JA N UA RY 2014

BEST
of
Editors name the best tech of the year, from work to play.

2013

JANUARY 2014 features

TABLE OF CONTENTS

50 BEST
2013
92 The best products of 2013

120 Windows 8.1

134 Old games on your PC

departments

5 News

53 Reviews

149 Heres How

columns
168 Answer Line 37 Bugs & Fixes 20 Sta Picks 24 Consumer Watch 39 Business Center
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178 Tech Spotlight

NEWS
6 All about beamforming 10 IE 11: Speedy on Windows 7, tailored for Windows 8.1 14 Study shows how long hard drives actually last 17 The end of an era: Winamp shuts down 18 HP Chromebook 11 pulled o shelves due to overheating charger

CONTENTS

Tech and trends that will affect you today and beyond.

NEWS

The faster Wi-Fi you should know about

Beamforming technology, built into many 802.11ac routers, focuses the signal for faster transmission.
BY ERIC GEIER

P H OTO G R A P H Y BY M I C H A E L H OM N I C K

EAMFORMING IS ONE of those concepts that seem so

simple that you wonder why no one thought of them before. Instead of broadcasting a signal to a wide area, hoping to reach your intended target, why not concentrate the signal and aim it directly at the target? Sometimes the simplest concepts are the most dicult to execute, especially at retail prices. Fortunately, beamforming is nally becoming a common feature in 802.11ac Wi-Fi routers, at least at the high end. First, a bit of background: Beamforming was an optional feature of the older 802.11n wireless networking standard, but the IEEE (the international body that establishes these standards) didnt spell out exactly how it was to be implemented. The router you bought might have employed one technique, but if the Wi-Fi adapter in your laptop
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used a dierent implementation, beamforming wouldnt work. Some vendors developed pre-paired 802.11n kits (with Netgears WNHDB3004 Wireless Home Theater Kit being one of the best examples), but such kits tended to be expensive, and they never had much eect on the market. The IEEE didnt make the same mistake with the 802.11ac standard thats in todays high-end devices. Companies building 802.11ac products dont have to implement beamforming, but if they do, they must do so in a prescribed fashion. This policy ensures that every companys products will work together. If one device (such as the router) supports beamforming but the other (such as the Wi-Fi adapter in your laptop) doesnt, theyll still work together; they just wont take advantage of the beamforming technology. Beamforming can help to improve wireless bandwidth utilization, and it can increase a wireless networks range. Such enhancements

Targeted signals boost strength and range Beamforming concentrates the signals exchanged between a Wi-Fi router and the clients its paired with.
TODAYS WI-FI 802.11AC BEAMFORMING

I L LU ST R AT I O N BY F LY I N G C H I L L I

Dispersed wireless signal

Stronger, focused signal

The Linksys EA6900 is one of several 802.11ac routers on the market that support beamforming today.

can in turn improve video streaming, voice quality, and other bandwidth- and latency-sensitive transmissions. Beamforming is made possible by transmitters and receivers that use MIMO (multiple-input, multiple-output) technology: Devices send and receive data using multiple antennas to increase throughput and range. MIMO was introduced with the 802.11n standard, and it remains an important feature of the 802.11ac standard.

How beamforming works

Wireless routers (or access points) and wireless adapters that dont support beamforming broadcast data pretty much equally in all directions. Think of the wireless router as a lamp without a shade: The bulb (transmitter) radiates light (data) in all directions. Devices that support beamforming focus their signals toward each client, concentrating the data transmission so that more data reaches the targeted device instead of radiating out into the environment. Think of putting a shade on the lamp (the wireless router) to reduce the amount of light (data) thats radiating in all directions. Now poke holes in the shade so that concentrated beams of light travel to dened locations (your Wi-Fi clients) in the room.
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NEWS

If the Wi-Fi client also supports beamforming, the router and client can exchange information about their respective locations in order to determine the optimal signal path. Any device that beamforms its signals is called a beamformer, and any device that receives beamformed signals is called a beamformee.

Netgears Beamforming+
As mentioned earlier, beamforming support is an optional element of the 802.11ac wireless networking standard, and any vendor oering the feature must adhere to a specic technique. But the vendor can also provide other types of beamforming in addition to that standard technique. Netgears Beamforming+ (go.pcworld.com/ beamplus) is a superset of the beamforming technique dened in the 802.11ac standard, so its interoperable with any other 802.11ac device that also supports beamforming. But Beamforming+ does not require the client device to support beamforming, so you could see range and throughput improvements by pairing one of Netgears routersspecically, Netgears model R6300 (go.pcworld.com/r6300), R6200, or R6250with any 5GHz Wi-Fi device. Netgears R7000 Nighthawk (go.pcworld.com/nighthawk) router also supports beamforming on its 2.4GHz network. Of course, Netgear is not the only router manufacturer to support beamforming. The feature is becoming common on higher-end Wi-Fi routers and access points. If youre in the market and you want a router that supports beamforming, check the specs on the box or at the vendors website. For three other router options, consider the Linksys EA6900, the D-Link DIR-868L, and the Trendnet TEW-812DRU.

Beamforming is an optional element of the 802.11ac wireless networking standard.

Internet Explorer 11: Speedy on Windows 7, tailored for Windows 8.1

BY MARK HACHMAN MICROSOFTS INTERNET EXPLORER 11 for Windows 7 provides a nominal speed boost over IE 10, and includes performance-enhancing technologies such as prerendering and prefetching. Although users can download a copy of IE 11 for Windows 7 from the Microsoft website (go.pcworld.com/iedownload), the company is also sending out the upgrade through automatic updates. Overall, Microsoft claims, users will see a 9 percent performance improvement versus IE 10, and performance thats about 30 percent faster than rival browsers. IE 11 ships with the new Chakra just-in-time Java compiler, which is designed to improve the performance of websites, plus support for components of the ECMAScript6 standard.
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NEWS

IE 11 ofloads WebGL graphics processing onto the GPU, reducing CPU power consumption and improving performance. Microsoft has improved the browsers compliance with Web standards, too, including support for processing HTML5 video without the need for plug-ins. The performance improvements are also partly attributable to the browsers technique of prefetching the rst or primary link on the page, downloading and constructing the page before you even click the link. Background elements are downloaded and stored ahead of time, as well. Finally, the previous page is stored and cached for a smooth transition if you decide to back out of a page. Nevertheless, if youre not running Windows 8.1 on a touch-enabled PC, youre missing out on a number of touch-specic IE 11 features. One of the most subtle, yet most convenient, of these is flip ahead, a simple way to avoid the pixel hunt at the end of a lengthy page of items. For example, imagine that youre shopping for a laptop on Amazon.com, and youre looking

If youre not running Windows 8.1, youre missing out on touchspecic IE 11 features.

Internet Explorer 11s clean-looking Reading View neatly strips out ads.
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In Windows 8, you can snap a couple of Internet Explorer windows and run them in parallel. Not so for Windows 7.

for a middle-of-the-road model, so ordering the list of results by price or screen size still forces you to navigate through a few pages. While Amazons site allows you to navigate by clicking a page link, flip ahead allows a touchscreen IE 11 user to advance one page simply by flipping the page left with a nger gesture. Such a feature might have been a curiosity at one time. But developers are adding flip ahead to major sites, bringing it not only to Amazon but also to Best Buy, Barnes & Noble, and NewEgg. (Flip ahead is not enabled at the Costco, Target, or Walmart sites, however.) IE 11 also taps into other Windows 8.1 features such as the ability to pin websites to the Start screen, to snap a window, and to save articles to Reading List, an app within Windows 8 and 8.1. Thanks to collaboration between Microsoft and partners, projects such as the popular game Contre Jour (go.pcworld.com/contrejour) and the Everest: Rivers of Ice (go.pcworld.com/everest) experience are both optimized for Windows 8. And developers can visit Microsofts
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NEWS

Microsofts Inori Aizawa is the new anime personication of Internet Explorer.

Build My Pinned Site tool (www.buildmypinnedsite.en. com) for help in constructing a site that will appear as a dynamically updating live tile on the Start screen. Such eorts transform a website into something that looks much like an app, a feat that Google and other browser rivals havent been able to match so far. But Microsoft hasnt done a great job of showing o these capabilities, something that Roger Capriotti, director of marketing for Internet Explorer, says the company might explore further. To date, Microsofts unocial mantra for the latest versions of IE has been Touch is the new fast. With the release of IE 11 for Windows 7, Internet Explorer is simply faster. But users who run IE 11 on Windows 8 or 8.1 will see noticeable improvements beyond that. Fortunately, users of either IE 10 or IE 11 can view Microsofts frankly awesome Internet Explorer anime (go. pcworld.com/ieanime).
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Study shows how long hard drives actually last

BY BRAD CHACOS
P H OTO G R A P H Y BY Z E N T I L I A / S H U T T E R STO C K.COM

FEW THINGS IN computing are as vital as the lowly hard drive. If your computers memory goes bad or its processor blows up, switching out the dead component is easy enough; when a hard drive gives up the ghost, your precious les expire along with it. Just how long do hard drives last? We now have a semblance of an answer thanks to the BackBlaze cloud-storage service. BackBlaze employs more than 25,000 consumer-grade hard drives to back up its customers data, and the service recently released a comprehensive report (go.pcworld.com/backblazereport) on the life span of those hard drives over a four-year period.

Life comes in waves

Lets get the big reveal out of the way: Only 26 percent of BackBlazes drives failed during the four-year testing period. Thats not too shabby for a component frequently featured in PC users tales of woe.
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NEWS

More interesting, though, is when and how those hard-drive failures happened. The reports results indicate that the failures follow the Bathtub curve (go.pcworld.com/bathtub), a concept near and dear to reliability engineers. Around 5 percent of BackBlazes drives fail within the rst year and a half, falling prey to manufacturing defects. From that point to year three, reliability settles down, with mostly random failures occurring, before wornout drives start to die en masse, causing the failure rate to spike to a double-digit annual percentage.

Drives have three distinct failure rates Survival drops by the fourth year
100%

90% Survival rate

5.1%
annual failure rate

1.4%
annual failure rate

80%
11.8%
annual failure rate

70%

1 year

2 years

3 years

4 years

BackBlazes report shows that hard-drive failures follow a clear trend.

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BackBlaze doesnt have data beyond four years, but the company says that it expects hard-drive deaths to hold constant at around the 12 percent failure rate seen in the period from year three to year four. Double-digit failure rates sound scary, but note that only 1 in 20 drives failed due to manufacturing defects in their early days. More than 90 percent of BackBlazes drives were still spinning strong after three years, and nearly 80 percent of the drives survived four years, despite laboring hard in a server farm. Thats not bad, and the data helps to explain why warranties on consumer hard drives tend to be one year or three years in length. It also drives home the point that you should be backing up your data (go.pcworld.com/backupstrategies) on a regular basis, especially with brand-new drives or units that are at least three years old.

Nearly 80 percent of BackBlazes drives survived four years, despite laboring hard.

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NEWS

The end of an era: Winamp shuts down

BY BRAD CHACOS AFTER MORE THAN 16 YEARS, the much-loved Winamp media player shut down on December 20, 2013, following a mid-November announcement from the softwares makers. Consisting of a small banner notication on the Winamp website, the announcement itself came with a whimper rather than a bang. Such an end seems sadly appropriate: The skinnable, customizable media player software was all the rage in the late 1990s, but barely made a peep after AOL acquired it in 1999. After years of floundering, Winamp saw the release of Android and Mac versions in 2010 and 2011, respectively, but those releases appear to have been too little, too late. Just as Winamp ruled in the era of Napster, iTunes and streaming media services such as Pandora and Spotify control the music scene of today. Winamp had the skins, but the player was simply too niche for todays cross-platform, pay-as-you-go world. Even so, reportedly the software still made money right up until the end. Want to learn the full story? In June 2012, ArsTechnica posted a superb, detailed look at Winamps fall from grace (go.pcworld.com/ winampfall), a tumble that former Winamp honchos attribute to AOL mismanagement.
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The Winamp website recently warned users of the softwares impending shutdown.

HP Chromebook 11 pulled o store shelves due to overheating charger

P H OTO G R A P H Y BY M I C H A E L H OM N I C K

BY MARK HACHMAN AND BRAD CHACOS GOOGLE AND HP recently yanked the HP Chromebook 11 (go.pcworld.

com/chromebook11) from store shelves, roughly a month after the laptop launched. The laptop disappeared from Amazon, too, as well as from HP and Googles own Web stores. The reason: The Micro-USB charger that shipped with the HP Chromebook 11 is faulty, and some of the charging units have been damaged from overheating during use.
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NEWS

Following is the full text of what Google public relations passed along when PCWorld asked for a comment from Caesar Sengupta, vice president of product management:

Google and HP are pausing sales of the HP Chromebook 11 after receiving a small number of user reports that some chargers included with the device have been damaged due to overheating during use. We are working with the Consumer Product Safety Commission to identify the appropriate corrective action, and will provide additional information and instructions as soon as we can. In the meantime, customers who have purchased an HP Chromebook 11 should not use the original charger provided with the product. In the interim they may continue using their HP Chromebook 11 with any other Underwriters Laboratorieslisted Micro-USB chargerfor example, one provided with a tablet or smartphone. We apologize for the inconvenience.

The defect denitely puts a damper on HPs rst year as part of the ChromeOS family. HPs other current Chromebook model, the HP Chromebook 14 (go.pcworld.com/chromebook14), is still being sold.

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STAFF PICKS
New products that have our editors drooling

Asus Xonar Essence STU

go.pcworld.com/xonarstu

The Xonar Essence ST and STX have long been the go-to sound cards for audiophiles. Now the Xonar Essence STU oers the same impressive audio in a digital-to-analog converter, with easyto-reach controls and a minimalist casing. If you use high-end headphones, you owe it to your ears to pick up one of these DACs.

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SteelSeries H Wireless
go.pcworld.com/steelh

With the same drivers as the

phenomenal SteelSeries Siberia Elite, the H Wireless is a greatsounding gaming headset. Its not quite as sleek or sculpted as the Elite, but that might appeal to a certain crowd. Its also wireless, so you can use it from the comfort of your couch.

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Razer Taipan eSports EditionEvil Geniuses

go.pcworld.com/geniuses

This Razer mouse, created in conjunction with the Evil Geniuses eSports organization, features an ultraprecise 8200-dpi laser sensor, an attractive ambidextrous design, and nine programmable buttons. You can also pick up a matching mouse pad.

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STAFF PICKS

Acer C720P
go.pcworld.com/acerc720p

The rst touchscreen Chromebook, Acers 11-inch

C720P is a lightweight beauty, perfect for browsing the Web or doing basic work on the go. The specs, led by a Haswell-class processor, are similar to those of the rest of the C720 line. Its a viable competitor to the horde of touch-enabled Windows 8 machines.

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Make smart purchases, stay safe online.

CONSUMER WATCH

Must-know privacy tips for Facebook and more

Explore encryption, scrutinize your settings, and consider alternative online services that are more discreet. BY IAN PAUL
P H OTO G R A P H Y BY M I C H A E L H OM N I C K

ECENT HEADLINES ABOUT shadowy government agencies and high-prole hack attacks drive home a crucial point: Your online privacy is best protected when you keep an iron grip on the information youre handing out. If your personal info is on a server somewhere, its not truly yours. So many core aspects of our lives have shifted to the cloud, mostly to our great benet. Every gain in convenience, however, comes with a loss of control, and that loss of control all too often comes bundled with privacy or security woes.
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You can take some simple precautions to minimize the amount of personal information that you have online. But before we get started, remember that this data checkup is about what youre comfortable with. If nothing else, this article can help you make better decisions about the information you share with the services you love.

Firefoxs private browsing mode kills cookies dead.

Give Google the cold shoulder

Just imagine the dossier Google has on you: your search history, the sites you visit, your Google Play purchases, location data from Android and Chrome and Maps, your stored Google Drive documents...it looks like a lot, doesnt it? To its credit, Google takes data security seriously, receiving fairly good marks in the Electronic Frontier Foundations annual Who has your back? survey (go.pcworld.com/esurvey). But Google also makes heavy use of your data, and the company touched a nerve upon announcing its plans to use real names and faces (go.pcworld.com/ googlename) in online advertising. Divorcing Google isnt a realistic option for most people, though, given its superior services and sheer ubiquity. Switching to Microsofts services still leaves your information in the cloud. So what can you do to reduce the amount of personal data youre sharing with either online monolith?
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To start, you can prevent Google from collecting and sharing your data as much as possible. Using your browsers private/incognito mode will erase tracking cookies, including Googles, when you close it. You can also tell Google to stop trailing you in your accounts Web History page (go.pcworld.com/googlehistory), at the expense of Google Now features, and tweak your general Google privacy settings (go.pcworld.com/googleprivacy). Another option is to replace some Google services with more-private alternatives. Do you use Google Docs but not its online capabilities? Try the open-source Libre Oce (go.pcworld.com/libre). If you need basic image-editing capabilities, skip Picasa and stick to Paint.net (go. pcworld.com/paintnet). And if you can aord to cut the Google cord completely, theres always the nuclear option (go.pcworld.com/endgoogle) to consider. (See instructions on how to shutter your Microsoft account at go. pcworld.com/endmicrosoft for good measure.)

You dont want to be highlighted in embarrassing Graph Search results. Mind those Likes and privacy settings.

Reduce your Facebook presence

When it comes to mapping your social connections, no company knows more than Facebook. And just like Google, Facebook is practically impossible to shut out of your life. You need it to sign in to services, play games, chat, and keep in touch with pals.
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CONSUMER WATCH
Tweaking your Facebook proles privacy settings (go.pcworld.com/ facebookprivacy) can keep snoops at bay, but Facebook itself has a reputation for making questionable user data decisions. How can you take back control without divorcing Facebook completely? Easy: Stop clicking that Like button so much and consider removing past thumbs-ups. Dont add extra information to your prole such as life events, places youve lived, and so on. (Watch the YouTube video at go.pcworld.com/lifeevent to learn how to delete life events.) Finally, decide whether to continue sharing your photo library online. Is anybody really looking at your pictures, or are the photos just fodder for Facebooks face-detection algorithms? Facebook also tracks you as you travel from site to site, using the Like buttons embedded on each. Make sure youre signed out of Facebook to prevent that from happening, or use your browsers private mode. Remember that you can delete your Facebook account (go.pcworld. com/endfacebook) if youre ableand willingto cut the social cord completely.

Clamp down on cloud storage

If you keep les in a cloud-storage locker for anytime, anywhere access, you probably dont want to give up that convenience. You can, however, seize control of your cloud documents by encrypting them, which helps protect against data breaches and government information requests. Note that while many services (such as Dropbox) encrypt your data on their servers, they control the encryption keys in most cases. That makes using the service easier, but it also means you are not in control of when or for whom that encrypted data is unlocked. A truly zero-knowledge cloud provider such as SpiderOak (spideroak.com) or Wuala (wuala.com), on the other hand, never has access to your personal encryption key, meaning that only you can unlock your data. (Dont lose the key!) Alternatively, you could manually encrypt the les that are bound for Dropbox, Google Drive, SkyDrive, SugarSync, or any other cloud service by using a utility such as TrueCrypt (go.pcworld.com/truecrypthowto) or the
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cloud-focused tool BoxCryptor (go.pcworld.com/boxcryptor). Or, if you dont want to entrust your stu to anyone else, you could use an Internet-connected storage drive such as Western Digitals My Cloud (go.pcworld.com/mycloudrev).

All the rest

Weve taken care of your major online accounts, but what about all those random accounts you have connected to your social networks? Go through the settings of your Facebook, Twitter, and Google+ accounts to see the list of apps and services connected to them. Then simply remove access permissions for the ones you no longer use. Speaking of apps and services, its good data hygiene to regularly delete accounts youve left by the wayside. Go ahead: Close that MySpace prole and kill your Klout score if youre not using them.

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Keep your laptop safe and secure while you travel

BY ALEX COCILOVA

CONSUMER WATCH

P H OTO G R A P H Y BY A DSTO C K R F/S H U T T E R STO C K.COM

YOUR LAPTOP IS your pride and joy. Its your umbilical cord to the

oce. Its your entertainment at the airport and on the plane. You bring it everywhere you go. But there are all too many ways that it can come to harm. Follow these tips for laptop safety and security, and you wont have to worry while you and your notebook are on the road.

1.

Take steps to safeguard your laptop from physical harm, theft, and data loss.

Keep it padded

Traveling is full of shoving bags into tight spots, jostling them about, and stung in just one more thing. Push a little too hard, however, and you may hear an investment-shattering crack. Buy a laptop-specic carrying case with plenty of padding and protection. Separate compartments for accessories and power cables are a luxury that can keep your PC scratch- and dent-free.
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To deter theft, choose a nondescript bag, without logos advertising that valuable merchandise sits inside.

2.

Turn it off

For laptop makers, its dicult to pack a powerful computer into a slim enclosure while keeping all of its critical components nice and cool. But thats what the laptops vents and fans are for. Now imagine the heat that can accumulate in the secure, padded, tight quarters of a laptop bag. Dont cram a sleeping computer into the connes of a backpack or messenger bag. Heat is a computers number one enemy. Heat can shorten your computers useful life, loosen components in the motherboard, or destroy it entirely. Block a running computers vents for extended stretches, and you could nd yourself unpacking a fried PC. Power down the laptop before you stow it.

3.

Keep an eye on it, but keep it out of sight

Laptops are hot-ticket items for thieves. Keep yours on your
LoJack can increase your chances of recovering a stolen laptop.

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CONSUMER WATCH
lap or within view while youre at the airport, bus, or train terminal. Dont set the machine on an adjacent seat and then turn your attention to your phone or your kids. When traveling by car, keep your laptop hidden. Leaving it exposed on the passenger seat, even when youre getting out for only a few minutes to pump gas, could be the perfect opportunity for a stickyngered individual to scoop up the loot. Keep it in the trunk or under the seat, or cover it with a jacket. And keep your car locked at all times. If in spite of your best eorts your laptop still winds up missing, you might be able to recover itprovided that you installed a program such as LoJack (go.pcworld.com/lojack) before you hit the road.

4.

Back it up and lock it down

What could be worse than losing your laptop? Losing the data you have on it. Follow a backup regimen, keeping a copy of your important data on a hard drive at your home or oce or in the cloud. And what could be worse than losing the information stored on your laptop? Knowing that some unsavory person has access to it. Your machine might even have enough personal information and photos for someone to steal your identity. Protect yourself by locking it all down with a strong password and encryption (go.pcworld.com/ encrypt). Be sure to store any written-down passwords and sensitive data away from the laptop itself.

5.

Remember, youre in public

When youre wandering between public Wi-Fi networks, its easy to pick up hitchhikers in the form of viruses, malware, and snoops. Make sure that you have an up-to-date antivirus utility and current antispyware software installed and running in the background. Keep your systems rewall up. When youre connected to an unfamiliar
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Be sure your connection is secure before you give up sensitive data.

network, its best to be paranoid and treat everything like an enemy. If possible, avoid uploading personal information to the Internet while youre using a public Wi-Fi connection; wait until youre on a secured network to do sensitive stu. If you must perform an online transaction, conrm that the Web address begins with https and that a locked padlock icon appears in the corner of the browser window or in the address bar, indicating that youre connected to a secure site.
This service tag on the bottom of an HP laptop contains vital information, including its serial number.

6.

Know what you have

Finally, record your PCs specications, including the make, model, and serial or service number. Having this information on hand is crucial for reportingand perhaps recoveringa lost or stolen laptop. Check the bottom of the laptop for a service tag with bar codes. Write this information down; better yet, take a picture of it to keep on your phone. Be sure to note any distinguishing features. Recalling the presence of stickers, scratches, dents, or other physical attributes will help you prove youre the rightful owner.

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CONSUMER WATCH

Security tips from the spymasters

BY PAUL MAH WITH THE REVELATION that the National Security Agency may have been involved in everything from spying on U.S. residents to cracking online encryption to collecting global nancial data, computer privacy has taken on all the cloak-and-dagger intrigue of a John le Carr novel. We went right to the expertsthe NSA itselfand pored over the agencys security tips and recommendations (go.pcworld.com/ nsatips) for its Department of Defense and intelligence-community customers. From there, we identied seven simple measures that you can easily implement to protect yourself from hackers and cybercriminalsand perhaps even from the NSA.

On its website, the NSA oers extensive guidelines for securing computers.

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Enable automatic software updates

Good security starts with the basics, of course, and nothing is more basic than keeping your operating system current. So its no surprise that the NSA recommends enabling automatic updates in Windows. Navigate to System and Security from the Windows Control Panel. Click Turn automatic update on and o, and select Install updates automatically.

Encrypt your hard drive

The BitLocker encryption feature is built into the Enterprise and Ultimate versions of Windows 7, as well as the Pro and Enterprise versions of Windows 8. When enabled, BitLocker encrypts all of the data on a storage volume, and it works in the background to protect the contents of a Windows PC from unauthorized access. BitLocker is an excellent rst line of defense that takes a few clicks to enable. However, if youre concerned that the full-disk encryption technology may have been compromised by a backdoor deal with the NSA (though there is no evidence of that so far), you can nd alternative methods (go.pcworld.com/nsaencrypt) to encrypt your data.

Tape over the webcam

Integrated webcams present excellent opportunities for malicious hackers to spy on users. And although the webcam indicator light is supposed to switch on when the camera activates, hackers have found ways to disable the light in certain laptop models. According to the NSA, a simple, low-tech solution is to tape over your webcamwith black tape, naturally. If youre worried that the tapes adhesive might damage the webcam, use tape to secure a small piece of paper over the lens instead.

Disable the built-in microphone

Similar to the webcam, your laptops built-in microphonetypically enabled by defaultcan also fall prey to remote hijacking and allow strangers and snoops to eavesdrop on your conversations. To prevent that, launch the Sound applet from the Control Panel.
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CONSUMER WATCH
Disable your laptops built-in microphone to ensure that your private conversations stay private.

Click the Recording tab, select your laptops microphone, and disable it. Of course, taking this step doesnt prevent a malicious hacker who has already compromised your laptop from reenabling the mic. If youre really paranoid, you can disable the built-in microphone permanently by poking it with the business end of a needle or paper clip. The espionage game has its casualties.

Disable unnecessary network services

Although its impossible to lock out malicious hackers completely, you dont have to make their task any easier. Start by disabling network protocols and services you dont use. For small businesses, such services likely include IPv6, Bluetooth wireless, or even Wi-Fi, if you use deskbound laptops connected via ethernet. And if you dont share le and printer resources on your PC, disable sharinga step that Microsoft recommends (go.pcworld.com/disablesharing), as well.

Harden your account settings

Spend a few minutes tweaking your Windows account settings. A good rst step is to disable any guest accounts, to ensure that a password is set for each account, and to disable automatic login. Next, enable a screensaver and set it to start with an inactivity
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If you use sleep mode, set the PC to require a password on waking up.

timeout of between 1 and 5 minutes. To do so, right-click the desktop, select Personalize, and then click Screen Saver. Select the On resume, display logon screen checkbox. Obviously, you will need to have a password congured rst for this step to work. Lastly, require that users reenter their system password if the PC has been inactive. Click Power Options in the Control Panel and select Require a password on wakeup in the left column.

Dont read email on an admin account

Web surng on a user account with administrative rights is kind of like walking through a bad neighborhood with your house keys in one hand, your Social Security card in the other, and your ATM PIN written on your forehead. The usual advice is to avoid surng the Web on an admin account to limit the damage if a zero-day exploit compromises your account. Given the growing number of attacks launched via email messages, its a good idea to extend this precaution to your inbox by reading email only on a nonadministrator account. This practice wont protect you from phishing attempts, though, so be sure to stay on your guard against fake email messages, too.
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BUGS & FIXES

BY JON L. JACOBI

CONSUMER WATCH

Mozilla releases Firefox 25 and updates Thunderbird

THIS TIME AROUND, as two Web browsers come out with new major revisions, an email client receives a minor update. Plus, the Sonar X3 audio software nally works out its bugs.

Firefox 25 plugs holes, adds Web audio

Securing browsers is a full-time occupation, and someone (likely a small army of people) kept busy at Mozilla before releasing Firefox 25 (go.pcworld.com/refox25). The bugs that Mozilla xed relate to JavaScript PDF usage, spoong the address bar, image decoding, the ofline cache, and various memory hazards (such as null pointers and nondeallocated blocks). Version 25 also adds a gaming feature: Web audio. The JavaScript interface to HTML 5 audio is now supported.

Thunderbird update xes bugs and security aws

The free Mozilla email client has revved a dot to version 24.1 (go.pcworld.com/thunderbird241), with the majority of the changes being bug xes and plugged security holes. Gone from Thunderbird are some improperly initialized memory and overflows in select JavaScript functions, other sundry memory issues, and the same spoong of an address bar that aected Firefox. Also xed in version 24.1 are too-light signatures and problems with cc-ing a message reply if the cc address is the same as the sending address.
37
I L LU ST R AT I O N BY G A RY N E I L L

IE 11 for Windows 7 speeds up and adds WebGL support

Though Internet Explorer 11 has been available for Windows 8 for some time, the recent Windows 7 release of the browser is still big news, as many users have yet to move to the Redmond giants latest operating system. (For more about IE 11s features, see News, page 10.) Of course it has a ton of bug xes and upgraded compatibility. The new version of the browser also oers faster rendering and improved support for existing standards as well as relatively new ones, such as WebGL (for online gaming). IE 11 should be among your Windows automatic updates. If not, download it (go.pcworld.com/iedownload).

Internet Explorer 11 has a ton of bug xes and upgraded compatibility.

Sonar X3s third x is the charm

The Sonar X3 high-end audio-recording application recently experienced whats known in the software business as an Oracle-style release. Thats when you take the customers money, ship what is essentially a buggy beta, and then strive to x things and update them as fast as you can. Cakewalk released the X3 software on September 28, 2013, issued version X3b ve days later, and then brought out X3c at the end of October. Fortunately for the company, the dust has settled: Sonar X3 (go.pcworld.com/sonarX3) is an excellent piece of softwareand as of version X3c, its largely free of major bugs.

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Tips to keep small businesses productive.

BUSINESS CENTER

I L LU ST R AT I O N BY A DA M McC AU L E Y

Five Microsoft services to make any business smarter

Level the playing eld with these affordable services. BY TONY BRADLEY

ICROSOFT IS MUCH more than the Windows operating system. The company oers an array of services that address some of the most common headaches small businesses face and enable them to operate like much bigger organizations. Here are ve of those gems.
39

1.

Office 365

You can buy Oce 365 Small Business Premium for only $150 per user per year. Thats less than the cost of a single Oce Professional 2013 license (go.pcworld.com/oce2013pro), but it allows you to install the full Oce Professional 2013 suite on up to ve devices including iPhones and Android smartphones. Oce 365 (go.pcworld.com/oce365sbp), though, is more than Microsoft Oce in the cloud. Oce 365 Small Business Premium includes Exchange, SharePoint, and Lync, which together give you a complete business infrastructure without the cost and overhead of buying and maintaining your own servers. Plus, Microsoft manages the server back end. Its like getting an IT department thrown in for free.

Oce 365: A business infrastructure in the cloud.

40

BUSINESS CENTER

2.

Power BI

Data is power. Power BI, Microsofts business intelligence service, lets you analyze data through a tool most businesses are already comfortable withExcel. You can create analytical models, build interactive visualizations, and more. You can also share insights with other team members, track who is accessing what data, and see which data sets are used most. Power BI is included in an Oce 365 subscription.

Microsofts Power BI shows you data based on location, among other insights. Capacity by energy source is shown here.

Many businesses are too small to have a dedicated IT department and lack the skills and resources required to manage Windows Servers (go.pcworld.com/windowsservers). The Catch22 for these businesses, though, is that their needs exceed the capabilities of the Windows desktop OS as well. Windows Server 2012 R2 Essentials (go.pcworld.com/serverR2) provides an aordable, simple server option for businesses with 25 to 50 users. Its a stepping-stone that takes your business from a random group of separate Windows PCs to a more-capable business network. Windows Server 2012 R2 Essentials can automatically back up client
41

3.

Windows Server 2012 R2 Essentials

computers to a central locationa lifesaver in the event that a laptop with crucial information is lost or stolen. You can also easily restore entire PCs or specic les or folders as needed. You can use Remote Web Access to connect with company data and resources over an encrypted connection from virtually anywhere. The Remote Web Access interface is designed to be a touch-friendly experience, allowing users to connect from any Web-enabled device. Using Windows Server 2012 R2 Essentials gives your business the ability to manage and protect data, implement and enforce policies on PCs, and more, without requiring a full-time IT administrator or a Windows Server guru to run it.

4.

Windows Intune

The BYOD (bring your own device) trendadvantageous for small businessescalls for a tool that lets you reap the benets and mitigate the risks. Windows Intune (go.pcworld.com/windowsintune) gives your business a unied platform for managing both PCs and mobile devices that are running Windows, Windows RT, Windows Phone 8, iOS, and Android. You can implement policies, distribute software, and track device inventory from one Web-based console.
Windows Intune gives you everything that you need to manage a BYOD environment.

42

BUSINESS CENTER

A single license of Windows 8.1 costs $120 in the Microsoft Store (go.pcworld.com/win81store). For a little more than thatper year you can subscribe to Windows Intune (go.pcworld.com/intunesub) with Software Assurance ($11 per user per month), which includes licensing for Windows 8.1 Enterprise. Or subscribe to just Windows Intune without the Windows license for $6 per user per month.

5.

Bing Webmaster SEO reports

Bing Webmaster SEO reports tell you if your site isnt compliant with SEO best practices and how to x it.

SEO (search engine optimization) is crucial for ensuring your website ranks high and attracts trac. But understanding searchengine algorithms and mastering SEO can be a full-time job. Bing Webmaster Tools (go.pcworld.com/bingwebtools) lets you see how your Web pages rate, even if youre not a Web guru. It generates reports based on SEO best practices and helps you ne-tune your website with page-level recommendations. The reports explain any potential issues and show a sample of pages aected by noncompliance with established SEO guidelines. These ve services just scratch the surface of Microsofts oerings, but using them can save your business money and give you tools to operate more eectively and eciently. More important, they will put you on a level playing eld with much larger enterprises, and give your company a strategic edge over the competition.

43

Alternatives to online backups

BY TONY BRADLEY THE NEED TO BACK UP YOUR DATA is indisputable, but how you do it is a matter of choice. Cloud backup services (go.pcworld.com/easysaves) are the most hassle-free option, but they can be costly, and require a stable, high-speed broadband connection not available to everyone. And NSA surveillance (go. pcworld.com/nsacloud) has certainly made it dicult to trust sensitive data to a third-party provider. Alternatives exist. With a combination of hardware, apps, and services, you can create secure, easily accessible data backups without relying on the cloud.

P H OTO G R A P H Y BY RO B E RT C A R D I N

Western Digitals My Cloud gives you anywhere access to your local backup.
44

BUSINESS CENTER
External drives
Long before cloud backup services sprang up, businesses and individuals used external USB hard drives. Such a local backup is faster than uploading it to the cloudespecially via a USB 3.0 connectionand external drives are a relatively cheap, one-time investment rather than an ongoing subscription. Still, two potential concerns remain. One: What happens when the external drive malfunctions or crashes? Consumer-grade drives are pretty reliable, but they will inevitably fail (go.pcworld.com/drivefails) usually about the same time your PC crashes, if Murphy has anything to say about it. Second, if a re or flood destroys your home or oce, your external drive will succumb right along with your PC. You can resolve both issues, however, with a couple of simple steps. First, perform backups to two external USB hard drives. Then store one of the drives in a reproof safe (preferably on a shelf to avoid water damage from a flood) or osite in a safety deposit box. For even more security, use a disaster-proof drive like an ioSafe Solo (iosafe.com) as one of your two backup drives. Theyve been designed and tested to survive (go.pcworld.com/drivetested) mans and Mother Natures destructive worst.

The ioSafe Solo protects your data from re and flood.

Peer-to-peer backup
One of the biggest benets of using a cloud backup service, obviously, is that the data is stored safely osite. As an alternative to locking away a hard drive in a reproof box, you could instead use a peer-to-peer backup system such as the one oered by CrashPlan (go.pcworld.com/peerbackup). CrashPlan is a cloud backup provider, but it also oers a free service that lets you back up data to the PC of a friend or family member,
45

while they back up their data to yours. Your backup will be stored safely osite and encrypted, so it can be accessed only by using your personal account information. Consider a few caveats, though. The process takes place over the Internet, so, depending on your broadband speed, it may take a lot longer than a local backup. Your friend or family members PC must also be turned on, connected to the Internet, and have enough available storage to accommodate your data.

CrashPlan Free creates a peerto-peer network for backing up data osite.

Private cloud
Another advantage of storing data in the cloud is that you can access it from virtually anywhere, anytime, via a mobile app or a Web browser. A network-enabled external drive like the Western Digital (WD) My Cloud (go.pcworld.com/mycloudrev) provides the same convenience. My Cloud oers 2 terabytes or more of storage, and WD has apps for both Android and iOS that let you access the data stored on the drive from wherever you are. The apps also integrate with cloud services like
46

BUSINESS CENTER
Dropbox, SkyDrive, and Google Drive, enabling you to transfer les from your My Cloud drive to the cloud, or vice versa. WD also has a four-bay version called My Cloud EX4 (go.pcworld.com/mycloudex4), which adds the assurance of a RAID arrays mirrored copies. ioSafe oers a networked version of its disaster-proof drives (go. pcworld.com/iosafenas). It features two drives set up in a RAID conguration with similar syncing and mobile app access, for use as a private cloud. Another option is a service like Younity (go. pcworld.com/younity) or MiST (go.pcworld. com/mist); they index your data where it is and make it available from mobile apps and other PCs. In short, the data itself stays in its original locationon your mobile device, or your Windows or Mac computer. The source of the data has to be turned on and connected to the Internet for the data to be accessible from other platforms or devices, but you can use these services along with some other backup alternative to enjoy the same anywhere-access to data that you get from the cloud. Backing up your data using a mix of these tools isnt as turnkeysimple as using an online service. But once you have a process in place, you can condently kiss the cloud good-bye.

With a mix of these tools and a process in place, you can kiss the cloud good-bye.

47

8 tips to protect your businesss wireless network

BY PAUL MAH ENAMORED BY WI-FIS CONVENIENCE, we tend to be blind to its risks. Many routers are riddled with security holes that leave your data exposed to enterprising hackers and other intruders. And if you run a business, the jeopardy is even greater. To keep your wireless network secure, follow these eight security tips.

1.

Change the default password

If you didnt do it when you set up your router, immediately change its default password. The default passwords for all vendors of network equipment are widely known and just a quick search away. (For more on wireless network setup, see go.pcworld.com/wisetup.)

The unidirectional nature of Wi-Fi signals necessitates the use of encryption to prevent neighbors or malicious parties from spying on your online activities. Even though the option is still available for legacy reasons, avoid WEP encryption, as it can be cracked in minutes.
48

2.

Use only WPA2 encryption

BUSINESS CENTER
Use only WPA2, which introduces a new AES-based encryption for better security over WPA. Theres really no excuse not to: Today, every Wi-Fi router bearing the Wi-Fi trademark supports it, as does every wireless device and Wi-Fi adapter card made in the past few years.

Despite the lack of known weaknesses in WPA2, it remains susceptible to brute-force attacks when used with an easily guessed passphrase. Specialized software makes it trivial for attackers to process captured wireless data packets against huge dictionary lists to obtain a match. To foil such attacks, use a passphrase containing at least 25 characters including a mix of letters (upper- and lowercase), numerals, and symbols.

3.

Use a complex passphrase

One common tip is to not broadcast the SSID (Service Set Identication) of your wireless network. While it could be used to throw o novice attempts at breaking in, hiding the SSID is useless against a half-competent hacker. But its good practice to not use the default SSID, or any common names (go.pcworld.com/ssidnames). Hackers have developed precomputed tables of password hashes known as rainbow tables to nd the WPA passphrase quickly. Because these tables are keyed to individual SSIDs, using an SSID that is not on such a table or list would
WPS makes it easier to add a device to your network, but it also makes your network more vulnerable.

4.

Avoid common SSID names

49

force an attacker to adopt a more time-consuming approach without the benet of a ready-to-use rainbow table.

If your Wi-Fi router supports Wi-Fi Protected Setup (WPS), disable it. Created as a user-friendly way for users to add new devices to their network, the WPS PIN is an 8-digit number printed on the label of WPS-enabled devices. Depending on vendor implementation, however, this is likely to be susceptible to brute-force attacks. An attacker can crack the PIN code of a vulnerable device in between four to ten hours (go.pcworld.com/reaver) of automated eort, which would allow the attacker to recover your secret passphrase and make changes to your Wi-Fi hardware.
50

5.

Disable WPS

An access point may let you lter out unauthorized MAC addresses, but see tip 7.

BUSINESS CENTER

6. 7.

Set up a guest network

It would be bad form to deny friends and relatives access to your Wi-Fi network when theyre visiting. But circulating the static passphrase to everyone is bad security. Instead, set up a separate wireless network under a second SSID, a feature supported by an increasing number of wireless routers. Having a separate network for guests allows you to routinely change the passphrase without aecting your own devices. You can even disable it entirely when not in use.

Forget MAC address ltering

The MAC (media access control) address is a unique identier hardcoded to individual ethernet ports and Wi-Fi devices. However, its actual eectiveness is dubious, since its trivial to spoof a MAC address. Unless you know what youre doing, we would advise against MAC address ltering, given the inconvenience and hassle that can result from a misconguration. And having to manually add every single tablet or smartphone that you acquire is a productivity downer.

8.

Disallow admin access from the wireless network

You may not be able to keep a determined hacker out, but you dont have to make his job easier. Disallowing administrative access from the wireless network should keep any successful hacker from wreaking further havoc by making changes to the conguration of your Wi-Fi router. Obviously, this means that any tweaks to your Wi-Fi router would have to be done from a desktop or laptop on your wired local area network. But the added protection is worth the hassle. The tips here arent meant to exhaustively cover all possible security risks of a Wi-Fi network, but adhering to these eight tips should make you signicantly safer. Ultimately, though, if security is paramount, sticking to a wired ethernet network may be your best bet.
51

Adhering to these eight tips should help to make you signicantly safer.

The PCWorld Superguide Series

Get PCWorlds thorough reference guides to help you learn more about your tech gear. These books are packed with practical how-to advice, in-depth features, tips and tricks, and much more.

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Get Yours Today: pcworld.com/superguide

REVIEWS & RATINGS

CONTENTS
54 Touchscreen monitor duel: Dells P2314T vs. Samsungs S24C770T 60 Asus ROG G750JH: A swift, silent superhero 63 Origins EON17-5 is an absolute beast 68 Toshiba Satellite P75A7200: A fast desktop replacement 72 My Cloud Ex wins on features, not speed 76 Epson Expression XP-810: Great quality, pricey inks 80 Sony SmartWatch 2: A tiny step in the right direction 84 7-inch tablet showdown: Kindle Fire HDX vs. Nexus 7 89 10-inch hybrid head-to-head: Asus Transformer Book T100 vs. Lenovo Miix 10

53

TESTED IN PCWORLD LABS

In this section, hardware & software goes through rigorous testing.

REVIEWS & RATINGS

Touchscreen monitor duel: Dell vs. Samsung

P H OTO G R A P H Y BY RO B E RT C A R D I N

Use Windows 8 the way its designed to work. These huge, high-res touchscreens tilt deeply for easier interaction. BY JAMES GALBRAITH
TS AMAZING HOW quickly you can become accustomed to a touchscreen user interface. If you currently use Windows 8, youve probably experienced this phenomenon in the form of reflexively swiping your nger across your desktop monitor at least onceto no eect, if it isnt a touchscreen.
54

REVIEWS & RATINGS

Fortunately, aordable touchscreen displays are nally making their way into the market. I recently spent some time with two such models: the Dell P2314T Touch Monitor (go.pcworld.com/p2314t) and the Samsung S24C770T 10-point Touch Monitor (go. pcworld.com/s24c770t). One is denitely better than the other. The Dell P2314T is a 23-inch display based on an IPS (In-Plane Switching) panel, and the Samsung S24C770T is a 24-inch model based on MVA (Multi-domain Vertical Alignment) technology. Both use LED backlights and deliver a native resolution of 1920 by 1080 pixels with ten touch points. Both monitors are mounted on easily Dell P2314T Touch Monitor adjustable stands that can hold the display PROS: upright, like a standard Responsive touchscreen with accurate monitor, or reclined at a color low angle thats easier Many I/O ports on your arms when you Sturdy, flexible stand use the touch features. Neither stand requires CONS: you to push any buttons Highly reflective screen to adjust the angle: You Display is prone to glare simply push or pull the BOTTOM LINE: screen into the angle This is a very good touchscreen display, that works better for with all the video inputs you could ask you. Despite oering for, plus a USB hub and MHL support for that highly desirable mobile devices. flexibility, both stands feel sturdy and solid $450 when parked on a desk. The Dell lies flatter
55

P H OTO G R A P H Y BY RO B E RT C A R D I N

Dells 23-inch P2314T is a very responsive touchscreen monitor with lots of I/O ports.

than the Samsung by a few degrees, but the Dells stand sticks out from the front by a couple of inchesa design feature that leaves less room for a keyboard in front of the monitor, and increases the distance your arms must reach across to touch the screen. Unfortunately, both monitors have highly reflective screens. When I put each unit in its reclined orientation, it reflected the overhead lights in my oce, producing intense glare. Youll want to consider your working environment before purchasing either model. Dell provides plenty of ports on its P2314T: DisplayPort, HDMI, and VGA video inputs, plus two USB 3.0 downstream ports for connecting peripherals or portable storage devices. The Samsung S24C770T Samsung S24C770T comes 10-Point Touch Monitor with two HDMI portsand PROS: thats it. The Samsung monitor also lacks a USB Responsive touchscreen hub. If you need speakers, Built-in speakers though, the 3-watt pair Sturdy, flexible stand built into the Samsung CONS: models bezel arent bad. Highly reflective screen Dell expects you to provide your own audio hardware, Panel has a reddish hue which can be a problem if Few connectivity features you have limited space on BOTTOM LINE: your desk and dont want This model has a superior stand, but to wear headphones. its color delity and o-axis viewing The Dell P2314T also arent as good as they could be, and supports MHL (Mobile the only input choice is dual HDMI. High-Denition Link), a technology that enables $650 you to connect a compatible smartphone or
56

P H OTO G R A P H Y BY RO B E RT C A R D I N

The Samsung S24C770T has a superior stand, but its color delity isnt as good as the Dell models.

REVIEWS & RATINGS

tablet and display video (up to 4K resolution) and stream surround sound (to a maximum of 7.1 channels, including TrueHD and DTS-HD audio formats) while simultaneously charging the attached device. In addition to manufacturing smartphones and tablets, Samsung is a member of the MHL Consortium, so its interesting that Samsungs monitor doesnt support the technology. Overall, I found the touch capabilities of the two displays to be quite similar. On both models I could use Windows 8 gestures to pinch, zoom, swipe, and type without any noticeable latency. Typing via the on-screen keyboard worked well, though I wont plan to give up the superior tactile response of a standard keyboard anytime soon. Comparing the displays side by side, I found that images on the Samsungs MVA panel had a slightly pinkish hue. I preferred the neutral grays and colors of the Dells IPS panel. Extreme o-axis viewing tends not to be a big issue for a touchscreen display, since youll typically be situated front and center, but it remains important when you need to
Dells monitor oers DisplayPort, HDMI, and VGA connections, as well as a USB downstream port and MHL support.

P H OTO G R A P H Y BY RO B E RT C A R D I N

57

REVIEWS & RATINGS

The Samsung S24C770T has dual HDMI ports, but the monitors USB capabilities are upstream only (to support touch).

share information on the display with someone else. The Dell model looked much better when viewed at an angle. The Samsung monitor progressively lost contrast as I moved away from its center, and images gradually disappeared as I moved to the far left or right. Text was clear and legible on both displays, but the Dells whiter whites and slightly higher pixel density helped make text viewed on that monitor a little easier on the eyes. The Samsung has good speakers, but it costs more and has fewer I/O ports, and its colors leaned a little on the red side. Overall, I recommend the Dell P2314T with its raft of ports, its neutral grays, and its lower price.

P H OTO G R A P H Y BY RO B E RT C A R D I N

58

LIFE FLIES BY IN AN INSTANT, LETS

PROTECT
THE MEN WE LOVE.
One in six men will develop prostate cancer in their lifetimes. Every 16 minutes, a man dies of prostate cancer in the U.S. But prostate cancer is often treatable. Encourage the men in your life to speak to their health care providers about prostate cancer screening. Visit PCF.ORG to create a plan for better prostate health.
Quincy Jones and daughter Rashida Jones, Stand Up To Cancer Ambassadors

TO LEARN MORE GO TO SU2C.ORG.

Stand Up To Cancer is a program of the Entertainment Industry Foundation, a 501 (c) (3) non-prot organization.

Photo by Andrew MacPherson.

Watch the video at go.pcworld. com/g750video

Impressively hefty, the G750JH is one of the fastest laptops weve seen.

Asus ROG G750JH: A swift, silent superhero

BY SARAH JACOBSSON PUREWAL IN TODAYS ULTRABOOK- and MacBook Airobsessed world, youd be

forgiven for thinking that hulking desktop replacements are pass. But Asuss Republic of Gamers G750JH (go.pcworld.com/g750jh) is ready to prove you wrong. The G750JH earned a mark of 435 on our WorldBench 8.1 test suite, coming in more than four times as fast as our baseline model, an Asus VivoBook S550CA. Its the second-fastest laptop weve tested, losing only to the similarly equipped Micro Express NB5720 gaming machine. That ultrafast performance is attributable in part to the laptops powerful components, which include a fourth-generation Intel Core i7-4700HQ processor, 16GB of DDR3 RAM, and Nvidias best mobile graphics processor, the GeForce GTX 780M. A 256GB solid-state drive
60

REVIEWS & RATINGS

helps it start up in 7.3 seconds. Thats crazy-fast for a gaming laptop the NB5720 takes twice as long to boot. The only thing thats too fast about the G750JH is its battery life, which ends after just 3.5 hours. As you might expect, the G750JH delivers top-notch graphics performance. In our gaming tests it played everything smoothly, from Dirt Showdown at Low quality settings and 1024 by 768 resolution (122.9 frames per second) to BioShock Innite at Ultra quality settings and 1920 by 1080 resolution (55.4 fps). Other welcome features include built-in Wi-Fi (802.11a/c), Thunderbolt 1.0 support, a Blu-ray drive, and even a built-in headphone amplier. The matte-nish screen measures a spacious 17.3 inches diagonally and oers bright, crystal-clear graphics. Its not a touchscreen, which isnt surprising for a gaming laptop but is a little disappointing considering all the cool Windows 8 features. Asus ROG G750JH The matte-black G750JH is reasonably attractive for PROS: a desktop replacement. Its Excellent performance soft, angled cover picks up Silent while running, and the ngerprints, but as long as keyboard is quiet too you refrain from eating Speakers provide impressive bass potato chips nearby, you and full sound should be ne. The full-size CONS: keyboard (complete with a Heavy, bulky machine and AC numeric keypad) is large adapter and easy to type on, and it BOTTOM LINE: feels solid, yet its fairly If youre looking for a powerful, quiet when youre typing portable gaming rig, the Haswellrapidly. The large touchpad based Asus Republic of Gamers has discrete, physical G750JH delivers the goods. buttons; its acceptable, but most gamers will probably $1750 opt for an external mouse just for the feel.
61

The impressive speakers provide a good bass range and full sound. If you use headphones, youll appreciate the headphone amplier, which will help to plunge you into the on-screen action. When a laptop emphasizes raw power, it sacrices some renement. The Asus G750JH is heavy, at 10 pounds sans peripherals, and the power brick weighs another 2 to 3 pounds. The system also lacks the lights and pizzazz that gaming machines such as the Razer Blade get just right. But you cant beat the graphics performance, and thats what really matters to the gaming crowd.

Asus ROG G750JH Notebook WorldBench 8.1 score

Asus ROG G750JH Micro Express NB5720 CyberPower FangBook EVO HX7-200 Asus VivoBook S550CA
(reference)
0

435

483

417

100

100

200

300

400

500

(LONGER BARS INDICATE HIGHER PERFORMANCE; THE BASELINE SCORE IS 100)

The Asus G750JH is more than four times as fast as our baseline system, and only the Micro Express NB5720 gaming laptop outperformed it.

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REVIEWS & RATINGS

The EON17-S comes in a chunky but coollooking chassis.

Origins EON17-S is an absolute beast

BY SARAH JACOBSSON PUREWAL
P H OTO G R A P H Y BY RO B E RT C A R D I N

MOST GAMERS PREFER huge, liquid-cooled, multiple-graphics-cardladen desktops over laptops. But sometimes you need a machine thats as portable as it is powerful, and thats where Origins EON17-S (go.pcworld.com/origin17s) comes into play. This hulking desktop-replacement system is pretty sexy, considering its an 11.25-pound monster. And thats without the 2-pound power brick you wont be able to ditch, because the EON17-S gets only 2 hours of battery life on a single charge.
63

Comfortable to use, the EON17-Ss keyboard is fullsize and backlit.

Our fully loaded review conguration will set you back $3760. Thats actually not a bad price for a system with a fourth-generation Intel Core i7-4930MX Extreme Edition processor, 16GB of DDR3/1600 RAM, a discrete Nvidia GeForce GTX 780M graphics card, a 240GB solidstate drive, and a 750GB hard drive that spins at 7200 rpm. The EON17-S also features a Blu-ray writer and runs Windows 8.1 Home. In our Notebook WorldBench 8.1 suite, the EON17-S achieved a score of 449, and was more than four and a half times faster than our baseline test model, an Asus VivoBook S550CA with a third-generation Intel Core i5 processor and integrated graphics. The Micro Express NB5720 did slightly better with a score of 483, and a couple of other gaming laptops came close, including the Asus ROG G750JH (435) and the Toshiba Qosmio X75 A7298 (430). (For
64

P H OTO G R A P H Y BY RO B E RT C A R D I N

REVIEWS & RATINGS

more about the Asus G750JH, see our review on page 60.) All three of these competitors carry Haswell processors and Nvidia 700-series graphics cards, but the EON17-S is the only one to have Intels most powerful mobile CPU. Graphics performance is where the EON17-S dominates. In our Bioshock Innite test, the EON17-S produced a fantastic frame rate of 214.2 frames per second (at Low quality settings, 1024-by-768-pixel resolution). On our Dirt Showdown test (at Low quality settings, 1024-by768 pixel resolution), the EON17-S whizzed along at a speedy 123.6 fps. The EON17-S hasnt changed much from its previous iterations. Its Origin EON17-S housed in a chunky yet PROS: cool-looking chassis, with a Extremely fast at everything glossy, glacier-white cover Has the best CPU and GPU money (customizable, of course). can buy The full-size, backlit Great keyboard with three keyboard, which has a lighting zones dedicated numeric keypad, is comfortable to type on, CONS: thanks to its pseudo Exceedingly heavy island-style keys. The Mediocre touchpad and speakers keyboard features three No touchscreen custom lighting zones, a BOTTOM LINE: nice option if youre playing If money is no object, check out a game with lots of Origins gaming notebook; its one shortcuts. The machines of the most powerful weve ever touchpad is mediocre: Its benchmarked. laggy, even when you speed up the pointer, and $3760 the discrete buttons are shallow and oer little
65

The keyboard features three custom lighting zones, a nice option if youre playing a game with lots of shortcuts.

REVIEWS & RATINGS

Ports, left side (from top): On the EON17-S youll nd mini-FireWire, ethernet, USB 3.0, and eSATA connections.

Ports, right side (from top): In addition to a USB 2.0 port, you get audio, microphone, and headphone jacks.

tactile feedback. Youre more likely to use an external mouse anyway. The Onkyo speakers are loud but lacking in bass and depth. Theyre also a bit noisy at higher volume. Luckily, audio piped through the headphone jack is clean and oers excellent results. Sporting a native resolution of 1920 by 1080 pixels, the 17.3-inch, matte-nish screen looks very good: Its bright, images and text are crisp, colors seem accurate, and blacks are deep. Its not a touchscreen, but thats to be expected from a gaming laptop. If I had to choose a laptop for my gaming needs, the Origin EON17-S would be very high on my list. This beast is expensive, but its a portable powerhouse.

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The larger screen, comfortable keyboard, and second hard drive make a couple of extra pounds worthwhile.

Toshiba Satellite P75-A7200: A fast desktop replacement

BY JON L. JACOBI
P H OTO G R A P H Y BY RO B E RT C A R D I N

WITH TABLETS AND ultraportables garnering so much attention, you

might not have noticed how thin and light desktop replacements have become. Youll need an extra-tall backpack to accommodate the Toshiba Satellite P75-A7200 (go.pcworld.com/toshibap75) with its 17.3-inch display, but this machine actually weighs two ounces less than Dells Latitude E6540 (go.pcworld.com/dellE6540), which has only a 15.5-inch screen. Okay, so 7.5 pounds with the AC adapter wont win over any
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MacBook Air fans. But for many, this laptops extra screen real estate, super-comfortable keyboard, and second hard drive bay will make it worthwhile to tote around a couple of extra pounds. The Satellite P75-A7200 houses Intels fully threaded quad-core Core i7-4700QM CPU feeding o of 8MB of DDR3/1600 memory. The hard drive is a 750GB, 5400-rpm unit that delivers capacity, but not scintillating performance. Put an SSD in Toshiba Satellite P75this laptop, and itll scream. A7200 That brings us to one of the major perquisites of this PROS: particular desktop 17.3-inch display replacement: a second drive Excellent keyboard and touchpad bay. Loosen a single captive Second hard-drive bay and open screw on the P75-A7200s SODIMM slot bottom access panel, and not CONS: only can you easily add an Mediocre battery life SSD or second hard drive, No discrete GPU option youll nd two open SODIMM No touchscreen slots for adding more BOTTOM LINE: memory. You cant make up With an extra hard drive bay (for an for the absence of a discrete SSD) and two free SODIMM slots, graphics processor, though; the Satellite P75-A7200 can easily Toshiba relies entirely on be made faster. But theres no integrated graphics. getting around its reliance on The display is a large (17.3integrated graphics. inch), 1920 by 1080 widescreen (nontouch), but I $800 was disappointed to see only a DVD burner in its chassis. A
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At 1.5 inches, Toshibas Satellite P75-A7200 is thicker than it should be, considering that it relies on integrated graphics.

Toshiba Satellite P75-A7200 Notebook WorldBench 8.1 score

Toshiba Satellite P75-A7200 Dell Latitude E6540 Asus VivoBook S550CA
(reference)
0 50

279

263

100

100

150

200

250

300

(LONGER BARS INDICATE HIGHER PERFORMANCE; THE BASELINE SCORE IS 100)

The P75-A7200s Notebook WorldBench score is pretty solid, considering it has neither an SSD nor a discrete graphics processor.

Blu-ray player/DVD burner would have taken better advantage of that screen. That said, video looks superb. The P75-A7200 delivered a Notebook WorldBench 8.1 score of 279 on our WorldBench 8.1 test suite. Compared to similar laptops running hard drives, thats a good score. Subjectively, the P75-A7200 feels responsive, especially after the Windows 8 Home operating system has nished caching. I cant say the same about its gaming performance. BioShock Innite chugged along at 38 frames per second even at a resolution of 1024 by 768. But thats to be expected with Intels integrated graphics, fourth-generation HD 4600 or no. If you really want to game, you need a dedicated AMD or Nvidia GPU. The P75-A7200s 3-hour, 24-minute battery life is disappointing, considering its reliance on integrated graphics.
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The P75-A7200s external connections are mostly top-notch: It has four USB ports and all of them are 3.0. It also has both VGA and HDMI output, as well as an SDHC card slot. The Satellite P75-A7200s ergonomics rise almost to Lenovo quality: The keyboard has a slightly soft feel, but it took only a minute or two to adjust to it and set up a good typing rhythm. The touchpad is rst-rate, with no perceivable wobble and just the right amount of resistance when you press down to click. Theres a lot to like about the Satellite P75-A7200. Its aordable, fast out of the box, easily made faster with more memory and an SSD, and the display and input ergonomics are rst rate. If Toshiba had included discrete graphics, this machine would be a major winner. But if you dont intend to play hard-core games on your desktop replacement, that might not matter.

Its affordable, fast out of the box, and easily made faster with more memory.

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My Cloud EX4 wins on features, not speed

BY MICHAEL BROWN WESTERN DIGITALS My Cloud EX4

(go.pcworld.com/ex4) oers all of the user-friendly features of the original My Cloud, packed in a metal four-bay enclosure that boasts a number of high-end perks the My Cloud does not. First and foremost is RAID support, specically RAID 5 if you purchase the device prepopulated with drives. The unit we tested came from the factory with four 2TB drives in RAID 5, which means any one of the four drives could fail and you would still be able to recover all your data. Because the drives are hot-swappable, you can yank out the failed drive and replace it with a new one, and the EX4 will automatically rebuild the array without any downtime. The balance of the EX4s feature set will appeal to consumer and business users alike. Consumers will appreciate its friendly, dashboardlike user interface, its DLNA server and iTunes support, and its built-in torrent downloader. Business users will value its dual gigabit ethernet ports, with support for both link bonding (so you can pool the
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REVIEWS & RATINGS

bandwidth of two broadband connections) and automatic failover (if one connection fails, the EX4 automatically switches to the other). Dual power connections deliver similar functionality: If one power supply fails, the EX4 can automatically switch to the other (though you must purchase the second one). Both camps will like the EX4s onboard display and its dual USB 3.0 ports. WD includes ten WD SmartWare Pro licenses for client-PC backups in the purchase price, and the NAS supports Time Capsule for Mac backups. WD also oers mobile apps for Android and iOS devices, along with many third-party apps. But one feature thats sorely missing is the ability to sync folders via the cloud. The My Cloud EX4 delivers a WD My Cloud EX4 great collection of features for its price tag. You can buy a bare PROS: unit and supply your own Strong feature set drives, or you can buy an EX4 Ten PC client backup licenses Power and ethernet failover thats prepopulated with WDs own Red drives. CONS: In our benchmarks, the four Very slow read/write performance drive My Cloud EX4 read both No provision for folder syncing our 10GB collection of les and BOTTOM LINE: folders and our single 10GB le The My Cloud EX4 has all the somewhat faster than the features you want in a four-bay NAS single-drive My Cloud, but it and is priced right, provided that was signicantly slower reading you accept its performance than the much more exdeciencies. pensive QNAP TS-469 Pro. The EX4 was $800 signicantly slower than both (including four 2TB Red drives) devices when writing a single 10GB le, and it also fell behind
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Business users will appreciate the dual gigabit ethernet ports.

WD My Cloud EX4 File-transfer benchmarks

WD My Cloud EX4
18.4 84.9 37.1 37.2

Read a 10GB le Write a 10GB le Read 10GB of les/folders

WD My Cloud

79.4 29.9 21.4 62.1

Write 10GB of les/folders

QNAP TS-469 Pro

110.8 92.9 39.5 69.9

0 20 40 60 80 100 120

(MEGABYTES PER SECOND; LONGER BARS INDICATE HIGHER PERFORMANCE)

The WD My Cloud EX4 produced unimpressive performance and is particularly slow in writing.

the other two boxes when writing our 10GB collection of les and folders. We replaced the EX4s WD Red drives, which spin their platters at 5400 rpm, with four 1TB, 7200-rpm Seagate Constellation drives to see if the faster drives would improve the EX4s performance. It didnt matter: The benchmark results were nearly the same. If youre a consumer, you wont care about the EX4s ethernet and power-failover features. And if youre a small-business owner, you wont care about the My Cloud EX4s DLNA server and iTunes support. Both parties, on the other hand, just might decide that the EX4s low price tag and strong feature set trump its slow performance.
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Epson Expression XP-810: Great quality, pricey inks

BY MELISSA RIOFRIO THE EPSON EXPRESSION XP-810 Small-in-One (go.pcworld.com/

epsonxp810) printer could make almost anyone happy. It has an impressively deep list of features for a home printer and is also one of the best all-around performers in its price range. Heres the big catch: ink costs. This is ocially a $230 printer (as of November)though you should be able to shop around for a better price, and Epson is currently discounting it on its own site. However, if Im spending that much, I expect to be repaid with lower ink prices. Instead, the costs are a little higher than average: 4.6 or 5.2 cents per page for black, and 13.4 or 18.2 cpp for a four-color page,
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using the high-capacity or standard-size cartridges, respectively. I had the same complaint about ink costs recently with a close competitor of this model, the Canon Pixma MG7120 (go.pcworld. com/pixmamg7120). Not a good trend. The best overall deal in this price range currently is the HP Photosmart 7520 e-All-in-One (go. pcworld.com/hpps7520), whose inks are refreshingly aordable. The only compensation for the ink costs is the print quality, which is some of the best youll experience with a consumer-level inkjet. The Expression XP-810 has both pigment- and dye-based blacks as well as cyan, magenta, and yellow. The pigment-based black helps produce crisp-looking text even on plain paper. Meanwhile, the Epson Expression dye-based black gives Premium XP-810 Smallphotos a nice sense of depth. Weve always liked in-One the bright, lively palette of PROS: Epson-printed photos Impressive speed and print quality anyway, and the Expression Prints on specially coated CD and XP-810 sticks with that DVD media tradition. Photos printed on plain paper can look a CONS: little pinkish, but they look Output tray doesnt retract automatically, is awkward to spectacular on Epsons own reinsert photo paper. The output arrives A printer this expensive should quickly, too. The have cheaper inks than it does Expression XP-810 clocked User guide is available online only some of the fastest times BOTTOM LINE: weve seen for a The ink costs more than it should, consumer-level inkjet. but we have no complaints about Simpler pages, consisting the output. mostly of plain black text and basic monochrome $230 graphics, printed at an
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aggregate speed of 10.3 pages per minute on the PC and 9.7 ppm on the Mac. Photos can slow a printer to a crawl, but the Expression XP-810 crawled faster than most: 2.4 ppm when printing 4-by-6-inch photos on plain paper on the PC, and 0.8 ppm for a full-page, high-res photo on the Mac (which sounds slow, but the average is 0.5 ppm). The Expression XP-810 has nearly every feature you could possibly want in a color inkjet multifunction. It has an easy-to-use, 3.5inch touchscreen control panel. Connectivity options include ethernet, USB, and 802.11b/g/n Wi-Fi. The printer also has Wi-Fi Direct, so it can connect directly to a device rather than having to go through a wireless network. Front slots support Secure Digital, Memory Stick, and Compact Flash media, as well as PictBridge. Epson also oers a great selection of mobile-printing apps and options.

The output tray doesnt retract automatically.

Paper handling
Paper handling is versatile, if not always high-capacity. The 30-sheet automatic document feeder for the letter/A4-size scanner is something many home-oriented printers lack, but youll appreciate it if you have to scan or copy longer documents. The 100-sheet, letter/legal main input tray is skimpy, but theres also a 30-sheet photo-paper tray, so you wont have to swap out paper as often.
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The unit even has a caddy for printing on specially coated CD and DVD media, though the software and documentation can be confusing. The 30-sheet output tray is the only thing on this printer that I didnt like. It slides out on its own when needed, which is cute. But it doesnt slide itself back in, which seems odd. Worse, it bucks and squeaks when you push it in manually. The documentation says, As you slide in the output tray, there may be slight resistance and noise. This is normal. No, this is cheesy. The other cheesy thing is the online-only user guide. Im not trying to get Epson to kill more trees. I just dont understand why the company wont put the user guide on the installation CD so you can have a local copy. I was disappointed by the cheap feel of the output tray and the pricey inks on the Epson Expression XP-810. Its otherwise one of the best consumer printers you could buy, perhaps overshadowed only by its fancier (and higher-priced) cousin, the Epson Expression XP-850 Small-in-One Printer (go.pcworld.com/epsonxp850). As noted before, the HP Photosmart 7520 e-All-in-One has cheaper inks, though its photo quality isnt quite as good.

The unit can even print on specially coated CD and DVD media.

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Sony SmartWatch 2: A tiny step in the right direction

BY JON PHILLIPS

DONT LOOK NOW, but Sony has quietly released a new smartwatch,

P H OTO G R A P H Y BY M I C H A E L H OM N I C K

and Im almost surprised to report that its not a total disaster. Compared with Samsungs widely criticized Galaxy Gear (go.pcworld. com/galaxygear), Sonys SmartWatch 2 doesnt overreach with a zillion half-baked features. So it might restore some credibility to the smartwatch category. You strap the SmartWatch 2 on your wrist and use it to check notications of whos emailing, texting, or calling you. It oers few thrills but imposes less pain than its competition.

The SmartWatch 2 interface will be familiar to anyone who has ever used a smartphone.

Smartphone support for (nearly) all

First, I need to clarify three big dierences between the SmartWatch 2 and the Galaxy Gear. The SmartWatch 2 works with any phone running Android 4.0 or laterimportant because both watches depend on smartphones for key functions. It oers better battery life: three to seven days compared to the Galaxys 12 to 24 hours. And at $200, the SmartWatch 2 costs a full C-note less than the Gear.
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The Sonys 1.6-inch LCD screen isnt spectacular, but it gets the job done. Resolution is just 220 by 176. On the plus side, o-axis viewing isnt horrible, and I could easily read the display in direct sunlight. The watchs design aesthetic is unapologetically nerd-tech. Would you give up your Swatch or Timex to wear this watch? Only you know the answer. But the watchs size and shape (the body measures about 1.6 by 1.6 inches) make a shouty statement that wont suit everyone. A plastic tab covers the USB charging port, to keep water out, but prying it open requires a razor blade or an X-acto knife. Thats a pain, considering youll need to access the port every time you charge.

Sony SmartWatch 2
PROS: Familiar Android interface

Familiar interface, annoying vibrations

When youre not directly engaging with one of the watchs apps, the LCD functions as a basic timepiece, displaying an always-on, unbacklit watch face. You get ve built in, and you can download more faces via Sonys Smart Connect (go.pcworld.com/ connect) phone app. Click the power button, and the SmartWatch 2 comes to life. One click turns on the backlight. A double-click shoots you to the home screen. There youll nd three sliding panes, each supporting up
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Phone-call and messaging

functions work well enough

Liberal, inclusive phone support

CONS: Inscrutable, confusing notications for some apps

Blurry display Useful only for very specic use

cases BOTTOM LINE: Though far from perfect, the SmartWatch 2 inches the industry just a bit closer to a tenable smartwatch concept. $200

Text notications appear in full. But like all notications, they stay on screen for only 10 seconds.

The port cover helps make the watch waterproof but is a total pain to take o.

P H OTO G R A P H Y BY M I C H A E L H OM N I C K

to six app icons. Also on the home screen are icons for the battery level, the Bluetooth status, and the current time. On the bottom bezel sit Androids familiar Back and Home buttons, along with an Actions button that lets you choose how to sort your home-screen icons and dene options in various apps. Navigating the UI is pretty straightforward. The touchscreen is fairly responsive to nger taps, and apps launch quickly enough. Obviously, the display is way too small to support an on-screen keyboard, so the watchs app functions are all tied directly into simple notications and brief snippets of content. When the handset in your pocket receives a phone call, a text message, or emailor even a new Twitter or Facebook updatethe watch displays a notication of the incoming signal. The notications remain on screen for just 10 seconds. You can set the watch to vibrate during notications as well, but this is an all-or-nothing approach; you cant limit vibrations to just phone calls and text messages.

Hello? Did I do something wrong?

Theres also little transparency in how the watch decides which incoming signals appear as notications. For example, my Twitter follows generate at least 100 tweets an hour, yet only a few of their updates made it to
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the smartwatch in the form of notications. Is that by algorithmic design? The documentation oers no explanation. At least phone-call and text-message notications consistently hit my watch face. When a phone call comes in, the notication shows the name and number of the caller, along with controls to mute your smartphones ringer, reject the call outright, or reject the call with a predened text message. Text-message notications appear at full length, accompanied by options to reply with an emoticon or with one of eight predened templated messages that you create and edit on your phone. As a simple bridge to your phone, the SmartWatch 2 oers a just-good-enough interface for managing calls and messages when youre stuck in a meeting or otherwise occupied. Digging into the home screen itself, each app icon includes a badge that displays how many unread updates are waiting for you. Embedded links are unclickable, of course, as the watch includes no Web browser.

Inching closer to a tenable smartwatch

The SmartWatch 2 feels a bit more polished and all-around sensible than the Galaxy Gear. Sure, its riddled with problems, and the display doesnt match the visual clarity of Samsungs. But its UI is familiar, and its feature set, however limited, essentially does what it sets out to do. I would never swap it for the TAG Heuer on my wrist, but I can see how people reliant on text messaging and voice calls might nd it useful. The worlds smartwatch engineers might nd it useful, too. They should study the SmartWatch 2, tear apart its UI, and poke and prod at its every success and failure. Slowly but surely, the smartwatch concept is inching closer to a winning combination of design, simplicity, and utility.

Twitters Update frequency control panel is buried in Sonys Smart Connect phone app.

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7-inch tablet showdown: Kindle Fire HDX vs. Nexus 7

BY FLORENCE ION IF YOURE INTERESTED in a smaller tablet, you might be looking straight at Googles updated Nexus 7 (go.pcworld.com/2013nexus7) or Amazons new Kindle Fire HDX (go.pcworld.com/kindlerehdx). These tablets lead the 7-inch pack. Aside from a black chassis, they are nothing alikeand choosing between them is a challenge because their features and software ecosystems are worlds apart.

P H OTO G R A P H Y BY M I K E H OM N I C K

Design
The 7-inch Kindle Fire HDX is smaller than last years Fire HD, and more compact than the Nexus 7. Its smaller size leaves a bit of extra room in your bag, and its easy to use one-handed. The HDX is
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noticeably heavier than the Nexus 7, however, and the volume and power buttons are awkwardly placed on the back. The Nexus 7s recessed buttons are no better, though. Winner: Tie. Both are stylish-looking devices with their own quirks.

Display Amazon Kindle Fire HDX

PROS X-Ray and other features enhance reading and viewing Thin, light, winning industrial design Great battery life, zippy interface Amazon Prime overflows with content CONS No access to Google Play Slight inconsistencies in screen brightness BOTTOM LINE: Oering winning second-screen content features and real-time video tech support, Amazon delivers a beautifully designed tablet that climbs to the top of the 7-inch heap. $344 (lowest price) Both the Fire HDX and the Nexus 7 have 7-inch, 1080p displays with the same pixel density (323 ppi), and they make watching videos, perusing the Web, reading ebooks, and playing games a pleasant experience. Though the Nexus 7 exhibits a bold color palette against a whiter background, the Kindle makes a much better reading device because of its softerif dimmercolor palette. Winner: Google Nexus 7, thanks to its colors (even if the Kindles screen makes ebooks easier to read).

Performance
Both the Nexus 7 and the HDX have quad-core processors. The Nexus 7 uses a 1.5GHz quad-core Snapdragon S4 Pro with 2GB of RAM; the Fire HDX is
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Both tablets are stylish devices, with their own quirks.

fueled by a 2.2GHz quad-core Snapdragon 800, also with 2GB of RAM. Both are speedier than most of their similar-size rivals; they launch apps and games without any lag. Winner: Tie. Though the Fire HDX technically has a more powerful processor, both are speedy and responsive.

Camera
The Kindle Fire HDX comes with a 1.2-megapixel front-facing camerasucient for video chattingbut no rear-facing camera. The Google Nexus 7 has both a 5-megapixel rear-facing camera and a 2-megapixel front-facing camera. Winner: Nexus 7. Its nice to have rear-camera functionality when you need it.

P H OTO G R A P H Y BY M I K E H OM N I C K

Battery life
It took a little more than 8 hours of constant video playback to completely exhaust the Kindle HDXs batterybut even when I left it in my backpack for a few days at a time the HDX didnt burn through much of its battery life. The Nexus 7 is just as long-lasting, and it can handle almost 9 hours of constant video streaming before it peters out. It managed several days on standby without needing a charge, too. Winner: Tie. Both tablets will hold up for several days of moderate use or a full day of heavy use on one charge.
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Interface
Both the Fire HDX and the Nexus 7 use Android, but the former runs a forked version of Android, meaning that Amazon has essentially built its own mobile operating system (called Amazon Fire OS 3.0) on Androids original framework. The Nexus 7, however, runs the latest version of Android Jelly Bean, so the device will receive updates for the latest base version of Android as long as Google supports it. Winner: Kindle Fire HDX. It quickly gets you right to the content that you use the most.

Apps and content

Though Amazon has a massive content library, its lack of apps puts it at a disadvantage; despite an exponential growth in apps since its app store opened in 2011, its still missing major hits like Instagram and Googles core Google Nexus 7 applicationsincluding PROS YouTube. The Nexus 7 is a bit like traversing the Wild Vibrant, high-resolution screen Its a Nexus device, so youll get West with a few prospecting most of the software updates tools and a mule: Theres a for now lot of gold out there, but getting to it is an adventure. CONS Winner: Kindle Fire HDX. No expandable storage Despite lacking the Nexus BOTTOM LINE: 7s core applications, you can If youre in the market for an watch your content virtually Android tablet, the new Nexus 7 is anywhere and call on the one to get. And if you have the Amazons attentive old one lying around, considering customer service if you nd trading it in for this one. yourself in dire straits. $230

And the winner is...

The Kindle Fire HDX. It wins
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on the strength of its superior interface and its software/ content, though it excels in other ways, too. I found myself using the Fire HDX more often than the Nexus 7 to watch movies and to read on the train ride home. Its smaller size and convenient content carousel help guide you to exactly what youre most likely to use a tablet for, without having to sift through a library of apps or spend hours setting it up. The HDX is also a keen choice for technologically challenged family membersit oers better out-of-the-box functionality. Multitaskers looking for a huge app library and maximum flexibility might prefer the Google Nexus 7. It provides access to a vast application library, and its a good option for families looking to share a tablet, since it lets you switch between user accounts. And Amazons services are available as individual apps in the Google Play store. The cost of entry is the same on both tablets, with each model starting at $229. The Kindle gives you a better processor, while the Nexus 7 has a back-facing camera.

The Kindle Fire HDX offers better out-of-the-box functionality.

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10-inch hybrid PCs: Asus versus Lenovo

BY MICHELLE MASTIN TABLETS ARE WELL on the way to outselling notebooks. But while the Windows 8 user interface makes it possible to navigate the operating system with just a ngertip, that doesnt make all your old programs magically nger-friendly. For some things, you just need a keyboard. A new class of hybrid PCs combines a wafer-thin slate for watching movies, reading, and Web surng with a detachable keyboard to use with full-blown programs that work best with physical input devices. I spent several weeks using two hybrids that run Windows 8the Asus Transformer Book T100 and Lenovos Miix 10 to see if they deliver on the promise of providing the flexibility of a tablet with the productivity of a laptop. I read, watched, and wrote while wrangling a very active toddler. I used the machines all around the house and while out running errands. Lenovo has years of experience building twist-and-fold convertibles
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P H OTO G R A P H Y BY RO B E RT C A R D I N

Lenovo Miix 10
PROS: Feels comfortable in your hands

Great keyboard cover available

CONS: Powered by an older Intel CPU (Clover Trail)

Odd port layout (USB port blocked

when docked) BOTTOM LINE: Lenovos Miix 10 is a solid hybrid: Its comfortable and responsive, and the optional keyboard cover is a cut above. But so is the price tag for a generation-old processor. $479 (keyboard cover is a $100 option)

and slates with keyboard docks and covers. Its Miix 10 combines a good 10inch tablet with a fantastic keyboard cover, but I just cant get past the combos $579 price tag ($479 for the tablet, plus another $100 for the keyboard cover) and the slates previous-generation CPU. (Full review at go.pcworld. com/miix10.) Asus is also no stranger to hybrids. The company built several generations of dockable Android tablets before trying a Windows 8 device. The companys engineers wisely selected a

Lenovos Miix 10 is solid but uses an older CPU, and the keyboard is an extra $100.

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processor from Intels all-new Bay Trail family, which delivers great battery life and strong benchmark performance. (Full review at go.pcworld. com/asust100.) The Transformer Book is not without flaws, however. It feels like a $399 device, for starters especially its sti keyboard dock and flakey touchpad. But its hard to argue with its long battery life (more than 11 hours in Asus Transformer Book our tests) and the T100 performance that you get for the price. Lenovo PROS: makes a great keyboard, Great battery life but its not $180 better. Keyboard dock included Bottom line: Lenovos Very responsive Miix 10 ($579 with keyboard cover) is a solid CONS: hybrid: Its comfortable Flakey touchpad on keyboard and responsive, and the Cramped keyboard optional keyboard cover is Top-heavy in notebook mode a cut above. But so is the BOTTOM LINE: price tag for a generationThe Transformer Book T100 delivers a old processor. The $399 solid tablet experience and a good Transformer Book T100 notebook experience in one machine. delivers a solid tablet and But it would be even better with a notebook experience in superior keyboard and trackpad. one machine. But it would be even better with a $399 superior keyboard and trackpad.
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The Asus has one of Intels newest Atom processors, and its keyboard is included.

0 2 f o s t c u d o r p t s e b the

PCWorlds editors name the top tech products of the year, 13 from PCs to productivity software.
BY PCWORLD STAFF
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What a year 2013 turned out to 50 BEST be. We saw new CPUs, GPUs, and 2013 chipsets; several all-new form factors; lighter laptops and tablets with superhigh-res screens; tons of great software; and more. After testing, using, beating on, and writing about hundreds of products, the editors at PCWorld and TechHive have carefully compiled a list of our 50 favorites. Notebooks, tablets, and other mobile devices feature prominently in this years list, along with a fair number of peripherals, services, and other hardware that will make you more productive. But since all work and no play would render us all dull, weve also included a handful of fun gadgets, tech toys, entertainment devices, and a couple of games. Read through our list and see which of your favorite tech products made the cut.

WOW.

READ

THROUGH OUR LIST AND SEE WHICH OF YO U R FAVO R I T E T EC H PRODUCT S MADE T H E C U T.

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f 2013 o s t c rodu best p

HASWELL IS KEY

1.

TO M A N Y D E V I C ES O N T H I S L I ST.

Intels Haswell generation of x86 microprocessors

(go.pcworld.com/ haswell) With its fourthgeneration family of Core processors, Intel proved it could build a supremely power-ecient CPU for laptops and desktops. Haswell chips are only slightly faster than the generation of microprocessors they replaced, but they enable notebooks to run considerably longer on batteries. AMD, meanwhile, remains more than a generation behind Intel in every metricapart from graphics. Still, no one will buy a slower CPU just because it delivers better graphics.

(go.pcworld.com/ surfacepro2) Other Windows 8.1 hybrid devices might be cheaper, but few are as beautifully designed or as portable as Microsofts top-ofthe-line Surface tablet. At a halfinch thick, the Surface Pro 2 still manages to pack in as much as 8GB of RAM, 512GB of solid-state storage, and an Ultrabook-caliber Core i5 Haswell-class processor. The included stylus is a nice touch, but even more interesting is Microsofts new Type Cover with backlit keys. Pair everything with Microsofts upcoming Docking Station, and the Surface Pro 2 becomes a single device that performs tablet, notebook, and even desktop duties.

2.

Microsoft Surface Pro 2

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(go.pcworld.com/ kindlerehdx) Packed with a Retina-quality display, a speedy 2.2GHz processor, and copious battery life, the 7-inch version of Amazons tablet could give potential iPad buyers pause. But what really pushes the Kindle Fire HDX to the top of our list is software innovation. Amazons new X-Ray feature oers second screen content tools that provide contextual information when youre watching movies and reading books. Even better, the new Mayday feature provides free, real-time video tech support at the touch of a button, like having an Apple Genius at your beck and call.

3.

Amazon Kindle Fire HDX

4.
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Motorola Moto X Motorola

(go.pcworld.com/motoxrev) The best Android phone doesnt boast the most impressive specs. Rather, its an eminently usable smartphone that makes your life more convenient. Builtin sensors detect when youre holding the phone and automatically display the time of day. The Active Display feature activates the display each time you get a notication, so you can see which app is trying to get your attention instead of having to guess. Touchless Control sits atop Google Now, so you can speak commands to the phone without any other interaction. And those are just two of this phones great features.

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BLADE-THIN PC

H A N D I LY RU N S T H E V E RY L AT EST G A M ES.

6.

Lenovo IdeaCentre Horizon 27

5.

Razer Blade

(go.pcworld.com/ razerbladerev) The Blade earns its name, measuring just 0.66 inch high despite packing a high-end Intel Core i7 CPU, a discrete Nvidia graphics processor, 8GB of memory, and a 256GB solidstate drive. Those components enable this ultra-low-prole gaming laptop to deliver performance thats nearly on a par with that of thicker, heavier desktop replacement laptops such as the Origin EON 17-S. Whats more, it delivers more than twice the battery life. If you want to play cutting-edge games such as BioShock Innite o the grid for hours at a time, the Razer Blade is the notebook youre looking for.

(go.pcworld. com/horizon27) Sony deserves credit for creating the all-inone/tablet hybrid in 2012, but Lenovo took the concept to its logical extreme with the Horizon 27. This oversized all-in-one is a very good family PC with a 27-inch touchscreen display and wireless peripherals, but when you unplug it from the wall and take it into the living room, you can enjoy more than three hours of family gaming fun without having to worry about bringing the power supply with you. Mount this computer to its optional roll-away cart, and youll never want to be deskbound again.

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7.

Microsoft Xbox One

(go.pcworld.com/ xbox1rev) Microsofts Xbox One is a complete home-entertainment system that caters as much to our love for TV and movies as it does to gaming. The launch titlesincluding Forza Motorsport 5, Ryse: Son of Rome, and Dead Rising 3make great use of the platform. The hardware integrates easily into the rest of the gear in our home-entertainment system, and we can control it all with voice commands. The new console needs some minor tune-upsbut Microsoft nailed the hardware.

ULTRA THIN,

U LT R A L I G H T, G R E AT D I S P L AY.

8.

iPad Air

(go.pcworld.com/ ipadair) Critics will say that Apple is running out of tricks, but the latest iPad rewrites the rules of how thin and light a full-size tablet should be. Consider: The Air delivers a 9.7-inch, 2048-by-1536pixel display, yet measures a seemingly impossible 0.30 inch thick and weighs almost exactly a single pound. To put this in context, the new Surface 2 measures 0.35 inch thick but weighs a full half-pound more than the Air. Add in Apples new A7 processor and access to the worlds greatest mobile-app store, and the iPad Air cant be ignored.
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9.

Google Chromecast

(go.pcworld. com/ googlechromecast) The concept is simple: First, plug the Chromecast dongle in to a free HDMI port on your TV, and power it up with USB. Next, re up a video streaming service from your phone, tablet, or PC. It could be Netflix, YouTube, or Googles Play Movies & TV. Boom! Youre streaming or rather castingthat video to the big screen. Its a simple, elegant, $35 solution to the oftenvexing problem of getting modern cloud content onto aging TVs that lack smart features.

10.
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iPhone 5s

(go.pcworld.com/ iphone5s) Apple may still be lagging in terms of screen size (a 4-inch display feels very 2011), but the companys new Touch ID ngerprint sensor elegantly solves a smartphone pain point, and anyone who struggles with numbercode and gesture locks on Android devices has to take note. The new A7 processor provides a palpable performance boost, and a new Slo-Mo video mode adds a nifty trick wed like to see in all smartphone cameras. Add in the fact that some important mobile apps are available only for iOS, and you have an iPhone line that remains as fresh and relevant as ever.

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(go.pcworld.com/ dellvenu8pro) The iPad mini is a great tablet, but when you need to be productive as well as entertained, we recommend Dells Venue 8 Pro. Powered by Intels power-sipping Atom processor (code-named Bay Trail), the Venue 8 runs the full version of Windows 8.1 and delivers all-day battery life. If you need more than 32GB of storage, plug in an SD Cardor pick up the 64GB model, which costs just $50 more. The Venue is very comfortable to hold, and text, webpages, and video all look great on its 1280-by-800-pixel display.

11.

Dell Venue 8 Pro

Abine DoNotTrackMe
(go.pcworld.com/abine) Advertisers and data aggregators constantly track our Web browsing habits. Its an unseemly practice, because what we browse reveals so much about us. Enter Abines DoNotTrackMe, an easy-to-use browser plug-in that prevents websites from tracking you and skimming personal details from what it nds. A dashboard lists the sites youre currently blocking, and recommends more that are known to track browsing behavior. Version 3.0 adds tools that mask any personal or nancial info that might be exposed while youre shopping online.
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12.

BROWSE SAFELY

TO COV E R YO U R ONLINE T R AC KS.

(go.pcworld. com/ bioshockinnite) No game is perfect, but Bioshock Innite comes close. This game has it all: a richly imaginative plot, exquisite graphics, nearly flawless gameplay, and a fabulous soundtrack. And unlike some other ambitiously designed games, this one wont bring your average PC to its knees. It will take full advantage of any state-of-the-art gaming rig; but dial down the resolution just a wee bit, and youll get a great experience even with integrated graphics. If you buy only one PC game this year, make it Bioshock Innite.

13.

Bioshock Innite

(go.pcworld.com/ win81rev) If you can put aside its disappointing app store inventory and confusing Live Tile interface, Windows 8 has always been a solid operating systemprecisely because its desktop features improve on Windows 7. You get a better le system, speedy performance, and elegant cloud integration. And now, with Windows 8.1, Microsoft oers traditional PC users even more, including a boot-todesktop option and various features that make the schism between old and new Windows less pronounced. Microsoft still has a long way to go in perfecting its new Windows vision, but Windows 8.1 is denitely a product of the yearon notoriety if not on merit.

14.

Windows 8.1

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(go.pcworld.com/ dellxps27) This was by far the fastest and most beautiful all-in-one PC we tested this year. The XPS 27 boasts one of Intels most powerful quad-core CPUs, 8GB of memory, a 2TB hard drive with a 32GB SSD cache, and a discrete graphics processor driving a gorgeous 27-inch touchscreen with 2560-by-1440-pixel resolution. This PC plays games, tackles photo and video editing, and plays HD movies better than many tower PCs.

15.

Dell XPS 27

16.
VIDEO STREAMER
CO U L D R E P L AC E YO U R C A B L E B OX.

Roku 3

(go.pcworld.com/roku3) Cord cutters, take note: The Roku 3 is one of the best streaming video devices you can buy. With support for dual-band Wi-Fi, 7.1 surround sound, and more than 750 content sources (including Netflix, Amazon Instant Video, and PBS), this tiny black puck might just replace your cable or satellite box. But best of all, Roku 3 comes with an overhauled and simplied user interface, and the remote has a headphone jack so you can watch streaming content without disturbing anyone else.

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(go. pcworld.com/vaiopro13rev) When you think of Intels Ultrabook standard, a sleek, powerful, absolutely beautiful notebook like Sonys VAIO Pro 13 is what comes to mind. With a chassis wrapped in carbon ber, the VAIO Pro 13 measures just 0.68 inch thick and weighs only 2.34 pounds. The 1920-by-1080-pixel display benets from Sonys expertise in building highend TVs, and the 128GB SSD helps the machine bust benchmarks while delivering strong battery life of more than six hours. The only area this Ultrabook doesnt excel in is games, due to its reliance on integrated graphics.

17.

Sony VAIO Pro 13

(go.pcworld. com/ asusrtac68u) Asuss latest router isnt the absolute fastest 802.11ac model on the marketthat distinction goes to D-Links DIR868Lbut the RT-AC68U has the best overall feature set and its only a bit slower than D-Links oering (and in some benchmarking scenarios, was much faster). The RT-AC68U is a good choice whether youre a consumer looking to stream HD video around the house or a small business that needs features such as multiple guest networks, a VPN server, cloud storage, and the ability to fall back to a 4G USB modem should your wired Internet fail.
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18.

Asus RT-AC68U

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19.
Transporter 2.0

Fitbit Force

(go.pcworld.com/tbitforce) Slowly but surely, Fitbit has rened its step- and sleeptracking hardware over the past few years, and it all culminates in the Force. This wristband includes a bright OLED display that reveals your steps taken, miles covered, floors climbed, and calories burned, all in real time. The display even functions as a simple digital watch. Sync the wristband with your smartphone or desktop PC, and you can drill further into your data. The Force is one of best activity-tracking wristbands around.

20.

(go.pcworld.com/ transporter2) Owning Connected Datas Transporter 2.0 storage device (or its kissing cousin, the Transporter Sync) is much like subscribing to Dropbox or one of the many other cloud-based storage services. When you save a le to your PCs hard drive, a copy of that le is automatically sent to your Transporter via the cloud. That le is then copied to every other PC you own (provided, of course, youve installed the Transporter software on them). Whats even better is that if you buy two or more Transporters and install them in dierent physical locations, theyll all sync to each other to give you disaster-proof redundancy.
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STORAGE DEVICE
OFFERS E A SY C LO U D BAC K U P.

21.
Samsung NX300
VERSATILE,
A F FO R DA B L E S P E A K E R S YO U CAN BUY IN M U LT I P L ES.

(go.pcworld.com/ samsungnx300) With Samsungs NX300, you can shoot stellar photos without touching any of the cameras controls. But if you explore its many shooting modes, and youll be rewarded with even better shots. Other innovative features include a tilting 3.31-inch AMOLED viewnder display, built-in Wi-Fi and NFC (near eld communication) for wireless le transfers, and the ability to sync the camera to your smartphone. Adobe Photoshop Lightroom also comes bundled. This is an outstanding compact camera.

(go.pcworld.com/ sonosplay1) Sonos is the king of multiroom audio, but you could spend a kings ransom outtting every room in your home with a node. The new Sonos Play:1 changes that equation. Its not powerful enough to ll any room with sound, but with a price tag of just $199, you can aord to sprinkle these self-powered networked speakers throughout your home without breaking the bank. Theyre versatile, too: Deploy two and you can congure them as a stereo pair. Or link a pair with a Sonos Playbar to create a wireless surround-sound system for your HDTV.
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22.

Sonos Play:1

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24.
Dropcam Pro Nexus 7

23.

(go.pcworld.com/ nexus7) Behold one of our favorite tablets for consuming content on the go. For just $229, you get a 1980-by-1200-pixel display, wireless charging support, a 1.5GHz processor, and 2GB of RAM. But perhaps best of all, in a tablet world thats sullied by forked operating systems (see the Kindle Fire HDX (go.pcworld.com/kindlerehdx) and home screens littered with manufacturer-imposed shovelware (see pretty much any Android tablet not sold by Google), the Nexus 7 oers a pure Android experience, so, among other things, it will receive the most urgent updates of the newest system versions from Google.
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(go.pcworld.com/dcpro) You wont nd a cloud-connected security camera thats easier to set up and use. The Dropcam Pro includes improved optics, better night-vision video quality, and a wider eld of view. Set one up at home, and you can get alerts on your smartphone whenever something (or someone) triggers a motion detector on the camera. And because all your video is stored in the cloud, thieves cant steal the camera even if they steal the camera itself.

25. 26.
Dell XPS 18

HTC One

(go.pcworld.com/htcone) Other Android phones might have fancier software features, but the HTC One has the best industrial design in the Android handset universe. We love the phones satiny aluminum unibody. And the front-facing speaker grilles telegraph the volume and clarity of the phones Beats audio system. A bright LED on the top grille even lets you know when you have notications waiting. Add in a great camera for low-light situations and a 1920 by 1080, 4.7-inch screen, and the One is still a contender some eight months after its release.

(go.pcworld.com/dellxps18) If the IdeaCentre Horizon 27 is too big and pricey for you, consider Dells XPS 18 all-in-one/tablet hybrid. But be sure to add the optional stand to your cart if you buy one. The stand delivers better viewing angles than the flip-out feet on the tablet, and it will charge the device while its docked. The 0.7-inch-thick, under-5-pound device is easy to move around the house. And it streams video and audio to any TV or adapter that supports Intels WiDi technology.
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27.

AMD Radeon R9 290X

(go.pcworld.com/radeonr9) Okay, Nvidias GeForce GTX 780 Ti is the faster video card. But we think AMDs Radeon R9 290X delivers more innovationin visual and audio quality. And with a price tag of $550compared to the GTX 780 Tis $700 stickit delivers a lot more bang for the buck. We're also excited about the prospect of seeing game developers take advantage of AMDs True Audio technology.

28.
DVR
R ECO R DS LIVE TV WITH OR WITHOUT C A B L E.

TiVo Roamio

(go.pcworld.com/tivoroamio) If youre a TV acionado, and youre still renting a DVR from your cable company, put down the remote, jump online, and buy a TiVo Roamio Plus (1TB of storage), the Roamio Pro (3TB of storage), orif youre a cable cutterthe plain ol Roamio (its ATSC tuner records over-the-air HD broadcasts, but you also need the TiVo Stream box [go.pcworld.com/tivostream] to use some features). These DVRs let you record live TV, play Netflix and YouTube videos, watch live TV remotely, and transfer shows to mobile devices.

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BACKPACK

C A N H AU L A L L YO U R GEAR AND K E E P I T D RY.

30.
Canon Rebel T4i

29.

Chrome Bravo Night

(go.pcworld.com/ chromebravonight) When you need to move a lot of gear from point A to point B without contributing to global warming by using an exhaust-spewing internal combustion engine, Chromes Bravo Night can get the job done. This backpack boasts 20 liters of storage space, and you can nearly double that amount by unrolling its top flap. A second compartment can accommodate up to a 15-inch notebook. Weatherproof denier on the outside and waterproof truck tarpaulin lining the inside keeps everything safe from the elements, and a large reflective panel on the back will ensure that motor-vehicle drivers see you at night.
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(go.pcworld.com/rebelt41) If you just want to snap images of Sunday brunch, please use your smartphone. But if your ambitions veer toward serious photography, the Canon Rebel T4i oers a wealth of advanced DSLR features at an aordable price. The 18-megapixel sensor oers great image quality, and the camera itself has a revamped autofocus system and an articulating touchscreen, along with a raft of features for video recordingespecially if you purchase an optional imagestabilized, stepping motor lens.

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HIGHER-

T H A N -AV E R AG E Q UA L I T Y AT A N I C E P R I C E.

32.
Candy Crush Saga

31.

HP Chromebook 14

(go.pcworld.com/ chromebook14) Most Chromebooks are small, clackety machines that are designed to hit a price pointand the results are usually disappointing. Not the Chromebook 14, if only thanks to its generous 14-inch display. But the machine also includes two USB 3.0 ports, 802.11a/b/g/n Wi-Fi, a Haswell-class CPU and a 16GB SSD. Most importantly, it just feels less cheesy than most other Chromebooks, from its cheerful color scheme to its overall solid build. This is one of the few Chromebooks you might actually enjoy using, and its not that much more expensive than the others.
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(go.pcworld.com/ candycrush) We dont typically play games that look like they were designed for ve-year-olds. Nor do we appreciate constant harassment from Facebook friends begging for extra lives. But if you can put aside the games treacly aesthetic and hectoring social media component, youll nd true puzzle-game addictionin the best possible way. Candy Crush Saga has become a cultural phenomenonand with just slight embarrassment, well confess were hooked.

(go.pcworld.com/ knomokobe) Yeah, thats right. A laptop bag made our list. And if you ever get the chance to see (and touch) the Kobe in person, youll see why. The bag is sophisticated yet not exceedingly showy. Its design works for both men and women. And its leather chassis is supple and soft. The Kobe is large enough for 15-inch notebooks, and has just the right amount of pouches, pockets, and zipped compartments to handle your sundry mobile accessories. Yes, its $325. But when compiling our top-50 list, we just couldnt bear to part with the Kobe.

33.

Knomo Kobe

34.

Google Chromebook Pixel

(go.pcworld.com/chromebookpixel) To think that Google would dare to design a machine so lavishly appointed, and so freaking expensive, just for the Chrome OS. The plan worked, though, as the Pixel is indeed a wonderful ambassador for Googles vision of a browser-based future. With its Retina-class, 2560-by-1700-pixel touchscreen and burnished aluminum case, the Pixel is a stunning piece of industrial design. And it also succeeded in getting people talking about the Chrome OS again. Dont ask the Pixel to be practical. It isnt. But if youre a Chrome OS supporter (as many of us are), its the top notebook in your fleet.

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(go.pcworld.com/ intelnuckit) Intels NUC (Next Unit of Computing) system oers endless possibilities. Shipped in kit formbring your own memory, storage, Wi-Fi adapter, and operating systemthis diminutive and super-quiet computer would make a fantastic home-theater PC, but you could also bolt it to the back of a monitor and create your own all-in-one. The D54250WYK model we reviewed is equipped with a dual-core Core i5 processor, strong integrated graphics, gigabit ethernet, and both Mini HDMI and DisplayPort video connections. This secondgeneration NUC packs a powerful punch.

35.

Intel NUC Kit

36.

Roccat Ryos MK Pro Gaming Keyboard

(go.pcworld.com/roccatryos) We see a ton of gaming keyboards every year, and some are very good. But a keyboard has to be fantastic to make our best-products list, and the Roccat Ryos MK Pro ts that description to an inverted T. Roccat took its already ne Isku FX keyboard and added mechanical switches. You can program each individual key to perform a custom function, and you can plug your headsetUSB or analog directly into the keyboard, so you'll never need to perform a reach-around on your PC.

s FRONT VIEW BACK VIEW

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ULTRABOOK

37.

DELIVERS SOLID S P ECS A N D G O O D VA LU E.

Acer Aspire V7 Ultrabook

(go. pcworld.com/aspirev7ultra) Think of the Acer Aspire V7 as the Ultrabook for the masses. Despite measuring just 0.83 inch thick, it tips the scales at 4.7 pounds and looks downright corpulent compared to Sonys chic VAIO Pro 13. But Acers machine packs a faster processor, a larger display, more memory and storage, and a discrete graphics processor at a street price thats several hundred dollars lower than Sonys. No one would describe the Aspire V7 as the ultimate Ultrabook, but it ts Intels denition and is a great value.

(go.pcworld.com/ samsunghm3300) For those regrettable (and hopefully rare) occasions when you have to be that personthat person who walks around town with a Bluetooth headsetyou can help alleviate some of your misery by donning Samsungs HM3300. It quickly pairs with your phone via NFC, comes with a variety of earpiece covers, and (most importantly) provides crisp, natural call quality. It even does an admirable job of blocking out wind noise.
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38.

Samsung HM3300

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40.
NEC MultiSync EA294WMi

SteelSeries Siberia Elite

(go.pcworld.com/steelsiberia) For gamers, being able to hear an enemy is even more important than being able to see one, because making a full frontal assault is tantamount to suicide. Thats why gaming headsets have become such an critical tool in the gamers kit. And the SteelSeries Siberia Elite headset is among the very best. Where most manufacturers place the volume/mute controls on tiny buttons in-line with the USB cable, SteelSeries puts them on an easy-to-manipulate wheel on the earmu itself. These comfy earmus sound fantastic and look even better.

(go.pcworld.com/ multisyncea294) We reviewed several wide-aspect ratio monitors this year, but nothing topped NECs MultiSync EA294WMi. Not only is this monster display 29 inches wide (with a native resolution of 2560 by 1080 pixels), but the IPS panel can pivot into portrait mode to give you a skyscraper-tall view. Its just the ticket for editing vertically oriented photographs and viewing websites and very long documents. The MultiSync delivers outstanding picture quality, and its outtted with nearly every input you can think of (including Mobile HighDenition Link, for connecting an Android device to the monitors HDMI port).

39.

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41.
CONTROL
THIS CO LO R F U L RO B OT BA L L W I T H YO U R P H O N E.

Asus Transformer Book T100

(go.pcworld. com/asustransformert100) Oering decent performance and great battery life, Intels Bay Trail CPUs occupy a sweet spot in the mobile marketand one of our favorite Bay Trail PCs of 2013 is the Transformer Book T100. Slap on the keyboard attachment, and this 10-inch Windows tablet becomes a formidable laptop with surprising speed, 11 hours of battery life, and a low price. Hand it to Asus for undercutting competitors on price while still oering great build quality, specs, and features.

(go.pcworld.com/sphero2) The Sphero 2.0 is a robot ball you control with a smartphone app. Its motor can push it at speeds up to about 5 miles per hour. Improve your navigation skills, and youll earn level-up rewardssuch as extra speed, or Rainbow Drive, which makes the ball glow in dierent colors at full brightness. One third-party app lets you use the Sphero to practice your golf swing; others tap into augmented reality.

42.

Sphero 2.0

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43.

Office 365 Home Premium

44.

Razer Ouroboros

(go.pcworld. com/ocehomepremium) Microsoft Oce is nothing new but Oce as a service is. Oce 365 Home Premium lets you subscribe to the productivity suite for $10 per month or $100 per year. While the stand-alone (and pricey) Oce 2013 software works only on a single machine, an Oce 365 subscription gives you the right to install the fullblown Oce Professional 2013 suite on up to ve PCs and Macs, plus ve Android or Apple phones. Oce 365 also includes synced settings and les, instant updates, Oce on Demand, 20GB of additional SkyDrive space, and 60 monthly Skype international minutes. Sure, you might not own Oce 365 the way you do Oce 2013 proper, but thats still one sweet deal.
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(go.pcworld.com/ razermouse) There are plenty of great gaming mice on the market, but precious few of them accommodate the needs of southpaw gamers. With its Ouroboros gaming mouse, Razer proves that designing an ambidextrous mouseand a wireless one at thatrequires no serious compromises. Besides looking gorgeous, the Ouroboros is completely customizable, physically and functionally, and its incredibly responsive and accurate (gaming purists can plug in its USB cable if theyre afraid of lag, but we didnt experience any).

(go.pcworld. com/qnapt469) Most NAS (network-attached storage) boxes are relatively dumb storage devices that wind up hidden in a closet. Once theyre congured and connected to a network and then mapped to all the PCs, theyre quickly forgotten. Not so the QNAP TS-469 Pro. Its one of the fastest NAS boxes weve tested. And whereas most NAS boxes have a crude graphical user interface, QNAPs uses an implementation of XBMC (an opensource, cross-platform media player and entertainment hub). While the TS-469 Pro resides on your network (it wouldnt be a NAS box if it didnt), it also features an HDMI port and an infrared receiver, giving you the option of plugging it straight into your HDTV and controlling it directly using QNAPs (optional) IR remote or the companys free Qremote apps for Android and iOS.

45.

QNAP TS-469 Pro

46.

Netatmo Weather Station

(go.pcworld.com/neatatmo) Purchasing a weather station is often a sign of impending old age. Its like taking a sudden, unexplained interest in canasta. But Netatmos take on weather stations is so modern, so high tech, you can buy it without concern. Its industrial design is sleek and modern, and you can view various indoor and outdoor weather conditions (temperatures, barometric pressure, and air quality, among other metrics) on a smartphone app. You can even share your readings on social media. Yes, so very, very modern.
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47.
AIRPLAY SPEAKER

Toshiba Qosmio X75 A7298

(go.pcworld. com/qosmiox75rev) When designing a desktop replacement, most manufacturers throw weight considerations out the window. Not Toshiba. With the Qosmio X75 A7298, Toshibas engineers pack a 17.3-inch display, a Haswell-class Core i7 CPU, 16GB of memory, a 256GB SSD, a 1TB hard drive, and a Blu-ray burner into an aluminum chassis to produce a benchmark-busting laptop that weighs just over 7 pounds. If youre into gaming or content creation, and you want to do it anywhere you happen to be, the Qosmio X75 is the laptop to buy.

IS PRICEY B U T S O U N DS A N D LO O KS A M A Z I N G.

(go.pcworld.com/z1airplay) If youre in the market for an AirPlay speaker, dont audition the $400 Bowers & Wilkins Z2 unless youre prepared to buy one. After you hear it, you wont want anything less. The Z2 looks beautiful and sounds even better. In addition to supporting Apples AirPlay wireless music-streaming technology, the Z2 has a Lightning connector so you can attach your newer iPhone or iPod directly to the speaker. Dual 20-watt ampliers power a pair of 3.5-inch full-range speakers that deliver exceptional clarity and terric bass response. We havent heard anything better in this price range.
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48.

B&W Z2

49.

Withings WS-30 Bathroom Scale

WEIGHT
A N D F I T N ESS T R AC K I N G AT H OM E AND ON T H E G O.

(go.pcworld.com/ws30scale) Besides being a sturdy, high-end scale that reports your weight and body mass index in real time, the WS-30 can connect with a smartphone app over Wi-Fi or Bluetooth to help you track your vital measurements over the long haul. It can automatically recognize up to eight family members to make sure the right data is pushed to the right mobile app. But most of all, we love how the WS-30 syncs with partner apps. For example, you can see your weight and body mass numbers directly in Jawbones UP wristband app (go.pcworld.com/jbup). Anyone down for a quantied sele?

(go.pcworld.com/galaxynote3) The Note 3 may sport a laughably gargantuan 5.7inch screen, but all that real estate is useful, the smartphone oers great battery life, and the included S-Pen stylus is handy if you like taking longhand notes. A 2.3GHz processor and 3GB of RAM help power this device. It practically eliminates the need for a 7-inch tablet. The more we use massive smartphones, the more we like them. And the Note 3 is pretty much the best tablet phone around.
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50.

Samsung Galaxy Note 3

25 Windows 8.1
Tiles. Files. Apps and Snaps. The update is jam-packed with little things that add up to a big improvement over Windows 8.
By Brad Chacos
ILLUSTRATION BY JAMES PROVOST
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hidden features in

ts the little things that count.

And thats denitely the case with Windows 8.1. Even after covering the operating system updates best new features (go.pcworld.com/81best), its ve most compelling improvements (go. pcworld.com/81compelling), and its most intriguing secrets (go.pcworld. com/81secrets), weve found that it still holds plenty to discover. And the OS doesnt actively point you to some of the cooler things it has on tap. No more! Discover a universe of hidden extras that range from the mundane to the mind-blowing. You could spend hours scrounging for them allor you could just read this article. Enjoy.
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Windows 8.1 hidden features

The SkyDrive app: A modern File Explorer

SkyDrive knits itself thoroughly into Windows 8.1, as evidenced by the invitation to save all your photos and les to the cloud once you install the OS update, and SkyDrives prominent spot in the desktop File Explorer. Microsofts cloud service lls the much-needed role of a modern-UI File Explorer in Windows 8.1 as well, allowing you to browse your les from the nger-friendly interface.

Look, Ma, no hands

One of Windows 8.1s coolest tricks is buried deep in the new Food & Drink app. The app is chock-full of recipes for all sorts of delectable goodies, but touchscreens and foodstus dont mix so well. Enter hands-free mode. In hands-free mode, simply waving your sauce-stained hand in front of your devices webcam flips through the steps of the recipe. Your touchscreen stays clean, your food gets cooked, and the whole thing is so novel (yet practical) that it feels like magic.

How to browse your les in SkyDrive: Simply open the SkyDrive app, click the big SkyDrive name at the top of the screen, and then select This PC from the dropdown menu.

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One app, many windows

The ability to dynamically readjust the Snap ratio of multiple apps opened side by side is a small yet major improvement in Windows 8.1, but one of its auxiliary features isnt getting much airtime. Windows 8 allowed you to have only one modern app open in a single window at a time; you couldnt, for example, snap two dierent instances of Internet Explorer next to each other. Now you can in Windows 8.1at least with Internet Explorer 11, the app that needs those capabilities the most. You cant just snap the app to one side and open it again, though.

How to snap in IE 11: Press and hold or rightclick a link, and then select Open tab in new window from the context menu. Other apps dont appear to oer multiple-window capabilities, alas.

IE 11 Reading View
Internet Explorer 11 is one of the slickest touchfriendly browsers around, and buried within it is a setting that makes browsing the Web even more pleasant: Reading View. This mode strips the clutter (as well as the ads) from the article youre reading and presents the information in an attractive, horizontally scrolling format.
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How to enable Reading View: Just click the open-book icon on the right side of IE 11s address bar. Shown here is a PCWorld.com article displayed in standard view (left), and the same article in IE 11s Reading View (right). Yummy.

Windows 8.1 hidden features

How to turn on auto updates: Launch the Windows Store, open the Settings charm, and select App Updates. Ensure that Automatically update my apps is set to Yes. Voil!

Automatic app updates

Windows 8 required you to dive into the Windows Store and manually update all your modern apps. Windows 8.1 handles the busywork in the backgroundif you activate the option.

Restarting apps
In Windows 8, dragging apps down o the bottom of the screen closed them. In Windows 8.1, it only hides themthe app continues to run in the background.

How to restart an app completely: Drag it down until just the top half of it is peeking up from the bottom of the screen. Hold it there, and after a few seconds youll see the tile spin around to show the apps icon. Reboot complete!

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Major Mail tweaks

Plus: Another small yet crucial addition to the Mail app gives you the ability to drag and drop mail to other folders. Finally.

Microsoft tweaked Windows 8.1s Mail app far more than any other native app, and the beauty here is more than skindeep. Clicking hyperlinks in Mail automatically opens the page in a snapped version of Internet Explorer 11, allowing you to browse the site without leaving your inbox (assuming that IE is set as the default browser and can run in the modern environment, that is). Its a small change, but a huge boost in usability.

Batch app-editing tools

Tinkering with apps and live tiles in Windows 8 was an exercise in tedium: You had to delete or resize apps manually, one by one. In Windows 8.1, entering the Start screens Customize mode (right-click an empty part of the Start screen, and then select Customize in the bar that appears at the bottom) allows you to select several apps simultaneously and then move or resize their tilesor uninstall the Bonus hidden feature: Speaking of live tiles, did you notice the new apps completelyen masse. Small and Wide resizing options? To see additional controls, open the Search and apps section in the modern PC Settings and then navigate to the App Sizes menu. There you can see how much space each app is chewing up and delete any hogs if desired. Huzzah!
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Windows 8.1 hidden features

Apps available directly on the lock screen

Some new features are available right when you start Windows 8.1. For example, you can now access the Camera app directly from the lock screen, for those times when you need to take a snapshot lickety-split. It wont mean much to proper-PC users, but its a helpful touch for early adoptees of Windows 8 or Windows RT tablets.

How to add items to a library: Right-click the library and click Properties u Add From there you can integrate additional folders.

Library support for removable media

Yep, Windows 8.1 disables libraries by default, though you can easily turn them back on (go.pcworld.com/win81libraries). But dont stop there. Libraries in Windows 8.1 now allow you to include locations on removable storagesomething you couldnt do in Windows 8 vanilla. That matters because Windows 8.1 ships on numerous laptops, hybrids, and tablets with space-limited flash storage or solidstate drives. If you plan on watching videos on your Windows tablet, for example, a removable thumb drive is virtually a musthave. Thanks to the Windows 8.1 tweak, you can now have the flicks that are stored on your thumb drive appear in your Videos library when its connected.

Thats not the only change: You can now answer Skype calls and messages straight from the splash screen, too.

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Camera app improvements

Extra feature: The Camera app packs a BlackBerry 10esque Photo Loop, which takes a bunch of pictures in rapid succession and then lets you choose the best ones to keep.

The tweaks continue once you open the Camera app, which can now take panoramas in the style of Microsofts Photosynth app (shown at left)though the feature isnt supported on all hardware, even if you have a webcam (see go.pcworld.com/ panorama). An icon will appear if your device is compatible.

Silent notications
With Windows 8, Microsoft mashed disparate desktop and mobile elements into a singular whole. One of those mobile elements is app notications, which pop up with a sound. In standard use, notications are pretty wonderful (though a discrete notication center would be nice). But if youre using a tablet or if you leave your PC on 24/7, those subtle chimes can become an ongoing annoyance. Rejoice! Windows 8.1 adds a Quiet Hours setting that lets you silence notications (and calls, optionally) during specic times of the day.
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How to use Quiet Hours: Open the Settings charm, click Change PC Settings u Search and apps u Notications, and scroll down a bit.

Windows 8.1 hidden features

Secret desktop shutdown

Sure, you can eradicate the modern UI (go. pcworld.com/ wipemetro) if you like, but shutting down requires a jaunt into the charm bar, right? Wrong.

How to shut down your PC from the desktop: Rightclick the returned Start button to bring up a hidden power menu, and then hover over Shut down or sign out to bring up log-o options.

Secret desktop bliss

Speaking of the desktop, right-click your taskbar, select Properties, and open the Navigation taba new addition to Windows 8.1. Inside, youll discover a bounty of tools with a prodesktop bent that will let you disable some hot corners, boot directly to the desktop, and more.
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All Apps sorting

One hidden desktop option (as mentioned on the previous page) is to launch the All Apps screen, rather than the modern Start screen, when you click the desktops Start button. In the 8.1 update, you can also open the All Apps screen either by clicking the small arrow in the lower-left corner of the tiled Start screen or by swiping up on a touchscreen device. The All Apps screen itself sports a much-needed makeover in Windows 8.1.

Finagling with Photos

The Photos app may have lost its Facebook and Flickr integration, but it has gained a handful of basic image-editing tools. Its no Photoshop, but youre now able to crop images, adjust the focus and color, and add numerous eects from within the app itself.

About the revamped Apps: A static list in Windows 8, the Windows 8.1 iteration lets you sort apps by name, date installed, most used, or category. The secret taskbar menu mentioned previously lets you have desktop programs appear rst on the list.

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Windows 8.1 hidden features

Miracast wireless display support

You can wirelessly beam your modern-style apps to a discrete displaybut only if your Windows 8.1 device supports the nascent Miracast standard (go.pcworld.com/miracast), and if the receiving display does as well. The Surface Pro supports Miracast; you can also buy set-top boxes that support the standard, such as the Netgear Push2TV (go.pcworld.com/push2tv).

For more details: WithinWindows (go.pcworld.com/within) explains how to get rolling with wireless display support. For most people, though, this is a Windows feature that will remain hidden until Miracast gets wider support.

The cutting edge of printing

In another bout of futureproong, Microsoft built robust 3D-printing support into Windows 8.1 (go.pcworld.com/ win3dprint), so printing real things will be as seamless as printing on paper. And even if youre stuck in two dimensions, Microsoft is pushing the bleeding edge of printer tech: Windows 8.1 supports NFC tap-to-print and Wi-Fi Direct printing. Who needs local networks?
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New (and super) sync settings

SkyDrive was a big deal in Windows 8, but its an integral part of Windows 8.1s vision for One Windows across many devices. Great new cross-device syncing options abound in Windows 8.1, including the ability to sync your app list, your Start screen layout, and even your IE 11 tabs.

How to nd the settings: Open the PC Settings section in the Settings charm, and go to SkyDrive u Sync settings for granular cloudbased options galore.

Systemwide wallpaper
One of Windows 8s biggest problems lies How to set the Start screen in its very nature: The background: If your OS desktop and modern UI didnt do so when you feel like two warring updated from Windows 8, open the charm bar while operating systems on the Start screen. Go to battling for your Settings u Personalize, and attention, rather than a select your wallpaper from single, cohesive whole. the list of backgrounds. The core experience remains the same in Windows 8.1, but the tweaked OS is packed with renements to make the two environments play nicer with each other, includingyes!the ability to use your desktop wallpaper as your Start screen background. (How was that not included from the get-go?)
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Windows 8.1 hidden features

How to share: Open the Share charm, and click the name of the app youre using. Select Screenshot from the drop-down menu, and click the name of the app you want to use to share the image.

Built-in screenshot sharing

This small Windows 8.1 addition is a big boon for tech journalists or anyone else who needs to share something thats happening on their screen with colleagues or pals.

Lock-screen slideshow
Sick of the static appearance of Windows 8.1s lock screen? Turn your monitor into a digital picture frame by diving into the Settings charm and heading to Change PC Settings u Lockscreen. Enable Play a slide show on the lock screen, and a wealth of options will crop up.
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Default device encryption

Like Windows RT, Windows 8.1 now encrypts your storage drivemaybe. While all Windows RT tablets support encryption, few PCs are likely to be compatible with Windows 8.1s feature. To support it, your PC needs to have ticked a laundry list of notvery-common checkboxes: Secure Boot support, Trusted Platform Module 2.0, and Connected Standby (which has obscure requirements of its own; see go.pcworld. com/standby). How to nd device encryption: Head to PC If your PC supports all and devices u PC info. If that, youll nd device your hardware gets the encryption within the seal of approval, youll PC Settings section of see a device-encryption the Settings charm.
How to share your connection: Open PC Settings in the Settings charm, and browse to Network u Connections. Select your mobile network, and slide Share this connection to On. (The option wont appear if the connection isnt a mobile one.)

Broadband tethering
Windows 8.1s embrace of the mobile lifestyle extends beyond the touch-friendly modern UI. If youre using a PC or tablet that includes mobile broadbandthe Asus VivoTab with LTE, for example, or the Nokia Lumia 2520you can congure the device to function as a Wi-Fi hotspot and share your connection with up to ten other devices.

option. (The PC we used for the screenshot here doesnt, even though it has a highend Ivy Bridge Core i5 CPU and an SSD. If it did, Device encryption would be underneath Change product key.)

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10Great Games

Games
FOR UNDERPOWERED, OLD PCs
BY A L E X CO C I LOVA I L L U S T R AT I O N BY B E NJA M I N WA C H E NJE

10Great

134

ven if you have a computer from the Paleolithic Era, you can still enjoy a hearty helping of fun games. Check out this collection that will keep you playing for hours without giving your PC a stress-induced heart attack. So lets get started! (For a list of links to all the games, see the nal page.)

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10Great Games

Atom Zombie Smasher

The enemies might appear as harmless, purple dots, but theyre actually deadly foes. Evacuate civilians before they come into contact with the zombies and transform into monsters. The more you save, the higher your score.

136

Terraria

Craft tools to chop trees, gather materials to construct elaborate structures, and wield weapons to fight monstrous hordes. With access to everything from bombs to magic attacks, you could play for a year and still be surprised.

137

10Great Games

3
Hotline Miami

Violent and bloody, this game plays like some gangsters demented dream set in the mid1980s. You get to don a mask that gives you special abilities, run into hostile situations, and finish off anything that moves.

138

4
Gunpoint

Being a spy for hire can be a messy businessand its twice as bad when you play a double agent. You decide whom to help, and the story has plenty of branching paths that lead to different outcomes.

139

10Great Games

5
To the Moon

This is a beautiful, sad, and moving account of fulfilling a dying mans last wish to visit the moon. Music, dialogue, and story create a memorable package that youll feel in your gut long after the game ends.

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Torchlight II

Choose a class and delve into dungeons to uncover the source of paranormal events. Kill monsters and level up for awesome abilities. The game scales well, but it also looks great at lower settings.

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10Great Games

Fez

This game is extremely demanding on your mind. Take a trip through a world that seems two-dimensional until you don a magical fez that lets you spin the environment 90 degrees for a whole new perspective.

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FTL: Faster Than Light

8
Take the helm in this game full of distress signals, asteroid fields, and space pirates. Youre on the run with vital info to defeat the rebel fleet and your decisions will determine whether you arrive safely or get blasted into space dust.

143

10Great Games

9
Braid

Time is both your enemy and weapon in this game: It creates puzzles that hinder your progress, but it also keeps you alive. Bend it to your will to save the princess, trapped by a monster. The art, music, and puzzles are superb.

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10
Super Meat Boy

Delve into this story about a boy of meat who embarks on a quest to save his love, Bandage Girl. Many dangerous obstacles face our tenderized hero, and split-second maneuvers and precision are required to succeed.

145

10Great Games

BONUS

Good Old Games

Once you run out of games to play on your crummy PC, dive deep into the gold mine of PC gaming history at GOG.com, a digital distributor of classic games. GOG has an impressive collection of games at unbeatable prices.

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Old PCs Rejoice

R E V E L I N S O M E O F T H E B E S T P C G A M E S.

Atom Zombie Smasher

$15, blendogames.com

Torchlight II
$20, torchlight2game.com

Terraria
$10, terraria.org

Fez
$10, polytroncorporation.com

Hotline Miami
$10, hotlinemiami.com

FTL: Faster Than Light

$10, ftlgame.com

Gunpoint
$10, gunpointgame.com

Braid
$10, braid-game.com

To the Moon
$10, freebirdgames.com

Super Meat Boy

$15, supermeatboy.com

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MacMania 17
British Isles, June 13th 23rd, 2014

Greenock (Glasgow) Dublin Dunmore East (Waterford) IRELAND Cobh (Cork)

Liverpool Holyhead
UNITED KINGDOM

HARWICH

St. Peter Port

FRANCE

Le Havre (Paris/Normandy)

I n s i g h t C r u i s e s . c o m / M a c -17

Cruise prices vary from $1,649 for an Interior Stateroom to $6,499 for a Royal Suite, per person. Port charges are $299. Gratuities are $150 per person. Cruise pricing is subject to change.

JOE KISSELL

When the Chip Hits the Fan Think Like a Mac Geek
DON McALLISTER
Your Life!

10 Alfred Workflows That Will Change Incredible Apps for iPhones and iPads
BEBO WHITE

Explore the distinctive cultures of the British Isles Join MacMania as we explore the green landscapes and ancient traditions of England, Ireland, Scotland, and Wales. Connect with friends aboard the Celebrity Innity roundtrip Harwich, England June 1323, 2014. Juicy chunks of info Mastering the iPad, digital photography, security, disaster recovery, & the cloud. Visit the Beatles hometown! Relax amidst the British Isles timeless atmosphere. Questions? Contact Concierge@Insight Cruises.com. We hope to welcome you aboard!

www.InsightCruises.com/Mac-17
CO - P R O D U C E D B Y:

SEMINARS
The conference fee is $1,275 and includes fourteen (14) 60- to 90-minute seminars. Seminars are only offered when were at sea between the hours of 8:30am and 7:30pm.
TM

Big Data and Open Data The Real Future of Online Social Media
on Education

BOB LeVITUS

For a full listing of seminars visit InsightCruises.com/Mac17-seminars DERRICK STORY

Master Your iPad Master Your iPhone

CHRIS MARQUARDT

Concierge@InsightCruises.com

iPad for Digital Photographers Using Aperture and iPhoto Together

Photo 101 Photo 201

Optional Tours
HAMPTON COURT AND WINDSOR CASTLE
Pre-Cruise: June 10 ( 199) Join us visiting two timeless treasures in a day designed to bring British history to life. Enhance your

knowledge of Britains history with an idyllic day trip to Windsor Castle and Hampton Court Palace. They are related yet differing demonstrations of British monarchy, nationhood, and domesticity. Its good to be Queen, and the evidence is all about you at 1,000 year old Windsor Castle. Rubens, Rembrandt, and a remarkable collection of fine art envelope you in history rich STONEHENGE AND BATH chambers and corridors. Go behind the scenes at the legendary seat of the House of Windsor. Pre-Cruise: June 11 ( 199) Mute, mysterious, and megalithic, Stonehenge calls to us Hampton Court (also known as King Henry across the millennia. VIIIs summer palace) is a place of royal pasPeople are drawn to Bath to see its honeysions and competing interests. Pomp and consequence, subterfuge and service inform colored Bath limestone buildings, and to explore its 2,000 year history as a place of the history of the palace. relaxation and restoration.
CST# 2065380-40

THE ROYAL OBSERVATORY AND THE CHURCHILL WAR ROOM/MUSEUM

Pre-Cruise: June 12 ( 199) Courage, duty, shared sacrifice, and conviction are the foundation of the Churchill Cabinet War Rooms. Hidden in plain sight in the heart of London, a scant 600 miles from Berlin. See the Royal Observatory and master the lingo of time UT0, UT1, UTC, and GMT. Stand astride two hemisperes on the Prime Meridian, a moment sure to be recorded on your timeline.

HERES HOW
150 When Windows breaks: How to x it, piece by piece 159 Make your tablet your main computer 165 How to edit GIFs without resorting to Photoshop 168 Answer Line: How to set up two monitors

CONTENTS

170 Speed up a slow PC without buying new hardware 173 Bring back Libraries in Windows 8.1

149

How to build, maintain, and x your tech gear.

HERES HOW

When Windows breaks: How to x it, piece by piece

I L LU ST R AT I O N BY JO H N U E L A N D

Your browser goes bonkers! Your rewall freaks out! No worries: Windows can repair many problems itself. Heres how. BY BRAD CHACOS

INDOWS IS SO CUSTOMIZABLE that you have endless opportunities to tinker. Dont like Internet Explorers default feel? Change the settings! Hate the way Windows 8s Ribbon UI looks? Tweak away! And if youre feeling truly adventurous, you can make a multitude of
150

personalized alterations within the easy-to-bork Windows Registry. Unfortunately, all that freedom has a dangerous downside: You can really mess things upincluding some vital things. But dont abandon your dreams of total customization. Microsoft has built a slew of granular controls into Windows that let you reset all sorts of operating-system features. And usually you wont have to resort to using a clean install sledgehammer to obliterate an irritating fly! Read this before you decide to pound your installation into the ground and start all over.
The fateful Reset Internet Explorer Settings box takes you back to square one.

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Revert to default IE settings

The Internet Explorer browser is more likely than any other part of Windows to suer from excessive tinkeringespecially if you tend to install lots of free software. All too often, such apps come bundled with tacked-on toolbars and settings that hijack your homepage. If you trash the desktop version of your browser beyond repair, click the gear icon on the right side of the IE toolbar and select Internet Options. In the resulting window, open the Advanced tab and click the Reset button at the bottom of the screen. Decide whether youd also like to clear personal settings (such as your homepage), and then click Reset once more to blast your browser back to its origins.

Enable File History

If youve made the jump to Windows 8 or Windows 8.1, Microsofts insurance extends beyond the system itself to protect your personal lesif you enable the OSs new File History feature. File History periodically backs up your Windows Libraries, desktop, contacts, and favorites folders to an external drive, network drive, or other storage location that isnt the primary Windows drive. By default, the feature saves once per hour. Even better, File History stores each save as a dierent version, so you can jump back multiple steps to restore your les to an older, pre-problem state.
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File History wont work unless you have some sort of auxiliary drive connected to your PC.

HERES HOW

Wiping the slate clean on a messed-up Library is so easy that Windows wont even ask if youre sure about wiping the Library associations.

To enable File History, rst connect another drive to your system; then head to Control Panel u System and Security u File History to set it up. Youll nd a list of advanced options in the left menu pane. This otherwise awesome feature comes with some important caveats, howevermost of them stemming from its reliance on Libraries. (Why no SkyDrive backup option, Microsoft?) First, because Windows 8.1 hides Libraries by default, youll need to reenable them. Also, if you want to save a folder that isnt part of one of the default Windows Libraries, you can add it to one. To do so, right-click the Library that you want to absorb the folder (Documents, Music, or whatever) and select Properties u Add...; then point the system to your chosen location.

Reset your Libraries

If you inadvertently turn your Libraries into a cluttered mess in the course of enabling File History, you can wipe the slate clean by right-clicking the Libraries listing in Windows File Explorer and selecting Restore default libraries. You can also restore an individual Library to its pristine state by right-clicking it, selecting Properties,
153

and then clicking the Restore defaults button at the bottom of the window. Alternatively, just click the Restore settings button that appears in the Manage tab of Windows 8s Ribbon UI when youre looking at a Library in the File Explorer. Be warned, though: Windows doesnt ask you to conrm that youre sure about your decision to reboot a Library, so dont click that button unless youre committed to action.

Reset the Ribbon UI

The Ribbon UI in Windows 8s File Explorer is much more customizable than the traditional le menus found in Windows 7 and earlier. As with many of Windows other forays into flexibility, though, wiping the slate clean is almost too easy. Open Windows File Explorer in the desktop, browse to the View tab, and click the Options button on the right side of the Ribbon menu. Each of the three tabs hidden within the resulting Folder Options window contains its own Restore defaults button, and each of those buttons does exactly what youd expect it to. Once again, theres no turning back once you click that button.
154

Recover disabled system icons and their default behaviors here.

HERES HOW

Reset the taskbar and Start menu

The Windows taskbar provides at-a-glance information about your open programs and pops up system notications as necessary. Nevertheless, you can mute or hide individual software in the taskbar and system tray to cut down on the cacophony if you wish. If you decide later that your decluttering operation has gone too far, and that youve hidden too much, you can selectively undo the overcleanup: Right-click an empty section of the taskbar and select Properties. Open the Taskbar tab, and click the Customize button. Below the scrolling list of options is the blue link youre looking for: Restore default icon behaviors. Click it. While youre poking around the taskbar properties, you can restore the Start Menus defaults (if youre using Windows 7 or another version of Windows that still has the Start Menu). In Windows 7 or earlier, open the Start Menu tab, click the Customize button, and press the Use default settings button at the bottom of the Customize Start Menu pop-up that appears.

The reset button for Windows Firewall is labeled Restore defaults.

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Mr. Microsoft, tear down this rewall!

Firewalls are nicky. If you accidentally block a needed program (or accidentally let a malicious program in), connectivity havoc can ensue. Microsofts baked-in Windows Firewall is as user-friendly as a rewall can be; but it, too, has a reset button in case everything suddenly goes pear-shaped. Head to Control Panel u System and Security u Windows Firewall, and click Restore defaults in the left pane. Conrm that you want to do so, and poof: Your rewall will revert to its stock setup.

Restore all system settings

The venerable System Restore lets you return your PC to a previous, workable state if your computers system les and programs go wonky. (It doesnt aect personal les.) Windows System Restore automatically creates restore points once per week, as well as whenever you install a new app or software update. To create a snapshot of your system manuallybefore you attempt to install a crucial system upgrade, for examplehead to Control Panel u System and Security u System, and then select System
156

In System Properties, the buttons of special interest are System Restore and Create.

HERES HOW

Protection in the left pane. Click the Create button at the bottom, and the operating system instantly generates a new restore point. If you ever need to use of the feature, head to the same place and click the System Restore... button. A wizard will walk you through the straightforward procedure from there.

Refresh and reset

Among Windows 8s more dramatic features are new Refresh and Reset options that restore aspects of Windows to their native state. Refresh is the kinder, gentler option of the two. It wont touch your personal les, but it will thoroughly wipe everything else o the books. Customized settings, downloaded apps, desktop programs, you name itall vanish, replaced by the stock settings and apps that originally shipped with your PC. But watch out: Any personal les stored in your PCs Program Files folders will be obliterated, too. Reset is the nuclear option, the tool of last resort. Kill your
System Restore lets you undo the your PCs most recent update or installation.

157

customized setup, raze it, clean-install it into the ground. When you press Reset, everything youve installed, created, or changed on your computer disappears, replaced by a factory-fresh Windows installation. Make sure that youve backed up your important les before you venture upon taking this unforgiving step! If you nd that youve broken or cluttered your operating system to an appropriately dire level, seek out the Refresh and Reset options in Windows 8s Settings charm. Open it, click Change PC Settings at the bottom, and in Windows 8s PC Settings menu select General (in Windows 8.1, Update and recovery u Recovery). Back up your data, kiss your kids, and select the option youd like to use.

Go forth and tinker

Now that you know all the ways Windows has your back, you can let loose. Install dazzling, incredibly useful desktop programs! Excise annoying PC irritations! Hack your Registry to make Windows leaner, meaner, and faster than ever before! Even if you wreck things completely, restored sanity is just a reset button away.

The Groundhog Day option is in the Update and recovery window: Select Recovery, and take action.

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HERES HOW

With the right apps, a tablet can do many tasks that a laptop can.

Make your tablet your main computer

BY RICK BROIDA THE LAPTOP KILLER of tablets has yet to emerge, but you can
P H OTO G R A P H Y BY M I C H A E L H OM N I C K

congure a powerful enough slate to let you retire your laptop. Microsofts Surface 2 (go.pcworld.com/surface2rev) and Surface Pro 2 (go.pcworld.com/surfacepro2) tablets work natively with the Oce productivity suite, which comes free with every Surface 2 and is also available for the Surface Pro 2. Both have roomy, 10.6-inch displays. Add a Touch or Type Cover, and you have a ne hybrid device. People who own iOS and Android tablets have other productivity options, aside from Oce. If you equip your tablet with the right apps and accessories, it just might replace a conventional laptop.
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Pick your tablet

Two great tablet choices are Apples iPad and Googles Nexus 10 (go. pcworld.com/nexus10). The latter has a slightly larger screen, built-in near-eld communication, and a lower starting price ($399 for a 16GB model, or $499 for 32GB). The iPad starts at $499 with 16GB of storage. But the new iPad Air (go.pcworld.com/ipadair) weighs just 1 pound to the Nexus 10s 1.3 pounds, and all models oer optional 4G LTEa huge perk for frequent travelers, and a feature that most laptops lack. Working on a tablet does involve some compromises, starting with a smaller screen. A full-size iPad gives you just 9.7 inches of work area (measured diagonally), while Googles Nexus 10 aords 10.0 inches. Thats much less space than you get with even a 13.3-inch laptop. But the iPad and the Nexus oer sky-high screen resolutions: 2048 by 1536 pixels on the iPad 3 and later, and 2560 by 1600 pixels on the Nexus 10. The Nexus 10 supports USB On-the-Go for attaching a wired keyboard

Googles Nexus 10 can connect to a wired mouse and keyboard for a more laptoplike experience.

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HERES HOW

Logitechs Folio keyboard case protects an iPads front and back.

or mouse or a flash drive. The mouse makes the tablet seem distinctly more laptop-like than the iPad. On the other hand, third-party accessories (cases and keyboards in particular) abound for the iPad.

Add a keyboard
The onscreen keys on Android and iOS devices suce for quick notes and email, but they consume nearly half the screen and lack tactile feedback. For serious data entry, get a physical keyboard. iPad users can choose from various third-party keyboards, many of which double as covers and carrying cases. Belkin and Logitech have announced keyboard cases in their Qode (go.pcworld.com/qode) and Folio (go.pcworld.com/folio) series, respectively, for the iPad Air. Other manufacturers oer similar options for earlier models. These keyboards connect via Bluetooth and typically conform to the iPads design to create a seamless, laptop-like package. Nexus users have fewer options, but MiniSuits Bluetooth Keyboard Stand Case (go.pcworld.com/minisuit) and VSTNs Aluminum Nexus 10 Keyboard Case (go.pcworld.com/vstn) provide a hard-shell cover for the tablet, plus QWERTY keys and a slot for propping the tablet at a
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comfortable viewing angle. If you dont need a form-tting cover, most Bluetooth keyboards will work with the Nexus or any other tablet.

Find apps for that

Software may be the biggest challenge in suiting up a tablet for work. Youll need to take stock of the programs you run daily and gure out how many you can replace with app equivalents. Microsoft still doesnt oer the biggieOcefor Android or iOS, though such versions may be in the works. Still, you have lots of ways to tackle documents, spreadsheets, and presentations on a tablet. Googles Quickoce suite (go.pcworld.com/driveapps) for Android or iOS permits basic document creation and editing, and its lecompatible with Microsoft Oce. Originally it cost $15; but last fall, Google made Quickoce free. The only catch is that you have to sync your documents with your Google Drive account. Quickoce no longer supports Dropbox or any other cloud-storage service. If you prefer (or need) Microsoft Oce, CloudOn (cloudon.com) provides a virtualized copy of Oce 2010, so you can create, edit, and share Word, Excel, and PowerPoint documents, using the Oce

No Oce? No sweat. Googles Quickoce suite brings document creation and editing to iOS and Android.

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HERES HOW

interface youre accustomed to. CloudOn is available in app form for Android and iOS, and the basic service is free. But using it requires a live Internet connection it cant run ofline. As for other desktop programs, you might be surprised at your range of options. Adobe Reader, Dropbox, DocuSign, Evernote, Photoshop, RoboForm, Skype, and Twitter all have app counterparts for Android and iOS. Ciscos AnyConnect can help you connect to your company VPN, and LastPass can make your desktop passwords accessible on your tablet. Cant nd an alternative to a vital app? Consider leaving your laptop PC running back at the oce, and use a remote-access app such as LogMeIn Free (go.pcworld.com/ logmeinfree) to connect to and control the system from afar. Now you can run any program you need, just as if you were sitting back at your desk.

Connect your tablet to your company VPN with Ciscos AnyConnect.

Migrate your data

The nal piece of the puzzle is data. Resist the idea of copying your Oce les, PDFs, and the like from your laptop to your tablet. If you mostly work online anyway, youre better o using a cloud-storage service like Box, Dropbox, Google Drive, or SugarSync to sync your desktop les and make them available via their companion apps on your tablet. If you know youll need access to certain documents while
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ofline, you can easily download them ahead of time. Youll want to migrate your browser bookmarks, too. Accomplishing this task is a cinch for Google Chrome users: When you sign in to the Chrome browser on Android or iOS, your favorites sync immediately. In fact, using that approach could be your best bet even if you normally run a dierent browser on your PC: Install Chrome, import your bookmarks from Internet Explorer or Firefox, and then run Chrome on your tablet to sync those bookmarks. Handling email might be as simple as adding your Gmail or Yahoo account to the stock Mail app in Android or iOS, or it might involve monkeying with Exchange settings and perhaps even importing an Outlook PST le. PST Reader (go.pcworld.com/pstreader) for Android and Pst Mail (go.pcworld.com/pstmail) for iOS help you with the latter option, letting you view and search your messages. Your companys IT department may have procedures and policies in place for dealing with email on mobile devices. Start there.

A tablet can do more than just replace your laptop: It can actually improve on it.

Other considerations
A tablet can do more than just replace your laptop: It can actually improve on it. With an app like CamScanner (camscanner.net), you can use your tablet like a scanner, snapping photos of printed documents, converting them to raw text or PDFs, and ling them electronically. Evernote (go.pcworld.com/evernote5w) can give tablet users basic word processing and robust information capture and management, plus data syncing and sharing. Audiolio (go.pcworld.com/audiolio) for iPad lets you take notes and capture audio, creating time-synced bookmarks along the way. WritePad (go.pcworld.com/writepad) can turn notes scribbled on your tablet screen (with a nger or a stylus) into text, and the new Livescribe 3 (go.pcworld.com/livescribe3) pen can send notes scribbled on paper directly to your iPad.

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HERES HOW

How to edit GIFs without resorting to Photoshop

BY EVAN DASHEVSKY GIFs ARE THE twitchy, loopy language of the modern Web. So it stands

to reason that when youve discovered a GIF capable of expressing the real deep-down you, youll want to share it with others. But sometimes those pieces of bitmapped magic need a little tweaking before theyre ready for prime time in an email or on Tumblr.
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Various programs and apps will allow you to create your own GIF goodness (go.pcworld.com/giftools), but if you ever need to make a quick x on an existing GIF, youll be interested to know that EzGIF (ezgif.com) is a free one-stop shop for doing just that. The site oers a straightforward GIF tool belt for cropping, resizing, optimizing, and otherwise xing a GIFwithout needing to buy any software or have any graphics training.

Tool time
To choose the tool you want, click the appropriate tab at the top of the sites page. Then upload the leeither from your computer or directly from a source URL. For example, I found a familiar friend, the cartoon gaming character Mario, captured in looping animated form, on Giphy (giphy.com), one of the many GIF repositories online. One caveat: When using EzGIFs cropping function, its annoyingly unclear how to proceed once youve uploaded a lebut the steps get more intuitive from there. First, click Set. Youll be presented with a small box in the corner of the image. Click and drag that box to reveal a scalable, movable box for marking the perimeter of your crop. When you nd the perfect crop, click Crop it. EzGIF will process the cropped GIF and youll be good to go. This process can take a few

EzGIFs easy Web suite of editing tools.

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HERES HOW

minutesit all depends on the size of your GIF. Youll then have the opportunity either to manipulate the image further (by clicking any of the options located at the bottom of the screen) or to download it (by clicking the green Save button). Below your scaling window, youll see a pull-down menu with two options: Gifsicle and ImageMagick. Every EZgif function has various engines that it uses to process the GIF. Regrettably, due to the vagaries of GIFdom, an engine may on occasion mangle your GIF. If that happens, simply begin again and try another option in the pull-down menu.

The new, improved (or at least freshly cropped) GIF.

All the options

The GIF Resize option lets you resize your GIF. Simply specify your new size based on number of pixels. If you leave either the width or the height blank, EzGIF will scale the GIF. Click Resize it and the tool will process the new GIF. The GIF Optimizer option lets you reduce the data size of your GIF by applying precalibrated optimization methods. The GIF Eects option gives you access to a few preselected eects like changing the GIF to sepia tone or black-and-white, or making it run in reverse. You can create wholly unnecessary combinations of lters, too, if you dont fear overdoing things. Finally, the GIF Split option separates the GIF into its component slides and lets you reorder them as you see t. But that option may be a bit too advanced if you just want to make a simple change. Now go out there and make the Web a more seizure-inducing place.
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ANSWER LINE
BY LINCOLN SPECTOR

HERES HOW

Q: A:

How to set up two monitors

RAY RAULERSON asked about running a computer

with two monitors.

FOR YEARS, I was quite happy with one monitor. When I saw other people working with two monitors, the arrangement struck me as a waste of desk space and electricity. A three-monitor setup looked as if it were about to flap its wings and fly away. Then, one day, on a whim, as I was working with my closed laptop in its docking bay and my eyes on my external monitor, I opened the laptop for a second screenand I loved it. Though your graphics subsystem can probably handle two screens, the issues for desktops and laptops dier.

Windows 7s Screen Resolution window lets you use two monitors.

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Desktops: The vast majority of modern graphic cards for desktop PCs support two or more monitors. Your motherboards built-in graphics may support both, too, but thats less certain. Check the back of your computer to see how many video ports you have. Then, just to make sure, check the manual. Laptops: All laptops have separate VGA ports, and often either HDMI or DisplayPort ports, as well. Plug in a monitor, keep your built-in screen on, and presto: You have two displays. But the ability to plug in two monitors and send signals to them isnt enough. You must tell Windows how to manage the monitors correctly. The following instructions apply specically to Windows 7. For advice on handling a Windows 8 setup, see How to set up multiple monitors in Windows 8 (go.pcworld.com/multiplemonitors). If Windows appears on only one monitor, or if the two monitors dont work together the way they should, right-click the desktop and select Screen resolution. The resulting dialog box lets you do more than just set pixels. The Multiple Displays pull-down menu enables you to control how the two screens work together. I recommend choosing Extend these displays. After selecting that setting, you can tell Windows which monitor is on the left or right by dragging the graphics at the top of the dialog box. Get this detail wrong, and scrolling the mouse will be very confusing. Select Make this my main display to specify which monitor gets the taskbar and Start button. If you dont see this option, the currently selected monitor is already the main one. You can also reach many of these settings by right-clicking the desktop and selecting Graphic Options u Output to.

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Speed up a slow PC without buying new hardware

BY LINCOLN SPECTOR
I L LU ST R AT I O N BY JO H N U E L A N D

IF YOUR ONCE-FAST computer has slowed to a crawl, you shouldnt blame the hardware. Though you may be able to improve its speed by adding RAM, upgrading its CPU, or replacing its hard drive with an SSD, none of those responses addresses the underlying problem. Your hardware isnt underpoweredits overloaded. Cleaning Windows will likely speed up your PC, without your having to reinstall the operating system. Less drastic xes are available.
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HERES HOW

Look for hog processes: Your computer may be running a poorly written process that hogs a lot of resources. To nd out, right-click the taskbar and select Start Task Manager. Click the Processes tab and then the CPU column header. The top items in the list are the ones making the heaviest demands on the CPU. If you see an obvious culprit, close the program responsible for running that process (its usually pretty easy to gure out what it is). If that doesnt work, click the End Process button and conrm that you want to kill this process. If that tactic xes the problem, avoid using the oending program in the future. Or nd and use a better-written replacement. Otherwise, return to the Processes tab, click the Memory column header, and try to nd the culprit there. Clean out autoloaders: When Windows boots, it automatically loads additional programs, which collectively can slow the PC down.

In Windows 7, uncheck a items entry to stop it from autoloading.

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The trick is to bring up Windows list of autoloaders and gure out which ones are causing the problem. To do this, you must successively disable and reenable each one, and then reboot. In Windows XP, Vista, or 7, click Start (Start u Run in XP), type mscong, and press <Enter>. Once System Conguration comes up, click the Startup tab. To disable an item, uncheck it. In Windows 8, right-click the taskbar and select Start Task Manager. If you see a Startup tab, click it. If you dont, click More details and then Startup. To disable an item, right-click it and select Disable. Check for malware: Infections rarely cause slowdown problems successful malware doesnt draw attention to itself that way. But to be on the safe side, scan for it, anyway. For scanning advice, see When malware strikes: How to clean an infected PC (go.pcworld.com/disinfect).
In Windows 8, click Disable in Task Manager to halt autoloaders.

Do less multitasking: The more programs you run, the slower they will all perform. Consider changing your working habits so that you have fewer programs up at the same time. Turn o Aero: Windows 7 and Vista use a technology called Aero to improve the screens esthetic look. Aero isnt necessary, and when its activated it does slow the PC down a bit. For more on Aero, and how to turn it o, see How important is Aero? (go.pcworld.com/aeroeval).

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HERES HOW

Bring back Libraries in Windows 8.1

BY RICK BROIDA IVE RESIGNED MYSELF to the fact that some

questions dont have answers. For example, who built the pyramids? What happened to Amelia Earhart? And why did Microsoft disable the Libraries feature in Windows 8.1? Libraries was a highly touted (and useful) addition to Windows 7a way to nd and sort les without having to navigate across a zillion far-flung folders. Not surprisingly, the feature carried over to Windows 8. But quite surprisingly, it vanished in Windows 8.1. So what happened? Did Libraries generate too many tech-support calls? Did research show that not many people used it? Im stumped. The simplest way to look at it is as yet another slapusers-in-the-face change that makes no sense. The good news if youre a fan of the feature is that you can easily restore Libraries in Windows 8.1. Heres how: 1. Open File Explorer. You can do this in Desktop mode by clicking the File Explorer icon in the taskbar, or in the Start Screen by typing le and then clicking File Explorer. 2. Click the View tab. 3. Click the Navigation pane button (left side of the toolbar), and then click Show libraries. And theyre back! Ah, Windowsalways with the hoop-jumping.

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Watch the video at go.pcworld. com/cartech

The best of car tech 2013

Check out some of the best car tech we saw this year. These range from the Chevy Sonics cool tech that works with music and apps you already have on your smartphone to the Lexus IS 350 s sensors that help you back up your car and the Acura RLXs lane-keeping assist feature.

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