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For the most part, you shouldn’t experience any problems using the NordVPN Windows app, or any of the other apps. But if you are having issues connecting to servers it could be a problem with your account, the settings within the app, the actual server in question or something awry with the network settings on your laptop or PC. Before trying any of the more in-depth fixes, there are some quick ways to discover where the issue lies by a process of elimination....

Ever gone to join a meeting or watch a video, then realised the sound isn’t working? There are few things more frustrating, especially once you’ve figured out it’s your device causing the problem. Annoyingly, there isn’t a one size fits all solution, either. You’ll need to strategically go through the steps below one by one, starting with the most obvious. But whether you’re having issues with the internal speakers or connecting to external equipment, here are seven things to try on Windows 11....

The iPhone has been a remarkable device, but like any gadget it has the potential to stop working properly from time to time. One of the most common issues is a device freezing or becoming unresponsive, and the go-to method is normally to force a restart. This is great because you won’t lose any data, and your phone should be back up and running in no time. In fact, this method will be no worse than a regular restart, so don’t worry about losing any of your personal files or settings....

One of the changes brought in with the latest Android Marshmallow operating system is a new app drawer, which places frequently used apps at the top of the drawer, then lists alphabetically all your apps below. With this new app tray you scroll down rather than across to access all your apps. Here we show you how to add the Android Marshmallow app drawer to any Android phone . See all Android how tos ....

For the first year after release, Microsoft offered a free upgrade to Windows 10 for any users running older versions. It was a popular move and one that has undoubtedly contributed to the software now being installed on more than 1 billion devices . While this offer officially expired back in 2016, it’s still possible to make the transition without spending any money. We’ve been able to successfully upgrade a Windows 7 PC to Windows 10, now that the former is no longer supported by Microsoft....

There are various ways to hide photos on an Android phone, and here are some of the best. How to hide photos on Samsung phones If you own a Samsung Android phone, you’ll already have a Secure Folder option which is a great way to keep certain photos private. Other manufacturers have variants on this theme. Huawei phones have PrivateSpace, and LG offers Content Lock, so it’s worth checking if your phone already provides some sort of privacy option like this....

The Google Assistant app is now available on Android and iOS, bringing with it a host of useful ways to manage your schedule, get answers to queries, plus many other daily tasks. One new feature for the Android version of the app is the ability to listen to the music playing nearby and tell you who the artist is and what the track is called. We show you the simple way to use this handy song-identifying trickery....

Over the past few days, we’ve seen the temperature rocket. And it’s only May. There are months of summer ahead of us and (fingers crossed) that’ll include lots of sunny days. This year, many workers will find themselves banished from the air-conditioned offices they’ve become used to. We’ll have to do what we can to make our home offices as cool and comfortable as possible. UK homes are not traditionally built with hot weather in mind, which is why investing in a few cooling products for use around your pad may pay dividends when it comes to keeping your cool this summer....

In these days where it’s harder to visit friends and hang out, we’re all turning to online solutions to keep us sane. We’ve already covered how you can watch YouTube videos simultaneously with friends online, but what about music? None of the major subscriptions seem to offer any kind of group or party experience, but there are some services available that can let you chill out with mates and spin some tunes....

As the owner of a shiny new smartphone you are now tasked with getting all those phone numbers off the old phone and on to the new device. If you’re moving from Android to Android or iPhone to iPhone that’s a pretty straightforward task, since they should all be associated with your account ID. But what if you’re switching OS, from Android to iOS or vice versa? Thankfully, Google Contacts makes it easy to back up and transfer your phone numbers, regardless of platform....

Years ago, you almost had to be a networking guru to make anything work on your home network. These days port forwarding is rarely talked about because it’s almost never needed. And that’s because online servers work as middle men to connect your phone to your smart home gadgets and game servers allow players to connect to their friends, sometimes even between different games consoles. It all happens transparently in the background....

If you’re planning on travelling abroad, you’ll want to know in advance if your smartphone will still be able to make calls, send messages and use data before you head out. There’s nothing worse than arriving back home to find a huge bill that you accidentally amassed while on your adventures. So, if you’re Vodafone UK customer, then you’ll be glad to know that it lets you use your phone in over 150 countries worldwide, but you’ll need to check first as some countries allow free roaming for certain customers, while others incur daily charges or require purchasing a roaming Extra in advance....

Thanks to the advances in smartphone and camera technology in recent years, we’re all recording more video than ever before. Capturing those precious memories for posterity is all well and good, but if you find that when you import them to your PC that they’re sideways or upside down, here’s how you can rotate those videos and get things back in the right orientation. Can Windows Movie Maker rotate videos? Yes, it can....

The web is a great place to search for instructions, tutorials, recipes and other articles that you may well want to keep after reading them. You could use an online service such as Pocket to achieve this, but sometimes you may want to download and store the page as a document you can print or share. You never know: the page could get removed, updated or changed, so preserving the information by turning it into a PDF that you can keep is a handy option....

First, it’s impossible to do this without extra software. Windows doesn’t support animated GIFs as background images, so although you can select one and set it as your wallpaper, it will appear as a static image: effectively the first frame of the animation. There are a few programs that will play animated GIFs as a wallpaper, including Stardock DeskScapes and BioniX Animated Wallpaper Stardock is available as a free 30-day trial (it’s $10 to buy – around £6) while BioniX is freeware....

It goes a step further for kids, with the ability to not only set up their own Apple ID but set Screen Time permissions remotely, approve spending and downloads with Apple’s Ask to Buy verification system, set up Apple Cash (in the US, anyway) or set them up a cellular Apple Watch without the need for a paired iPhone. In summary Go to the Settings app. Tap on your name at the top of the page....

If you have more than one Google Home or Nest device, it’s easy to pair the speakers to play audio from all devices at once, and to quickly transfer your tunes from one Google Home to the next. If you have not yet set up a Home group launch the Google Home app, tap the plus sign at the top left of the home screen and choose ‘Create speaker group’. Select the speakers you wish to include (these must be on the same Wi-Fi network as your phone or tablet), click Next, then give it a name and click Save....

As instructed during the Google Home Hub (now rebranded Google Nest Hub) setup process, say “Okay Google, Good morning” and you’ll get a recap of any appointments you have in the day ahead, a rundown of the weather forecast and an estimate of how long it’s going to take you to get to work, finishing up with a round-up of the day’s news. By default that might not be a video feed of the news, and having just bought a smart speaker with a built-in display that’s surely what you want....

Facebook is a great platform on which to share good times, but when those good times sour it can be a constant reminder of your heartache. Perhaps you’ve split up with your partner, lost a loved one, or just had a particularly hellish day that you never want to re-live. Here we show you how to stop Facebook bringing up painful memories of the past – plus: how to hide photos of your ex....

Airplane mode, aeroplane mode, flight mode – whatever you call it – the little plane icon that resides in your Android phone’s settings represents arguably one of its most important networking features. Here we cover how to use airplane mode, what airplane mode actually does and when to use airplane mode. How to use airplane mode While Android phones from different manufacturers all come with slightly different interfaces and user experiences, like a lot of a phone’s principal settings, airplane mode usually lives in the same places across the board....