Innholdsfortegnelse for May 2024 i APC

WELCOME | EDITORIAL It’s a challenging world for most of us, and while I hope you’re all kicking goals and are generally winning, it’s the annual time here at APC when we spare a thought for another group facing its own massive challenge – being the companies making and selling security suite software. Yes, these battlers have been doing it tough for several years now. Ever since the free Windows Defender got really good, the reasons we little consumers should pay up for a full suite are fewer. But not zero! As with all evolutionary systems, the security suite people have risen to the challenge. Now it’s less about simply protecting against viruses and malware and all its evil variants, because frankly they all do a great job of that…

OPINION | TWO BITS Flying in cattle class in the 21st century is generally not all that enjoyable – unless you’re 150cm tall or an excited child that is. You have to put up with shrinking legroom, long queues at check in and security, unappealing food and generally poor-quality in-flight entertainment systems (IFE). Disappointingly IFE hasn’t kept pace with the advances in screen and connectivity technology we’ve long enjoyed on our personal devices. Thankfully, that’s slowly beginning to change. Panasonic Avionics is beginning to roll out its Astrova in-flight entertainment system. That means no more terrible low-resolution LCD screens with terrible contrast ratios, terrible colour reproduction, and terrible viewing angles. Say hello to glorious 4K OLED screens complete with HDR, multi-channel audio, 100W USB-C charging ports and integrated Bluetooth support.…

WHATSAPP | PRICE Free WEB www.whatsapp.com | SIGNAL | PRICE Free WEB https://signal.org WhatsApp and Signal have a lot in common: they’re both messaging apps that support text, voice, and video. They can also make use of group chats, status updates, and share much of the same codebase for encrypting communications. Still, WhatsApp’s the pick for billions of people, while Signal is in the low tens of millions. This said, due to Signal’s focus on privacy, there’s often a spike in downloads in the wake of privacy scandals, such as the security bug discovered by Twitter engineer Foad Dabiri in 2023, where WhatsApp secretly activated the microphone on his Pixel phone. WhatsApp At the time of writing, WhatsApp has over 2.8 billion active users, and is expected to pass three billion…

PRICE $3,499 WEB gigabyte.com/au While many people buy a high end laptop just to game, others want it to pull double duty as a capable workstation. Not all laptops can pull off this delicate balance, but the Gigabyte Aorus 16X manages better than most. The laptop is built around a 16in frame, weighing in at 2.3kg and measuring 35.6 x 25.4 x 2.7cm. In other words, chunky, but able to be slipped into a bag with any drama. The 16X we tested features a mighty Intel Core i9-14900HX CPU (5.8GHz, 24 core), while graphics are provided by a GeForce RTX 4070 8GB GPU. The 16in screen has a 16:10 aspect ratio, slim borders, a 2560 x 1600 resolution, a fast 165Hz G-Sync compatible refresh rate, 400 nit peak brightness, 3ms…

PRICE $2,299 WEB rog.asus.com/au A few months ago, we wondered whether Asus had made the best monitor ever, owing to the performance of its 49-inch, ‘SuperWide’ QD-OLED PG49WC gaming monitor. Now here’s, what looks like, its smaller, 34-inch, more-affordable sibling. But, are the looks deceptive? The first thing to note is that the PG34WCDM uses a traditional OLED panel instead of the new-fangled QD-OLED. It’s noticeably less bright and colours don’t pop as much as its sibling, but virtually nothing else does either. Any ultrawide, curved (800R), OLED gaming monitor should still be highly desirable. Its 21:1 aspect ratio, 3,440 x 1,440 resolution shows-off a mostly crisp and clear Windows Desktop. Most fonts are rendered cleanly but thin ones (especially) can turn a bit spidery. Some OSD features (like, ‘Clear…

PRICE $1,499 WEB rog.asus.com/au We’ve been absolutely blown away by the performance offered by the first Wi-Fi 7 routers and mesh systems that we’ve seen, so we were particularly keen to see what Asus ROG’s latest flagship could bring to the party. The ROG Rapture GT-BE98, once again, takes its design cues from the mechanical space spider school of design. Set-up is simple via Asus’ mobile app or desktop browser. The app is polished and well-featured and you’re first asked if you’d like to separate all Wi-Fi channels into individual networks or combine them. The app’s first two tabs provide a visual representation of connections via the 10GbE LAN/WAN, 2.5GbE WAN/LAN, three 2.5GbE LAN, single 1GbE LAN, single 10GbE LAN, USB 3.0 and USB 2.0 ports. You’re also shown what’s…

LABS PRICE $169 WEB www.corsair.com Even if a decent 240mm AIO liquid cooler can be found for less than the asking price of the Corsair A115 air cooler, not everyone needs or wants an AIO. They’re more prone to failure and they’re generally overkill for lower TDP CPUs. The best air coolers remain completely relevant, and a high-quality dual tower like the Corsair A115 is a new contender for users looking for a stealthy, quiet and highly capable air cooling option. Corsair is a name that needs no introduction on these pages. The A115 dual tower air cooler is the company’s latest high-end air-cooling effort. With its top shelf fans, stealthy RGB-less good looks, and some thoughtful features, the A115 sets itself up to contend with the very best air…

It runs on almost every Windows PC, but what exactly does Windows Defender do – and what settings should you be tweaking for the best protection? Here, we reveal seven tips that not only explain the philosophy (and history) behind Windows Defender, but also how to get the most out of it. 01 What is Windows Defender? It’s a funny thing: everyone’s heard of Windows Defender, but if you search your system, you won’t find any program of that name. At least, not if you’re running a recent version of Windows 10 or 11. For more than a decade, though, the OS did include a built-in tool called Defender. In Windows Vista and 7, Defender was a system component that detected and removed spyware from your system; in Windows 8…

Direct price: 10 devices, $169.99 | avast.com Avast’s offerings need careful explanation. Avast Ultimate includes Avast Premium Security, Avast SecureLine VPN, Avast AntiTrack Premium and Avast Cleanup Premium. It’s the main subject of our review here. However, if you’d rather have everything in a single application, then Avast One is also worth considering. Both use the same malware-detection engine and VPN infrastructure, so the core functionality is the same, although the two products’ feature sets differ on several points. Regardless of which version of Avast you subscribe to, you’ll benefit from the same malware-detection engine. Avast’s sibling AVG also uses the same detection engine, with the same effective results, although the app itself is different. This is why Avast did better in AV-Test’s system performance tests. Avast products have recently…

This year, our group test has conspicuously focused on top-of-the-range security suites, brimming with extra features. Think VPNs, parental controls, password managers, identity theft insurance and recovery services. We included only one free antivirus suite, Windows Defender Antivirus, because it’s both the operating system default and a solid benchmark against which to judge all the others, even if its performance in detection tests suffered a minor slump during the latter half of 2023. However, a key takeaway from these reviews is that, although these extra tools can help you retain your online privacy or even provide a second layer of detection, the core malware-detection engines remain the same across most vendors’ different tiers. That means that, when it comes to pure malicious software detection, Avast Free is as effective as…

From the front lines of the Australian PC market Nvidia recently hosted its 2024 GPU Technology Conference and made some big announcements that will shape the future of computing over the next few years for companies needing AI hardware. Nvidia’s current top end AI GPU; the H100, based on Nvidia’s AI specific Hopper architecture, is capable of around four petaflops of throughput. CEO Jenson Huang announced that Nvidia will be bringing its new Blackwell architecture to GB200 enabling throughput of an amazing 20 petaflops of performance. As usual, Nvidia’s metrics from its marketing department are very selective and show only the best performance uplifts in extreme situations, and don’t tell the whole story. GB200 is two B200 GPUs on a motherboard paired with an Nvidia designed Grace CPU. Each B200…

ANDROID & iOS Block WhatsApp spam from your lock screen WhatsApp has introduced a useful feature that lets you block spam messages from unknown senders directly from your phone’s lock screen. This saves you having to open an unsolicited message to block the spammer – which would let them know that you’d received their message and run the risk of accidentally tapping a malicious link. When a spam message pops up on your lock screen, simply long-press the notification and select Block, then Block again (see screenshot below). You can also report the sender’s number to WhatsApp – they won’t be notified that you’ve blocked or reported them, and can no longer message or call you. Previously, you had to either open a chat, tap the three-dot menu and choose…

GAMES PRICE Free PLATFORM PC, Linux WEB bit.ly/Celeste64 Celeste 64 isn’t a sequel, but a small game made in celebration of its sixth anniversary. Collect strawberries in an intricate platforming level, while suffering a heroic number of deaths. Same as it ever was, but with one key difference: it’s now in 3D. It’s an alarming shift from the previous game, which is one of the most exquisite and precise 2D platformers yet made. When you failed to pass Celeste’s devious platforming challenges, you could only blame yourself. Likewise, when you succeeded, it was all down to you. It felt so good to jump and dash across its two-dimensional planes that the thought of bunging in one more dimension feels like heresy. I did struggle at times, and for a reason…

Download these APC exclusives free from: www.apcmag.com/exclusives ASCOMP SECURE ERASER SECURE DATA DELETION AND DESTRUCTION. What is deleted from the hard drive is far from gone. As long as the data is not overwritten, anyone can make it visible again at any time. This is particularly problematic when a computer is resold or given away. Secure Eraser utilises recognised methods for data deletion and overwrites confidential information so securely that it cannot be restored even with specialised software. But that’s not all: Our award-winning solution for secure data destruction also removes cross-references that could allow conclusions about the former existence of the deleted files in the allocation tables of your hard drives. “As long as the data is not overwritten, anyone can make it visible again at any time.” ASHAMPOO…

OPINION | TRADE CHAT Graphics drivers are hard. That isn’t news. Recently, however, Intel revealed details on its efforts to get its Arc GPUs running really fast. This candour makes me hopeful for its next-gen Battlemage graphics, which could appear this year. The takeaway is that Intel isn’t giving up on Arc, and there are reasons to think that Battlemage might just be the bomb. The difficulty of getting graphics drivers right and more generally optimising GPU performance is known. At the same time, it’s hard not to be a little exasperated with Intel and its Arc graphics cards. Intel surely knew how tough it was going to be. It’s hardly a newbie in the tech space, so surely it put in all the work to do the job before…

Find the best deals on new gear at getprice.com/au Premium laptops Apple MacBook Pro 16in (M3) STUNNING CREATIVE POWER A reasonable processor upgrade to device with an impressive screen and unparalleled battery life. The new M3 3nm processors is more efficient, so you’ll be able to run the same tasks as the M1 using half the power draw, which helps battery life. From $4,299, apple.com/au THE ALTERNATIVES ASUS ZENBOOK 14 OLED (UX3405) The Asus Zenbook 14 is a great option for those who value a fantastic OLED touchscreen, long battery life and a powerful CPU. $2,399, asus.com APPLE MACBOOK AIR The MacBook Air M3 replaces the M2 model previously listed here. It’s a powerful and quiet ultraportable with an unbeatable battery life and screen. From $2,099 apple.com/au MICROSOFT SURFACE PRO…

LABS PRICE $1,599 WEB au.msi.com The MSI Modern 14 H is a low cost, business focused laptop that aims for bang for buck over packing in every last feature. The laptop has a 14” frame, 31.4 x 23.6 x 1.9cm dimensions and weighs 1.6kg, so is quite portable but larger than slim or ultralight models. The Modern 14 we have for testing (variant: D13MG-045AU) features a relatively powerful Intel i9-13900H CPU, which has 14 cores, 20 threads, and can boost up to 5.4GHz. You also get 16GB of DDR4 3200MHz RAM (upgradeable to 64GB), a 1TB NVMe M.2 SSD and a 53.8Wh battery. The 14in display has a resolution of 1920 x 1200 (16:10 ratio), and uses a 60Hz IPS panel, with a matte coating and no touchscreen. On the…

LABS PRICE $2,095 WEB www.aorus.com/en-au People are falling in love with 49-inch monitors: gamers love the additional, immersive and performance-enhancing screen-based real estate while workers and content creators love the productivity boosts. The models we’ve seen so far have primarily targeted cashed-up gamers but Aorus’ CD49DQ seeks to buck the trend. The super-wide, 49-inch, 32:9 aspect ratio, 5,120 x 1,440, curved (1,800R) display sure can fit lots on it. For sim racers it’s a similar size to some real racing cars’ cockpits, making laps around Mount Panorama feel that much more immersive. You can also more-easily hit apexes and see rival cars in your peripheral vision. Flight simmers receive a more lifelike world view, FPS players get real-world-like peripheral vision and RTS players receive more on-ground intel than many opponents.…

PRICE $257 WEB crucial.com This might just be the best-value M.2 PCIe 4.0 SSD we’ve found – one that not only delivers big on the storage per $ front, but doesn’t sacrifice performance while it does it. At its heart, it’s a super-speedy PCIe 4.0 drive, with sequentials listed at 7,400 and 7,000 MB/s and random read/write IOPS at 1,180K / 1,440K respectively. You can pick one up in two variants, either with or without a heatsink, and it features an impeccable 1200 TBW endurance rating and a five-year warranty. The NAND flash at its core is the real showpiece, however. It’s powered by Micron’s 232-layer NAND Flash tech – according to Micron, it’s 35 percent denser than the best-competing products out there (at least at time of release, debuting…

WEB tinyurl.com/APC532avc NEEDS WINDOWS 7, 8.1, 10 OR 11 No sooner did we figure out how to use the new subtitling feature in Any Video Converter than the program received yet another update with even more options. These include the addition of a microphone-recording function to its Screen Record tool, which means you can now capture audio and video simultaneously. The free version of AVC limits you to three-minute recordings, but the new option is useful for making short video tutorials. To use it, select Screen Record on the program’s Home screen (click the right-arrow button if you can’t see this) and tick the Record Audio box (see screenshot) before you start recording. AVC has also integrated a third-party video editor and audio editor, which you can use for free in…

LABS Here’s the basic question this Labs aims to answer: is it worth spending money on a security suite when Windows Defender does the job for free? Our answer: yes, probably. At the very least, you should consider one of the free alternatives. Turn to p75 for more on that topic. However, there isn’t a straightforward answer that’s right for everyone. Some people might find it simpler to stick with Windows as it does the job, even if it can’t match the top anti-malware for protection levels. Some may find the upgrade nags in the free alternatives unbearably annoying. It’s also well worth dipping into your pocket for the right product and the right reasons. It can provide an affordable route to VPNs, which could be extremely useful for those…

PC CASE GEAR FORGE 4070 SUPER $2,399 tinyurl.com/APC532PCCG This rig houses one of the newer CPUs for the aging AM4 platform in the Ryzen 7 5700X3D. This puts it very close to the 5800X3D in terms of gaming performance, which is to say similar to the Ryzen 5 7600. Very respectable indeed, and more than enough to feed the paired RTX 4070 Super. With 32GB of RAM and 2TB of SSD storage it’s well equipped for any gaming scenario. The RAM runs at Ryzen 5000’s preferred clock speed too which is good attention to detail. Considering this is $200 cheaper than the similarly capable Computer Alliance system, this is a good value gaming rig. CPU AMD Ryzen 7 5700X3D; COOLER Aerocool Rave 3 ARGB; MOTHERBOARD MSI B550-A Pro; GRAPHICS Zotac…

WINDOWS 10 & 11 Download Apple’s replacement for iTunes Apple has been phasing out iTunes since 2019, and has now officially launched Windows apps on the Microsoft Store that replace the service – having initially made them available in beta in early 2023. In Apple Music (pictured above) you can access songs and albums from your iTunes library, while Apple TV lets you watch films and TV shows. Apple Music in particular is a welcome addition to Windows. It has a clearer design than iTunes, and offers dark mode as well as support for lossless audio. You can also play Apple’s music-streaming service in it too, which wasn’t possible in iTunes. Search for either app in the Microsoft Store to install them. If you’ve been using iTunes, all your music…

GAMES PRICE Free PLATFORM PC WEB bit.ly/NeuralGame Before WASD and mouse-aiming became the norm, there were all sorts of crazy control schemes for first-person games, and in that light Neural Parasite’s isn’t too bizarre. You move with your feet – by which I mean you click on a pair of on-screen feet, alternately, to make your character walk. Luckily, Neural Parasite isn’t an FPS. It’s a first-person survival horror, a genre where control awkwardness isn’t just expected, it’s almost celebrated. Waking up in a Nazi facility, you have to scour the gloomy halls for keys, knives and, ultimately, pistol ammo, as shuffling zombies emerge to have a munch on you. There’d be little tension if you could simply hold S to step backwards, but here you’re frantically clicking the shoe…

GAMES PRICE Free PLATFORM PC WEB bit.ly/ToxicTomb In a game that could have been unearthed from a ’90s time capsule, Toxic Tomb resembles a Master System game, with its looping, one-room stages and simple premise. You play as a demon trying to save a power plant, by killing the ghouls that have set up shop in its reactors – er, forget what I just said about that simple premise. But it’s just an excuse to fill stages with toxic blobs and generators – destroy all these and the stage’s boss ghoul will be unleashed. It’s a hard game, with no difficulty concessions on that lavish game menu, but you can always dodge the spawning blobs if you’re quick enough. Really you want to make a beeline for them, as chaining…

OPINION | TECH TALK We should be pretty much done with new GPU launches from AMD and Nvidia for this generation, barring the possibility of something like a desktop RTX 4050. But with Nvidia’s recently released 40-series Super models, AMD didn’t look quite as competitive as before. “Where AMD will go next is the real question. The RDNA 4 architecture should be underway, and we could see the first parts late this year.” To remedy the situation, we have the RX 7900 GRE – for Golden Rabbit Edition (reviewed in APC 531, score 4/5). The 7900 GRE isn’t a new GPU as such; it’s built on the same Navi 31 processor as the 7900 XTX and XT, only trimmed down. AMD uses GPU chiplets for Navi 31 and 32, with…

The outright best CPU for you isn’t all about raw frame rate metrics – most of us game at resolutions where our graphics card is the dominant player in terms of deciding game performance – so, while AMD is undoubtedly the best for top-end gaming, Intel’s chips are superb all-rounders for the money. We’re also happy to report that there’s a great affordable processor out there right now, too. This list covers off all of the CPUs worth considering in both high-end and budget categories, with our number one pick offering the best price-to-performance overall. 5 INTEL CORE I9-13900K Forget about the latest, and arguably fastest Intel chip, the 14900K. The 13900K is a little cheaper, and performs pretty much identically. For pure gaming, the value proposition isn’t great here,…

LABS PRICE $499 WEB www.duckychannel.com.tw If you’ve ever wanted to build your own keyboard, then the Ducky ProjectD Outlaw65 is a simple and easy way to go about it. Included in this compact kit are most of the pieces required to build a mechanical keyboard from scratch, and a guarantee that every piece will fit together – you need only provide switches and keycaps. Why might you want to build your own keyboard when you can pay someone less for one that has already been made? Good question, and if you don’t already get why that might be appealing, I don’t have a particularly convincing answer for you. Beyond an opportunity to lube up all your stabilisers and switches before actually putting them inside your keyboard, or the option to…

PRICE $349 (motherboard); $149 (case) WEB www.msi.com Cables. You can’t live with them and you can’t yet live without them. Or can you? If you can’t see them, do they really exist? Deep philosophical questions aside, the humble PC has come a long way over the decades. The fundamentals of a 1990’s ATX PC are easily recognisable today. Still, despite the massive advances in performance over the years, you still need to plug power cables in, and connect the motherboard to your case’s USB, audio and fans. Some well thought out cable ties and sleeving doesn’t negate the fact that PC cables are still there, staring you in the face. Enter MSI’s Project Zero. Its claim to fame is that it relocates all of those unsightly headers and connectors to…

PRICE $779 WEB www.asus.com It’s one thing to release an RTX 4060 Ti 8GB model with a factory overclock or a marketing tie-in, but one with a built-in SSD slot? That’s something else entirely. Asus has done just that, creating an RTX 4060 Ti 8GB with a built-in PCIe Gen 5 SSD slot. Now that’s innovation. Apart from that impressive innovation, the Asus Dual GeForce RTX 4060 Ti SSD is an otherwise unremarkable RTX 4060 Ti graphics card. Asus’ Dual series of cards eschew fancy frills in favour of value for money. In this case, the RTX 4060 Ti’s 160W TDP is a natural fit for a dual fan cooler. Premium triple fan coolers are unnecessary for a card in this class. What sets this card apart is the inclusion…

DEVELOPER Clément Lefèbvre and community WEB linuxmint.com LICENCE Mainly GPL Originally released in 2006, Linux Mint is one of the most popular distros. This may be because it uses the Cinnamon desktop environment by default, which provides a more familiar Windows-like interface for newcomers to Linux. Alternative downloads are also available, which bundle the MATE and Xfce desktop environments. The latest version of Mint (code name Virginia) is an LTS release based on Ubuntu 22.04 LTS, so will be supported until April 2027. It uses version 5.15 of the kernel. Mint now comes with support for Secure Boot and is compatible with a much wider range of BIOS/EFI implementations. The tools and framework that are used by the Linux Mint team to create its ISO images have been updated and are…

PART #2 Here at APC, we’re specialists when it comes to, you know, building PCs. We’ve been doing it for a heck of a long time now. This journalist alone has logged no less than 63 separate build logs, and built many more. Along the way, we’ve picked up a ton of tips and tricks to make the process as painless and seamless as possible. It’s this knowledge, these ingrained, subtle refined notions and ideas, that have turned even the most challenging of concept system builds into paltry, simple, and easy-to-produce machines of mayhem. They can be crafted on a whim, and knocked out in less than a few hours. Here, we’ll be divulging all that information to you. We’ve scoured the team’s collective brains and come up with no…

Budget. A perfect balance between price and performance. If this month has taught us anything, it’s that the market is unstable. We’re seeing price fluctuations all over the place – not surprising given we’ve just got past the holiday rush, and this time is notorious for big businesses to struggle to push those sale goals, but still, these builds have been tricky to fine-tune. Take our budget build as an example – the Ryzen chips are all over the place. You can theoretically pick up a Ryzen 5 7600X for less than the 7600. But the X doesn’t come with a cooler. If you’ve got an AM4/AM5 cooler spare, it’s worth the jump, but otherwise, you’ll end up spending more. The new 8000 series G chips might look tempting, particularly…

Compressing files is one of the most mundane activities, and frequently performed without much thought. For most Linux users, irrespective of distro, Gzip is the tool of choice. But it’s quite slow, especially with large files running into hundreds of megabytes or more. On modern multi-core machines, you can easily speed up compression with parallel processing. Cue Pigz. Pigz achieves far faster compression because it puts the power of multi-core machines to proper use when compressing data. Released under the permissive zib licence, Pigz is the brainchild of Mark Adler, who apart from his work with NASA on the Spirit Mars Exploration Rover, has contributed to the development of the PNG image format, and developed both zlib and the Gzip utility along with Jean-lop Gailly. As a parallel implementation of…

PRICE $54.95 PLATFORM PC, PS5 WEB arrowheadgamestudios.com It’s amazing just how often a Helldivers 2 sortie climaxes in screaming, skin-of-the-teeth heroics. And it remains exciting time after time. Maybe you get tagged metres from completing your great escape. Maybe by a spray of bullets from a wheeling teammate. Maybe the group’s impossibly overrun, yet one of you somehow dives home and lives to tell the tale. Or maybe no one makes it at all. In this four-player squad shooter, every element harmonises explosively, resulting in scenes that really could have been choreographed for the movies. And, well, in a sense they were. Helldivers 2 is unashamedly a mash of sci-fi action film tropes, with a large slice of Starship Troopers on proud display, sprinkles of Aliens and the Terminator series…

GAMES PRICE $43.95 PLATFORM PC, PS4/5, XB1/S/X, Switch WEB tinyurl.com/APC532lara Lara Croft may need no introduction, but her first three artefact-swiping, wildlife-bothering, lever-pulling adventures were in real danger of becoming exactly the sort of forgotten relics she hunts for. Tomb Raider I-III Remastered hauls this trio of excellent action-adventure-puzzle hybrids and their original expansions – foundational examples of a style of game we’re still enjoying today – back into action. This is the definitive version of these games, feeling both 25+ years old and also brand new at the same time. The framerate didn’t wobble even when I was mashing the game’s dedicated graphics toggle button, seamlessly switching back and forth between the tastefully updated (and default) new look and the classic style, crude 2D keys and all. It works…