How-To Geek

For years, the Jeep Grand Wagoneer had a pretty obvious problem: it looked and felt like a luxury SUV, but it asked luxury-SUV money for a Jeep badge. That made it tough to justify next to established names like Cadillac and Lincoln.

Back-to-school season brings a list of new costs for families with a teen driver in the house, from a parking permit to gas money to maybe a vehicle of their own. Car insurance is yet another cost that joins that seemingly endless list.

When you think of open-source OSes, you might think of Linux distros, but BSD-based systems have been around for a long time. Here are some of the best BSD systems that you can try that can give Linux distros a run for their money.

Most people who switched away from Bixby didn’t leave because it was bad at what it was built to do. They left because something shinier showed up, and going back never crossed their mind. I was the same way. I moved from Bixby to Google Assistant to Gemini without really thinking about it, and I assumed Bixby had quietly died somewhere along the way because it was somehow bad. But it’s actually giving Gemini a run for its money.

The days of digging through your car's owner's manual might soon be over. Ford is now broadly rolling out an AI assistant that can answer questions about your car, including some that would normally involve thumbing through a book or talking to a service technician.

There are plenty of three-row SUVs that can haul a family, swallow a pile of luggage, and get everyone where they need to go. What’s harder to find is one that makes you feel like you spent considerably more than you actually did.

Many of the streaming media players on the market are built on Android—this includes Fire TV and, of course, Google TV. So, why can’t an Android phone be used as a streaming stick? They can, and that’s exactly what I did with an old Samsung Galaxy phone.

Image editors and desktop publishing tools keep getting better all the time. While I love a good dedicated publishing tool like Scribus, sometimes I need something quick to test layouts or make images/videos fast. There are plenty of image editing tools out there, but Canva and PenPot are two of the most powerful that I've used. So I decided to compare them and see how they both fit into my workflow.

Some tech projects generate a lot of information, and that information isn't always used as well as it could be. I have a Raspberry Pi project running bird detection software, and it's identified a large number of species. I decided to see if I could take the audio that it had captured and turn it into an educational game.

You might want to think carefully the next time you copy-paste text from an AI chatbot. Anthropic has confirmed that its Claude AI models now watermark generated text and files, making it easier to gauge the authenticity of material — with major ramifications for slop and privacy issues.

With Nvidia's RTX 50 Super a pipe dream, and GPU prices crazier than ever, now is not the time to get a new graphics card. Look, I wouldn't mind, but no. The prices are way too wild.

I've used Windows for most of my life, but I've become increasingly frustrated with the way Microsoft expects me to work. Search is still unreliable, useful context-menu options are hidden behind an extra click, and Windows can use my internet connection to help distribute updates to other PCs through Delivery Optimization. Add in Microsoft's recommendations I never asked for and constant interface changes, and there's no shortage of reasons to consider leaving Windows.

In Home Alone 2, Kevin McCallister scoffs at Cedric when asked if he knows how the television works. "I'm 10 years old. TV's my life," Kevin tells Cedric before tipping him with gum. I'm much older than Kevin, but I can relate to what he said about TV. It's not my entire life, but it's certainly a crucial part, considering I write for How-To Geek's streaming vertical.

Few things are more frustrating than a phone that suddenly starts feeling sluggish. It's even worse when there's no obvious cause, like overheating or running a demanding app. That's because Android is a surprisingly complex operating system, and the real reason behind a slowdown isn't always easy to pinpoint.

Are you looking for a new laptop as school approaches? Look no further than the Lenovo IdeaPad Slim 3i 15 Gen 11. With a 15.3-inch 16:10 120Hz display, the latest Intel Core 7 processor, and ample I/O, this laptop is sure to be the perfect mix of work and play that you've been looking for.

There are plenty of smart devices that are significant upgrades over their dumb equivalents. A video doorbell, for example, is much more useful than a standard doorbell. While smart locks do offer some useful features, there are plenty of reasons why replacing your current lock might not be the best idea.

USB-C cables are pretty darn awesome (although confusing in many ways), but most run pretty short. The good thing is that longer options exist, yes, including 10-foot USB-C cables. But is the extra length a good thing?

Just 10 years ago, thumb drives were commonplace everywhere. You probably carried one around in your keys, or you had one in your backpack. Things have changed a lot, though.

Google Messages is one of the most popular messaging apps for Android, especially now that the Samsung Messages app has been discontinued, which means millions more are finally using Google's option. And while Google Messages is great, there are several frustrating default settings that I always change for a better experience.

I love looking outside in my backyard to see the wildlife buzzing about. From bees to squirrels, rabbits, birds, and more, my little 0.3-acre yard always has something going on. When I found out that bees need a safe place to drink water from, I knew what I had to do—3D print a watering station just for them.