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• Stan standing still on offline viewing... For now
• Photoshop Elements 14 takes a page out of the Apple Photos scrap book
• Toyota Yaris: Micro car maximises sales
• Updated: 90 best free iPhone games on the planet
• Buying Guide: 10 best gaming laptops 2015: top gaming notebooks reviewed
• Apple iPhone 6S and iPhone 6S Plus now on sale in Australia
• In Depth: Dolby Atmos: an in-depth guide to the premature speaker tech
• You haven't seen Pluto until you see it in color
• Pentax gears up for its full-frame DSLR launch with a new zoom lens
• iOS Tips: iOS 9 Wallet: Using the shortcut, loyalty cards and more
• Updated: 10 Best Ultrabooks 2015: top thin and light laptops reviewed
• UPDATED: Oculus Rift price and release date a no-show at Connect conference
• Star Wars Battlefront beta opens up to all on October 8
• VIDEO: This is how much Razer cares about your gaming mouse
• Oculus Rift is taking Minecraft and classic games to a whole new level
• Samsung Gear VR just nabbed Netflix
• Oculus announces new Samsung Gear VR that's super affordable
• TechRadar gets to cut ribbon at new data centre

Stan standing still on offline viewing... For now Posted: 24 Sep 2015 11:09 PM PDT Australia has an exceptionally strong 4G mobile network compared to the rest of the world, but if you ever try to stream video while on a train during peak hour, you're in a for a world of disappointment. That's why we got kind of excited when Amazon announced it would be offering offline viewing for certain shows. While Netflix is adamant it will never offer offline viewing, it made sense that one of the local rivals – Stan or Presto – might look to implement a similar feature in their mobile apps. At a preview of Stan's upcoming original comedy series No Activity, we got a chance to chat to Stan CEO Mike Sneesby, who told techradar that while he would never rule out offline viewing, at the moment he's not convinced the benefits outweigh the challenges. "We're looking closely at how that's taken up by consumers internationally," Sneesby admitted when asked about offline options in the Stan app. "I think if you surveyed a bunch of people and said, 'would you be interested in offline viewing', 99 per cent of people will say 'yes, if it's just another option then of course, I'll take that,'" he continued. Viva la resiSTANce The challenge then isn't so much on the consumer side, but in the complexity it adds to the service, both technically and in terms of user experience. "On Stan we've got about 8,000 hours of viewing – You can't download that onto your phone, so there'll be a limited number of shows or programs that you can ever have offline at once based on how much memory is available on your device," Sneesby explained. "That's challenge number one. Challenge number two is not all shows will have the rights available for offline. "So you will get into this situation where you've kind of got this confusing mismatch of 'why is this show available? Why is that not available? I can only download one show but I want everything!'" he added. These challenges may seem insignificant for a tech-savvy consumer, but for the team at Stan, they are real questions that need to be addressed before offline viewing becomes a feature worth implementing. That's not to say we'll never see offline viewing for Stan. For Sneesby, Amazon's approach is a good case study that will help determine the local approach. "I think the jury's out as to whether the complexities in the experience for consumers actually do end up outweighing the benefits of making it available. But, as I said, I'd never say no and we're certainly keeping a very close eye on it," he said. Check out our run down of the Stan content lineup you won't be watching offline in the near future

Photoshop Elements 14 takes a page out of the Apple Photos scrap book Posted: 24 Sep 2015 09:01 PM PDT Adobe has changed a lot about the look and feel of Photoshop Elements 14, and it looks strikingly like the new Apple Photos app for the Mac. For starters, the new interface showcases your photos and video together, rather than showing them separately as it was in Photoshop Elements 13. The new version of Elements also does a much better job of grouping photos based on events and the people tagged in them. For example, hovering the cursor over someone's name will find all of the images that they're found within. Additionally, if you want to find out where you took a photo, Elements 14 will present you with a map. Events view, meanwhile, will automatically group photos into a combined calendar view. Aside from the new look, Elements 14 adds a new guided edit mode, which will point out what could be improved in the photo for you, including framing and correcting skin tones. Other enhancements include automatic haze removal and improved automatic camera shake correction. Photoshop novices will also appreciate the newly improved refine selection tool, which makes it especially easy to select a subject with hair. What about Adobe Premiere Elements 14? Adobe also announced a new version of Premiere Elements 14, with a major focus on audio editing. The new video editing software package now includes a new audio view that shows the audio track in .wav format. Filmmakers also get a set of audio tools, including the ability to mix or add narration as well as effects such as low and high pass filters. Motion Tiles (a completely new feature), meanwhile, will allow videographers to add an animated video tile on top of their footage – think picture-in-picture. Black and White video has trickled down from the Photoshop Creative Cloud package to Elements 14, and you'll even be able to add slow and fast motion with the Timezone feature. And lastly, you'll be able to import and export 4K footage. Adobe plans to launch both Photoshop Elements 14 and Premiere Elements 14 before the end of the year for $99 (£64, AU$99) each. We'll be sure to tell you whether the former is worth the price of admission in our forthcoming review. This is the best free video editing software

Toyota Yaris: Micro car maximises sales Posted: 24 Sep 2015 06:48 PM PDT It may not be the most desirable car on our roads, but the Toyota Yaris clearly has its share of fans after it became the first car in its class to hit 200,000 sales in Australia. Beating out the likes of the Mazda2, Honda Jazz, and Suzuki Swift, the Yaris took less than 10 years to hit the milestone, surpassing its closest competitor by over 60,000 sales. Official figures have the Yaris sitting at 200,670, meaning that on average Australians have bought 54 of the small car every day since it was introduced. As Australia's appetite for small cars increases, Yaris sales are unlikely to decline, with 2015 seeing an increase in demand of 20.2 per cent. Small cars are good for the environment. The 5.600 fuel cell patents Toyota made royalty-free earlier this year could be, too.

Updated: 90 best free iPhone games on the planet Posted: 24 Sep 2015 06:25 PM PDT Best free iPhone games It's safe to say that Apple's given the gaming industry a square kick in the tender regions. Despite their bluster, dismissing Apple in every way possible, Sony and Nintendo are both clearly concerned by the meteoric rise of iPod touch and iPhone as handheld gaming devices. Although great games are the driving force behind the success of Apple gaming, low prices have also helped. Most 'premium' titles cost six quid or less, and many developers end up in a race to 69p, thereby providing games that'd cost 20 quid on a rival platform for the price of a Kit-Kat. But what if you've spent the last of your cash on your shiny Apple object of desire? Can you get great games for nothing at all, or is the 'free' section of the App Store best ignored? The answer is, of course, both, and the trick is finding the gems amongst the dross. What follows is our pick of the bunch - our top 90 free iPod touch and iPhone games. In fact - in our latest update we've even included a VR game. And before you tell us that the goggles are too expensive, we'll point you in the direction of the cardboard ones that cost virtually nothing... 1. Timberman Not so much an endless runner as an endless chopper, Timberman has your square-jawed (and, in fact, just plain square) lumberjack hacking away at a giant tree. You tap to move left or right, dodging deadly branches, and must chop at speed, lest your power meter run dry. Those in it for the long haul will find 30 Timbermen to unlock, including a certain large, angry, green superhero. 2. Tiny Striker We've seen quite a few spot-kick flick-based efforts on the iPhone, but Tiny Striker also brings to mind old-school arcade footie like SWOS. It's all goalmouth action here, though, with you scoring from set-pieces, initially against an open goal, but eventually by deftly curling your ball past walls of defenders and a roaming 'keeper. 3. Run Sackboy! Run! The wee knitted chap from LittleBigPlanet lands on iOS, in yet another endless runner. We should yawn and hit delete, really, but Run SackBoy! Run! is absolutely gorgeous, with stunning scenery based on the LittleBigPlanet titles. The gameplay's intuitive and simple, but inventive level design will keep you coming back time and time again. 4. Fallout Shelter You know that popular Fallout 4 game we've all been getting excited about? Why not get in the post apocalyptic mood with this Bethesda made spin-off game? Fallout Shelter sees you take control of a Vault from the game series as you try to keep all its dwellers happy whilst protecting them from the horrors of the outside world. It's a funny little way to get excited about the upcoming game whilst also being great in its own right. 5. Mr Crab Another iOS platform game that relies on your ability to use a single dextrous digit, Mr. Crab finds the eponymous hero rescuing his kind from levels wrapped around towering tubes. It's all about timing, using scenery to double back and grab whatever you've missed, and, at certain points, figuring out how to defeat terrifying bosses. It looks fantastic, and there's surprising depth behind this game's stripped-back control system. 6. Sonic All-Stars Racing Transformed The first iOS Sonic kart game worked nicely on the platform (a rare thing for the genre), and this sequel doesn't disappoint. You get plenty of dynamic, colourful tracks to speed around, grabbing power-ups and boosts along the way. Periodically, your kart will transform to become a boat or plane, adding further dimensions to the racing action. It's a bit grindy now and again, but you won't care when you're drifting like a loon across an aircraft carrier, before plunging into the sea. 7. InMind (VR) Looking to VR now, with Nival inc's offering: InMind, a free VR game for cardboard-based VR kits. Really it's a glorified demo, as you zoom and whizz through a semi-educational brain, zapping neurons to cure depression. The one-look button press idea is a good way to navigate the lack of tethered controls although sometimes instructions aren't always clear as to what to do next and the controls (at least on an iPhone 6) aren't as sensitive as they could be. If this is your first experience of VR, you could do worse than to load this Inner Space/Fantastic Voyage movie vibe upon your mobile although gamers will be left feeling a little frustrated after the wow effect of the soaring visuals wears off. 8. Winter Walk This sweet survival game is full of character, as you assist a Victorian gent, out for his evening constitutional. The problem is it's a bit windy, and the gent's hat is in danger of blowing away during a gust - press the screen and he holds it in place. Each step increases your score and also the chances of seeing thoughtful comments from the hatted chap. 9. BaconBaconBacon BaconBaconBacon feels a bit like Bejeweled slipped through a time-warp and collided with oddball British gaming humour from the early 1980s. Instead of gems, you swap pigs, and must smite vegans guarding them for extra points. Bonus pigs can be matched for extra sausages, or to fill a ketchup bomb. 10. Retry In this insanely tough arcade test, you coax a finicky biplane through side-on levels of floating islands. The slightest touch on anything but a collectable coin or runway spells doom, and ghosts of previous crashes helpfully litter the way as you retry. IAP is available to buy coins for restart points, which in this case are tacit admission of your lack of gaming prowess. 11. Boulder Dash 30th Anniversary The Boulder Dash series has a long pedigree, but this is the first time its co-creators have teamed up since the classic 1984 original. It's also the first time (in several attempts) the game has worked on iOS. The game itself is business as usual: dig through dirt; avoid boulders and enemies; grab gems. But it looks great, controls well, and even includes the original caves as an optional IAP. 12. Zombie Highway 2 The zombies in this title are surprisingly sprightly, leaping towards any oncoming vehicle and aiming to shake it until it flips, presumably whereupon they prise open the door and eat the occupant's BRRAIIINNZZ. You must fend them off, by scraping your vehicle against wrecks littering the highway, or blow them away with your gun. 13. Sky Force 2014 Sky Force 2014 celebrates the mobile series's 10th anniversary in style, with this stunning top-down arcade blaster. Your little red ship, as ever, is tasked with weaving its way through hostile enemy territory, annihilating everything in sight. The visuals are spectacular, the level design is smart, and the bosses are huge, spewing bullet-hell in your general direction. 14. Crazy Taxi City Rush We imagine this Crazy Taxi rethink will alienate some fans of the original series, but plenty of the classic time-attack racer's feel remains intact. You zoom through city streets, picking up and dropping off fares against the clock; only this time, everything's largely on rails. It's sort of Crazy Taxi meets Temple Run, with plenty of upgrades and mini-games to master. 15. Asphalt 8: Airborne At some point, a total buffoon decreed that racing games should be dull and grey, on grey tracks, with grey controls. Gameloft's Asphalt 8: Airborne dispenses with such foolish notions, along with quite a bit of reality. Here, then, you zoom along at ludicrous speeds, drifting for miles through exciting city courses, occasionally being hurled into the air to perform stunts that absolutely aren't acceptable according to the car manufacturer's warrantee. 16. Letterpress What mad fool welds Boggle to tug o' war Risk-style land-grabbing? The kind who doesn't want anyone to get any work done again, ever, that's who. Letterpress is, simply, the best word game on the App Store. You make words to win points and temporarily 'lock' letters from your opponent by surrounding them. The result is a tense asynchronous two-player game with plenty of last-move wins and general gnashing of teeth when you realise 'qin' is in fact an acceptable word. 17. Jetpack Joyride We're pretty certain if there's one thing you shouldn't be using for a joyride, it's a jetpack that's kept aloft by firing bullets at the floor. But that's the score in this endless survival game with decidedly tongue-in-cheek humour, not least the profit bird power-up, a rather unsubtle dig at certain App Store chart-toppers. 18. Super Monsters Ate My Condo Logic? Pah! Sanity? Pfft! We care not for such things, yells Super Monsters Ate My Condo. It then gets on with turning the match-three genre and Jenga-style tower-building into a relentless time-attack cartoon fest of apartment-munching, explosions, giant tantrums and opera. No, really. 19. Hero Academy Most developers create games from code, but we're pretty sure Hero Academy's composed of the most addictive substances known to man all smushed together and shoved on to the App Store. The game's sort-of chess with fantasy characters, but the flexibility within the rule-set provides limitless scope for asynchronous one-on-one encounters. For free, you have to put up with ads and only get the 'human' team, but that'll be more than enough to get you hooked. 20. Nimble Quest If you're looking for a new one-handed game to pass the time during your commute, Nimble Quest is a fantastic choice. It's a lot like Snake in that you need to carefully navigate through the course while avoiding obstacles, but enhanced with a pixelated, medieval aesthetic and tons of unlockables. Guide a team of heros through tons of included stages using nothing but the swipe of your finger. It can get tough a few stages in, but the game is fun enough to stick with through to the end. 21. Triple Town Three bushes make a tree! Three gravestones make a church! OK, so logic might not be Triple Town's strong suit, but the match-three gameplay is addictive. Match to build things and trap bears, rapidly run out of space, gaze in wonder at your town and start all over again. The free-to-play version has limited moves that are gradually replenished, but you can unlock unlimited moves via IAP. 22. Real Racing 3 While Asphalt 8 aims squarely at arcade racers, Real Racing 3 goes for the simulation jugular. Its stunning visuals drop you deep into high-quality racing action that sets new standards on mobile devices. Plenty of cars and tracks add longevity, although do be aware the game is a bit grindy and quick to hint you should buy some in-app cash with some of your real hard-earned. 23. Pitfall! Fans of the ancient Pitfall series on the Atari might feel a bit short-changed, given that this comeback in the shape of a Temple Run clone diverges wildly from the platforming action of the originals. However, it's one of the best-looking endless runners on iOS, and if you persevere there are exciting mine-cart and motorbike sections to master. 24. MazeFinger Plus Again, the forced Plus+ account sign-up is hateful, but it's worth persevering to get to this addictive game, where you "unleash the awesome power of your finger," according to the App Store blurb. The aim is to drag your finger from the start to the finish of each simple maze. The problem is you're against the clock and obstacles litter your path. Great graphics and 200 levels of compelling gameplay ensure you'll be glued to your screen. 25. Candy Crush Soda Saga It gets a bit of stick from time to time, but microtransactions aside, the Candy Crush saga is quite a lot of fun. Sandy Crush Soda Saga throws in some new dynamics, making the game even more addictive - and frustrating. You can do quite a lot without parting any money at all, but the game will limit your replays, meaning you'll eventually hit a timer that demands you take a break for a little while - or pay up to keep playing. It's a horribly arbitrary feature, but all things considered, probably a good way of stopping us from becoming forever lost in the colourful abyss. 26. Trace Trace is a sweet, inventive platform game which has you navigating hand-drawn obstacles to reach the star-shaped exit. The twist is that you can draw and erase your own platforms, to assist your progress. With an emphasis on time-based scores rather than lives and the ability to skip levels, Trace is very much a 'casual' platform game, but it's none the worse because of it. 27. Solomon's Keep Reminiscent of a twin-stick shooter mashed into an RPG with a really big wand, Solomon's Keep has your wizard battle endless hordes of supernatural foes, with the help of your thumbs and some in-game spells. It's a bit like an overhead Diablo, or, if you're getting on a bit, a powered-up Gauntlet. 28. Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft Few free games are quite as polished as Hearthstone, but then this is a Blizzard game, so we hardly expected anything less. There are dozens of card games available for iPhone, but Hearthstone stands out with high production values and easy to learn, difficult to master mechanics, which can keep you playing, improving and collecting cards for months on end. Matches don't generally take too long either so it's great for playing in short bursts. 29. Spider: Hornet Smash Tiger Style's Spider: The Secret of Bryce Manor is an App Store classic, combining arcade adventuring and platforming action, with you playing the role of a roaming arachnid. Hornet Smash includes a level from that game, but its main draw is the frenetic arcade minigame. Still controlling our eight-legged hero, the aim is to fend off attacks by swarms of angry hornets, while weaving webs and munching tasty lacewings for health boosts. Three environments are included in this compelling and innovative title. 30. Bankshot One for pool sharks, Bankshot tasks you with sending your orb to a goal by bouncing it off of at least one wall. A few different modes are on offer in this attractive neon-style game, but the best is Blitz, a high-octane time-attack affair. 31. Spaceteam Think you know stress? You haven't experienced stress until you've played Spaceteam, a cooperative multiplayer game that requires you to all work together as a crew (and bark orders at your friends). Sounds easier than it is; failure to cooperate will probably end with your ship getting sucked into a black hole. 32. Lux Touch Quickfire Risk clone Lux Touch isn't exactly a champion in the smarts department - the AI's pretty easy to outfox - but it's perfect ten-minute fodder for Risk fanatics. The graphics are clear, the board is responsive, and the game's also universal, for if you want to install it on your iPad. 33. iCopter Classic There are plenty of one-thumb copter games on the App Store, but iCopter Classic goes right back to the genre's roots. You simply use your thumb to make your copter bob up and down, surviving for as long as possible without smashing into something; and there are plenty of unlockable themes if you prefer, say, a bee, submarine, spaceship or football to a helicopter! 34. Punch Quest Punch Quest is one of the best games available for smartphones and tablets. Period. It's an endless runner and a beat-em-up smashed into one. The sprite-based graphics are detailed and the world and the enemies inhabiting it are charming. Most of all, they're fun to punch. As you play through and die many, many times, you'll gain in-game currency to unlock more moves, which can grant you the power to do things like summon a spinning ring of fists to protect you or make your punches explosive. It's fun, addicting and, best of all, it's free. 35. InvaderR Like Cell Splat, InvaderR streamlines and hones a popular game, but this time it's Space Invaders. Like Taito's original, aliens are out to get you, but in InvaderR you have it tough. While the invaders are content to stay out of reach, it's 'game over' the second you're hit by a projectile. This turns InvaderR into a compelling and exciting score-attack game. 36. Whacksy Taxi Although it looks like a 1980s racer, Whacksy Taxi also has much in common with platform games. You belt along absurdly straight highways, avoiding traffic by dodging or leaping it. Variety's added by power-ups, new background graphics when you reach a stage's end, and several bonus zones that also provide extra challenge. 37. Hoggy Hoggy resembles VVVVVV smashed into Nintendo's Kirby, combining platforming and puzzles. The game tasks you with grabbing fruit within jars that are peppered around a maze. Complete a jar and you get a key; with a certain number of keys, new maze areas open up. Although occasionally a mite frustrating, Hoggy's a great-looking, fun and innovative freebie. 38. Bam Bam Dash Imagine Monster Dash with the cast of The Flintstones and you've got Bam Bam Dash. Your auto-running caveman has to avoid plummeting to his death and being eaten by things with sharp teeth. Nice graphics and helpful dinosaurs you can ride add extra flavour to the game. 39. Alice in the Secret Castle If brutally difficult old-school games are your thing, Alice in the Secret Castle will appeal. The game boasts 64 rooms of NES-style hell, with a curious game mechanic that hides walls when you hold the 'A' button. Progression therefore becomes a case of mastering taxing and relentless (but rewarding) puzzle-oriented platforming. 40. Fairway Solitaire Blast In this game, golf met solitaire and they decided to elope while leaving Mr. Puzzle Game to fill the void. What's left is an entertaining bout of higher-or-lower, draped over a loose framework of golf scores, with a crazed gopher attempting to scupper everything. You get loads of courses for free with Fairway Solitaire Blast and can use IAP to buy more. 41. PicoPicoGames It's clear you'll never see Nintendo games on iOS, but PicoPicoGames is the next best thing: a collection of tiny, addictive NES-like minigames. Frankly, we'd happily pay for scrolling shooter GunDiver and the Denki Blocks-like Puzzle; that they're free and joined by several other great games is astonishing. 42. Fun Run 2 Online multiplayer Sonic? What sounds better than that? Well sadly this isn't with the traditional Sonic characters, it's just other cuddly animals instead, but the concept is still the same. Fun Run 2 matches you up with four other players from around the world and throws you into a game where you sprint, dodge and fight your way to the end over a variety of obstacles. You can even add friends and play against them specifically as well as upgrading your character with new clothes and items. 43. Froggy Jump At first, Froggy Jump seems like Doodle Jump, starring a frog. That's probably because Froggy Jump pretty much is Doodle Jump, starring a frog. However, its character, unique items, themes and lack of price-tag makes it worth a download, especially if you're a fan of vertically scrolling platform games. 44. StarDunk Another game showing that simplicity often works wonders on mobile titles, SlamDunk is a straightforward side-on basketball game. The time-attack nature of the title gives it oomph, though, and there's also the option for online competition against players worldwide. 45. Solebon Solitaire Solitaire was the casual game on computers before the term 'casual game' was invented. On iOS, there are tons of free and paid solitaire titles, but Solebon is our favourite traditional take. You get 50 variations (including the well-known Klondike) entirely for free, with the game being supported by unobtrusive ads. 46. Flick Golf A sports game that utilizes the touchscreen isn't very hard to find on the App Store or the Google Play Store. But finding one that's actually worth downloading is tough. Flick Golf doesn't innovate, but provides fun, arcade-style challenge that golf lovers will enjoy. Stocked with a few modes of play, this isn't a full-blown golf title. Rather, you do your best at making an approach to the green and sinking the ball in the hole, if you've got skill. It's easier said than done (just like real golf) but the level of polish alone makes it worth a download. 47. Into the Dead You know, if infinite zombies were running towards us, we'd leg it in the opposite direction. Not so in Into The Dead, where you battle on until your inevitable and bloody demise. The game's oddly dream-like (well, nightmare-like), and perseverance rewards you with new weapons, such as a noisy chainsaw. VVRRRMMM! (Splutch!) 48. Drop7 What do you get if you cross Drop7 with Zynga? A free version of Drop7! Luckily, the game's far more entertaining than that attempt at a joke: drop numbered discs into a grid and watch them explode when the number of discs in a column or row matches numbers on the discs. Drive yourself mad trying to boost your score by chaining! Forget to eat! 49. Punch Quest The clue's in the title - there's a quest, and it involves quite a lot of punching. There's hidden depth, though - the game might look like a screen-masher, but Punch Quest is all about mastering combos, perfecting your timing, and making good use of special abilities. The in-game currency's also very generous, so if you like the game reward the dev by grabbing some IAP. 50. Galaga 30th Collection In the old days, invaders from space were strange, remaining in a holding pattern and slowly descending, enabling you to shoot them. By the time of Galaxian, the aliens realised they could swoop down and get you, and Galaga 30th Collection is the game you get here, with minor updates that improve its graphics and pace, albeit for a weighty 140+ MB footprint on your device. Galaga fanatics can unlock other remakes in the series via IAP. 51. X-Baseball It's a little-known fact that baseball mostly involves trying to hit colourful birds flying overhead and bananas lobbed in your direction by a mischievous fan. But X-Baseball provides a perfect, accurate one-thumb iOS recreation of America's favourite banana-thwacking pastime. (What?) 52. Rogue Runner Rogue Runner is another one of those endless games, where you leap over gaps and shoot things until you fall down a chasm and ponder why your in-game avatar doesn't learn to stop once in a while. Rogue Runner stands out by offering a ton of skins and a smart overhead dodge-and-shoot variation, which is a bit like Spy Hunter if someone knocked the original arcade cabinet on its side - the vandal. 53. Dumb Ways To Die Based on a Webby Award winning video, Dumb Ways to Die lets you try and save adorable characters from dying in dumb ways. There's more than a hint of WarioWare when it comes to the game's quickfire levels, which charge you in mere seconds with batting away wasps, saving private parts from underwater peril, stopping a head from exploding in outer space, and many more surreal rescue missions. 54. Draw Something Free "No drawing skills required!," boasts the App Store description for Draw Something Free. You might argue otherwise when this app demands you draw something suitably tricky for your friends to guess, but can merely manage a red blob. Still, Pictionary plus iPhone plus social gaming equals 'must have' in gaming maths. 55. Temple Run Top tip for any budding Indiana Jones types reading this: do not steal shiny things from temples guarded by demon monkeys, otherwise you will die. Still, if you're too stubborn to take our advice, use Temple Run for training, swiping and tilting your device until your on screen hero meets his inevitable demise. 56. ElectroMaster We've no idea what's going on in ElectroMaster, beyond a bored girl trying to avoid responsibility by killing everything in sight with electro-blasts. The game's sort of like a twin-stick shooter but you tap-hold to charge and then release to let rip, dragging your finger about to fry your foes. Games are short, but this is one of the most thrilling blasters on the system, despite it costing nothing at all. 57. Grim Joggers Freestyle The original Grim Joggers was odd enough: 15 joggers jog for their lives in oddball environments, including a warzone, the Arctic, and an alien world. In the free Grim Joggers Freestyle, you get just one world, but it mashes up everything from the paid game into a surreal (but thoroughly enjoyable) endless survival game. 58. Frisbee Forever Flinging a plastic disc can be dull in the real world, but in this whimsical game the classic toy gets to soar over desert canyons, through Ferris wheels and alongside pirate ships moored in sandy bays. Frisbee Forever is a flying disc game as Nintendo might have crafted it, with vibrant graphics, jolly music and simple but engaging gameplay. 59. Wind-Up Knight Kings in fairytale lands have a screw lose, or perhaps just an odd desire to create the conditions for a tough videogame. In Wind-Up Knight, a princess has been kidnapped. Horrors! But rather than send an army, the king tasks a knight with rescuing her. Only he's fragile. And clockwork. And can't turn around. Really, it's an excuse for puzzle-oriented swipe-based thrills, which demand near-perfect timing as the quest nears its end. 60. Flood-It! 2 Flood-It! 2 meets the rules of great puzzlers: keep things simple, but make the game so challenging that your brains start to dribble out of your ears. In Flood-It!, you tap colours to 'flood' the board from the top-left, aiming to make the entire board one colour using a limited number of taps. This release offers additional modes over the original Flood-It! (timers, obstacles, finishing with a defined colour), and offers schemes for colour-blind players. 61. The Sims Freeplay EA might not have a great reputation when it comes to free-to-play (*cough cough* Dungeon Keeper), but The Sims Freeplay is one of the games that's closer to getting the balance "right". Buying more Simoleons (the in-game currency) with real money will let you skip ahead, but you can also simply make your Sim earn them in the good old fashioned way by getting them a job. Lifestyle points will let you skip timers, but they can also be earned by levelling up. As for the game itself, this is the closest thing to a fully-fledged Sims experience you'll get on your mobile. 62. Tiny Tower Social management games are big business, but are often stuffed full of cynical wallet-grabbing mechanics. While Tiny Tower does have the whiff of IAP to speed things along a bit, its tower-building and management remains enjoyable even if you pay nothing at all, and the pixel graphics are lovely. 63. Cube Runner The accelerometers in Apple handhelds have driven development of myriad tilt-based racing games, but tilt controls can be finicky. Cube Runner, however, feels just right as you pilot your craft left and right through cube-littered landscapes, aiming to survive for as long as possible. The game doesn't look like much, but it plays well, and longevity is extended by Cube Runner enabling you to create and download new levels. 64. Letris 4 At first, Letris 4 looks like yet another bog-standard word game, albeit one that's rather visually swish, but it regularly tries new things. The game's based around creating words from falling tiles, but it keeps things fresh by adding hazards, such as debris, ice and various creatures lurking in the letter pile. If you're feeling particularly brainy, you can even play in two languages at once. 65. Bejeweled Blitz Before we played Bejeweled Blitz, we never knew precious gems were so 'explodey'. Still, here's the frantic member of the match-tree/gem-swap family, giving you one minute to obliterate as much shiny as possible, and then discover via online leaderboards that your chums are gem-smashing wizards. 66. Cool Pizza Cool Pizza isn't so much endless running as endless weirdness. In a world of stark black, white and neon, a skateboarder catches air to hack oddball enemies (laser-spewing mini Cthulhus; rotating pyramids of doom) to death. The crunchy soundtrack adds to the sensory overload, resulting in one of the finest freebies on the platform. 67. Frisbee Forever 2 We already covered Frisbee Forever on this list, with its Nintendo-like fling-a-plastic-disc about larks. Frisbee Forever 2's essentially more of the same, but prettier, smoother and with wilder locations in which to fly through hoops and collect stars. It's lovely and costs precisely zero pence, so download it. 68. Gridrunner Free Jeff Minter is a shoot 'em up genius, and his Gridrunner series has a long history, starting out on the VIC-20, at the dawn of home gaming. This update riffs off classic Namco arcade machines but also shoves modern bullet-hell mechanics into a claustrophobic single screen, and in this version's survival mode, you have just one life. Argh! The 69p 'Oxtended Mode' IAP adds the rest of the standard game. 69. Subway Surfers It looks a lot like Temple Run mashed into a children's cartoon show, but Subway Surfers plays a lot more like Run!, with its primarily linear leaping and sliding action. There are also plenty of power-ups to keep your graffiti-spraying hoodlum away from the chasing lawman and his faithful mutt. Just don't try this at home, kids, unless you want to redecorate a train with your innards. 70. HungryMaster The hero from the insane ElectroMaster returns, but this time she appears to be tasked with feeding sentient houses roaring "HUNGRY!" in a fairly rude manner. Local monsters amble about, which can be snared by swiping over them with a surprisingly deadly pixie dust trail, whereupon they're handily converted into food to be collected. Much like ElectroMaster, HungryMaster feels like someone found a lost classic arcade game and squirted it into your iPhone, but forgot to charge you for it. 71. Temple Run 2 We have no sympathy for the heroes of Temple Run 2. Having presumably escaped from the demon monkeys in Temple Run, they steal more ancient and shiny goodies. This time, they're pursued by only one undead ape - but it's massive. Cue: more running/jumping/hopefully not falling over, and some new mine-cart and zip-line sections. Wheeee! 72. Dropship This wonderful ngmoco title used to cost a few quid, but Dropship is now free and is one of the App Store's biggest bargains. The game is a modern take on Gravitar or Thrust, with your ship battling gravity and shooting gun emplacements while searching complex vector-based cave formations for marooned allies. The 'touch anywhere' dual-thumb controls take some getting used to, but the game feels fluid and exciting once they're mastered. 73. Chip Chain This combo-oriented match game has a casino feel, and there is a certain amount of luck evident, not least in the way new chips are added to the table. But in carefully laying your own chips in Chip Chain, merging sets of three to increment their number, and wisely playing cards, you can amass high scores while simultaneously wondering why real casino games are rarely as much fun. 74. Score! World Goals Take dozens of classic goals and introduce them to path-drawing and you've got the oddly addictive game of Score! World Goals. As you recreate stunning moments of soccer greatness, the game pauses for you to get the ball to its next spot. Accuracy rewards you with stars; failure presumably means you're compelled to take an early bath. 75. Groove Coaster Zero Tap! Tap! Swipe! Rub! Argh! That's the way this intoxicating rhythm action game plays out. Groove Coaster Zero is all on rails, and chock full of dizzying roller-coaster-style paths and exciting tunes. All the while, you aim for prodding perfection, chaining hits and other movements as symbols appear on the screen. Simple, stylish and brilliant. 76. Snuggle Truck For reasons unknown, cuddly toys are making a break for it, trying to get away from… something. We dread to think what cuddly toys are scared of, but we're willing to help them flee. The aim in Snuggle Truck, then: trials-like side-on hill-jumping with a truck, trying not to spill your cute chums along the way. 77. Pac-Man 256 This latest rethink of one of gaming's oldest and most-loved series asks what lies beyond the infamous level 256 glitch. As it turns out, it's endless mazey hell for the yellow dot-muncher. Pac-Man's therefore charged with eating as many dots as possible, avoiding a seemingly infinite number of ghosts, while simultaneously outrunning the all-devouring glitch. Power-ups potentially extend Pac-Man's life, enabling you to gleefully take out lines of ghosts with a laser or obliterate them with a wandering tornado. Although there's an energy system in Pac-Man 256, it's reasonably generous: one credit for a game with power-ups, and one for the single continue; one credit refreshes every ten minutes, to a maximum of six, and you can always play without power-ups for free. If you don't like that, there's an IAP-based £5.99/$7.99 permanent buy-out. 78. Cubed Rally Redline The endless rally game Cubed Rally Redline is devious. On the surface, it looks simple: move left or right in five clearly-defined lanes, and use the 'emergency time brake' to navigate tricky bits. But the brake needs time to recharge and the road soon becomes chock full of trees, cows, cruise liners and dinosaurs. And you thought your local motorway had problems! 79. Whale Trail There's something delightfully trippy and dreamy about Whale Trail, which features a giant mammal from the sea traversing the heavens, powered by rainbow bubbles, collecting stars with which to attack menacing angry clouds. The game's sweet nature disguises a challenging edge, though - it takes plenty of practice before your whale stays aloft for any length of time. 80. 1800 Games don't come any simpler than 1800. You try to stop a cursor in the dead centre of the screen, which rewards you with the maximum score. Any deviation and you'll be awarded with a lower number and have to try again… and again. This one might be insanely minimal but it's absurdly addictive. 81. Peggle Blast If you've never played Peggle before then get ready for a new addiction as shooting balls at pegs has never been this much fun. Actually, before Peggle shooting balls at pegs probably wasn't even slightly fun, but with its colourful art style, crazy power-ups and high-score chasing Peggle Blast is very much a game where one more go turns into a dozen. In app purchases can give you an edge, but it's playable without them and hearing Ode to Joy at the end of each level is all the sweeter for having earned your victory. 82. Clowns in the Face Tennis in the Face had a racket-wielding hero saving a city from an evil energy drink corporation, mostly through smacking enemies in the face with tennis balls. This freebie version comes across like the protagonist's fever dream, placing him in a clown-filled hell, with only his fuzzy balls to save him. 83. Plants vs Zombies 2 This is more like Plants vs Zombies 2 vs freemium grinding. But if you can look past the forced repetition of stages and irksome IAP, there's a lot to like in EA's horticulture/zombie defence sequel, including loads of new stages, a bunch of new plants, plenty of unique features, and a smattering of time travel. 84. Doctor Who: Legacy It's a case of timey-wimey-puzzley-wuzzley as Doctor Who: Legacy aims to show you that your iPhone is bigger on the inside, able to house intergalactic warfare. The game itself is a gem-swapper not a million miles away from Puzzle Quest, but all the Doctor Who trappings will make it a must for fans of the show - or Daleks fine-tuning their tactics regarding how to finally beat their nemesis, mostly via the use of strategically placed coloured orbs. 85. Rise of the Blobs Poor Marsh Mal. He's atop a cylindrical tower, about to be mauled to death by waves of hungry blobs. His only defence: a limitless supply of fruit, which he can use to blow up like-coloured blobs, thereby holding off death for a few precious extra moments. Yep, it's Rise of the Blobs - another block-falling game (think: a simplified Dr. Mario wrapped around a tube), but this one has wonderful visuals, suitably squelchy sound, and strategic underpinnings for those willing to master the game mechanics. 86. Sid Meier's Ace Patrol Nyeeeeooowww! Daggadaggadaggadagga! It's biplane o' clock in this Civ-like take on World War I dogfighting. You and the bally enemy take it in turns to climb, dive, roll and shoot, as you aim to turn the tide of the war and ensure it'll all be over by Christmas. Sid Meier's Ace Patrol is also one of the few games we've seen that understands the concept of micro-transactions, for example enabling you to spring POWs for 69p/$0.99 a pop. 87. Tiny Thief It's hard not to have a smile glued to your face when playing Tiny Thief, with its colourful cartoon graphics, inventive levels and constant humour. It feels like a point and click game of old redesigned for the smartphone generation, with simple controls and bite-sized levels. While you get several level packs for free several more are hidden behind a paywall, but whether you stump up for them or not the game is likely to prove memorable and well worth your time. 88. Pocket Planes The Tiny Tower devs take to the air in game form. In, Pocket Planes, this management sim, you take command of a fleet of planes, aiming to not entirely annoy people as you ferry them around the world. Like Tiny Tower, this one's a touch grindy, but it's a similarly amusing time-waster. 89. Dots Dots looks and feels like the sort of thing Jony Ive might play on his downtime (well, ignoring the festive theme, which is probably more Scott Forstall's style). A stark regimented set of coloured dots awaits, and like-coloured ones can be joined, whereupon they disappear, enabling more to fall into the square well. The aim: clear as many as possible - with the largest combos you can muster - in 60 seconds. 90. Smash Bandits In Smash Cops, you got to be the good guy, bringing down perps, mostly by ramming them into oblivion. Now in Smash Bandits it's your chance to be a dangerous crim, hopping between vehicles and leaving a trail of destruction in your wake. The game also amusingly includes the A-Team van and a gadget known only as the Jibba Jabba. We love it when a plan comes together! 91. Sage Solitaire If you're of a certain vintage, you probably spent many hours playing Solitaire on a PC, success being rewarded by cards bouncing around the screen. Sage Solitaire's developer wondered why iOS solitaire games hadn't moved on in the intervening years, and decided to reinvent the genre. Here, then, you get a three-by-three grid and remove cards by using poker hands. Additional strategy comes through limitations (hands must include cards from two rows; card piles are uneven) and potential aid (two 'trashes', one replenished after each successful hand; a starred multiplier suit). A few rounds in, you realise this game's deeper than it first appears. Beyond that, you'll be hooked. The single £2.29/$2.99 IAP adds extra modes and kills the ads.

Buying Guide: 10 best gaming laptops 2015: top gaming notebooks reviewed Posted: 24 Sep 2015 06:00 PM PDT Gaming laptops we recommend Updated: Nvidia has announced its latest mobile GPU and in an expected move the chip maker has managed to port its GTX 980 desktop graphics chip to select gaming laptops. This includes some big hitters like the MSI GT80 Titan. You don't even need to tell us what happened when you told your friends that you want to buy a gaming laptop. Their inner elitist got the best of them, and bashed you for not just building an outright gaming desktop. But we get you. Building a gaming PC takes knowledge and dexterity that you just don't have or care to develop. That's where the gaming laptop shines, as a fast lane to PC gaming. No need to build a case or even buy a monitor. Of course, that convenience usually comes with a hefty price tag. Most vendors start their asking prices at around $1,400 (about £901, AU$1,894) for 13 and 14-inch products, whereas the biggest and beefiest 17 and 18-inch models can skyrocket upwards of $3,000 (around £1,931, AU$4,059). If you're ready to accept that a gaming laptop will almost never be as affordable or offer the same level of performance as a comparably-priced gaming desktop, then your decision is already made. But again, the gaming notebook is a device of convenience and portability over raw power. Without further ado, here are our favorite gaming laptops that we've reviewed thus far. 1. Origin EON15-X A desktop-grade CPU in an unbeatable gaming laptop CPU: 4GHz Intel Core i7-4790K | Graphics: Nvidia GeForce GTX 980M (8GB GDDR5 RAM), Intel HD Graphics 4600 | RAM: 8GB | Screen: 15.6-inch, 1920 x 1080 LED Backlit Matte Display | Storage: 240GB SSD; 1TB HDD (5,400 rpm) | Connectivity: Intel PRO Wireless AC 7265 + Bluetooth Wireless LAN Combo | Camera: 2MP Video Camera | Weight: 7.5 pounds | Dimensions: 15.2 x 10.31 x 1.40 inches (W x D x H) See more Origin EON15-X deals Great value Desktop-grade performance Razor thin viewing angles Origin EON15-X is a real head turner. It packs a desktop processor into a fairly compact 15.6-inch laptop that, while smaller, offers even more performance compared to other, bigger hardcore gaming rigs. What's more, this extra CPU power is clutch for users who need to edit video and other processor intensive tasks that a mobile chip can't handle. The larger CPU might lend itself to more processor-intensive applications rather than games. However, the extra kick of performance will come in handy no matter what game you're running. Origin has packed a ton of power into a much smaller 15.6-inch package that's great in almost every way. This machine is definitely worth consideration over all others and now that Origin has updated this monster with a Intel Skylake processor, you can bet you'll get even more performance mileage. Read the full review: Origin EON15-X 2. Aorus X3 Plus v3 A slim and light gaming machine CPU: 2.5GHz Intel Core i7-4710HQ Processor | Graphics: Nvidia GeForce GTX 970M GDDR5 6GB | RAM: 16GB | Screen: 14-inch QHD+ 3200 x 1800 Wide Viewing Angle LCD | Storage: 2 x 256GB SSD, RAID 0 | Connectivity: 802.11ac Wi-Fi; Bluetooth 4.0 | Camera: HD webcam | Weight: 4.12 pounds | Dimensions: 12.9 x 10.3 x 0.9 inches See more Aorus X3 Plus v3 deals Highly portable Blazing performance Trackpad is a weak link 4K screen makes text tricky to read High-res gaming machines are a tough nut to crack whether you have a baller PC tower and even more so with portable laptops. So it comes as a pleasant surprise to see the Gigabyte build out the Aorus X3 Plus v3 as a machine that can fly even with a 4K screen in tow. This 14-inch gaming laptop can pull off this feat largely thanks to its Nvidia GTX 970M graphics card packing 6GB of GDDR5 video RAM - whereas the the Razer Blade 2015 struggled to play anything at full resolution with only half the amount of memory for Ultra HD graphics. Thanks to RAID SSDs and the graphical power of the GeForce 970 GPU, the Aorus X3 handles the latest graphics-heavy games such as Elite Dangerous with ease at 60 fps even in the most frantic space combat. Read the full review: Aorus X3 Plus v3 3. MSI GT80 Titan An outrageously sized and powerful gaming laptop CPU: 2.6GHz Intel Core i7-4720HQ | Graphics: 2 x Nvidia GTX 980M SLI (16 GB GDDR5); Intel HD Graphics 4600 | RAM: 16GB | Screen: 18.4-inch WLED FHD (1920 x 1080) Anti-Glare Display | Storage: 256GB SSD; 1TB HDD (7,200 RPM) | Optical drive Blu-Ray Burner | Connectivity: Killer DoubleShot Pro 11ac + Bluetooth 4.1 | Camera: Full HD type (30 fps, 1080p) | Weight: 9.9 pounds | Dimensions: 17.95 x 13.02 x 1.93 inches See more MSI GT80 Titan deals Authentic mechanical keyboard Easily upgraded H-E-A-V-Y Impossible to use on your lap The MSI GT80 Titan goes above and beyond to give gamers a desktop experience in a notebook with a complement of high-performance parts to a built-in mechanical keyboard. However, weighing in at nearly 10 pounds and measuring roughly two-inches thick, this laptop is seriously pushing the limits of what you can call portable. For all the strain it'll put on your back and wallet, though, this 18.4-inch gaming laptop is a truly amazing piece of technology that can easily take on everything you throw at it. The Titan will absolutely plow through almost any graphically intense game you try to run. Hardcore gamers will also feel right at home with the mechanical keyboard then add in the the excellent screen, and this is a great setup PC gamers can feel comfortable using wherever they are. This gaming behemoth proved to be a monster with the best in class mobile GPUs so we can't even fathom what it could do with a Nvidia GTX 980. Read the full review: MSI GT80 Titan 4. Gigabyte P35K v3 An excellent gaming laptop for budget-conscious players CPU: 2.6GHz Intel Core i7-4720HQ | Graphics: Nvidia GeForce GTX 965M (4GB GDDR5 RAM); Intel HD Graphics 4600 | RAM: 8GB | Screen: 15.6-inch, FHD 1,920 x 1,080 Wide-Viewing LCD | Storage: 128GB SSD; 1TB HDD (7,200 rpm) | Optical Drive Super Multi DVD-RW | Connectivity: 802.11ac Wi-Fi + Bluetooth 4.0 | Camera: HD webcam | Weight: 5.07 pounds | Dimensions: 15.1 x 10.6 x 0.8 inches (W x D x H) See more Gigabyte P35K v3 deals Gorgeous IPS display Excellent simulated surround Bland style Thick screen bezels The Gigabyte P35K v3 is a nearly perfect machine through and through. It's amazingly thin for a 15.6-inch gaming laptop that offers great performance and decent battery life. Compared to competing models in this affordable space, Gigabyte easily outpaces the Asus ROG GL551 and Acer Aspire V15 Nitro. For $1,499 (about £973, AU$1913), the Gigabyte P35K v3 offers plenty of performance. Thanks to Nvidia's beefier, entry-level GTX 965M GPU, gamers can expect to play most games on medium to high settings at a playable 45-to-60 fps range. You'll even be able to play Far Cry 4 on Ultra without having to worry about the game slowing to a frame-skipping crawl. What's more, the P35K v3 features a colorful In-Plane Switching (IPS) screen. It renders hues brightly and accurately, while offering up excellent viewing angles up to an extreme 170 degrees making the Gigabyte laptop an excellent media device to share with some couch mates. Add in the immersive Dolby Digital Plus home theater technology, and Gigabyte has put together one of the nicest self-contained gaming platforms we've ever reviewed. Read the full review: Gigabyte P35K v3 5. Alienware 17 (2015) The Alienware 17 is an impressive refinement for this series of gaming laptops CPU: 2.5GHz Intel Core i7-4710HQ | Graphics: Nvidia GeForce GTX 980M (4GB GDDR5 RAM), Intel HD Graphics 4600 | RAM: 16GB | Screen: 17.3 inch, 1,920 x 1,080 IPS anti-glare display | Storage: 256 GB M.2 SATA SSD + 1TB HDD (7,200 rpm) | Connectivity: Killer 1525 802.11ac 2x2 WiFi + Bluetooth 4.1 | Camera: 2MP Full HD webcam | Weight: 8.33 pounds (3.78 kg) | Dimensions: 16.93 x 11.49 x 1.35 inches (W x D x H See more Alienware 17 (2015) deals Flexible desktop mode Excellent large screen Still quite expensive Slightly bottlenecked Amplifier performance Although you're looking at spending $3,049 (£2,581, AU$4,547) for the full experience, the Alienware 17 is one of those few outrageously priced gaming laptops that's actually worth it. The notebook is a fully capable gaming machine and, with the added power of an Nvidia GTX 980 inside the Amplifier, you won't run into a game you can't play on Ultra settings for a long time. And when you do, you can easily swap out the desktop GPU for a newer model. Alienware even says they're working on adding support for Nvidia's latest monster card, the Titan X. Alienware has done the gaming laptop-desktop hybrid right with an even leaner 17-inch monster and its accompanying Graphics Amplifier. The ability to use the screen, plus not needing to plug in a keyboard and mouse makes it a much more sensible solution than the MSI GS30 Shadow. And if you're looking for something smaller, the Alienware 13 also works with the optional GPU box. Read the full review: Alienware 17 (2015) 6. Aorus X5 A compact gaming laptop that has it all CPU: 2.7GHz Intel Core i7-5700HQ | Graphics: 2 x Nvidia GeForce GTX 965M SLI | RAM: 8GB | Screen: 15.6-inch 2,880 x 1,620 WQHD+ LCD with G-Sync | Storage: 2 x 256GB SSD, 1TB HDD | Connectivity: Killer LAN, Intel AC 7265 802.11ac Wireless | Camera: 720 | Weight: 5.51 pounds | Dimensions: 15.35 x 10.72 x 0.9 inches See more Aorus X5 deals Gorgeous screen Tons of storage Battery life Fan noise The Aorus X5 is one heck of a package packed into a compact 15-inch laptop. It comes rocking one of the industry's fastest processors, dual graphics cards, all topped off with an enhanced 4K display that reduces flicker and smoothes out your frame rate. Everything looks and runs beautifully on the Aorus X5 from vividly rendered photos to fluidly running modern games. The Aorus X5 is a worthy gamer status symbol you'll want to show off to every single one of your friends. Read the full review: Aorus X5 7. Origin EVO15-S Peak performance from a super slim gaming laptop CPU: 2.5GHz Intel Core i7-4710HQ | Graphics: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970M (6GB GDDR5 RAM), Intel HD Graphics 4600 | RAM: 16GB | Screen: 15.6-inch, 1920 x 1080 eDP Wide View Angle Matte Display | Storage: Dual 128GB M.2 SATA SSD in RAID0 (256GB Total); 1TB HDD (7,200 rpm) | Connectivity: Intel PRO Wireless AC 7260 + BT Wireless LAN Combo | Camera: Built-in 720P Video Camera | Weight: 4.3 pounds | Dimensions: 15.35 x 10.47 x 0.78 inches (W x D x H) See more Origin EVO15-S deals Super thin chassis Color rich, contrasty screen Short battery life Obnoxiously loud fans There's plenty to like about the EVO15-S, and while it comes at an expensive premium, it's one of the few laptops that are well worth the expense. This Origin machine is one of the thinnest and lightest gaming laptops you possibly buy. Meanwhile, it does not skimp at all with some of the latest cutting edge parts, an excellent 1080p panel for all types of media, three storage drives and 16GB of RAM. Plus there's also the option to throw on a 4K screen for a marginally priced upgrade. In time, more and more gaming PCs will be outfitted with Nvidia's latest GPUs, but for now, the Origin EVO15-S is one of the best-performing gaming laptops for a reasonable price. Read the full review: Origin EVO15-S 8. HP Omen A most sophisticated and attractive gaming laptop CPU: 2.6GHz Intel Core i7-4720HQ | Graphics: Nvidia GeForce GTX 960M (4GB GDDR5 RAM), Intel HD Graphics 4600 | RAM: 16GB | Screen: 15.6-inch, 1920 x 1080 Full HD WLED-backlit IPS touchscreen | Storage: 512GB SSD | Connectivity: Intel 802.11ac WLAN and Bluetooth | Camera: HP TrueVision Full HD WVA Webcam with Dual Digital Microphone | Weight: 4.68 pounds | Dimensions: 15.07 x 9.67 x 0.78 inches See more HP Omen deals Bold, unique design Sublime screen Pricey compared to competition Lacking screen brightness If you want a machine that doesn't follow the crowd with glowing alien heads and flaming decals, the HP Omen has a style unto its own. Steeply tapered edges give way to a plenty of lights and other little details to make this one of the industry's most sophisticated and attractive gaming laptops. Beyond the skin deep beauty, the HP Omen packs enough processing brains to handle anything from everyday task to hardcore PC gaming. As a mid-range system, it straddles the line of excellent power efficiency while still offering enough performance to handle the latest games. Read the full review: HP Omen 9. Digital Storm Triton A rare powerful and affordable gaming laptop CPU: 2.5GHz Intel Core i7-4710HQ | Graphics: Nvidia GeForce GTX 970M (3GB GDDR5 RAM), Intel HD Graphics 4600 | RAM: 8GB DDR3L (1600MHz)| Screen: 15.6-inch, 1920 x 1080 (Anti-Glare) LED-backlit Matte Display | Storage: 120GB SSD; 750GB HDD (7,200rpm) | Connectivity: Intel Wireless-AC 7265 + Bluetooth 4.0 | Camera: 2MP 720p webcam | Weight: 5.5 pounds | Dimensions: 15.16 x 10.67 x 0.98 inches (W x D x H) See more Digital Storm Triton deals Excellent performance Thin, attractive design Bland screen Heat ventilation problems The Digital Storm Triton is an attractive, powerful and, most importantly, affordable gaming laptop. These are three qualities you don't often hear in the same sentence, making this machine special for pulling together such a rare combination. Though it has a lackluster screen and trouble keeping cool, this Digital Storm laptop is still an incredible deal. It has enough computing power to play most modern games at 60 fps with just a few tweak in your graphics settings. What's more, the Triton has enough power to rival some of the biggest and baddest gaming machines we've reviewed. For $1,620 (about £1,063, AU$1,974), the Digital Storm Triton is a powerful little machine that's definitely worth a look despite all its flaws. Read the full review: Digital Storm Triton 10. Asus ROG G751JY The G751 combines top-end components with a great design CPU: 2.4 GHz Intel Core i7-4860HQ | Graphics: Nvidia GeForce GTX 980M 4GB | RAM: 32GB DDR3L (1600MHz) | Screen: 17.3-inch 1080p IPS display | Storage: 1TB hard disk, 512GB SSD | Optical drive: Blu-ray | Connectivity: 2x2 802.11ac Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 4.0 | Camera: 720p | Weight: 10.5 pounds | Dimensions: 16.3 x 12.5 x 0.79-inch (W x D x H) See more Asus ROG G751JY deals Good performance Great overall design Rather hefty Expensive The Asus ROG G751 is a gaming tank in every sense. At 17 inches and 4.8kg, it's bigger and heavier than some other gaming laptops but it sports a premium design spruced up with aluminum and houses powerful components that justify the chunk. Inside you'll find some of the best components available to notebooks to day that allows this mobile rig to play games at high detail settings. For all of its horsepower, the G751 runs quietly with a gentle hum, which isn't something you always get with high-end gaming laptops. It's big, bold, perhaps even beautiful — and definitely a beast. What's more, Asus has a new ROG G752 waiting in the wings with an new sleeker design plus Skylake processors - and on the horizon there's also the liquid-cooled Asus ROG GX700. Read the full review: Asus ROG G751JY

Apple iPhone 6S and iPhone 6S Plus now on sale in Australia Posted: 24 Sep 2015 04:58 PM PDT Prepare to see Apple fans dancing in the streets – or at least queuing in the rain – with the long-awaited launch of the iPhone 6S and iPhone 6S Plus today. At 8:00am this morning, Apple's flagship store on Sydney's George St flung open its doors to a wave of umbrella-clutching iPhone fanciers. With a line stretching down George St – not to mention those who camped out for a week or more in advance – the iPhone's knack for inspiring manic devotion appears to remain intact. The waiting game... As is often the case with iPhone launches, handsets will likely be scarce after the initial rush from the true believers, and those who don't obtain their device today may have to wait a couple of weeks at least before stocks replenish. Apple stores aren't alone in the iPhone frenzy, with Telstra, Optus, Vodafone and Virgin stores nationwide also unlocking their safes and freeing the Apple-y goodness within, though their stock is likely to be comparatively limited. While it's certainly an impressive piece of tech, the Aussie pricing for the iPhone 6S and 6S Plus has gone through the roof, with the entry-level 16GB iPhone 6S costing $1,079, compared with the launch price of $869 for last year's 16GB iPhone 6. It will be interesting to see how, or if, this steep rise impacts iPhone sales on our shores. Looking for a new Apple handset? Check out the best Australian iPhone 6S plans and the best Australian iPhone 6S Plus plans.

In Depth: Dolby Atmos: an in-depth guide to the premature speaker tech Posted: 24 Sep 2015 03:57 PM PDT Dolby Atmos Hands On Dolby Atmos promises to be the future of sound. With its object-oriented audio engineering and its up-or-down-firing speakers, Atmos is changing the way home theaters are set up and, more importantly, how sound is distributed in the room. In the past, we've explored how exactly Dolby Atmos is the future of cinema sound, as well as how the technology is hacking our ears. But this is the first time we've taken the technology home, set it up on our own and tried to replicate the life-changing auditory experience of hearing Dolby Atmos in theaters. The experiment was challenging to say the least, taking hours of research and planning, setting up the system and finally finding something to watch with it. Consider this a field guide into next-level home entertainment. Or, if you don't plan on making the leap into the aural unknown, a sneak peek at what's to come in the next five years. Step 1. Finding the system Surprisingly, finding a Dolby Atmos-compatible system is the easiest part of the process. Major audio manufacturers – like Onkyo, Denon, Yamaha and Pioneer – all make audio/visual receivers capable of processing Dolby Atmos audio tracks, with few distinctions for the layman between the mid-tier models. For the one-day experiment, I went with an Onkyo TX-NR747 receiver and its SKS-HT594 5.1.2 home theater in a box, which is five speaker units with surround sound and a subwoofer. I paired these up with a pair of old Pioneer tower speakers I have, and the result was a room-filling orchestra composed of tweeters, subwoofers and drivers. Why this setup instead of a Klipsch or purely Pioneer pairing? The SKS-HT594 has front left and front right speakers that do double duty as both left and right channels, as well as the additional two height channels needed for Dolby Atmos. This means I didn't need to completely rewire my entire living room and saved myself a bunch of time. Now, down the road, I could see myself switching to a 9.1.2 or even a 9.1.4 setup (left/right audio, center, three sets of L/R surround, a subwoofer and four ceiling speakers), but I decided not to get greedy on my first time working with Atmos. The takeaway here is that, as long as both the receiver and speakers are Dolby Atmos-ready, you're all set. Confused about where to start shopping? Dolby offers a handy catalog of all the current Atmos-ready products. Step 2. Wiring and configuring the system With system in hand, it came time for the fun part: wiring. Like most systems, Onkyo's HTiB (or home theater in a box) comes with color-coded cables. Match positive ends to positive terminals of the same color, and you're in business. The only real difference between Dolby Atmos and your run-of-the-mill speakers is that the former will have two sets of terminals – one for front left and right audio and one for height left and right – instead of one. Make sure both are connected to the proper terminals on the receiver. Once the stars have aligned and your speakers are connected, run the setup on the receiver to calibrate the the system. I won't walk you through the long and sometimes arduous process of setting up a system, but make sure when you select a configuration you choose something with three digits (e.g. 5.1.2 or 7.1.2, etc), which indicates that you want to enable Dolby Atmos. After you've got your system placed perfectly comes the moment of truth. Step 3. Finding content and testing it out We're in the home stretch. Now, all I needed to find was some Dolby Atmos content. The best place to start? YouTube, of course. (Protip: It seems like whenever I test out a new technology – 4K UHD, for instance – YouTube always seems to have a sample of what I need.) When it comes time to test out your Dolby Atmos system, check out the reference videos provided straight from Onkyo or another audio company to make sure you really can hear a difference. So, what are you looking for? Dolby Atmos creates a sound bubble of audio. You should be able to hear raindrops falling from the sky and thunder in clouds that sound like they're 10 feet above your head. Ideally, it should feel like your room is filled with sound from every direction. Two videos are particularly helpful in this regard: Amaze, a short one-minute clip of a rainforest in a thunderstorm, and Conductor, an even shorter movie of a little girl conducting nature sounds. In both videos you should be able to hear objects move from one speaker to the next and overhead noise. If you don't, re-check the connections or dive back into the settings. While I've heard those sound effects in Dolby's labs on cinema-quality speakers, they weren't there with the same force or fullness during my in-home experience. Instead of the rain engulfing my living room, it sounded distant, as if rain was outside the windows. As for the plethora of animal sounds packed into Dolby's demos, they again sounded accurate and real, but not as if they were within the same room. It's another scenario wherein marketing and press previews can paint a more vivid picture than what the mainstream ends up seeing. (You know, like the Big Macs in the ads versus what's in the wrapper?) It's also a matter of the equipment available to me against what, say, Onkyo can muster for a demo. Plus, Dolby Atmos works best in a smaller room with a level ceiling. Changing the slope of the ceiling messes with the reflection angle of the surround sound. In my medium-sized, cathedral-ceiling apartment, I again didn't have the best of luck recreating the nuanced and perfectly balanced audio experience I've had at Dolby's labs, but that said, there were a few moments when everything came together and worked perfectly. Atmos is a lot like 4K, in a way If everything sounds right to you, Dolby outlines five other primary sources for Atmos content, including games on PS4, Blu-ray, TV shows and movies from Netflix, content on the Amazon Fire TV and, lastly, films on Vudu, the Walmart-owned video streaming service. Now, problematically at the time of testing, I didn't have all of these on hand - and I expect you might find yourself in a similar situation. I'm not overly fond of replacing my DVD collection or older Blu-ray collection with Atmos-enhanced discs, nor does the idea of paying more for Dolby Atmos speakers sit well with me. But, like the advent of Blu-ray, new technology is expensive. We're reluctant to upgrade to something we're still unsure of until it comes down in price and eventually becomes the status quo. The good news is that, while the technology is still in its infancy, it's still really clever and interesting technology that will revolutionize the home cinema once it becomes the standard in the same way 5.1 or 7.1 surround sound is now. Like Ultra-HD, there's not a lot of content out there to support the tech, but do a bit of digging and you'll uncover some auditory gems. The big question: Should you upgrade your system to Dolby Atmos? If you're an entertainment junky keen on having the latest and greatest tech – i.e. you already own a 4K TV and a seriously sweet surround sound system – then yes. But if you're an average movie or TV buff, I would wait until the tech begins to normalize. Still on the fence? Wait until CES 2016, where I'm sure we'll hear even more about Atmos and its main contender, DTS:X. What you need to know about home entertainment in 2015

You haven't seen Pluto until you see it in color Posted: 24 Sep 2015 03:31 PM PDT NASA has released some of the highest-resolution colour images of Pluto from New Horizons, to give us a stunning look at the dwarf planet. In the image above, which is part of a larger swath, has had color details added using New Horizons' wide-angle Ralph/Multispectral Visual Imaging Camera. "Pluto's surface colors were enhanced in this view to reveal subtle details in a rainbow of pale blues, yellows, oranges, and deep reds," NASA explained. "Many landforms have their own distinct colors, telling a wonderfully complex geological and climatological story that we have only just begun to decode." In the image above, it almost looks like you're looking at the Star Wars planet, Tatooine, as in the entire high-resolution swath, which you can see here, you can see areas that look like dunes, and what NASA says an older shoreline of a shrinking glacial ice lake, and fractured ice mountains with sheer cliffs. NASA also released an image of Pluto, that it says looks more "like tree bark or dragon scales than geology." "It's a unique and perplexing landscape stretching over hundreds of miles," said William McKinnon, the New Horizons' Geology, Geophysics and Imaging team's deputy lead. You can check out more of the images on NASA's site, and we expect to see more high-res images of Pluto to emerge in the coming weeks. NASA last week released a video that lets you go on an aerial tour of Pluto Image credit: NASA/JHUAPL/SwRI

Pentax gears up for its full-frame DSLR launch with a new zoom lens Posted: 24 Sep 2015 03:01 PM PDT Just a few days after our story about the new Pentax full frame DSLR teaser page, Pentax has announced a new standard zoom lens for this camera. The HD PENTAX-D FA 24-70mmF2.8ED SDM WR offers a 2.9x zoom range covering standard everyday wideangle to short telephoto focal lengths and matches similar premium-quality optics for full-frame Canon and Nikon cameras. The constant f/2.8 maximum aperture is what marks this out as a pro lens – and this is effectively what you're paying for. Consumer lenses, to keep down the cost and weight, use variable aperture zooms, so that a typical cheap kit lens might have a maximum aperture of f/3.5 at its shortest zoom setting but can only offer f/5.6 at its maximum zoom. Constant aperture advantages A constant aperture zoom like this new Pentax model offers three advantages over a consumer lens – faster shutter speeds at maximum zoom, better 'bokeh', or shallow depth of field effects for blurred backgrounds, and the ability to shoot in low light without having to bump up the ISO as high. Interestingly, Pentax makes no mention of an image stabilization system in this or any other of its full-frame lenses. Is this a hint that the new full-frame DSLR will have Pentax's SR Shake Reduction system built in, just like its smaller APS-C models? 'SDM' in the product name indicates that the new Pentax 24-70mm f/2.8 uses Pentax's Supersonic Direct-drive Motor, which is designed to deliver quiet, high-speed autofocus. It should be a lot more refined than the 18-55mm kit lens supplied with the company's APS-C DSLRs, befitting the new camera's professional status. 'WR' stands for weather resistance – this is a lens designed for tough outdoor use. This is not the only full-frame lens in the Pentax range. Pentax also has 50mm and 100mm full-frame macro lenses updated from its days as a film camera maker, and in February 2015 announced new full-frame 70-200mm f/2.8 and 150-450mm f/4.5-5.6 telephoto zooms. Price and availability The price does reflect the 24-70mm f/2.8's professional aspirations – it will cost £1,149.99 (about US$1,750, AU$2,500) when it goes on sale in late October 2015. This is, however, on the same level as comparable full-frame pro lenses from Nikon and Canon. If you want this lens but can't wait for the new full-frame camera, you can use it on a regular APS-C format Pentax DSLR in the meantime. The smaller sensor means the effective focal length becomes a slightly longer 37-107mm, but you still get the benefit of that constant f/2.8 maximum aperture. Pentax is some way from the full frame lens range it will need to compete with Canon and Nikon's full frame cameras, but it's made a good start. All it needs now is a super-wideangle 14-24mm f/2.8 lens to go with the 24-70m f/2.8 and 70-200mm f/2.8 to complete the 'holy trinity' of everyday full frame professional lenses. Pentax full-frame DSLR put back to early 2016 Best full frame DSLR What camera should I buy? How to use the techradar camera channel

iOS Tips: iOS 9 Wallet: Using the shortcut, loyalty cards and more Posted: 24 Sep 2015 02:36 PM PDT Alongside the fresh new San Francisco font and the News app that replaces Newsstand, the biggest change to the iOS 9 home screen may be the arrival of Wallet, the rebranded name for the former built-in Passbook. However, the update isn't simply cosmetic: There are a few new features and improvements coming along for the ride, although some of them haven't been enabled quite yet. Let's take a quick look at what's new. (And for even more iOS 9 tips, click here.) Welcome Discover If you've been hanging onto a Discover-branded credit card in a physical wallet lamenting the fact that Apple Pay doesn't support this preferred payment method, your long, national nightmare comes to an end with the update to iOS 9. But it gets even better: Not only can you now add Discover credit cards alongside Visa, MasterCard, and American Express, but cardholders will also be eligible to receive a 10 percent Cashback Bonus through the end of 2015 on up to $10,000 worth of in-store purchases. (Discover It Miles, Miles, and Escape cardholders earn an extra 10 miles per dollar on the same amount of purchases.) Discover cards can be added to Wallet on iPhone 6, iPhone 6 Plus, iPhone 6s, and iPhone 6s Plus devices as well as Apple Watch, and requires nothing more than a quick verification by text message, email, or phone call. Store Credit Cards, Too The iOS 9 Wallet app will also mark the arrival of retailer-specific credit cards to the Apple Pay fold, with Best Buy, BJ's Wholesale Club, JCPenney, and Kohl's already lined up to support the feature. Apple has yet to announce when store charge customers can add such cards, though — we tried while writing this article using our Best Buy card, but it came back ineligible. Once available, adding a supported store-branded credit card is exactly the same as Visa, MasterCard, Amex, or Discover: Tap the plus sign in the upper right corner of the Wallet, then follow the on-screen instructions to snap a picture of your card and verify with the three-digit code on back (four on front for Amex); cards can be added to Apple Watch using the built-in app. Easier Access Although Apple Pay has always worked without unlocking your iPhone, accessing the cards stored in Passbook often required drilling down into the app itself or being near a supported retail location that would automatically offer to display a loyalty card via push notification. iOS 9 makes things a bit easier on us all with a new shortcut: Just double-click on the Home button while your iPhone is locked, and up pops the Wallet app with your default payment card ready for action, and all of your other credit cards, store credit cards, and loyalty cards just a tap away. Get Rewarded Although the previous Passbook app was often convenient for adding certain types of rewards cards, it wasn't always clear who actually supported them. iOS 9 promises to expand the available options by receiving and redeeming rewards automatically whenever you use Apple Pay. Already announced is support for Dunkin' Donuts DD Perks, Walgreens Balance Rewards and MyPanera, and Apple's official screenshots also tease My Coke Rewards, Kohl's Yes2You, Wegmans Food Markets, and Starbuck's, which previously offered a Passbook for gift card payments and racking up points. As of this writing, however, this feature of Wallet has yet to be implemented. More Retailers Though not a new feature per se, there will be plenty of new retailers ready to accept Apple Pay on your iPhone or Apple Watch this year. Announced during the iOS 9 unveil back in June, Best Buy lit up support for the mobile payment service in its retail stores last week after accepting Apple Pay for in-app payments earlier this year. Other retailers with upcoming support for Apple Pay include B&H Photo, Baskin Robbins, BevMo!, Big Lots!, JCPenney, Jonny Rockets, Kohl's, LEGO, Dunkin' Donuts, El Pollo Loco, Express, Forever 21, Levi's, Peet's Coffee, Trader Joe's, and White Castle. Last but not least, scores of small retailers will soon be able to jump into the Apple Pay action, thanks to Square integration courtesy of new reader hardware. You can bet there will be plenty of additional retailers jumping on board Wallet and Apple Pay in the very near future as well.

Updated: 10 Best Ultrabooks 2015: top thin and light laptops reviewed Posted: 24 Sep 2015 02:30 PM PDT Best Ultrabooks Ultrabooks have come a long way since they were first introduced to compete with the MacBook Air world. They're thin and light while featuring powerful Intel Core processors, fast SSD storage and superb battery life. But more than anything else they represent the bleeding edge of laptops; case in point the side shrinking Dell XPS 13 and the unbelievably light Lenovo LaVie Z. Of course, this all means Ultrabook also come at a premium. Don't be surprised with prices that start at $999 (around £584, AU$1,064) just for the low-end and nearly $2,000 (around £1,169, AU$2,131) at the very high end. It's an arms race in the Ultrabook world and there's no room for losers in this space, as such it's hard not to find a great machine. But if you're looking for the very best cream of the crop, you've come to the right place. 1. Dell XPS 13 Possibly the best laptop on the planet, Dell's latest is a masterpiece CPU: 2.2GHz Intel Core i5-5200 | Graphics: Intel HD Graphics 5500 | RAM: 8GB | Screen: 3,200 x 1,800 | Storage: 230GB SSD | Connectivity: 802.11 AC, Bluetooth 4.0 | Camera: 720p | Weight: 2.8 pounds See the best Dell XPS prices Gorgeous display Super lightweight No ethernet port Off-centre webcam The new Dell XPS 13 is a 13.3-inch notebook, but it has the small footprint of an 11-inch machine. Fortunately for us, the XPS 13 isn't all beauty and no brains. This laptop features the horsepower to make work and play enjoyable, and it has just enough battery life to never leave you in a lurch. Regardless of whether you choose to upgrade to the touchscreen quad HD+ version, or if you stand pat with the full HD model, the Dell XPS 13 will provide you with a delightful experience for years to come. Read the full review: Dell XPS 13 2. Asus ZenBook UX305 A truly excellent ultrabook at a very agreeable price point CPU: 800MHz Intel Core M 5Y10 | Graphics: Intel HD Graphics 5300 | RAM: 8GB | Screen: 13.3-inch 1920x1080 | Storage: 256GB SSD | Connectivity: 802.11n + Bluetooth 4.0 | Camera: 720p | Weight: 2.6 pounds | Dimensions: 12.8 x 8.9 x 0.5 inches See the best Asus ZenBook UX305 prices Very thin and light Incredible performance Wonky video driver Tinny speakers The ZenBook UX305 is a superbly-built, fully metal machine that's thin, light and very attractive. This lightweight system can easily take on any task whether its browsing the web, watching video or editing images. What's more, you get excellent battery life out of this machine all while doing. The most striking thing about the UX305 is that it comes at a $699 or £649 (about AU$902) price. While it isn't exactly a shining symbol of innovation in the Ultrabook space, it is the most affordable Ultrabook out today and it won't disappoint you. Read the full review: Asus ZenBook UX305 3. Asus ZenBook Pro UX501 An attractive alternative to a certain fruit-flavoured laptop CPU: 2.6GHz Intel Core i7-4720HQ | Graphics: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 960M | RAM: 16GB | Screen: 15.6-inch, 3840 x 2160 IPS Display | Storage: 512GB PCIe x4 SSD | Connectivity: Intel PRO Wireless AC 7260 + BT Wireless LAN Combo | Camera: Built-in 720P Video Camera | Weight: 5.0 pounds | Dimensions: 15.08 x 10.04 x 0.84 inches See the best Lenovo Asus ZenBook Pro UX501 prices Bright, vibrant screen Excellent performance Feels heavy Mediocre battery life If you're looking for a laptop with a little more meat on its bones but don't want to break the bank, the Asus ZenBook Pro UX501 is a stylish contender. It features a bright, vibrant 4K display and simply flies with the fastest storage drive around. While it's not the lightest Ultrabook around, it comes with a very capable processor and a dedicated graphics card to handle some light gaming too. The UX501's meaty innards and affordability make it an attractive option for content creators and media buffs alike. Read the full review: Asus ZenBook Pro UX501 4. Lenovo LaVie Z The lightest Ultrabook in the world CPU: 2.40GHz Intel Core i7-5500U | Graphics: Intel HD Graphic 5500 | RAM: 8GB | Screen: 13.3-inch WQHD (2560 x 1440) LED anti-glare | Storage: 256GB SSD | Connectivity: Wi-Fi 802.11 ac and Bluetooth 4.0 | Camera: 720p HD | Weight: 1.87 pounds | Dimensions: 12.56 x 0.67 x 8.35 inches See more Lenovo LaVie Z deals Core i7 processor Excellent WQHD screen Mediocre battery life Astronomical price tag By creating the 1.87-pound LaVie Z, Lenovo has created the lightest laptop in the world. Aside from its lightweight chassis, the Lavie Z offers performance and display are among the best available today. However, the laptop's somewhat questionable build quality, inferior battery life, and inflated price tag are qualities that could turn many off from what is an otherwise splendid device. Read the full review: Lenovo LaVie Z 5. HP EliteBook Folio 1020 G1 A thin, attractive business laptop posing as an Ultrabook CPU: 1.2GHz dual-core Intel Core M-5Y71 | Graphics: Intel HD Graphics 5300 | RAM: 8GB | Screen: value | Storage: 256GB M.2 SSD | Connectivity: Bluetooth 4.0; dual-band 802.11ac (B/G/N), dual-band Wi-Fi | Camera: 720p webcam | Weight: 2.68-pound | Dimensions: 12.2 x 8.27 x 0.62-inch See more HP EliteBook Folio 1020 G1 deals Sleek design and tough construction Fingerprint scanner, enterprise security Underpowered Intel Core M performance No full-sized SD card reader Although it has the look and body of an Ultrabook, the HP EliteBook Folio 1020 G1 is very much a business laptop in disguise. Underneath its MacBook Air like exterior, this machine packs plenty of enterprise perks including fingerprint scanner, enterprise security and the durable build quality to meet a Military Specifications certification. At the same time though, the HP Folio 1020 G1 has a gorgeous design that's atypical of business-class notebooks. Cloaked in a unibody aluminum shell, the fanless Folio is one of the lighter, more attractive business portables in the world. Add in a gorgeous QHD screen, comfortably ergonomic keyboard, and this premium business machine is well worth its slightly premium price tag. Read the full review: HP EliteBook Folio 1020 G1 6. Lenovo Yoga 3 Pro A triumph for design, Lenovo's flagship is impressive if a little pricey CPU: Intel Core M | Graphics: Intel HD Graphics 530 | RAM: 8GB | Screen: 13-inch 3200x1800 | Storage: 256GB SSD | Ports: 2 x USB 3.0 | Connectivity: 802.11ac | Camera: 720p | Weight: 2.62 pounds | Dimensions: 13 x 9 x 0.5 inches See the best Lenovo Yoga 3 Pro prices Slim and light Attractive hinge Quite pricey Poor battery life If you're all about style and don't need a super powerful machine, things don't get much better than Lenovo's latest flagship Ultrabook. While it may not be as punchy as its predecessor (thanks in part to its low-power, fanless Intel Core M chip), it can still manage all of the usual tasks you would throw at it. And given its new metallic hinge and super thin design, the Yoga 3 Pro makes a better case than ever for its multitudes of usage modes. At any rate, this is one of the thinnest, lightest and sharpest Windows laptops to date. And while you'll certainly pay for it, the price for such panache will be worth it for style nuts. Read the full review: Lenovo Yoga 3 Pro 7. Acer Aspire S7 Acer's luxurious laptop is an ultraportable star CPU: 2.4 GHz Intel Core i7-550U | Graphics: Intel HD Graphics 5500 | RAM: 8GB | Screen: 13.3-inch, 1,920 x 1,080 touchscreen | Storage: 256GB SSD | Connectivity: value | Camera: value | Weight: value | 12.72 x 8.78 x 0.51 | Dimensions: 12.72 x 8.78 x 0.51 inches See the best Acer Aspire S7 prices Attractive glass design Full-day battery life Screen limited to 1080p Too much bloatware If you have a passion for white electronics, the Aspire S7's looks alone may seal the deal, but the laptop is more than just a pretty face. Acer packs in Intel's Broadwell Core i7 processor, a battery that lasts close to a full work day, plenty of storage and RAM all into a sleek body. The Aspire S7 is an attractive and powerful laptop, but not one without compromises. If you're willing to invest a little time to removing bloatware and can live with a keyboard with the shallow key travel, then the Aspire S7 rewards you with a very capable computing experience that will also look good on your desk. Read the full review: Acer Aspire S7 8. Toshiba Kirabook A high-res Ultrabook that's easy on the eyes CPU: 2.4GHz Intel Core i7-5500U | Graphics: Intel® HD Graphics 5500 | RAM: 8GB | Screen: 13.3 inch 2560 x 1440 WQHD touchscreen | Storage: 256GB SSD | Connectivity: Intel Dual Band Wireless-AC 7265 + Bluetooth 4.0 | Camera: HD webcam | Weight: 2.9 pounds | Dimensions: 12.4 x 8 x 0.37 inches See more Toshiba Kirabook deals Stylish design Good battery life Expensive Dim, bendy screen The Toshiba Kirabook (otherwise known as the Kira in the UK) sits at the higher end of the Ultrabook spectrum. It offers a high-res screen and a fully metal body that feels so premium, it even gives the MacBook a run for its money. While there were a few missteps with the annoying keyboard and dim screen, you'll be pleased with this long lasting machine that's easy on the eyes. Read the full review: Toshiba Kirabook 9. Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon An excellent business laptop that (almost) has it all CPU: Intel Core i5-4300U | Graphics: Intel HD Graphics 4400 | RAM: 4GB | Screen: 14-inch, 2560 x 1440 IPS | Storage: 180GB SSD | Ports: 2x USB 3.0 | Connectivity: 802.11ac | Camera: 720p | Weight: 3.15 pounds | Dimensions: 13.03 x 8.94 x 0.73 inches See the best Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon prices Clever adaptive keyboard Fantastic design Generally dim screen Average battery life The Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon (starting at $1,186, £1,198, AU$1,699) is a business laptop that straddles the line between form and function more than ever after this update. For those with a penchant for aesthetics, here's a brand new design with some fantastic new features. And to keep the no-nonsense business user happy, this is a plenty powerful piece of hardware. The connectivity on offer through this Ultrabook's super slim design profile alone is impressive. And the adaptive keys, while divisive, add a ton of function in a limited amount of space and an attractive presentation. Look out, MacBook Pro, you're no longer the only thin and light business option on the block. Read the full review: Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon 10. Samsung Ativ Book 9 Plus With stunning performance and screen, it doesn't get much better than this CPU: 1.6 GHz Intel Core i5-4200U | Graphics: Intel integrated | RAM: 4GB | Screen: 13.3-inch 3,200 x 1,800 | Storage: 128GB SSD | Ports: 3 x USB 3.0 | Connectivity: 802.11ac | Camera: 720p | Weight: 3.06 pounds | Dimensions: 12.6 x 9 x 0.5 inches See the best Samsung Ativ Book 9 Plus prices Incredible touchscreen Excellent battery It's expensive Full of bloatware Samsung was one of the very first PC manufacturers to jump on the Ultrabook bandwagon. It's done a fine job of representing Intel's baby ever since, with some stunning offerings. Now Samsung's Ativ Book 9 Plus (starting at $1,399, £1,412, AU$2,259) has kept the company ahead of the game for a while. It's a wonderful-looking unit that's thin and carefully crafted, with shiny, chamfered edges lining its all-aluminium chassis. Read the full review: Samsung ATIV Book 9 Plus

UPDATED: Oculus Rift price and release date a no-show at Connect conference Posted: 24 Sep 2015 01:20 PM PDT There was an Oculus Rift, a price and a release date at today's Connect 2 keynote, but it wasn't exactly the Oculus Rift consumer edition everyone was waiting for. Instead, today's press conference unveiled a new Samsung Gear VR that supports the Galaxy Note 5, Galaxy S6 and its other 2015 smartphones. It also gave us new details about the Oculus platform. But there was no official Oculus Rift consumer edition price, release date or pre-order information. That's the news we were all waiting to hear in the audience. Understandably, the team is probably still making sure every bit of the headset will ship as best as it can be - this has been clear from recent Oculus Connect sessions about the difficulty making hardware. Oculus Rift release date window, price estimate It's always disappointing when a product confirms a specific date, then has to push back. Oculus likely doesn't want to promise something it can't deliver on time. That leaves us with the current, rather wide release window of the first quarter of 2016. In other words, the Oculus Rift consumer edition launch will happen in January, February or March. Oculus has been even more vague about the price. The Rift DK2 price is $350 (about £300, AU$497), which gives us an idea of what the final version could cost given all of its current components. A VR-ready computer or very high-end laptop isn't going to be cheap either, with a total price that could be closer to $1,500 (about £9,90, AU$2,132), with a PC and the Oculus headset included. Oculus CTO John Carmack still has to give his keynote, but he'll probably continue to discuss mobile VR, and leave the pricing and release date announcement to Palmer Luckey at a future event. Good news: the new Gear VR is really cheap

Star Wars Battlefront beta opens up to all on October 8 Posted: 24 Sep 2015 12:29 PM PDT EA has announced the Star Wars Battlefront beta is set to begin October 8, but will only last up until the end October 12. The beta, which is more of a technical test for game-maker DICE, will be available on PC, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, and will be open to everyone. The announcement of the beta also sheds some light on what we can expect from the game when it launches officially on November 17, with the beta to focus on three modes on three different planets. You'll be able to check out the 40-player battles of the Walker Assault on Hoth, which we have seen in trailers before, as well as the Drop Zone Sullust, which features 8v8 matches. There's also the online and offline split-screen co-op Survival Mission on Tatooine, which will have you facing hordes of Imperial forces - something we've also seen glimpses of in previous trailers. Along with the game beta, players will also be able to test out the Star Wars Battlefront Companion app, which includes the Star Card perk system, but during the beta, you'll only be able to access it via the web. Check out all the Star Wars: Battlefront news and trailers in the lead up to its launch

VIDEO: This is how much Razer cares about your gaming mouse Posted: 24 Sep 2015 12:01 PM PDT If you're a gamer, your mouse is your greatest tool. It's the sword and shield in medieval RPGs, your SMG in first-person shooters and an extension of your brain in real-time strategy games. Making something so precise and responsive, while simultaneously staying comfortable and durable after years of use, can be a challenge. These decisions are a full-time job for Stefan Blanchard, Director of Design at Razer, and his team. In an interview at the company's west coast headquarters in San Francisco, Blanchard explained the dozens of innovations that go into every new mouse Razer produces and gave me a sneak peek at its two newest mice: the Razer Mamba and the Razer Mamba Tournament Edition. The video gives you a behind-the-scenes look at some of the conceptual designs Blachard has created (those white, plastic mice) as well as some of the history of the company that created the gaming mouse as we know it. YouTube : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=19crCzQD5wg Razer announces a premium Xbox One controller of its own

Oculus Rift is taking Minecraft and classic games to a whole new level Posted: 24 Sep 2015 10:59 AM PDT Oculus Rift games are going to be the main driver behind sales of the virtual reality headset, and one of those games likely be the ever-popular "Minecraft for Windows 10." This full 3D edition of Minecraft can be played in both creative and survival modes and will be sold via Microsoft's Windows 10 Store as well as the Oculus store early next year. The Facebook-owned company is planning to launch an Oculus Rift consumer edition around this time, though the Minecraft for Windows 10 in full 3D will also work with the new Samsung Gear VR. We'll have demos of new Oculus content after today's press conference, and tell you what it's like to jump into Minecraft like never before. More Oculus games The Facebook-owned company also announced a mix of very old and new games at its annual conference. Giving it a jumpstart are classic titles from previously established gaming leaders, including Sega, Midway and Bandai Namco. No, Sonic the Hedgehog hasn't been announced - yet. At Oculus Connect 2, there were specifics about new games from modern-day developers, too. The team behind Monument Valley is creating a new VR game called Land's End. Another mobile game making the phone-to-Oculus transition is the smash hit Smash Hit developed by Mediocre (it's not mediocre). Finally, Oculus briefly showed a tile of new game titles including Darknet, Shooting Showdown 2, Bazaar, Into the Dead and Rocket Toss, all coming to Oculus Rift soon.

Samsung Gear VR just nabbed Netflix Posted: 24 Sep 2015 10:34 AM PDT The Netflix app is set to be available in the Oculus Store starting today, with a slew of other streaming services to follow soon. Oculus made the announcement during its Oculus Connect 2 conference, and while it is coming to the new $99 Gear VR in November, you'll also be able to download Netflix on to existing Gear VR hardware today. But Netflix isn't the only video streaming app coming to the Oculus store, with Twitch, Vimeo, TiVo and Hulu also set to be made available on Gear VR soon as well. Of course, you'll also be able to experience Facebook's new 360-degree videos on Gear VR as well as. A rise of VR video? Oculus also announced partnerships with movie houses Lionsgate and 20th Century Fox, and will allow you to watch blockbuster movies in a VR setting, probably through Oculus Cinema, though this hasn't been confirmed. We imagine that with the availability of these apps through Oculus, we'll begin seeing more and more VR video content being created, including movies and even TV shows. For example, with the Hulu VR app, Hulu said in a statement that along with being able to access its 2D content, users will also be able to stream "original virtual reality short-form," starting with the VR short film The Big One, which is produced by Lionsgate and RocketJump. Unfortunately, besides the availability of Netflix from today, we haven't been given more details on when the other video streaming apps will be made available. It is also still unclear if the apps will be available on the Oculus Rift, but with the availability of these apps in Oculus' app store, we imagine we'll be seeing these video streaming apps on Oculus' own VR gear when it launches next year. Why it's taken so long for the Oculus Rift to ship

Oculus announces new Samsung Gear VR that's super affordable Posted: 24 Sep 2015 10:17 AM PDT During Oculus Connect 2, Brenden Iribe welcomed Peter Koo, SVP of Samsung Mobile to announce yet another new Samsung Gear VR. The device is 22% lighter 310g compared to first Gear VR which weighed in at 379g and the S6/S6 Edge follow up of 403g/409g respectively. The new Gear also works with the recently announced next-gen Samsung phones: Galaxy Note 5, S6 Edge+ along with the S6 and S6 Edge. The field of view remains the same at 96 degrees however the IPD (interpupillary distance) has been decreased to 54 70 mm from its previous 55 71 mm for the Note 4 version. The touchpad is better and redesigned to pop out more making it easier to use, while the Oculus Home universe has expanded. More cushion has been added to provide greater comfort as well. Costing only $99 (about £65, AU$140), the price is far cheaper than past headsets. This new Gear VR will be available globally November 2015. A lot of content is making its way into VR, including classic games and streaming services

TechRadar gets to cut ribbon at new data centre Posted: 24 Sep 2015 10:10 AM PDT Data centre space in Central London has just received a significant boost after City Lifeline cut the ribbon on a new data hall at its Shoreditch base. The new hall brings a much needed uplift in capacity at the site right in the heart of London's Tech City and a member of the TechRadar team, Kane Fulton, was on hand to cut the ribbon to open the new facility. "The reason for opening a new data hall is to meet demand. City Lifeline has plenty of space to expand on its existing site and this is the first phase of a much larger expansion in progress to meet and succeed the requirements of our customers. The new Shoreditch Data Hall will enable the need for highly connected central London colocation for the next year or so, until the next phase is ready," said Roger Keenan, MD of City Lifeline. City Lifeline's new data hall has been designed with resilience and reliability in mind and the cooling systems are all-DX (direct expansion) to make sure the small amount of space available is used to its highest potential. Power, meanwhile, comes from a new 10,000 volt supply and there is capacity in this to be used when more expansion takes place, such as a second hall that will be built out once the first hall is at capacity. Eventually the new data hall will increase the efficiency of the entire City Lifeline operation and it's expected to function with the same operations staff that handle the existing data halls and private suites. Cloud and comms Customers that will take up the new space will be similar to City Lifeline's current base that is made up of communications and cloud firms. The data centre is also perfect for those need to be in Central London whilst at the same time specialising in data communications, voice telephony and cloud computing. In terms of the future, the data hall is in a conservation area, however, City Lifeline confirmed that it already has formal planning permission for an extension at the rear should demand dictate that more space is needed. Why location, location, location, also holds true for data centres

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