How-To Geek

One of the best things about Waze is also one of the worst. The app lets users report hazards, which are then shared with every other Waze user on the same stretch of road. These alerts can be really useful, but they can quickly get incredibly annoying.

Once you've spent $2,000 on a new graphics card or a high-end CPU, your first instinct is probably to download a suite of benchmarking tools. You want to see the numbers, compare your score with other systems, and make sure you got what you paid for.

For TV nerds, it's the most wonderful time of the year—Fall TV season! It's the time when many of the shows you've been waiting on are finally coming back. But it also means that you've got a few weeks to get it together before your remote and your watchlists go into overdrive.

Google is releasing its second Pixel Drop for September, and it's big news if you need to get in touch with loved ones — or just can't get enough of Hogwarts. The new update for Pixel phones delivers VIP contact updates and a set of Harry Potter themes, among other perks.

I write about Excel shortcuts a lot, and I've picked up plenty over the years. Some are useful only in very specific situations. Others become so familiar that I don't even think about pressing them anymore. Since Microsoft introduced Ctrl+Shift+V to Excel in 2022, it's become one of those shortcuts for me.

I was a massive science fiction fan growing up (I still am). I never imagined that one day I'd have a fully functioning computer that could do just about anything in my pocket. That tiny computer does a lot every single day. The fact that it runs on a battery is amazing. Unfortunately, some processes, apps, and usage can kill your battery fast. But if you're on Android, your phone probably has a hidden feature that will warn you when it happens.

Most Linux advice targeted at newcomers starts and ends with “just pick Ubuntu or Linux Mint,” but I find that to be an oversimplification. However, at the same time, I do understand that it’s not helpful to overwhelm someone with the hundreds of distros out there. So, we’ve developed a quick cheat sheet that walks you through a dozen beginner-friendly distros and shows how they compare across the four key areas that matter for a Linux newcomer. This should help you decide for yourself instead of simply listening to someone else’s opinions.

If you abruptly lost Android app sideloading on your Fire TV device last fall, you can relax. Amazon now says a future update will restore sideloading on affected hardware, with a caveat.

When you’ve owned a 3D printer for a while, it’s easy to fall into the trap of thinking it’s the solution to every problem. This is especially true when it comes to storage and organization. However, as much as it may hurt to admit, there are times when it just doesn’t make sense.

My car came with more USB ports than I thought I would need, and it's understandable to ignore any that don't charge your phone. But you can do a lot more with your ports than just charge a battery. Once you have a cable that works and isn’t useless, you can use those same ports to do a lot more to your car.

As much as I want my PC to run as smoothly as possible and avoid running into issues, I don't take exceptionally good care of it. Sometimes, old habits get the best of me, and I find myself slipping into a lack of maintenance that doesn't do my computer any favors.

Most laptops want to grab your attention with a stylish design or flashy features, to amaze and delight. The Lenovo ThinkPad T14 has never been one of those laptops; it simply aims to be the go-to laptop for businesses all over the world. Another generation has arrived, and it maintains that standard of class-leading durability and repairability. This laptop feels invincible, and that's by design.

There’s a new trend among some hobbyist photographers that involves 3D printing covers for digital cameras that make them resemble the analog cameras of the 35mm age.

I have a lot of video files scattered between my Plex library and shared folders full of family videos. Some have subtitles, plenty don't, and I wanted an easy way to transcribe them without uploading personal footage to a third-party cloud service. While looking for something that could handle the job locally, I came across Whisperer on GitHub.

Samsung Galaxy devices are some of the best Android phones you can buy, and that's because they're packed with features. Most Galaxy phones are full of exclusive features fans love, but there are dozens more that don't get talked about enough and deserve far more attention.

Apple’s AirPods are so ubiquitous, they’ve become the Kleenex of Bluetooth earbuds. But whether you own an iPhone or an Android, AirPods are hardly the only compelling option. As long as you stay clear of the cheapest budget options you see in checkout lines, Bluetooth earbuds, in general, are all pretty awesome.

Android's default keyboard, Gboard, ships with clever predictions and slick design, but it also ships with a permanent connection to Google's servers. HeliBoard, a free and open-source alternative, actually makes a pretty good case for a replacement.

I still value my Google Chromecast with Google TV dongle because I don’t mind when it slows down a little, since I only use it on an older TV to stream movies and shows. So when I ran into a visual problem and thought my dongle was dead, I found it just needed a quick settings adjustment to come back to life. Some have claimed their dongle received an update that broke their Google TV stick, but mine still worked until one day it showed that lovely black screen of death on an old TV that replaced my dead one. Sometimes it’s just one setting that causes the black screen; other times, it's more complex.

I'm no stranger to using different keyboard layouts. I'm a big mechanical keyboard fan, and I still use typewriters, even in 2026. The IBM Selectric I grew up with had a QWERTY layout, and the vintage (well, more like dilapidated and in bad need of some oil) Smith Corona I'm using now also uses the layout. In the late 1800s, QWERTY became the standard for typewriter keyboard layouts. But in the 1930s, another layout emerged: Dvorak. It looked like it could beat QWERTY on paper, but it never quite got there. I wanted to find out why (and give it a go myself).

I've used Excel for long enough to know that it isn't the first tool I'd reach for when I want to draw a picture, plan a room, or design a craft project. But a blank worksheet has helped me get creative, have a bit of fun, and sometimes even solve a problem faster than I could with a piece of paper or a dedicated app. Once you stop thinking of Excel as just somewhere to enter data, its grid becomes a surprisingly useful playground.