Maximum_PC_June_2017
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macOS Sierra, and it is an effective and<br />
welcome feature for people who tend to<br />
use computers at all hours of the night. It<br />
lowers the amount of blue light your <strong>PC</strong><br />
emits though its display, which can play<br />
havoc with your internal clock.<br />
What’s even better than the competing<br />
solutions is how Night Light enables you<br />
to adjust the tone of the color change, in<br />
addition to the standard setting of whether<br />
the mode kicks in at sunset local time, or<br />
activates within set hours.<br />
Microsoft has also thrown a lot of new<br />
features at its Edge browser in a bid to make<br />
us ditch Chrome and Firefox. As well as<br />
the aforementioned support for 3D media,<br />
it also includes a genuinely useful tab<br />
preview bar that gives you a visual overview<br />
of all your currently open tabs, so you can<br />
quickly and easily switch between the ones<br />
you need. This is a great addition for those<br />
of us who usually end a browsing session<br />
on the Internet with an unwieldy number of<br />
tabs open.<br />
You can also “set tabs aside,” which is<br />
Microsoft speak for saving open tabs as<br />
a collection, which you can then open and<br />
restore later.<br />
Edge has often felt a little neglected<br />
when it comes to add-ons and extensions,<br />
with popular ones on Firefox and Chrome<br />
often skipping Microsoft’s latest browser.<br />
The company is looking to fix that with<br />
the Creators Update, by bringing a large<br />
number of popular add-ons and extensions<br />
to Edge.<br />
Microsoft has also worked hard on<br />
making Edge as lightweight as possible,<br />
which means that if you’re browsing the<br />
web on a laptop or tablet, Edge should<br />
be less taxing on your device’s battery,<br />
which should mean more time before your<br />
machine dies.<br />
To prove its point, Microsoft has released<br />
a battery test video comparison, showing<br />
the staying power of the three most popular<br />
browsers side-by-side, pitting its own Edge<br />
offering against Google’s Chrome and<br />
Mozilla’s Firefox.<br />
The test was a simple one: which<br />
browser could last the longest while<br />
streaming full-screen video from Vimeo.<br />
Given that Microsoft is keen for you to see<br />
the results, there’s no prizes for guessing<br />
which browser came out on top—yep,<br />
Microsoft Edge.<br />
Edge didn’t just, well, edge the test<br />
either. Instead, it dominated proceedings,<br />
lasting a full 35 percent longer than Google<br />
Chrome, and a massive 77 percent longer<br />
than Firefox.<br />
While Firefox lasted just 7 hours and<br />
4 minutes before conking out, Chrome<br />
managed a full 9 hours and 17 minutes<br />
of streaming.<br />
Microsoft’s Edge browser, which has<br />
been specially tuned for the new Windows<br />
10 Creators Update, just kept on chugging,<br />
eventually notching up 12 hours and 31<br />
You can also use your device as an ereader, with built-in support for ebooks.<br />
The Creators Update brings more compatibility with “mixed reality” devices.<br />
minutes of streaming time before finally<br />
calling it a day.<br />
In terms of fairness, the three browsers<br />
were each made to run on identical Surface<br />
Book machines, each powered by Intel’s<br />
2.4GHz Core i5-6300U processor, 8GB of<br />
RAM, and Intel HD Graphics 520 GPU.<br />
Ensuring further parity, each device was<br />
muted, had brightness set to 75 percent,<br />
Bluetooth and location disabled, and the<br />
Quiet Hours functionality switched on.<br />
To be honest, it’s not quite enough<br />
for us to make the leap from our trusted<br />
browsers to Edge just yet, but it looks like it<br />
is definitely going in the right direction.<br />
privacy<br />
As good as Windows 10 is, there were<br />
concerns around the default privacy<br />
settings it shipped with, with many people<br />
worried about the kind of data—and<br />
control—to which Microsoft has access.<br />
The company has been aware of these<br />
criticisms, and it has responded by trying to<br />
make it more transparent what kind of data<br />
it collects in the Creators Update—as well<br />
as making it easier for you to change any<br />
privacy setting you don’t like.<br />
When you update Windows 10 to the<br />
Creators Update, you’ll see a screen asking<br />
you to choose the privacy settings of your<br />
device. The options are for “Location,”<br />
“Diagnostics,” “Relevant Ads,” “Speech<br />
Recognition,” and “Tailored Experiences<br />
with Diagnostic Data.” Each option has a<br />
“Learn more” button that you should click to<br />
get a full explanation about what it affects.<br />
In our eyes, this is a very positive step that<br />
Microsoft has taken, and while we’d rather<br />
most of those settings were off by default,<br />
we’re glad that Microsoft has explained<br />
each setting thoroughly, so that you are<br />
mostly in control of your privacy when using<br />
Windows 10 Creators Update.<br />
maximumpc.com jun <strong>2017</strong> MAXIMUM<strong>PC</strong><br />
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