How-To Geek

Well, if you haven’t gotten your fill of a sappy Christmas on HBO Max by now, you’d better get to it. The end of the month will see a major clear-out of Hallmark-type seasonal content. Additionally, all but the first movie of the Harry Potter franchise are peacing out, as are plenty of classic and popular hits like Taxi Driver and Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes, as well asHBO documentaries and Max Originals.

Over the years I've had to buy numerous external SSDs for myself, and my wife, who is a video professional. You'd think that one external SSD is pretty much like the next, but as I've learned the hard way, there's more to it than just picking the fastest or the cheapest drive.

Wireless earbuds are the greatest thing since sliced bread. They’re a compact audio solution that lets you listen to music, block outside noise, hold meetings, and so much more. Unfortunately, they have one fatal flaw that makes them fall short for gaming—latency.

Are you experiencing hardware issues on your Linux device? Or maybe you're just curious about what information you can gather using terminal commands? You should try these lspci command examples.

There are a ton of USB Type-C hubs that all have similar ports and designs, but Belkin just introduced another one at CES 2026 with a more uncommon feature. It has a one-click privacy button to shut off external monitors, which is handy for shared workspaces or presentations.

MagSafe and magnetic Qi portable batteries can be a great alternative to larger portable batteries, and now Belkin has revealed one at CES 2026. The new UltraCharge Pro can snap onto your phone for a battery boost, while also providing a convenient kickstand and charging your other devices.

Many factors play into how good or bad your internet connection might be, but ultimately, none of it matters if your internet service provider (ISP) is just plain bad. I learned that harsh truth the hard way some time ago.

The phone sold simply as the “iPhone” isn’t the cheapest phone Apple sells. There’s a cheaper model currently known as the iPhone 16e—and while this is described as the most affordable iPhone, that doesn’t actually make it an affordable phone.

Even as a Microsoft Word power user, I'm always stumbling upon different ways to speed up my workflow and make the most of the program's tools. Here are some nifty tricks you should know.

Podcasts have become a lot more popular as time has gone on. They jumped from being niche to becoming a huge media powerhouse. However, as this medium matured, the platforms that host it seem to have rewarded video content over the audio itself.

If you work with strings in your Python scripts and you're writing obscure logic to process them, then you need to look into regex in Python. It lets you describe patterns instead of writing procedural logic. Let's look into some real-world examples where Python’s re module makes scripts smarter.

Are you interested in building an app with AI? I used to think that AI was worthless and dumb, but 2025 was the year I started to fully embrace AI in many aspects of my life. As 2025 came to a close, I ran into AI programming head-first and was actually pleasantly surprised with just how far AI coding has come. Here are things that really impressed me.

What if you could have a massive portable monitor for your PC, phone, tablet, or gaming handheld anywhere? XREAL did that with its augmented reality glasses, and now the company has announced an updated model and optional external hub at CES 2026.

Baseus just revealed a super-thin magnetic power bank, in the same style as the Apple MagSafe Battery. It can attach to the back of a phone with magnets, and you can still use it as a regular USB-C charger for other devices.

There are many USB Type-C laptop docks, but the new Baseus Spacemate RD1 Pro is a bit different. It's a vertical tower with 15 ports, a screen for checking the charging status, and a Qi wireless charger on top.

Jokes about "the Year of the Linux Desktop" seem to have been around almost as long as Linux has. The last few years have seen more developers and desktop users taking Linux seriously. Linux powers many servers, including those that bring you sites like this one, but could it finally break through on the desktop in 2026? Here's what would need to happen for Linux to reach a tipping point.

The annual Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas just kicked off, and Jackery has all sorts of exciting new tech to share, including a solar-powered gazebo that combines outdoor lounging with energy storage. This isn't your average canopy, and I can't wait to put one in my backyard.

Every so often, a product gets released that's truly excellent, but it doesn't receive a lot of attention. It's easy to forget about streaming boxes when we all have smart TVs, spare streaming dongles everywhere, or an old Google Chromecast in a junk drawer. However, this particular streaming box is over 10 years old, and I still use mine daily.

Are you using an AI browser like ChatGPT Atlas, or Perplexity Comet while logged into all your accounts? Letting an LLM automate your browsing can quietly put everything at risk. Here's how AI browsers are being hacked and why no antivirus can save you.

If you have ever tried crunching large datasets on your laptop, maybe a big CSV converted to NumPy or some scientific data from work, you have probably heard your laptop fan roar like it is about to take off. That is a sure sign it is doing some heavy lifting. Push it a little further, hit run on your Python script, wait, and then everything freezes as out-of-memory errors start flashing.