How-To Geek

Nvidia is slowly lifting the veil from the first PCs with its RTX Spark chip, and it's now clearer what they can do. I had the opportunity to demo several computers from Asus, Dell, Microsoft, and other brands at IFA 2026, and they promise to transform computing — although some big questions remain.

Four of the best series to watch on Netflix this weekend came to the service in a 50/50 split—two from the back end of August, and two newbies just dying to make an impact on the Netflix Top 10.

When someone new comes over, one of the first questions I get is why in the world I have a random laptop plugged into my router. Depending on how tech-savvy they are, my answer usually ranges from "Oh, it’s just for movies" to "This is my home server, and here's what it does." So, here’s why I actually keep a decade-old laptop running next to my router.

I'm forever creating dashboards in Excel, and while I get a lot of satisfaction from it, that's part of the problem. I end up going down a rabbit hole, adding more charts, and then wondering whether I left anything out. There's no handbook for creating a dashboard in Excel, as every dataset is different. So I decided to let Gemini do the decision-making for me.

Cassettes, CDs, even vinyls (despite their recent resurgence in popularity) — physical media that you can hold and confidently pronounce as yours has unfortunately become a rarity in the modern world. The digital landscape is one of temporary consumption and conditional ownership, and convenience alone can't make up for the downsides.

Do you have a fast internet connection, but your Windows PC often feels slower than it should? Have you already tried switching your DNS providers and other internet speed optimization hacks, but still no luck? Well, I’ve been in the same place you are — and after some digging around, I found that a few background apps and processes were causing the problem. Here’s how to find out if that’s happening on your PC and how to stop it for good.

Your desk is your command station, and no command station is complete without the right equipment. Make yours even better with an ESP32, some extra components, and these easy-to-follow build guides that add fun and useful toys and accessories to your desktop.

Anybody who has set up a new Windows PC for development knows the tedium—spending the first few hours installing tools, muting distractions, changing File Explorer settings, and configuring Linux support. Microsoft’s Project Zenith is designed to make that ritual obsolete. It is a ready-to-code Windows 11 experience that ships pre-configured instead of a blank-slate install.

SSD prices are higher than ever due to the ongoing NAND flash shortage, which makes both your existing NVMes and any future upgrades a serious investment. When you’re spending big money on a 4TB or 8TB drive, the last thing you want is heat quietly shortening its lifespan.

As I occasionally torture myself with checking GPU prices at various retailers, I'm well aware of the fact that GPUs are, indeed, still massively overpriced. Shocker.

Netflix has many award-winning movies hidden in its evolving library. You might find your new favorite watch from the platform's exhaustive collection. This week's picks span musical history, a defining horror, and a thrilling psychological drama.

I use a surprising number of little utilities every day, from cleaning up text and calculating dates to converting file sizes and working out percentages. But I got tired of opening different apps and websites for these simple tasks, so I wanted a single place to keep the tools I actually use.

Android has no shortage of high-quality apps, but with such a vast selection on the Play Store, finding the best one for a particular task can be surprisingly difficult.

I first came across LinuxPDF in a Reddit thread, and I had to read the post twice to make sure I understood what it was saying. Linux was apparently running inside a PDF file. This wasn't a screenshot of a terminal or a simulated command prompt. It was an actual Linux environment that you could interact with from the document.

Ryobi is one of the most popular power tool brands on the market, and a big part of that is affordability. We all love a budget-friendly tool, but here are some expensive Ryobi tools that are worth saving up for.

Many tech companies like to tout "world's best" claims, but here's one that actually matters. Lexar has introduced the "world's thinnest portable SSD," the Muse, and it looks to be genuinely helpful if you love recording video (or any media, really) on your phone.

If your old speakers are gathering dust and you're not sure what to do with them, you've come to the right place. Don't worry; I've got plenty of ideas that won't involve complicated DIY Raspberry Pi projects. Let's dive into a few creative ways to put your old speakers back in the game.

Buying a new phone leaves you with an older one that is pretty much useless unless you trade it in. No one really needs a second phone unless it is for work. Once you've moved your contacts and photos over, it's easy to forget the old phone is still useful when repurposed. It won't lose any of the features that make it such a good mini computer, and you should take advantage of that.

After a pretty solid run of documentaries for August, it's finally September, and for non-fiction fans, that means Netflix has re-upped its library of gripping real-life stories to sink your teeth into. Let's jump right in.

Excel has plenty of features that can make everyday spreadsheet work easier, but some of the most useful ones are surprisingly easy to overlook. If you have a little time to experiment this weekend, try three of my favorite hidden gems.