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“Do you even make wired mice anymore?”

I posed that question to Logitech during a briefing this week for its new G603 mouse, yet another wireless addition to Logitech’s lineup. Just two months ago the company introduced  Powerplay—a mousepad that charges your wireless mouse while you play—plus a G900 refresh  to go along with it. So another wireless mouse? Already?

Indeed. Even weirder: The Logitech G603 wireless mouse is not Powerplay compatible—a fact Logitech ascribes to it being developed in parallel.

Don’t write it off yet, though. Powerplay is expensive tech, requiring a brand-new $150 G903 mouse and the proprietary $100 mousepad. The G603 is aimed at people who want a more traditional wireless experience, maximizing the power and performance you can get from just two AA batteries.

And Logitech’s claiming it’s really maximized that ratio. Abandoning the PWM3366 sensor introduced with the G502 and used as its flagship for the past few years, Logitech’s moved away from venerable Pixart entirely. Instead, it’s contracted a different company to make the new HERO sensor—an acronym that stands for High Efficiency Rating Optical.

As you can probably guess, HERO is meant to maximize battery life on wireless mice without compromising on performance. I’ve yet to test it, but Logitech claims that you’ll see the same performance out of HERO that you’d get from the much-loved PWM3366 sensor, but with much greater efficiency—like, 500 hours (around six months for most people) of intensive gaming on just two AAs. The company also revealed a G613 wireless keyboard similarly built around HERO technology.

The G603 features a switch on the bottom so you can also run it in low-intensity mode, which boosts that number up to 1500 hours, or 1.5 years of battery on two AAs, as well as Bluetooth functionality. High-intensity mode is most interesting though. Six months on two AA batteries with the performance of the Logitech G502 or G900? That’s pretty stunning. It’s already twice the capability of the previous generation G602, which lasted 250 hours and had the less impressive M010 sensor.

I’d still personally prefer Powerplay for its fire-and-forget simplicity, but at $70 the G603 is way more affordable and an interesting proposition indeed.

As for whether Logitech even makes wired mice still? Nothing to announce yet, but expect to see HERO crop up in more Logitech mice. Logitech assured me the PWM3366 isn’t going away anytime soon, but did note that HERO’s simplified internals offer benefits even to hypothetical wired mice—lowered weight, more design flexibility, and so on. It probably helps too that Logitech has indefinite rights to the HERO sensor—no ever-so-slightly-tweaked PWM3360 knockoffs here. We’ll keep you updated.

 

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Connecting your phone to your Windows 10 PC has never been easier—and with the hints Microsoft has dropped as part of the Fall Creators Update, it looks like the phone will be a big deal in future PCs.

Right now, if you own either an Android phone or an Apple iPhone, you can reply to texts right from your PC. In the future, you’ll be able to take webpages you were reading on your train ride and send them to your Windows PC at the office. Passwords? Who needs ‘em? And now, with a dedicated Phone section within the Settings menu, Microsoft appears to be setting up a framework for even stronger connections in the future.

For those of you frantically waving Windows phones—yes, you too can connect your phones to your PC, via the Continuum experience Microsoft debuted a little more than a year ago. Unfortunately, with limited hardware and tepid customer support, Microsoft’s Windows phone aspirations are basically dead. Instead, Microsoft has focused on bringing its ecosystem to the far more popular iPhone and Android platforms.  There’s just one catch: You’ll need stable and Insider beta builds right now, at least until (hopefully) the Fall Creators Update unites the two.

1. Reply to texts right within Windows

If you’re like me, you probably work best without distraction—and most of your electronic gadgets are primarily designed to distract you, with notifications, popups and audible tones to get your attention. Texts and phone calls are the worst, in part because we’ve programmed ourselves to prioritize those needs above everything else. Now, Windows 10 allows you to treat a text like just another email.

Here’s what you’ll need: an up-to-date Windows 10 PC, an Android phone or iPhone—and, most importantly, the Microsoft Cortana app for Android or Cortana for the iPhone. If you wish, Cortana can step in and largely replace your phone’s digital assistant. Even if you refuse her assistance, however, Cortana operates behind the scenes as the connective tissue between your phone and your PC. We’ve used the most popular phone platform, Android, for this article.

The key to connecting your phone and your PC lies within the Cortana app’s cross-device settings (Go to the app’s “hamburger menu” in the upper left-hand corner, then go to Settings > Cross device.) Make sure that the top three settings (Missed call notifications, Incoming message notifications, and Low battery notifications) are all toggled on. You can also toggle on App notifications sync, though of the four apps Cortana detected, some were obsolete (my discontinued Basis Peak fitness band app) and others were of dubious value, such as Google’s VR services.

A bit strangely, the ability to sync Cortana itself is off by default. If you toggle it on, the app warns that Cortana will have the ability to read all your messages. For now, there doesn’t seem to be any reason to do so, though it’s certainly possible that in the future your spouse might be able to text you a reminder—“pick up eggs at the store” and Cortana will interpret it as a formal reminder.

As you might expect, the capabilities that the Cortana app toggled on enable the corresponding abilities within your PC. When your phone’s battery drops below a certain point (usually about 15 percent) a low-battery notification will slide in from the lower right-hand corner, and will archive itself within your Action Center notifications. If you miss a phone call, another notification will appear. Texts sent to your phone will also appear as pop-up notifications.

What makes this especially convenient is the ability to reply to phone calls and texts right at your PC. If you miss a text, for example, you can click the notification (look for the downward-pointing caret) and a text box opens up. Within it, you can send a reply, and Cortana will talk to your phone and send it on its way. Even if you miss a call, you can send a text letting the other party know you’ll respond soon. Windows doesn’t allow you to actually call the other party back—either by phone or by Skype—though this could, presumably, be added to the future.

If there’s a drawback, though, it’s that this capability still isn’t as reliable as it needs to be. If you move among multiple Windows PCs, Windows can get confused about which one you’re working on, and send notifications to another. But even if you’re not switching PCs, Windows has an annoying habit of not always sending notifications until you shift focus between apps, or resume working from sleep or hibernation. Then a string of notifications pop up on your PC. Fortunately, you can still go into the Action Center and respond via text from the notification itself.

2. Pick up where you left off, on the web

Microsoft is still adding features to the Windows 10 Fall Creators Update, and Windows 10 Insider Build 16257 finally added one of the features Microsoft had originally promised: the “pick up where you left off” capability for phones. The idea is that you should be able to move seamlessly between Windows devices, specifically your phone and your PC. Again, this should be eventually part of the Fall Creators Update, due in September or so.

To enable this feature, you’ll need to do two things: link your phone within Windows, and download the required mobile app.

Insider Build 16257 adds a new section to the Settings menu: the Phone settings menu. There, the relatively spartan Phone settings asks you to connect your phone to your PC. To do so, you’ll need to enter your phone number to text yourself a link to the app you’ll need—Microsoft Apps, which began life as an index of the Microsoft apps within the respective app stores. A recent update enables the app to connect your phone to your PC. (It’s not clear whether you’ll eventually need both the Cortana apps as well as the Microsoft Apps to connect your phone to your PC, but for now, you do.)

Now, when you surf to a webpage—even on Android’s Chrome browser—you’ll have the option to “share” it to your PC, just as you might share it to Twitter or Facebook. You’ll have the options to share it now or share it later. Sharing it now immediately opens a webpage using Windows’ Edge browser. Sharing it later should place the link inside the Action Center’s notifications for later viewing, though a bug seemed to prevent that from working on my machine. (It appears that Build 16273 may fix this, based on the update notes.)

Right now, the sharing options are not available on the mobile Office apps, though you can always auto-save documents to OneDrive for later editing on the PC.

Note that Microsoft already provides a PC-centric “pick up where you left off” capability within Cortana, where users who work on more than one PC can theoretically resume their work on another PC. However, it’s of limited use. Click the Cortana search box, and then the “I’ve got more for you…” box just above. Cortana will then show you the apps you were previously working on. That’s of limited use: You’re really going to forget that you were working in Outlook?)

3. Bypass your Windows password and use your phone instead

By now, you’ve probably heard of two-factor authentication, where your phone is used as an additional authentication beyond your password. Use it!  But you may not know that you can avoid using your Windows password and use your phone as the primary login method to certain Microsoft apps and services—theoretically, at least.

Remember, two-factor security is based on any two of these three factors: what you know, what you have, and what you are. Normally, two-factor authentication works by asking you for your password (what you know), then texting a code to your phone, or using an app (what you have). Microsoft’s Authenticator app for Android and iPhone is the approved way to receive that code. The combination of the password you know and the code Microsoft sends to your device secures the transaction.

 

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As Windows 10‘s next big release date nears, the latest Insider Preview Build 16241 gives us a solid sneak peek at what the Fall Creators Update will look like. You’ll see a some significant new features, including Ubuntu support, update delivery options, and improved Task Manager visibility. But tellingly, Microsoft also opened its final “bug bash” challenge. That means the Windows 10 team is just about ready to button up the OS for its promised September debut.

Build 16241 also shows it’s serious because of the nature of its new features, emphasizing nuts-and-bolts improvements over new capabilities. For example, Windows 10 now offers a great deal more granularity into how Windows updates will be delivered, and how you can manage their bandwidth. Task Manager adds deeper insights into what’s going on with your GPU. Microsoft is also preparing for the launch of mixed-reality headsets with several updates to its MR capabilities.

Why this is important: Build 16241 marks the final lap in the race to the Fall Creators Update. Sure, it shows off some significant new features, but the simultaneous bug bash announcement signals that those will be the last additions. Remember, Microsoft has committed to a schedule of Windows upgrades in both March and September.That means the “shipping” version of the Fall Creators Update is just weeks away.

A greater degree of visibility within Windows

Massive Windows updates are part and parcel of owning a Windows machine. That doesn’t mean you have to like them, however. Part of the new Windows 10 Build 16241 includes what Microsoft calls Delivery Optimization Advanced Options, where you’ll be able to manage how much bandwidth Windows uses for updates. Typically, Windows tries to throttle itself so as not to not monopolize your connection. If you’re on a low-bandwidth pipe and watching Netflix, for example, the amount of Windows update data will slow to a crawl.

What Windows doesn’t know, however, is how much bandwidth is being used across your network, not only by other phones and PCs downloading information from the Internet, but also how much data is being sent from device to device. Now, you can manage that data.

That’s important for two reasons: The first is just the impact on your own network performance. But for those who live in rural areas or have signed up for a broadband plan with a strict data cap, managing that flow of information can be vital. Remember that your PC can also be used as a local “node” to send updates around the neighborhood, though you can turn that off.

To show how much data Windows actually requires, Build 16241 includes the new Activity Monitor, which tracks data to and from your network, specific to Windows and its updates.

If this level of visibility appeals to you, you’ll probably be happy to learn that Microsoft tweaked the GPU portion of Task Manager once again. Now, you can view the active GPU’s name and see which of its functions (including 3D, video decoding and video processing) are currently active. Microsoft also applied more descriptive labels to the tab processes used by Microsoft Edge, allowing you to see whether a particular Web page is slowing your system down, or a more generic service.

Prepping for mixed reality

Microsoft includes support for some fun in the latest build, too. Linux fans should be happy to know that the Bash shell now supports Ubuntu—an app that can be downloaded from the Windows Store.

Microsoft has also begun hammering out bugs within its mixed-reality devices—which have yet to begin shipping. It’s unclear whether headsets like Acer’s mixed-reality devices, which were shown off at the Build conference in May, will be ready in time for the Fall Creators Update launch, but Microsoft is apparently working hard to support them. The latest build includes support for USB motion controllers (with wireless support pledged soon) as well as a host of other improvements, including speech commands and a better teleportation experience. (In MR, users “jump” from spot to spot using what Microsoft calls “teleportation.”

We expected Microsoft to take a somewhat conservative approach to the Windows 10 Fall Creators Update, and so far it seems to be paying off. Assuming that the bug bash goes smoothly, that gives Microsoft about five weeks before September begins, and some wiggle room within that to ship the “final” version of the Fall Creators Update. Look for more of the pieces to fall into place over the coming weeks.

 

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From message stickers and 3D Touch to Live Photos and Apple Pay, iOS is stuffed with attention-getting features that grab headlines and demand rounds of applause at Apple keynotes. But some of iOS’s most useful features are, in fact, the oldest ones. They’re easily overlooked, particularly by new iPhone and iPad users.

Read on for 10 basic iOS features that every iPhone owner should know, like how to take a screenshot, the ability to long-press your way to draft Mail messages, a physical button that doubles as the Camera app’s shutter release, and more.

Take a screenshot

One of the oldest iOS features around also happens to be one of the most powerful: the ability to quickly snap a photo of whatever’s on your iPhone’s (or iPad’s) screen. It’s handy for everything from documenting buggy iOS apps to quickly sharing a text message thread with a friend.

To take a screenshot, just press the Sleep/Wake and Home buttons at the same time; when you do, the screen will flash and you’ll hear a telltale camera snap. You’ll find your screenshot sitting in the iOS Photos app’s Screenshots album or in your Camera Roll. From there, you can share it by tapping the Action button (the square button with the upward arrow).

Unfreeze a frozen iPhone

Every once in awhile, your iPhone may come to a grinding halt, perhaps because of an errant app, or maybe iOS itself has wandered into a corner that it can’t get itself out of.

Generally speaking, quitting a frozen app (by double-clicking the Home button, then swiping up on the app’s multitasking card) is enough to fix the problem. You could also try a standard restart (press and hold the Sleep/Wake button until the “slide to power off” slider appears).

But if an app remains stubbornly stuck—or, worse still, if iOS becomes completely locked up—there’s another way to get things moving again: by force restarting your iPhone (a.k.a., a “hard” reset).

On pre-iPhone 7 models: Press the Sleep/Wake and Home buttons—but instead of letting them go immediately as you would when taking a screenshot, keep holding them until the screen goes blank. In a moment or so, you should see the Apple logo, a sure sign that your iPhone (or iPad) is rebooting itself.

On iPhone 7 or iPhone 7 Plus: Press and hold the Sleep/Wake and volume-down buttons until you see the Apple logo.

Take a picture with volume buttons

Keeping your iPhone steady while snapping a photo can be tricky when you’re trying to tap the shutter-release button on the slippery touchscreen.

If you miss the feeling of a physical shutter release, here’s a tip: pressing either of your iPhone’s volume buttons will also take a picture, handy for snapping photos while holding your iPhone firmly in both hands.

Silence the incoming call ringer

Whenever you duck an incoming call by tapping the Decline button or double-clicking the Sleep/Wake button, you send the caller straight to voicemail. That might be fine if you’re declining an unknown or spam caller, but you might want to think twice before sending your touchy boss directly to voicemail purgatory.

Instead, try clicking the Sleep/Wake button once instead of twice. Doing so will silence the ringer without sending the caller straight to voicemail. After a few rings, they’ll roll naturally to voicemail, just as if you were simply unavailable to take the call rather than declining the call outright.

Type in all-caps

Nope, there’s not a separate Caps Lock button on the stock iOS keypad, but there’s still an easy way to type in all-caps mode: just double-tap the Shift key.

When you do, the Shift button will turn bold, and you’ll see a little underline just beneath the arrow. To go back to standard typing mode, double-tap the Shift key again.

Type characters with accent marks

Just because you don’t see any accent marks in the stock iOS keyboard doesn’t mean they’re not there.

To type, for example, “voilà” instead of “voila,” tap and hold the “a” key. When you do, a pop-up with a series of accents will appear, everything from acute and grave to circumflex and umlaut. Slide your fingertip to the accent mark you want to type, then release.

Shake to undo

When you’re tapping out a message but have a sudden change of heart about how to phrase your thought, there’s an easier way to start over besides tapping the Backspace button over and over.

Instead, just shake your iPhone; when you do, an Undo Typing pop-up will appear. Tap the Undo button to undo what you just typed. To redo the typing you just undid, shake your iPhone again.

Jump directly to your draft Mail messages

If you tap Cancel while composing a new Mail message, you’ll get the option to save the unfinished message as a draft. All well and good, but retrieving a saved draft message the regular way—that is, by tapping the Mailboxes button and navigating to the Drafts directory—can be a royal pain, particularly if you’re using multiple email accounts on the iOS Mail app.

Luckily, there’s a handy but hidden shortcut that will take you to all your Draft messages, regardless of which account you created them in: just tap and hold the Compose button. To continue a draft message, tap to open it, or swipe to delete it.

Create an event directly from a Mail message

If you receive, say, an invitation to lunch via email, there’s no need to memorize the date and time and plug them into a new Calendar event.

One of Mail’s handiest features is its ability to detect dates and times within a message. Mail will underline the date within the body of the message, and it will also put an “Event found” banner at the top of the screen.

Tap the underlined date (or just tap the “Event found banner”), then tap Create Event. When you do, a new calendar event will slide into view, with the date and time already filled in. Just fill in any additional details, then tap Add.

Put a website shortcut on your home screen

If there’s a site that you’re constantly visiting on your iPhone, you can create an icon for the site and pin it to your home screen. Once you’ve created the icon, it will act just like a standard app icon, meaning you can tap and hold it to rearrange it on your home screen, tuck it into an app folder, or even put it into the app dock.

Just visit a site in Safari for iOS, tap the Action button (the square one with the upward arrow), then tap Add to Home Screen. You’ll have a chance to rename the icon before you pin it to the home screen.

 

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Android 8.0 Oreo was officially named last Monday, which is when the final version of it started going out to Pixel and Nexus devices enrolled in the Android Beta program. Yesterday, Verizon started rolling out the same build of Oreo to Pixel and Pixel XL units it’s sold.

In the meantime, the Oreo update has been spotted arriving on many more carriers across the world, for supported Pixel and Nexus devices – which are the Pixel and Pixel XL, Pixel C, Nexus 6P, Nexus 5X, and Nexus Player. So at this point the rollout is pretty much hitting every device that Google’s in charge of, software-wise.

The company has also posted the usual factory images and OTA zip files for anyone to download (check out the Source links below). You can install the OTA zip if you’re tired of waiting to receive the update through an actual over-the-air rollout. Though if you own a supported device and haven’t yet seen a notification regarding the new software, it’s best to first try and manually check by going to the relevant Settings menu.

The build number is OPR6.170623.011 for Pixels and Pixel XLs on Bell, Telus, Telstra, T-Mobile, Sprint, US Cellular, and Rogers/Fido, and OPR6.170623.012 for every other carrier. The Nexus 6P gets the build ending in 013, but Google notes this is not for T-Mobile, US Cellular, or Fi – but hasn’t yet provided an alternative download. The Nexus 5X’s build is 013 also, while the Pixel C gets 010 and the Nexus Player gets nothing at this point – hopefully it won’t be too long before the console sees its update too.

 

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Cortana and Alexa just went from being rivals to being besties. Microsoft and Amazon’s respective digital assistants are teaming up to work together later this year, the companies surprisingly announced today.

That means you’ll be able to tap into Alexa’s smarts via Cortana on Windows 10 PCs and (further down the line) Microsoft’s mobile Cortana apps, or access Cortana via Amazon’s Echo devices and Alexa-enabled phones like the HTC U11 and Huawei Mate 9. You’ll need to specifically summon the assist, however, by saying “Cortana, open Alexa” or “Alexa, open Cortana.”

The timing might seem weird with Cortana-powered devices like the Harmon Kardon Invoke speaker launching this fall. But with both digital assistants owning a firm niche—PCs and Office software for Microsoft, smart speakers for Amazon—the collaboration helps them extend their reach without stepping on each other’s toes too much. Cortana and Alexa need to battle Apple’s Siri and Google’s Assistant, and unlike the competition they aren’t baked into smartphones by default.

“This agreement makes strategic sense as Alexa gets access to over 500 million Windows 10 seats and also gets access to high-quality productivity skills,” Patrick Moorhead, president and principal analyst at Moor Insights & Strategy, said in an email. “Cortana gets access to very diverse Alexa consumer and home automation skills.”

While the domain of digital assistants have largely been walled gardens to this point, Microsoft and Amazon are actively promoting how Cortana and Alexa work better together thanks to their focus on different aspects of your life.

“Say you are at work, and you receive a text from your partner saying, ‘We’re running low on diapers,’” Microsoft says in its announcement post. “In the future, on your Windows 10 PC, iPhone or Android phone, you could simply say, ‘Hey Cortana, open Alexa,’ and ask Alexa to order diapers using your preferred payment method for your Amazon account.”

Handy!

Conversely, Microsoft writes, “What if you’re making breakfast in the morning and need to know if you have enough time to drop off the dry-cleaning before work? On your Alexa device, you can say, ‘Alexa, open Cortana,’ and ask when your first meeting is. If you won’t have enough time, simply ask Alexa to open Cortana again and set a reminder for the end of your workday to drop off the clothes.”

You could also use Cortana to ask Alexa to control your smart home devices, since many support Alexa skills. Which begs the question: Will this kill Microsoft’s attempts at bolstering Cortana support before it really gets off the ground? The Cortana Skills Kit preview only launched in May. Allowing Cortana to access the thousands of available interactions available on the wildly successful Amazon Echo could squash the dream of Cortana-powered appliances before it happens. Time will tell.

 

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Bigger power comes to Asus’ slim, light laptops.

The battle over thin and light notebooks flared back to life at IFA 2017 on Wednesday. Mere hours after Acer revealed the Switch 7 Black Edition, a 2-in-1 laptop with a detachable keyboard and dedicated graphics chips, Asus unleashed an army of svelte new ZenBook laptops equipped with Intel’s new quad-core 8th-gen Core CPUs and discrete Nvidia GPUs of their own. We loved the last ZenBook Flip that crossed PCWorld’s test bench, so let’s dig in!

Asus beat the drum loudest for the ZenBook Flip 14, which it calls “the world’s thinnest 2-in-1 laptop with high-performance discrete graphics.” The 13.9mm-thin laptop packs the same somewhat mysterious GeForce MX150 chip as Acer’s Switch 7 to achieve that feat. Nvidia says the MX150 is three times more efficient and 30 percent faster than the GeForce 940MX it replaced. The laptop’s no slouch in other areas either, with a quad-core Core i7 processor, 16GB of RAM, and a 512GB PCIe SSD.

The ZenBook Flip 14 includes niceties beyond swanky graphics and a small size, though. Audio duties are handled by Harman Kardon, and the notebook packs a fingerprint sensor for Windows Hello biometric authentication. A “NanoEdge” bezel let Asus include a 14-inch 1080p panel while giving the laptop a similar footprint to most 13-inch notebooks—and that display can flip a full 360 degrees.

The ZenBook Flip 15 is a bit larger and swaps out Nvidia’s MX150 chip for gamer-friendly GTX 1050 graphics. Asus puts the extra space to good use, offering your choice of 1080p and 4K displays with a 178-degree field of view, Thunderbolt 3-equipped USB-C ports, and up to a 2TB hard drive in addition to everything you find in the Flip 14.

Asus says the Flip 15 is the most powerful ZenBook Flip ever. If you want to push your gaming experience even further, the company also announced the ROG Station X2. This second-generation Asus graphics card dock lets you power up your laptop with full-blown desktop graphics cards. It connects over Thunderbolt 3.

The ZenBook Flip S is even smaller than the itty-bitty Flip 14, measuring in at just 10.9mm thick with a 2.42-pound heft. Despite that tiny size the 2-in-1 harbors an 8th-gen Core i7-8550U processor, a 1TB PCIe SSD, and a fingerprint reader, as well as an option to upgrade to a 4K display.

The 14-inch ZenBook 3 Deluxe and 13-inch ZenBook 13 lack the rotatable displays of the Flip models but offer similar upgraded amenities, including thin-and-light designs, 8th-gen Intel Core processors, PCIe SSDs, Thunderbolt 3 ports, and tiny NanoEdge bezels. The ZenBook 13 also includes Nvidia’s GeForce MX150 discrete graphics. The company’s slightly thicker, but more affordable VivoBook laptops received the 8th-gen CPU treatment, too.

Availability and U.S. pricing for the ZenBook laptops weren’t announced. On the opposite end of the notebook spectrum, Asus’ ROG gaming brand revealed the ROG Chimera, a hefty gaming rig that brings buttery-smooth 144Hz G-Sync displays to laptops.

 

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Your Windows PC too slow? Here are nine speed tips to give your PC a performance boost without spending a dime.

Your computer is slow. Annoyingly slow. You can add RAM, or buy a faster SSD, but that costs money. No, the first thing you should do is try to make Windows faster. Thus we present nine ways to speed up your Windows 10 PC without spending a dime.

1. Give it the reboot

If your PC is behaving horribly slow, try rebooting. Yes, it’s an obvious solution, but people tend to forget the obvious.

The sleep or hibernate setting will save power, but only a full reboot clears out the cobwebs in Windows’ brain and gives it a fresh start. Do it every day if the PC is really slow.

2. Turn on High Performance

Windows assumes that you want an energy-efficient computer. But you can trade electricity for speed. Use this tip only if you’re willing to increase your electric bill and decrease your battery performance.

Right-click the Start button and in the resulting menu, select Power Options.

In the resulting Control Panel window, pull down the Show additional plans option. Select High performance.

3. Undo some appearance options

Windows works hard to make the screen easy on the eyes.  If your PC is underpowered, you may want to sacrifice aesthetics and gain some speed.

Right-click Start, and select System. In the resulting Control Panel window’s left pane, select Advanced system settings.

This brings up the System Properties dialog box, already on the Advanced tab. Click the Settings button in the Performance box (the first of three “Settings” buttons on this tab).

This brings up another dialog box. You can uncheck some of the options, or simply select Adjust for best performance.

4. Remove unneeded autoloaders

A whole lot of programs want to load automatically every time you boot. Each one slows down the boot process, and some continue to slow down Windows afterwards.

These are not all bad. Your antivirus program should load when you boot and keep running as long as your PC is on. Other programs that need to run in the background to work, such as OneDrive, should also autoload.

But some programs—even good ones that you use frequently—don’t really need to run all the time. You don’t want to uninstall those, but you may want to stop them from autoloading.

To see how bad the situation is, right-click the taskbar and select Task Manager. Click the Startup tab. (If you don’t see any tabs at the top of the window, click More details in the lower-left corner.)

The Startup tab will show you all the autoloading programs. As you examine the list, think about what programs don’t really need to keep running at all times. To stop one from loading automatically, right-click its entry on the Startup tab and select Disable.

If you don’t recognize the name of an autoloader, right-click it and select Search online to help you find more information.

5. Stop hog processes

Your computer may be running a poorly written process that’s hogging a lot of resources. To find out, right-click the taskbar and select Task Manager. (Once again, if you don’t see any tabs at the top of the window, click More Details.)

On the Processes tab, click the CPU column header to sort by processor usage. The top items will be the ones hogging the CPU. (If the top processes are all using 0%, the processes are sorted in the wrong direction. Click the column header again.)

Don’t assume that the top process is necessarily a hog. Some big applications are worth the CPU cycles. One way to manage these programs is to close them when you’re done with them. Another is to switch to a smaller program.

If the hog is Windows Driver Foundation, see this Windows Club article.

You can close a process from inside Task Manager. Select the process and click the End task button and confirm your decision. But this should be avoided.

When you’re done, click the Memory column header and repeat.

6. Turn off search indexing

When you search for a word across all the files in your Documents library, the results come up almost immediately. That’s wonderful, but it comes at a price. When you’re not searching, the indexing needed to create those fast searches slows you down.

To turn off all indexing:

1. Open Windows Explorer, right-click your C: drive, and select Properties.
2. On the General tab, uncheck Allow files on this drive to have contents indexed in addition to file properties.
3. In the resulting warning box, select Apply changes to drive C:\, subfolders and files.

Windows may take some time turning off the indexing. Get up and take a walk; it’s good for you.

There’s another option that will let you turn off some indexing but not all of it:

Type indexing in the Cortana field. Select Indexing Options. Click the Modify button near the lower-left side of the resulting dialog box.

This brings up another dialog box, with two sections. And yes, it’s confusing. Start in the bottom section of the dialog box, Summary of selected locations. Click any of these options, and it changes the contents of the top section, Change selected locations.

7. Turn off Windows tips

Windows 10 occasionally gives you tips about how you can better use the operating system. The problem is that, in order to see what tips you need, it keeps an eye on how you’re using your PC.

Yes, that sounds worrying from a privacy issue, but it also slows down your PC.

To turn it off, click Start > Settings. Select System, then select Notifications & actions in the left pane.

At the bottom of the Notifications section, turn off Get tips, tricks, and suggestions as you use Windows.

You might also want to explore the other notification options, and turn some of them off, as well. I don’t think any of the others slow down the PC, but they can get annoying.

8. Clean your internal drive

If your internal storage is almost full—whether it’s a hard drive or an SSD—that could be slowing you down. But if your drive has plenty of free room, skip this section.

Start with Windows’ own Disk Cleanup tool. In the Cortana field, type disk and select Disk Cleanup.

Wait while Disk Cleanup examines your drive. Click the Clean up system files button (this time you’ll need an administrator password). Then wait again for another examination.

Examine the options. If you find one called Previous Windows installation(s), you’re in luck. By checking it and clicking OK, you’ll free up a lot of space. You can check other items to get rid of them, as well.

Something else you might want to consider: Uninstall programs you no longer use.

9. Check for Malware

I doubt an infection is intentionally slowing down your PC. There’s no illegal profits from that. Plus it’s a sure-fire way to trigger a victim’s suspicions.

But some malicious code could be slowing down your PC, even if that wasn’t the criminal’s intention. So if you’re suspicious, read Eric Geier and Josh Norem’s guide on how to remove malware from your Windows PC.

If after performing these tips, your PC still feels sluggish, it might be time to upgrade your hardware. Start here, with PCWorld’s recommendations of killer, but shockingly cheap PC upgrades.

 

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The easiest way out (if not the cheapest)? Just upgrade to Crashplan’s business tier.

It’s been a week since CrashPlan decided to call it quits on its personal backup service. But CrashPlan isn’t going away—it’s just ending a program that probably wasn’t profitable. After the initial shock, home users should realize there’s absolutely no reason to panic—or even be hasty. The company will keep your data safe for an extra 60 days past the end of your current subscription, and it will keep its servers online until October 23, 2018. But it’s still a good time to figure out your next move, so we’ll walk you through the options.

CrashPlan option 1: Upgrade to a business plan

You needn’t leave CrashPlan at all if you turn your home plan into a business plan. Just pony up the $10 a month for the small business plan and keep on keepin’ on. The company (Code42) is also offering a 75% discount to users for the first 12 months.

CrashPlan option 2: Free or cheap alternatives

If the business plan doesn’t fit your budget, then what you need to do depends on how you used CrashPlan. If you simply maintained a backup of your current data with the service, you don’t even need to download your backup from CrashPlan. Just start backing up elsewhere.

There are any number of free services for small data sets: 15GB Google Drive, 5GB iCloud, 5GB OneDrive, and 5GB Dropbox. You may also choose from low-cost tiers of pay services, including the one CrashPlan recommends—Carbonite. In fact, Carbonite is offering a 50% discount for CrashPlan users.

CrashPlan option 3: Download archives

If you used CrashPlan for archiving—that is, you stored data on the company’s servers without keeping a local copy—then you’ll need to download that to your local PC before your subscription ends (plus the 60-day extension). The CrashPlan servers might be a tad stressed right after the announcement, but wait a couple of weeks and you should be able to download without undue delay. If you procrastinate, you could always move to the $10-a-month business plan until you got your act together.

CrashPlan option 4: External backup

If CrashPlan was your only backup, now is a good time to consider backing up your backup—combining a cloud service with backup to an external drive. Check out our backup software reviews to find our recommendations.

Note: This article was edited to capitalize the “P” in CrashPlan at the request of the company, as well as to note the one-year 75% discount for exiting users when they change to the business plan.

 

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Moving to a new phone can be a pain. Android might have the edge over iOS when it comes to tight integration with cloud services, but Google still has a ways to go when it comes to effortlessly transferring all your data off your old phone and onto the new one.

But it has gotten better. You’ll need to rely heavily on Google’s services, of course, but with Android Nougat, moving your personal info has never been easier. It’ll still take a some vigilance and a little work, but you don’t need to be an Android whiz anymore to ensure your data is ready to move the next time a catastrophe hits your phone—or you just really want a new one.

Know your backup options

Before you can do anything, you’ll need to make sure your old phone is signed in to your Google account. It almost certainly is, but head over to the Google tab in Settings to make sure.

Then, you’ll need to find your phone’s backup settings. On Pixel and Nexus devices there’s a Backup & reset option under the Personal tab in Settings, but the location varies on other phones. The easiest way to find it is to type “backup” into the settings search bar.

Once you’re there, you’ll see a couple options. On Pixel and Nexus phones, there’s a Back up to Google Drive switch that will enable several types of content to be backed up, including installed apps and accompanying data, call history, device settings, calendar entries, contacts, photos and videos, and, exclusive to Pixel phones, SMS messages. It’ll be backed up automatically overnight, so once you switch it on, you won’t have to give it another thought.

On other phones, you’ll see a Back up my data toggle. Turning it blue will ensure that your application data, Wi-Fi passwords, and various phone settings are sent to Google servers and at the ready when you sign in to a new phone. This way you won’t have to re-enter passwords to networks you’ve already saved. Yes, that means Google probably has all the world’s Wi-Fi passwords. But that’s a story for another day.

You’ll also see a second toggle called Automatic restore. Turning that one on will restore the data and settings if you decide to reinstall a previously deleted app.

Since backups work through Google Drive, if you head over to the app, you’ll see a Backups option in the sidebar. Inside you’ll see a list of any device that has been backed up, with your current phone occupying the top slot (likely with a funky name like SM-G955U or 2PZC5). Tap it and you’ll be able to see when the last backup took place and which apps were included in it.

Mail, calendar, and contacts

If you don’t want to use Google Drive backups, you can still make sure your most important things make it over when you power on your new phone.

Mail, of course, is the easiest. If you use Gmail, you need only sign in to your Google account to bring over all of your messages. And your other accounts, whether Outlook, iCloud, or Hotmail, will be just as easy. Simply download your favorite app, type in your username and password, and you’ll be on your way. Additionally, there are numerous apps such as Newton and Blue Mail that will keep multiple accounts synced with a single login.

For people and appointments, Google has you covered here, too. Even without a proper Google Drive backup, any entries inputted into Calendar on your phone will automatically appear on your new phone as soon as you open the app. The same is true with Contacts. Whether you’re opening the app itself or using the Phone app, your contact list will be fully synced with your new phone, no matter which phone you’re switching from or to.

Photos and music

Photos are rapidly becoming the one thing that absolutely needs to be transferred from one phone to the next, and Google has built a fantastic way to do it in its Photos app.

Available for all phones, it’s far and away the best photo management option, backups aside, so if you’re not regularly using it, you should be. To make sure it’s backing up everything, head over to the Settings in the sidebar and tap Back up & sync. Make sure the toggle is blue and the backup account is the same as the one you use for everything else.

Google lets you back up as many high-quality photos as you’d like, and it won’t count against your Google Drive storage. If that’s not enough resolution for you, you can opt to back up the full-sized original photos to your Google Drive, but it’ll cost you. While Google gives Pixel users unlimited backups of their original photos, anyone else will have to use their allotted Google Drive space, so you might have to bump up your storage to accommodate the extra gigabytes. Google Drive users only get 15GB free, so if your camera roll is bigger than that, you can pay $1.99 a month for 100GB or $9.99 a month for 1TB of storage. But whichever size you choose, all of your photos will appear when you open the Google Photos app on your new phone.

When it comes to music, there are two ways to do it. If you already subscribe to a streaming service like Spotify, Google Play Music, or Apple Music, just head over to the app in your new phone and sign in to access all of your songs.

But if you aren’t a streamer, Google Play Music will still help you get your groove on, letting you store up to 100,000 tracks for free. To get it to work, you’ll need to head over to the Google Play Music site, sign in with your Google account, and install the Music Manager app on your PC. After you select the source of your tunes, the app does much of the work, uploading whatever it finds and adding it to your music library in the cloud. Big libraries will take a little time, but for the most part the process is simple and speedy.

Then, when you sign into Play Music on your new phone, all your tracks will magically appear. You can choose to keep those songs in the cloud if you’re tight on storage, or download them to your new phone so you can rock out no matter how spotty your signal gets.

Passwords and bookmarks

If you use Chrome on your phone, you can also take your browser history, passwords, and bookmarks to your new phone. First, head over to the Google tab in Settings (on pre-Marshmallow phones it will be a separate app called Google Settings), and scroll down to the Smart Lock for Passwords option.

This settings stores passwords from supporting apps and Chrome sites to your Google account. Switch it on, and the next time you sign into Chrome on your new phone you won’t have to re-enter the same passwords over and over. It works on third-party apps, too, as long as the developers have built in support.

If you’re leery about app passwords being stored in your Google account, you can blacklist any app from using Smart Lock. Or you can forgo it all together and download a password manager. There are plenty of great ones out there, including Dashlane, LastPass, and 1Password, and they’ll all store your passwords in an encrypted locker. Most charge a fee, but it’s worth it.

For the rest of your web needs, head over to the Chrome settings. Tap on your account name and then sync to see everything that you want to store in the cloud, including bookmarks, history, open tabs, and saved credit cards. Once you select the ones you want, they will all be available when you sign into Chrome on your new device.

SMS and MMS messages

This one is a little trickier than the others. If you own a Pixel phone on Android 7.1 or later, there is an option for backing up your SMS messages, though it will leave behind any photos or videos. If you use Allo, you can turn on chat backups in the latest version of the app, and everything will be synced to your new device, including media. And, of course, if you use WhatsApp, Telegram, Facebook Messenger, or some other third-party service, you only need to sign in to the appropriate app to access your full chat history.

But the most fool-proof way to move all of your messages from Android Messages or your text-messaging app of choice to a new phone is an over-the-top service. There are several in the Play Store—SMS Backup+ and SMS Backup & Restore are two of the most popular and highest rated—and they act as a sort of middleman that collects your messages until you’re ready to transfer them to a new app.

It’s not the speediest process, so you’ll need to carve out some time to let it run if you have a lot of messages, but it works quite well. In a recent test, we used SMS Backup+ to back up and restore a batch of more than 2,000 messages on a test device without a problem. It’s baffling why Google hasn’t implemented a similar system in Android, but for now, apps like SMS Backup+ will certainly do the trick.

One word of warning, however: Don’t wipe your old phone until you’re sure your messages have appeared on your new one. This way you’ll be able to start over if something goes awry during the transfer.

Some software to ease the move

Most Android phone makers offer their own helping hands when it comes to moving over your stuff. Granted, they’ll work best when changing to the same brand (like a Galaxy S7 to a Galaxy S8), but they all generally do a fine job.

Samsung offers its own service called Smart Switch that’s now built right into Settings on the Galaxy S8. Turn it on and it will sync the same things Google does (contacts, calendar entries, etc.), plus your notes, alarms, messages, and even your home screen layout to your new phone. It works with non-Samsung phones as well, though it works best if you also use Samsung’s own Galaxy apps.

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