Remembering… Amstrad Sinclair PC200

This week, we check out an unfamiliar PC with a familiar name

Back in 1988, Amstrad had the idea that people may want to actually have a portable version of an IBM PC, and thus the Amstrad PPC512 and the Amstrad PPC640 came into being. Both had an 8MHz NEC V30 processor, 512KB of memory, a full-sized keyboard and a tiny LCD display. They both ran MS-DOS 3.3, and featured a number of business-based software packages.

Dropsy

A surreal adventure game about being nice to people

The key to Dropsy is the hug system. Anyone you see – and some inanimate objects – can be hugged. Dropsy may look like the stuff of nightmares, but he has a heart of gold. Not everyone will want to hug him at first, though. First you have to make them like you by completing sidequests. For every successful hug, Dropsy pins a picture of the hugee to the wall above his bed.He’s a serial hugger, whose hunger for hugs cannot be sated, and the most unlikely videogame hero of the year.

The Future of the GPU

It could be the perfect time to upgrade your current graphics card, but what do you need to prepare for the GPU future?

The graphics card is the component most responsible for PC gaming performance. Above everything else in your PC. You could have the most powerful, £800 octo-core Haswell-E CPU in your rig, but if you’ve got a weedy GPU backing it up, you’re never going to be hitting the graphical heights that today’s PC games deserve.

The hidden cost of Windows 10

Barry Collins warns that you always end up paying, even for “free” OS upgrades

It wasn’t so long ago that Apple and Microsoft routinely got away with charging for upgrades to their operating systems. Now, the very idea of paying to update Windows or Mac OS X seems as ludicrous as making Wayne Rooney the poet laureate.

We’re all suckers for a freebie. As soon as an alert pops up informing us that there’s a new version of an OS for our phones, tablets or computers, we eagerly tap the ‘Update’ button... and then spend the next eight hours regretting it while swearing at slowmoving progress bars.

Best New Mapping Tools

We’d be lost these days without Google Maps, but there are plenty of other good mapping tools that offer features it lacks. Robert Irvine directs you to the best

Try the new and improved Bing Maps

Microsoft’s mapping service (www.bing.com/maps) has always been overshadowed by Google’s, but it recently relaunched with a much-improved design that makes it faster and easier to use. Bing Maps lets you switch instantly between road, aerial, birds-eye and street-level views; see real-time traffic information, including roadworks, closed lanes and accidents; save collections of your favourite places; and get accurate directions and journey times based on traffic and transport conditions. If you haven’t checked Bing Maps for a while, you’ll be pleasantly surprised.

The Great Windows 10 Swindle?

One month on from the launch of Windows 10, we expose the hidden costs that undermine the ‘free’ upgrade, reveal how to tweak its most annoying settings and explain how to fix common problems

From early indications, Windows 10 is looking like a success for Microsoft. The reviews have been mostly positive, users are reporting that the new operating system is fast and easy to use, and thus far there has been no sign of the major backlash that followed the arrival of Windows 8.

Smart mirrors

You can ask smart mirrors a lot more than if you’re the fairest of them all, such as if you may be unwell. David Crookes reflects on these innovative new devices

What is a smart mirror?

Smart mirrors go beyond simply showing your reflection as you groggily peer into them in the morning. Instead, they act as large screens that deliver useful, targeted information and even an analysis of your overall health. Their makers say they will revolutionise our daily routines and prompt us to take better care of ourselves.

Linksys RE6700 Wi-Fi Range Extender

You don’t want your Wi-Fi extender hogging a power socket. Andy Shaw tests one with a pass-through option

Network dead zones are the most annoying thing about Wi-Fi, but wherever you put your router, the chances are that there will be places in your house that your network can’t reach. One answer is a range extender. This new model from Linksys is as fully featured as they come, operating across both 2.4GHz and 5GHz networks, and even boosting the latest 802.11ac routers.

Corel PaintShop Pro X8

Andy Shaw tests the latest version of a classic Windows image editor

PaintShop Pro is a PC classic. Originally developed by Jasc Software and released as shareware, it was one of the first full-featured image processors available for the PC, rivalling Adobe’s Photoshop (at the time only available on Apple computers and aimed at professionals) for a fraction of the price.

Corel took over the PaintShop Pro brand in 2004 and while the software has been tweaked and refined over the years, it essentially does the same job it always has: providing you with tools to improve your photos. Whether they just need a crop and straighten, or more complicated retouching, there are plenty of tools available.