INSIDE: THE BEST FREE BACKUP SOLUTIONS

MARCH 2018

RYZEN APU
D’s
AM

COULD SAVE BUDGET GAMING

 AMERICA,
LET’S DO LUNCH TM

Lola Silvestri, SINCE 1921. Conversation and good company are her domain.
Now, she and 1 in 6 seniors face the threat of hunger and millions more
live in isolation. So pop by, drop off a hot meal and say a warm hello.
Volunteer for Meals on Wheels at AmericaLetsDoLunch.org
 CONTENTS

MARCH 2018

» DEPARTMENTS » FEATURES

7 News

39 Reviews & Ratings 81 Android Wear vs. Samsung Gear

95 Here’s How

116 Tech Spotlight 88 5 awesome Android features

MARCH 2018 PCWorld 3

MASTHEAD

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4 PCWorld MARCH 2018

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 AMERICA,
LET’S DO LUNCH TM

Asha Ida Bell, SINCE 1937. Her life’s work is about helping the hopeless find
hope. Now, she and 1 in 6 seniors face the threat of hunger and millions
more live in isolation. So pop by, drop off a hot meal and say a warm hello.
Volunteer for Meals on Wheels at AmericaLetsDoLunch.org
News TECH NEWS AND TRENDS THAT WILL
AFFECT YOU TODAY AND BEYOND.

Don’t build a gaming PC right

now. Buying one premade can
save you hundreds of dollars.
That’s how bad DIY component prices have become. BY BRAD CHACOS

I
t crushes my soul to say this, but if you
need a new gaming PC, don’t build
your own. Buy a prebuilt computer
instead.
That’s not permanent advice. I’m a die-
hard DIYer. Few things in life are more
satisfying than seeing your handmade rig
POST the first time you boot it up. The deck is

IMAGE: HP MARCH 2018 PCWorld 7

NEWS DON’T BUILD A GAMING PC
stacked against home-brew PC builders in
today’s market, though, as hardware
shortages and the cryptocurrency boom have
sent the cost of crucial components sky-high.
Current graphics card prices are ludicrous
(go.pcworld.com/ludi) unless you’re
targeting entry-level GPUs, with most models
selling for at least twice their suggested price.
The Radeon RX 570 (go.pcworld.com/rd57)
is supposed to start at $170, for example, but
the cheapest I can find on Newegg right now
costs $509 (go.pcworld.com/rx57), and the
vast majority go for closer to $600. It’s no
better at other retailers, or even with used
graphics cards. We’ve even taken the drastic
step of suggesting that gamers in a bind snag
an Xbox One S with Forza Horizon 3 for
$240 (go.pcworld.com/xb1s) or an Xbox
One X for $500 (go.pcworld.com/xbo1) until
the GPU pricing pain stops. Ugh.
Memory prices hurt just as much. The
Screenshot from CamelCamelCamel.
8 PCWorld MARCH 2018
industry can’t make enough to keep up with
demand, so prices for DIY RAM kits have
almost doubled over the past year. Just check
out the price history of this 16GB Corsair
Vengeance 3000MHz kit (go.pcworld.com/
ve16), courtesy of CamelCamelCamel (go.
pcworld.com/caml). It’s a nightmare—and
one that isn’t expected to end any time soon.
PREBUILT VS. DIY
GAMING PC PRICES
Things aren’t as bleak in the world of prebuilt
gaming PCs, where vendors like HP, Dell,
Lenovo, Falcon Northwest, Origin, et cetera,
buy components in bulk directly from hardware
suppliers. That helps keep costs down.
Consider the Dell Inspiron 5675 series
(go.pcworld.com/dl56) of gaming PCs,
which come with AMD Ryzen processors and
Radeon graphics cards. There’s a $649 model
(go.pcworld.com/ingd) that includes a Ryzen
5 1400 processor, 8GB of
RAM, a 1TB hard drive, and
the Radeon RX 570 graphics
card—a solid 1080p gaming
rig, in other words. On
January 25, a banner on Dell’s
site offers 10 percent off all
PCs site-wide with the
TENOFF coupon code,
bringing the total down to
$765. (Dell also offers a
similarly priced Inspiron 5680
lineup [go.pcworld.com/

The Dell Inspiron 5675.
dl80] with Intel and Nvidia GeForce hardware
inside.)
Remember that the cheapest Radeon RX
570 available costs $470, with most selling
for closer to $600. You’ll find 8GB of
2400MHz DDR4 memory for around $100
(go.pcworld.com/cmk8). Add in the Ryzen 5
1400’s $150 cost, and DIY builders already
find themselves near the price of the Dell
Inspiron, before you even factor in a case,
motherboard, storage, power supply, or a
$100 Windows license. Dell throws in a
wireless keyboard, too.
CyberPowerPC’s offerings are just as
enticing. The Gamer Xtreme GXIVR8020A4
costs $720 on Amazon (go.pcworld.com/gxiv)
and comes with a 4GB Radeon RX 580, 8GB of
RAM, a 1TB hard drive, and a last-gen Core
i5-7400, as well as a bunch of snazzy RGB LED
fans. Radeon RX 580
graphics cards (go.
pcworld.com/rd58)
currently start at $500
stand-alone on Newegg
(go.pcworld.com/degc),
with some going for over
$700. In other words, you
can snag CyberPower’s
entire system for the cost
of what you’d pay for the
graphics card, RAM, and
Windows license alone in a
DIY machine. You’d save at least $300 opting
for this over building your own PC.
The massive savings don’t only apply to
midrange PCs either. CyberPowerPC’s Gamer
Xtreme VR GXiVR8080A2 costs a healthy
$1,900 on Amazon (go.pcworld.com/cypc),
but for that price you get a beastly GeForce
GTX 1080 Ti (go.pcworld.com/nv80), a
liquid-cooled Core i7-8700K (go.pcworld.
com/870k), 16GB of DDR4 RAM, and a
240GB SSD augmented by a 1TB hard
drive—plus the same snazzy RGB LED fans
mentioned in the last CyberPower rig. That’s
serious firepower.
But the cheapest GTX 1080 Ti on Newegg
right now is $1,200 (go.pcworld.com/z0tc),
with the vast majority selling for over $1,300.
These cards are supposed to cost $700,
remember. Once you add in the DIY costs of
a 16GB DDR4 kit (about $200 [go.pcworld.
com/c14m], depending on the brand) and
MARCH 2018 PCWorld 9
NEWS DON’T BUILD A GAMING PC
The CyberPower Gamer Xtreme GXIVR8020A4
prebuilt gaming PC costs $720.
the Core i7-8700K processor ($380 on
Amazon [go.pcworld.com/bx80]) alone
you’re already spending as much as you
would for CyberPower’s full system.
BUY, DON’T BUILD
The pricing gap closes as you move toward
entry-level gaming PCs, as graphics options
like the GeForce GTX 1050 (go.pcworld.com/
gtx5) and 4GB memory kits aren’t as pricey as
more potent gear. But even that hardware is
still selling for higher than it should.
Once you move beyond budget builds,
prebuilt PCs hold a clear pricing advantage—
and it isn’t even close. You can save literally
hundreds of dollars by picking up boxed
computers like the ones I detailed here, and
10 PCWorld MARCH 2018
those come ready to go out of the box,
factory tested and backed by warranties
with support staff available in case
anything goes wrong.
I know, I know: When you buy
prebuilt, you lose the freedom and fun of
selecting your own hardware, let alone
the pure cathartic bliss of building a
machine with your own two hands. But
hey, you’ll be hundreds of dollars richer.
Did I mention that yet?
Not all prebuilt PCs will be cheaper
than comparable DIY rigs though, so be
sure to do your research before you
empty out your wallet. Also watch out for
prebuilt PCs offering a GeForce GTX 1060
(go.pcworld.com/3gb6). Many of the ones
I’ve seen online carry a 3GB GTX 1060. This
stripped-down version isn’t as fast as the
superb 6GB GTX 1060 (go.pcworld.
com/6gb6), and its limited memory capacity
could already force you to turn down
graphics settings in modern triple-A games.
Or, if you want portability, gaming laptops are
more enticing (go.pcworld.com/gmen)
when you consider the astronomical
desktop prices.
Fingers crossed these dark days will pass
soon… but that seems unlikely unless the
bottom falls out of Bitcoin prices. Bummer. If
you’re determined to buy a graphics card
without buying a full PC, check out PCWorld’s
guide on how to keep gaming in the coin
mining era (go.pcworld.com/mner).
VLC 3.0 adds Chromecast, HDR,
and 360-degree video support
The always popular VLC media player is getting even better with support for Chromecast,
360-degree video, 3D Audio, and a tweaked UI. BY IAN PAUL

T
he best free media player is
getting even better. After three
years of development, VLC 3.0
“Ventari” is rolling out to all
platforms, and it’s packed full of goodies such
as Chromecast support. The new version is
available from Videolan.org’s dedicated page
for VLC 3.0 (go.pcworld.com/vlc3) and is
rolling out to your device’s respective app
store.
The latest version of VLC contains a lot of
great additions, as well as a tweaked UI.
Chromecast discovery tops the list. It’s only
available on Windows desktop and Android
right now, but Videolan says the feature’s
coming to VLC’s iOS and the Windows Store
apps in the future.
VideoLAN designed VLC’s Chromecast
support as a workaround for any media
formats Chromecast can’t natively support.
VLC can re-encode video on the fly to make it
work with Chromecast, including casting

IMAGE: IDG MARCH 2018 PCWorld 11

NEWS VLC 3.0
DVDs from your Windows machine (go.
pcworld.com/cast).
VLC on Windows handles Chromecast a
little differently than most other apps. Instead
of a Chromecast icon that you tap or click,
you navigate to Playback > Renderer > [name
of Chromecast device] within VLC’s menus to
stream your video file. In my tests on an older
PC, I couldn’t get video casting to work,
however. I was able to send videos saved to
my PC to Chromecast, and the device would
show a loading screen, but they never actually
played back on the TV. This turned out to be a
problem with MKV videos. MP4 videos
The new VLC also adds
hardware decoding across all
platforms for better performance
and less CPU consumption,
especially when dealing with
more resource-intense video.
played back easily on a Kaby Lake PC and the
aforementioned older one; however,
playback quality was not smooth. I also tried
casting a DVD from the Kaby Lake PC, which
displayed without video stutter but there was
no audio.
Music playback on VLC 3.0 worked
reliably with all Chromecast-compatible
devices, including Google Home.
VLC 3.0’s refreshed UI isn’t a fresh, new
look from previous versions, but it is
12 PCWorld MARCH 2018
noticeably different. The icons at the bottom
of the window are cleaner, and the small icons
used within menu items are also new.
Version 3.0 also adds support for
360-degree video and 3D audio, readying
features for a VR version of VLC slated to roll
out in mid-April.
The new VLC also adds hardware
decoding across all platforms for better
performance and less CPU consumption,
especially when dealing with more resource-
intense video. You can check out a Videolan
clip on Vimeo showing VLC playing back an
8K, 60fps, 360-degree video using a
Windows machine with a Kaby Lake Core i7
processor (go.pcworld.com/vdln).
Other features in this release include
direct HDR support on Windows 10 Fall
Creators Update (go.pcworld.com/10fl) and
up, passthrough for HD audio codecs, and
local network drive browsing.
True to its heritage, VLC 3.0 supports a
massive range of platforms including
Windows XP and up, macOS 10.7 and up,
Android 2.3 and up, Chromebooks with the
Play Store, Apple TV, and Linux. All good
things must come to an end, however, and
this will be the last version of VLC for some
platforms. With VLC 4.0, the media player will
drop Windows XP and Vista, macOS 10.7 and
10.8, and Android 2.x and 3.x.
For a full list of all the changes to VLC with
version 3.0, check out the changelog (go.
pcworld.com/chlg).
6 features to expect in the
next Windows 10 update from
Insider Build 17083
Windows 10’s Insider Build 17083 offers big hints of what’s to come, from fonts
to Timeline tweaks and more. BY MARK HACHMAN
M
icrosoft appears to be
gearing up for the next big
Windows 10 update, after
releasing Windows 10 Insider
Build 17083. Codenamed “Redstone 4,” the
next release is expected in the spring.
Microsoft has made several tweaks to the
operating system with this build, including a
revamp of font management and how a user’s
IMAGE: MICROSOFT
history is treated within the Timeline feature.
Conspicuously absent is the Sets feature (go.
pcworld.com/sets), an intriguing tabbed UI
that essentially replaces separate windows
with a browser-like interface. Microsoft had
warned previously that Sets would take
months to deploy—a final release is expected
at the end of 2018, or even later—so the
removal of Sets was planned.
MARCH 2018 PCWorld 13
NEWS INSIDER BUILD 17083

“If you have been testing Sets, you will no

longer see it—however, Sets will return soon Some speculation suggested
in a post-RS4 [Redstone 4] flight!” Dona that Microsoft might push
Sarkar, the software engineer who oversees the release out to early April.
the Windows Insider program, wrote in a A March window allows the
blog post (go.pcworld.com/dona). company a month or two for
What’s most interesting is that Microsoft fixing bugs, which sounds
is signaling that it’s preparing to finalize about right.
Redstone 4. The company has said
previously that it planned major updates to 1. FONTS, FONTS, FONTS
Windows 10 and Office in both March and If you’re a graphic designer, fonts may be your
September (go.pcworld.com/10of). Some stock in trade. For others, you may not have
speculation suggested that Microsoft might thought about what font to use in literally
push the release out to early April. A March years. Microsoft has now added a specific
window allows the company a month or two Settings menu for controlling fonts, with a
for fixing bugs, which sounds about right. preview of each font family and how each
one will look. If a font has any additional
What this means for you: Redstone 4 could controls attached to it, such as the ability
be a mellow release, if its lack of flashy rollouts to adjust the width of a variable font like
or multiple developer sessions is any Bahnscrift, those controls will appear
indication. This may
mean that useful but
somewhat understated
features like Timeline
may be the showcase
additions, along with
general polishing and
under-the-hood
improvements. Here
are the six key changes
to expect based on
what we see in
Windows 10 Insider
build 17083: The new Fonts settings page within Windows 10.

14 PCWorld MARCH 2018

 Timeline will go it
alone as one of the
core features of
Redstone 4. Now,
Microsoft is
apparently
concerned that
there will be too
much information
in Timeline, as it is
allowing users to
delete information
on a day-by-day or
You’ll be able to download new fonts within the Store app, too.
hour-by-hour basis.
there, too. A new setting
Perhaps more importantly, you will be allows you to sync your activities to the cloud
able to find fonts in the Store, similar to the for what Microsoft promises will be a
way you can find and download new Themes seamless cross-device experience.
for personalizing your Windows desktop.
Microsoft says there are currently just a few 3. QUIET HOURS IS NOW
curated fonts available, but more will be CALLED FOCUS ASSIST
arriving soon. Microsoft has taken an excellent name—Quiet
Hours—and replaced it with a bland attempt at
2. TIMELINE TWEAKS bringing what it does in line with the workplace.
Microsoft’s new Timeline feature was often Focus Assist basically turns off notifications and
thought of as going hand-in-hand with Sets, but alerts when you need to remain undisturbed,

Timeline makes it easier to delete data.

MARCH 2018 PCWorld 15

NEWS INSIDER BUILD 17083

such as during a
presentation.
Now, there are
three tiers to
Focus Assist:
where only
priority
notifications will
get through,
where only
alarms will
interrupt you, as
well as a simple
Off switch. You’ll
be able to turn The new Windows 10 build 17083 features improved privacy controls,
them on and off such as tweaks to your dashboard.
by right-clicking
the Action Center notification panel. you can toggle the scrollbars on and off, so
they always remain visible.
4. WINDOWS HELLO IS
NOW EASIER TO ENABLE 6. NEW PRIVACY TWEAKS
Microsoft correctly points out that setting up Microsoft revealed separately that it plans to
Windows Hello, even on a PC that supports it, adjust privacy settings (go.pcworld.com/
required diving down deep into the settings, prvs) within Windows 10, giving you the
adding a PIN, then configuring Hello. Now, ability to delete individual search results, as
you can begin Hello setup right from the well as adjust the Privacy Dashboard that
sign-in screen. shows how much data Microsoft stores.
Separately, Microsoft also said that it will
5. SCROLLBARS CAN BE restrict a UWP app’s access to Documents,
TOGGLED TO ‘ALWAYS Videos, or Pictures folders without your
ON’ IN UWP APPS consent. If an app wants to look through your
Frustrated by the fact that UWP apps hide photos, it will have to ask. You can also go to
scrollbars for a fresh, clean, look? No longer. the Settings > Privacy page and manage
Within Settings > Ease Of Access > Display, folder access yourself.

16 PCWorld MARCH 2018

Intel’s plan to fix Meltdown in
silicon raises more questions
than answers
But what silicon?!! Be sure and read the questions Wall Street should have asked.
BY MARK HACHMAN

I
ntel chief executive Brian Krzanich told
investors recently that the firm plans to
release silicon with built-in mitigations
to the Spectre and Meltdown
vulnerabilities later this year, a statement that
raises more questions than it answers.
For Intel, it really has been a Tale of Two
Cities scenario: Intel reported the best
quarter in its history, as fourth-quarter 2017
revenue grew 4 percent year-over-year to
$17.1 billion. But Intel has also been the face
of Spectre and Meltdown (go.pcworld.com/
spme), two critical vulnerabilities built into
basically every processor it ships into the
PC and server markets.
Why this matters: Intel has been busy
working with PC makers and OS vendors like

IMAGE: PROJECT ZERO MARCH 2018 PCWorld 17

NEWS INTEL’S MELTDOWN PL AN

Microsoft to
release
microcode that
includes
so-called
mitigations,
microcode
updates that
patch the
vulnerabilities.
But even that
hasn’t gone so
well: Intel advised Intel’s Client Computing Group did fairly well in a tough PC market.
end users to stop
applying patches (go.pcworld.com/apat) Intel’s Client Computing Group reported
after systems unexpectedly rebooted. Now, a sales decline of 2 percent to $9 billion.
Intel has revealed it’s working on a more Notebook revenue was flat, while sales into
permanent fix, but the impact on users desktop PCs declined by 8 percent.
remains unknown. Krzanich reiterated that the vulnerabilities
won’t have an effect on future sales. “I can tell
‘SECURITY IS A TOP you, at the highest level, that we’re not seeing
PRIORITY’ much of a change in those forecasts as a result
“Security is a top priority for Intel, of this,” he said of the discovery of the
foundational to our products, and it’s critical vulnerabilities and their mitigations.
to the expanse of our data-centric strategy,” “I’ve assigned some of the very best
Krzanich told investors in a conference call. minds at Intel to work through this,” Krzanich
“Our near-term focus is on delivering high- added.
quality mitigations to protect our customers’
infrastructure from these exploits. We’re 6 QUESTIONS INTEL NEEDS
working to create silicon-based changes to TO ANSWER
future products, that will directly address The Wall Street analyst community had several
the Spectre and Meltdown threats in chances to pin down Krzanich on Intel’s
hardware. And those products will begin silicon security strategy. Instead, they
appearing later this year.” peppered Krzanich with questions about the

18 PCWorld MARCH 2018

company’s proposed capital expenditures
and memory plans.
Important questions about the silicon fix
remain hanging for end users and corporate
customers. Here’s what we wished the
analysts had asked, and our best guesses
as to the answers.
1. WHEN EXACTLY WILL THE
SILICON FIXES TAKE PLACE?
Our guess: the end of 2018. Based upon
leaked product roadmaps, that would
probably mean the reported Cascade
Lake-X 14-nm parts, as well as possibly
the 10-nm Cannon Lake parts due
sometime thereafter.
Note that Pat Moorhead, a corporate
fellow at AMD and now the principal analyst
Even new Intel chips like the Core i7-8700K are affected by Meltdown and Spectre.
at Moor Insights, disagrees. “I believe these
mitigations are already built in or we would
see a year delay in new chips,” he said in
a message. So it’s possible that chips
releasing sooner, such as Coffee Lake-S,
might include these fixes.
2. WILL THESE FIXES
SOLVE BOTH SPECTRE
AND MELTDOWN
VULNERABILITIES?
Our guess: Just Meltdown. As our Spectre
and Meltdown FAQ explains (go.pcworld.
com/spme), Meltdown most strongly affects
Intel processors because of the aggressive
way those chips handle speculative
execution. Spectre appears to require a more
fundamental redesign.
MARCH 2018 PCWorld 19
NEWS INTEL’S MELTDOWN PL AN

3. WILL THE MITIGATIONS

APPLY ONLY TO NEW
PRODUCTS, OR OLDER
CHIPS, TOO?
Our guess: only new PC microprocessors,
though potentially Intel could re-spin existing
processors, especially for cloud servers.
Doing so, however, would open up the
possibility of an actual recall, something
that Intel doesn’t seem to be indicating as
part of its “everything-is-fine” guidance.
To reassure customers, some chips might
carry a suffix to assure buyers that the CDM 5.5.0 results on the Microsoft Surface
Book once its been updated for the Spectre
mitigations are built in.
and Meltdown exploits.

4. WHAT EFFECT WILL 6. WILL SILICON WITH

THOSE MITIGATIONS HAVE
ON THE CHIP ITSELF?
Our guess: Any time you add logic to a CPU,
and physically increase its size, the cost is
affected as well. But whether Intel would have
to add dedicated logic blocks, or simply
restructure the chip, isn’t known. If there
were additional costs that raised prices,
Intel would eat it.
5. HOW WILL
PERFORMANCE BE
AFFECTED?
Our guess: The only guidance we have is
what our tests have shown (go.pcworld.com/
te5t): little effect in CPU-dependent
benchmarks, but more significant slowdowns
in broader tests of system performance.
BUILT‑IN MITIGATIONS
BOOST PC SALES?
Our guess: In consumer PCs, probably not. In
enterprises, it’s more likely to be seen as a
selling point. Businesses won’t want to risk
exposing themselves to lawsuits, and any
smart PC salesperson will remind them of this.
Consumers will just grit their teeth and bear
the slowdown and the lack of available
GPUs (go.pcworld.com/mner).
“I think we could see some increased
demand for servers, but not for PCs, as I do
not think many will notice the performance
degradation,” Moorhead said.
Again, our guesses are just that. Let’s
hope that Intel starts laying out plans for
solving Spectre and Meltdown in silicon,
and does it soon.

20 PCWorld MARCH 2018

AMD will Spectre-proof the
Zen 2 architecture, and 4 other
nuggets from its earnings call
One piece of good news is obvious: AMD’s making money again, contributing to the
long-term health of Intel’s chief rival. BY MARK HACHMAN

A
fter years of reporting loss after
loss, AMD marked a second
straight profitable quarter,
standing upon the shoulders
of its successful Ryzen CPUs and Vega
chips. Company executives also said they
plan to implement mitigations for the
Spectre vulnerabilities in the upcoming
Zen 2 architecture, and warned of
memory shortages.
The Wall Street analysts on the call were
focused on what impact this would all have
on AMD’s future earnings, and by extension,
its stock price. But as always, it was possible
to distill a few drops of information that
could affect users directly. Here they are.

IMAGE: GORDON MAH UNG MARCH 2018 PCWorld 21

NEWS AMD TO SPECTRE-PROOF ZEN 2 ARCHITECTURE

1. SPECTRE MITIGATIONS design, to further address potential Spectre-

WILL BE BUILT INTO ZEN 2 like exploits,” Su added. “We continue to
If you’ve been following the ongoing Spectre collaborate closely with the industry on these
and Meltdown saga (go.pcworld.com/ vulnerabilities, and are committed to
spme), you know that Intel has been the protecting AMD users on these and other
vendor most affected by the two chip security threats, as they arise.”
vulnerabilities. Lisa Su, AMD’s chief executive, Put another way, it won’t be until 2019
reiterated AMD’s prior position that the that AMD solves its Spectre problem. Based
company’s chips aren’t vulnerable to on AMD’s extensive road map (go.pcworld.
Meltdown, nor to some of the iterations com/exrm) that the company recently
of potential Spectre exploits. revealed, the next-gen Zen 2 architecture
Here’s how Su explained it: won’t be released until next year.
“For Spectre variant 1, we continue
actively working with our ecosystem partners 2. CRYPTO IS PARTIALLY
on mitigations, including operating system RESPONSIBLE FOR AMD’S
packages that have begun to roll out,” Su SUCCESS
said. “We continue to believe that variant 2 One point that Wall Street analysts hammered
of Spectre is difficult to exploit on AMD AMD executives on: What was the impact of
processors. However, we are deploying cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin mining, and
CPU microcode
packages that in
combination
with operating
system patches,
provide
additional
mitigation steps.
“Longer
term, we have
included
changes in our
future processsor
cores, starting
with our Zen 2

22 PCWorld MARCH 2018

what will they be in the future? Su played coy,
claiming that cryptocurrencies had about a
single-digit impact to the company’s annual
revenue, though it could be a little higher.
Crypto, she allowed, was a great way to “get
Radeon in as many applications as possible.”
But is cryptocurrencies a long-term play,
something that will keep GPU prices in the
stratosphere (go.pcworld.com/ludi)? Su
wouldn’t say. She also pooh-poohed the
notion that AMD couldn’t get enough
foundry space or silicon to manufacture the
company’s GPUs.
3. BUT THERE ARE
SHORTAGES IN MEMORY
Su did admit, though, that there are shortages
in the graphics memory that AMD’s GPUs
connect to, specifically GDDR5 and HBM
memory. (She didn’t say whether HBM2
memory was affected, or whether she was
using “HBM” as a generic term.)
“We’re working through that with our
memory partners,” Su said, identifying it
as a problem in 2017.
4. DESKTOP AND SERVER
IS BACK
Desktop CPUs—especially the lowest-cost
Ryzen 3—appear to have helped drive sales
during the quarter, Su said, as the Ryzen
Mobile chips started to ramp up during the
end of the quarter. What’s especially
impressive is that AMD has started selling its
Epyc server chips into Microsoft’s Azure
cloud and at companies like Baidu. That’s
not going to affect the PC market, but
enterprise revenue is the fuel that can
power a company’s long-term success.
5. AMD IS PROFITABLE
AGAIN
And while things can change, it appears
that AMD’s train is under full steam.
Though exactly how much money AMD
made won’t directly impact your ability to buy
a graphics card, AMD’s financial viability
means that Intel will continue to have
competition, forcing PC prices lower. In this,
AMD shone: The company reported net
income of $61 million on revenue of $1.48
billion, as revenue climbed 34 percent over
the same quarter last year, when AMD
reported a loss. AMD’s Computing and
Graphics business—which includes Ryzen
and Radeon sales—climbed a whopping
60 percent year-over-year.
One of the biggest indicators of AMD’s
confidence, however, was its earlier, massive
road map disclosure. You don’t show your
cards unless you feel you can run the table.
And that’s good news for the PC market.
You don’t show your cards
unless you feel you can run the
table. And that’s good news for
the PC market.
MARCH 2018 PCWorld 23
NEWS

Why parents should worry

about Office 365’s Immersive
Reader dictation feature
At some point, dictation moves from a shortcut to a productivity aid. But when? Microsoft
appears to be making that choice for you. BY MARK HACHMAN

B
eginning in February, Microsoft
started offering a new feature for
young students called Immersive
Reader dictation within Office
365 apps for Windows and the Mac. As a
parent of two elementary school students,
though, I’m concerned that this feature—
which brings smartphone-style voice dictation
to traditional desktop apps—will be an
unwelcome crutch.
It’s not just on Windows, either. Microsoft
is pushing dictation onto Word for Mac,
iPhone, Outlook Desktop, OneNote iPad,
and OneNote Mac.

24 PCWorld MARCH 2018 IMAGE: ISTOCK

 Even though I write about
technology for a living, I’m sort
of feeling my way through
applying it toward parenting.
Is a smart speaker an
annoyance or a learning aid?
Do I need to place hardwired
parental controls on my kids’
screen time, or can I just check
up on them? And when do I
need to have “the talk” about
using the computer to solve
Pearson, the large education company, will begin rolling out in
problems that my kids are March curriculum that will work on both HoloLens and Windows
struggling with? Mixed Reality immersive VR headsets, Microsoft said.
For example, my oldest is
currently writing three collaborative stories, including it within Office 365—and pushing it
for fun, using Google Apps’ similar dictation within Microsoft Education—Microsoft has
feature (go.pcworld.com/dcgd). (Immersive released a calculator app for young writers.
Reader is probably Microsoft’s attempt to
catch up.) My son doesn’t see dictation as a DICTATION: GREAT
crutch, but as a convenience. FOR ADULTS, A CRUTCH
In some sense, he’s right. I’ve written FOR KIDS
about how Windows inexplicably lacks Writing requires at least two basic skills: the
dictation (go.pcworld.com/spre), and how ability to write coherently, with proper
Cortana’s speech-recognition features could grammar and spelling; and the basic
be tapped to facilitate content creation. There capability to enter those words on the page.
aren’t any broad statements being made here My high-school writing skills involved mainly
about whether dictation should replace the smeared ink on lined paper and a mishmash
traditional keyboard. Microsoft already of older typewriters and early computer
considers dictation to be an assistive screens. My typing skills were spotty at best
technology, but including it within Office 365 by the time I began writing papers on the
demonstrates how easily it could be applied early Macintosh.
toward productivity. I think that it’s fair to worry that pushing
That’s where the problem lies: By dictation on a new generation of young

MARCH 2018 PCWorld 25

NEWS OFFICE 365’S IMMERSIVE READER DICTATION FEATURE
students will have the same effect. My oldest
son writes with a grasp of language and idiom
that’s way beyond his years, both writing and
editing. The other night he proudly showed
me his latest work of Star Wars fan fiction, and
it was easy to differentiate between the
sections where he had dictated text into
Google Docs, and where he and a friend had
gone back and proofread it. One of the
reasons he dictated it, he told me, was that
his typing skills weren’t able to keep up with
his train of thought.
My mother, now a retired elementary
school teacher, generally frowned upon
technology in the classroom, viewing it as a
distraction. We embrace technology more
warmly today, acknowledging that there will
be a time when products like self-driving cars
eventually take over from humans, just as
automatic transmissions have largely replaced
the stick shift. I could be raising the
generation that makes the computer
keyboard obsolete.
If you’re reading this, though, and do
have young children, it’s worth taking a
moment to consider the ramifications of this
new technology. I’m not specifically calling
out Microsoft, though it may look like I’m
doing so. Chromebooks dominate the
classroom, and Google Apps are far more
prevalent in elementary schools than
Windows or Office 365. That’s motivated
Microsoft to push hard on delivering features
teachers want, such as the ability to lock
26 PCWorld MARCH 2018
OneNote Class Notebooks, and for
PowerPoint users to record their lessons with
ink and video, both of which Microsoft also
announced today.
But chances are your teacher grew up
with chalkboards, film strips, and overhead
projectors. Dictation may not be a feature
they’re familiar with, or are aware is even
present. (Or whether they can turn it off via a
global policy change, something worth
asking a school IT administrator.) Should we
worry about spell-checking and grammar
correction, too? Probably not.
Like any new technology, though,
dictation comes with its own consequences.
At some point, once students have
demonstrated a grasp of how to construct a
sentence, dictation may become a tool to
assist students to focus on critical thinking, or
a logical argument. When that point actually
arrives, though, is one you, your child, and
your child’s teacher will have to agree upon.
The lesson remains the same: As a parent,
keeping tabs on your kids’ digital activities is
always a smart practice.
What I’d like Microsoft and Google to do,
however, is to allow parents and educators to
have input into that decision, by leaving
dictation off by default. Immersive Reader
dictation for the Microsoft Education sounds
like a marvelous tool for adults to whip out a
short memo or even a longer document. But
for young kids, it’s a powerful temptation to
take a shortcut that they don’t really need.
Microsoft’s Surface Pro turns
5 amid rising competition
and faltering sales
Microsoft’s tablets once led the way, but innovation has slowed in recent versions.
BY MARK HACHMAN

M
icrosoft’s iconic Surface Pro
tablet turned five in February.
The original product led the
way for other productivity
Windows tablets and detachable computers,
but on its fifth anniversary, Microsoft may be
losing momentum.
On Twitter, the Microsoft Surface team
celebrated its “revolution,” which began
when it discarded the limited Windows RT
and brought full Windows 8 to the tablet
market. “Five years ago today, a revolution
was born when Surface turned Pro,” the
Surface account tweeted (go.pcworld.com/

IMAGE: MICROSOFT MARCH 2018 PCWorld 27

NEWS MICROSOFT SURFACE PRO TURNS 5

supr). “And it was just the start.”
SURFACE SALES FALTER
That strong start has slowed, though.
According to research firm IDC, unit sales of
detachable Surface devices are down nearly
19 percent from a year ago. (Full disclosure:
PCWorld and IDC are owned by the same
parent company, China Oceanwide.) IDC’s
report (go.pcworld.com/dtab), which
analyzes the state of the convertible and slate
market, shows an industry dominated by the
high volumes of Android and iOS tablets sold
by Apple, Samsung, and other vendors.
Thanks in part to the popularity of its
Surface products, Microsoft typically appears
on the list, though usually at or near the
bottom. This year, Microsoft’s name didn’t
appear at all. A follow-up inquiry by PCWorld
revealed why: Surface sales
fell significantly during the
fourth quarter, and during
all of 2017 as well, IDC said.
com/lm52), for example, is likely one reason
for the drop in Surface sales, though we’ll go
into other possibilities later. But we as
consumers should still be rooting for
Microsoft to succeed. The company is one of
the few willing to risk launching new products
into new categories.
MICROSOFT SURFACE,
CAUGHT UP IN TABLET
TROUBLES
Microsoft sold 748,000 Surface devices
during the fourth quarter, a drop of 18.8
percent compared to the fourth quarter of
2017, according to Lauren Guenveur, a senior
research analyst for IDC’s device group. For
all of 2017, Microsoft sold 3 million Surface
devices, down 16.8 percent from 2016, she
said via email.

Why this matters: The

Surface Pro was important
for Microsoft, because it
led the way for other PC
vendors to make slim, light
Windows tablets that could
be powerful business
machines. A rise of viable
competitors like Lenovo’s Stunning products like the Microsoft Surface Book 2 don’t come cheap,
Miix 520 (go.pcworld. which might have impacted sales.

28 PCWorld MARCH 2018

IDC’s tablet numbers are dominated by Android vendors.
Those devices included all of the Surface
devices that IDC considers detachables: the
Surface Pro 3, 4, and Pro (2017); as well as the
Surface Book and Surface Book 2. (IDC
excludes the Surface Studio and Surface Hub,
two niche Surface products, as well as the
Surface Laptop, which isn’t a detachable.)
It’s worth noting that overall tablet sales
are down, too, though not by as much: In all,
the market dropped 7.9 percent in 2017,
IDC said.
A closer look at the numbers reveals that
Microsoft isn’t struggling alone, and even has
reason to be optimistic. According to IDC,
Microsoft is still the sixth-largest tablet vendor,
trailing companies like Apple and Amazon,
which sold 13.2 million iPads and 7.7 million
Fire tablets, respectively. But Apple’s iPad
sales were essentially flat, and Amazon’s
nearly-doubled Fire tablet sales were fueled
by dirt-cheap prices. Samsung, which has
done well in the tablet market, saw unit
sales fall by 13 percent.
Microsoft still ranks second in the true
convertible market as defined by IDC, while
the leader is Apple’s iPad Pro. Detachables
make up just 14 percent of the total tablet
market currently, according to IDC, and
are expected to grow over time.
As to why Microsoft’s Surface has
struggled, Guenveur gave several reasons.
For one, she said, no one expected that tablet
owners would treat them like laptops: Buy
one, and then hold onto it for close to 4 to 5
MARCH 2018 PCWorld 29
NEWS MICROSOFT SURFACE PRO TURNS 5
years, rather than exchange them every
couple of years as smartphone owners do.
But Guenveur also zeroed in on the lack of
significant change within Microsoft’s
individual Surface lines—one reason why
PCWorld knocked down the Surface Pro
(2017) refresh (go.pcworld.com/su17), versus
its competition. “I think Microsoft’s struggle
mostly comes down to their product refresh
cycle, which has been uneven, and the fact
that the new generation of products don’t
appear very different to the previous
generation,” she said.
Microsoft representatives declined to
comment. During a recent conference call,
company executives largely glossed over the
performance of the Surface lineup (go.
pcworld.com/sulu), noting that unit sales had
Solid competition from competing tablets, like this Lenovo Miix 520,
has probably affected Surface sales to some extent.
30 PCWorld MARCH 2018
decreased, but that revenue had increased by
1 percent. “Surface revenue should grow
year-over-year from continued launch
momentum from the latest Surface Pro, Book
and Laptop, but decline sequentially,
consistent with holiday seasonality,” Microsoft
executives said (go.pcworld.com/yony).
ALWAYS-CONNECTED PCS
ARE A WILD CARD
Competition for Microsoft’s Surface products
is arguably good for consumers and for
innovation. What we don’t know, Guenveur
said, is how the push for the upcoming
Windows 10 on ARM products will change
that dynamic.
So far, Acer, HP, and Lenovo have
announced Always Connected PCs that are
powered by Qualcomm
Snapdragon chips (go.
pcworld.com/qusd), which
emphasize long battery life
over traditional performance
metrics. Microsoft was an
enthusiastic participant at
Qualcomm’s launch, but it has
yet to announce a product of
its own for the new category.
Depending on how well
these competing tablets are
received, Microsoft may
find itself moving from a
leader in the tablet space
to a follower.
Microsoft buying Valve would
be a disaster for PC gaming
Right now, it’s just a rumor. Hopefully it stays that way. BY HAYDEN DINGMAN
T
here’s been a rumor recently, thin
even so far as these rumors
usually go, but so enormous in
potential impact it seems to have
captured people’s attention anyway:
According to Polygon (go.pcworld.com/
poly), Microsoft has reportedly talked about
acquiring Valve, the independent company
behind the Steam gaming platform. Or
IMAGE: GORDON MAH UNG/ROB SCHULZ
there’s been “a whisper about Valve,” as
Polygon puts it.
It seems ludicrous to me—after all,
we’re talking about Valve, the company that
hated Windows 8 so much it tried to convert
developers (and players) to a custom Steam‑
centric Linux build.
But let’s assume this hypothetical scenario
is more serious than it seems. Anything’s
MARCH 2018 PCWorld 31
NEWS MICROSOFT BUYING VALVE A DISASTER

possible, I guess. And then,

once we’ve considered the
possibility, let’s talk about
why it would be disastrous
for PC gaming.

CERTIFICATION?
WHAT’S THAT?
Actually, in the name of
fairness, let’s start with some
positives. First off, there’s A low-cost subscription program like Xbox Game Pass on PC would be
Xbox Game Pass, pretty enticing.
Microsoft’s console-only
service that gives subscribers access to about
100 games, new and old, for $10 per month
(go.pcworld.com/10pm). That includes new
first-party Microsoft games the same day they
hit retail. This could conceivably come to the
PC anyway, but the chances get a lot better
when Microsoft actually has more than a
handful of PC games to entice people.
There’s also the persistent issue of Valve’s
hands-off approach to Steam. I feel the lack of
curation is a detriment to the platform. Lost in
the shuffle, or perhaps unwilling to even set
foot in the shuffle, more and more indie
developers are seemingly headed to the
Nintendo Switch—a place where tighter
standards and a smaller library ensures
someone might actually see your game
before it’s swept into the void.
Microsoft runs the Xbox in a similar fashion
to Nintendo, and thus an acquired Steam may
look a bit more like…well, 2010-era Steam,
when Valve still curated its collection. In this
one particular fashion, at least.
BETTER THE DEVIL YOU
DON’T KNOW
Then again, we know what a Microsoft
storefront looks like. Two of them actually, and
they’re both pretty bad. On the Xbox, sales
are rare, the interface is awful and cluttered
with non-gaming ads, and oh yeah, people
still need to pay out the nose every month for
Xbox Live Gold if they want multiplayer.
Microsoft also hasn’t completely overcome
the wave of negative sentiment that
culminated in the “Microsoft hates indies”
catchphrase a few years back. It’s getting
better, but the Xbox still isn’t a prime
destination for indie developers the way it
was from 2008 to 2012 or so.
The Microsoft Store in Windows 10 is even
worse. Microsoft has failed to convince pretty

32 PCWorld MARCH 2018

much anyone to care about the built-in Store,
which has been part of the operating system
since Windows 8 launched in 2012. It’s hard
to say it’s “better curated” than Steam when
this is what the best-selling chart looks like:
It’s as bad as any mobile store, and
somehow even more upsetting to me than
the flood of generic asset flips on Steam’s
“New” charts on any given day. Outside of
Microsoft’s own first-party titles, only a handful
of developers have made the effort to come
over to Windows 10’s Microsoft Store. You
get the feeling those experiments were more
beneficial for Microsoft than the publisher—
and a failure. See: Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare
(go.pcworld.com/cdiw) and its D.O.A.
Gears of War: Ultimate Edition was the first major UWP game on PC, and it was a disaster. The situation’s
improved since, but nearly two years later the UWP version of a game (like 2017’s Cuphead) is still the
inferior choice for most users.
multiplayer scene in the Windows 10 Store.
Microsoft seemingly has no idea how to
entice the average PC gamer, as evidenced
by the Microsoft Store’s forced (and subpar)
integration with Xbox Live, the fact the store
“organizes” all your games into one
looooong and entirely unsorted list (with
your DLC purchases listed separately and
individually in the “Apps” section for some
reason), the awkward controller-friendly
interface, and so on.
Not to mention the nightmare that is UWP,
the Universal Windows Platform format
Microsoft touts as a successor to traditional
Win32 desktop software. UWP games have
had a laundry list of problems though—no
MARCH 2018 PCWorld 33
NEWS MICROSOFT BUYING VALVE A DISASTER

support for common streaming utilities, no
support for frame rate counter overlays like
FRAPS, no support for multiple video cards, no
modding or backup abilities, and more. Some
of these problems have been somewhat
worked around at this point, but the troubled
run-up certainly hasn’t instilled confidence
Microsoft understands the PC market.
Hell, just last week my colleague Brad
Chacos and I were playing the Sea of Thieves
beta (go.pcworld.com/sotb) and no matter
how many times I invited him to my party he
never saw an invite. He eventually had to pop
open the Windows 10 Xbox app and join me
that way. These are fundamental problems.
Microsoft continues to push the issue,
though. This week Microsoft even threw
shade at Valve, saying that of course Age of
Empires: Definitive Edition (go.pcworld.com/
aede) could come to Steam, as long as Valve
supported UWP. While I theoretically support
every game coming
to every platform, I
can hardly fault Valve
for not supporting a
format that’s a)
half-broken on its
own, b) breaks much
of the functionality
Valve’s built into
Steam, and c) is
pretty much only
used by a single
company— Sea of Thieves.
Microsoft. Even Remedy, when given the
option, ported Quantum Break (go.pcworld.
com/qubr) away from UWP so it could land
on Steam.
Again, these issues don’t inspire
confidence in Microsoft, and the problems
only seem more glaring the further we get
into the Windows 10 lifespan.
Which brings me to my next point, and
possibly the most important: Microsoft hasn’t
earned the goodwill of PC gamers yet, and
trying to buy respectability would be disastrous.
I actually think Microsoft’s been
surprisingly good at following through on its
promises to PC gamers these last two years.
Phil Spencer’s been a breath of fresh air as far
as Microsoft’s PC presence, and the Xbox Play
Anywhere program (go.pcworld.com/xbpa)
is an excellent gesture despite UWP’s
lingering issues. Forza Horizon 3 (go.pcworld.
com/frz3), Gears of War 4 (go.pcworld.com/

34 PCWorld MARCH 2018

 preceding dark
age—and thus
doubtful that,
without Steam,
Microsoft
would’ve ever
looked back to the
PC to begin with.
Swooping in
at the eleventh
hour and trying to
cash in on that
Portal 2. goodwill would
just prove
gow4), Sea of Thieves—these games look Microsoft’s exactly the type of company most
great on PC, and considering there are PC gamers already believe Microsoft to be:
undoubtedly people (like me) who now never Walled-off and disinterested in the long-term
touch their Xbox One? A weirdly self- health of the ecosystem. And as misguided as
sacrificing business move by Microsoft. the “Good Guy Valve” image might be,
But there were 15-odd years of neglect there’s no disputing that trust between Valve
preceding, years where the PC gaming and player led to Steam’s success. It’s the
market was very much not Microsoft’s focus— reason people are willing to spend thousands
and years where, on the rare occasions of dollars on games that don’t actually exist,
Microsoft did glance at desktops, the results that are served digitally—there’s a confidence
were disastrous. Looking at you, Games for Steam will exist for the long haul.
Windows Live (go.pcworld.com/gawl). A Microsoft acquisition undermines all
Valve was there, and that means a lot. It that trust, and might lead to the death of PC
doesn’t earn Valve a free pass. It doesn’t mean gaming as we know it.
we overlook all of Steam’s myriad missteps
(and there have been and will continue to be HALF-LIFE 3 IS A LIE
many). Gabe Newell, Mike Harrington, and There’s a third consideration here—one I think
Co. deserve credit though. It’s doubtful PC is less important than the overall health of the
gaming would be going through its current PC gaming market, but which others might
renaissance if Steam hadn’t lifted us out of the consider most important.

MARCH 2018 PCWorld 35

NEWS MICROSOFT BUYING VALVE A DISASTER
Games.
Valve’s first-party catalog isn’t huge, but
it’s beloved: Portal, Half-Life, Dota 2, Counter-
Strike, Left 4 Dead. A Microsoft acquisition
presumably turns these into Microsoft titles,
ripe for cashing in. And oh, I’m tempted. I’d
love to see a Portal 3 or, dare I say it, the
proverbial Half-Life 3.
But the reason that prospect’s at all
tempting is because the games that came
before were so amazing—even revolutionary.
One of the oft-rumored reasons we’ve never
seen a Half-Life 3 is because Valve hasn’t
found a way to capture that lightning-in-a-
bottle feeling again.
Microsoft would make it regardless. Hell,
you want Half-Life 3? Microsoft will give you
Half-Life 3 through 6, probably within the next
decade. And they’d all be perfectly pleasant,
visually stunning, competent, polished.
Also—I bet—not at all what people
wanted.
There’s an abundance of evidence: Halo
4 and 5, and Gears of War 4. Microsoft took
over beloved franchises from the original
developers, turned out perfectly competent
sequels, and yet all three games lack the
spark that made the early entries special—
that made people want sequels in the first
place. Whether that spark is actually missing,
or just a result of us looking behind
Microsoft’s curtain and seeing another wizard
at the controls? Hard to say. In any case, it
makes the prospect of a Microsoft- helmed
36 PCWorld MARCH 2018
Half-Life 3 something to be dreaded, not
welcomed.
BOTTOM LINE
This is not to say Microsoft shouldn’t acquire
someone. It absolutely should, if it wants to
make the Xbox a force again. My list of
PlayStation 4 exclusives is long and packed
full of great games. My Xbox list is…well,
Forza Horizon mainly. Quantum Break. Uh,
Recore I guess?
It’s not great. Microsoft needs stellar,
exclusive games, and clearly recognizes
that fact in the wake of the Xbox One X’s
(go.pcworld.com/xbx1) launch. Other
names in this week’s rumor mill seem even
more far-fetched—EA is mentioned by
name, which is another moonshot to say
the least. But at least Microsoft acquiring
EA wouldn’t destabilize an entire platform,
nor would many casual observers object to
a change of management after the last (go.
pcworld.com/swb2) few years (go.
pcworld.com/n4sp) of EA’s output (go.
pcworld.com/msef).
Valve, though? A disaster—for Microsoft,
for Steam, and for PC gaming in general.
It’s not great. Microsoft needs
stellar, exclusive games, and
clearly recognizes that fact in
the wake of the Xbox One X’s
launch.
IWitnessBullying.org
DISASTERS DON’ T
PL AN AHEAD

YO U C AN
DON’T WAIT. COMMUNICATE.
Talk to your loved ones about how you are
going to be ready in an emergency.

VISIT READY.GOV/PLAN.
Reviews & Ratings
TESTED IN PCWORLD LABS
WE PUT HARDWARE & SOFTWARE
THROUGH RIGOROUS TESTING

Ryzen APU: Ryzen plus Vega

saves budget gamers during
a GPU drought
Ryzen 3 2200G and Ryzen 5 2400G just stepped in to give budget gamers a
worthy alternative. BY GORDON MAH UNG

L
et’s just lay our cards down at
once. AMD’s Ryzen 3 2200G and
Ryzen 5 2400G APUs are
everything budget gamers have
been praying for: surprisingly decent gaming
performance at a shockingly low price.
In years past, such a statement would be
met by skepticism and dismissive “whatever”
animated GIFs. But AMD actually over-
delivered on its Ryzen CPUs last year, so talks
of combining those same Zen cores with the
latest and greatest Radeon Vega graphics

IMAGE: GORDON MAH UNG MARCH 2018 PCWorld 39

REVIEWS RYZEN APU

cores has cash-strapped gamers in a tizzy of (go.pcworld.com/ludi), these new

excitement. And it turns out the excitement is
warranted. Compared to a similarly equipped
Intel-based system running a Core i3, the
lower-end Ryzen 3 2200G is 142 percent
faster in 3DMark Fire Strike, 154 percent faster
in 3DMark Time Spy, and 203 percent faster
in Rainbow Six Siege. Those are just a few of
the highlights from our game performance
testing, which you can see if you jump to our
gaming tests on page 45.
In practical terms, AMD’s new budget
wonder chips should be able to produce a
reasonable 60 fps at 720p in many games,
and some will be playable at 1080p, too. So
if you’ve been avoiding building a
gaming PC because of sky-high GPU prices
AMD APUs provide some intriguing options—
at least on the budget end.
Now we’ll dig into the Ryzen APU specs
and architecture before we return to our
performance results.
RYZEN 3 2200G AND
RYZEN 5 2400G SPECS
There are two Ryzen APU parts AMD is
releasing. The Ryzen 3 2200G ($99 on
Amazon [go.pcworld.com/220g]) features
four Zen cores without symmetrical multi-
threading (SMT), which is AMD’s version of
Intel’s Hyper-Threading. The cores have a
base clock of 3.5GHz with a boost clock of
3.7GHz.

AMD Ryzen 5 2400G AMD Ryzen 3 2200G

CPU Cores 4 Cores, 8 Threads (1 CCX) 4 Cores, 4 Threads (1 CCX)

CPU Base Clock 3.6GHz 3.5GHz

CPU Max Boost Clock Up to 3.9GHz Up to 3.7GHz

GPU Cores 11 Radeon Vega CUs 8 Radeon Vega CUs

GPU Clock Up to 1250MHz Up to 1100MHz

L1$ 64K i$, 32K D$ per core 64K i$, 32K D$ per core

L2$ 512K per core 512K per core

L3$ 4MB Shared 4MB Shared

TDP 65W 65W

DRAM Supported Up to DDR4-2933 (Dual Channel) Up to DDR4-2933 (Dual Channel)

Transistors and Die Size 209.78mm2/˜4.94 billion 209.78mm2/˜4.94 billion

40 PCWorld MARCH 2018

 For graphics, it features eight Vega
compute units (CUs) inside. Yup, the same
Vega cores used in the company’s impossible-
to-obtain Radeon Vega cards (reviewed at
go.pcworld.com/rdvg).
One step up is the Ryzen 5 2400G
($169 on Amazon [go.pcworld.com/24oo]).
It still nets you a quad-core chip, but with
SMT switched on for a total of eight threads
of computing power. AMD also increases
the base clock to 3.6GHz and the boost
clock to 3.9GHz. For graphics, you get
about a third more CUs, with 11 Vega
units inside.
Both are AM4-based and should
work in most AM4 socket
motherboards that have display
outputs and the latest BIOS
available.
Both are AM4-based and should work in
most AM4 socket motherboards that have
display outputs and the latest BIOS available.
Unlike Intel, which locks its lower-end chips,
AMD has left them unlocked for those who
want to explore overclocking.
RYZEN APU VS. RYZEN CPU
Although the actual Zen cores are the same,
the Ryzen APUs differ from Ryzen CPUs in a
couple of key ways. In the chart, three things
should jump out: less cache, half the GPU PCI
VIDEO: AMD RYZEN APU
BENCHMARKS AND REVIEW
WATCH NOW AT GO.PCWORLD.COM/RAPU
lanes, and the use of a single, unified CCX in
the APU, rather than the dual-CCX design in
the current CPU.
All Ryzens are modular and built around
the basic four-core CCX unit. An eight-core
Ryzen 7, for example, features two CCX units.
On the six-core Ryzen 5 CPU, AMD disables a
core on each CCX and links them together.
On the four-core Ryzen 5 CPU, two cores are
disabled on each CCX.
This CCX link has a real cost in latency
(which tech website PCper.com thoroughly
explores at go.pcworld.com/pcpr.) With its
new APU, AMD said it needed to save space
and make thermal room for the overhead of
the Vega cores, so it went with a single
four-core CCX. This eliminates the latency
issue, but also lowers total cache, as each of
those CCX units has a dedicated cache.
AMD said the practical impact in its own
testing was minimal: Some games pick up a
little gain from lowering the latency, while
others benefit slightly from the increased
MARCH 2018 PCWorld 41
REVIEWS RYZEN APU

cache size. To help make up

for the cache decrease,
AMD said, it buffs the clock
speeds a bit.
AMD didn’t get into why
it cut the PCIe lanes, but
we’d guess it’s due to the
mobile roots of the APU.
These APUs were designed
to scale up from laptops to
desktops and you just don’t
need all of those lanes in
laptops. Many tests over the
years have shown PCIe lanes typically don’t
impact GPU performance.
AMD PENNY-PINCHES ON
THE PASTE
One last divergence between the CPUs and
the APUs is a shift from a metallic solder
thermal interface material (TIM) used in Ryzen
CPUs to a paste-type material in the Ryzen
APUs. AMD admits it did it to save bucks.
When the internet learned Intel used a
paste TIM in its Skylake-X chips, nerds went
If you’re thinking we
intentionally tried to make
Intel look bad by not using the
similarly priced 8th-gen Core
i3-8100, we can explain our
real reason in two words:
motherboard costs.
apoplectic at the thought of lowly paste in a
performance CPU. With the Ryzen APUs, I
anticipate less rage. Even though the move
to paste will lower the APU’s overclocking
potential, these are budget parts, not
$2,000 CPUs.
HOW WE TESTED
For our performance test, we built on an
AMD-supplied MSI B350 Pro AC
motherboard and 16GB of G.Skill Flare
DDR4/3200 RAM, approved and supplied
by AMD. For storage we opted to use a
240GB Kingston HyperX Savage SATA SSD
rather than an M.2 NVMe device, which
would add to the cost and likely isn’t the first
choice of someone buying a $99 APU. All
testing used the bundled AMD cooler.
For performance context, we decided to
use an Intel Core i3-7100 chip. It’s a dual-core
7th-generation Kaby Lake CPU with

42 PCWorld MARCH 2018

Hyper-Threading, and costs $115 on Amazon
(go.pcworld.com/i371). It doesn’t have
TurboBoost, but its base clock is a hefty and
constant 3.9GHz. For graphics, it features
Intel HD 630, which is used on everything
from Core i7 to Core i3. We sourced this CPU
from Amazon and used the stock cooler for
our tests, along with a Gigabyte GA-H270M-
DS3H MicroATX board.
If you’re thinking we intentionally tried to
make Intel look bad by not using the similarly
priced 8th-gen Core i3-8100, we can explain
our real reason in two words: motherboard
costs. With Kaby Lake, you can get an
LGA1151 board for as cheap as $50 using
H-series chipsets. So far, Intel has not released
a budget chipset for its 8th-gen CPUs, which
means the cheapest Z370-board we could
find was $120.
The graphics comparison should mostly be
the same, as Intel’s UHD 630 is essentially the
same as its HD 630. While the Core i3-8100 is
a quad-core, its lack of Hyper-Threading and
overall lower clock speed (there’s no Turbo
Boost) would probably put the two a lot closer
in performance than you’d expect.
WHY WE TESTED AT
DDR/2400
One last thing we want to note: We used
16GB of DDR4 on both platforms, both rated
for DDR4/3200. However, the Core i3 would
not run higher than DDR/2400 on our
H-series board. That led us to ponder
whether it was fair to test the AMD using
higher-clocked RAM than the Intel board.
Ultimately we did test the AMD APUs at
the higher speed as well as DDR/2400, but
for our CPU section, we decided to present
results at DDR4/2400 clock speeds. In our
gaming section, because memory clock
speeds are critical, we show multiple speeds.
Because Ryzen does benefit from higher
clock speeds, you can basically add about 5
to 6 percent to the performance of both APUs
at higher clock speeds.
Lastly, while we had no issues running the
Ryzen 3 2200G at DDR4/3200, the Ryzen 5
2400G was finicky with reboots occurring
when using the preset XMP 3200 profiles. We
suspect this is mostly a tuning issue that will
eventually be worked out.
MELTDOWN AND SPECTRE
PERFORMANCE
All our tests were completed with fresh
We tested both Intel and AMD with all of the
available Spectre and Meltdown patches in place.
MARCH 2018 PCWorld 43
REVIEWS RYZEN APU

installs of Windows 10 Fall

Creators Update with the latest Cinebench R15.038 nT
patches installed. That means Multi-core
we ran our tests with patches for
Ryzen 5 2400G
793
the Meltdown and Spectre DDR4/2400

exploits in place. On the AMD Ryzen 3 2200G

DDR4/2400
587
platform, that means just Core i3-7100
DDR4/2400
412
operating system updates. On
LO N G E R B A R S I N D I C AT E B E T T E R P E R F O R M A N C E
the Intel platform, that meant a
microcode update as well.
Although some vendors have
yanked their Spectre microcode
Cinebench R15.038 1T
Single-core
fixes, Gigabyte still offered it for
Ryzen 5 2400G
147
the motherboard we used, so DDR4/2400
Ryzen 3 2200G
we installed it and verified it with DDR4/2400
144
GRC’s InSpectre (go.pcworld. Core i3-7100
DDR4/2400
166
com/mesp).
LO N G E R B A R S I N D I C AT E B E T T E R P E R F O R M A N C E

3D RENDERING
PERFORMANCE HandBrake 0.9.9
Our first test is the venerable Encode 1080p (seconds)
Cinebench R15.038 test. Based
Ryzen 5 2400G
2,667
on Maxon’s professional DDR4/2400

rendering engine, it’s pretty Ryzen 3 2200G

DDR4/2400
much a pure CPU test and scales Core i3-7100
DDR4/2400
well with thread and core count.
The result is no surprise: The
quad-core $99 Ryzen 3 2200G
easily outstrips the $116 Core i3 by 42
percent. Going from the Ryzen 3 2200G to
the Ryzen 5 2400G, we see about a
35-percent bump by adding SMT support.
Not everything is multi-threaded, though,
so we also run Cinebench R15 using a single
3,529
4,740
S H O R T E R B A R S I N D I C AT E B E T T E R P E R F O R M A N C E
compute thread. Here’s one test where the
Core i3 ekes out a win.
Should you be surprised? Not really.
Intel’s advantage in IPC (instructions per
clock) efficiency is real. When combined
with its full-time 3.9GHz clock speed, it’s a

44 PCWorld MARCH 2018

 COMPRESSION
7-Zip 9.20 Performance PERFORMANCE
Our next test uses the free 7-Zip
Ryzen 5 2400G
19,652
DDR4/2400 utility and its built-in
Ryzen 3 2200G
DDR4/2400
15,392 performance benchmark. The
Core i3-7100 test is a CPU test and doesn’t
DDR4/2400
12,002
look at the disk I/O as a factor.
LO N G E R B A R S I N D I C AT E B E T T E R P E R F O R M A N C E
AMD again leads the way, with
the dual-core Core i3 landing
where we expect.
3DMark Sky Diver 1.0
Graphics Performance
Ryzen 5 2400G
RYZEN APU
DDR4/2400
11,550
GAMING
Ryzen 3 2200G
DDR4/2400
9,681 PERFORMANCE
Core i3-7100 Now we know AMD gives you
DDR4/2400
4,143
more cores or more threads than
LO N G E R B A R S I N D I C AT E B E T T E R P E R F O R M A N C E
Intel for the money, but Intel’s
cores are also generally better.
fantastic chip for single-threaded tasks. Let’s see how that plays out in games.
In fact, for uses outside of gaming, it’s a 3DMark Sky Diver is fairly lightweight—
fine CPU. basically like playing a typical eSports game—
and therefore a useful tool for measuring, say,
ENCODING PERFORMANCE integrated graphics. Rather than use the overall
Our next test uses the free and popular score, which factors in CPU performance, we’re
HandBrake encoder to convert a 1080p drilling down into the graphics subscore. The
high-bit-rate file using the Android Tablet score you see for the HD 630 should be familiar,
preset. HandBrake, like most video editing
and encoding applications, loves CPU
threads, and the Ryzen APUs walk away from 3DMark Sky Diver is fairly
the dual-core Core i3. We suspect the Core lightweight—basically like
i3-8100 would be very competitive here with playing a typical eSports
the Ryzen 3 2200G, but again—it’s another game—and therefore a useful
$70 out of your pocket to run that Coffee tool for measuring, say,
Lake CPU. integrated graphics.

MARCH 2018 PCWorld 45

REVIEWS RYZEN APU

as it’s what most IGP-based

Intel laptops have coughed 3DMark Fire Strike 1.1
up for the last year or two. Graphics performance
With the Ryzen 3 2200G
Radeon RX 550 2GB +
and its Vega 8, you’re Ryzen 5 1600
4,400
looking at more than a 133 Ryzen 5 2400G Vega 11
DDR4/2933
3,555
percent increase in
Ryzen 3 2200G Vega 8
3,050
performance compared to DDR4/3200

Intel’s Core i3. The Ryzen 5 Ryzen 5 2400G Vega 11

DDR4/2400
3,230
2400G takes that to 178 Ryzen 3 2200G Vega 8
DDR4/2400
2,785
percent. Let’s say that again,
Core i3-7100 HD630
but slowly: 133 and 178 DDR4/2400
1,147

percent. LO N G E R B A R S I N D I C AT E B E T T E R P E R F O R M A N C E

The thing is, on

desktop chips, it really
doesn’t get any better for Intel. Its Iris Plus
lineup of graphics with EDRAM isn’t available
in a socket. And mind you, this isn’t even
accounting for the speed advantage of using
higher-clocked RAM in Ryzen.
RYZEN APU PERFORMANCE APUs come close. It’s really hard to justify a
IN 3DMARK FIRE STRIKE
Let’s step up to something a little harder:
3DMark Fire Strike. It’s obvious Intel’s HD 630
isn’t up to the task, so we pulled numbers
from a Ryzen 5 1600 system with a Radeon RX
550 2GB card in it. This Polaris-based GPU
can be found everywhere from $110 to $150.
The tests we selected are mostly GPU bound,
so the obvious increase in core count on the
Ryzen 5 1600 should have minimal impact.
I’m also going to rope in performance
results for the Ryzen APUs with faster RAM. As
a reminder, I used DDR4/2933 scores for our
Ryzen 5 2400G, because it wasn’t quite
stable at DDR4/3200 with the G.Skill
modules AMD provided.
The results speak for themselves. The
Radeon RX 550 clearly has a lead, but those
$110 to $150 premium for that difference.
Putting that money into a larger SSD or
more RAM—or socking it away until you
have enough for an RX 570—makes a lot
more sense.
RYZEN APU PERFORMANCE
IN 3DMARK TIME SPY
Our last 3DMark test for now is Time Spy. It’s a test
built completely to test DirectX 12 gaming
performance. Interestingly, the lead the Radeon
RX 550 had in the DX11 Fire Strike test evaporates,

46 PCWorld MARCH 2018

 RYZEN APU
3DMark Time Spy 1.0 PERFORMANCE
Graphics IN RAINBOW SIX
SIEGE
Radeon RX 550 2GB +
Ryzen 5 1600
1,100 Now let’s see how the
Ryzen 5 2400G Vega 11 Ryzen APU handles real
DDR4/2933
1,101
games. Our first test is the
Ryzen 3 2200G Vega 8
DDR4/3200
908 circa-2015 Tom Clancy
Ryzen 5 2400G Vega 11
DDR4/2400
1,013 Rainbow Six Siege. We
Ryzen 3 2200G Vega 8 tested it at multiple
DDR4/2400
841
resolutions and game
Core i3-7100 HD630
DDR4/2400
357 quality settings, but they’re
LO N G E R B A R S I N D I C AT E B E T T E R P E R F O R M A N C E pretty much all impressive.
We see the Ryzen APUs
actually pulling dead even
with Radeon RX 550—and
Tom Clancy’s Rainbox Six Siege then surpass it when paired
1280x720 Ultra (fps)
with higher-clocked RAM.
Radeon RX 550 2GB + The Ryzen APUs almost
Ryzen 5 1600
59.2
have enough grit to handle
Ryzen 5 2400G Vega 11
DDR4/2933
68.7 Rainbow Six Siege at
Ryzen 3 2200G Vega 8
64.2 1920x1080. The Ryzen 5
DDR4/3200

Ryzen 5 2400G Vega 11

2400G pushes 51fps, and
DDR4/2400
58.9
the Ryzen 3 2200G, 40fps.
Ryzen 3 2200G Vega 8
DDR4/2400
57.9 The Intel HD630
Core i3-7100 HD630
19.1 graphics? Let’s just stop
DDR4/2400
talking about it, okay? At a
LO N G E R B A R S I N D I C AT E B E T T E R P E R F O R M A N C E
certain point, it just becomes
cruel and inhumane.
and surprise, the Ryzen 5 2400G is equal to it
when running higher-clocked memory. The RYZEN APU PERFORMANCE
Ryzen 3 2200G also represents well and for the IN RISE OF THE TOMB
money, it’s cooking along nicely—especially RAIDER
when compared to Intel HD 630 graphics. Even though it was also released in 2015, Rise

MARCH 2018 PCWorld 47

REVIEWS RYZEN APU

of the Tomb Raider is a far

harsher graphics load. Rise of the Tomb Raider
Rainbow Six Siege is Medium quality 0 AA 12x7 DX11 (fps)
playable at 1920x1080.
Radeon RX 550 2GB +
RoTR isn’t. Ryzen 5 1600
56.7
Overall, we saw decent Ryzen 5 2400G Vega 11
DDR4/2933
51
performance from the
Ryzen 3 2200G Vega 8
45.3
APUs, especially when DDR4/3200

paired with faster system Ryzen 5 2400G Vega 11

DDR4/2400
42.4
RAM, but they’re still really Ryzen 3 2200G Vega 8
DDR4/2400
40.3
“only” 720p-medium-
Core i3-7100 HD630
capable. At the same time, DDR4/2400
14.5

even the Radeon RX 550 LO N G E R B A R S I N D I C AT E B E T T E R P E R F O R M A N C E

was only 5 fps faster than

the Ryzen 5 2400G.
The takeaway here is
that if you’re expecting to Crysis
Very high 16x10 (fps)
get away with 1920x1080
gaming all the time, you’re GeForce 8800 GTX +
Core 2 Duo E6600
28.9
going to be disappointed
Ryzen 5 2400G Vega 11
in some heavier titles. DDR4/2933
29.6
Ryzen 3 2200G Vega 8
DDR4/3200
28.6
CAN THE RYZEN Ryzen 5 2400G Vega 11
26.3
APU RUN DDR4/2400

CRYSIS? Ryzen 3 2200G Vega 8

DDR4/2400
24.6
By now, you probably want Core i3-7100 HD630
12.5
DDR4/2400
to make a wisecrack: “Can
LO N G E R B A R S I N D I C AT E B E T T E R P E R F O R M A N C E
it run Crysis?”
This statement refers to
how the 2007-vintage game brought even everyone learns to whine that whatever game
the most powerful and expensive gaming rigs they didn’t like was “poorly optimized.”)
to their knees, begging for mercy. More than Well, guess what? The new Ryzen APUs can
a decade later it still represents the most run Crysis. Using the ancient single-player demo,
ultimate bad-ass game ever (at least until we ran the island GPU demo file and recorded

48 PCWorld MARCH 2018

the average fps of each completion (it doesn’t
seem to want to cough up a final score anymore). To see how much of an impact
To give you a feel for how far we’ve come, various clock speeds of RAM
we also dug up a performance report that matter with the Ryzen APU, we
Ryan Shrout at PCper.com (go.pcworld.com/ recorded performance gains
rysh) recorded in 2007 running the Crysis from 2,133MHz to 3,200MHz
demo on a GeForce GTX 8800 GTX. Shrout’s RAM on the Ryzen 3 2200G.
score was generated at a slightly higher
resolution of 1650x1200, but it’s clear the graphics results, you’ve noticed that faster
Ryzen APU is faster in Crysis. RAM helps. A lot. Unlike a GPU that has its
Granted, there is a world of difference in own pool of very fast RAM nearby, the IGP
operating system, drivers, and hardware, but uses the RAM in the PC itself. To see how
the top-of-the-line $650 GPU was simply much of an impact various clock speeds of
hobbled by Crysis. Even worse? That Intel HD RAM matter with the Ryzen APU, we
630 really isn’t that far behind the GeForce recorded performance gains from 2,133MHz
8800 GTX. IGPs have come a long way. to 3,200MHz RAM on the Ryzen 3 2200G.
We also recorded how much of a hit you
HOW MUCH DOES MEMORY take by running single-channel mode vs.
MATTER TO A RYZEN APU? dual-channel.
If you’ve been paying close attention to our We used 3DMark’s Fire Strike Graphics
test, which is isolated to
graphics performance.
Impact of RAM bandwidth on The results show how
Ryzen 3 2200G in 3DMark Fire Strike 1.1 Graphics
every notch up in memory
DDR4/3200 speed takes you up in
Dual Channel
3,050
performance. Going from
DDR4/2933
Dual Channel
2,949 DDR4/2400 to
DDR4/2667
2,841 DDR4/3200 nets you
Dual Channel
DDR4/2400
about 9.5 percent more
2,785
Dual Channel performance. Is it worth it?
DDR4/2133
Dual Channel
2,643 That very much depends on
DDR4/2400
1,807
how much you’re paying for
Single Channel
the higher-speed RAM.
LO N G E R B A R S I N D I C AT E B E T T E R P E R F O R M A N C E
On the day we wrote

MARCH 2018 PCWorld 49

REVIEWS RYZEN APU
this, we could find 8GB of Corsair Vengeance
DDR4/2133 for $102. The cost for 8GB of
Corsair Vengeance DDR4/3200 ran $115.
That means you’d be paying about 13 percent
more for RAM for about a 9.5-percent
increase in performance. We’d probably say
it’s worth it, especially if you can get the price
a little closer. The same day, we also found the
same DDR4/3200 modules on sale for $109,
which meant paying about 6 percent more for
about 9.5 percent more performance.
One thing we can certainly say is, don’t
cheap out and buy a single module. As you
can see from our results, doing so would
kneecap your graphics performance.
CONCLUSION
We’ve tested plenty of CPUs with integrated
50 PCWorld MARCH 2018
graphics, but with all of them, we’ve had to
issue more disclaimers than a pharmaceutical
ad. AMD’s new Ryzen APUs are simply the
first processors with graphics to get
everything right.
With the new Ryzen APUs and their
Vega cores you’re finally getting decent
graphics performance with top-shelf x86
cores at a price that isn’t a punch line.
Frankly, it’s amazing timing for AMD to
come out with a chip that can help quench
budget gamers’ thirst when there’s a
drought of GPUs.
We’ve read comments that people think
the Ryzen APUs will “save PC gaming.” While
we think that’s going too far, we have to
admit, at least there’s finally a decent option
for budget gamers.
The best free backup software
and services: Reviews and
buying advice
Most free backup products are competent, if in some way limited. BY JON L. JACOBI

F
inding a good free backup
solution is easier than you’d think.
A host of companies would love
to give you free online backup or
free backup software—and perhaps
surprisingly, nearly all of them are quite
competent.
Of course these companies aren’t really in
it for the satisfaction of knowing your data is
safe. Their free versions usually only provide

IMAGE: GETTY IMAGES MARCH 2018 PCWorld 51

REVIEWS BEST FREE BACKUP SOFT WARE
enough storage for essential data, or are
lacking some advance features that pros
would employ. They hope you’ll love the
program or service so much, or find it so
useful that you’ll eventually fork over some
cash for additional storage or those
advance features.
But wait, you say: I have free online
storage through Apple’s iCloud or Google
Drive, or Microsoft OneDrive. Then there are
services like Dropbox, with 5GB for free.
The issue with all those services is that
they’re not necessarily true backup, but
syncing. That is, when you delete a file from
any device or online, it’s deleted from every
device. Lord help you if you make a mistake
and don’t realize it in time. True backup
means retaining data indefinitely no matter
what’s happening with the data elsewhere.
Read on for our top picks in free online
backup and free backup software, and of
course the reasons why we picked them.
You can get the skinny on paid backup
software (go.pcworld.com/wnbk) and
online backup services (go.pcworld.com/
onbk) by clicking those links.
HOW WE TEST FREE
BACKUP SOFTWARE AND
SERVICES
Backup software: We run each program
through the various types of backups it’s
capable of. This is largely to test reliability
and hardware compatibility, but we time test
52 PCWorld MARCH 2018
two: an approximately 115GB system image
(two partitions) and a roughly 50GB image
created from a set of smaller files and folders.
We then mount the images and test their
integrity via the program’s restore functions.
We also test the USB boot drives created
by the programs.
Online services: As noted earlier, the
performance of online backup services will
vary according to their location and the
network equipment between you and the data
depository. We installed the software and
backed up the same 2GB data set to check for
any major issues or glitches in the client
software. These are noted in the reviews.
WHAT TO LOOK FOR IN
FREE BACKUP PRODUCTS
Online storage and backup services
Capacity: Obviously, you’ll need as much
storage as you have data, plus a little or
possibly a lot more if you want to track
changes and save previous versions of
files. Some services keep multiple versions
of files, some don’t. In many cases there’s
a time limit.
Cost: Nearly all online services charge for a
maximum allowable amount of data, and
generally uploads are free. Aside from the
free tiers available from a service like
Dropbox, pricing is fairly consistent across
services, though you definitely get more
capacity for your money from some vendors,
notably Backblaze.
However, there may be additional
charges or limitations on downloads. For
instance, Amazon’s Glacier is intended solely
for backup and archiving. It’s very cheap per
gigabyte and uploads are free, but you’re
charged for downloading—a service you
hopefully will never need.
Features: In addition to backup, you may
want to share your files with others, work
with them from mobile devices, or even edit
them with office applications such as those
available with Dropbox, Google, and
OneDrive. If you do intend to work online,
we recommend that you maintain a local
copy as a backup, and a hedge against
internet downtime.
OS and device support: Most services
provide client backup software for the major
operating systems (Linux, OS X, and
Windows) and both Android and iOS. Make
sure the service you sign up for supports all of
your platforms. Note: iDrive even supports
Windows Phone.
Privacy: If you’re concerned about the
privacy of your data, make sure you use a
service that allows the use of a personal
encryption key that you define. Do not lose it,
as it is absolutely required to restore your
data. Sadly, using your own key often limits
the types of services (e.g., no mobile
backup) available. If private encryption keys
aren’t available, read the privacy policy,
especially with the free services—there are
significant differences.
MARCH 2018 PCWorld 53
REVIEWS BEST FREE BACKUP SOFT WARE
Generally speaking, data
centers are backed up to the hilt.
Some of the larger ones even
back up to different
geographical locations.
Reliability: Generally speaking, data
centers are backed up to the hilt. Some of
the larger ones even back up to different
geographical locations. Availability
(hopefully 24/7) can also be important.
Check for news of outages and the vendor’s
own service blogs. If there are too many
outages in service, buy accordingly. In truth,
all the services we’re aware of are near–100
percent reliable.
Speed: Speed, in many cases, is far more
dependent upon your broadband connection
than that of the online service, though the
geographical location of the storage and the
equipment in between can make a significant
difference. Check the location of the data
servers if speed is important to you. Or, just
give the trial a whirl and see if you can live
with it.
Backup software
As with most things, don’t over-buy backup
software. Features you don’t need add
complexity and may slow down your system.
Additionally, if you intend to back up to a
newly purchased external hard drive, check
54 PCWorld MARCH 2018
out the software that ships with it. Seagate,
WD, and others provide backup utilities that
are adequate for the average user. And of
course, while we describe the features to look
for, you’re going to find fewer of them in free
software. That’s life in the cheap lane.
File backup: If you want to back up only your
data (operating systems and programs can be
reinstalled, though it’s mildly time- and
effort-consuming), a program that backs up
just the files you select is a major time-saver.
Some programs automatically select the
appropriate files if you use the Windows
library folders (Documents, Photos, Videos,
etc.).
Image backup/Imaging: Images are
byte-for-byte snapshots of your entire hard
drive (normally without the empty sectors) or
partition, and can be used to restore both the
operating system and data. Imaging is the
most convenient to restore in case of a system
crash, and also ensures you don’t miss
anything important.
Boot media: Should your system crash
completely, you need an alternate way to
boot and run the recovery software. Any
backup program should be able to create a
bootable optical disc or USB thumbdrive.
Some will also create a restore partition on
your hard drive, which can be used instead if
the hard drive is still operational.
Scheduling: If you’re going to back up
effectively, you need to do it on a regular
basis. Any backup program worth its salt
allows you to schedule backups.
Versioning: Overwriting previous files is not
backing up, it’s one-way syncing or mirroring.
Any backup program you use should allow
you to retain several previous backups, or
with file backup, previous versions of the file.
The better software will retain and cull older
backups according to criteria you establish.
Optical support: Every backup program
supports hard drives, but as obsolescent as
they may seem, DVDs and Blu-ray discs are
great archive media. If you’re worried about
optical media’s reliability, M-Disc (go.pcworld
.com/mdsc) claims its discs are reliable for a
The difference between dye-based and inorganic recordable optical discs.
thousand years, backed up by Department of
Defense testing.
Online support: An offsite copy of your data
is a hedge against physical disasters such as
flood, fire, and power surges. Online storage
services are a great way to maintain an offsite
copy of your data. Backup to Dropbox and
the like is a nice feature to have.
FTP and SMB/AFP: Backing up to other
computers or NAS boxes on your network or
in remote locations (say, your parent’s house)
is another way of physically safeguarding your
data with an offsite, or at least physically
discrete, copy. FTP can be used for offsite,
while SMB (Windows and most OS’s) and AFP
(Apple) are good for other PCs or NAS on
your local network.
MARCH 2018 PCWorld 55
REVIEWS BEST FREE BACKUP SOFT WARE
Real time: Real-time backup means that files
are backed up whenever they change, usually
upon creation or save. It’s also called
mirroring and is handy for keeping an
immediately available copy of rapidly
changing data sets. For less volatile data sets,
the payoff doesn’t compensate for the drain
on system resources. Instead, scheduling
should be used.
Continuous backup: In this case,
continuous simply means backing up on a
tight schedule, generally every 5 to 15
minutes, instead of every day or weekly. Use
continuous backup for rapidly changing data
sets where transfer rates are too slow, or
computing power is too precious for
real-time backup.
Performance: Most backups proceed in the
background or during dead time, so
performance isn’t a huge issue in the
consumer space. However, if you’re backing
up multiple machines or to multiple
destinations, or dealing with very large data
sets, speed is a consideration.
ANY BACKUP IS BETTER
THAN NO BACKUP
Free or paid, we highly recommend that you
back up at least your essential data against
theft, malware or ransomware, and natural
disasters, not to mention user error. Even if
you work online, a local backup is a lot
56 PCWorld MARCH 2018
quicker to restore. And this goes beyond PCs:
We get a lot of emails asking how to get data
back from a stolen phone—the users generally
don’t like the answer.
BEST FREE ONLINE
BACKUP: iDRIVE
There’s no more complete online backup
storage service than iDrive. And though it’s
not the cheapest, it’s still affordable and
comes with backup clients for nearly every
PC and device, including Windows
Phone—a rarity these days. The company
also provides additional storage for syncing
all your devices and PCs, allows sharing of
files with anyone, and has the ability to
back up to a local drive.
Plans and pricing
iDrive has two personal plans that cover one
user with unlimited computers and devices:
$69.50 a year for 2TB, and $99.50 a year for
5TB. If you enable the separate sync service,
you get an equal amount of storage just for
that task, at no extra charge.
Business plans allow unlimited users and
computers, but significantly less storage per
dollar, starting at $99.50 for 250GB. Don’t
get completely caught up in the price-per-
gigabyte game: The size of your essential data
is probably a lot smaller than what’s being
offered as a minimum these days, unless
you’re into HDR and 4K.
iDrive also has a very nice ship-it-to-you
restore policy. You
can get up to 3TB
of data delivered
to you on a hard
drive for free—
the first time.
Business users
get three times.
Subsequently,
there’s a $60
charge. You can
also send your data
to the company for
safekeeping in the
same manner. If iDrive’s client will back up files as the change.

your bandwidth is
challenged, or you simply prefer keeping it off
the grid, this Iron Mountain–like feature is just
what the doctor ordered.
Features
One of our favorite iDrive features is the
continuous data protection (CDP). If you have
a rapidly changing data set, it’s nice to have
files backed up when they are changed, not
just on a schedule. iDrive also supports nearly
every type of PC and device: Windows, OS X,
Android, iOS, various NAS boxes, and as we
said, even Windows Phone. Also nice are the
snapshots, which make it easy to restore your
PC to a particular point in time.
The iDrive local client is nearly identical to
iDrive’s online dashboard, so you can change
settings, including turning on and off CDP
using either. iDrive will also handily create a
local backup using the same data set that’s
being backed up online. That allows you to
painlessly maintain the Rule of Three: your
original data, a copy, and a copy of the copy.
Also, it’s much faster to restore from a hard
drive than from any online service.
Bottom line
If you don’t require online document editing,
iDrive truly has the most comprehensive set of
backup and backup-related features of any
online service we’ve tested. And, they’re all
available at the basic service level, making
iDrive less expensive than it seems. Good
stuff. Mozy (go.pcworld.com/m0zy) is the
only close competitor we’ve reviewed so far,
and worth a mention.

MARCH 2018 PCWorld 57

REVIEWS BEST FREE BACKUP SOFT WARE

BEST FREE BACKUP file backup, disk cloning, and plain file syncing.
SOFTWARE: AOMEI There are a plethora of scheduling options as
BACKUPPER STANDARD 4 well as syncing, including the aforementioned
Would you rather pay $50 for your backup real-time synchronization. Syncing isn’t true
software, or get it for free? All things being back up—it’s keeping a mirror of your data in
equal, and with the free Aomei Backupper another location—a great hedge against losing
Standard (go.pcworld.com/bst4) they pretty recent work.
much are, we’re generally going to opt for the Backupper will image entire drives or
latter. Backupper even sports real-time sync, partitions, verify them, and mount them so
mirroring files to an external folder whenever you can grab a few files from one. The pay
changes occur. version adds imaging of dynamic volumes,
and merging images—tasks few end users will
Design and features ever need to perform. The system cloning
Backupper Standard’s bitmapped interface offered in the $40 paid version ($50 if you opt
may be retro, but the layout and workflow are for lifetime free upgrades) could be very
so intuitive, even beginners should have few useful, as could the network boot function.
problems figuring out what to do. At least you But that’s speaking from an IT perspective.
have some idea of backup concepts involved. Aomei provides both Linux and Windows
We spotted a couple of mild interface PE boot images, which can be burned to CD
glitches in Aomei Backupper. When you or installed on USB drives.
increase the size of Windows
objects in the Display Preferences
(to 125% in this case), Backupper’s
window actually shrinks. There are
other tiny scaling glitches, such as
the bottom of a dialog cut off, but
nothing that renders the program
unusable. Hopefully this will be
addressed soon with a new look
and a rendered (drawn in real time),
not static bitmapped GUI.
Despite being free, there’s little
missing from Backupper Standard’s Imaging of your entire system, whole disks, single partitions,
feature set, which includes: imaging, or sets of files is available with Backuppper.

58 PCWorld MARCH 2018

Performance
Backupper Standard’s performance
was the yin and yang in our roundup.
It was the fastest backing up disks and
partitions, but easily the slowest
backing up sets of files. On the other
hand, CPU usage was light, and
speed isn’t of much consequence for
a task running in the background.
Aomei Backupper Standard has a
heavy footprint, spawning three
background processes: the core,
shadow copy, and a scheduler. We Backupper help is only available online and there are no
tool tips. On the other hand, if you know backup, you
often wonder why companies ignore probably won’t need them.
a perfectly good scheduling app
(Windows’ own) that’s already running in the flawlessly. And here’s a link to the PDF
background. To be fair, Acronis True Image help that you can keep for offline use (go.
spawns six background processes. pcworld.com/usmn).

Help wanted Bottom line

Don’t get us wrong: It’s great that companies
keep their help files online so they can be
constantly updated, but there should be local
help as well, just in case. Like just in case you
can’t get on the internet and need to back up
your PC right now! Even tool tips would be
useful, but as with EaseUS ToDo Backup,
there are none. This is an exceedingly minor
complaint and probably out of line
considering the program’s price.
Also, after making a comment like that, we
should point out that we’ve never had the
slightest operational difficulty with Backupper.
All backups and restores have gone off
It’s a heck of a thing when a program vies
both for best value, and best overall. But that’s
Backupper Standard for you. Give it a whirl
before you plop down your hard-earned cash
on something else. It’s likely all you’ll need.
Now about the name….
There are plenty of honorable mentions,
one of which may fit your needs or style
better: Todo Backup Home (go.pcworld.
com/tdbh), Macrium Reflect Free (go.
pcworld.com/mcrf), MiniTool
Shadowmaker (go.pcworld.com/mtsh),
and Paragon Backup & Recovery Free (go.
pcworld.com/pbrf).

MARCH 2018 PCWorld 59

REVIEWS

Samsung 860 EVO:

Further proof that TLC-NAND
SSD can be fast and affordable
The 860 EVO performs as well, or better than, most MLC-NAND SSDs
we’ve tested. BY JON L. JACOBI

T
he Samsung 860 EVO has
convinced us: It is now safe to
equate TLC (Triple-Level-Cell)
SSDs with top-notch SATA
performance. TLC-NAND SSDs used to be
more about affordability, but the 860 EVO is
the third TLC-NAND drive we’ve tested that
doesn’t bog down on long sustained
transfers. (The other drives are the
identical-except-for-the-label WD Blue 3D
(go.pcworld.com/wd3d) and Sandisk Ultra
3D (go.pcworld.com/su3d).)
We even quadrupled our normal 20GB
copies, and the 860 EVO easily maintained
the pace. In fact, despite being quite a bit
cheaper, the 860 EVO’s performance
compares more than favorably with that of its
860 Pro cousin (go.pcworld.com/86pr).

60 PCWorld MARCH 2018 IMAGE: SAMSUNG


DESIGN AND FEATURES
Though the 860 EVO is available in the
2.5-inch form factor, we tested the M.2
2280 (22mm across, 80mm long) version in
the 1TB capacity. Both are SATA 6Gbps and
available with up to 4TB of capacity. Fitting
that much storage into something little
bigger than a stick of gum is quite the
achievement. The controller is Samsung’s
own MJX, and the NAND it’s feeding and
reading from is Samsung’s own stacked/
layered/3D 3-bit TLC.
As to the controller, I didn’t speak to
Samsung about it, but the scuttlebutt I’ve
heard around the industry is that while TLC
(when written to its full 3-bit capacity) is
indeed slower than 2-bit MLC or 1-bit SLC,
it’s been primarily the controllers that have
held back performance. The latest
generation of controllers apparently knows
how to cope with the slower write times.
The 860 EVO is Samsung’s answer to the
TLC sustained-write lag. And the answer
is there isn’t any, any longer.
Whether this translates into increased
latency (the time between the data’s being
captured to the drive and permanently
written) hasn’t been discussed.
Initial pricing for the 860 EVO is $95 for
250GB, $170 for the 500GB version; $330
for the 1TB flavor we tested, $650 for the 2TB
version; and the 4TB version is $1400. On a
per-gigabyte basis, that’s around 31-35 cents,
while the 860 Pro varies between 47 and 51
cents per gigabyte. Note that the 860 Pro
offers slightly more storage per capacity in the
smaller sizes, at 256GB and 512GB.
Initial pricing for the 860 EVO is
$95 for 250GB, $170 for the
500GB version; $330 for the 1TB
flavor we tested, $650 for the
2TB version; and the 4TB
version is $1400.
MARCH 2018 PCWorld 61
REVIEWS SAMSUNG 860 EVO

The 860 EVOs are rated for

600TBW (TeraBytes Written) for 20GB copies
every 1TB of capacity over their (seconds)
lifespan. This is about half what the 81
860 Pros are rated for, but typical 131
20GB folder write
70
for the low end of the market, and
71
far more than the average user will
ever write. 90
91
20GB folder read
94
PERFORMANCE 96
By just about every metric, the 860
41
EVO is the fastest TLC SATA SSD 64
20GB write
we’ve tested, if only by a slim 43
44
margin. But it’s a clear
improvement over the previous 44
48
750 (go.pcworld.com/75ev) and 20GB read
43
850 (go.pcworld.com/85ev) 42
EVOs, and faster than many MLC
SA MSUNG 860 E VO SA MSUNG 850 E VO
SSDs. In the performance charts
SAMSUNG 860 PRO W D B LU E 3 D
below, the 860 EVO is the
turquoise-colored bar.
As you can see above, there’s
AS SSD Sequential throughput
not a lot to choose from between 10GB (MBps)
the 860 EVO and the WD Blue 3D
(green bars), but the older 850 492
319
EVO (red bars) is clearly a step Write
489
behind with sustained transfers. 453

AS SSD, shown above, reveals 519

the same story. CrystalDiskMark 508
Read
(shown below) calls out the one 516
516
area, small queued writes, where
the 860 EVO clearly outperforms SA MSUNG 860 E VO SA MSUNG 850 E VO

the WD Blue 3D. SAMSUNG 860 PRO W D B LU E 3 D

Same-model SSDs can vary

62 PCWorld MARCH 2018


CrystalDiskMark 5
Sequential performance (MBps)
Sequential Write
Sequential Read
352
Random
350
Write 4KB Q32
260
399
Random
397
Write 4KB Q32
392
S A M S U N G 8 6 0 E VO SAMSUNG 860 PRO
W D B LU E 3 D
drastically in performance according to their
capacities, because the less capacious
models have fewer chips and pipelines for
shotgunning data. Samsung rates all its
capacities the same for the same
performance. We didn’t have other capacities
to test, but based on previous testing and
experience, we find this claim likely to be just.
As sustained write speed is no longer a
concern with the latest TLC SSDs, the only
reason to go with an pricier MLC drive such as
the 860 Pro is if you’re concerned about
longevity or write far more data daily than the
average user. Note that the average SSD is
rated for at least 10 years averaging 10GB of
writes a day. And privately, vendors are
convinced they’ll deliver more.
That’s not a promise, just
reassurance for the faint of heart.
492
489 BOTTOM LINE
494
The 860 EVO is the fastest TLC SSD
517 we’ve tested, albeit by a gnat’s
514 eyebrow. But a win is a win, and
525
given the same price, we
recommend it over the WD Blue
3D and Sandisk Ultra 3D. That
said, you’ll be more than happy
with any of the three, so if you find
the latter two significantly cheaper,
go for it. Subjectively, you’ll never
be able to tell the difference.
Caveat emptor: There are still
lots of older TLC SSDs out there
with slow to pitifully slow sustained writes.
Shop carefully, and of course, read our other
SSD reviews (go.pcworld.com/18sd).
Samsung 860 EVO
PROS
• Excellent performance on a par with MLC drives
• Very affordable
• Very fast with small queued writes
CONS
• Less long-lived than the MLC (2-bit) SSDs
BOTTOM LINE
The Samsung 860 EVO delivers performance every
bit as good as its MLC rivals. It’s a worthy competitor
for the WD Blue 3D and Sandisk 3D, two other TLC
drives that are undoing TLC’s weak reputation.
$299
MARCH 2018 PCWorld 63
REVIEWS

8bitdo SN30 Pro: A Super

Nintendo-inspired controller
for the PC
The classic Super Nintendo controller grows up. BY ADAM PATRICK MURRAY

8
bitdo’s SN30 Pro is the last of a
long line of gaming peripherals
released by this busy company in
2017. Like the N30 Pro (go.
pcworld.com/3pro) before it, it’s a controller
designed for die-hard retro fans like myself
who emulate on the PC.
This time 8bitdo is taking its design cues
from the Super Nintendo Entertainment
System, or SNES for short, one of my favorite
consoles of all time. After only months of use
it has already become a staple in my gaming
arsenal, but it falls just short of being the
perfect controller.
WHO SHOULD BUY THE
SN30 PRO
The SN30 Pro is a Bluetooth-based wireless
controller that connects to your PC, Mac,
Android phone, Nintendo Switch and more,

64 PCWorld MARCH 2018 IMAGE: ADAM PATRICK MURRAY

and works with everything from classic
games to current ones. The controller has a
build in rechargeable battery that has lasted
me for a few weeks on a single charge, and it
connects via USB-C for charging or data
transfer. The SN30 Pro also has all the
buttons, sticks, and bumpers that you’d need
to play current games, but I’ll get to how well
they work a bit later.
On the design side, 8bitdo has done a
great job of using classic Nintendo design
elements to charm retro game fans. The N30
Pro hearkened back to the Nintendo
Entertainment System (NES) quite successfully
from a design perspective but had to alter the
hardware in order to add functionality. With
the SN30 Pro, 8bitdo didn’t change as much
of the design. If you love the look and feel of
the SNES controller, it’s all here in the SN30
Pro, and does it better than the N30 Pro.
USING THE SN30 PRO
At first blush you might think the
SN30 Pro is supposed to be used
only with retro emulators, but it’s
actually a great controller to take with
you on the go and use across
different scenarios. It uses controller
layout standards like X-input to map
out the buttons properly, depending
on the platform.
Setup has been streamlined a
bit compared to 8bitdo’s Four LEDs on the front of the SN30 Pro indicate power,
controllers from earlier this year. connection, and player number.
Instead of telling the controller which layout
(platform) to boot up with every single time,
it’s only required the first time you pair. So
when I sit down to play on my PC I hold down
the start button + X, which boots it into the
X-input layout, common for PC games. Next
time I come back to play, all I have to do is
hold down the start button, and the SN30 Pro
remembers the last layout. Moving to another
platform, such as my Switch, requires the
same sequence, again, only once.
While setup was easy, holding the SN30
Pro in my hand took some getting used to.
I’m so fond of the classic SNES controller
that slight deviation from muscle memory was
an actual hurdle for me to get over. On the
face of the controller is the usual d-pad, start,
select, and face buttons, but they’ve shifted
up to allow room for analog sticks and two
extra buttons. Along the top edge sits four
shoulder buttons instead of the classic’s two,
mimicking current-day layouts of L1, R1, L2,
MARCH 2018 PCWorld 65
REVIEWS 8BITDO SN30 PRO

and R2. The L2 and R2 buttons are

even concave, allowing for more
trigger-like pulls.
Using the SN30 Pro for classic
games via an emulator is one of its
primary purposes, and while it’s not
perfect, it comes pretty close. When
working against years of muscle
memory slight deviations can really
mess up a flow.
First off, moving all the face The stacked bumpers on the SN30 Pro are a huge
improvement over the N30 Pro’s side by side version.
buttons higher isn’t a huge deal-
breaker, and even in some games felt better in might have me reaching for the regular SN30
my larger hands. The bigger problem is the (go.pcworld.com/sn30) if it’s a SNES game I
thumbsticks, which got it in the way too often. really need to be on top of.
Every time I went to hit the Y button, my Using the SN30 Pro for current games is a
thumb rubbed against the side of the right completely different matter. Here I didn’t
thumbstick. Same goes for right on the d-pad compare it to the N30 Pro that came before
and the left thumbstick. When hitting Start or it, but Microsoft’s Xbox One controller, which
Select I had to reach my thumbs up and over is my de-facto controller for current games on
the thumbsticks—not great if you need to the PC. We’ll get this out of the way now: No,
quickly pass the action. Like I said, these it can’t compete with the full-sized, fully
aren’t deal-breakers but annoyances that functional Xbox One controller. But it comes
pretty close, and is more portable! Using it in
a game like Destiny 2 worked as intended and
felt solid. So if you want a controller on your
PC that aligns the thumbsticks side by side
and have trouble using Sony’s PS4 controller,
this is a solid option.

IMPROVEMENTS OVER
VIDEO: 8BITDO SN30 PRO THE N30 PRO
REVIEW We’ll finish it off by comparing the SN30 Pro
WATCH NOW AT GO.PCWORLD.COM/8BIT
to the N30 Pro. A more streamlined pairing

66 PCWorld MARCH 2018

system is just one of many improvements, so
I’ll hit the highlights here.
First off, 8bitdo included rumble in the
SN30 Pro. The results are passable: If you hit
the right frequency it can be quite loud, and
the output isn’t very strong, but it’s better
than not having it.
Next up is the inclusion of USB-C. You can
still pass power and data like the N30 Pro, but
as more and more devices switch to this new
format it means I’m getting closer to
discarding my old micro-USB cables!
The most important improvements are in
the overall size and layout of the buttons. One
of the reasons to spring for a controller like this
is its portability, but as I noted in my N30 Pro
review 8bitdo went too small and sacrificed
playability. The SN30 Pro is double the size,
and its battery is larger, but the package is still
small enough to put in a pocket or throw into a
backpack. The face buttons are larger and
spaced farther apart, and the improvements to
the thumbsticks and the shoulder buttons
make the SN30 Pro much better all around.
8bitdo has capitalized on the size and style of the classic Super Nintendo controller (right) with the SN30
Pro and SN30.
8bitdo SN30 Pro
PROS
• Classic Nintendo design
• All the functionality for current games
• Highly portable
CONS
• Weak rumble implementation
• Thumbstick placement obstructs emulated games
BOTTOM LINE
A controller for gamers with portable needs and
retro nostalgia.
$49
BOTTOM LINE
Like the N30 Pro, the SN30 Pro is for
gamers who appreciate retro nostalgia,
want contemporary functionality for current
games, or are looking for a great portable
option. Whether pairing it with your
home PC, a gaming laptop at a friend’s
house, or even your Nintendo Switch,
the SN30 Pro can tackle all of that in a
stylish package.
MARCH 2018 PCWorld 67
REVIEWS
Kingdom Come: Deliverance:
This realistic Skyrim rival is
a true role-playing game
“Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of
government.” BY HAYDEN DINGMAN
I
t was a triumphant moment when I
finally bought a sword in Kingdom
Come: Deliverance. Here I was, Henry
the blacksmith’s son, one of the few
survivors of the attack that burned my home
village of Skalitz to the ground, a man with
little money and even fewer prospects,
assistant to a C-tier lord in the Holy Roman
Empire—and I could finally afford my first
sword. Not even a proper longsword, mind
68 PCWorld MARCH 2018
you, but something called a “hunting
sword.” Still, I strapped it to my side with all
the pride befitting a peasant who ever-so-
slightly increased his social status in class-
centric Medieval Europe.
I bring it up because it’s indicative how
different Kingdom Come: Deliverance ($60 on
Steam (go.pcworld.com/king)) feels from
other RPGs. There, you’re usually the chosen
one, destined to save the world. Here, I’m
IMAGE: WARHORSE STUDIOS
over 20 hours in and I’m basically a glorified
intern-in-armor. I spent a whole day carrying
some spoiled noble’s equipment out to the
woods so we could hunt rabbits. Since then,
my biggest responsibility is solving the
murder of some no-name peasants and their
horses in a backwater village with only four
or five homes.
I also drank myself senseless with a priest,
then delivered a sermon barefoot the next
morning. You could say that was a low point
for Henry. Probably.
THY WILL BE DONE
Kingdom Come: Deliverance is essentially an
Elder Scrolls-style RPG made “realistic.”
Abandoning the fantasy lands of most sword-
and-board stories, the game instead builds a
tale around Bohemia, the region of modern-
day Czech Republic and, as of the 1400s, the
Kingdom within the Holy Roman Empire.
There’s a succession crisis. After the
glorious reign of Charles IV, his son
Wenceslaus IV inherited the crown of
Bohemia. Being rather more interested in
drinking and gambling than ruling, he was
considered a poor king, which prompted his
brother Sigismund to invade to “restore
order.” Sigismund’s motives weren’t quite so
pure of course, and his troops cut a swathe
through Bohemia, including through the
town of Skalitz, a silver mining town and
home to our poor protagonist Henry.
This all happened. Well, maybe not Skalitz
and maybe not Henry’s exact story. Kingdom
Come is drawing on real history though. The
Hussite Wars, the Protestant preaching of Jan
Hus, the Papal Schism of 1378—all these events
are common topics of discussion in Henry’s
Bohemia, because he’s living through them.
For the rest of us there’s a codex included,
giving further background info on topics
characters raise in conversation—the Papal
Schism, important characters and battles, and
even more general info like the role of
bathhouses in the 1400s, or why tanners lived
on the outskirts of town. (Spoiler: Turning skins
into leather involved copious amounts of urine.)
If I’m remembering correctly, Kingdom
Come’s towns are even located where they
would’ve been located in real life, and with
layouts that match what few maps survived to
the modern day.
For history enthusiasts, Kingdom Come:
Deliverance is a dream.
And that’s why it’s such a big deal to just
purchase a sword. You’re the son of a
blacksmith—not quite a peasant, but barely
one step above. Your early quests aren’t
If I’m remembering correctly,
Kingdom Come’s towns are
even located where they
would’ve been located in real
life, and with layouts that match
what few maps survived to the
modern day.
MARCH 2018 PCWorld 69
REVIEWS KINGDOM COME: DELIVER ANCE
daring tales of adventure, but rather
“Finding enough money to afford charcoal”
and “Bringing my dad some beer back from
the tavern.”
Later, luck has you promoted to
essentially the local militia, but even that’s a
long way from the top. Your reward is a
rusty helmet, a torn shirt, and a stick. A stick!
They call it a bludgeon, but I spent hours
basically defending myself with a rough-
hewn piece of firewood while nobles spat at
me and chastised me for trying to enforce
the laws on them.
It’s a fascinating game in that regard, a
true “role-playing game” in the literal sense,
not what the term’s colloquially come to
represent. Hell, it almost feels like a
simulator at times, especially given the
number of systems layered on top. There
are skills for basically every action in the
game. Swords and speech and defense,
sure, but also skills like “Drinking” and
“Horsemanship.” There’s
even a “Reading” skill,
and until Henry’s learned
to read properly every
book he finds is written
in anagrams.
You’ll have to eat on a
schedule, sleep on a
schedule. If you don’t
bathe, your charisma goes
down, and you’re worse at
stealth too. A codex provides information on topics characters raise in conversation.
70 PCWorld MARCH 2018
Stealth is also affected by your clothing.
Heavier clothing makes you clumsier, but it’s
more complex than that. The materials
matter too, with metal clanking on every
step—unless, of course, you repair
your armor yourself in which case you can
pad the metal to make it more stealthy.
Colors also contribute, with black blending
in at night but making you more conspicuous
during the day.
And then there’s combat. It’s not
amazing. Actually, it feels downright bad at
first. Slow, clunky, and awkward, alternating
with moments where it falls into the “Two
people swinging pool noodles” airiness of
most first-person swordfighting. Chaotic
largescale battles are a nightmare, with the
lock-on trying to attach to a dozen different
people at once.
You sort of learn to live with it though, and
I did feel like Henry improved noticeably over
time—which probably makes sense for a
blacksmith’s kid
with zero combat
experience at the
start. There’s also a
surprising amount
of depth, with
Kingdom Come
folding in six
different stances,
plus combos,
feints, parrying,
and more. Best of
all: Helmets The maps are gorgeous, too.
properly occlude
your vision. You’re welcome to wear full plate time to time, usually after major quest
armor (if you can afford it), but when you do updates. The only way to save outside those
your vision is limited to a thin band of light in moments is to carry an alcoholic drink called
the middle of the screen. “Saviour Schnapps,” represented as a floppy
It’s cool. It’s complicated. In many ways, disk inside a flask.
Kingdom Come feels like the principles It’s cute, and prevents you from abusing
behind Deus Ex or Thief or System Shock, the the save system at every turn like you might
so-called “immersive sims,” but writ large on in an Elder Scrolls game. The problem:
an Elder Scrolls-style game. Autosaves are few and far between, and
Saviour Schnapps prohibitively expensive
GET THEE BEHIND ME, in the early game. We’re talking 100 gold in
SATAN a game where the average quest reward is
It’s ambitious to be sure, and sometimes too 5 to 25 gold, and where it took me 10 hours
much so. I’m excited by Kingdom Come but to even afford repairs on my equipment.
it’s also, as with so many genre-breaking After 20 hours, I’ve just barely earned 1,500
games, an incredibly flawed experience at gold total.
times. I’m often annoyed, or simply I understand wanting to make the item
bewildered. Sometimes both. precious instead of me hitting F5 to quicksave
The save system is chief among my every two minutes, but I think the pendulum’s
complaints. Kingdom Come autosaves from swung too far the other direction. More

MARCH 2018 PCWorld 71

REVIEWS KINGDOM COME: DELIVER ANCE

annoying is the game

doesn’t actually let you
save even if you want to
exit the game. If you
don’t have Saviour
Schnapps? Too bad.
You either find an
autosave before leaving
or you lose all progress
since the last one. That’s
some straight-
out-of-2003 design, and Basically the horse from Oblivion.
I’ve had nights where it
took me upwards of half an hour before I
could safely exit.
(The game’s awkward save system has
already been fixed by modders (go.pcworld.
com/svsy).)
Kingdom Come is also riddled with bugs,
which is to be expected in an Elder Scrolls-
style game I guess, but it’s nevertheless
annoying, especially when quicksave can’t
help me. I’ve gotten stuck in the geometry,
had quest scripting go haywire, tried to jump
over a bush and found myself thrown 30 feet
through the air, watched my horse get stuck
in a cliff, had conversations with the side of
someone’s face, and so on.
None of this dampened my spirits much,
and luckily the more egregious problems
have surfaced for me soon after an autosave,
but the game’s definitely janky. The AI also
fluctuates between “Solid” and “Stupid,”
with the oddly-stilted schedules I associate
with Bethesda’s “Radiant AI” circa Elder
Scrolls IV: Oblivion. Characters and
background villagers are just uncanny at
times, entering rooms and then leaving for
no reason or lining up to wait for you to
trigger the next quest step. We also haven’t
solved the problem of “Two people trying to
pass each other in a narrow space,” with
Kingdom Come making you batter into
people until they move out of the way.
But it’s the load times that are most
egregious. Start-up time is a bit slow, clocking
in at around a minute before you get into the
game, but that one’s not too surprising at
least. Worse is the fact that every conversation
is preceded by a load screen. Sometimes it’s
a quick two-second black screen. Other
times, especially with cutscenes, the action is
interrupted for upwards of 15-20 seconds.
The worst instances are when Kingdom Come
transitions from dialogue to pre-rendered

72 PCWorld MARCH 2018

cutscene and back to dialogue—that can
mean three separate load screens for a short
conversation.
Again, this isn’t an insurmountable
issue. I’ve learned to live with it, so to
speak. But it can be disorienting to start a
conversation with some unimportant
villager and be kicked to black for a few
seconds before the generic “Blessings be
upon you” greeting or whatever. It’s made
me less interested in talking to anyone
who’s not of immediate interest.
Kingdom Come looks and runs better than
it has any right to, given the size of the world
and the relatively small size of the team that
worked on it. CryEngine is great for creating
realistic outdoors environments, and it’s
stunning what developer Warhorse has done
with it here. Whenever I hit one of those long
load times though, or the frame rate starts
stuttering when lots of people show up, I’m left
thinking “CryEngine
was not built for
enormous RPGs like
this” and wondering if
that’s the heart of the
issue. I hope I’m wrong
and that some of the
rough edges can be
sanded down post-
launch, but it’s safe to
say the rough edges
desperately need
sanding.
BOTTOM LINE
Jank aside, I think it’s a pretty incredible
undertaking though. Kingdom Come’s flaws
arise from its depth, from ambition, from its
unique aesthetic and ideas, and I’d rather
deal with its problems than play an ultra-
polished experience that simply retreads old
ground. It’s reminiscent of The Witcher in
that respect—the early games, before The
Witcher 3 became accessible enough to go
mainstream. Maybe the next Kingdom Come
will be more approachable. For now,
Kingdom Come: Deliverance is decidedly
niche, and all the better for it.
I’m not sure how long it will take me to get
through the rest, nor how high Henry can rise
through the ranks. Knight? Lord? Only time
will tell I guess. I’m looking forward to finding
out, in any case.
And looking forward to learning to read
one of these days too.
MARCH 2018 PCWorld 73
REVIEWS

Microsoft Surface Precision

Mouse: A flagship mouse
worthy of the Surface name
It combines comfort, excellent resolution, and a nearly unique feature that
leaps between PCs. BY MARK HACHMAN

M
icrosoft’s Surface Precision
Mouse is a practical PC
accessory for Surface
owners, especially right-
handed ones. Over a week of use, I found the
cordless, six-button mouse comfortable and
precise. I wasn’t truly happy with it, however,
until I downloaded Microsoft’s hard-to-find
Mouse and Keyboard Center app, which
includes a cool but gimmicky ability to
straddle multiple PCs.
Priced at $100 (sometimes discounted on
Amazon [go.pcworld.com/mspm]), the
Surface Precision Mouse is Microsoft’s
flagship PC peripheral. As such, it’s the
direct competitor to the Logitech MX Master
2S mouse ($100 or discounted on Amazon
[go.pcworld.com/lmxm]), which offers

74 PCWorld MARCH 2018 IMAGE: MARK HACHMAN

similar features, including
its own ability to leap from
PC to PC.

A LARGE,
COMFORTABLE
MOUSE
Measuring a rather large
4.8 x 3.1 x 1.7 inches, the
Surface Precision Mouse is
best used by those who
prefer to rest their palm
across the entire surface of Microsoft’s Surface Precision Mouse is sized appropriately for average
the mouse, as opposed to male hands.
those who prefer to perch
their fingers upon smaller mice. With a
dots-per-inch (DPI) rating of up to 3,200 DPI,
this mouse is suitable for precision PC work,
though on the low end of the resolution you’d
want for gaming. It weighs 0.3 pounds
(measured) or 4.76 ounces, light enough to
glide smoothly over my beaten-up home
mousepad as well as slicker pads used by
more hardcore gamers.
On the, er, surface, the Surface Precision
Mouse features the same minimalist design
principles as Surface PCs, with a silver-and-
gray aesthetic. The Surface Precision Mouse
connects with either Bluetooth Low Energy
4.0-4.2 or with a USB 2.0 corded interface
that doubles as a charging cord for its non-
removable internal battery, which is rated at a
three-month lifespan. (Though it works with
Windows 7, 8, and 10, the wireless
capabilities aren’t supported by Windows 7,
so it will only work as a “corded” mouse.)
In addition to the left and right buttons,
the scroll wheel doubles as a middle button.
A small button behind the scroll wheel allows
you to toggle between “smooth” scrolling,
where you can zoom down webpages with a
flick of the wheel, and “detent” or incremental
scrolling, where the wheel feels like it’s
bumping over a series of small ridges. The
latter is better for navigating menus. Three
configurable thumb buttons hide on the
mouse’s left-hand side.
Microsoft claims that the mouse allows for
both vertical and horizontal scrolling. That’s a
bit of a misnomer. You must click the scroll
wheel and then physically move the mouse to
either side to enable horizontal scrolling—you
can’t nudge the scroll wheel left or right, nor

MARCH 2018 PCWorld 75

REVIEWS MICROSOFT SURFACE PRECISION MOUSE
spin the wheel to navigate horizontally.
Some gaming mice include toggles to
adjust DPI on the fly for certain games.
Microsoft’s Surface Precision Mouse offers
adjustable DPI, but via software. It’s
adjustable from 400 to 3,200 DPI, in
200-DPI increments.
LEFTY-APPROVED, THOUGH
IT’S DESIGNED FOR
RIGHTIES
The 10 percent or so of humans worldwide
who favor their left hand share common
challenges: smearing ink as they write,
struggling with golf clubs and manual
transmissions, and fumbling with computer
mice. In the name of ergonomics, right-
handed mice typically hump toward the left
The Microsoft Surface Precision Mouse, from the rear.
Though the mousing surface may appear tilted, it’s not.
We’ve used a piece of white computer paper as a guide to
bisect the mouse and show that it leans to the left.
76 PCWorld MARCH 2018
side of the mouse, encouraging righties to
rest their hand’s weight on the mouse itself.
This can make mice uncomfortable for
lefties, but the Surface Precision Mouse
splits the difference. (Even “right-handed”
Microsoft mice like the Sculpt Bluetooth
Mouse (go.pcworld.com/mscb) tend to
accommodate lefties.)
By my estimates, the Surface Precision
Mouse bends to the right by just a few
degrees, with the top of the mouse’s rounded
“hump” offset to the left by about a half-inch.
This has the effect of tilting the plane at which
your hand rests to about 80 degrees.
In practice, this makes using the Surface
Precision Mouse slightly more awkward than
a true ambidextrous mouse would be, but not
uncomfortably so. Righties will still benefit
from increased comfort, for the
thumb rest that juts out from the left of
the mouse. It ‘doesn’t support a
left-hander’s pinky as well as a right-
hander’s thumb—though, let’s face it,
that’s par for the course with most
ambidextrous mice, too.
Where lefties will truly struggle,
however, is with the three thumb
buttons nestled on the left-hand side
of the mouse. For a righty, they’re
comfortably accessible, allowing
users to quickly thumb a key to move
forward or back within a Web
browser, for example. Lefties need to
blindly nudge them with a ring finger
with near-zero precision. Essentially, lefties are
buying a moderately comfortable, though
pricey two-button mouse, while righties are
buying a more full-featured peripheral.
MICROSOFT’S MOUSE
AND KEYBOARD CENTER
IS ESSENTIAL
Because the Surface Precision Mouse is
plug-and-play, you can use Microsoft’s
Settings > Devices > Mouse to configure
the mouse with basic settings: selecting the
primary button, adjusting the number of
lines to scroll down using the thumbwheel,
and so on. Additional options in the Control
Panel (click Additional mouse options
within Settings) yield choices like adjusting
pointer shadows.
Maybe it’s some misplaced sense of
corporate humility, or simple reluctance to
clutter the user experience. But unlike
The settings page provides a wealth of options.
Microsoft Surface
Precision Mouse
PROS
• Comfortable for both left- and right-handers
• Nearly unique “smart switch” capability to
transition between PCs
CONS
• No specific left-handed version available
• Difficult to locate Mouse and Keyboard Center
setup software
BOTTOM LINE
Microsoft’s Surface Precision Mouse is comfortable
for both right-and left-handers, with an ability to
automatically jump from PC to PC that most other
mice lack.
$80
Logitech, which presents its control center
software as soon as you connect your mouse,
you’ll somehow need to figure out that you’ll
need Microsoft’s Mouse and Keyboard
Center app to access any advanced options.
And how do you do that? Well, you could
find a footnote on the back of
the box, or refer back to
another footnote on the last
page of the instruction booklet.
Both footnotes refer you to
microsoft.com/accessories/
downloads—a website that
does not exist on the Microsoft
site. (Download it from
go.pcworld.com/mmkc,
instead, and launch it from your
Downloads folder as an
administrator.) You’ll have a
MARCH 2018 PCWorld 77
REVIEWS MICROSOFT SURFACE PRECISION MOUSE
choice of downloading either the 32-bit or
64-bit version (most likely, you own a 64-bit
version of Windows).
To its credit, though, the app leads off by
showcasing the best features of the Surface
Precision Mouse, then jumps into the
comprehensive “basic” settings menu, where
individual buttons can be configured and the
behavior of the wheel can be adjusted. A
small battery percentage meter at the
bottom reports the charge remaining,
though not the estimated time left. App-
specific options also allow you to change
the behavior in different apps.
It’s here, though, that Windows actively
Like other mice, you can manually switch the
Surface Precision Mouse’s Bluetooth connection to
one of three different PCs.
78 PCWorld MARCH 2018
sabotages the Surface Precision Mouse. As
part of the DPI Settings menu, Microsoft
correctly advises users to set the DPI high,
and the pointer speed low, for a mix of
precision and performance. But to adjust the
pointer speed, not only do you have to open
the Settings > Devices menu, but then drill
down to Additional mouse options (the
Control Panel, in other words) to adjust the
pointer speed. Rival Logitech puts pointer
speed controls within its Options app. Put
another way, I have to open an app,
Settings, and the Control Panel to optimize
the mouse. This is ridiculous.
Basically, Microsoft needs to hustle a
streamlined Mouse and Keyboard Center
app into the basic Settings menu, or else
automatically launch it when the Surface
Precision Mouse is detected. Microsoft
already has a problem scattering functionality
around Windows, and Mouse and Keyboard
Center merely adds to the clutter.
SMART SWITCH:
SMART, BUT NOT A
REASON TO SWITCH
One of the most interesting features of the
Surface Precision Mouse is something called
“Smart Switch,” a sort of mouse-specific
version of a KVM (keyboard/video/mouse)
switch. It’s a funky hybrid of two familiar
Windows scenarios: the way a mouse pointer
moves between two connected displays, and
the ability of most mice to connect to multiple
PCs. The Surface Precision Mouse includes a
Bluetooth toggle on its underside, which you
can tap to pair to three PCs, one at a time.
Smart Switch merges the two
experiences. If you have the Mouse and
Keyboard Center app enabled on multiple
PCs, you can move the mouse to the edge of
one display, and, after a pause, it will “leap”
to the other PC—almost exactly as if the two
displays were connected. It’s an idea that
anticipates a future where you’ll have two
PCs on your desk: perhaps one for work,
and another for play.
The Mouse and Keyboard Center app is
used to set the “layout” of the two PCs,
aligning them horizontally or vertically next to
one another in the same way you can tell
Windows how your connected display is
aligned. In practice, switching from one PC to
the other requires you to “lean” on the mouse,
forcing it off the side of one screen in the
direction of the other PC for a few seconds.
While I’d prefer the switching process to occur
more quickly, the delay is acceptable.
I’m torn regarding the appeal of Smart
Switch. Swapping back and forth between
a powerful desktop and a more mobile
tablet is a nifty trick, especially if one device
is being used for a CPU-intensive purpose
like video editing.
But any device being used with Smart
Switch must also be set up with the Mouse
and Keyboard Center app, and you’ll still
need to attach the keyboard to the other
device. (Smart Switch could arrive on
Microsoft keyboards in the future, but
for now, the Surface Precision Mouse
is the only peripheral that includes it, a
Microsoft representative said.)
All in all, Smart Switch is a useful
gimmick, but it probably won’t prove too
popular except for a few devoted fans.
BOTTOM LINE
I can’t say for certain whether Microsoft’s
Surface Precision Mouse improves over
anything that Logitech or another mouse
manufacturer offers. With any mouse, I
recommend figuring out what setup you
prefer (a handed mouse, for example,
versus an ambidextrous one) and whether
the size is appropriate.
Personally, I prefer a mouse that’s a bit
smaller, less expensive, and accommodates
my left-hand preferences a bit better.
Microsoft also needs to solve its setup
experience, which fortunately should be just a
one-time chore. But Microsoft’s Surface
Precision mouse should serve you well, and
you may very well fall in love with its Smart
Switch feature.
I can’t say for certain whether
Microsoft’s Surface Precision
Mouse improves over anything
that Logitech or another mouse
manufacturer offers.
MARCH 2018 PCWorld 79
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 FEATURE

ANDROID
WEAR vs.
SAMSUNG
GEARWhich smartwatch should
you buy? BY RYAN WHITWAM

MARCH 2018 PCWorld 81

FEATURE ANDROID WEAR VS. SAMSUNG GEAR
I
f your phone runs Android, and you’re
interested in buying a smartwatch,
your journey begins with answering a
single fundamental question: Samsung
Gear or Android Wear? Sure, there are other
smartwatch platforms that work with Android
phones, but Gear (perhaps best represented
by the Gear S3 [go.pcworld.com/gs3c]) and
Android Wear (represented by watches too
numerous to mention) have the most mature
ecosystems and refined hardware.
Google’s Android Wear platform has
strong third-party app support, and if you
opt for a Wear watch, you can choose from a
wide variety of models in all shapes, sizes
and styles. Samsung, meanwhile, has gone
its own way with its Gear smartwatch lineup.
These watches run Samsung software and
adhere strictly to the Samsung ecosystem,
but they also offer some benefits that Wear
watches do not.
Smartwatches can be almost as complex
and varied as smartphones, so you’ll want to
consider the following criteria before you
decide which platform is the right one for you.
NOTIFICATIONS
A quick glance at a regular watch tells you
the time, but a smartwatch can tell you
everything that’s going on in your digital
world with notification sync. Both Samsung
Gear and Android Wear can show
notifications from your phone, but the way
they do it is very different.
82 PCWorld MARCH 2018
Android Wear’s interface is based almost
entirely on notifications. You swipe up and
down to page through them, and you get
everything, including emails, image
messages, and media playback notifications.
Android Wear, however, also unbundles all
the bundled notifications from your phone.
The upshot is each email notification you get
on the Wear watch has its own separate page,
and that can be tedious to navigate if you get
a lot of email.
It’s also worth noting that the rotating
crown for scrolling through notification lists
is only available on a few Wear watches—
notably the LG Watch Sport (go.pcworld.
com/lgsp). This means you better get used
to swiping.
Samsung Gear keeps notifications
bundled and places them to the left of the
watch face. On most Samsung watches, you
can flip through them with a swipe or with
Samsung’s Gear software keeps notifications in
bundles for easier management.
Samsung’s rotating bezel.
Each notification stack can be expanded,
and the rotating bezel quickly scrolls through
them. Media notifications aren’t shown
natively on Gear watches, but you do have a
playback widget that can be placed off to the
right of the watch face (widget location for all
apps is customizable). This approach is more
convenient than, say, searching through a
stack of Android Wear email notifications to
find a play button.
Both platforms support two-way sync. This
allows you to deal with notifications on your
watch, and not see them again the next time
you pick up the phone. Neither notification
engine is inherently better, but Samsung’s
approach makes dealing with large volumes
of email easier.
FITNESS FEATURES
As you might expect, Samsung’s watches run
Samsung Health while Android Wear is tied
into Google Fit. However, Android Wear
device makers can also include their own
extra fitness apps. So, for example, if you’re
already using a Huawei fitness app on your
Huawei phone, a Huawei smartwatch might
make sense.
Google Fit is good for step counting and
heart rate tracking, but its exercise features are
rudimentary, and Google has yet to crack the
code on automatic tracking for workouts.
Also, some Android Wear devices—even very
expensive ones—don’t have heart rate
Samsung Gear has extremely reliable automatic
workout tracking.
sensors at all.
Fitness tracking is one of the Gear
watches’ killer features. They track steps and
sample your heart rate, and Samsung’s
exercise tracking is borderline magical. Within
a few seconds of starting an exercise, watches
like the Gear S3 and Gear Sport (go.pcworld.
com/sgss) can figure out what you’re doing—
whether that be running, walking, elliptical,
cycling, or more—and begin logging the
activity. No additional setup is needed, and all
your data is saved to Samsung Health. The
Gear Sport can also do more advanced things
like swim tracking.
This one is a blowout. Samsung Gear
devices are worlds better than Android Wear
at fitness tracking. None of the third-party
fitness apps on Android Wear can match the
MARCH 2018 PCWorld 83
FEATURE ANDROID WEAR VS. SAMSUNG GEAR
power of Samsung’s built-in features.
APP ECOSYSTEM
Google wisely tied Android Wear apps into
the Play Store ecosystem by encouraging
developers to add Android Wear support to
existing apps. In Wear 2.0 and later, you can
even browse the Play Store on your watch.
The app ecosystem isn’t as deep as it is for
phones, but many of the top developers
have added support. There are apps from
Nest, IFTTT, Play Music , Facebook
Messenger, and more.
Over in Samsung land, poor app selection
is one of the biggest drawbacks for Gear
watches. The preinstalled apps are the best
ones on the platform because developers
haven’t gotten serious about supporting
Samsung’s Tizen software on any device,
neither phones nor watches. The only apps
worth downloading are the handful that were
Android Wear has many thousands of apps via the
Play store, but Gear only has a handful.
84 PCWorld MARCH 2018
developed in partnership with Samsung, like
Flipboard and Spotify.
All that said, navigating your app list on
Samsung Gear is really cool: You can use the
rotating bezel to highlight apps, and then
tap in the middle to launch. This is much
easier than tapping the tiny icons on Android
Wear.
But this doesn’t save Samsung in this
category. App support is a clear win for
Android Wear.
VOICE AND DIGITAL
ASSISTANTS
Phones have generally become easier to use
as their screens have gotten bigger, but
watches can’t play that game—they need to
fit on our wrists, after all. Luckily, voice
interaction gives us an alternative to touch
control for replying to messages and getting
things done, and it’s a cornerstone of the
Google Assistant blows S Voice out of the water.
Android Wear experience
thanks to fantastic
integration with Google
Assistant.
Android Wear’s voice
input is often surprisingly
accurate, and a long-press
of the crown button
launches Google Assistant
from any screen. Assistant
on a Wear watch offers
most of the same
capabilities as Assistant When it comes to watch faces, Android Wear has much more variety
on your phone or a and customization.
Google Home smart
speaker—you can perform searches, set WATCH FACES
reminders, and control smart home The story here is very similar to the one for
devices, among other tricks. apps. Android Wear has many more options
Samsung is in a transitional period with thanks to higher developer adoption. Wear
voice control on its phones. It now has its own watch faces are distributed through the Play
Bixby digital assistant, but Bixby doesn’t offer Store, sometimes along with apps. These
very strong support for apps and services. watch faces can also display data pulled from
What’s more, there’s no Bixby on Gear other apps, giving you “complications” like
watches yet, so the voice control platform you’d find on a fancy analog watch.
remains S Voice, and it’s definitely showing its On Samsung Gear, watch face selection is
age. It’s serviceable for inputting text or much weaker. It’s better than the app situation,
creating a reminder, but Google Assistant on but few of the Gear faces are as customizable
Android Wear is more accurate. What’s more, or powerful as on Wear. The one bright spot:
S Voice is terrible when it comes to search Custom watch face design apps like Facer and
queries, and there’s no smart home Watchmaker work on both platforms.
integration.
Google Assistant is a much better VOICE CALLS
experience, so that’s a big win for Android Using your watch as a phone for voice calls
Wear. is handled in a similar fashion on both

MARCH 2018 PCWorld 85

FEATURE ANDROID WEAR VS. SAMSUNG GEAR

connected phone or
Bluetooth headset in
order to actually hear
anything.
Also, there’s only
one LTE watch on the
Gear side right now, the
Gear S3 Frontier (go.
pcworld.com/gs3f).
Samsung’s watches do
have a more robust
dialer, though. The
Android Wear dial pad
is cramped, making it
Both watch platforms support phone calls well enough, but the Gear annoying to place calls
watches have an easier-to-use dialer. to numbers you don’t
have saved.
platforms, but the capabilities vary based on
the specific watch you have. Calls that come MODEL VARIETY
in to your connected phone show up as There are currently several dozen
notifications on both Android Wear and smartwatches running Android Wear, giving
Samsung Gear. Most Android Wear devices the platform healthy variety in terms of sizes
have speakers and microphones so you can and styles. There are cheaper options that
actually take the call without touching your cost around $150 (like the TicWatch 2) and
phone. Some Wear watches even have LTE obnoxiously expensive watches, like the
connections so you can take calls without $1,500 Tag Heuer Connected Modular 45
your phone present. And, of course, you can (go.pcworld.com/th45). You also have
dismiss a phone call entirely from your smaller, simple watches like the LG Watch
watch. That’s table stakes. Style (go.pcworld.com/lgws) and more
Gear devices can also answer calls from robust watches like the Asus ZenWatch 3 (go.
your phone, but support varies across the pcworld.com/azw3).
model range. The newer Gear Sport, for one, Samsung’s Gear line only comes in a handful
lacks a speaker, so you can answer and place of flavors, all of which are on the expensive side.
calls from that watch, but you need a There’s the Gear S3, the slightly smaller Gear

86 PCWorld MARCH 2018


The TAG Heuer Connected Modular 45 is not only the pinnacle of
smartwatch design. It also comes in a wide variety of styles.
Sport, and the fitness tracker–influenced Gear
Fit2/Fit2 Pro. There are also some older Gear
S2 devices still floating around. They all have
similar styles and feature sets.
Bottom line: If you want variety, Android
Wear has it.
MOBILE PAYMENTS
Some Android Wear devices support
Google’s mobile payment platform, Android
Pay. But support is still far from a sure thing, as
many watches still ship without the required
NFC hardware.
Watches like the Huawei Watch 2 do have
NFC, allowing you to make payments from
the watch at stores that accept Android Pay.
But, unfortunately, that’s still far from all stores.
On the Samsung Gear devices, you have
Samsung Pay, and that can be much more
useful if you get the Gear S3. That
watch has the full Samsung Pay
experience, meaning it can do
both NFC (like Android pay) and
Magnetic Secure Transmission
(MST). With MST, you can make
payments at almost any store that
has a credit card reader. However,
MST hardware isn’t available in
the Gear Sport, and the Gear Fit2
Pro doesn’t have NFC or MST.
So, mobile payments are
much better on Samsung,
as long as you get the Gear S3.
Otherwise, it’s a draw.
WHICH PLATFORM IS
RIGHT FOR YOU?
If you’re torn on which way to go, start by
checking out the style of Samsung’s Gear
devices. There are only a few, so if they don’t
appeal to you, Android Wear’s larger watch
ecosystem will probably be more to your
liking. Android Wear is also strong when it
comes to apps and watch faces, and the
Google Assistant integration is excellent.
Samsung Gear excels in fitness tracking—
it’s uncanny how quickly and accurately it can
detect workouts. Samsung’s Gear software is
also better for managing large numbers of
notifications, and the interface is easy to
navigate with the rotating bezel. Android
Wear’s rotating crown is nice, but is only
available on a few devices.
MARCH 2018 PCWorld 87
FEATURE
5
IT’S EASY TO
FORGET HOW
MUCH ANDROID
HAS EVOLVED OVER
THE YEARS. SO
HERE ARE SOME
VIVID REMINDERS
OF HOW THINGS
USED TO BE—AND
HOW GOOD WE
CURRENTLY HAVE IT.
BY RYAN WHITWAM

AWESOME
ANDROID
FEATURES
YOU
PROBABLY
TAKE
FOR
GRANTED
ILLUSTRATION BY DANIEL DOWNEY

MARCH 2018 PCWorld 89

FEATURE 5 AWESOME ANDROID FEATURES
I
t’s easy to become obsessed with the
next big update to Android and what
we want Google to add, but what
about all the great things Android has
gained since it debuted nearly a decade ago
on the venerable T-Mobile G1 (go.pcworld.
com/tmg1)?
You might be surprised by what we
used to go without. So it’s time to step
back and appreciate what we have. Here
are five amazing Android features we take
for granted.
1. DOZE MODE
Just a few years ago, you were bound to wake
up to a nasty surprise if you forgot to plug in
90 PCWorld MARCH 2018
your Android smartphone before going to
bed. Even when sitting idle, apps would
continue waking up your phone whenever
they wanted, draining your battery in the
process. And you were really in trouble if an
app encountered an error and caused a
wakelock—your phone could be nearly dead
(and warm to the touch) in the morning.
That all changed when Google
introduced Doze Mode in Android 6.0
Marshmallow. After remaining stationary for
several minutes, Doze Mode kicks in to keep
apps from waking your phone except when
very specific conditions have been met. The
phone does still wake up periodically for short
maintenance windows so apps can “catch
IMAGE: RYAN WHITWAM
up” with the cloud. In
Android 7.0 Nougat,
Google further improved
Doze Mode to work
even when your phone is
in your pocket.
Standby battery life is
on a different level now
than it was prior to Doze keeps apps from running wild all night.
Android 6.0. Those were
dark times. changed all that. Multitasking now includes a
preview screen of the app’s last state before
2. SCREEN PREVIEWS IN you left it.
MULTITASKING Actually seeing screens of the app helps
Android has supported multitasking since the you find what you’re searching for faster, and
beginning, which was one of the main it just looks nicer.
differentiators from iOS
at the time. However,
switching between
apps in Android was
very much a clunky
experience. In fact, the
app switching UI didn’t
even have preview
screens early on.
Prior to Android
3.0 Honeycomb,
Android’s multitasking
UI just had a bank of
eight icons to represent
your recent apps.
Honeycomb on tablets
and 4.0 Ice Cream
Sandwich on phones Wow, Android used to be ugly until multitasking previews came along.

MARCH 2018 PCWorld 91

FEATURE 5 AWESOME ANDROID FEATURES
3. CHROME CUSTOM TABS
There are numerous reasons why an app
might want to display web content, but
booting you over to your browser app is a
poor experience. Google’s first attempt to
solve this problem was called WebView, but
the addition of Chrome Custom Tabs to
Android in 2015 made viewing web content
vastly better.
Chrome Custom Tabs allow developers to
render a webpage inside their app using the
Chrome engine. You have access to all
Chrome’s basic features like saved passwords,
Chrome Custom Tabs are faster and more feature-rich than
WebView.
92 PCWorld MARCH 2018
bookmarking, and so on. And if you need the
full browser experience, it’s easy to move the
active Custom Tab over to Chrome without
reloading the content. Chrome Custom Tabs
are also much faster than the old WebView
option, and they’re updated frequently as
part of the Chrome app itself.
4. TAKING SCREENSHOTS
In the early days of Android, you couldn’t take
a screenshot (go.pcworld.com/tkss) on most
devices without root access or a PC. The only
“official” way to capture a device’s screen was
to connect to the Android
developer tools on a PC and pull
screens over ADB—it was a real
nightmare. It’s hard to believe
something as simple as taking a
screenshot took so long, but
Google finally added this feature
in Android 4.0 Ice Cream
Sandwich.
Starting in Ice Cream
Sandwich, all devices supported
a long-press on power and
volume-down to capture the
screen (home and volume-down
for Samsung until recently). It was
a big deal at the time.
Some OEMs have added
their own twist to the screenshot
support like instant cropping,
scrolling screenshots, and
gesture support. Google hasn’t
 That button still
exists today, but
Android 4.0 Ice
Cream Sandwich
enabled a much
more granular way
of managing
notifications. If
you don’t want a
particular
notification in the
shade, you just
swipe it away. In
the Jelly Bean
release of Android,
This used to require root.
Google added the
added anything notable to the screenshot option to swipe down on a notification.
feature in stock Android, but that’s fine. At Rather than clear the item, this expands it to
least we’re not still stuck using ADB. display more information. These gestures
served to make the notification shade a
5. SWIPEABLE cleaner, more dynamic place to manage
NOTIFICATIONS your world.
Android’s notification shade
was one of its early advantages
over iOS—so much so that
Apple eventually copied
Android. However, there was a
time when Android’s
notifications were an all-or-
nothing affair. You could see
your notifications stacked up in
the shade, but you couldn’t
dismiss them individually. There
was only the Clear All button. Swipe that one notification away instead of clearing everything.

MARCH 2018 PCWorld 93

YOUR BODY
YOUR HOPE
Your immune system may be the key to beating cancer.
lmmunotherapy, a new approach to cancer treatment, is bringing hope
to cancer survivors everywhere. lmmunotherapy works by empowering
your body’s own immune system to correctly identify and eradicate
cancer cells. This approach has been used to effectively fight many
types of cancer, with new research leading to greater hope each day.
Speak with your doctor and visit standuptocancer.org/immunotherapy
to learn if immunotherapy may be right for you.
Jimmy Smits, SU2C Ambassador
Photo By: Timothy White

Stand Up To Cancer is a division of the Entertainment Industry Foundation (EIF), a 501(c)(3) charitable organization.
This Public Service Announcement was made possible by a charitable contribution from
Here’s How HOW TO BUILD, MAINTAIN,
AND FIX YOUR TECH GEAR

How to build a powerful,

portable mini-ITX Ryzen
gaming PC
Stay safe(r) with this guide. BY BRAD CHACOS

C
omputers don’t have to be big
to be powerful. While opting for
a small form-factor PC once
required sacrificing system
speed, recent technological advances have
shrunk even potent PC hardware into pint-
sized packages. Case in point: The 6-core,
12-thread mini-ITX gaming PC we’re building
in the wake of AMD’s recent Ryzen CPU price
reductions (go.pcworld.com/prdp). This

IMAGE: BRAD CHACOS MARCH 2018 PCWorld 95

HERE’S HOW BUILD A MINI-IT X RYZEN GAMING PC

football-sized rig is tiny enough to tuck

underneath your arm and ferocious
enough to spit out fast frame
rates during an all-night LAN
party session.
Graphics card and memory
shortages mean it’s a horrible
time to build a gaming PC (see
page 7), but a specialized rig like
this simply can’t be found at most
big box retailers. Portable yet
powerful PCs yearn for a personal
touch. The hardware needs to do
everything you need with limited
expansion and connection slots, but more
crucially, it all needs to fit. There’s not much
wiggle room inside a mini-ITX case.
Components can easily wind up bumping
into each other if you’re not careful, and you
need to consider the order of installation to
avoid blocking access to crucial ports while
you’re trying to plug everything in. They’re a
challenge, in other words.
Well, challenge accepted. Let’s dig in!
MINI-ITX RYZEN GAMING
PC: WHAT’S INSIDE
Today’s market influenced this tiny Ryzen
gaming build. We’d originally planned to
make this a blazing-fast, no-holds barred
system capable of chewing through gaming
and productivity tasks alike without breaking
a sweat. But in an era where graphics cards
and RAM are selling for twice what they used
The SilverStone
Sugo SG13.
to, we dialed back the scope to craft a more
affordable, still portable 1080p gaming rig
with CPU threads a-plenty.
All hardware was provided by its
respective vendors.
Case: Usually we start these system guides by
listing the core system components, but for our
mini-ITX gaming PC, let’s start with the genesis
of the build. After reading PCWorld’s guide on
how to buy the perfect PC case (go.pcworld.
com/ppcc), SilverStone reached out and
offered to send me its well-regarded Sugo SG13
for testing. It’s been a while since I’ve built a
mini-ITX machine, so I leaped at the chance.
The adorable Sugo SG13 (go.pcworld.
com/su13) measures a mere 8.74 x 7.13 x
11.22 inches but can nevertheless cram in a
full-length, 10.5-inch graphics card. That

96 PCWorld MARCH 2018

means even a GeForce GTX 1080 Ti Founders
Edition could fit, though custom cards with
beefy cooling solutions may not.
SilverStone’s case doesn’t ship with any
fans. It has room up front for a single
120mm or 140mm fan or closed-loop CPU
cooler radiator. Opting for the larger fan
size would squeeze out a full 10.5-inch
graphics card, though. Choose your path!
You can find 120mm (go.pcworld.
com/120m) and 140mm (go.pcworld.
com/140m) case fans for under $10 each
on Amazon; I slapped in a 140mm fan left
over from a retired Corsair case.
This mini-ITX Ryzen gaming build uses the
Sugo SG13WB specifically, a white-clad
version of the case with black accents and a
black mesh front. Ventilation holes galore
adorn every panel, providing crucial airflow
The Biostar Racing X370GTN.
for the hardware on the cramped insides.
The Sugo SG13WB can currently be found
for $50 on Amazon (go.pcworld.com/sg13),
or $40 (its official MSRP) at FrozenCPU.com
(go.pcworld.com/fzcp), a specialist PC
hardware vendor.
Motherboard: If you’ve got a mini-ITX case,
you need a mini-ITX motherboard. Full-sized
mobos just won’t fit. Diminutive Ryzen
motherboards are still somewhat rare. We
decided to roll with the first AM4 motherboard
ever released, the affordable Biostar Racing
X370GTN (go.pcworld.com/bdwf; $110 on
Newegg, go.pcworld.com/xgt4).
The board uses AMD’s enthusiast-class
X370 chipset (go.pcworld.com/x370), as the
name indicates, but its small size restricts you
to using a single graphics card—not that you
could fit any more in a
mini-ITX case. Biostar uses
X370’s capabilities to offer a
full four SATA slots, though,
as well as an M.2 SSD slot on
the bottom. The Racing
X370GTN also lets you
overclock your processor.
(We won’t for this build.)
Memory is limited to two
slots but again, that’s all you
need in a build like this.
Port-wise, the board
offers DVI, ethernet, PS/2,
five analog audio
MARCH 2018 PCWorld 97
HERE’S HOW BUILD A MINI-IT X RYZEN GAMING PC

connections, and an S/PDIF optical out. The Because the scope shifted to a 1080p gaming
USB selection includes four USB 3.1 Gen 1 PC, I opted for the Ryzen 5 1600, which
(5Gbps) Type-A ports, one USB 3.1 Gen 2 recently received a permanent price slashing
(10Gbps) Type-A port, and one USB 3.1 Gen to $199.99 on Amazon (go.pcworld.com/
2 (10Gbps) Type-C port. Interestingly, r516). Six cores, 12 threads, and the Wraith
Biostar’s motherboard also includes HDMI, Spire CPU cooler (go.pcworld.com/wscp)
which means you can use it to output video if included for under $200?! Yes, please.
you pair it with one of the Ryzen-based APUs
coming out in February (go.pcworld.com/ Graphics card: I’d originally hoped to stuff a
amrv). Many motherboards lack the feature. GeForce GTX 1080 Ti Founders Edition into this
Basically, Biostar’s Racing X370GTN packs itty-bitty SilverStone Sugo SG13, but well, they’re
everything you need for a solid mini-ITX selling for $1,300 these days (go.pcworld.com/
gaming rig, except for native Wi-Fi, and at a ludi). Hard pass. So now we’re using a GeForce
fine price. GTX 1050 Ti (go.pcworld.com/gtxt). This card
delivers console-beating 1080p performance
Processor: You know what’s even more without breaking the bank—even though it is
satisfying than a tiny gaming PC? A tiny selling for higher than its $140 MSRP right now.
gaming PC with all the cores! We’re going The EVGA GTX 1050 Ti cost $180 on
with AMD’s disruptive Ryzen multi-core Newegg (go.pcworld.com/04gp) when we
processors. While Intel’s
rival 8th-gen “Coffee Lake”
CPUs launched late last
year, only high-end Z370
motherboards have been
made available, and they’re
pricey.
I’d originally planned to
build this with the flagship
Ryzen 7 1800X processor
($350 on Amazon [go.
pcworld.com/r718]) because
the idea of a shoebox-sized
PC with 8 cores and 16
threads makes me drool. The EVGA GTX 1050 Ti.

98 PCWorld MARCH 2018

spec’d out this rig, but it’s
since leaped to over $330.
Volatile graphics card prices
sure do ruin a good build.
Just grab the cheapest GTX
1050 Ti you can find on
Newegg (go.pcworld.com/
dpgc), but you probably
don’t want to spend more
than around $200.
Most of these energy-
efficient cards have a single
fan and don’t need 8GB kit of Corsair Vengeance 3,000MHz RAM.
supplementary power cables,
making them perfect for a space-constrained com/lpx8). That hurts—and every memory kit
mini-ITX build. Ideally, you’d use a reference has been similarly affected. You just have to grit
card with a blower-style fan in a small form- your teeth and pay the price if you’re building a
factor case in order to expel the hot air out of PC these days. The Ryzen platform requires
the rear of your system, but Nvidia never DDR4 RAM, so you can’t just swap in DDR3
created a Founders Edition version of this card. sticks left over from a previous computer.
It doesn’t get overly hot anyway. Shop around if you want to look for a
The 6GB GeForce GTX 1060 or Radeon better price, but take note of two things. First,
RX 570 would be the best 1080p gaming you want 8GB of RAM for a gaming PC—
option in a vacuum, but here in reality, they’re some modern games list that as the minimum
selling for more than twice their MSRPs. requirement these days. Second, Ryzen’s
Again: Hard pass. The GTX 1050 Ti gets the performance increases with faster RAM,
job done, as you’ll see later! which is why we’re using a 3,000MHz kit.
Dropping down to the 2,400MHz version of
Memory: RAM prices suck, too. Our 8GB kit this Corsair Vengeance kit cuts $15 off the
of Corsair Vengeance 3,000MHz RAM costs a price (go.pcworld.com/cvlp) if you’re really
staggering $120 on Amazon (go.pcworld. pinching pennies, though.
com/2x4g) these days, a twofold price
increase compared to what it cost in January Storage: I used an older Intel 730 series SSD
2017, per CamelCamelCamel (go.pcworld. I had lying around for this build, because I’m a

MARCH 2018 PCWorld 99

HERE’S HOW BUILD A MINI-IT X RYZEN GAMING PC
sucker for aggressive silver skulls. They’re
discontinued now, though. If you’re following
along, consider picking up the Samsung 850
EVO (go.pcworld.com/85ev; $150 on
Amazon for 500GB, go.pcworld.com/8500)
instead. Samsung’s drive is the best SSD for
most people thanks to its superb mix of
performance, capacity, and affordability (go.
pcworld.com/18sd).
Power supply: The Sugo SG13 accepts
standard ATX power supplies, but the power
supply sits above the motherboard in the
case. Going with a full-sized PSU wouldn’t
give much clearance for the CPU cooler;
you’d basically need to use a closed-loop
liquid cooler or low-profile air cooler. Instead,
we opted for SilverStone’s ST45SF ($60 on
Amazon [go.pcworld.com/st45]) so that we
could use the Wraith Spire CPU cooler
included with the Ryzen 5 1600. This tiny
Awwww, it’s a tiny
power supply!
100 PCWorld MARCH 2018
450W, 80 Plus Bronze-rated power supply is
tailor-made for small form factor PCs and
comes with an adapter bracket to fit into
standard PSU slots. It’s cute!
Grand total: $854. Even with a modest
graphics card and just 8GB of RAM, today’s
sky-high hardware prices nudged the total
higher than expected. If you buy a basic
monitor like this $90 HP Pavilion model (go.
pcworld.com/90hp), an affordable keyboard
and mouse combo like the Logitech MK120
($15.90 on Amazon [go.pcworld.com/
mk12]), and a $30 Windows 10 license on
Kinguin (go.pcworld.com/kngn) to complete
the PC package, the final price winds up
around $1,000.
BUILDING THE MINI-ITX
RYZEN GAMING PC
PCWorld’s guide on how to build a PC
provides a step-by-step overview of hardware
installation (go.pcworld.com/
h2pc)—but working in such
a diminutive case requires
much more forethought than
full-sized builds do. We’ll talk
about those unique quirks
here.
As ever, I started by
building out the motherboard.
The Ryzen 5 1600 slipped right
into the CPU socket after aligning the
triangles found on a corner of each. The
 the tie from around those cords and you
can pop the front panel off, too. Finally,
there’s a storage bracket screwed toward
the front of the top panel’s frame. Take
that off as well to strip the case to its bare
bones. You’ll want the wiggle room.
SilverStone’s manual says to install
the motherboard first, but I respectfully
disagree. That clutters up the cramped
interior of the case. Install your storage
and (optional, but you should really
Building out the Biostar Racing X370GTN motherboard. include it) case fan beforehand. Start
with the SSD, installing it in the single
bundled Wraith Spire cooler simply screws into drive location on the bottom panel of the
the stock Ryzen support bracket. Easy! (Plug case. The case fan screws easily into the front
the cooler into the motherboard’s CPU fan panel; we’d suggest making it an intake fan to
header now, before installing the motherboard blow cool air over the components inside.
in the case. Your fingers will appreciate it.) If you want to install a hard drive or up to
Because the Biostar Racing X370GTN packs two more SSDs, use the storage bracket you
only a pair of memory channels, I didn’t even removed earlier. Be warned: An SSD mounted
need to check slot compatibility for
the two sticks of Corsair Vengeance
RAM. Just drop them in.
With that done, it’s time to dig
into the case. After removing some
screws on the rear of the SilverStone
Sugo SG13 you can slide the top
and side panels off in one fell
swoop—they’re all made from a
single piece of metal. Inside, you’ll
find a bag of screws and other
hardware tied to the frame, as well as
a collection of cords snaking in from
the front panel connections. Remove Install your storage and optional case fan first.

MARCH 2018 PCWorld 101

HERE’S HOW BUILD A MINI-IT X RYZEN GAMING PC

if you do, as it sits right underneath

Then install the built-out motherboard after.
to the bracket makes for a very tight fit if you
use a larger 140mm case fan. Don’t reinstall
the storage bracket yet.
Now it’s time to install the motherboard.
Well, after inserting the motherboard I/O
shield into the rear of the case. You don’t want
to commit that common PC building
mistake (go.pcworld.com/pcms).
Securing the motherboard is easy with
the storage bracket still removed. Plug
in your cables now, including the front
panel connections, as the case is about
to get real full, real fast.
Add the power supply before the
graphics card, as there isn’t much space
between the two. Screw the SilverStone
ST45SF into its adapter bracket first,
then STOP! Don’t install the power
supply yet. You won’t be able to plug in There’s seriously little room between the Wraith Spire CPU
the motherboard’s 4-pin power header
the PSU. Slip that connector in
first, then screw the power supply
(via adapter) into the case, with the
PSU exhaust fan pointing out of the
case. There’s only a sliver of open
air between the Wraith Spire cooler
and the bottom of the SilverStone
ST45SF, but it works just fine.
Fortunately the Sugo SG13 lacks
clear panels, because cable
management in mini-ITX cases gets
ugly. After you’ve connected the
power cables for your SSD and
motherboard, just tuck the rest of the ST45SF’s
cables wherever you find some room. Be sure
not to catch them in the system’s fans! I snaked
mine into the space between the power supply
and the case fan, and worked some others
over to the left side of the case, between the
cooler and SilverStone’s tiny power supply.

102 PCWorld MARCH 2018


Cleaning up the cables inside a mini-ITX computer can be tricky—or
futile, depending on how you look at it.
panel and where the graphics card will sit. If
you have some extra budget, SilverStone also
offers a version of this power supply with an 80
Plus Gold rating and modular cables—which
means you only install the ones you need—for
$90 on Amazon (go.pcworld.com/80pg).
The graphics card is the final hardware
you need to install. You’ll need to remove a
bracket on the rear panel of the case that
secures the blank plates (and eventually your
graphics card’s video outputs) first. After that,
you simply slide the graphics card into the
motherboard’s sole PCI-E x16 slot. Most
GeForce GTX 1050 Ti variants (including the
EVGA GTX 1050 Ti we used here) don’t
require any supplementary power
connections from the power supply. Side
note: If you opt for a larger,
more powerful graphics
card, you may need to install
it by sliding it through the
front of the case. The tiny
GTX 1050 Ti has no problem
dropping in the top
opening though.
Tidy up any remaining
cables, replace the GPU
plate and storage brackets,
then slide the exterior
panels back on. You’ve got
yourself a portable, hexa-
core gaming rig! Install your
operating system of choice
and connect the mini-ITX
Ryzen gaming PC to your peripherals and
monitor.
MINI-ITX RYZEN GAMING
PC PERFORMANCE
Portability is only part of this tiny PC’s appeal.
It’s got game, too.
To test the mini-ITX Ryzen gaming PC’s
chops, we loaded it up with a variety of
games from PCWorld’s various testing suites,
testing each in DirectX 11 mode with V-Sync
and GPU-specific features (like Nvidia
Gameworks effects and AMD’s TressFX)
disabled. We tested at 1920x1080 resolution.
The GTX 1050 Ti inside proved more
capable than today’s gaming consoles, easily
clearing the 30 frames-per-second barrier
MARCH 2018 PCWorld 103
HERE’S HOW BUILD A MINI-IT X RYZEN GAMING PC
with all the visual bells and whistles
cranked to High. 1080p gaming performance
Heck, with the exception of
Deus Ex: Mankind Divided—an Deus Ex:
Mankind Divided
especially demanding game
included to see how this rig
Shadow of Mordor
performs when you make it
sweat—all of the games surpass 45
fps with High graphics settings. Ghost Recon
Wildlands
You could push most of the games
closer to the hallowed 60-fps mark Rise of the
Tomb Raider
by dropping some visual options
down to Medium. This rig could
put in a strong showing at a LAN The Division
party. Because the build uses a
solid-state drive, load times proved
nice and speedy as well.
Overheating can be a concern with such
small builds, and I was worried the abundant
cabling and restricted airflow inside would
cause temperatures to spike. Nope.
SilverStone gave the Sugo SG13 abundant
ventilation on all sides. This system runs a little
hotter than a similarly configured full-size
build would, but after gaming for over an
hour straight, the CPU temperature maxed
out at 72 degrees, and 57 degrees for the
graphics card. That’s nothing to worry about
whatsoever. (Think twice about overclocking
a rig like this unless you spring for fancier
liquid cooling, though.) You can definitely
hear the fans spinning but they’re not
excessively loud.
These gaming benchmarks represent
104 PCWorld MARCH 2018
42.8
36.4
82.53
65.69
49.8
45.38
62.45
55.63
60.6
47
HIGH RED
stock performance, too. If you tried some of
these seven tricks to maximize your Ryzen
PC’s performance (go.pcworld.com/7trk),
your frame rate could soar even higher.
In the end, I’m very happy with this build.
It’s one-sixth the size of most of the PCs lying
around my office, it games with far more
ferocity than consoles, and its 6-core,
12-thread Ryzen CPU makes the tiny rig a
productivity beast. Sure, it’d be nice if
memory and graphics prices weren’t
outrageously inflated right now, but you
won’t find a potent system this tiny at any
big-box retailer. Building something you can’t
find anywhere else with your own two hands
feels incredibly cathartic—especially when a
system this satisfying is the result.
How to check your PC’s
CPU temperature
Here’s how to monitor your computer’s CPU temperature, and lower
it if needed. BY BRAD CHACOS

I
s your computer’s CPU too hot? If your
PC starts spontaneously shutting
down, locking up, or acting sluggish
during intense tasks, overheating
could be the issue. Keeping tabs on your CPU
temperatures is crucial when you’re
overclocking your PC’s processor (go.
pcworld.com/ovcp), too—you don’t want
to accidentally push the performance
pedal too far to the metal.

IMAGE: THOMAS RYAN MARCH 2018 PCWorld 105

HERE’S HOW CHECK YOUR PC’S CPU TEMPER ATURE

Bizarrely, Windows
doesn’t offer any way to
check your computer’s CPU
temperature. You could dive
into your system’s BIOS to
find the information, but that’s
a lot of hassle to find a simple
sensor reading. Fortunately,
several free programs exist
that make it easy to see your
processor’s temperature.

HOW TO CHECK
YOUR CPU Per-core CPU temperature readings provided by the Core Temp app.
TEMPERATURE
The fastest, easiest way to check your CPU
temperature is with the aptly named Core
Temp (go.pcworld.com/cotm). Be mindful
during installation though! Like many free
programs, it tries to install bloatware (go.
pcworld.com/inbl) unless you uncheck
some boxes during setup.
Once you’ve installed Core Temp,
opening it shows a no-frills look at the
current state of your processor, including an
average temperature reading at the bottom
of the window. If you want even more
detail, click the Show Hidden Icons button
in the system tray located at the right edge
of your Windows taskbar. You’ll see a
temperature listing for every individual CPU
core in your computer.
Core Temp’s Settings menu allows you
to tweak exactly what you’ll see in the
system tray, and how you’ll see it, but the
default configuration makes it dead-simple
to see if your CPU is overheating or
performing as expected.
Core Temp isn’t the only option though.
HWInfo (go.pcworld.com/hwin) is an
in-depth system monitoring tool that provides
deep details about every piece of your PC’s
hardware. If you choose to run it in sensors-
only mode, scrolling down to the CPU
section—the dedicated section, not the CPU
temperature portion of the motherboard
listing—reveals current temps and other
nitty-gritty details.
NZXT’s Cam software (go.pcworld.com/
nzca) is another popular option with a diverse
skillset. Its slick interface is easier to read at a
glance than those on most other monitoring
tools, and the program shows all sorts of

106 PCWorld MARCH 2018


NZXT’s Cam monitoring software.
useful info about your CPU, graphics card,
memory, and storage. Cam also includes an
in-game FPS overlay and overclocking tools,
among other features. You can use NZXT’s
Cam mobile apps to keep tabs on your
software when you’re away from your PC, too.
Open Hardware Monitor (go.pcworld.
com/ophm) and SpeedFan (go.pcworld.
com/spfn) are other well-regarded
monitoring tools that can track system
information. You’ve got options! But for
simply checking your computer’s CPU
temperatures, Core Temp’s straightforward
focus can’t be beat.
Finally, note that if you’re running an AMD
Ryzen system (go.pcworld.com/rysy), you
may see two different CPU
temperature readings. You
want the Tdie reading,
depending on how the
program you’re using
displays the info. It’s a
measurement of the actual
heat on the die. The
alternative Tctl reading is the
control temperature
reported to your cooling
system and sometimes
includes a temperature
offset to ensure universal fan
speed behavior between
the various Ryzen chips. Any
of the programs mentioned
that list a single temperature
account for the offset already.
IS MY CPU TOO HOT?
The maximum supported temperature varies
from processor to processor. Most of the
free monitoring software mentioned lists the
information as “Tj. Max.” That stands for the
temperature junction (go.pcworld.com/
tjmx), or the highest operating temperature
of the hardware. If you don’t see the
information for some reason, search the CPU
World website (go.pcworld.com/cpww) for
your CPU’s model number to find the
information. Every program listed here
displays your processor’s model number, so
it’s easy to find.
MARCH 2018 PCWorld 107
HERE’S HOW CHECK YOUR PC’S CPU TEMPER ATURE

But that’s the maximum temperature—the temperatures cross 85° C, be concerned.

point at which your processor freaks out and Over 90° C: Danger, Will Robinson!
shuts down to avoid damage. Running
anywhere near that hot regularly is bad for the HOW TO LOWER YOUR CPU
long-term life of your hardware. Instead, TEMPERATURES
follow this general rule of thumb regarding If you’re regularly encountering high CPU
CPU temperatures under load. temperatures, there are some steps you can
take to try and fix the issue.
Under 60° C: You’re running great! First, clean out your PC. High CPU
60° C to 70° C: Still running fine, but getting temperatures are often caused by years of
a bit warmer. Consider cleaning the dust out dust and grime built up inside a PC, clogging
of your PC if CPU temperatures continue to fans and crucial air pathways. Local hardware
creep up over time. stores usually charge outrageous prices for
70° C to 80° C: This is hotter than you want canned air, but you can pick up a bottle for
to run unless you’re pushing an overclock. If about $7 on Amazon (go.pcworld.com/
you’re not, definitely check to make sure your dp10), or four for $18 (go.pcworld.
fans are working and there aren’t dust bunnies com/4c10). PCWorld’s guide on how to clean
clogging up your system’s airflow. your PC can walk you through the process
80° C to 90° C: Now we’re getting too hot (go.pcworld.com/clpc). While you’re at it,
for long-term comfort. Check your hardware check to make sure that all your fans are
for broken fans or dust
build-up, and if you’re
overclocking, dial back
your settings—especially
the voltage if you’ve
tweaked it. One notable
exception: We sometimes
see more powerful laptop
processors hit the low 80s
during gaming sessions
when plugged in, at which
point they start throttling
back performance. This is
expected, but if Roll up your sleeves.

108 PCWorld MARCH 2018

working correctly, and that
none of the vents in your PC
are blocked.
Hopefully that fixes the
issue. If not, more intensive
steps are in order. The
thermal paste that transfers
heat from your CPU to its
cooler might have dried out
if you’ve had your PC for a
few years. That can cause
temperature spikes.
Removing the old thermal
paste with rubbing alcohol
and a applying a fresh layer can potentially and fan, it’s a solid step up over stock AMD
help lower temperatures by a large amount. and Intel CPU coolers. Moving up in size and
TechAdvisor (go.pcworld.com/h2tp) has a price, the Noctua NH-D14 ($75 on Amazon
helpful, illustrated article on how to remove [go.pcworld.com/d146]) is one of the most
and apply thermal paste, and you can find effective air coolers ever to hit the streets, but
small syringes of thermal paste by respected its large size might block memory access or
brands like Arctic (go.pcworld.com/actc) and not even fit in smaller cases.
Noctua (go.pcworld.com/nctu) for under $7 Closed-loop liquid cooling solutions
on Amazon. (I’ve been a happy Arctic Silver 5 (CLCs) provide far cooler temperatures than
user for years now [go.pcworld.com/acs5].) air coolers with minimal hassle. The 120mm
If all that doesn’t help, your cooling Corsair H80i v2 ($95 on Amazon [go.
solution simply might not be capable of pcworld.com/9624]) is a great entry-level
keeping up with your CPU’s heat output, CLC, but if you plan on overclocking,
especially if you’re pairing a stock cooler or a consider moving up to the Corsair H100i v2
modest third-party cooler with higher-end ($109 on Amazon [go.pcworld.com/9625])
chips—and doubly so if you’re overclocking. and its larger 240mm radiator, which can
Buying a new CPU cooler may be in order. accommodate even fierce overclocks. We’ve
The Cooler Master Hyper 212 ($30 on been using one inside PCWorld’s dedicated
Amazon [go.pcworld.com/c212]) is a solid, graphics card benchmarking system for years
affordable air cooler. With its larger heatsink now (go.pcworld.com/gcpc).

MARCH 2018 PCWorld 109

HERE’S HOW
How to set up two monitors for
double the screen real estate
A must for multitaskers. BY KATHERINE STEVENSON
E
ven a generous 24-inch monitor
can feel cramped when you’ve
got multiple windows open on
your desktop (and who
doesn’t?). It’s much worse if you’re confined
to a laptop screen. Fortunately, it’s simple
enough to add a second monitor to your PC
setup and spread out.
Any modern desktop or laptop PC has the
graphics capability to run dual displays. All
that’s required is a second monitor. You can
get a very nice second screen for around $100,
110 PCWorld MARCH 2018
such as HP’s 21.5-inch, 1920x1080 Pavilion IPS
monitor for $99 on Amazon (go.pcworld.
com/hppn) or Acer’s 21.5-inch, 1920x1080
G226HQL for $90 on Amazon (go.pcworld.
com/g226). Both feature fairly thin bezels, an
important feature if you want to minimize the
interruption between your two screens.
Today’s monitors typically come with some
combination of VGA, DVI, HDMI, and
DisplayPort ports. In other words, you’ll have a
couple options for how to connect the monitor to
your PC. While its common for VGA and DVI
IMAGE: ISTOCK
cables to come
included with the
display, you may
have to purchase
your HDMI or
DisplayPort cable
separately if you go
that route. Those
can be easily
purchased on
Amazon (go.
pcworld.com/
hdcb).

STEP 1
The first part is easy.
Simply connect The display settings in Windows 10: Click the Identify tab under the graphic to
your second establish your monitors’ arrangement.

monitor to a power
outlet and an available port on your PC.
STEP 2
Next you have to tell Windows how to
manage the two monitors.
If Windows only appears on one monitor,
or if the two of them aren’t working the way
they should, right-click the desktop and select
either Screen Resolution (Windows 7 and
Windows 8) or Display Settings (Windows 10).
In the resulting dialog box you can specify
the displays’ arrangement. The Multiple
Displays pull-down menu allows you to
control how the two screens work together.
Choosing Extend These Displays will prompt
Windows to treat your displays as one
contiguous screen.
Once you’ve selected that setting, you
can tell Windows which monitor is on the left
or right by dragging the graphics at the top of
the dialog box. Get this wrong, and scrolling
the mouse will be very confusing.
The Make This My Main Display option
controls which monitor gets the taskbar
and Start button. If you don’t see that
option, the currently selected monitor is
already the main one. You can also
control many of these settings by right-
clicking the desktop and selecting your
graphics control panel.

MARCH 2018 PCWorld 111

HERE’S HOW

Five Chromebook hacks that

give your laptop surprising
new talents
A few tweaks and additions can turn these laptops into indispensable tools. BY IAN PAUL

C
hromebooks may be
impressively versatile (go.
pcworld.com/impv), but a
good Chromebook hack helps
it break out of its browser-based confines and
try new talents on for size. Top of the list, of
course, is the ability to install a full Linux
desktop operating system (go.pcworld.com/
lxos) via the Crouton project. But there’s a lot
you can tweak or add to multiply a
Chromebook’s powers. Some of these
features require you to install Linux—a really
easy task if you follow our Crouton tutorial—
but many do not. Here are five Chromebook
hacks that will improve your user experience
and make these laptops even more powerful.
1. STEAM STREAMING
Just as everyone knows you can put Linux on a
Chromebook, it’s probably common

112 PCWorld MARCH 2018 IMAGE: GOOGLE

knowledge that you can install Valve’s Steam
to play games. The problem is only a few
Chromebooks come with a GPU that can run
big-time PC games. Enter Steam’s local
network streaming (go.pcworld.com/stpc).
Using this feature, your full-time gaming PC
runs the game you want to play, but you
interact with it on your Chromebook.
Valve gets around device limitations by
recording a game’s video stream and sending
it to your lower-powered device. Then your
gameplay inputs (controller or mouse and
keyboard) are returned to the gaming PC over
your home network. It sounds a little janky,
but it’s amazing how well this works. Don’t be
afraid to try your most resource-intensive
games, either.
If you’re new to it, check out our earlier
tutorial on the finer points of Steam in-home
streaming (go.pcworld.com/sihs). This
feature works almost the same on a
Chromebook as it does on a standard
Linux box.
The one wrinkle is that Steam’s fantastic
feature needs a few tweaks to work correctly.
That’s because Chromebooks close certain
ports by default that Steam needs for
streaming. Those ports remain closed even
when you’ve got Linux running on your box
via Crouton.
Many sites around the web that can show
you how to open these ports via command-
line magic, but these particular instructions
are based on a post by developer Brian Smith
(go.pcworld.com/brsm).
The goal is to create a Bash alias with all
the instructions. Then all you have to do is
type in a simple word or phrase, and the ports
you need will open with a few taps.
To do that, jump into your Linux chroot on
your Chromebook, open a terminal and type
in the following:
echo “alias steamStream=’ sudo
iptables -A INPUT -p udp —dport
27036 -j ACCEPT; sudo iptables -A
INPUT -p udp —dport 37804 -j
ACCEPT; sudo iptables -A INPUT -p
tcp —dport 37804 -j ACCEPT; sudo
iptables -A INPUT -p tcp —dport
27036 -j ACCEPT; sudo iptables -I
INPUT -p udp —dport 27031 -j
ACCEPT; sudo iptables -I INPUT -p
udp —dport 27036 -j ACCEPT; sudo
iptables -I INPUT -p tcp —dport
27036 -j ACCEPT; sudo iptables -I
INPUT -p tcp —dport 27037 -j
ACCEPT;’” >> ~/.bash_aliases
Now every time you want to open your
ports, fire up the terminal in Linux, type
steamStream into the command prompt,
hit Enter, then start Steam, and you should
see a Stream option next to any games
installed on your Windows gaming rig. If you
forget to run your alias before opening
Steam, you’ll have to relaunch the program
to see the streaming option.
MARCH 2018 PCWorld 113
HERE’S HOW FIVE CHROMEBOOK HACKS
2. CHROME REMOTE
DESKTOP
We’ve covered this before, but it’s hard to
beat Google’s Chrome Remote Desktop (go.
pcworld.com/gcrd) for getting free access to
your primary PC when you’re on a
Chromebook. You can use this feature if
you’re on the other side of the house or the
other side of the country. The only thing to
keep in mind is that you’ll need to make sure
your Windows PC isn’t set to go idle.
Otherwise, you won’t be able to access your
machine using this method.
Once you’ve installed the Chrome
Remote Desktop Chrome app on both PCs,
it’s just a matter of opening Remote Desktop
on your Windows machine. Then press Get
Started under My Computers, and follow the
instructions.
As part of the initial setup process you’ll
need to install Chrome’s Remote Desktop
Host controller and set a PIN. Once that’s
done, open Chrome Remote Desktop on
114 PCWorld MARCH 2018
your Chromebook, click Get Started under
My Computers, select the name of the
Windows computer you just set up, enter the
PIN, and you’re in.
3. VOICE DICTATION
For those suffering from repetitive strain
injuries or who would rather not type all the
time, using a voice dictation app for
document creation can help. There are
several options for using voice dictation with
Chromebooks, but two that I tried and liked
were Google’s built-in dictation for Google
Docs and the free Chromebook app
VoiceNote II (go.pcworld.com/vnII).
To use the feature on Google Docs, open
a word processing document, and go to
Tools > Voice Typing in the menu. A small
window with a microphone will open to the
left of the document area. Click that and start
dictating your document. The only problem
with Google’s solution is that it was a little on
the slow side in my tests.
When you need to dictate offline,
VoiceNote II is a good choice. This
Chrome app takes dictation very well.
It’s not the best at doing edits such as
properly interpreting what you mean by
saying “delete” or “backspace,” but for
the most part it works.
4. NIGHT LIGHT
Like Apple and Microsoft have done,
Google added a night light feature to

Chrome OS. This feature allows you to tone
down the screen temperature at night by
reducing the amount of blue light coming off
the screen. Blue light is associated with
daylight, and toning it down is supposed to
help your body release melatonin to aid in
falling asleep after a late-night YouTube
session.
Google has yet to make this an official
feature, but enabling it on a Chromebook is
easy enough. All you have to do is drop into
the flags section, where you can find many
interesting and experimental features for
Chrome and Chrome OS.
Open Chrome and in the address bar type
chrome://flags/#ash-enable-night-
light and hit Enter. Next click Enable, and
restart your machine. Tap the control panel
area in the lower right corner of your shelf.
You should now see a new Night Light icon
between the help and lock symbols.
Whenever you want to go into night mode—
it’s best to do this at or a few hours after
sundown—just tap that icon. To turn off the
feature tap it again.
If you want to schedule Night Light’s
active hours or adjust the color mix for the
feature, go to Settings > Device > Displays >
Night Light. By default, Night Light doesn’t
have any scheduling, but you can tell your PC
to turn on Night Light from sunset to sunrise
or set a custom time.
5. SHARE FILES BETWEEN
CHROME OS AND LINUX
We’ve already covered how to use Crouton to
install Linux on your Chromebook. It’s an easy
way to get a second operating system on your
laptop for those times you really need a full
desktop—like when you want to play
Civilization VI (go.pcworld.com/cvvl) on the
couch using Steam in-home streaming.
One of the handy features that Crouton
has is that by default you can share files
between your Linux install and Chrome OS via
the Downloads folder. This folder has the
same contents regardless of which operating
system you’re in. If you have a file or folder in
Linux that you need to drop to Chrome OS or
vice versa, just put it in the Downloads folder
on either side and you’re all set.
MARCH 2018 PCWorld 115
Tech Spotlight A video showcase
of the latest trends

Watch the
video at
go.pcworld.
com/iq

Nest Cam
IQ Outdoor
≥ The Nest Cam IQ Outdoor’s
highlights include 4K internal

review video resolution, as well as person

recognition and sturdier construc-
tion. It’s also $200 more expensive than its sibling, the
Nest Cam Outdoor. But if you already own Nest Cam IQs,
the IQ Outdoor is the way to go.

116 PCWorld MARCH

MONTH2018
2017