All posts tagged: home office

Big John’s in Birmingham found to be employing illegal worker and paying them below minimum wage

Big John’s in Birmingham found to be employing illegal worker and paying them below minimum wage

Published by Sam Flores

An outlet of a popular Birmingham takeaway chain has been found to be employing an illegal worker following a raid by Government immigration officials. The Big John’s outlet in Bristol Road, Selly Oak, was visited by members of the Home Office’s ICE (immigration compliance and enforcement) team last June. Officers raided the venue on Thursday, June 19 at 1.30pm, and found four workers, one of whom was working illegally in the kitchen. Read more: Watch moment armed police ram knifeman about to head wrong way down motorway The man from Pakistan had arrived in the UK on a student visa in February of last year, but that only entitled him to work term time for 20 hours a week. He was said to be nervous when confronted and stuttered in his replies. He did, though, hand over his mobile phone, which had messages showing he worked well in excess of 20 hours a week, sometimes triple that. Big John’s in Selly Oak sits at the junction of Bristol Road and Elliott Road in Selly Oak …

Wi-Fi Router vs. Mesh System: Which Is Best for You?

Wi-Fi Router vs. Mesh System: Which Is Best for You?

Published by skeptic

After testing more than 60 mesh systems and routers in my last home, a modern two-story, 1,600-square-foot house, I found that single routers generally outperformed mesh systems, providing a faster and more stable connection, transferring files from one device to another on the network more quickly, and working efficiently without smart home connectivity issues. But many of those routers struggled to provide a fast connection in my backyard. Mesh systems extend your coverage, and nodes can target dead spots. I used a node to extend Wi-Fi into my backyard and to plug in a TV in the back room via Ethernet for a more stable and reliable connection. But it wasn’t until I moved to an old Victorian house that I felt the full benefit of a mesh system. It’s slightly larger than my last home, but extremely thick stone walls can seriously dampen a Wi-Fi signal, especially on the fastest 6-GHz band. After testing several systems in this home, it is crystal clear: I need a mesh for this house. A single router struggled …

Routers vs. Modems: What You Need to Get Online

Routers vs. Modems: What You Need to Get Online

Published by skeptic

To get internet access in your home, you need both a modem and a router. They aren’t interchangeable, and they serve two very different functions. If you think of your home as an island, the modem is the port where the big cargo ships come in from the world wide web, and the router is the warehouse sending out delivery trucks to the devices dotted around your island. But here’s where the confusion can set in: Sometimes they are combined into a single device. So, if you’re setting up a new network or planning to upgrade your home internet connection, knowing the basics of routers, modems, and gateways is crucial. If you’re in the process of upgrading your home internet, you may also be interested in How to Buy a Router, Mesh Versus Router, Best Mesh Systems, and Best Wi-Fi Routers. Table of Contents AccordionItemContainerButton What Is a Modem? The modem (or Modulator-Demodulator) acts as a translator between your home and your Internet Service Provider (ISP). It translates (or modulates) your outgoing traffic, whether that’s …

Mustard Made Storage Lockers Are on a Rare Sale Through May 31

Mustard Made Storage Lockers Are on a Rare Sale Through May 31

Published by skeptic

Storage furniture is too often drab and functional, intended to blend into the background of your home. Mustard Made is an exception. The company’s storage lockers come in a variety of loud colors that announce themselves in a room. Mustard Made makes some of our favorite storage solutions here on the WIRED Reviews team, especially when it comes to outfitting our overflowing home offices. Julian Chokkattu from the WIRED Gear team takes Zoom meetings from a space full of high-end office chairs and brand-new gadgets, and yet my residual image of his home office will always be the stylish yellow Mustard Made lockers behind him. My colleague Louryn Strampe gave the brand’s smaller dual-shelf low-down locker an 8/10 review. Mustard Made is having a rare sale from today through the end of May, with 20 percent off eight colors from its collection. Among the sale colors is that yellow favored by Julian, a really soft and lovely sage, a noble navy blue, and a medium pink they call “berry,” shown below. (Unfortunately, the vibrant poppy …

The Herman Miller Coyl Standing Desk Is Built Just for Gamers

The Herman Miller Coyl Standing Desk Is Built Just for Gamers

Published by skeptic

“Coils by nature solve a problem, which is how do you keep a space clean and tidy, that has a variable length between two things,” says Steven Harton, senior product manager at Herman Miller. He says the design choice was inspired by the coiled cables on vintage tech like telephone handsets and early mechanical keyboards. The result is fun and orderly. Finally, there’s the rotary dial. This is the height adjustment mechanism on the Coyl desk. Rather than using traditional paddles or levers to make the desk go up or down, Herman Miller employs a dial that feels like something you’d find on an old-school stereo—or a really nice gaming mouse. It lets you fine-tune the desk’s height to a 10th of an inch. (A display shows the table’s exact height.) That level of detail is an ode to the kind of precision gamers are fond of, digging into settings to maximize performance. Twist the knob to adjust the height of the desk. Photograph: Julian Chokkattu “Sensorially, how it feels and the feedback you get …

Best Webcams (2026): My Honest Take After Testing the Best

Best Webcams (2026): My Honest Take After Testing the Best

Published by skeptic

That’s a lot of complaints, I know. But if you just need something simple and “good enough,” the Logitech Brio 300 will do and certainly has better lowlight performance over an older option like the Logitech C920. If you have decent lighting in your room, the Brio 300 will still be an upgrade over your laptop’s webcam in terms of image quality. The gap between the $150 and $50 is pretty wide, but honestly, there aren’t a lot of great options in between that I’ve tested. Check in my honorable mentions down below for some other options in between, but truthfully, I haven’t yet seen a $100 webcam that actually feels like it’s worth the extra money. One I’m looking forward to testing in my next round is the Anker AnkerWerk C310, the 4K upgrade over the C200 from a few years ago. It comes in right at $100 and has a larger 1/2.5-inch sensor. Best PTZ Webcam PTZ, also known as Pan-Tilt-Zoom webcams, are the latest hotness in the world of home office cameras. …

Vari Align Desk Chair Review (2026): Breathable, Comfy, Low Cost

Vari Align Desk Chair Review (2026): Breathable, Comfy, Low Cost

Published by skeptic

Like the brand’s easy-to-assemble desks, the Align chair has a deceptive simplicity with relatively few parts. The chair required less than 15 minutes and only three screws to put together, using an Allen wrench that came in the box. (While the QR code, on a chair released in March, did not yet link up to the right URL for the assembly instructions, I mostly didn’t need them.) The simplicity stems mostly from the decision to limit the chair’s components: a cushion atop the wheels and casters and a single-piece mesh top held aloft by a suspension system that allows for a quite generous lean. The chair’s spec sheet says one can lean back about 20 degrees, but I found there to be significantly more play on my large frame: I could lean back closer to 45 degrees while still feeling full support and no tipping danger. This makes for a lot of room to stretch. Customization Concerns Video: Matthew Korfhage Even though the chair is constructed from minimal parts, Vari has managed to trundle in …

Lume Cube Edge Light Go Review (2026): Versatile, Portable

Lume Cube Edge Light Go Review (2026): Versatile, Portable

Published by skeptic

The base of the lamp has two slider buttons. One toggle adjusts the warmth, from cold white light all the way to red. One adjusts the intensity, from ultra-bright down to a glareless glow. Hard taps on each button skip ahead, while holding the toggle down on one side or another adjusts the light settings quite slowly—slowly enough I at first sometimes question whether it’s happening. The maximum brightness is 1,000 lumens—the approximate intensity of a 75-watt incandescent bulb. At this brightness, the battery lasts about five hours. At a lower intensity, this can extend to as long as a dozen hours. Red Shift Photograph: Matthew Korfhage There’s an added feature I have come to appreciate at night, which is the red-light mode. There’s little evidence that blue light from your little smartphone is keeping you awake at night. But numerous studies do show that blue light wavelengths can affect melatonin levels and thus your body’s circadian rhythm, while red light doesn’t do this. Red light therapy is, of course, the province of TikTok as …