Dell Wireless Dock available today

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Laptop computers are great, as they allow the user to be portable. Want to surf the web in Starbucks? You got it. Need to take notes in class? Go for it, bro. Unfortunately, some people -- myself included -- prefer working with a huge monitor, mouse and keyboard. Traditional docking stations are a good solution, but they can take up significant desk space. Plus, depending on the unit, docking and undocking can be a tedious affair.

There has to be a better way, right? The Dell Wireless Dock may be what you are looking for. While not the first such Intel WiGig solution, fans of Dell quality will want to take notice. If you have a compatible Intel-powered laptop or tablet, you can dock your machine -- sans wires -- for increased productivity.

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Are you a Bitcoin early adopter? Here's how you can minimize risk

Bitcoin more acceptable

Bitcoin has significantly shifted from being a commodity traded by investors towards being used as an actual currency used to pay for goods and services. Exponentially growing transactions in the past year as well as increased involvement from businesses and government figures suggest that cryptocurrency adoption will only continue. The British Chancellor of the Exchequer, George Osborne, stated his desire for the UK to become a "global center of innovation for financial technology" before the end of 2015, and has taken steps to both regulate Bitcoin exchanges as well as provide guidelines for organizations who deal in the currency. On the business side, the number of merchants accepting Bitcoin have already hit 100,000 this year -- this number is expected to reach 140,000 by the end of this year.

It is common knowledge that there are clear business benefits and opportunities to utilizing Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. For example, any existing market currency can be converted to a cryptocurrency through the use of online portals. Once held, cryptocurrencies can be stored in an electronic "wallet" without the need for a bank account. If a company manages most of its assets in bitcoin, this will naturally result in a reduction of third-party costs, and represent an alternative to managing multi-currency risk -- however, this option is not without its own risks.

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Why backups are shifting to the cloud

cloud laptop

A backup and recovery solution is essential for enterprises if they're to safeguard their critical data. Yet whilst they may take care of their servers, according to a new infographic from private cloud company SingleHop they're less concerned about endpoint data.

Only 50 percent of companies have endpoint backups in place and this leads 16 percent of end users to do their own backups using a non-approved solution.

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Tor blocks third-party tracking, debuts security slider

TorProject

Privacy software Tor has been updated to version 4.5 with a stack of new and enhanced features.

Improved website isolation stops most third-party tracking by social networking buttons, adverts and "mashup" content.

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Windows 10 is undeniably impressive, but can it win you over?

Victory Winner Free

I was sold on Windows 10 before I could even try the first Technical Preview. Now, after seeing the latest slew of changes unveiled at Build 2015, it is clearer than ever that Microsoft is on the right path and that Windows 10 will be the most impressive release yet. There is no doubt in my mind about it.

It shouldn’t come as a surprise that Microsoft expects Windows 10 to attract one billion users within the first two to three years of its release. The timer starts this summer. It may sound like an empty claim, but when you look at everything that has been done so far to make Windows 10 so exciting, and consider the huge unlocked potential, it certainly sounds plausible. While I am no fortune-teller, I can’t see Microsoft getting anything important wrong. And that’s something I haven’t felt in ages in regards to the software giant.

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You can now tweet playable MS-DOS games

street fighter

Using Twitter used to just involve writing something under 140 characters in length, but over time the service has evolved, and you can now include photos, animated Gifs, short videos, files and more with your tweets. And if that’s not enough, how about embedding fully playable DOS games?

The Internet Archive lets visitors play classic console and arcade games directly on its site, and it recently added 2,600 playable DOS games too. It’s those games that can be embedded on Twitter.

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Generate gorgeous math-based art with Spirograph

Spirograph

Spirograph is a classic geometric drawing toy, developed 50 years ago and still popular today.

Normally it involves using multiple gears to draw intricate patterns on sheets of paper, but if that sounds like too much hassle then you could just download the open source (and entirely unofficial) Spirograph for your PC.

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Unpatched PDF readers leave US private PCs open to attack

Patch download

Adobe Reader 10 has 39 vulnerabilities and is unpatched on 65 percent of private PCs in the US, whilst Adobe Reader 11 with a 55 percent market share has 40 vulnerabilities and remains unpatched on 18 percent of machines.

This is one of the findings of the latest Secunia country report. Additional findings show that 14 percent of PC users in the US (up from 12.9 percent last quarter) have an unpatched operating system, and that Oracle Java once again tops the list of applications exposing PCs to security risks.

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Outlook.com API brings add-ons from PayPal, Boomerang, Uber and more

Outlook.com API brings add-ons from PayPal, Boomerang, Uber and more

Add-ons are a common feature of traditional, offline applications, but they're becoming increasingly popular in online services. Microsoft is the latest to get in on the action, announcing a batch of new add-ons for Outlook.com, including one from PayPal that makes it easy to make payments via email.

The add-ons were made possible when Microsoft launched the Outlook APIs at Build. They can be used by developers to create plugins with HTML, CSS3, and JavaScript. Microsoft is pushing the "write once, run anywhere" nature of the API that means the same plugin can run in Outlook.com, Outlook Web App and the desktop version of Outlook.

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Get Windows 10 for Raspberry Pi 2 now

DefaultAppRpi2

When the Raspberry Pi Foundation launched its new Raspberry Pi 2, we were impressed to hear it would be able to run Windows 10. Admittedly it isn't the full PC version of the operating system, but rather a special version created especially to run on such devices.

Yesterday, following the keynote at its Build developer conference, Microsoft released a new build of Windows 10 Insider Preview, but that’s not all. It also pushed out a Windows 10 IoT Core Insider Preview with support for Raspberry Pi 2 and Intel’s Minnowboard Max. So if you have either of those devices, you can download and try out the preview right now.

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Bing predicts where your team will finish in the Premier League

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The Premier League is almost over, but the final positions of the 20 teams is still up for debate, with several middle of the pack teams currently tied. Microsoft’s Bing Predicts looks to answer where every team will be come the end of the season.

Using algorithms based on past matches against future opponents, current form, injuries and other factors, Bing Predicts has a good overview of the entire situation, although nothing is for certain.

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Windows 10 Build 10074 becomes official -- available now from Windows Update

happyman

Today has been a whirlwind day for Microsoft. On the first day of the Build conference, the company stunned the world by announcing tools to easily port both iOS and Android apps to Windows 10. That alone is news worthy, but the company did not stop there. It also announced Continuum for Windows 10 phones, allowing the devices to scale up as desktop PCs. It also revealed the user-facing name for Project Spartan to be "Edge". Phew!

Of course, as many people expected, Microsoft released a new Windows 10 preview build today too. Yes, it is Build 10074 -- the one that leaked -- although now you can get it from Windows Update rather than messy ESD files. The company has revealed changes in the now-official build including additions, fixes and the dreaded known issues.

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Microsoft HoloLens can run Windows apps in 3D

HoloLense headset

When Microsoft unveiled HoloLens a few months ago, it came as something of a surprise. It's essentially Google Glass meets virtual reality on steroids, throwing the users into a 3D world filled with holograms, all powered by Windows 10. Today at build 2015, Microsoft showed off some of HoleLens' capabilities.

Something that had been talked about when HoloLens first came to light was the possibility of running regular Windows 10 apps in HoloLens. In a demonstration, Microsoft showed how Windows 10 Universal apps can be used in 3D space, 'projected' onto floors, walls and other surfaces.

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Microsoft's new browser -- Project Spartan changes to Microsoft Edge in Windows 10

Microsoft Edge

Project Spartan -- the all new Web browser which Microsoft announced at an event in January -- now has a proper name. At its developer conference Build 2015, the Redmond, Washington-headquartered software company announces that it will be calling the new browser Microsoft Edge.

Microsoft Edge, which is a successor to the age old internet navigation tool -- and source of tons of jokes and memes -- Internet Explorer, is designed to surf on the waves of the modern Web. Interestingly, the company seems to be using the same moniker it used while christening the new rendering engine (EdgeHTML) that powers Edge.

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Blame the dollar: PC prices rise, as features fall

freaking out omg no shock surprise

Gartner predicts that currency devaluation will compel major computer manufacturers to reverse a longstanding trend. "PC vendors selling to Europe and Japan, where local currencies have fallen up to 20 percent since the start of 2015, have little choice than to raise prices to preserve profits" -- by as much as 10 percent, Ranjit Atwal, Gartner Research director, says in a statement earlier today.

Higher prices mean more consumers will do with leaner configurations, and many businesses will push back upgrades. All the while, PC makers will give customers less for more money. Atwal anticipates fewer features in new computers in affected markets and increased sales emphasis in "regions least affected by these currency effects".

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