How-To Geek

Prime Day is one of the best times of the year to upgrade your tech setup, and if your iPad is your go-to device for work, school, or creative projects, ESR has some particularly compelling deals worth checking out.

Amazon Fire TVs are great until you start to notice the slowdown. Amazon sells televisions and Fire TV Sticks by the thousands. Along with sticks, they all come with these ads that seem to make everything slower. However, you don't need to deal with the lag; you just need to know what settings to turn off.

I remember when I first subscribed to Netflix streaming (using a Smart DNS, but don't tell anyone) and how impressive it was. At the time, I had a 4Mbps DSL connection, a Wi-Fi 3 router with 54Mbps of bandwidth, and a 720p plasma TV. The Netflix app ran on my PlayStation 3. It was all just enough to run smoothly, and I saw that it was good.

Affordable performance cars are becoming increasingly rare. As prices continue to climb, enthusiasts are often forced to choose between practicality and driving enjoyment, with many sporty models demanding premium money or sacrificing everyday usability in the pursuit of speed.

Meta knows its smart glasses are a hit, and it's doing as much as it can to reach a wider audience — including more affordable and celebrity models. The social media giant has introduced its simply-titled Meta Glasses (no Ray-Ban or Oakley here) starting at a lower $299 price, with more styles that include a Kylie Jenner edition.

I had four different desktop folders named some version of "misc" and a wallpaper I hadn't seen fully in months. Every shortcut, document, and stray file just piled up until the icons ran together, and finding anything meant scanning the whole mess. Windows actually has a built-in answer that's been sitting in the taskbar settings the whole time, though. It turns a regular folder into a pop-up menu, and it doesn't cost you any more memory to run.

I've had rooftop solar for roughly 10 years, and I love almost everything about it. Almost everything. There's one downside, and that's the fact that, like many smart home products, my solar array is partly dependent on the cloud.

Bad Wi-Fi is the biggest buzzkill. It's something I've experienced firsthand; the random dropouts, the uneven coverage, and the endlessly frustrating smart TV slowness. But a cheap Eero 6+ bundle fixed my wireless woes in one fell swoop. And today, the price of this four-pack mesh router bundle is just $190—its lowest price to date and a massive $250 discount.

Travel isn't only about rest and relaxation. I find myself catching up on shows I've been meaning to watch or tackling series that have been on my list for years. In particular, sitting on a plane is when I do my best binge-watching. I'm going to be sitting on a plane for hours on the way there and back. I might as well crush some Netflix, from shows I can finish in one sitting to long-running series where I can make a dent in the episode count.

Did you know that Home Depot isn't the only place to save big on the best Milwaukee tools? This week, Amazon Prime Day is back in session, and if you're looking for new tools or batteries to complete summer projects, now is the time to buy.

Being a tech enthusiast is an expensive hobby. While almost any hobby can get pricey at the high-end, buying tech comes with associated costs that don't always equal quality. Sometimes, buying the most expensive thing isn't necessary, and that's definitely the case when it comes to some networking gear.

Entertainment season is here, and there’s one detail that you may be overlooking if you want to elevate your gatherings — your water filtration system. Adding a reverse osmosis system to your setup is a simple detail and smart investment that will serve you all year round. Family gatherings, watch parties, and backyard barbecues can all benefit from healthier hydration.

Luxury cars have always come with a premium price tag, and for plenty of buyers, that's simply part of the deal. The Mercedes-Benz E-Class has spent decades earning its reputation as one of the benchmark luxury sedans, blending comfort, prestige, and refinement better than most.

Valve made clear SteamOS was coming to more devices when it started taking Steam Machine orders, and now it's clear just how broad that support will be. The company has confirmed discussions with Intel and Nvidia to expand support for its Linux-based platform beyond AMD hardware.

We've all spent too long tweaking spreadsheet numbers by hand, trying to hit a budget target or find the best outcome. Instead of relying on trial and error, use Excel's hidden Solver tool—it finds the best possible outcome based on the rules you define.

In my view, the Kindle is both the best and most frustrating product Amazon has made. And that's why I no longer recommend new ones. If you already own one, there's a good chance that it's got years more life in it. And if you don't, buying a new Kindle is often the least best option.

Power outages are rude and arrive without knocking, cutting through your plans, and leaving your filesystem looking at you like it has just been betrayed. The usual answer is to buy a UPS, plug everything into it, pray the batteries still work, and pretend the problem has been solved until the UPS starts beeping like a dying microwave. I wanted something a little different.

I am no stranger to having to deal with flights and passport issues. That kind of moment is exactly what Samsung is trying to solve with its new partnership with CLEAR. It sounds both too good to be true and a major security violation, but it is so much bigger than that. You can likely access it right now if you have a Samsung, and if your other electronics are packed well, you could skip the long wait.

Sick of the monthly Netflix fees? Amazon Prime Day is back in session, so if you want to take control of your media and spin up a local streaming service with Plex or Jellyfin, now's the cheapest time to buy the hardware.

My experiments with a Pi-hole started as a way to fix a few common problems: a network that was getting bogged down, smart devices phoning home, and ads that made websites literally unusable.