Gigarefurb Refurbished Laptops News

Gigabyte was out in force at Pax East, showcasing its gaming chops with Aorus-branded desktops and laptops. However, the PCs weren’t the only tasty technological treat Gigabyte displayed: The company quietly revealed an Aorus external graphics dock with a GTX 1070 inside.

The new Aorus GTX 1070 Thunderbolt External Graphics Box runs over a single Thunderbolt 3 connection, and it’s a complete departure from the Gigabyte GPU dock we saw last year at CES. Gone is the tall, upright, handled, awkward chassis; it’s been replaced with a small, sleek, and impressively light case. The new External Graphics Box will also ship with a Gigabyte GTX 1070 mini GPU already inside, and the dock itself is only slightly larger than the graphics card.

Furthermore, the weak 250W power supply from the previous iteration has been replaced with a more powerful 450W PSU, which is plenty of juice for even the most top-end graphics cards (assuming they can fit inside the tiny dock). The new dock also features two USB 3.0 ports and RGB LED lighting.

Pricing and availability for the Aorus GTX 1070 External Graphics Box is unknown, as this new device hasn’t seen the light of day until now. However, judging by the fact that it was running a demo in complete working order, it may not be long until we see it hit the market.

Go to Source

Because the fossil fuel industry is quickly losing public support amid reports of global warming, the industry must embrace clean energy in a more substantial way, the CEO of Royal Dutch Shell said this week.

Shell CEO Ben van Beurden said his company plans to increase spending on renewable energy to $1 billion a year by 2020, according to reports. And he said  government policies should include a carbon tax, which will help to cut back on the most harmful pollutants.

A carbon tax creates a fee based on the production or use of fossil fuels related to the amount of carbon dioxide they produce. The more carbon dioxide used, the higher the tax.

“If we’re not very careful, with all the good intentions and advocacy that we have, we may, as a sector and society, not make the progress that is needed,” van Beurden said curing the CERAWeek energy conference in Houston on Thursday.

Shell, a $265 billion company, is one of the world’s largest oil companies on a list that includes the largest, Saudi Aramco, which had $478 billion in revenue last year. In January, Bloomberg reported Saudi Aramco plans to boost its renewable energy investments to $5 billion, including the acquisition of renewable energy companies.

In November, 10 of the world’s largest oil companies, including Saudi Aramco and Shell, joined forces to bolster efforts to fight global warming by creating a $1 billion investment fund to develop low-emission technologies.

Go to Source

After more than 365 days, this make-or-break version of Microsoft’s veteran Windows operating system is off to a strong start. And, the way in which new features and improvements keep arriving means that the Anniversary Update is a notable improvement over what shipped in July 2015.

We’re a long way from Windows 8 now, and Microsoft seems to have got the hang of mixing the traditional keyboard-and-mouse driven desktop environment with touch features for the growing number of tablets and 2-in-1 PCs.

This release is a milestone for the ‘Windows as a Service‘ process that Microsoft is using to develop Windows 10. Last year’s November Update polished the release version of Windows 10, while this release continues that process, concentrating on the daily features you likely use the most, including some useful refinements to the Start screen and Action Center interface. But it also introduces some brand new features like the Ink Workspace.

The Edge browser has matured quickly and gets support for extensions, and the key UWP apps like Mail, Groove and Skype have also improved significantly. Cortana is gaining more features and Windows Hello is more reliable, as well as ready for apps and websites that support the new FIDO 2 specification that is bidding to replace passwords with biometrics. Improved browser security is a major plus.

Performance is improved from the already impressive speed of the release version of Windows 10 – booting your PC is a second or so faster on SSD-based systems, and battery life has improved on laptops (especially if you’re using the Edge browser, but the new Battery Saver option that appears when you click or tap the battery icon also maximizes battery life).

On the other hand, those uncertain about Windows 10 won’t find solace in the fact that Anniversary Update only lets you roll back within 10 days to save on disk space, or the fact that, like any new release, there are problems (including some systems with SSDs freezing, and the well-documented problems with webcams that won’t be fixed until another update arrives in September).

Latest news

The Windows 10 Creators Update is right around the corner, what with Microsoft officially stating that it’s only “a matter of weeks” away, and anonymous sources telling MSPowerUser that it’s set to arrive on April 11. 

What’s more, those affordable Windows 10 VR headsets Microsoft has been raving about since last October are finally tipped to reach developers by the end of the month – or at least Acer’s contribution is. At GDC 2017, Microsoft confirmed that the Acer “Mixed Reality Development Edition” is slated for shipment beginning in March.

Now, with the next major update still basically a month away, let’s take a look at how Windows 10 has progressed up to this point.

Windows is more than just an OS

Microsoft believes the future of Windows is as a platform for all. Like Android, the strength of Windows is in the thousands of companies that develop for it and use it in their products – on multiple devices.

That’s why Windows 10 is no longer just an operating system for 32 and 64-bit PCs. It also runs on ARM chips as Windows 10 Mobile for smartphones (and, eventually, Microsoft promises, smaller tablets). That’s thanks to the OneCore foundation of Windows.

Like Windows XP, Vista, 7 and 8 before it, Windows 10 is built on the Windows NT kernel, but much more of Windows is now shared between the different devices, and apps built for the Universal Windows Platform (UWP) will run not only on PCs, but on Windows 10 phones, Windows 10 for IoT devices, HoloLens headsets and Xbox One as well.

Note that we’ve published a distinct Windows 10 Mobile review here, for those of you who want the full lowdown on the OS from a smartphone standpoint.

First reviewed: July 2015

Joe Osborne and Gabe Carey have also contributed to this review

Go to Source

Skype started life as an easy way for regular PC users to chat with their friends via text and voice chat. But underneath that user-friendly veneer, Skype has a few power moves ready and waiting for people who know about them.

I’m talking about Skype’s slash commands. If you don’t know what those are, slash commands begin with a “/“ and tell a program to carry out a specific action. Longtime chat users will recognize slash commands from the days of Internet Relay Chat, or IRC, one of the earliest ways to do live text chat online—and still widely used among technophiles.

Skype

A list of Skype’s slash commands after typing /help.

Controlling IRC clients typically requires the use of text commands preceded by a slash such as /AWAY or /JOIN. Many newer apps and services still use slash commands such as the popular workplace messaging apps Hipchat and Slack.

While text commands may seem silly in the day of visual interfaces, they are often more efficient to use than point-and-click commands. And in the case of Skype they reveal hidden functionality you won’t get from the regular menu.

Here are a few key commands to liven up your Skype life. You can type these commands into any chat and the other side won’t see them.

Skype

My recent result for /showplaces.

If you need to see how many devices you’re logged into on Skype type /showplaces and hit Enter. Skype will show you a list of devices where Skype is running under your account. If you want to log out of all Skype clients except the one you’re currently using type /remotelogout. Note that these commands don’t work with Skype for the Web.

Want to add your mom to a chat with your brother? As long as you know mom’s Skype username—i.e. not her real name—use /add [Skype Name]. Skype will start a group text conversation with mom and her kids. If everyone wants to start a group conversation via voice or video type /golive and the call will start—this feature doesn’t work with one-on-one conversations.

Now let’s say you’re in a group chat and someone else is getting hard to take, you can bow out by typing /leave. You could also dump your mom or brother from the chat by typing /kick [Skype Name].

The VR market is rife with innovation, and one of the aspects that many are working on involves controllers. 3DRudder’s foot controller has been unique in the market for some time now, and we’ve reviewed it, but a competitor is emerging in the form of SprintR.

One Foot Two Foot

Simply put, like 3DRudder, SprintR gives you a foot controller to zip around VR experiences. There are some key differences between the two, however. Primarily, whereas you use both feet on the 3DRudder, the SprintR requires just one. This speaks to significantly different methods of control. With the 3DRudder, your feet more or less function as one unit, like a mermaid tail (for lack of a better comparison). By letting you leave one foot on the ground, SprintR decouple your feet, which it claims makes for a better experience. The device uses a potentiometer.

SprintR seems to have been designed with FPS games in mind. In fact, its navigation is preset to mimic WASD keys and the spacebar (for jumping). You slide your foot forward, back, left, or right to move, and you can rotate the pad to swivel left or right. The big button at the top is clickable, so when you press down on it, you can jump. SprintR also said that you can crouch with the device. Meanwhile, you can still move your head to look around. Taken together, then, SprintR offers a great deal of navigational freedom within a VR environment.

Because the PC (or whatever device you connect it to) recognizes SprintR as a joystick, it has analog input. That means you can walk slowly or run fast depending on the amount of pressure you apply to the controller. You can also map to other functions to those controls, just as you can a mouse or keyboard.

• sprintr vr 2_result

• sprintr vr 3_result

• sprintr vr 4_result

• sprintr vr 1_result

Go to Source

The Tom’s Hardware Community is constantly busy. Whether our members are discussing the site’s latest articles and reviews, providing tech support and building advice, or playing the latest PC Games, we have so much great stuff going on that it could make your head spin! Not to worry — Community Roundup is here to let you know the best of what’s going on in the Tom’s Hardware forums on a regular basis.

• We have another great Steam giveaway starting today. We’ll be giving away three copies of Ghost Recon Wildlands to three lucky members of our community. It’s been a while since the last Ghost Recon game–nearly five years, to be exact. We played the game in January and were impressed by what is said to be Ubisoft’s largest open-world game. Head to the giveaway thread in the Tom’s Hardware PC Gaming Forum and enter the raffle or answer the discussion prompt. The Steam Giveaway will run until 6pm ET on Friday, March 10. The game will be awarded to the winners as a Steam gift. A Steam account is required to receive and play the game.

• The Nvidia GTX 1080 Ti Review is in, and there’s a new king of the hill. The Nvidia GeForce GTX 1080 Ti is one of the fastest graphics cards we’ve ever reviewed and is $500 cheaper than the Titan X, Nvidia’s former champ. We were rather wowed by the 1080 Ti’s performance per dollar and would be surprised if the forthcoming Radeon RX Vega could deliver a better value. To discuss the review in full, head to our GTX 1000 MegaThread.

• Earlier this week, we put the Dell Inspiron 15 7000 Gaming Laptop through our gauntlet of benchmarks to see if it truly was a budget gaming champ. Our resident Lab technician, Alex Quejado, found the Dell Inspiron 15 7000 Gaming Laptop to be a great value for its price. While its mobile 1050 Ti didn’t best other more robust mobile solutions, the outstanding battery life and thermals make this Dell laptop a great pick at $900. Check out the review, as well as our guide to Best Gaming Laptops.

Know of something awesome going on in the Tom’s Hardware community? Brag about it in the comments!

Go to Source