At the 14. January 2020 the extended mainstream support for Windows 7 expired, more than ten years after the appearance of this operating system. This means that there are no more security or feature updates for private users. Nevertheless, it is still very popular almost a year later, as a look at the evaluation of the Statcounter shows.
Windows 7 was still running in December on about 18 Percentage of the Windows PCs recorded by Statcounter.
(Image: GlobalStats Statcounter)
Therefore run on scarce 76 Percentage of counted Windows computers Windows 10, Windows 7 is around 18 percent in second place. This is somewhat surprising, especially since Microsoft is still offering the upgrade to Windows 10 free of charge although the company is no longer promoting it publicly. On the other hand, the latest Windows edition has a bad reputation with some users, for example because it collects data in the background and strongly urges them to create a Microsoft account.
Windows 8 and 8.1 come together, according to Statcounter about 5 percent, while Windows XP only runs on 0.8 percent of the recorded devices. Only Windows Vista is even rarer with 0.4 percent.
The United States Government Digital Analytics Program, which evaluates visits to US websites, offers a different perspective on these figures. One of the possible filters is the version of Windows used. Accordingly, 14, 9 percent of surfers used Windows 7 and 75, 8 percent Windows 10. Based on Microsoft’s statement that around 1.5 billion users use Windows, this means that at least 100 millions of them are still on Windows 7.
Players like Windows 10 According to the evaluation of the Steam gaming platform, the distribution is a little different: While almost 96 Percentage of users playing under Windows, comes Windows 10 on a user share of 88, 6 percent. Windows 7, however, only accounts for 5.4 percent. This is probably due to the fact that Microsoft DirectX 12 initially only for Windows 10. Only in March 2019 followed DirectX 12 for Windows 7.
According to the Steam Survey, only just under 6 percent of users still play under Windows 7.
(Image: Steam Survey)
According to Steam, the share of the other Windows versions together is not even 1.7 percent – more than Linux (0.9 percent), but only about half as much as macOS (3rd , 37 percent).
Not yet dead in the company In the private environment, it mainly depends on personal preferences whether you want to use Windows 10, it looks different in corporate use. Some company authorities or universities are forced to continue to use an old Windows version due to compatibility requirements.
Offers Microsoft is still offering the so-called Extended Security Updates (ESU) for Windows 7 up to 2023. However, this can be quite expensive, because the ESUs are calculated per Windows computer and the prices double every year. From January 2021 Microsoft requires for a system with Windows 7 Enterprise 50 U.S. dollar; Windows 7 Pro costs an annual 100 dollar support fee. The steadily rising costs are likely to ensure that other major customers say goodbye to Windows 7. (bkr)
It’s not easy to make it to a library right now, and with a long winter stuck at home looming ahead for many of us, there’s never been a better time to hunker down with a good book. If you’ve been lucky enough to receive a new Kindle (or a non-Amazon-branded e-reader or just a device with an e-book app on it), you might be looking for some new books to read.
To help, here are some of the best new science fiction books released in 2020 (along with some additional recommendations for other books in a series, where applicable), which should be the perfect pairing with your new e-reader.
We’ve rounded up our favorite and most-used games, apps, and entertainment. Check out our app picks for iPhones, Android phones, Windows PCs, and M1-equipped Macs; our favorite mobile games from Apple Arcade and Google Play Pass; and our top choices for gaming PCs, the PS5, Xbox One and Series X / S, Nintendo Switch, and VR. We’ve also listed our favorite streaming shows on Disney Plus, Hulu, ESPN Plus, and Netflix; some great sci-fi books; and exciting new podcasts. (Note: pricing was accurate at the time of publishing but may change.)
The City We Became by N.K. Jemisin
N.K. Jemisin is best known for her astounding Broken Earth trilogy (which is well worth adding to your reading list, too). The City We Became — a novel-sized spinoff of an earlier short story by Jemisin — reimagines New York City as a living, breathing entity, personified by a diverse collection of people from across the five boroughs as they fight to save the city from an otherworldly foe.
Harrow the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir
If you haven’t read Gideon the Ninth, the first book in Muir’s Locked Tomb trilogy, read that first. You probably won’t need any encouragement at that point to dive into the second book, Harrow the Ninth, which picks up right where the first book left off, while managing to outdo its predecessor in baffling puzzles, inventive sci-fi horror, and Muir’s personal brand of crackling style and wit.
Axiom’s End by Lindsay Ellis
This debut novel from video essayist Lindsay Ellis images an alien first contact event in an alternative version of 2007, capturing both the political and cultural flavor of the time period while examining what it really means to be human — or alien.
From a Certain Point of View: The Empire Strikes Back
A love letter to The Empire Strikes Back (much as the original From a Certain Point of View is to A New Hope), From a Certain Point of View: The Empire Strikes Back features 40 short stories from 40 authors, diving into new facets of the film, from the Wampa ice creature to Boba Fett to Willrow Hood.
A Beautifully Foolish Endeavor by Hank Green
Another sequel here, so you’ll likely want to seek out Green’s first book, An Absolutely Remarkable Thing, before you dive in. (Think of this as two recommendations for the price of one!) Both books examine the fallout that happens when April May encounters a strange, alien statue (named Carl) — while also exploring how social media and fame can change how we interact with and view the world.
To Sleep in a Sea of Stars by Christopher Paolini
Paolini’s first novel since his popular Inheritance Cycle moves on from dragons to deep space and from YA novels to a more adult audience. Xenobiologist Kira Navárez encounters a strange alien relic, and things quickly spiral into a war that could decide the fate of humanity’s interstellar civilization. At nearly 900 pages, it’s a perfect book to hide away in over the holidays.
The Hidden Girl and Other Stories by Ken Liu
Liu has already become one of the biggest names in sci-fi and fantasy short stories, dating from his first collection, The Paper Menagerie. The Hidden Girl and Other Stories, his latest collection, features 17 new tales that look at artificial intelligence, classical mythology, and more in a new light.
Subcutanean by Aaron A. Reed
Subcutanean may be the most unique book of 2020 — or perhaps ever — literally. Reed describes it as a “permutational novel,” with each copy of the novel containing its own unique text. Some differences from copy to copy will be big, others small, even as the overall story stays largely the same.
Network Effect by Martha Wells
Murderbot — a self-aware artificially intelligent killing machine — is one of the best sci-fi heroes in recent memory. Murderbot has already been the star of Wells’ Murderbot Diaries novellas, but Network Effect gives a proper full-length novel to the cynical TV-marathoning robot who just wants a break. Best of all, it’s a standalone, so you won’t have read the first few novellas — but you probably should, seeing as they’re just as excellent.
The Ballad of Snakes and Songbirds by Suzanne Collins
The return to The Hunger Games’ world of Panem comes almost a full decade after the release of Mockingjay. But instead of another action-packed dive into the arena, The Ballad of Snakes and Songbirds is a prequel that focuses on the future President Snow’s rise to power — and the political and social forces that forged the Hunger Games.
Shorefall by Robert Jackson Bennett
Shorefall is technically a fantasy novel, but I’m including it anyway because it’s set in a magical world that’s based far more on computer coding and AI than it is on swords and elves. It’s an almost cyberpunk take on the genre in a city filled with sorcerous computers and augmentations. Practically everything in the city of Tevanne is a programmed AI of some sort, and massive, looming megacorporations spar with each other as they rule the city. Start with Foundryside, the first book in the series, before you head to Shorefall, which ratchets everything up another notch.
If you received a virtual reality gaming headset this holiday season, congratulations! Whether you’ve got the newly released Oculus Quest 2, one of the last few units of the now discontinued Oculus Rift S, or another headset like the PlayStation VR, there are a ton of video games for you to explore with your new head mount display. Here are ten games I personally enjoy and think are worth your time and money.
We’ve rounded up our favorite and most-used games, apps, and entertainment. Check out our app picks for iPhones, Android phones, Windows PCs, and M1-equipped Macs; our favorite mobile games from Apple Arcade and Google Play Pass; and our top choices for gaming PCs, the PS5, Xbox One and Series X / S, Nintendo Switch, and VR. We’ve also listed our favorite streaming shows on Disney Plus, Hulu, ESPN Plus, and Netflix; some great sci-fi books; and exciting new podcasts. (Note: pricing was accurate at the time of publishing but may change.)
Half-Life: Alyx
Half-Life: Alyx Image: Valve
Yeah, it’s not Half-Life 3. But the fact that Half-Life: Alyx even exists is truly a blessing and is a great addition to the Half-Life franchise. Set five years after the events of Half-Life 2, you control Alyx, who is tasked with taking a super weapon that belongs to an alien empire.
Star Wars: Squadrons
Star Wars: Squadrons Image: EA
When I was a little girl, I always wanted to pilot an X-Wing. I thought it was so cool to be soaring through space and blasting Tie Fighters out of the sky. So when EA announced that Star Wars: Squadrons would have VR support, I knew I could finally fulfill my childhood dream.
It’s a very difficult game, and you don’t need a VR headset to play. But it’s also a very rewarding game that fully immersed me when I strapped on a virtual reality headset.
Real VR Fishing
Real VR Fishing Image: Miragesoft
When I was growing up on the eastern shore of Maryland, fishing was (and is) a very popular activity in the summer. There’s something great about casting your line with a cold drink in hand while on the water, and the challenge and patience it takes to reel in a fish. Now that it is winter, I needed something to fill the void until the warmer season returns once again, and Real VR Fishing does not disappoint.
Void Racer: Extreme
Void Racer: Extreme Image: Coplanar Games
Void Racer: Extreme is a sci-fi racing game that gives me the same adrenaline rush that I get from games like Wipeout or Sprint Vector and combines it with an aesthetic like that seen in the film Tron. If you are looking for a fast-paced racing game and love sci-fi vibes, this is the game for you.
Dreams
DreamsImage: Media Molecule
Sure, there are no true PS5 games released yet, but the PlayStation VR still has a solid library of PS4 titles that you can check out, including Media Molecule’s 2020 game creation title Dreams. It’s not a video game in the traditional sense — it’s more of a game about creating games. Dreams strongly encourages players to embrace their creative side, and you would be surprised by what type of user-generated content you can create.
Rez Infinite
Rez Infinite Image: Enhance Experience
Rez Infinite is a techno-fueled shooter with sublime and trippy graphics that is truly a breathtaking experience. It’s released on practically every virtual reality gaming headset, which makes it very accessible to play.
Beat Saber
Beat SaberImage: Beat Games
Although Beat Saber was originally released in 2019, this is still one of the best VR games around, and it’s one that every VR headset owner needs to experience. A rhythm game where you use lightsaber-like drumsticks to slice through musical beats? You can’t beat that. The game has also expanded to a slew of content packs, which include original songs and some licensed songs from bands like Linkin Park and BTS.
VR Shoot Around
VR Shoot Around Image: BoninblueDesignLab
Among the many things I missed this year because of the pandemic is sports. Namely, the ability to go to a basketball court and shoot some hoops. After some asking around, I heard about a really decent VR simulation title called VR Shoot Around,and it did not disappoint. Oh, and did I mention this game is only $5?
Trover Saves the Universe
Trover Saves the Universe Image: Squanch Games
Like a few games on this list, Trover Saves the Universe was not released in 2020 (though it was released this year for the Oculus Quest). Developed by Squanch Games, this game is one of the goofier titles available on VR headsets. And if you are a fan of Rick and Morty,you will surely get a kick out of this game — in fact, it was created by Justin Roiland, one of the co-creators of that series.
Like its predecessor, Pixel Ripped 1995 is a love letter of sorts to the decade it is set in: the ‘90s. It’s a sequel to Pixel Ripped 1989 and will make anyone who grew up during the 16-bit or 32-bit era of gaming feel nostalgic.
The new Surface Pro 8 range will debut presumably in January 2021, with a cheaper entry proposal that will be able to offer good elaboration
by Paolo Corsini published 30 December 2020 , at 09: 01 in the Laptops channel Intel Core Microsoft Surface 2-in-1
New information on next generation 2-in-1 Microsoft Surface Pro , ready to debut in version 8. Po what changes to the external appearance but many news under the body those expected, starting from the processors that will be proposed in the 11th generation Intel Core series based on Tiger Lake architecture .
The WinFuture site among the news is Microsoft’s choice of provide a minimum of 8GB of system memory for the cheaper version , overcoming the 4GB limit of the entry level proposal of the Surface Pro range now on the market.
This is an important step as it allows you to better manage the needs of the Windows operating system 10 also with the proposal entry of the range. A similar choice was also made for the processor: from the Core M3 of the entry model of the Surface Pro 7 family we have now moved on to the Core i3 CPU of the Tiger Lake family , able to offer superior performance both for the CPU and GPU compartment.
Below are the different configurations of the Surface Pro 8 that are expected to debut in the European market; they differ, as always, for the amount of system memory and onboard storage, for the processor and for the presence of an integrated LTE modem .
Surface Pro 8 i3 8 / 128 GB
Surface Pro 8 LTE i5 8 / 128 GB
Surface Pro 8 LTE i5 8 / 256 GB
Surface Pro 8 LTE i5 16 / 256 GB
Surface Pro 8 i5 8 / 128 GB
Surface Pro 8 i5 8 / 256 GB
Surface Pro 8 i5 16 / 256 GB
Surface Pro 8 i7 16 / 256 GB
Surface Pro 8 i7 16 / 512 GB
Surface Pro 8 i7 16 / 1TB
Surface Pro 8 i7 32 / 1TB
The debut of the new Surface Pro 8 range, alongside the Surface Laptop 4, is scheduled for January 2021 .
(Pocket-lint) – Yes, it really is only a few months since the last MacBook Air hit the streets. But while this new end-of-2020 model looks and feels the same as the one from earlier in the year, what’s inside is quite different.
That’s because the MacBook Air now runs exclusively on Apple’s own processors, dubbed Apple Silicon. The Apple M1 chip inside shares more in common – actually a lot in common – with Apple’s A-Series iPhone and iPad chips than any Intel processor. It’s the same M1 that’s now available in the Mac mini range as well as the 13-inch MacBook Pro (although there’s still an Intel model available of the latter for now).
Apple Silicon is here: What does the Apple M1 mean for your next Mac?
The transition to Apple Silicon follows on from 15 years of Macs using Intel processors and, while we’re not sure what’s happening at the top-end of the range, it’s safe to say that all low-to-mid-level Macs will be running Apple Silicon by the end of 2021. So what difference does it make and is now the right time to jump in?
Design
Dimensions: 304 x 212mm / 41-161mm thick / Weight: 1.29kg
As with the 2019 and early 2020 models, the external design of the first M1 Macbook Air is the same. We’ve remarked elsewhere how surprised we are that Apple didn’t take the opportunity to create a radical new Mac with the change to its own processor design. After all, we could have had a replacement for the old MacBook, which was sort of like a sub-MacBook Air.
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But we didn’t get that and so we move on. Apple is perfectly capable of pushing the envelope on design – just look at the AirPods Max – but clearly with the portable Mac it feels that its distinguished and hardy aluminium unibody is something to stick with. And why not? This is a hugely successful design that remains modern-looking, even though we’re now nearly 13 years on from Steve Jobs pulling the original from an envelope.
Once again there are two USB-C/Thunderbolt 3 ports – which can sometimes limit you a little, but in reality it’s increasingly a rarity. The notable thing here is that they support the new USB 4 standard. The 3.5mm headphone jack remains but it’s surely now on borrowed time on the Mac.
The keyboard is the same again as the early 2020 MacBook Air, but that keyboard brought serious improvement over earlier generations, with the introduction of the Magic Keyboard with an older-style scissor mechanism. It’s very comfortable to type on for long periods and has much better travel than older ‘butterfly’ MacBook Pro keyboards. While many lauded the Magic Keyboard as a revelation, the fact is you should expect a fantastic keyboard to be part of a laptop like this. It’s a minimum requirement.
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Touch ID is in the top right corner of the keyboard, meaning quick and easy login with a fingerprint, but we really hope that Face ID will come to the Mac in 2021. You’ve been able to use your face to log into Windows 10 since 2016, so Apple is trailing behind here – in particular as the technology already exists in its phones.
Display
13.3-inch Retina Display, 2650 x 1600 resolution
Can drive up to one 6K external display
True Tone support, P3 wide colour
Again you get the well-known 13.3-inch Retina display, giving you the same resolution of 2560 x 1600 pixels as the 2019 and early 2020 versions. True Tone ensures the display adapts to your environment, while there’s also support for the P3 wide colour gamut – which is new for the Air this time around.
The Air’s display no longer has a huge bezel, but it does feel like Apple needs to match some of the PC designs coming out with near-borderless displays, which aren’t even that new – the Dell XPS 13 has had a super-thin bezel for half a decade now. We’ve said that bezel design needs to be refined for other Macs, too, particularly the iMac, and perhaps we will see some movement here over the next year or so.
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We found there was no problem driving our external 4K display via USB-C, but you can only connect a single 4K, 5K or 6K display at 60Hz (yes, you can drive Apple’s Pro Display XDR if you really want to – wouldn’t that be a dream?). The recent Intel version was capable of driving two 4K displays, or a single 5K display or a single 6K display over Thunderbolt, so the M1 is a rare and slight downgrade in that regard which will be noticed by some.
When we talked about the changes we wanted to see from Apple Silicon Macs, one of them was the hope that the Mac would support touch. Apple seems very set against touch for the Mac – and is persisting with the Touch Bar on the MacBook Pro – yet tells us that an iPad is a computer and that it can do anything. As a differentiator between product lines, it makes sense.
But there’s now (more than) a generation of kids who are totally used to touch and are pretty bemused they can’t touch a laptop’s screen, especially if they’ve done it with Windows 10, iPads and smartphones. Every time we’re using a Mac, someone in our family tries to touch the screen to flick through pictures or webpages – and that has to say something about what should happen with the Mac. Of course, Apple will have been thinking about this, but our opinion is that a change needs to happen sooner rather than later.
Performance and battery life
Apple M1 processor (3GHz; 8-core – 4 performance and 4 efficiency cores)
7 or 8-core GPU, 16-core Neural Engine
256/512GB storage (up to 1TB, 2TB)
8GB RAM (upgradeable to 16GB)
Battery cited at 15 hours
There are two versions of the Air available: one with seven-core graphics (more on that shortly) and a 256GB SSD; another with eight-core graphics and 512GB of storage. You can upgrade the storage in either version to a maximum of 2TB (an eye-watering upgrade in terms of cost though).
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Both versions of the Air have 8GB of RAM as standard (upgradeable to 16GB, which is the limit of what Apple Silicon can currently support, it seems). The two options also house identical CPUs – the eight-core Apple M1 with CPU cores based on the latest ARM design. And they don’t use fans either – so are silent in operation.
The M1 shares a huge amount with Apple’s A-Series processors and, more specifically, the A14 Bionic found in the iPhone 12 and 2020 iPad Air. Like that chip, the M1 is based on TSMC’s 5nm manufacturing process – which means it’s super-efficient. No non-Apple computer yet has a chip based on that process. Intel is still floundering with getting to 7nm, while Qualcomm hasn’t yet announced PC silicon based on 5nm.
The best Chromebook 2020: Our pick of the top Chrome OS laptops for school, college and more
Like the A14 Bionic there are four performance cores and four cores designed for power efficiency. This results in serious performance. Like others, we have been blown away by the raw capability on show here, because everything you expect to take time – like an installation or processing of video – happens so quickly. One negative, however, is that unlike the MacBook Pro with the M1 chip, performance will throttle over time to keep things cool and that’s why pros will still want to go with the Pro.
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We don’t normally do benchmarks on Pocket-lint (unless it’s for a gaming laptop or rig), but as this is the first time a chip has made its way into the wild it makes sense for a quick comparison. Our Geekbench 5 benchmark results show simply steaming performance (1731 single-core, 7475 multi-core score). A simple look at the Mac charts for Geekbench 5 shows you that on single-core performance the M1 is faster than any Mac Pro. And on multi-core performance the new M1 systems fall only behind the Intel Xeon Macs (Mac Pro and iMac Pro) and the 2019/2020 iMacs with Intel’s high-end Core Core i7-10700K and i9-9900K (check out our 2020 iMac review).
Raw performance is certainly not an issue then. And the efficiency of the ARM-based design has another benefit we had expected – longer battery life. Apple cites up to 18 hours video playback and 15 hours using the web. We found you could eke the battery out to last around 11 hours, but 10 is more common for serious use with video calls and lots of apps open and working in the background – which is still a great innings when many Windows machines will score around seven hours.
A note about the graphics. As we mentioned, the 256GB version of the Air has seven-core graphics, while the 512GB version has eight-core. There’s a pretty simple reason for this: with the manufacturing of any silicon, a certain percentage of product won’t come up to snuff, probably through defective cores. Those ‘bad cores’ can then be shut off and the product sold as a different version, hence the seven-core variant.
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There’s support for the latest Bluetooth 5.0 and Wi-Fi 6 standards, while the 720p FaceTime HD camera is now enhanced with some smarts from the image signal processor (ISP) on the M1 platform – it’s clearly better than in previous generations, as skin tones are better, colours are generally improved and the room looks brighter – but we still feel that Apple should upgrade the camera to a Full HD one.
Apple Silicon app support and macOS Big Sur
Support for non-native Apple Silicon apps via Rosetta 2 translator
All Apple apps are Apple Silicon-ready
Affinity, Google Chrome, Microsoft Office and other key apps have support
Others on the way, including full Adobe Creative Cloud compatibility
The key question with the move to Apple Silicon processors is if Apple could avoid the issues it had when it moved from Power PC to Intel processors around 2005. Could apps really work seamlessly on a completely new processor this time? The short answer is yes, Apple has avoided the major issues.
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That’s thanks to Rosetta 2, a code translator, helping non-native apps run on Apple Silicon systems. Bizarrely it isn’t installed as default – presumably if you just use Apple’s own apps you won’t need it. But if you open an app that isn’t ready for Apple Silicon, you’re prompted to install.
For an ever-increasing number of apps from the Mac App Store and Apple’s native apps, everything works fine. But for stuff from other vendors, more work is needed. That work is happening, of course, but if you rely on even a couple of lesser-known apps you may want to wait until you know there is native M1 support.
Zoom, for example, worked absolutely fine on Rosetta 2. Yet the company has been quick to announce an Apple Silicon version. Native Apple Silicon support doesn’t guarantee any problems, however – Google had to work to fix Chrome after the ARM version crashed repeatedly, which was a major pain for us the first few days we used this Mac. Generally though, apps are stable using Rosetta 2.
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Apple Silicon-enabled Affinity apps, including Affinity Photo, run brilliantly, as does Microsoft Office (also now updated for Apple Silicon). But other big-vendor apps are lagging behind. Adobe Creative Cloud has yet to fully move across, even if Lightroom already has support.
Now, if you compare apples with oranges and look at Microsoft’s rambling attempts to cater for ARM-based Windows PCs, the Apple Silicon transition is already a dream. The Windows Store is a car crash in comparison to the Mac App Store and, while you can easily live off apps from the Mac App Store, the same can’t be said of its Windows equivalent.
macOS Big Sur is generally very stable providing you’re using at least the 11.1 version – the 11.0 version wasn’t so hot, with some apps quite slow, a couple of issues with USB-C docks and so on. While the Apple Silicon support is the big story with Big Sur, the design has been overhauled. This isn’t the radical change that Apple first billed, but the design is more like iPadOS than ever.
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That isn’t a bad thing, because the new design elements are largely familiar, while the OS does feel genuinely fresh to use.
Verdict
While there’s a question mark over whether you should jump to Apple Silicon quite yet, there’s little doubt that Apple has seriously powered up the Air with its move to Apple Silicon. So much so that it’s hard to suggest you should plump for the MacBook Pro 13-inch over it – you have to really need the fan for sustained high performance over a longer time.
If you’re looking for an excuse to upgrade and the performance isn’t enough, consider the battery life. Obviously, a lot of us aren’t travelling so much at the moment, but the longevity of this Air really is a fresh experience. And this is a great laptop in many other ways, of course – the screen is super, the design robust, and the keyboard actually works well.
In the ultraportable market there’s little to compete. Of course, there are cheaper PCs, but they all have a compromise versus the Air, either in terms of performance or portability. It’s clear, then, that the M1 chip spells a bright future for Apple.
Also consider
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MacBook Pro (2020)
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The step-up model does cost more and gives you a fan instead for sustained workloads, but it’s mostly identical to the Air. One extra benefit is that it does give you even longer battery life (yes really) and so for some that could be worth the cost alone – it’ll take you up to the thick end of 20 hours.
Read our MacBook Pro review
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Dell XPS 13
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“Dell has once again proven it’s the laptop master” is what we said in our verdict on this laptop. And it’s a serious rival to both the MacBook Air and Pro. But considering the power of the M1, the XPS 13 has a real fight on its hands. But if you’re looking for the closest Windows 10 equivalent to the Air, this is the one. And it’s got a thin bezel, too!
Apple macOS 11 Big Sur: All the key new Mac features explored
This year marked the introduction of the first Macs to be powered by Apple’s own silicon instead of Intel chips. As is evidenced by our reviews of the M1 MacBook Air, 13-inch MacBook Pro, and Mac mini, these machines are incredibly powerful and offer wicked fast performance. This is especially true for apps that are designed to run natively on them and take full advantage of Apple’s latest technologies.
So in that vein, this year’s Mac apps list is going to focus on some of the software that has already been optimized for this new era of Apple hardware. Last year’s picks remain just as relevant and useful today if you’re on an Intel machine. But if you’ve been gifted (or are gifting yourself) one of these new speed-demon Macs, these are a few great ways of sampling what they can do.
We’ve rounded up our favorite and most-used games, apps, and entertainment. Check out our app picks for iPhones, Android phones, Windows PCs, and M1-equipped Macs; our favorite mobile games from Apple Arcade and Google Play Pass; and our top choices for gaming PCs, the PS5, Xbox One and Series X / S, Nintendo Switch, and VR. We’ve also listed our favorite streaming shows on Disney Plus, Hulu, ESPN Plus, and Netflix; some great sci-fi books; and exciting new podcasts. (Note: pricing was accurate at the time of publishing but may change.)
Pixelmator Pro
Pixelmator Pro
Pixelmator Pro is one of the very best image editing apps for the Mac. It has the usual set of RAW editing tools, presets, sophisticated layer editing, and photo filters, and makes it easy to control every detail of your images. What sets Pixelmator Pro apart are the automatic adjustments it can make through a machine learning algorithm that has been trained with over 20 million photos. The latest update also allows greater customizability over the interface, letting you put everything where it makes the most sense for your workflow. And in a world where many creative apps demand a subscription, I really appreciate the one-time $19.99 price for everything this app gives you.
Pixelmator Pro’s iPad app ($4.99) is also wonderful — especially if you like retouching things with your Apple Pencil, which is how I edit many of my review photos.
Lightroom
Lightroom
Lightroom is the first of Adobe’s hugely popular apps to be optimized for Apple’s M1 silicon. And for many people, it’s the default choice for editing and organizing their photo collection. Now the app has been updated to leverage the power of Apple’s M1 chip to make that editing go even quicker.
Keep in mind this is the regular version of Lightroom; Lightroom Classic doesn’t run natively on M1, but Adobe says there are no known issues running it through Rosetta 2 translation. In my experience, Lightroom Classic feels very similar to its performance on Intel Macs.
A native M1 version of Photoshop is set to follow sometime next year, but Adobe hasn’t given release time frames for other apps such as Premiere Pro.
Google Chrome and Firefox
Google Chrome
Two major browsers, Chrome and Firefox, have already been updated to run natively on M1 Macs, so you shouldn’t encounter any issues or irregular performance drops when using either. In the case of Chrome, just be sure that you select “Mac with Apple chip” when downloading — otherwise you’ll end up installing the Intel version, which will still run, but not as efficiently.
Microsoft Edge currently has M1 support in its beta channel, so that shouldn’t be too far off either.
Fantastical
Fantastical
If Apple’s built-in Calendar app isn’t doing it for you, then Fantastical might be the more advanced alternative you’re looking for. Its natural language parser can turn normal sentences about your plans into a perfectly formatted appointment entry. You can set your calendar view in exactly the way you want, and Fantastical also has widgets that you can pop into your Mac’s “Today” sidebar. There is a basic free version; the Premium version, which starts at $4.99 a month, offers additional features such as the ability to add tasks, full screen views, and calendar syncing.
Microsoft 365
Microsoft 365
Microsoft has quickly updated its entire Mac suite to fully optimize Word, PowerPoint, Excel, Outlook, and OneNote for M1. So you should notice very speedy performance when doing work with any of them. I’m sure many people will prefer these over Apple’s own productivity apps like Pages and Numbers.
Twitter
Twitter
Hear me out: the Twitter app for macOS has actually gotten very good. It took some polishing and bug fixes to reach this point, but Twitter for Mac is now full-featured, responsive, and not nearly as crash-prone as before. If you haven’t given Twitter’s native app a chance yet, now’s a great time.
If you still prefer a third-party app, Tweetbot remains the go-to, and it’s also universal and M1-ready.
iMazing
iMazing
iMazing is a great device manager for digging into everything residing on your iPhone or iPad. You can create backups (different from the regular Apple ones) and grab your messages, photos, music, and more right off the device.
But it was also discovered soon after the launch of M1 Macs that this software can be used to “side load” and install iPhone apps — even those that have not yet opted in — to macOS. If you’re experimenting with this, just expect that not everything will work flawlessly.
iMazing also recently added the option to clearly see which apps on your system are universal or developed for Intel.
Bartender
Bartender
If you’ve got a cluttered mess of a menu bar at the top of your Mac’s screen, Bartender can help you bring order to things. A longtime favorite macOS utility of ours, this app lets you neatly hide everything under one menu bar icon to ease up on the chaos. You can also set triggers so that certain icons only show at those times when it makes the most sense.
Neural Mix Pro
Neural Mix Pro
Neural Mix Pro is an app that lets you separate the various parts of a song — vocals, instrumentation, and beats — and listen to them individually. You can also change up the tempo of a song without ruining the pitch. A handy tool for DJs and musicians, it also just appeals to my inner music nerd. The end result can still sometimes sound a bit phase-y (like most vocal remover software) and have some artifacts, but it does a better job than other apps I’ve tried for this purpose. Just know that it’s pricey compared to other recommendations here; you’ll have to pay $50 to unlock the app.
BetterTouchTool
BetterTouchTool
If you’ve got the new 13-inch MacBook Pro with Apple’s M1 chip, well, that means you’ve also got the love-it-or-hate-it Touch Bar above your keyboard. There are ways of customizing it to your liking in macOS settings, but BetterTouchTool is a utility that gives you even greater flexibility over what goes where when using the Touch Bar, allowing you to quickly tap useful shortcuts for your most important apps.
A stunning AMOLED panel helps the XtendTouch Pro stand out among the portable monitor competition. But a required power hub and a high retail price mean this screen will mostly appeal to professionals.
For
Astounding image quality and brightness
More versatile than competition
Touch controls work well
Against
Expensive, especially at retail price
Requires two cables and a power adapter to function
Could use a metal kickstand
(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)
As far as productivity-focused portable screens go, the OLED-powered XtendTouch Pro is by far the nicest we’ve seen yet. And compared to professional alternatives, it’s surprisingly affordable — if you grab it from Kickstarter preorder for its starting price of $699 (the company claims retail price will be $1,299). But unless you need the level of color and brightness, that’s still a high price compared to lesser LCD-based 1080p resolutions models — though those don’t look nearly as good.
The XtendTouch Pro also requires two cables and a USB charging hub to function, making it a lot less practically portable than models that work over a single USB-C cable. So while the panel in this screen looks astounding, it will likely make sense solely to professionals and well-off prosumers who don’t want to pay much more for larger OLED alternatives.
Portable monitors have for years been a good option for those looking for increased productivity while on the go. And some, like Lenovo’s ThinkVision M14t, also include touch. But most don’t get very bright and/or don’t deliver the rich color, detail and contrast that professional or prosumer image and video editors need.
Enter the XtendTouch Pro from capsicum-themed peripheral maker Pepper Jobs. It’s a portable 15.6-inch 4K AMOLED, (a type of OLED) monitor with touch control, over 100% coverage of the DCI-P3 color space and a high rated peak brightness of 650 nits. It’s very portable at under 2 pounds and about 0.5-inch thick with its origami-like cover/stand.
Pepper Jobs XtendTouch Pro Specs
Panel Type / Backlight
AMOLED
Screen Size / Aspect Ratio
15.6 inches / 16:9
Max Resolution & Refresh Rate
3840 x 2160 @ 60 Hz
Color Depth
8-bit
Response Time
1ms (typical)
Max Brightness
650 nits
Contrast Ratio
100,000:1 (static)
Power Consumption
30W (peak)
Ports
2x USB Type-C, Mini HDMI, OTG/USB-C, 3.5mm audio
Touch
10-point
Stylus
4,096 pressure levels
Dimensions
14 x 8.8 x 0.4 inches (377 x 224 x 10mm)
Weight
1.87 pounds (0.85kg)
Design of Pepper Jobs XtendTouch Pro
(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)
The eye-catching deep blacks and high brightness of the AMOLED panel in the XtendTouch Pro will likely be the main thing people notice about this monitor. Note that AMOLED is a variant of OLED developed by Samsung, with an additional active matrix (hence the AM) TFT film for faster, precise pixel control.
But many other aspects of the monitor’s exterior look much like other portable displays. At 14 x 8.8 x 0.4 inches and 1.87 pounds, it’s quite portable. But that statement discounts the necessity of two USB-C cables and an external power bank to deliver the stable power required to run the high-brightness screen and the touch layer — much more on this in the next section.
Bezels around the display are slim, save for the bottom lip, which is typically larger to house necessary components, as well as to lift the screen a bit more than 1 inch above your desk for more comfortable viewing.
There are more ports on the XtendTouch Pro than most portable displays. That’s in part due to the fact that you need a dedicated USB-C/Thunderbolt cable just for power — the company says the screen needs about 30W at peak brightness with the speakers turned up. But there’s some extra versatility provided here as well.
(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)
The right edge, near the bottom corner, houses one USB-C port for power, a second for data and a Mini HDMI port. Those with devices with a DisplayPort Alt Mode or Thunderbolt capabilities will want to use the pair of USB-C ports. But for devices that lack this, you can still use the top USB-C plugged into the included powered hub, while using HDMI for video. This is handy for connecting to things like consoles or a Raspberry Pi. But if you connect this way via PC, note that you won’t be able to use the screen’s touch layer.
(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)
The XtendTouch Pro also has stereo speakers that fire out of either side of the device (when in landscape orientation). When I listened to the new “Seed EP2” from dirty electronic pioneers Portion Control, the speakers did a decent job of conveying the layered complexity of distorted sounds and samples, and volume was enough to fill my small office (once I realized you need to use the OSD and an on-screen slider to go up past the default 50% volume). But as you might guess about speakers shoved behind a screen in a chassis that’s just 0.4 inches thick, bass was pretty much non-existent. If you want that, use the headphone jack or plug in some external speakers.
Over on the left side is a small rocker wheel/button used to bring up the on-screen display (OSD), a headphone jack and a USB-C On-The-Go (OTG) port for connecting the display to a smartphone or tablet. The monitor even comes with a picture-in-picture mode, so you can display a secondary signal in a small window in a corner of the screen. Given the small size of the resulting image on a display that’s only 15.6 inches diagonal, we suspect this feature will have minimal appeal for most.
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Overall, build quality feels quite solid, as we’d expect given the price. Aside from the glass front, the shell is made of solid-feeling metal. And there’s even a pair of small screw holes on the back for mounting the monitor to a 75mm VESA arm or stand. That’s something we haven’t seen in a portable monitor before and a nod to professionals who may want to use this screen in a more permanent setup.
Accessories for Pepper Jobs XtendTouch Pro
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The XtendTouch Pro ships with far more accessories than most portable monitors. In some ways, that’s a good thing, but it’s also partially out of necessity. As noted earlier, the monitor needs two cables to work, one of which needs to be plugged into a dedicated power source. The company shipped our unit with a 100W charger for this purpose, which also lets you handily power a few more USB devices at the same time. A company rep told us that there will be another option with a smaller 60W charger that also comes with plugs for multiple countries.
The latter option will likely appeal more to those who travel (whenever we get to a point where we can safely travel again). But knowing that you need to plug into an external power adapter and bring along two cables to plug in your external monitor means the XtendTouch Pro is less travel-friendly and more cumbersome to set up than many portable monitors that can get all the juice they need from a single USB-C cable. But then those options don’t deliver anywhere near the color, brightness and contrast of this AMOLED panel — and most don’t include touch support.
Touch and Pen Support on Pepper Jobs XtendTouch Pro
(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)
Speaking of touch, the monitor also ships with a premium-feeling pen-like stylus with 4,096 pressure sensitivity layers, powered by a single AAAA battery. It worked well in my limited use (I’m no artist), though as with most styli I’ve tested over the years, there’s noticeable lag when you’re writing or drawing at any speed.
Touch controls worked much as you would expect with a touchscreen laptop. But the thin folding stand cover also isn’t sturdy enough for input with the pen or much more than light taps and swipes. So Pepper Jobs also includes a second metal stand that lets you adjust the screen’s tilt and, to some extent, height. This stand is far-better suited to use with the stylus and general use at a desk because it lifts the screen up as much as 3 inches off the surface for better line of sight. But it’s bulky and weighted at the bottom (to aid stability), which makes it less travel-friendly, though it does fold flat.
Aside from the stand, the cover, the USB Power Delivery power hub, a small stand for the power hub and the stylus, the company includes a few cables and a USB-C to USB-A adapter in the box. All of this is appreciated but will weigh you down if you plan on traveling with it. And final shipping models may ship with a slightly different set of accessories. So make sure you know what’s included before buying (or preordering on Kickstarter).
Image Quality of Pepper Jobs XtendTouch Pro
(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)
As you might expect given its AMOLED origins, many aspects of the image quality on the XtendTouch Pro are unrivaled, at least compared to most portable and budget monitors. I watched various 4K resolution videos of Scotland on YouTube (as I await the ability to safely travel there again). And the mixing shades of green, brown and gray looking over the Quiraing on the Isle of Skye were just as endless, complex and vivid on the AMOLED screen as I remember from hiking there in person. Looking at some of my own photos of the nearby Storr in the mist, the deep black of the Jurassic-era cliff faces, ripped down and exposed by the largest landslide in Britain, brought back a sense of timeless foreboding that I hadn’t felt since I last stood there myself, near-stupefied by the magnitude of everything around me.
The glossiness of a touchscreen can often cause viewing angle and reflection issues, as we saw with the ThinkVision M14t. But not so here. Thanks to a combination of the high contrast of AMOLED, (which is lit on a per-pixel basis, leading to the deepest of blacks) and high brightness (Pepper Jobs claims 440 average nits, with a peak of 650) means the image looks great from any angle and lighting condition. I have three 4K displays of various types that I use for testing and photo editing. But even the 49-inch Sony TV that I use as my primary productivity display couldn’t compete anecdotally on image quality, despite being a nice VA panel with some better brightness specs.
Again, OLED looks better than pretty much any kind of LCD display because the pixels provide their own light, rather than relying on any kind zone or edge backlighting. That said, for long-term use, my eyes prefer the (much) larger Sony TV than a 15.6-inch display.
(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)
XtendTouch Pro surpasses any other portable or budget monitor that we’ve looked at recently, with a brightness at default settings of nearly 423 nits, a little shy of the rated 440 average. You should see higher peak brightness if viewing HDR content, but I never felt like I was wanting for more brightness with this screen, even when working in direct sunlight.
According to our colorimeter, the XtendTouch Pro is also easily the most colorful display of the portable monitors we’ve looked at lately, delivering nearly 175% of the sRGB space and 117.8% of the more-demanding DCI-P3. Nothing else we’ve tested in this class comes close, making this a great panel for media editing.
Color Gamut Accuracy of Pepper Jobs XtendTouch Pro
For details on our color gamut testing and volume calculations, click here.
(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)
Our saturation sweep of the DCI-P3 color space turned in a Delta E (dE) result of 3.68, which isn’t good for a monitor aimed at content creators. But the version of the XtendTouch Pro that Pepper Jobs sent us was just an engineering sample ,and early on a company rep told us that professional profiles and firmware were still being worked on.
So given the unfinished nature of this aspect of the screen, we didn’t continue with detailed color, grayscale and gamma testing. Those primarily interested in this aspect of the screen will have to wait for tests from a finalized version of the display. Of course, professionals with calibration tools may also be able to get more accuracy that way, though we hope Pepper Jobs delivers solid accuracy out of the box with its final shipping display.
Settings and OSD on Pepper Jobs XtendTouch Pro
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One of the nice things about having a touch screen display is when the on-screen display (OSD) is also touch-enabled, as it is with the Xtend Touch Pro. Rather than having to navigate every setting and slider with the jog wheel button on the left side, you mostly just press that to bring up the OSD and switch between screens. Adjusting sliders and selecting options and sub-menus is handled by tapping things that pop up in the lower-right corner of the display.
Most of what’s available in the OSD is expected and self-explanatory. But as noted earlier, to go past the monitor’s default 50% volume on the speakers, you need to open the OSD and tap and slide up the volume meter here. I just set it at 100% then used Windows to adjust the volume further. For those using other devices or operating systems, however, having the volume in the OSD might make more sense.
Bottom Line
(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)
Given that similar portable OLED options, like Asus’ larger 21-inch ProArt PQ22UC OLED monitor cost thousands of dollars, the Pepper Jobs XtendTouch Pro is arguably a bargain for professionals and prosumers who need a colorful second display for working on the go or in small spaces. That’s especially true if you pick it up via Kickstarter for $699 rather than the eventual suggested retail price of $1,299. The good news is that the company estimates Kickstarter orders to ship in January 2021, so you won’t likely have long to wait. Just know that you’ll need to carry around a power hub and extra cables to get the screen working.
But even at the $699 price, the Xtend Touch Pro is too pricey to find much favor outside the creative realm. And we were unable to test final color accuracy, which is a key consideration, even for enthusiast photographers who want to make sure what’s on the screen is an accurate representation of reality.
If you just want an extra screen for productivity, there are lots of alternatives that, while they don’t look as good or get as bright, will let you bang out documents or sort spreadsheets for hundreds less. And while the 1ms rated response time means this screen should suffice for gaming, those spending anything close to this much on a portable monitor for gaming will likely be after a screen that can output more than this panel’s 60 Hz refresh rate. For those users, there’s the Asus ROG Strix XG17AHPE, which does 240 Hz, is larger at 17.3 inches and sells for about $500.
Most notebooks adopt displays from 16: 9 o 16: 10, however according to Chuwi the most reliable report for most activities is 3: 2. Here are the manufacturer’s recommendations
by Editorial team published 29 December 2020 , at 12: 41 in the Laptops channel Chuwi
To date, most notebooks use displays with an aspect ratio of 16: 9, sometimes the less flattened format 16: 10. This is a choice mainly dictated by multimedia needs (televisions are often 16: 10, and the film formats are approximately equal to 21: 9), while a less “squashed” format is preferable for productivity.
Microsoft itself strongly promotes 3: 2 screens on its Surface family products, and focuses on this aspect also Chuwi . It’s a ratio designed to maximize productivity and work efficiency, and the Windows operating system itself is designed to perform best on 3: 2 screens. I advantages of the 3: 2 format can be summarized as follows:
See more content : the 3: 2 format gives more space to vertical content, making it perfect for reproducing documents or web pages. In these cases it is possible to see more content without scrolling the page, thus reducing the frequency with which it is necessary to go up and down within the document being reproduced.
Best suited for document work : the 3: 2 ratio allows you to reproduce two A4-size pages each to side of the other, allowing the user to process multiple documents simultaneously or perform multiple operations during editing.
Best user experience : also thanks to the possibility to further reduce the frames, Chuwi’s 3: 2 screens offer a better user experience than the old models.
All the information on Chuwi notebooks can be found on the official website
Notebook 3: 2 by Chuwi from 13 “
CoreBook Pro Key Features – 2K Resolution | 3: 2 screen | Intel Core i3 CPU | 8GB + 256 GB
The lightweight and portable metal body, the size of a book and the full-screen panel from 13 “make it a great system for mobile office work. Adopt Intel Core i3 processor with Iris GPU 550, 8GB of RAM and 256 GB of storage, features that make it perfect even for productivity activities.
It is characterized by the design similar to that of CoreBook Pro, with a level of portability also in this case excellent. The Intel Celeron J processor 4115 is proposed in “performance” configuration, with frequency maximum of 2.5GHz in Turbo. It is a system that offers basic performance for everyday activities, with low energy consumption. I 12 GB of RAM allows you to keep more apps open in the background.
Notebook 3: 2 by Chuwi from 14 “
CoreBook X Key Features – 2K Resolution | 3: 2 Screen | Intel Core i5 CPU | 13 B + 256 GB
The 2K display from 14 “of CoreBook X is of higher quality, and the operating frequency of the integrated Intel Core i5 CPU can reach 3.5GHz. The Iris Plus GPU 650 offers more than satisfactory graphics performance for the multimedia, and is perfect for tasks that require a high level of computation such as photo and video editing. Combines productivity with portability.
GemiBook Pro Key Features – 2K Resolution | 3: 2 screen | Intel Celeron J CPU 4125 | 16 B + 512 GB
Same aesthetics and features for the integrated display compared to CoreBook X, but changes the processor under the body which is the less powerful Intel Celeron J 4125, combined here with 16 GB of RAM and 512 GB of storage. Great for everyday tasks, with low energy consumption, especially for those who often work with different software in multitasking.
Chuwi points out that their systems are designed to offer a good user experience. They are all products with a good quality-price ratio, but each is configured for a specific target of users, with Chuwi intending to satisfy different needs. More details on the official website.
Xiaomi had a massive event today in Bejing, China, where it introduced its latest flagship smartphones, as well as the new interface, called MIUI 12.5. It is a follow-up of MIUI 12 and comes with massive safety improvements, optimized applications, and the ability to receive notifications and do some work on connected Windows devices effortlessly.
Xiaomi clarified that the name makes the new update sound like a minor thing, but it is actually the next major software solution for the upcoming year. The company did not reveal why it decided to stay away from the number 13, but our guess is there was some superstition involved.
The new MIUI 12.5 has improved system aesthetics and visual design – the company executive on stage compared the interface with iOS and said the transition effects are pretty much the same. Xiaomi also boasted about being the company that brings the least system apps, when compared with Apple, Huawei, Oppo, vivo, and Meizu.
The back-end stage of development included rewriting the core structure so the MIUI 12.5 uses 20% less memory and 25% less power, with background memory decreasing to an average of 35%. Speaking about apps and their workload, aside from the handful of system ones for settings, camera, and phone calls, all other can be uninstalled.
Just like in MIUI 11 and MIUI 12, we have yet another new dynamic wallpaper. This time it is the highest peak of Four Sisters Mountain in Sichuan, China, and adapts in real life, based on the actual weather where the phone is. There are also more customizations in sights and sounds – multiple notifications will come in four different tones, inspired by various places around the globe.
Speaking about security, MIUI 12.5 will allow users to disallow applications to use their location, private data, access to clipboard and won’t save passwords or other sensitive information.
More than a dozen smartphones are eligible for the first closed beta, but all of them must be based in China. All the Mi 10 devices will be able to join, as well as Redmi K30, and even some phones from early 2019 like some Redmi Note 7 versions and the Xiaomi Mi 9 lineup.
The 31 December 2020 Adobe will end Flash support: users are warned and encouraged to uninstall
of
software Andrea Bai published on 28 December 2020 , at 13: 01 in the Software channel Adobe
Only a few days left until 31 December, the day on which not only 2020 but also
will end Flash support from Adobe . This is the inevitable end to a long road to a smooth transition, and now Adobe has started notifying Windows users 10 that the program will no longer have any support starting from January 1st 2021 .
Flash has represented for years a serious problem in the security of client systems and gradually the web has distanced itself from it thanks to the emergence of more modern, standardized and safer technologies. Taking note of the security problems and the now established spread of HTML5 open standards, Adobe announced in July 2017 the end Flash support for 31 December 2020.
As the fateful date approaches, Adobe has eliminated what will historically be remembered as the latest Flash update, released on December 9th, is “scaring” users to dissuade them from using the software. Starting from 12 January 2021, however, there will not be much choice: Adobe Flash Player and all related plug-ins will no longer play any content .
Adobe started broadcasting alerts on Windows 10 reminding users of deadlines and advising them to uninstall Flash Player. The program, even if unused, could still be exploited by malicious people to remotely access a PC, and the risk can only increase when the program no longer receives security updates.
Microsoft, in any case, has already put into account a measure for the automatic removal of Flash . In fact, an optional update will be released over the next year that will take care of this operation. However, this is a measure that only affects the version of Flash that Windows itself 10 installs automatically and for this reason users will still have to manually uninstall other Flash Players, unless the various browser manufacturers decide to take a similar path to that of Microsoft.
Science fiction author Cory Doctorow called for stricter antitrust regulations, especially for interoperable online services, at the remote Chaos Communication Congress (rC3) on Sunday in order to maintain competition in the digital age. With the five greats of US surveillance capitalism – Google, Amazon, Facebook, Apple and Microsoft (GAFAM) – “the worst nightmares” of the early advocates of civil rights on the Internet have come true. Political and legal countermeasures are therefore overdue.
Potential for a Big Brother dystopia As a “blind spot” in the eye of early “cyber-optimists” like Grateful Dead songwriter and activist John Perry Barlow, who 1990 in In a famous statement that rejected the governability of the Internet by state actors, Doctorow identified the dark potential of new technologies for building a Big Brother dystopia. They did not realize that the use of digital products such as Microsoft Windows and Office as well as social media would be massively increased by network effects and thus tend to monopoly structures.
In fact, the regulatory environment in the 1990 and the Internet looked like an “almost perfect market” after the break-up of AT & T’s monopoly in the telecommunications market and the US government’s antitrust proceedings against Microsoft, admitted the US comrade – Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) civil rights organization. The cyberuphorics had therefore thought that everyone could now reach a global audience with their products and services from their garage via a cheap network. But this was “naive”.
Monopoly position of large corporations has become routine At the same time, the antitrust law had been put into trouble by the influential US lawyer Robert Bork, who had already acted criminally as the chief lawyer of President Richard Nixon, Doctorow explained. This has made the theory acceptable internationally that monopolies are not bad in themselves. It only becomes dangerous if they raise prices and harm consumers. This view prevailed in Europe during the Reagan era.
A real abuse of power can hardly be proven for today’s monopolists like the GAFAM-League despite their “predatory behavior” and is already routine the Canadian complained. They are likely to buy up competitors with impunity and expand their markets horizontally and vertically. Google, for example, has only built one and a half innovative and successful products of its own: the search engine and the Hotmail clone Gmail. Android, technology for online ad networks (AdTech) and YouTube are all just bought in.
“Garage myth” of the digital companies is no longer applicable The state is even cementing the dominant position of digital corporations, Doctorow referred to the excesses of the system for “intellectual property”. Thanks to “author monopolies” such as software patents, copyright, general terms and conditions, potentially new copyright claims on interfaces (APIs) and the legal protection of technology for digital rights control management (DRM), companies could use upload filters, for example, to hinder competition and put their customers in distress bring. Governments help them to enforce their intellectual property rights and, for example, confiscate imitations at the borders.
The “garage myth” is thus finally invalid, said the civil rights activist. Start-up founders would have to fight against monopolies with enormous growth rates today and would no longer be able to easily access venture capital in the area of the “kill zone of the big five”. Meanwhile, employees of tech companies only dreamed of the free massage on Wednesdays or a good pension plan.
Competition further undermined For Doctorow, it is therefore the highest level not only to sharpen competition law again, but also to “rediscover the liberating power of technology”. After an initial test of a nuclear weapon he helped develop as part of the Manhattan Project, Robert Oppenheimer at least tried to “put the spirit back in the bottle” and put down his tools. Today’s technology developers should therefore also abandon building “digital equivalents of the atomic bomb” and rely on interoperable open services.
“We are at a crucial crossroads,” warned the network activist. Programmers shouldn’t make Orwell look like optimists. With the Internet of Things, not only would electronic eyes be created everywhere, some of which users could research without blinking and report them to the authorities. Every networked device is also shielded with many intellectual property rights, so that it can hardly be used for other purposes. In this way, competition will be further undermined. Monopolies could destroy lives, however, because many people need drugs, vaccines or glasses and fly by airplanes.
In 2019 the Huawei P30 Pro and Oppo Reno 10x zoom kicked off a zoom arms race with the introduction of the periscope telephoto lens – or should we say “re-introduction”. One phone had a periscope several years ago and with a design that was more advanced than modern phones.
Currently, you can get a periscope-equipped phones from Huawei, Oppo, Samsung, Xiaomi, vivo and Honor. But they have two major downsides. One, they have very long focal lengths (100+ mm). And two, they are locked at that focal length.
This means that mid-range zoom requires either digital zoom with the main camera (the most common approach right now) or a secondary telephoto module (an increasingly popular option). However, even with two tele lenses the gap between their focal lengths must be bridged by digital zoom. What if you wanted smooth zoom without digital processing?
The solution is to have a module with a variable focal length. Earlier this year O-Film announced such a periscope, which could go smoothly between 85 mm and 170 mm. A couple of months later Oppo unveiled its module that covered a more conservative range (85mm to 135mm). We’re excited to see these two (and others) in smartphones next year. But we have to take a minute to recognize the phone that did it right way back in 2015.
That was the Asus Zenfone Zoom (available as ZX551ML in Europe). It had just one camera module and yet its variable focal length periscope lens could take wide-angle shots at 28 mm, portrait shots at 50 mm and zoom in to 84 mm (that’s 3x optical magnification) and everything in between. All without a hint of digital zoom.
The phone used a module created by Japanese company HOYA and announced in 2013. Tentatively named the “Cube”, this was advertised as the thinnest periscope module to date, measuring only 6mm in depth. This meant it could be used in relatively thin smartphones – the Zenfone Zoom is 12mm thick, which sounds like a lot but is rather slim compared to the 15.4 mm of 2013’s Galaxy S4 zoom (later Galaxy camera modules were even thicker).
This module housed a 13.1MP sensor, 1/3” in size, which was fairly typical for the time. For comparison, the iPhone 6S Plus had a 12MP 1/3” sensor, the Galaxy S6 went bigger with a 16MP 1/2.6” imager.
The Cube module featured Laser AF for fast autofocus and optical image stabilization (OIS), which is essential for shooting at long focal lengths. As we mentioned already, the lens could stretch to 84 mm (in 35 mm equivalent) and open up to 28 mm on the wide end.
That’s not too bad, actually, the P30 Pro has a 27mm wide lens and the Reno 10x goes only slightly wider with a 26mm lens. But the keen-eyed among you would have spotted an issue with the Zenfone Zoom. In fact, it’s an issue shared by all telephoto lenses, periscope or otherwise.
The aperture is quite dim – only f/2.7 at the wide end. In 2015 the apertures of flagship phones were closer to f/2.0, which really helped with low-light performance. The Zoom’s sensor was comparable in size to that of the Galaxy and iPhone, but the lens held it back. Indeed, reviews at the time pointed out that the Zenfone produces less than stellar nighttime photos.
Using a larger senor in a periscope design is tricky as the thickness of the module is directly tied to sensor size. And the Zoom was already pushing the limits at 12mm. The camera bumps on some 2020 smartphones are ridiculous in size, but even that may not be enough.
Official Asus Zenfone Zoom photo samples: 1x zoom, f/2.7 • 3x zoom, f/4.8
Plus, there’s only so much a new lens design could do to widen the aperture, especially now that f/1.7 lenses are fairly common on the wideangle cameras. In other words, having a camera that handles both wide and tele focal lengths is not practical.
To be fair, a single camera was the norm in 2015, it wouldn’t be until the following year (2016) that LG would show off the LG G6 with a wide + ultrawide dual setup. These days mutli-camera setups are the norm as they deliver the best flexibility.
They really do. The wide cameras on modern smartphones are amazing and can beat most digital cameras in the hands of a casual user. A Zenfone Zoom style design unavoidably places restrictions on sensor size and aperture. The phone was ahead of its time, but its time has passed – it’s impossible to have a single do-it-all camera and compete in quality.
Still, when 2021 flagships are unveiled with wide angle cameras with huge sensors next to variable focal length periscopes, spare a moment to remember the innovative Zenfone Zoom.
By the way, this type of lens can be seen in some digital cameras. They have the advantage over traditional designs in that the periscope is safely housed inside the device’s body. This allows waterproofing and drop resistance to be added. In contrast, traditional designs have better optical qualities but are more fragile, which is why we have only seen them in a few oddball phones like the Galaxy S4 zoom and a few others. The Zoom wasn’t waterproof, but it could have been.
The Asus Zenfone Zoom itself is a curiosity from a past era and not just because of its camera. It ran Android on an Intel Atom x86 processor, which seems crazy now that Apple dropped x86 in favor of ARM for its Mac computers and Microsoft is enhancing x86-64 emulation for ARM-based Windows.
The writing was on the wall even in 2015, as the Intel Atom Z3590 was showing its age. Built on an old 22nm process, it housed four cores running at 2.33 GHz and an Intel GPU at 457MHz (533MHz boost). The European version of the Zoom got the Z3590 chip instead, which raised the CPU clock to 2.5GHz the GPU boost went up to 640MHz boost.
Earlier Atom-powered Zenfones were competitive in single-core performance – those CPU cores were intended for laptops and were larger than smartphone CPU cores, after all. However, ARM chipsets evolved quickly and left the x86 behind. In the smartphone form factor at first and now, perhaps, in laptops as well.
Since then Intel has abandoned its smartphone efforts, phone chipsets went first and more recently the modem division was sold to Apple. The company is now struggling in the laptop and desktop markets too, with AMD’s Ryzen showing impressive gains in performance. But we doubt AMD will re-enter the smartphone business (as some of you may know, Qualcomm bought the mobile Radeon division and scrambled its letters to come up with Adreno).
Another now-rare feature was the leather back. This was made from ox leather using traditional Italian tailoring methods to conform the leather to the milled aluminum frame. These days vegan leather is more likely to be used instead.
The SIM-free price of the Zoom was just $400, whereas Android or iOS flagships were in the $500-600 range. Excellent pricing considering the unique camera, but delays, limited availability and insignificant marketing spending made sure it never caught on with consumers and Asus never made a sequel. So, this unique phone now lies mostly forgotten.
Google Project Zero, the Google program dedicated to finding vulnerabilities in different software, has released the details of a zero-day security vulnerability in which a malicious actor could execute arbitrary code through the Windows spooler API.
This vulnerability, named CVE – 2020 – 829 , focuses on a splwow file vulnerability 64. exe on Windows that allows an attacker to execute arbitrary code in kernel mode on the computer the file is running on, so that it could be chained with malware to take control system ol.
Originally, Windows released a patch for this vulnerability, but several researchers have cataloged it botched, because this patch does not prevent or hinder the use of this vulnerability or make it disappear , so it was mainly used to “Shut up” Google.
After about 6 months without an appropriate solution and exploiting the vulnerability to attack a South Korean company, finally all the information is coming to light to try that, somehow, Microsoft take this vulnerability seriously and patch it properly, as it is a significant security risk that should not have been overlooked by Microsoft’s security team after being warned.
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Jordi Bercial
Avid enthusiast of technology and electronics . I messed around with computer components almost since I learned to ride. I started working at Geeknetic after winning a contest on their forum for writing hardware articles. Drift, mechanics and photography lover. Don’t be shy and leave a comment on my articles if you have any questions.
Just over twenty years ago, PC owners did not have an easy life, especially if they were players. On the one hand, the entire market departed from MS-DOS, on the other hand, the fifth generation of consoles (mainly Sony PlayStation) was mixed up a lot, and on the third, the most popular PC software platform, i.e. Windows, was simply a testing ground for new solutions, for example in the field of 3D graphics rendering or playing over the network. Today, some PC players complain that the next versions of DirectX do not introduce a revolution, and appear rarely. Probably only those players who do not know what happened in this matter in the last decade of the 20th century are saying that. When it comes to the games themselves, at that time there were a lot of iconic titles that are refreshed or rebooted today.
Author: Piotr Gontarczyk
However, before we move on to this not necessarily important matter for humanity, let me remind you that the leading topic is, of course, the games themselves from at least twenty years ago. In the previous, first part, fifteen items appeared, although originally there were supposed to be more. As I wrote in the previous article, no matter how many games I would like to recall and introduce briefly, there will always be something missing. Creating such a list is, contrary to appearances, difficult because it will never be possible to satisfy everyone. However, this is subjectivism, and while we’re at it, I invite you to read the second part, in which my always modest person will introduce you to the next fifteen games that I remember best from the old days. As with the previous part, everyone is warmly invited to mention the games presented in this publication, but also to point out to others titles that are not included in this publication, and in your opinion are worth knowing, especially by the younger generation.
More than twenty years ago, the quirks in games were all around. Electrification and a medieval castle? Nothing shocking. The creators willingly experimented.
In the second half of the nineties of the last century, having a 3D accelerator in the player’s computer was not “mandatory” yet, as there were still many games that were not used hardware acceleration of 3D graphics, and quite a few titles allowed the use of software rendering on the CPU.This was painful due to the very poor animation smoothness, but in a few cases it was (or had to be) acceptable. However, having a 3D accelerator was not limited to to the simple division into GeForce and Radeon. There were many companies on the market offering their solutions, such as 3DFX, Rendition, S3, PowerVR / NEC, 3DLabs, Matrox, Trident, Cirrus Logic, Intel (temporarily, but one k), Number Nine, and finally NVIDIA and ATI. In different years there was a lot to choose from! Many players of that time chose specific products for the so-called feel, and many regretted their choice fairly quickly. Most of the 3D accelerators available back then were errors, either terribly slow or with various compatibility issues.
This was overlapped with the successive versions of DirectX, with large releases up to 9.0 appearing at least once a year and smaller updates were released in between. What is it – you will ask? After all, it’s good that the software is developing rapidly? The problem was that the equipment was technically obsolete very quickly. For example, Riva TNT (Direct3D 6), bought in 1998, already a year later supported the outdated version in hardware, because then 3D accelerators were already using Direct3D 7, introducing, among others T&L (Transform & Lighting) function. Same for GeForce 2 GTS or Radeon
(Direct3D 7), already in 2001 were technically obsolete, because they were replaced by GeForce 3 Ti 200 / 500 and Radeon 8500, hardware compatible with Direct3D 8 and 8.1, which began the era of Pixel Shaders. The pace of technical development, also on other fronts (e.g. processors, interfaces, etc.), was enormous back then and it was much, much more difficult to keep up with than today.
When it comes to the games themselves, while today one could envy their availability, digital distribution, about twenty years (and more) ago, the degree of variation was much greater. Also when it comes to mechanics, practically all game developers experimented – many mechanics known today had to be created sometime. It was considered almost obligatory to publish free demos of games, the best sources for players of which were CDs attached to gaming magazines. You don’t need to register anywhere, create an account, subscribe to the newsletter, buy early access or participate in beta tests. The player did not have to believe in the credibility of the movie trailers and count on the fact that the popular graphics downgrading or cutting out the content will not take place today, just to be able to sell one DLC for another, or sell individual elements through micropayments.
Lord … 20 years ago it was played, i.e. the favorite games of a forty-year-old
end of winding the pasta around the ears. Let’s finally move on to the games themselves. In the second part of the publication, I present to you fifteen games that I remember best from at least twenty years ago. This time, as you will notice, the average age of games is greater than last time. Because I reach deeper into my memory. Sit down comfortably, the oldies put on warm little slippers, grab the rice gruel and we fly!
Desperate users have been complaining about it for years, countless memes make fun of it – the memory requirements of Google’s Chrome browser are almost legendary. But now this should end and Chrome finally need less RAM. The key to the much-needed improvement is a Windows 10 API.
With the “TerminateProcess” interface, Google wants to ensure that all system processes that are used by the Chrome browser are actually terminated and that the reserved memory is released when the corresponding tab is closed. On the Chromium page, Google explains that they have been working towards integrating TerminateProcess for a long time.
Not Google’s first attempt It’s not the first time that Google’s developers have decided to put Chrome on the RAM diet. Only this summer, Google announced that it wanted to save around a quarter of the RAM. The SegmentHeap used at the time was unsuccessful under Windows, on the contrary: Chrome’s stability suffered as a result, which is why the experiment was canceled, as reported by MSPowerUser.
At the beginning of the month, Google was initially more important Dedicated to things related to Chrome, namely security patches. Eight security holes could be found with the version 87. 0. 420. 88 getting closed. Before the patch, attackers were able to trigger memory errors in Chrome and thus smuggle in malicious code.
One of the advantages of Chrome is the flexibility provided by plugins and extensions. They do not make the browser faster or reduce the need for resources, but they do bring many new possibilities. But safety should always be considered, because not all of these extensions are really waterproof.
(sht)
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