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Learn where windows xp drivers are hiding and make a backup.

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If you are one of those power crazy individuals who would like to show off this part of yourself with an equally cutting edge laptop then the Dell studio XPS 16 is the right laptop for you. This laptop is one of the best looking laptops that dell has introduced in the market that is brilliant…

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The final socket 775 Intel chipset is deployed, but is it worth it?

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We really want to like the new X2. In many ways, especially the memory buffers and multi-monitor support, the HD 4870 is a dual-GPU done right. And when it does work properly, it gets immensely fast results.

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Elgato has released Turbo.264 HD Software Edition which is a software-only version of its hardware accelerated video encoder in response to customer demand.

Designed to convert video for use on an iPod, iPhone, Apple TV or other device, this Software Edition is identical to the app bundled with the hardware dongle. It’s easy to use. Just browse to or drag-and-drop a video file and select an output format.

It can handle most popular video formats, converts VIDEO_TS, the format used by DVD video discs, but won’t rip an encrypted DVD. It’s not as configurable as Handbrake (a free app), but settings can be customised.

Testing results

In our tests, on a 3.2GHz Core-i3 iMac, Handbrake converted our five minute test video to iPod format in 86 seconds. Turbo.264 HD Software Edition took 57 seconds, with the hardware version a second quicker.

On a 2GHz Core 2 Duo iMac, Handbrake took 173 seconds with Software Edition converting in 115 seconds, and the hardware-assisted version in 81 seconds – the less powerful your Mac, the greater benefits of Turbo.264 HD.

With no upgrade path for Software Edition users, you might prefer to dive straight in and buy the hardware version, which is available for £90 on Amazon. As well as being quicker, it takes the load off your processor if you’re using your Mac.

For the lighter user, the Software Edition offers advantages over free alternatives.

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Any MIDI keyboard can make your copy of GarageBand or Logic come to life. But in a crowded market of bargain-priced ‘boards you need something with that little bit extra. M-Audio’s Axioms have been around for years and last year the new Pro line added the ability to control your software directly from buttons on the keyboard.

This feature has now filtered down to the more affordable Axiom 61 (£305), 49 (this model) and 25 (£195). So, rather than have your mouse in one hand while your other belts out Bach, you can pretty much forget your computer and get on with making music.

It’s amazing how simple additions such as dedicated buttons for stop, play and record speed up your workflow, and ‘tweaking’ synthesizers and effects with dedicated knobs finally feels like grappling with an antique Moog. (Antique Moog plug-in not supplied.)

DirectLink

It’s M-Audio’s DirectLink that’s the star. A quick install and the Axiom found our Logic setup (we had similar success with GarageBand and Ableton Live too), and all the obvious features such as track levels and pan appeared on the keyboard’s controls.

And if you use complex third-party plugs, you can get locked into the world of control changes and make any dial do anything in your DAW. It works too, and after grappling with controllers that promised the earth only to glitch and grump, that’s the biggest praise we can give.

The Axiom’s keyboard is ‘ultra-expressive semi-weighted’, but this amounts to it being very firmly sprung in the initial stages and rather ‘clacky’ and weak when depressed. However, the large angular profile does help fool the senses into thinking you’re pressing something more piano-like.

The drum pads are well-sized but spongy. Likewise, the rest of the rubberised controls require a good push to operate.

That said, compared to the frail plastic on other keyboards, this is much more gig-resistant. You’re paying for something just that little bit more ‘pro’ here, but it’s worth the extra.

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When picking through your snaps in iPhoto, do you wish you could zoom into or rotate your images with a pinching or twisting gesture? If so, Apple has answered your pleas. The Magic Trackpad brings the MacBook’s trackpad technology to Apple’s desktop range, and does so very well.

The Magic Trackpad is styled to perfectly complement your Mac’s keyboard. It’s made from the same brushed aluminium and sits at the same angle on your desk.

It’s a different experience to using a MacBook trackpad though. For a start, at around 13cm square, it’s roughly 80% larger than a MacBook trackpad.

If you own an Apple notebook, or an iPhone or iPad, then the Trackpad’s pointer control and gestures should be familiar. Drag a finger around the pad to move the cursor, and two fingers to scroll.

The whole surface of the pad acts as a mouse button, and you can set it up to replicate the functionality of a one-button or two button mouse as you wish.

Gesture control

But it’s the gestures that really shine. Scrolling, pinching, swiping, app switching, screen zoom, double-click – it’s all at your fingertips.

The Magic Trackpad is fully configurable via a new System Preferences pane installed with the latest software upgrade. Inertial scrolling, introduced to the MacBook Pro range this year, is also catered for. With this feature switched on, a scrolling window doesn’t just stop when you lift your fingers from the Trackpad, but maintains a momentum depending on how fast you were moving it.

The Magic Trackpad can’t replace a mouse for everything. Gamers in particular need the greater precision offered by a mouse, and a graphic artist would be better off with a proper pen-based tablet device, but for general productivity and day-today computing, the versatility offered by a trackpad is very welcome.

If you’re running Snow Leopard on a desktop Mac, then the Magic Trackpad could become a permanent fixture on your desk, but next to – not instead of – your mouse.

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You might look at the Freecom Mobile Drive CLS hard drives and get all nostalgic for tapes and other old analogue media.

But the drives themselves are absolutely standard: bus-powered through their USB connection, and capable of a decent, respectable 28MB/sec write and 35MB/sec read for large contiguous files.

They are coated in velvety rubber and come in chunky translucent plastic boxes which are not only great for protection during transport, but also hold a handy index card – and a short USB cable so you can connect the drives wherever you go.

The drives themselves have a little slip of card along the edge, protected by a plastic fascia, that you can write on – handy, since hard disks are now sufficiently cheap that it’s not out of the question to keep several drives for different areas of your life, even if you’re using your Mac for fun rather than work. (Indeed, the drives’ cases stack and lock together beautifully.)

Using hard disks with a standard mini USB interface is smarter than a cartridge system like the old Zip disks, as you don’t need hardware to load them; USB is likely to hang around for a while, and the disk mechanisms ought to be robust enough to be reliable medium-term storage.

You can buy a cheap powered dock on which to mount three of the drives at once through a single USB port.

But if you add a drive with one or more already docked, it unmounts all drives before mounting the new ones, which causes OS X to complain.

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Canon's line of imagePROGRAF wideformat printers is at the forefront of the digital printing industry. Canon provides specialized customer solutions and applications that range from fine art and photography to production printing; from technical documents to general purpose poster making.

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The world is flooded with computers in many forms. This can either be desktops or laptops.

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