Author: batteryforpc

Windows 10 users have been handed another update blow as a patch from Microsoft can end up bricking your PC. Just recently Windows 10 fans were being warned about an unpatched security vulnerability that affected all versions of the market leading OS. And now once again PC owners are being warned about another issue affecting Windows 10.

This time around the problem is with Microsoft’s new KB4541335 Windows update which has been causing a number of different issues.

Most notably, some Windows 10 users have reported the download has ‘bricked’ their machines – turning them effectively into a makeshift paperweight.

Others have reported of unusually high CPU and memory usage after installing the KB4541335 update.

Elsewhere, some Windows 10 users have also been hit with the infamous ‘Blue Screen of Death’.

Reports of the latest issues affecting Microsoft’s flagship OS were revealed in a post by Komando.

The good news, however, is that KB4541335 is an optional update that you can choose to skip for now.

You can choose to roll back your OS to a more secure build of Windows 10 if you installed the patch in question within the last 10 days.

But before you do that make sure you have backed up your files as you don’t want to lose anything important should an unexpected issue arise.

Here is how to rollback to a previous version of Windows 10

• Go to the Start Menu and click the Settings icon

• Click ‘Update & Security’ and then select the Windows Update tab which can be found on the left-hand side

• You then need to click the View update history option followed by Uninstall updates

• In the Control Panel page find the KB4541335 update to uninstall it. If it isn’t there then that means you haven’t installed the update

The news comes after Windows 10 users were warned about another bug which could not have come at a worse time.

The bug affects those using the Windows 10 May 2019 Update or November 2019 Update and is caused by patch KB4535996.

The reason the bug is so troublesome is that some Windows 10 users have reported it affects the internet connectivity of their PCs.

And in some cases this has prevented work-critical apps such as Office 365 from getting online.

Which, if you’re one of the scores of people working from home right now amid the coronavirus pandemic, would be a particular tricky problem to deal with.

To make matters worse for Windows 10 fans, this issue is more likely to crop up when a PC is connecting or disconnecting from a VPN.

And this is an issue for those working from home as – in many cases – connecting to a private network is necessary to operate outside the office.

Microsoft are reportedly rushing out an April update to fix the Windows 10 issue.

International analyst Guo Mingji laid-out a few educated predictions about Huawei’s upcoming Mate 40 family of handsets. The latter, of course, expected to come no sooner than September and likely even later, given the ongoing global health crisis. Regardless, all the suggested info sounds pretty believable and deserves at least some attention, even if not backed by any hard proof.

Starting with the chipset, apparently we can look forward to a Kirin 1020, also known by its “Baltimore” codename. The source claims it will take advantage of TSMCs 5nm manufacturing node. Though, it’s a bit unclear on whether this refers to the N5 process, which promises 15% higher performance than 7nm, combined with 30% extra power efficiency, or the superior N5P process, which further drops power consumption by an estimated 15%.

The exact ARM reference cores to be used in the chipset or their configuration are still largely a mystery, as well. The source hints at a Cortex-A77 or Cortex-A78, but those are the only viable options anyway. As far as time-frames go, the analyst claims that the new Kirin 1020 can be delivered on a large scale around August. Huawei hasn’t been particularly thigh-lipped when it comes to its silicon lately, detailing the Kirin 820 5G and letting some major Kirin 985 leaks through the cracks. So, it probably won’t be too long now before we get the scoop on the Kirin 1020.

On to the camera department, where the main new piece of information is an expected free-form lens design. The analyst says this will benefit the ultrawide camera on the Mate 40 series, minimizing distortions and aberrations Apparently, the particular design will be patented by Huawei and thus be exclusive to its products.

Free-from lens design is kind of a vague term, but we do have a pretty-good idea of what it typically refers to in optics. Some of its alternative designations, like digitally surfaced, cut-to-polish and direct-to-surface are arguably a bit more descriptive. In overly-simplified terms, free-form lens design refers to an advanced process that spans from preliminary work on the lens shape and materials through advanced software and multi-point complex mathematical calculations of refractions and optics all over the surface of the lens. Finally, culminating in machines and manufacturing processes that can work with extreme precision. We are talking measurements as little as 1 micron or 1/25,400 of an inch. Impressive stuff, but we’re sure Huawei will do a much better job eventually hyping the tech up in its presentations.

Samsung Germany has given us another reason to believe that the Galaxy Tab S6 Lite is getting closer and closer to an official unveiling, as the tablet’s support pages went live on Samsung’s German portal. A pre-release listing in the support section usually indicates that the company is gearing up for the product’s release on the market.

Pair that with previous premature listings on a couple of retailers’ online shops – including Amazon Germany – and the puzzle pieces are beginning to fall into place and paint a clearer picture. The tablet should be on its way.

The Galaxy Tab S6 Lite will come in Wi-Fi and LTE flavors

Support pages went live for both the Wi-Fi (SM-P610) and LTE (SM-P615) versions of the Galaxy Tab S6 Lite. Earlier reports claim that the Wi-Fi and LTE models for Europe will cost €399 and €428, respectively. B&H also listed the Wi-Fi version along with a price tag of $350 a week ago, but the price didn’t contain VAT. The premature listing has since been removed.

The preliminary spec sheet based on previous leaks includes a 10.4-inch LCD with a resolution of 2000 by 1200 pixels, an Exynos 9611 chipset, 4GB of RAM, 64GB/128GB of expandable storage, a 7,040mAh battery, Android 10, and support for S Pen. In addition, the Galaxy Tab S6 Lite is said to carry an 8MP main camera paired with a 5MP front-facing sensor.

As a general rule of thumb, I try to avoid paying full price for SSDs (on the rare occasion I’m in the market for one), because there seems to always be a sale. Crucial’s new P2 500GB SSD, however, comes out of the gate with a tantalizing price point that will have some buyers skip the sale shopping.

The 500GB model (CT500P2SSD8) is one of only two capacities comprising the P2 series right now—it costs $64.99 on Crucial’s website and at Newegg. There’s also a 250GB model (CT250P2SSD8) for $54.99.

Pricing on the 250GB is actually fair for the specifications, but the 500GB is a better value and stands out as particularly interesting. Over on Newegg, every other 500GB SSD that costs the same (or slightly less) has a SATA 6Gbps interface, and most are 2.5-inch form factor drives.

In contrast, the P2 drives are built around the M.2 form factor and leverage an NVMe interface for faster speeds. Here’s what we’re looking at:

Crucial P2 500GB—2,300MB/s sequential read, 940MB/s sequential write

Crucial P2 250GB—2,100MB/s sequential read, 1,150MB/s sequential write

They’re not the fastest NVMe drives on the market, even among PCI Express 3.0 models, let alone those newfangled PCIe 4.0 SSDs that push speeds in excess of 5,000MB/s. But those read speeds are around four times faster than a typical SATA SSD.

To put the pricing on the 500GB model into perspective, Crucial’s MX500 500GB SSD in M.2 form (SATA 6Gbps) sells for $69.99 on the company’s website, and $70.99 on Newegg. In other words, Crucial undercut its own pricing by releasing a faster SSD at a lower price, as well as the competition.

It’s not clear what type of NAND flash memory chips Crucial is using on its P2 series. The P1 line (which we consider one of the best NVMe SSDs) uses Micron’s 64-layer 3D quad-level cell (QLC) chips paired with Silicon Motion’s SM2263 controller, and I assume the P2 line uses the slower QLC NAND chips as well.

There’s also no mention of the controller on this new line. It’s probably a different one, though, since the specifications have changed—the P1 500GB is rated to deliver up to 1,900MB/s random reads (versus 2,300MB/s) and 950MB/s random writes (versus 940MB/s).

Assuming these drives don’t cough up a hairball during any testing for the best SSD for gaming guide (none of us have spent any hands-on time with them), the only real complaint I have is the lack of capacity options. I’d like to see Crucial offer these in 1TB and higher capacities, with the same aggressive pricing strategy.

The idea of the thin and light gaming laptop has been bouncing around for years, and there have been plenty of manufacturers that have managed the feat, with some great machines from the likes of Asus, Dell, Razer, MSI, and many more. The problem is that while a lot of these pack the finest components into their super-thin chassis, they can get loud when you really push them. 

There have been a few exceptions though, and one machine that has stood out from the crowd for it’s whisper quiet operation is the MSI GS65 Stealth. We loved the original MSI GS65 Stealth Thin when we reviewed it back in May 2018, and we liked the refresh, the MSI GS65 Stealth Thin (2019) that shipped last June as well. So when MSI offered us an engineering sample of its up and coming GS66 Stealth, we jumped at the chance.

For the most part, this looks identical to the previous GS65, but instead of gold highlights, it’s all black. The star of the engineering sample is the 10th gen Intel processor, the Core i7 10750H to be exact. This is a 6-core, 12-thread CPU that has a base frequency of 2.6GHz, a max frequency of 4.8GHz across all its cores, and a potential top single core frequency of 5GHz.

As this is an early engineering sample it’s hard to say for sure how fast this CPU will go, but the fastest I recorded across days of testing was slightly shy of the single core Max Turbo frequency, but it lined up with the multi-core frequency. It may be that MSI has held back a little in order to keep the noise levels down, which I have absolutely no problem with.

The rest of the specifications makes for a tempting machine, with 32GB of DDR4-2666 RAM, a fast 512GB NVMe SSD and a 240Hz 1080p panel that looks great. There are several versions of the GS66 Stealth on the way, with the graphics subsystem being one of the defining factors. This engineering model had an RTX 2060 as a placeholder (with older drivers that couldn’t be updated), although the shipping machine will have either an RTX 2060 Max-Q or an RTX 2080 Super.

We can’t print the results of the benchmarking we did on this machine, because firstly it’s an engineering sample, and thus not finished, but also because there’s an embargo on performance results from both Nvidia and Intel until the 15th April. There’s also a rather important missing element from this machine, and that is the GPU. So I’ll be revisiting this machine just as soon as it’s in production to see how it performs.

While the performance and responsiveness of the machine are great, the thing that blew me away the most was how quiet it was in use. Push it hard and it continues to keep its noisy side in check. It’s not absolutely silent under load, but even when the fans do kick up a gear, they are only just audible. Can MSI keep the noise levels this low with such a high-end GPU? I can’t wait to find out.

So not everything is exactly as it will ship, which made it all the more surprising to find that MSI had set aside time to install Norton Antivirus onto it’s otherwise gorgeous machine. Far more welcome was MSI’s Dragon Center, which enables you to switch between various User Scenarios, which essentially pitches noise against performance. We did experiment here a little, although found the “Balanced” setting worked best.

As for the rest of the machine, the Steelseries keyboard looks good and is responsive, and that screen is also another plus point. It looks great from a range of angles, although whether you actually need a 240Hz screen is another question entirely. I was less impressed with the touchpad, which is large, but tricky to register clicks with. Still the chassis is sturdy, and I’m definitely a fan of the subdued styling. 

The bottom line is that the MSI GS66 Stealth is a deeply impressive laptop, and like its predecessors could do very well. The biggest problem for MSI right now, and indeed any manufacturer, is those new $999 RTX 2060 gaming laptops that could make this seem incredibly expensive. We’ll have to wait and see if the extra performance makes up for it.