Besiege

Lay waste to everything with a machine of your own creation

You can’t fault the ancient Greeks. They had a cracking plan when it came to building a giant, hollow wooden horse in order to enter the city of Troy. Now if they were to include several flame throwers, a brace of cannons, some catapulting exploding mines and gave it the ability to fly back out over the walls of the city, then history may have been somewhat more appealing to high school students

Canon Pixma MX725

Canon’s latest multi-function printer is designed for home and office

Having just reviewed a HP multi-function printer, I was very interested in the different approach that Canon might take to the same problem. Its Canon Pixma MX725 is a beast of a box, measuring 491 x 396 x 231mm and finished in the sort of highgloss black plastic designed to attract dust at range.

From the classic do-anything mould, it’s a scanner, copier, fax machine, photo-printer and dish-washer. Okay, I lied about one of those features, and it wasn’t faxing, sadly.

Toshiba Canvio Connect II 1TB

Toshiba unleashes yet more Canvio products on an unsuspecting world

With Seagate and Western Digital knocking seven sorts of SATA out of each other, this should be a good time for the Toshiba to make more of its hard drive business. Its Canvio range of external USB storage devices has generally been solid, if somewhat unexciting, and the new Canvio Connect II doesn’t break that particular mould.

i-Rocks Golem Series K50E Keyboard

A scissor action keyboard that’s a cut above the rest

i-Rocks has previously impressed us with its lowpriced but high-quality K10 USB Gaming Keyboard. Now, however, we’re upping the game slightly with a higherend model from i-Rocks, but will it impress us as much as the K10 did?

The first thing you’ll notice is the difference in weight. While the K10 was in excess of 1.2kg, the K50E is considerably lighter by about half as much. That doesn’t mean it’s lacking in sturdiness. i-Rocks engineering department needs to be congratulated on the design and structure of the K50E, because it’s as solid a keyboard as you’ll find anywhere.

Pan & Tilt HD Camera

Michael Fereday puts his living room under close surveillance and records the evidence

The Internet of Things has opened up new avenues of information gathering. We can now be kept informed as to what might be occurring in our homes when we're away for whatever reason. It's relatively straightforward to set up a system that can respond to different types of activity and sent alerts to designated personel. One such product is the Pan & Tilt HD Camera from Swann.

Philips Blade 2 Monitor

Philips tries to ride the smartphone bandwagon and falls off

Because this monitor has the same structural layout as an AOC I reviewed here recently, there appears to be something attractive about it for the display makers. What I’m referring to is the large support foot in which the inputs and speakers have been placed, allowing the screen (23 inches in this case) to be thin and elegant.