image of my hard drive. However, something has gone wrong and my laptop now fails to boot. I can access the BIOS but I don’t know if this is of any use in solving the problem. I have also seen the error code 0xc0000225. Can you advise me what to do to reboot the laptop, which is an Acer Aspire E 17. David Adam A It’s unlikely that using Macrium to create a system image should cause a problem like this, though it could occur when later using such an image to restore a PC. However, by definition, a working system image would allow you to recover from that situation by restoring…

3G/4G/5G Technologies that deliver faster mobile broadband. 802.11ac A standard for wireless networks that allows for much higher transfer speeds than 802.11n. Beta A version of software that’s being tested. Beta versions are often released so problems can be ironed out. BIOS Basic Input-Output System. Software built into every PC that connects the vital components. Bloatware Unwanted software built into a new device. CMOS Complementary metal-oxide semiconductor. A chip on computer motherboards that stores the date and time. CompactFlash A type of memory card used in high-end digital cameras and some older models. Cookie A small text file stored on your computer by a website. CSV Comma Separated Value. A standard file format, used for storing tabulated information, that can be opened by most spreadsheet applications. DIMM Dual Inline Memory…