Innehållsförteckning för October 2021 från TechLife

As I write this, I – like the half the country – am in lockdown, or at least some form of one. And, like so many of us, I’m finding it a lot harder. So I’ve been turning to some things I’d been ignoring for too long. Music is one of them, and my streamer of choice is Tidal. I’m no JayZ fan, but I am a fan of the Master Quality Audio files that Tidal offers. I’m super fond of the service, but it may not be to everyone’s taste... thankfully, this month we round up all the contenders to find the best music streaming service for all fans of all kinds of music. We even have some great headsets that we’ve reveiwed this issue, so you can listen…

Facebook wants to put an image of your eyes on the outside of VR headsets, if its latest research is anything to go by. A prototype has been unveiled from Facebook Reality Labs that would allow users to ‘connect’ to people in the outside world with their real-time gaze. If it sounds a bit weird, it is – but it marks a smart reversal of the ‘passthrough’ technology used in the Oculus Quest 2’s cameras, which records the wearer’s surroundings and displays them on the headset’s screen, effectively allowing you to look through the headset and see what’s around you. This new application of passthrough tech would instead utilise an internal camera that projects “a three-dimensional view of the wearer’s eyes [...] in a perspective-correct manner” onto a screen located…

$499, www.viewsonic.com Ultrawide monitors have been popular with gamers for a while since they provide a potentially greater field of view on those titles that support it. But they also have value to those that need screen real estate in a business scenario, and up to this point, it isn’t an area that monitor makers have been designing for. The new ViewSonic VG3456 Docking Monitor was created for business users and allows them to have multiple applications open on a single screen without impacting on their useability. Design and features One aspect of ultrawide designs that many don’t consider, including those that design them, is how difficult they can be to get out of their packaging and get onto a desk. The approach of ViewSonic with the VG3456 is to…

The release of a US intelligence report on unidentified flying objects (UFOs) has stirred excitement, so it’s not surprising to find that most Americans believe in intelligent life inhabiting other worlds. Approximately 65 percent of Americans concur that extraterrestrials exist, and about 51 per cent say that UFO sightings reported by members of the US military represent visits from intelligent aliens, according to a survey conducted by the Pew Research Center, a nonpartisan think tank in Washington, DC. Pew released its survey results prior to World UFO Day, an informal holiday celebrated on 2 July by UFO enthusiasts. The date is a nod to the purported 1947 UFO crash on a ranch at Roswell, New Mexico. While the exact date of the alleged Roswell crash is unknown, the US Army…

$154, www.logitech.com If you’ve been hunting online for a webcam in recent years then chances are you’ve stumbled across the Logitech C920 webcam in some buying guides and lists for the best webcams on the market. This could be seen as slightly deceiving because it certainly isn’t the most powerful webcam you can buy today, but its legendary status is well deserved. Not only is the Logitech C920 still one of the best Logitech webcams, it remains the top choice across all brands despite being released almost 10 years ago. A major reason for this is that the C920 manages to balance performance and affordability in a way that other brands seem to consistently miss. When it was released back in 2012 the C920 cost $154, but prices have varied…

The PSVR PS5 headset could be “even better” than previously rumoured, according to one outlet. That outlet would be Digital Foundry, tech experts who just recently posted the new “Digital Foundry Weekly” episode to their YouTube channel. In the new episode, host and tech expert Richard Leadbetter says that “we’ve seen some leaked[PSVR PS5 specs and it looks good,” before adding “we’ve seen some other specs which haven’t been leaked which make it look even better.” We don’t know the specifics of these as-yet-unseen specs doing the rounds about the PSVR PS5 headset, nor do we know which previous leaked Leadbetter is referring to. Earlier this year in June, you might remember one report claimed that the new headset from PlayStation would utilise OLED screens, which Sony has never commented…

$56.95, PlayStation, Xbox, PC, www.gamesworkshop.com Warhammer 40,000: Battlesector is turn-based and about space marines, which means it’ll rile up those who want more 40K games to be real-time and action-packed, as well as those who are sick of every 40K game being about space marines. Thing is, the last 18 months have given us games about the setting’s bounty hunters, giant robots, punk gangs, fighter planes, and fighter planes but with orks. Thank Games Workshop’s free-and-easy licensing for the variety, which is why I’m fine with Battlesector reprising one of the more classic themes. I’m also fine with it being turn-based, because I remember the days when every 40K game was real-time and we complained about that instead. For everything there is a season. It’s a little-known fact that when…

Tales of the Neon Sea PIXELATED NEON NOIR. Free Set in a neon-flushed, cyberpunk future, Tales of the Neon Sea lands you in the shoes of a private detective, Rex, who at the start of the game is literally, yes literally, chased by death himself. It should be noted that death may or may not be a militant android or a physical recreation of the singularity, but at the very least the game is willing (daring) to murder you almost immediately. But not to worry, Tales of the Neon Sea is mostly forgiving in its moment-to-moment activity. Displayed as a side scrolling adventure set inside one of the most gorgeous pixel-soaked environments I’ve ever had the pleasure of playing through, you’ll be largely digging up clues of an upcoming robot…

$2,499, www.hp.com The HP Envy x360 15 (2021) sits right in the sweet spot between the lower-end HP Pavilion x360 and the more premium HP Spectre x360 2-in-1 laptops in price, performance and specs, but it isn’t some undercard contender. The HP Envy x360 15 (2021) is one of the best 2-in-1 laptops of the year, even if it isn’t the best choice for everybody. The HP Envy x360 15 (2021) is well built, but there’s nothing especially striking about the design. It is an HP laptop, after all, but it looks decent enough. The touchscreen display, on the other hand, is fantastic – even if it isn’t a fancy 4K OLED. With up to 400 nits of brightness, the HP Envy x360 15 (2021) looks great inside and outdoors…

$299, www.nuraphone.com The third product from Australian audio company Nura is also the team’s first pair of true wireless earbuds, and could well be its most successful as a result. While we were incredibly impressed by the personalised audio from both the Nuraphone and NuraLoop before it, their over-ear and neckband form factors (respectively) kept them from strongly competing with the likes of Apple and Sony with their increasingly popular true wireless products. By far the most compact of Nura’s products to date, these buds - along with their sleek charging case - offer an exceptionally lightweight and portable audio solution. Stylised once again in serious black, these units sure look classy. The buds themselves each have a large disk on their exterior, boldly brandishing the Nura logo and allowing…

$69, www.tplink.com As well as producing an affordable range of routers and powerline adapters for more than two decades, TP-Link has become a trustworthy name for the best smart home devices, too. Since 2015, the brand has offered a range of such items, including some of the best home security cameras, best smart light bulbs, and the best smart plugs. TP-Link’s smart plugs sport an inoffensive white plastic design, and the Kasa Smart Wi-Fi Power Strip is no exception. Measuring 26 x 6.34 x 3.8cm (w x h x d), it’s a compact device; it isn’t as bulky as some of TP-Link’s individual smart plugs. It has a 1m cable and plug that connects to a power outlet in your home. On the left of each socket on the power…

The winter sunproduces tricky extremes of contrast. But there are occasions when you can embrace pronounced highlights and shadows, says Niamh Cottle. Spending more time at home has given us a great opportunity to take full advantage of winter sunlight as a creative light source. In this project, we’re going to explore some ways to get the most from this kind of lighting, and experiment with camera settings to produce different styles of image. At this time of year in the northern hemisphere, the sun is lower in the sky and casts long shadows, so if it’s a cloudless morning you’ll be rewarded for making an early start. First, analyse your garden or outside space to find out where the light hits, and when and how it affects objects. With…

Schedule calls Thanks to FaceTime Links, you can now schedule and share links to FaceTime calls that anyone can access – even your Android and Windows-owning mates can access it now. Share everything With SharePlay, you can now share music, movies, TV and whatever is currently on your screen with the people on your FaceTime call. Who said what? You can place the people on your FaceTime call in a grid view and, with Spatial Audio, hear the voice of the person come from their respective position on the screen. It’s witchcraft! Enhance the sound Voice Isolation and Wide Spectrum sound have been added to the FaceTime mic options, so you can block out all outside noise apart from a voice, or open the floodgates and let the ambient sound…

YOU’LL NEED THIS: LIFEOGRAPH Download it from lifeograph.sourceforge.net. One of the biggest weaknesses of blogging – the online equivalent of keeping a diary – is that it’s so public. Sure, you can lock down your blog, but unless you’re hosting it on your own local server, it can leak online despite your best efforts. Lifeograph (http://lifeograph. sourceforge.net) is designed to provide you with a journal that’s offline and – through password-protected encryption – private. It’s clean and simple to use, but dig a little deeper into it and you can get even more from it than simple text-based scribbles. First steps Look for the Windows installer download under Downloads on the Lifeograph web page. There are Linux and Android versions there too. At the time of writing, the latest version…

REQUIRES iPhone or iPad; AirPods, AirPods Pro, or AirPods Max YOU WILL LEARN How to use your AirPods as hearing aids IT WILL TAKE 30 minutes Apple’s AirPods, which now includes three devices – AirPods, AirPods Pro, and AirPods Max – are about much more than listening to music, podcasts, and telephone calls. Thanks to some thoughtful additions and modifications, you can use your AirPods as a device to allow you to more easily hear what’s being said on the other side of a room, keep an eye on decibel levels, and adjust the tone of the audio they reproduce to suit your ears, using Headphone Accommodations. These features sit alongside the accessibility features Apple has been adding to iOS for several years. Others that work in conjunction with AirPods…

Free divers, those without breathing gear, can hold their breath for more than four minutes and descend to ocean depths of more than 100 metres. But this endurance feat takes a toll on the body’s ability to pump oxygen through the blood and to the brain. If not enough oxygen goes to the brain, free divers are at risk of losing consciousness. “Before now, understanding the effects on these exceptional divers’ brains and cardiovascular systems during such deep dives, and just how far these humans push their bodies, was not possible, as all research was done during simulated dives in the lab,” said Erika Schagatay, a professor of animal physiology at Mid Sweden University. “The diver can reach a point where hypoxic (low-oxygen) blackout occurs, and the diver then needs…

There’s some real breakthroughs in AR this month for people with disabilities including a new haptic shoe navigation system developed by Honda and the successful trial of a speech producing neural implant. And while AI takes two steps forward, it’s also got to take a step back as SoftBank’s AI robot Pepper was reported to be doing such a bad job it’s been fired from basically all its high profile positions. But while useful general AI systems might still be a way off, the software is continuing to break new ground in specific areas like protein folding and telescope calibration. XR Honda navigation shoes Kicks that know the way. $TBC | honda.co.jp/stories/015/ Honda has made an in-shoe navigation system that will help guide the visually impared to novel destinations by…

$39.55, PlayStation, Xbox, PC, Switch, www.chernobylgame.com Chernobylite is a curious mash-up of ideas orbiting a pretty stiff first-person shooter, not unlike The Farm 51’s previous game Get Even. But where Get Even felt like a game that couldn’t get its ideas in order, coming across as aloof in its attempt to tell a poignant story, Chernobylite does a much better job of welcoming us into its world. Its melancholy atmosphere permeates you like plutonium, confronts you with big decisions at every turn, and surrounds you with a well-written (though sometimes terribly voiced) core of grizzled stalkers who you’ll need to befriend as you chase spectral visions of your long-lost wife around the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone. As physicist and former Chernobyl Power Plant employee Igor, this is why you’ve returned to…

$349, www.nvidia.com There’s certainly a ton of inexpensive streaming devices to choose from. From Fire TV Cubes to Roku streaming sticks, if all you’re after is the latest movies and shows streamed without hassle, you can do so without breaking the bank. But what if you’re after a bit more ‘oomph’ from the gadgets serving your TV? Enter this edition of the Nvidia Shield TV Pro. An Android-powered set-top-box/games console, is an impressively powerful streaming device, and is jam-packed with features that will tempt both movie buffs and gamers alike. Whether you’re after high-spec PC gaming streamed to your TV, or 4K movies in multiple HDR formats, it’s got you covered. It does offer less value for money than previous models however, despite a bump in specs. Design The Nvidia…

$TBC, consumer.huawei.com The new Huawei MateView isn’t like most other PC monitors. The big difference? Tallness. The 3:2 aspect ratio of its 28.2-inch LCD panel is designed to match other products in the Huawei ‘Mate’ portfolio, most obviously the MateBook laptops, all of which also sport 3:2 aspect displays. With that taller aspect ratio comes an unusual 4K-plus native resolution of 3,840 x 2,560 pixels. That comes to a grand total of 9.8 million pixels and a fairly significant step up on the 8.3 million pixels of plain old 4K. The 3:2 aspect works really well in Huawei’s MateBook PCs where the increased vertical space for viewing documents and webpages really pays off. That’s less of an issue on a desktop display. Arguably, for this type of premium panel the…

$199, en-au.sennheiser.com The Sennheiser CX True Wireless are the latest wireless earbuds from the German audio giant. Picking up where the CX 400BT left off, they’re cheaper than their predecessors, despite including a host of upgraded features that comprises a longer battery life and better connectivity. The design of the Sennheiser CX True Wireless doesn’t deviate very far from the previous model, with a rather functional look that will appeal to minimalists – although it might not hold as much appeal to those who prefer their earbuds to make a statement. Available in matte black or white, the earbuds sport large, square housings that are engraved with the Sennheiser logo. You’ll find a range of eartips in the box, making it relatively easy to find a decent fit – that…

$169, www.coolermaster.com Cooler Master has thrown its hat into the 60 percent gaming keyboard ring with two contenders: the Cooler Master SK622 and its newer fully-wired version, the SK620. However, these keyboards face some tough competition. Even with the SK622 dual-interface (wired and wireless) prowess, mini keyboards like the Corsair K65 RGB Mini, the Razer Huntsman Mini, and even the more stripped-down WhirlwindFX Atom have set the standards so high, you’d have to be pretty special to compete with the best of them. Is the Cooler Master SK622 special enough? For a mini keyboard with a low profile, there’s a lot going on, and the Cooler Master SK622 tries to do all that it can do with minimum fuss. At the same time, performance, while good, is nothing to write…

$499, www.viewsonic.com The Viewsonic M1+ is a compact, portable projector capable of up to 1080p Full HD resolution. In terms of price, it’s much more affordable than larger 4K capable beamers, and as such we can recommend it for first-time projector buyers curious about what the M1+ can offer over a traditional TV setup. The Viewsonic M1+ is impressively tiny, measuring just 14.6 x 4 x 12.6cm. The stylish, rounded design of the projector doesn’t hamper its functionality, either. The 360-degree stand is able to swivel around the device without issue, allowing you to easily place it based on your preference. The panel on the more rounded side of the projector opens up to reveal a host of ports for connectivity options. Here you’ll find a microSD slot and HDMI…

Winter is a season of fantastic legends and stories, which reflects the weather at this time of year. You can produce your own magical shots with a bit of planning; keeping an eye on weather forecasts will enable you to venture out to capture some marvellous mystical scenes in your local woodland or countryside. Whether there’s snow, fog or mist, it is worth getting out with your camera and tripod at dusk or dawn to bag the sort of moody shots you can only get at this time of year. Make sure you are well prepared with the right clothing: a warm woolly hat, gloves, and a flask of a warm drink – as well as making sure you take your phone with you. Do not venture too far from…

Setting up You can set up your Focus groups in Settings > Focus and choose who can contact you, and which apps can notify you during these scheduled phases. It’s a good way to switch off from work for the night. Instant access You can schedule your Focus periods to kick in at set times, or you can enable them instantly through your iOS 15 Control Centre (the ‘Focus’ control replaces the standard ‘Do Not Disturb’ option). Your Focus groups As well as using the more general Do Not Disturb feature to block everything, you can create custom notification sheets based on what you’re doing. By default these include Personal, Work and Sleep. Adding more Although four main Focus categories are created by default, you can also create your own…

1 ADD EXTRA HEADINGS We’ve seen how the first line on any diary entry is formatted as a heading by default – other lines revert to body text. Lifeograph also supports two further sub-header styles. The first level can be invoked for the current line by starting it with a single space – ‘ Sub-header 1’, for example – while the second starts with a double space, so ‘ Subheader 2’. 2 FORMATTING Insert formatting via the formatting toolbar, or use these shortcuts: underscore (italics); asterisk (bold); hash (highlighted); and equals (strike-through). Remember to use these before and after your chosen text – so _ italicised text_ for example. Disable formatting in a paragraph by starting it with a full stop followed by a tab. Right-click for emojis. 3 ADD…

Using photography to capture the miniature world outside of human perception never fails to impress. It’s one of the most interesting technical aspects of photography, and capturing fast motion in macro images can produce an additional level of visual interest. We’re going to take a look at a technique that looks like timing is key, which it is to an extent, but it’s the camera and flash settings that do all the hard work for you. For this technique, we’ll use off-camera flash to illuminate the match for more dramatic and interesting lighting than ambient light. Setting the flash to a low power setting means that not only will the flash direction be extremely short, but the flash will also recycle instantaneously allowing us to shoot with the camera set…

As well as altering background colours, the HSL tools are invaluable for all kinds of edits. In landscapes, a useful trick is to use the Luminosity on-image tool to drag down on blue skies to make them darker and richer, then switch to Saturation and drag upwards to make the blues more intense (as shown here in Lightroom CC). With beauty portraits, you can make the skin look slightly cleaner and fresher by lifting the Luminosity of the reds and oranges. And if any object in a scene lacks impact, like the petals of a flower or the greens in foliage, you can target and increase the Saturation with ease.…

Monsby Love in Light Lamp “I love lamp.” £3,500 | monsby.com/products/love-in-light-lamp We’re not sure if the artist behind the Monsby Love in Light Lamp was inspired by Brick from Anchorman’s devotion to the object, or if it manifested on its own, but nevertheless the lamp now exists. To turn on this phallic bulb slide the skin down over the shaft and prepare to be covered in white light. When you’re done simply tuck the head back into its sheath and you’ll be plunged back into the darkness you were living in before seeing the light. It will set you back £3,500, but that’s a small price to pay to be surrounded by what you love. Sloot Motor A methane moped masterpiece. $DIY | uitsloot.nl While undoubtedly ridiculous, the swamp gas…

Google officially revealed the Pixel 6 in a series of tweets in early August – and the company essentially confirmed the design leaks that trickled out through 2021. As you can see there’s a camera block that runs across the width of the back, jutting out, and a three-tone color scheme in a range of options. The image above shows both the Pixel 6 and the Pixel 6 Pro, with the Pro model having more space above the camera block. That camera block has glossy silver edges on the Pixel 6 Pro and matte black ones on the standard Pixel 6. Flip the phone to the front and you can see an all-screen design with a selfie camera in a central punch-hole. The front is visible in the tweet video…

What’s a good running starter kit? John Culmer “In-ear motivation is important, which means good sweat- and jiggle-resistant headphones. GaGu feels it is imperative, if you’re going true wireless, to pick up a set with powerful Bluetooth able to readily penetrate the meaty fluids of your body and not drop out while you’re running.” It’s that time of year again, is it? Where readers beg flat-foot plodder GaGu to reveal his top-secret jogging tech? Fine. Start with the motivation. Ignore those lithe, gorgeous, matte people pounding the pavement: focus instead on the glistening chunky dudes trying their best. If they can do it, so can you. You’ll find adequate coaching in the form of a good Couch to 5K app, or a Garmin Connect-compatible tracker, which can help build you…

There were a lot of reasons to be nervous going into the first Halo Infinite technical preview. After suffering multiple delays, and following the decision to split the Campaign and Multiplayer components – with multiplayer launching as a free-to-play experience across the Xbox ecosystem – I was beginning to wonder whether 343 Industries was trudging down the long road to ruin. Thankfully, the Halo Infinite beta makes one hell of a good impression. In our Halo Infinite multiplayer hands-on preview, we had the chance to spend the weekend with a two-month old build of the 2021 release to help stress test the servers, test out the new movement and combat mechanics, and try out some new maps and weapons. Suffice to say, I was incredibly impressed with what I played…

$40.45, Xbox, PC www.curve-digital.com The Ascent is at its best when you’re standing still. When you’re peering off the edge of the world, out at the neon-tinged arcology that encompasses the chaos unfurling around you. Sometimes, the camera will reel in from the sky towards some distant detail – plumes of smoke twisting in the wind, gears turning beneath some towering structure – and in closer to your character, who’ll be wearing an uncoordinated ensemble of whatever high-stat crap you’ve been able to scavenge from corpses. It’s only as you begin to move that the illusion is shattered. The Ascent is a beautiful, hollow thing. Developer Neon Giant has been able to establish an impression of scale throughout its environment that is truly impressive, an achievement that brings The Ascent…

$699, www.sony.com The Sony Xperia 10 III is a fairly plain-looking phone, but this is the classic Sony style. It does not lean on light-reactive finishes and color gradients. Xperia phones have had the same basic ‘monolith’ design since the year dot. We like it. It’s a mature style, the polar opposite of Realme and Xiaomi phones that have slogans printed on their rears in huge bold fonts. The Sony Xperia 10 III’s shape and appearance is crucial to the appeal here. This feels like a small phone. At 68mm wide it is only slightly wider than the iPhone SE (2020) and even tinier than the Samsung Galaxy S21. If you’re tired of Android giants, the Sony Xperia 10 III may be what you need. It’s easy to handle and…

$840, www.bangolufsen.com In some ways, the Beoplay HX are a typical Bang & Olufsen product: premium materials, premium construction, premium price. In others, though, they’re a lot less willful than we’ve become used to from the company. The HX headphones don’t prioritize design over performance, and while they’re undeniably expensive, they’re not as stratospherically priced as you might expect. The problem for Bang & Olufsen is obvious. For a company that’s built its reputation on the back of some high-performing products that sport a unique aesthetic, is there room for maneuver when it comes to design? After all, few people are in the market for a pair of over-ear headphones that could be described as ‘mad-looking’. Form is dictated by function just as rigorously here as anywhere else in Consumer…

$1,119, www.dyson.com.au The Dyson V12 Detect Slim was only mentioned in passing during the official launch of the V15 Detect – it was almost as though Dyson didn’t really want much to do with the V12 because it wasn’t a flagship. But we’ve just spent a few weeks with both new Dyson handsticks and we’re pretty impressed with what the V12 Detect Slim can do… at a slightly lower price than the V15 Detect. Compared side by side, the V15 flagship is the clear winner in terms of performance, with far superior suction, but given the V12 Detect Slim comes with the headline-making features like the Laser Slim Fluffy cleaning head and the piezo sensor that ‘listens’ to what’s getting sucked up, but in a slightly cheaper package, there’s not…

Shooting in raw enables you to transform colour photos into spectacular black and whites. Using the Adobe Monochrome lets you have much more control over the image than simply converting to greyscale. We’ll also look at how cropping can enhance an image and how to introduce a graphic style to your photography. WHAT YOU’LL NEED Camera Raw or Lightroom Time: as long as you want 1 Change to monochrome White mist is a great background for black-and-white shots, but experimenting with the sliders is key to produce your desired mono effect. Set Treatment to Black & White and Profile to Adobe Monochrome. Boosting Blacks and Shadows further after the mono conversion helps to bring out detail. Increasing Clarity makes the foreground sharp. 2 Consider your crop Cropping is vastly underused,…

Multitasking In iPadOS 15, there is a new tool that sits at the top of your open apps, and tapping on it reveals the multitasking menu. From this menu, you can make your current app go into split-view and then open another from your Home Screen. You can also minimise apps to a ‘shelf’ and come back to them later. System-wide translation Thanks to the arrival of the Translate app, translation is possible from within any of your other apps, including Photos. Just tap to highlight foreign text in images using Live Text, and then you will be able to get the text instantly translated, as if by magic. Updated widgets While the option to drag widgets to your Home Screen was introduced with iPadOS 14, there is now a…

No Store downloads My current problem is with the Microsoft Store. Having read somewhere (I think) that some future Windows 10 updates will be coming through the Store, and having discovered my Calculator app had stopped working some time ago, I thought I’d remove it and reinstall it from the Store. But while it comes up OK, whenever I click the “Get” button, nothing happens. I’ve tried running WSreset.exe, which didn’t fix things, and have tried resetting the Store under “Settings > Apps > Microsoft Store > Advanced Options” but still no change. I’ve also tried PowerShell commands – which I was able to verify had removed and reinstalled the Store – but that made no difference either. I’ve also tried signing out of my Microsoft Account and back in,…

1.Entry title Click the title to rename it, or click its associated icon to turn it into a to-do item or make it a Favorite. 2.Sort diary entries Click the burger (three lines) button to change the sort type (date, size or last changed) and order (ascending or descending). 3.Tags Assign these to diary entries to help organise them – click one to edit its properties (including theme). 4.Diary entry window This works like a regular text editor with some clever extras, including support for markdown formatting and hyperlinks. 5.Navigation pane All diary entries and chapters are listed here – use the Search tool or Filter to control what’s shown by date, keyword or other. 6.Calendar Use this to navigate by date – days with entries linked to them appear…

REQUIRES MacUpdater US$14.99, macOS 10.14 or later YOU WILL LEARN How to quickly update all your apps in one process IT WILL TAKE 5 minutes Keeping all your Mac apps up to date is important but doing it quickly and with minimal fuss is certainly easier said than done. It’s fine if your apps are from the App Store, but what if you have apps that you downloaded direct from the developer’s website? Then things take a bit longer and get a bit more complicated. Unless you use MacUpdater, that is. This app scans your Mac, finds which apps are installed, then looks for updates. If it finds them, it lets you update all your apps at once with a few quick clicks. It only takes a couple of minutes…

If you follow cyber security news at all, then you almost certainly would have encountered the term “supply chain attack” recently. These attacks have become increasingly commonplace, with a number of very notable hacks occurring in the past year. Technically, they’re not a new thing: in 2017, for example, the hugely destructive NotPetya worm started as a supply chain attack and such attacks are nearly as old as computers themselves – it’s just in the past year we’ve seen a massive growth in them. So what are they? The short explanation of a supply chain attack is one that attacks not you, the end user, but the supplier of software or hardware that you buy – hence the name. If the attacker can slip malicious code into a popular program…

Input lag is a hot topic these days. While gamers across the globe are using input lag as a convenient excuse for constantly getting spanked in online deathmatches, television manufacturers appear to have become engaged in an arms race to deliver the lowest possible input lag figures. At the same time, games consoles are delivering a more cinematic experience than ever before, particularly in terms of sound, and many gamers are taking advantage of that by connecting their machines to a soundbar or even an AV amplifier. The question is, though, whether placing an audio device in the chain between the console and TV increases the input lag. And, if it does, is there an alternative way to set everything up? With our trusty Leo Bodnar input lag tester, we…

Available in both Lightroom and Photoshop’s Camera Raw filter, the Hue, Saturation and Luminosity tools within the Color Mixer box give you a fine degree of control over the colours and tones in your images. Whether you want to subtly alter a colour or change it completely, these tools can help. Here we’ve made use of the Color Mixer tools to re-colour the backdrop without affecting the subject. This takes mere seconds with a targeted Hue adjustment, and doesn’t require any complicated selections or cut-outs. You simply enable the Hue sampler, then drag over the backdrop to alter the colour. If you want to delve deeper into controlling the hue, saturation and luminosity of colours in the image, you can experiment with Camera Raw and Lightroom’s local adjustment tools, which…