Features

Cooking up a storm: Heston Blumenthal's first masterclass

Forget the finals of MasterChef, or creating a feast for the Queen; when it comes to culinary challenges, a cooking lesson with Heston Blumenthal takes the crab biscuit with crystalised seaweed and oyster vinaigrette.

Inside Features

Truth or scare? Technology myths put the test

Wednesday, 2 April 2008

Mobile phones can cause planes to crash, life-support machines to fail and petrol stations to blow up

Cyberclinic: Who's behind all this spam I'm receiving?

Wednesday, 26 March 2008

According to a report whizzing around the net, 40 per cent of spam comes from just one source – which might make you wonder why a few police don't just get in there and unplug the damn machine. But they'd have a job doing so – the source is actually a botnet, a network of tens of thousands of machines whose security has been compromised via dodgy internet sites. This botnet makes the machines' owners – i.e. you and me – unwitting pawns in the spam industry.

Small wonders: Putting mini laptops to the test

Wednesday, 26 March 2008

The housewife

Cyberclinic: Is it too early to buy into mobile broadband?

Wednesday, 19 March 2008

How does mobile broadband compare with the fixed-line variety? We're now seeing a massive landgrab by Britain's mobile phone networks. Four of them (T-Mobile, Vodafone, 3 and Orange) are trumpeting their mobile broadband services, trying to sign up subscribers. Each gives you a USB dongle that plugs into your computer and connects you to the internet via a 3G network. But who are they best suited to?

The cult of Holga: The sixties' camera makes a comeback

Tuesday, 18 March 2008

Click here to see a gallery of entries in our low-tech photograph competition The Holga is, by all accounts, a terrible camera. Shake it and it rattles as if something has broken inside. Its laughably retro design looks like the work of a child let loose with a crayon. You almost expect it to squirt water when the shutter is pressed.

For Sale: My life in Oz... including a house, job, motorbike, clothes, and, of course, a barbie!

Monday, 17 March 2008

Ian Usher loves his life in Perth, Australia. But since his wife, Laura, was part of that life and the couple have split up, he has decided to offer it, lock, stock and barrel to the highest bidder.

Mobile phone scams: Sharp operators

Wednesday, 12 March 2008

A text message arrives: it's an offer of a free upgrade to your mobile phone. The monthly line rental is lower and the package includes more calls. You'll even get a new handset thrown in. So you call back and take them up on the deal.

Cyberclinic: Why do inkjet print cartridges cost so much?

Wednesday, 12 March 2008

Have you ever worked out the cost of running your inkjet printer? It seems that the excitement of picking up printing technology on the cheap (PC World's current bargain comes in at under £25) blinds us to the brow-furrowing cost of ink cartridges.

Innovation of the year: The blueprints for our future

Wednesday, 12 March 2008

They range from Yves Saint Laurent's Downtown tote bag to the Nintendo Wii, and from the Parisian self-service bicycle-hire scheme to a kitchen bin whose lid hovers on its rim when opened, and a felt chair that stacks noiselessly and cannot be used as a weapon, designed for a Swedish prison. These are just some of the 100 creations nominated by a panel of experts including the designer Wayne Hemingway, fashion photographer Nick Knight, and director of the Design Museum Deyan Sudjic, for the first Brit Insurance Designs Awards.

How to get your hands on the best mobile phone deals around

Saturday, 8 March 2008

Not so many years ago, mobile phones were almost exclusively the preserve of the wealthy or the spivvy. Most people swore that they would never need one, and even as prices came down and their popularity exploded, many were slow converts to the revolution.

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