Product Review: Inateck 3 Port USB Hub with Gigabit Ethernet

Windows IT ProProduct Review: Inateck 3 Port USB Hub with Gigabit EthernetWindows IT ProAs someone who regularly tests new gadgets and devices there's very little I haven't seen. Most gadgets on the market today all share similar features and functions and it really takes something special to make a gadget stand out. Sometimes it's a ...

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Review: Leveraxe Vipukirves 2

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8 Of The Best Computer Monitors For Gaming Over 24

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How to Download Free Games for Windows

So you've just opened up your brand new Windows PC, and you're all connected. But, what's next? Games! And, better yet, you can download free games. There are a plethora of options for getting free downloadable games on a Windows PC, including using Windows' own games store and some key websites.

The easiest way to download free games on Windows 8 is to simply visit the Windows Store. While looking at your desktop, simply point your mouse at the top right of your screen, and click on Search. Type 'store' in the search box, and hit enter. Then, click on 'Store.' Immediately, you're thrown a TON of new information. It can be a bit overwhelming at first, but it quickly becomes less so when you eventually learn what you're actually looking at. To find free games, go to the top navigation bar in the Store, and click on 'Top charts' and then 'Top free games.' You're then taken to a seemingly endless amount of free Windows games. There are some great games on here that are familiar to Android users, such as FlappyBird, Where's My Water 2, Asphalt 8: Airborne and Frozen Free Fall. But, of course, there are some classic Windows games on there too, such as Microsoft Sodoku, Microsoft Jigsaw and Microsoft Mahjong.

Another way to find some great free Windows games is to head over to CNET and do some browsing. The CNET hyperlink will bring you straight to the Free Games section, where you'll find even more Windows games available for free. Some of the best of the bunch are Alien Arena: Combat Edition, which is a sci-fi shooter in the spirit of Quake, Uberstrike HD, Tetris, Chicken Invaders, and WildLands Hockey. Simply search for these games (or browse for others), click the green 'Download Now' button, save the file and then double click on it to run the installer. Follow the on-screen instructions, as their install process may vary.

Of course, you can always look for free online games for your Windows PC. There are great sites like AddictingGames.com, Pogo.com and MSN Games that offer free Windows games you can play right online,without downloading the actual games.

But if you're looking for free Windows games that are quite a bit meatier, there are many games that were made specifically to be free-to-play. For example, if you're into games like Diablo, then check out Path of Exile, a free action RPG that's quite possibly the best free RPG available. In fact, one of the most impressive games of the year is absolutely free - I'm talking about Blizzard's Hearthstone. Hearthstone is a card game that's super addictive and, well, super free. To download and install the game, simply follow the hyperlink to the official site, and you'll be up and running in no time. And if you're looking for a free MMORPGs for Windows, there are a great number of a good games available, such as DC Universe Online, Firefall, Rift, and Neverwinter. There are an overwhelming number of free MMOs out there, but these are by far the best of the bunch.

Or, you can choose to download the most popular MOBA games that also happen to be free, such as League of Legends, Smite, Dota 2 or Infinite Crisis, which is a MOBA based on the DC Comics universe. Again, simply follow the links and sign up to play these games for free.

And, lastly, there are many free games on Steam available for download. Some of gaming's most recognizable games are available for a free download on Steam, such as Team Fortress 2, Warframe, Planetside 2 and Counter-Strike Nexon: Zombies. In fact, probably your best way to find the best free-to-play games is to go to the official Steam website and click 'Install Steam' at the top right of your screen. After you've signed up for an account, downloaded the installer and logged in, just browse for the free to play section and grab what looks good. As another tibdit of information for you, Steam quite often has CRAZY sales on video games so that users can pick up some truly great titles for extremely low prices.

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When he isn't enjoying the beautiful Northwest outdoors, you can find Tyler on business and tech sites, writing about the latest news, analyzing trends, and generally making the Internet a more interesting place.

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Kristie Bertucci is an L.A.-based writer, who can't live without her MacBook Pro. When she's not writing, she's either reading or shopping (online, of course) and loves lazy days so she can catch up on her DVR-recorded shows and movies. She's definitely a Mac girl, she loves music and is currently on a mission to to have an insane and enviable iTunes library.

Xiaomi Redmi Note Review: A Big Screen on a Budget

Well, it looks like Xiaomi has done it again. The Web is on fire thanks to the launch of another highly capable handset with an impossibly low price tag. This time, the Chinese manufacturer has jumped into one of the hottest current market segments: cheap devices with big screens. After having sold multiple lakh units of its Mi 3 and Redmi 1S phones, Xiaomi is cementing its appeal with a claimed 50,000 units of the brand new Redmi Note selling out within seconds in its first flash sale.

Demand is high and it will be frustratingly difficult to get your hands on one of the few units up for grabs each week. We're here to find out whether the Xiaomi Redmi Note lives up to the high standard set by its forerunners, or whether it's really not worth all the hassle.

Look and feelThe Redmi Note definitely has a family resemblance to the Xiaomi Redmi 1S ( Review | Photos), except that the rear cover is a glossy white. The front face is quite plain, with black glass surrounded by a slightly raised black plastic edging. The three capacitive buttons below the screen light up in red. It's a simple look, which we quite like.

The power and volume buttons are on the right, the Micro-USB port is on the bottom and the headset socket is on top. There's a camera lens and flash on the upper rear, with a silvery MI logo and the speaker grille closer to the bottom.

The cover comes off if you peel it back with one fingernail in the Micro-USB port cutout. The two SIM card slots and the microSD slot are beneath arranged such that you have to take the battery out to get to them.

The rear is very glossy, which gives it a great look but makes it a little slippery. Luckily, the Redmi Note isn't very wide and the sides are curved, which make it a little easier to grip when using it with one hand.

Specifications and softwareXiaomi is well known by now for stuffing high-end components into dirt-cheap phones, and the Redmi Note is no different. The 1.7GHz octa-core MediaTek MT6592 SoC and 5.5-inch 720x1280-pixel screen are more typical of phones that cost around Rs. 15,000 today. There are a few similarly-specced phones in this price range though: the Intel-based Asus Zenfone 5 ( Review | Photos) and the Qualcomm-powered Xolo Q1100 ( Review | Photos), for example. It will be interesting to see which one comes out on top in our performance tests.

The Redmi Note also has 2GB of RAM and 8GB of storage space which can be bumped up by only 32GB using a microSD card. Wi-Fi b/g/n and Bluetooth 4.0 are supported. There's a gyroscope and a digital compass in addition to the accelerometer, ambient light sensor and proximity sensor.

The rear camera takes 13-megapixel photos while buyers will be pleased to note that the front camera also has pretty decent 5-megapixel sensor.You get a charger and USB cable in the box, but no headset.

Xiaomi's MIUI skin is one of the most polished we've seen from the major Chinese manufacturers. As we've come to expect, all icons and widgets live together on the homescreens and there is no separate app drawer. This is something users who like simplicity might prefer, but we feel hampered because it's difficult to arrange widgets, and as we install more apps, things get really disorganised.

The system app icons are also customised, and thankfully they aren't too difficult to tell apart. Everything looks crisp and clean, without being over the top. Xiaomi includes an online wallpaper catalog within the Settings app itself. You can change the transition animation and some other visual effects if you like.

There are quite a few options to discover in the Redmi Note's Settings app. You can play around with settings for the buttons, notifications LED, lockscreen and more. There's a massive variety of ringtones and message alert sounds to choose from. The notifications shade is also clean, and you can choose whether to show quick settings shortcuts in a separate page or in a scrolling bar at the bottom.

There's also an interesting Lite mode, which completely replaces the MIUI launcher with a very simple tile-based interface and large text, probably designed for children, elderly people or the extremely tech-phobic. You get access to basic functions and a panel of contacts which are easy to access. It's a nice touch but Xiaomi doesn't offer fine-grained control over it, such as letting a parent allow or disable certain apps and functions, or forcing a password to get out of it. Some of the tools such as the dialler and messaging app are simplified, while others such as the gallery are just the regular apps, which presents its own set of confusions.

There's a separate Guest mode toggle, buried in the security and privacy settings, which hides your call history, messages, notes, photos and some settings, for times when you want to hand your phone to someone else temporarily. This lets you set a password so that it can't be disabled by anyone other than you. There's also a separate section for permissions which forces a PIN or pattern check (independent of your lockscreen PIN or pattern) when someone tries to launch any app you decide should be locked - including system-level ones such as the dialler.

PerformanceWe had no complaints with the general performance of the Xiaomi Redmi Note. There's a lot of buzz around this product and a lot of people recognised it in our hands as soon as they saw it. We're happy to report that the anticipation was worth it - Xiaomi has pulled it off yet again.

Day-to-day usage presented no problems, and we did not encounter any lag or slowdowns. Casual games ran well but we hit a wall when playing HD videos - only our lightest MPEG4 samples worked well enough, while the heavier H.264 files choked. For some reason, the red navigation buttons remained lit up while videos played in some apps, which was very distracting.

We liked the screen for the most part, though it felt unusually slick and was also not very readable in sunlight. Sound from the single speaker on the rear wasn't very impressive - music sounded tinny and compressed, but at least it didn't distort at high volumes.

The benchmark scores revealed some very interesting results. While CPU performance was impressive, graphics typically lagged. This has been true of MediaTek processors for a while, but it shows that the Redmi Note does have at least one chink in its armour. We saw scores of 31,969 in AnTuTu and 16,083 overall in Quadrant, which were way higher than those of the Xolo Q1100, Asus Zenfone 5 and even one of our more expensive favourites, the Motorola Moto G (Gen 2) ( Review | Photos).

However, the GFXbench and 3DMark Ice Storm scores of 13.1fps and 5950 points respectively were not as strong as all the others. The Zenfone 5, in particular, was considerably stronger in both tests. Gaming and HD video consumption will be the one area in which the Redmi Note falls short.

Both cameras were good when used with plenty of natural light around. Photos were a little grainy when seen at 100 percent, but details were reproduced consistently well and we managed to take some very nice close-up shots with defocused backgrounds. Focusing took a little time and we found it more reliable to tap the screen and confirm a lock rather than let the autofocus take care of it. The same behaviour was amplified in low light - it took a bit too long to lock focus, and there was also a fair bit of shutter lag. Still, results came out well enough for sharing around.

Battery life was also quite good. Our looped video test ran for 11 hours, 56 minutes before the phone down automatically.

(Click to see full size)

Verdict The Redmi Note continues Xiaomi's habit of upsetting the market with strong smartphones at phenomenal prices. With a phablet-sized screen and specifications that are more typical of phones twice as expensive, it's no surprise that there's a lot of buzz around this phone and demand is extraordinarily high.

The sub-Rs. 10,000 smartphone space hss been on fire all year and it's amazing to look back and see just how far things have come. For anyone considering a spend of Rs. 6-7,000 on a basic, entry level phone (such as any of the Android One lineup), it makes a lot of sense to step up just a little bit and try to snag a Redmi Note.

We say 'try' because of course Xiaomi also continues its practice of making devices very, very difficult to buy. The Redmi Note is available only through weekly Flash sales on Flipkart, and to make things worse, there's no guarantee of how many units will be available and how long these sales will go on. We already know that a 4G-LTE version of this phone will be released later in December for Rs. 1,000 more, so the future availability of this particular model is uncertain.

There's also the slight issue of graphics performance. If you're into gaming and don't mind a slightly smaller screen, it might be worth it to spend just a little more on the Asus Zenfone 5.

Xiaomi Redmi Note in pictures

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When he isn't enjoying the beautiful Northwest outdoors, you can find Tyler on business and tech sites, writing about the latest news, analyzing trends, and generally making the Internet a more interesting place.

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Viet works at Dealzon.com, a deal site for techies and gamers. Run by geeks across the U.S. with an unhealthy obsession for pizza and coffee. Dealzon tracks daily prices on laptops, video games, and HDTVs. At Dealzon, we find the deals so you don't have to.

OnePlus One Review: The New Mid

The OnePlus One has been a global sensation thanks to its unbelievably low price and top-end feature set, earning it the nickname 'flagship killer'. OnePlus is the latest Chinese manufacturer to adopt a global brand identity and slick packaging in order to hit the big companies where it hurts - the price tag. In India, OnePlus will go up against the likes of Xiaomi and Huawei, which have made big splashes already.

The OnePlus One will only be available in very limited quantities and that too, via a single online retailer. Whether this is a marketing ploy or a genuine way to keep costs down, there is bound to be a lot of excitement and a lot of disappointment. There's also a new twist to the story: the device runs CyanogenMod, which is one its headlining features, but Indian users won't be able to receive automatic updates.

There's a lot to learn about the OnePlus One and we're eager to get started.

Look and feelThe OnePlus One is handsome when seen head-on, with a sheer black front framed within a slightly curved metal bed. The three capacitive navigation buttons below the screen are barely visible when not lit up, and the earpiece on top is similarly subtle. The multi-coloured LED notification is invisible till it lights up. There's no branding, but we did notice that the Gorilla glass protecting the screen picked up a lot of grime.

The rear and sides of this phone are a different story - on the Sandstone Black model, which we received for review, all surfaces other than the front are coated in what feels like a very rough felt material. It's really unusual and frankly, not very pleasant. It feels rough in the hand, which is great for grip, but not for comfort. It causes a lot of friction in pockets and on cloth surfaces, and also picks up a lot of lint from pockets and bags. We can't be sure, but it also feels as though it will begin peeling off before too long. You'll really want to try this for yourself before you actually buy this phone. The rear isn't swappable, but you should be able to pick up a plastic or silicone cover if you later find you don't like it.

There's quite a bit of printing on the rear - large regulatory icons and a giant Cyanogen logo are stencilled on near the bottom, while a more subtle Oneplus logo is carved in relief against the textured rear surface. The camera and dual-LED flash are centred towards the top of the rear.

The Micro-USB port on the bottom is flanked by two speaker grilles, while the headset jack sits all alone on the top. The power button on the right and volume rocker on the left are thin and shallow, which means they aren't very easy to locate by touch alone thanks to the metal rim.

Perhaps our favourite design touch on this phone is that the SIM card slot is designed to accommodate either a Micro-SIM or a Nano-SIM. You get two trays, each with a different sized cutout, and can use whichever one you need. We really wish more manufacturers would come up with ideas like this.

The OnePlus One's box is also quite interesting. It's flat and bright red, with only enough space inside for the phone itself, a flattened USB cable with a thin connector, and a SIM eject tool in its own rubber sheath. The charger is packed in a separate box which allows for efficient production for multiple global markets.

Specifications and softwareMost of the OnePlus One's appeal lies in its hardware, and it isn't hard to see why. You'll have a very hard time finding anything else that delivers the same amount of power at this price level. It all begins with a top-tier Qualcomm Snapdragon 801 SoC, which has four CPU cores running at 2.5GHz and an Adreno 330 GPU. That's matched with 3GB of RAM and 64GB of storage space (a 16GB model is available in other markets but not in India at launch time).

The 5.5-inch 1080x1920-pixel display has its touch sensitive layer fused to display panel, which OnePlus claims makes the screen far stronger than the common OGS (one-glass solution) method of production.

There's Wi-Fi b/g/n/ac and Bluetooth 4.0 along with NFC and GPS. There are also three microphones for noise reduction. Sadly, there's no microSD slot. The 3,100mAh battery is also sealed in.

While certainly impressive, hardware is only one part of the OnePlus One's appeal. Another is - or should have been - its software. Since it first debuted, the OnePlus One has proudly used CyanogenMod, one of the world's most popular alternative Android distributions. Based on the Android Open Source Project (AOSP), CyanogenMod promises a whole host of features that go beyond what even stock Android delivers, such as themes and configurable UI elements, improved privacy controls, more flexible access to settings, root access and performance tweaks. Essentially, it gives users much more control over their devices than most custom Android-based interfaces and OS forks. The version on the OnePlus One is CM 11S, which is based on Android 4.4.2.

So that's all well and good, but in a surprise move mere days before the official OnePlus One launch, all that changed. The company will apparently not be allowed to sell its phones with CyanogenMod in India, thanks to the software maker's exclusive tie-up with Micromax for the forthcoming Yu line of phones.

In a statement on its website, OnePlus stated it was just as surprised by the news as everyone else, and as a result it will have to speed up development on its own Android fork, which is now planned for 2015 and will be built around the Android 5.0 codebase. This new software should be ready for wide release by February, but It isn't entirely clear how this will affect the Ones sold between now and then. The first batch of devices being shipped out to buyers has not been delayed, and it seems as though these will not be re-flashed with a new OS, but will not receive automatic updates until the in-house build is ready.

This is a huge disappointment, but nevertheless, intrepid OnePlus One buyers should be able to install CM themselves by following the instructions on the official website.

On the other hand, while CyanogenMod opens a lot of doors in terms of customisability and power, not everyone wants to face dozens of potentially confusing options at every turn. Few people actually discover and use all the features their devices offer, and for those who aren't really comfortable with smartphones, CM's features might be more confusing than helpful. With that in mind, the custom UI skins that other manufacturers ship might be more appealing.

Usage and performanceWe liked what we saw of CyanogenMod 11S running on our review unit. While not the most polished in terms of graphics, it definitely does give users a lot of control over the device's operating environment. We weren't huge fans of the blocky custom icons which weren't easy to tell apart, or some of the other custom visual elements.

However those are just minor niggles compared to the amount of joy we felt when we discovered each new thing that could be changed, enhanced and customised. It starts right at the splash screen animation, which you can customise. The list of things you can change is never-ending: the widgets and shortcuts on the lockscreen, the screen colour temperature, the appearance of status bar icons, the shortcuts in the notifications shade and the behaviour of each button, just to name a few.

Themes include lots of elements including graphics, sounds and fonts. You can change any or all of these via the Settings app or by long-tapping any homescreen. There's also an app called Themes Showcase which lets you buy additional themes which cost around Rs. 120 each on average.

Then there are the gestures and shortcuts you can set up, the advanced privacy and malware containment settings. One interesting feature is the ability to restrict apps from sending too many SMS messages and running up your bill. You can also blacklist callers, and restrict individual apps from accessing your personal information.

An app called AudioFX lets you set global equaliser settings and includes a number of presets which you can edit. The app also has controls for bass boost, virtual surround sound and reverb effects.

It would be a shame to see the One lose these features, and we hope that whatever solution the company comes up with will not take anything away from users.

In terms of its general performance, we enjoyed our time with the OnePlus One. It was snappy and responsive throughout, and gave us no cause for concern. HD videos played flawlessly and games ran well. The screen was crisp and vibrant in all situations except under direct sunlight. Sound coming from the two speakers was pretty loud, but very thin and stretched.

Benchmark scores were as impressive as we had expected, considering this phone's high-end specifications. The OnePlus one definitely lives up to its 'flagship killer' reputation and can give some of today's most expensive smartphones serious inferiority complexes. We recorded 45,372 in AnTuTu and 23,057 overall in Quadrant, which are right up there with the scores of the Samsung Galaxy Note 4 ( Review | Photos), and as good as (if not better than) those of the HTC One (M8) ( Review | Photos), Sony Xperia Z3 ( Review | Photos) and Samsung Galaxy S5 ( Review | Photos). Interestingly, these scores were also matched by options closer to the OnePlus One's price: the new Lenovo Vibe X2 ( Review | Photos) and the Motorola Moto G (2nd gen) ( Review | Photos).

(Click to see full size)

Things are also more or less even in the graphics tests, with the OnePlus One's GFXbench score of 28.8fps equalling all but the Mediatek-powered Vibe X2.3DMark Ice Storm Extreme maxed out, with the more demanding Unlimited test producing a score of 19,410 points.

The camera interface isn't much to get excited about. As expected, there are quite a few options but they are not laid out very well. You can record 4K video (either the more common 3840x2160 or the wider 4096x2160) and even choose your preferred audio and video codecs. As long as we took the time to focus, image quality was very good in daylight. Subtle details, metallic surfaces and even dense foliage came out well. Low-light performance was less impressive, with lots of noise even with ambient light such as streetlamps. The main problems with the OnePlus One's camera are that the autofocus takes a long time to lock and there is pretty significant shutter lag, which mean you don't always get the shot you wanted.

We managed to squeeze 5 hours, 56 minutes of battery life out of the OnePlus One - this is an area in which other flagship devices perform a lot better.

VerdictCalling this phone a 'flagship killer' is an overstatement, but only a very, very tiny bit. It certainly has the goods in terms of specifications and raw power, and if that's your main concern then you can save a lot of money by forgetting about Samsung, HTC and Sony altogether. At Rs. 21,999 for the 64GB model, the vast majority of buyers will be perfectly happy to overlook all negatives.

However, those other brands still have a lot to offer in terms of overall polish, camera quality and perhaps most important of all, availability. If they react by dropping prices, the customer still stands to gain.

OnePlusOne in pictures