29
pages of windows step-by-step guides do more with your PC
your google guidE
ALL you need to know about Google's apps
Reinstall windows Wipe your PC and start again! All your reinstall questions answered
ALSO INSIDE... Declutter your PC Improve your photos Destroy PC malware Secure your computer
BUILD a media PC Create the perfect home CINEMA setup
Expand your clipboard Turn speech to text Master the Taskbar
get free apps
THE BEST OF THE MICROSOFT STORE!
NEW TECH TESTED & RATED
• Microsoft Surface Go • ZenBook 3 Deluxe • Epson SureColor • Studio19 Solo E500X-EQ
The source for tech buying advice techradar.com 2
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| March 2017
Welcome Reinstalling Windows is one of the biggest – and most rewarding – things you can do with your PC: the fresh start it offers will not only help solve a myriad of issues, but can make your machine feel like new again. Yet, it’s not a task for the faint-hearted, so to help you through the process we’ve put together a list of the most commonly asked questions – with in-depth answers that will help return your PC to its former glory, and without losing a single file. It all starts on page 11.
On page 44, you’ll discover how to turn your PC into the perfect home cinema machine, with help and advice on the hardware and software you’ll need to enjoy all your music, movies and photos. And in our Explore section (page 23), you’ll learn all kinds of exciting ways to do more with your PC – from mastering the Taskbar, to having your PC read out loud to you. For more, sign up to our newsletter at www. windowsmag.co.uk
Rob Mead-Green Editor
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SUBSCRIBE TO THE MAG TODAY AND SAVE – TURN TO PAGE 20! We pride ourselves in being the only magazine on the shelves to show you exactly how to get the very best from the Windows operating system, whether you’re using Windows 10 or Windows 8.1. Also, don’t forget to take a look at how you can read the magazine on your laptop, smartphone or tablet.
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Don’t miss our Next issue, when we will show you how to… Build your own PC recording studio Master Windows Defender Surf securely with a VPN Get creative with your favourite photos
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2 October 2018
Features
11 Reinstall Windows FAQ
Get answers to all your Windows reinstall questions with our in-depth guide
44 The perfect home cinema PC Create and control the media centre of your dreams – we show you how
53 A deep dive into Google
How the tech giant became such an essential part of all our lives
Regulars
6 Discover How to plan the perfect holiday; Facebook’s plan to tackle fake news; and what’s next for PC graphics 20 Subscriptions Save up to 46% on print and digital issues
35 Back issues Missed an issue? Don’t miss out – order now while stocks last!
68 Digital issues Get the world’s best Windows mag on your phone or tablet
90 Next month Find out what’s
coming up in the November 2018 issue
Explore The best PC tutorials Your guide Rob Mead-Green says…
“If you’re looking for better ways to use your home computer, then this is the place to start. We’ll show you all the tips and tricks the experts use and more!” 24 Master the Windows Taskbar 27 Create a cool kaleidoscope effect in Photoshop Elements 30 Discover Google Chrome’s hidden anti-malware tool
Support
64 Get answers to your technical questions with help from our PC experts 4
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| October 2018
32 Secure your PC quickly and easily with these tips and tricks 36 Easily copy images, text and web content with PinClipBoard
38 Turn text into speech with the brilliant, and free, Balabolka app 40 Preview almost any file 42 Clear out clutter on your PC
subscription bundle offer Digital and print together with free USB charging hub! Find out more on page 20
reinstall windows
The most common questions answered; the most common problems solved
11 77 Our expert reviews
How to spec, build and control a very modern media centre
44
78 Asus ZenBook 3 Deluxe 80 Microsoft Surface Go 82 Epson SureColor SC-P600 84 Studio19 Solo E500X-EQ 88 Best free Microsoft Store apps
53 Follow us on‌ We take an in-depth look at the tech giant – and the products we use every day
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October 2018 |
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NEW things to do
amazing websites
fascinating facts
Where to? Pick the right holiday, and at a price that suits you, with a little help from the web.
Photo by Mohamed Ajufaan on Unsplash
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| October 2018
Discover Plan the perfect getaway
Th e pe rfect getaw a y
Plan your next holiday – no travel agent required
The Knowledge…
Package holidays are convenient, but they’re not perfect. The next time you travel, do it your way
E
veryone needs a break, and the natural first port of call is the high street travel agent. But with basic organisational skills and a little web savvy, you can put together your own holiday to suit your exact budget and requirements. Begin by starting a spreadsheet – use a web service like Google Sheets – and catalogue absolutely everything as you go. The key here is to pick out every element yourself, from event tickets to transport and accommodation.
Cut the cost
Picking up accommodation can be similarly cheap if you’re not picky. Head to skyscanner.com and use its comparison engine to see the kind of prices you’ll get through vendors like Expedia and Booking.com, each of which have worked out deals with hotels and chains to drive traffic their way by offering lower prices. Beware, though, that such bookings can be somewhat inflexible, and booking directly with the hotel can help you get precisely what you need – and even lower prices. It pays to check. If a hotel’s not your thing, then airbnb.com is an obvious alternative to check out. Its offerings can range from the basic to, if you’re prepared to pay, some very luxurious pads. Staying in someone else’s home can be a little odd, but bear in mind that you won’t usually be staying with them, and the uniqueness of your surroundings more than makes up for the service you lose by being outside a resort.
“Use its comparison engine to see the kind of prices you’ll get”
Flights can, depending on where you buy them, range from the extortionate to the astronomical. But you can also get good deals; if you’re prepared to take less favourable routes, fly from and to slightly different airports, sites like kayak.com and cheapflights.co.uk can help you to find veritable bargains. Add in a layover, and you may find your inconvenience leads to even lower prices.
Save your wrist Traditional mice hurt? Try this Logitech’s peripherals are going from strength to strength, but the company’s not resting on its laurels: the innovative MX Vertical mouse twists the usual position of your hand from flat on the desk to something more akin to a handshake, placing the buttons and controls on a semi-vertical surface which can alleviate pain by reducing strain in the wrist and forearm. It’s not cheap at £93, but if using a PC makes you suffer it could be the perfect purchase.
Straight up The MX Vertical uses a scientifically calibrated 57-degree angle for optimal comfort.
Nvidia RTX2080 What is… no, it’s a graphics card, right? It is indeed a graphics card. The GeForce RTX2080 – revealed at Gamescom in August – marks the beginning of Nvidia’s next-generation consumer cards, bringing new technology and a whole heap more pixel pushing power to the table. What’s so special about it? The ‘R’ in ‘RTX’ refers to raytracing – a by-now ancient way of creating realisticlooking graphics by mapping the way light falls on, travels through, and bounces off, materials in various directions. The GeForce RTX features a special processor for this and a number of AI operations, and speeds up the way it handles traditional graphics as well. What’s the damage? That depends on what or who you believe: Nvidia’s CEO, Jen-Hsun “Jensen” Huang, listed the price at around £527 during the announcement; Nvidia’s own website, accepting pre-orders at press time, pegs it closer to £607. We don’t need to tell you that that’s a big investment, particularly since it will take software publishers a while to get a handle on the new tech. Do I need one? Right now? Unless you’re a hardcore enthusiast, there’s almost certainly not a good reason to upgrade to an RTX card. But a couple of years down the line – when more reasonably priced versions of the tech meets the games and apps that can take advantage of it? Absolutely. Although PC makers like Acer, Alienware and HP have already announced a series of gamer-friendly PCs that will come with RTX cards on board – turn to page 10 to see but one example. But I want an upgrade! Now for some good news: With the release of a new generation of cards, even the top-end of the previous generation – like the GeForce 1080 Ti – will drop significantly in price, especially since demand for GPUs from cryptocurrency miners is also falling. Result? You should be able to bag a bargain once the RTX line launches in late September.
Quick charge The built-in battery delivers up to three hours’ use from a single one-minute charge.
Switch up You can quickly flick between a pair of devices, so your new mouse covers a couple of PCs.
October 2018 |
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7
Ev eryon e’s tal king about
Trustworthiness scores
Can what you say online really be trusted? Facebook, for one, is attempting to find out Fake news continues to be big news, but recent revelations from the offices of Facebook suggest that the social network – which has, more than any other, fallen victim to the effects of fabricated or biased reporting – has been working on reducing the amount you see. For more than a year, Facebook has been developing a so-called ‘trustworthiness score’, which it now applies to certain users to determine whether or not their actions are honourable.
keeping tabs
Facebook hasn’t said how the score is determined, and refutes suggestions that the tool could be used as a social rating system, though its lack of transparency does raise questions. The point is that, as a user, you won’t see the results of it. And like Facebook’s existing (and frankly baffling) algorithm, it could lead to posts being hidden and jumbled around. If the trustworthiness score is used on your account, will you know? If your friends’ status updates suddenly disappear from your homepage, will you notice? Could Facebook inadvertently – or, indeed, deliberately – use this to tear
friend groups apart, or to squash businesses that rely on their Facebook pages to stay afloat? The answer, as far as we have been able to determine, is ‘not right now’. At press time, the score is only fed to Facebook’s internal misinformation team for further investigation, primarily to determine if true news is being falsely flagged as fake in order to game the system, and to identify those users doing so. Since 2016, Facebook has been working with external companies to investigate the legitimacy of flagged posts, and this isn’t likely to change. It’s also not the first time a social network has hidden a rating system below the surface – in 2010, Twitter employed a similar metric to rank users, in order to aid the company in recommending new users to follow. There is still a human element, too. Unless someone in Facebook’s offices starts getting very malicious, the trustworthiness score should only affect those who aren’t trustworthy: report fake news legitimately, and you’ll get a high score, giving more weight to your reporting in the future.
Download this… SharpKeys github.com/randyrants/sharpkeys Caps Lock, eh? Unless you’re deathly allergic to using [Shift], it’s absolutely useless – an annoyance that makes you shout with words whenever you slightly miss hitting the [A] key. Well, banish its nuisance feature and, indeed, rejig your entire keyboard if you wish by employing the services of SharpKeys. It may not be the friendliest bit of software (if we’re honest, it’s a little ugly), but it supports pretty much every version of Windows that’s out there, and enables you to move around up to 104 keys to get the layout that’s perfect for you. Click the ‘releases’ link, then download the MSI file to find the installer. You’ll need the .NET Framework 4.0 installed; run SharpKeys from the Start menu once it’s safely installed. Then just click Add, and pick the key you want to map from and to. Easy peasy!
map it Get the keys on your keyboard to work the way you want them to with SharpKeys.
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uiz The 60-SecondmQ e sta rts no w! Pe ns at th e rea d y, yo u r ti
1
3
How does the Sneakernet send data?
Which of these held the most data?
A Floppy disk B Recordable CD C Iomega Zip Disk
2
TransFlash is another name for which storage medium? A microSD B Network-Attached Storage (NAS) C Solid-State Drive (SSD)
5
On which format did the Sony MDH-10 store data?
A By wires B In person C By wireless
A MiniDisc B LaserDisc C MaxiDisc
4
6
A Cuba B North Korea C USA
A Teletext B Morse code C Vinyl
To which country does Flash Drives for Freedom send USB flash memory sticks?
The Thompson Twins released a game on which format in the mid-1980s?
Answers 1B 2A 3B 4B 5A 6C
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| October 2018
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12 October
Discover Facts & figures
£15 billion
Amount of money Samsung’s planning to invest in Artificial Intelligence (AI), 5G mobile and car tech over the next three years. The Korean tech giant is also recruiting over 40,000 people, 1,000 of which will work in AI research.
Rob Mead-Green reveals a host of fascinating digital facts
50
Number of eye diseases that can accurately be detected by Google’s DeepMind AI, thanks to research carried out at Moorfields Eye Hospital in London. 15,000 optical coherence tomography (OCT) scans from 7,500 patients – along with expert diagnoses from eye doctors – were used to train the software. The technology could eventually be used in hospitals, once passed for clinical use.
5.955GHz
Clock speed achieved by Indonesian overclocker Ivan Cupa on an AMD Ryzen Threadripper 2990WX processor. The near-6GHz overclock was achieved across all of the CPU’s 32 cores, which were kept cool using liquid nitrogen. That’s a record for a consumer-grade CPU, which was mounted on an MSI MEG X399 Creation motherboard.
430,000
Speed, in miles per hour, of the Parker Solar Probe, which took off from Cape Canaveral in August. The Probe will travel to within 3.83 million miles of the Sun – close enough for temperatures on the ship’s surface to reach 1,377degrees Celsius; and the closest that any ‘ship has been to the surface of our galaxy’s star so far.
£76 Estimated cost of Disney’s new live-action Star Wars TV series – or £7.6 million per episode for each of the ten episodes in the first season. The aim is to create a series that will have the same high production values as Disney’s Star Wars cinema releases, making it one of the most expensive TV productions ever created.
32 Terabytes Maximum storage capacity of Intel’s forthcoming DC P4500 solid-state drive (SSD). Destined for datacentres, the ruler-shaped drive boasts an ultra-thin form factor and needs half the airflow of a regular SSD. It also uses one-tenth of the power.
October 2018 |
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Incoming
The hottest new Windows hardware on the horizon
Acer Predator Orion 9000 From £2,999 www.acer.com The graphics power of modern PCs just took an enormous leap, an order of magnitude shift that’s taken a decade to achieve. You can find out how and why on page 7, but here we’re looking at one of the first PCs to benefit: the Acer Predator Orion series – a premium gaming PC with a striking design, innovative features and, now, more power than you ever thought possible. Due in September, the range-topping Predator Orion 9000 will be able to handle the most demanding Virtual Reality (VR) apps, as well as 8K Ultra HD video. It will arrive packing the latest Intel Core i9 Extreme Edition processors, plus ground-breaking Turing-class GeForce RTX 2080 Ti GPUs from Nvidia. The Orion 2000 and Orion 5000 will also be getting an RTX 20-series upgrade – as will rival desktops from HP (Omen Obelisk) and Alienware (Area 51). There’s never been a better time to be a gamer. Or anyone interested in GPU power.
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| October 2018
Windows 10 Reinstall questions answered
YourREinstallquestions
ANSWERED Got a question or problem with reinstalling Windows? You’ve come to the right place – Nick Peers has the answers you need
Y
ou really can’t put off reinstalling Windows forever. If you’ve not reinstalled since Windows 10 was released in 2015 then you’re long overdue for a wipe-clean and brand, spanking new install. Not only do annoying problems disappear, but your PC will feel quicker and fresher, closer to what it was like when you first bought it all those years ago. But reinstalling isn’t something you can plunge straight into. And you may be putting things off because there are questions you need answers to. Or perhaps you tried reinstalling, but it’s not gone as planned. Maybe you’ve lost your Windows install media, or you want to try repairing Windows instead.
Whatever your circumstances, we have your back. We’ve collated some of the most frequently asked questions about the reinstall process, from deciding whether it’s right to reinstall in the first place, to putting things back again once the reinstall has completed. We’ll equip you with the information you need to not just make informed decisions, but to ensure you have that all-important backup in place so whatever happens you can get your PC working again without losing a single file or setting. In all, we’ve answered over 30 reinstall-related questions over the following pages – and if yours still hasn’t been answered? Email Support Squad at windows. helpline@futurenet.com and we’ll do our best to help you.
October 2018 |
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Before you reinstall Windows How often should you reinstall? Do you even need to reinstall Windows? These and other questions are answered here
Time to reinstall? On average, we recommend that you reinstall Windows from scratch every two years or so.
WHEN TO REINSTALL
Q
How often should I be looking to reinstall Windows?
A
On average, we’d suggest reinstalling Windows from scratch every two or three years. A lot, of course, depends on how many changes you make to your system – if you frequently install and remove programs, for example, then you may find a reinstall every 12-18 months is more practical. To cut a long story short, if your copy is Windows is starting to slow down and become unstable, a clear out and fresh reinstall could be the answer. It’s the surest way to make your PC feel like new.
TIME TO REINSTALL
Q
How long does it take to reinstall Windows on average?
Checking for your license Open your web browser and go to account. microsoft.com, click Manage under Devices.
A
The reinstall process for Windows takes around 30-60 minutes depending on the speed of your PC and whether the drive that Windows is being installed on is a hard disk drive (HDD) or a solid-state drive (SSD). SSD installs are typically much faster. However, the entire process of preparing and setting things up again after reinstalling can take half a day or even a day to complete – especially when you factor in reinstalling all your favourite apps, settings and your user files and personal data.
FREE UPDATE QUESTION
Q
I took advantage of Microsoft’s free update to Windows 10 back in 2016. Must I now buy a copy or go back to an earlier version of Windows?
A
No, because the act of upgrading to Windows 10 means your PC’s details are now logged with Microsoft, so it knows your PC’s been upgraded. This means you can reinstall Windows 10 from scratch without worrying about the product key. Note, however, that this version of Windows 10 isn’t transferrable to another computer, so it will remain tied to your current PC for the rest of its life.
Take a failsafe backup
Q
What’s the best way for me to back up everything I need to keep on my PC before reinstalling Windows?
A
We’re converts to Paragon Backup & Recovery Free (https://paragon-software. com/free/br-free/), which lets you back up files and folders as well as drive images. The step-by-step guide here reveals how to take a fail-safe image of your entire PC, so no settings or files will be lost.
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a backup type 1 Choose Launch the program. Click ‘+’ next to My
Backups to create a new backup set. Click ‘Backup’ source to choose what you’re going to back up: choose Disk/Volumes to create a fail-safe drive image of the entire drive containing Windows.
| October 2018
your Windows drive 2 Select Click the drive containing your Windows
installation – look for the Windows logo if you’re struggling to identify it. Paragon Backup & Recovery Free will automatically select all related partitions required for Windows to boot properly. Click ‘OK’.