made on iPad, for iPad

In a short space of time since its launch in October 2010, Tap! has become quite the authority on all things iOS. If you're confused about which things to stroke, smear and indeed, tap on your iPad or iPhone screen, this is the mag for you. Each issue covers a preposterously huge amount of apps, games and peripherals for your cogitation and delectation.

Makes sense to release a bespoke edition of the mag on iPad then, don't it? Well don't get all smug thinking you've second guessed us, because not only has Tap! produced a bespoke edition of their fine publication for iPad, making use of all its stroke-y, smeary, tappy features, but their app's already gone live.  read more »

Here are a plefora game demo noms noms for you this week, both, big studio and indie developers have come through in equal measures. And it's fair to say that this month's demo line up, the Indie games are leading the way in originality and excellence.  read more »

Keep a look out for our next issues security software article on Predator, a software solution to turn any USB flash drive into a security key to lock down your PC. Expanding further into the realms of PC security measures, here's a run down of other essential free software that will protect your valuable data from theft, both locally and from those dastardly Internet haxors! Issue 258 will be hitting the newsagents shelves on the 26th of September. But of course if you decide to subscribe you'll save quite a few bob and receive your copy a few days earlier.  read more »

Diverting, but probably best to wait for the Torchlight MMO...

You'd be challenged to find a game with a weirder history than Mythos (Ed - Easy, Prey). Originally a way to beta test new networking technology, it turned out to be a more absorbing, enjoyable dungeon crawler than the over-hyped and inevitable let-down that was Hellgate: London.

Mythos was blossoming into a sleeper hit then, but due to the ill-fortunes of Flagship Studios, the game was eventually shut down before it was even released and then sold off to South Korean company HanbitSoft. Many of Flagship's development team went on to form Runic Games and make the remarkably similar Torchlight.

Normally the tale would end there, the IP forever stuck in the hilarious complexity of copyright legalities, but Mythos was saved and worked on by HanbitSoft who recently released it in European as a free to play, micro-transaction supported MMO.  read more »

Coming up next issue (258, on sale 26th September), we're hacking around Windows Media Center to rinse more from this beast. If you haven't yet upgraded to Windows 7 or not using one of the enhanced editions of Vista then you're not completely out of luck as long as opt for an alternative media center package. And today I'm doing just that, with much research, sifting and effort here are the best free Windows Media Center alternatives at this very point in time.  read more »

You (our loyal readers) asked us for more tutorial features, and here we are delivering the goods as requested. Coming up in issue 257 (on sale 30th August) we're having a go at launching a website with Wordpress. Chances are you've visited dozens of sites built on this open source blog publishing platform, and we're going to show you how to do it yourself.

Going further afield towards full on web design and maintenance there are plenty of superb free applications for beginners and more advanced webmasters can take advantage of. This weeks Web pack release is a run down of our personal recommendations.  read more »

...and it's the fastest production 6950 on the market

That's right. The sweet spot in AMD's grapphics card range just got a little sweeter with Sapphire's latest update on the stock card. The HD 6950 TOXIC comes with a core clock set at 880 MHz out of the box, a beefy PCB and improved cooling.  read more »

So how do we go about speeding-up Windows I hear you cry! What about a major overhaul of the hardware followed up with CPU and RAM overclocking the to the point of destruction. That’d do the trick, though blaming sluggish performance on just hardware performance is not the way forward, instead Windows itself could well be sending a subtile hint for some TLC!

In our testing labs we’re in the process of sampling several commercial and well known free software tools  laying claim to optimise Windows, making it run quicker and fix scores of stability issues.  Is this just all smoke and mirrors or actually possible to speed-up Windows  using these applications? In issue 257 (on sale 30th August) we’ll reveal the truth, and in the meantime have a sift through our extensive handpicked selection of the optimisation solutions.  read more »

It's Magic but without the Paul Daniels bit...

I'll be honest; I'm pretty rubbish when it comes to the card game Magic The Gathering. I was introduced to it only recently through a friend who's been collecting the cards for years. She bought me an intro deck and instantly, I was hooked. I've already spent a pretty penny on a stack of cards and a multitude of decks. Not that it means I'm any good though, the current score between us is 16 to 2 and I'm not winning by 14 games...  read more »

Issue 256 of PC Format is about to hit the shop shelves (1st August), or if you subscribe, chances are you're already flicking through the pages of our latest edition. This past month brings along a slew of new demos to the gaming trough so feel free to get stuck in and have good old chew on this selection.  read more »