Search Results for: Kodi

California-based software developer iolo has unveiled a major new release of its flagship product family: iolo System Mechanic 23. The Windows PC system optimization app, available with additional tools in Pro and Ultimate Defense editions, opens with a completely revamped user interface.

The streamlined new look isn’t simple a case of redesigning existing elements; System Mechanic 23 unveils a more streamlined look designed to be easier to navigate.

Rick Brewster has announced the release of Paint.NET 5.0 (alpha). This early pre-release, which is also available as a portable build for existing users keen to try out the new features without affecting their current, stable release, promises significant performance increases, resurrected support for pressure-sensitive pens and tablets, plus a brand-new plugin system.

In addition, there are several new adjustments and effects, and a raft of improvements across existing tools. The new build does, however, jettison support for 32-bit systems and older versions of Windows.

Renowned eBook management tool Calibre has a new landmark release. Calibre 6.0 makes its bow on Windows (64-bit only), Mac and Linux.

Version 6.0 unveils one major headline new feature -- full text search across entire eBook libraries. It’s also the first version to support Apple Silicon and Linux ARM64 architectures, but also drops support for Windows 32-bit users.

Last week Kodi addons repository TVAddons threw in the towel following a long running piracy lawsuit, with founder Adam Lackman agreeing to pay damages of $19.5 million.

In an email sent out to users and subscribers this weekend, TVAddons concedes defeat. It says mournfully  that the lawsuits "didn't result in the outcome we'd hoped for" but adds that it brings closure and will "allow us to begin the process of moving on with our lives". It also calls for donations to help pay the colossal bill.

Four-hundred-sixty-two in a series. Welcome to this week's overview of the best apps, games and extensions released for Windows 10 and 11 on the Microsoft Store and elsewhere in the past seven days.

Microsoft started the rollout of the new Microsoft Store on Windows 10. It is being made available to Release Preview insider builds at first, but it will be pushed to stable versions of Windows 10 soon as well.

Windows 7 is no more -- or, more accurately, no longer supported. That means no more bug fixes and more crucially, no more security updates. If you’re still running a Windows 7 PC, it’s time to move.

What are your options? You could buy a brand-new PC, but the truth is that your current PC is probably more than capable of running Windows 10. If you’ve no need, desire or budget to buy a whole new computer, then discover how to upgrade to Windows 10 for as little as $29.99 with two fantastic deals.

Windows 7 is dead. Well, technically it will meet its demise tomorrow. On January 14th, the wildly popular operating system reaches "End of Life" status. This means Microsoft will stop supporting it. The company obviously hopes all remaining Windows 7 users will upgrade to Windows 10, but not everyone plans to do that. While Windows 10 is actually a very good operating system, many folks are put off by the overwhelming number of updates and aggressive telemetry. Understandably, some people feel that Microsoft's data collection is tantamount to spying.

Ultimately, using Windows 7 after tomorrow is foolish. Look, you should never use an unsupported operating system -- it is simply bad practice. If you refuse to upgrade to Windows 10, your best bet is to opt for a Linux-based operating system. There are many of those from which to choose, such as Ubuntu, Mint, and Fedora to name a few. There is one such Linux distribution,  however, that is designed to run on older hardware and is focused on providing a welcoming experience to Windows 7 switchers. Called "Linux Lite," it has a user interface that will feel familiar to Windows 7 users. Today, Linux Lite 4.8 is released.

Eight years ago, approximately, I built my last media center computer. My family and I used it a lot, but it was in the era when set-top boxes were still mostly in the planning stages.

I did it fairly simply. I bought a used desktop model (a tower wouldn’t fit on a shelf) and began a partial remodel. I tried to do it fairly cheap. I opened up the case and increased the RAM, replaced the hard drive with a higher capacity, the video card with one that had component out, and the audio card with one that had SPDIF out. Both cards ran their output to the A/V receiver, then the signal was processed and carried out to the TV via HDMI and also went to the surround speakers.

The Raspberry Pi Foundation announced a new version of its uncased credit card sized computer two months ago, claiming it to be powerful enough to be used as a complete desktop system.

While the Raspberry Pi 4 is easily the most capable iteration to date, the truth is you can’t really use it in place of a PC. I have the 4GB model, and it struggles massively whenever I try to do anything even slightly taxing. It also gets very hot.

Two months ago, the Raspberry Pi Foundation brought out a brand new version of its hugely popular uncased credit-card sized computer. The Raspberry Pi 4 is described as being a "complete desktop system" for just $35.

While it’s a great little computer, it does have one big flaw -- due to a design issue, many chargers aren’t compatible with the new board’s USB-C port, so they won’t work.

Raspberry Pi computers are pretty damn great. Not only are they small and inexpensive, but they are ideal for tinkering and learning. And yes, they can serve as excellent media boxes thanks to the Linux-based LibreELEC. With the Raspberry Pi 4, however, it is finally powerful enough to serve as a true desktop computer -- prior models were capable, but offered woefully slow desktop experiences.

With all of that said, surely the Raspberry Pi 4 is highly recommended, right? Actually no. Sadly, we must warn you not to buy this seemingly solid piece of hardware. Unfortunately, it has one massive faulty aspect, meaning you should probably pass on it.

Eight years ago, approximately, I built my last media center computer. My family and I used it a lot, but it was in the era when set-top boxes were still mostly in their infancy.

I did it fairly simply. I bought a used desktop model (a tower wouldn’t fit on a shelf in my cabinet) and began a partial remodel. I tried to do it fairly cheap. I opened up the case and replaced the RAM with more, swapped the hard drive for a higher capacity one, and replaced the video card with one that had component out and the audio card with one that had SPDIF out. Both cards ran their output to the A/V receiver where the signal was processed and carried out to the TV via HDMI.

Users of Trakt -- a service for "scrobbling", or tracking the movies and TV shows you watch in the likes of Plex and Kodi -- have received emails from the company notifying them of a data breach that took place way back in 2014.

Trakt says that although the security breach took place over four years ago, it only recently discovered it. The company says that an investigation is underway, but that it believes a "PHP exploit was used to capture data", including users' emails, usernames, encrypted passwords, names and locations.

Anyone who’s got a load of digital media lying about needs a media server, and while the obvious solution is to install Kodi or Plex, you might be missing a trick.

Although it’s still overshadowed by its better-known rivals, Emby Server 4.0 has just been released for Windows, Mac and Linux, plus is now available for Nvidia Shield and Android devices too.

Cryptocurrency mining malware has become a serious problem recently, and it seems the latest people to fall victim to the threat are users of the Android emulator Andy OS -- also referred to as AndY and Andyroid.

The emulator makes it possible to run Android software within Windows or macOS, but it appears that the installation harbors a dark secret -- a GPU miner trojan that secretly mines for Bitcoin. Over on Reddit there are large numbers of upset users trying to find out what's going on.