SD cards: the cheap way to boost laptop storage

Wednesday, August 24th, 2011

An increasing number of laptops these days boast SSDs, but capacities are rising quite slowly. For some people, 128GB as your main drive might be enough, but if you want more, is it worth shelling out the huge fees charged by manufacturers to upgrade to a higher capacity SSD, or can you make do with alternative storage?

To find out, we ran our standard file transfer tests – first between a RAM disk and the SSD of a brand new laptop, then between a RAM disk and a variety of external storage devices. (more…)

What’s really killing your Wi-Fi? Here’s a graphic illustration

Friday, August 19th, 2011

We’ve written many times about how crowded the 2.4GHz frequency band is becoming these days, and how that can affect the reliability and speed of your wireless network.

There are so many devices and routers now using the unlicensed space between 2,400MHz and 2,475MHz that finding a quiet, undisturbed channel for your network to reside on is nigh on impossible. That’s why we recommend anyone upgrading their wireless router chooses a dual-band model — one that gives you the option of connecting in the less congested 5GHz frequency band.

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How to earn money from your own tech A-List

Thursday, August 4th, 2011

Chances are that people constantly ask you what phone to buy, what laptop, even what TV. Well now there’s a way to make money from your recommendations.

It’s the brainchild of Brian Trevaskiss and team at the MoreFrom Group, and the idea is that you rebadge morefrom.co.uk as your own site. If people order from you, you’ll get 1% commission (or more if you manually increase the price), which appears as credit in your MoreFrom account. So you don’t get cash, but you can put that money towards future purchases.

The other clever thing is that you can order from it yourself. So let’s say you’re about to buy a £1,000 laptop. By ordering it from your version of the site, you get £10 credit applied to your account. This could be of particular appeal to small businesses that rack up purchases over the course of a year.

And if your business would benefit from an online shop, MoreFrom is offering a way to rebadge its site to do precisely that. Head to www.morefrom.biz.

So how easy is it to set up your own site? Shockingly so. Allow me to demonstrate: (more…)

Get free advice from PC Pro’s Business Clinic

Tuesday, August 2nd, 2011

Does your business need some expert help with its IT? PC Pro’s newly launched Business Clinic is on hand to offer free IT advice to Britain’s small businesses.

Our team of Real World Computing experts — with decades of computing experience between them — could pay a visit to your company, providing first-hand advice on anything from your server set-up, to your internet security, to managing your remote workers. What’s more, your business could feature in the new-look PC Pro.

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Join PC Pro at Byte Night 2011

Friday, July 29th, 2011

“You’ll enjoy it!” said Eleanor, in her bouncy, enthusiastic way. I had, and still have, my doubts. The idea of sleeping under the London sky on an October night isn’t my normal recipe for a fun evening, which generally involves good company, even better beer and a nice warm bed to collapse into afterwards.

But Eleanor, the London rep for Byte Night, has her way of winning arguments. The concept of the night, she explained, was to raise awareness of the thousands of young people who sleep rough each night.

Click on this link to sponsor PC Pro at Byte Night 2011

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Just how popular is Google+?

Tuesday, July 26th, 2011

We keep getting told that Google+ is Facebook’s biggest threat, that it’s on the rise faster than a 1990s house price and the only way is up. We’re told it already has 10 million profiles – or is it 20 million?

But is Google+ really catching on? I mean really, as in outside this little tech industry bubble we love to confine ourselves to? (more…)

Google+: big companies can cause big problems

Monday, July 25th, 2011

In its first three weeks of availability, Google+ reportedly attracted 20 million users. That’s a pretty impressive launch – especially since it’s been accompanied by what can only be described as a negative marketing campaign. Even as millions of users have poured onto the service, Google has insisted on calling it a “limited field trial”. At this rate, by the time they officially make it available to the public, everyone will already be on it.

Everyone, that is, except for Mr Matthew Brock of Swiss Cottage. I have it on good authority that the gentleman in question, an old friend of mine, is giving Google+ a miss. (more…)

The new PC Pro Reviews and Labs pages

Tuesday, July 12th, 2011

When the new issue of PC Pro hits the shelves this Thursday, readers will notice quite a bit has changed – not least the Reviews and Labs sections. They’re among the most popular parts of the magazine, so we’ve been sure to retain what makes them so readable and comprehensive. But we hope a few simple changes will improve them immeasurably.

Here’s an actual page from the new Reviews section:

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How we shot the cover of the new-look PC Pro

Thursday, July 7th, 2011

If you’re a PC Pro subscriber, you may already have received the latest issue of your magazine – the first issue to sport our new design and logo.

On the front, you’ll notice a pyramid of laptops, which illustrates this month’s comprehensive Labs of 20 Intel Core laptops.  That image isn’t a piece of cobbled together Photoshop trickery. Our brilliant photographer, Danny Bird, not only came up with the concept of arranging the laptops in a pyramid, but carefully constructed the tower himself.

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AMD Llano for laptops review: first look

Wednesday, June 22nd, 2011

Just when we’ve grown used to Intel being the dominant force in the processor world, AMD has finally begun to mount its Fusion defence. Its Brazos chips have already staged a land-grab in the netbook and ultraportable sector, and now its new addition to the family, codenamed Llano, is making a play for the laptop market.

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