How-To Geek

When you’re consumed by a hobby, it’s normal to want to spend some money on it. But what if you’re spending your money on the wrong thing? And what if you bought something else that both kickstarts a new hobby and augments your existing pastimes?

Repurposing a 1TB or 2TB SSD is easy enough. There's always something you can do with those, from game drives to external drives for backups. But when it comes to things like 250GB HDDs or 120GB SATA drives, it might seem like we're not as spoiled for choice.

Live-action video game adaptations seem to be populating on streaming services these days, and I couldn’t be happier about it. After years of teasing that my favorite game might be adapted into a live-action series, it’s finally happening. In 2022, Sony confirmed the development of a God of War TV show and, in January, cast its lead.

My homelabbing journey started off like many of you, with just one server. I finally moved to using multiple servers about a year ago and I can say that my homelab has never been more stable than it is now, and I couldn’t be more happy with the setup.

Equipping a vehicle as advanced as the Tesla Cybertruck with functional accessories doesn’t always mean spending thousands of dollars. While Tesla’s engineering is world-class, you can make a few strategic upgrades to the Cybertruck for about $200 on Amazon. These accessories will enhance the experience of driving a Cybertruck, whether you are on a Tuesday morning grocery run, a hot Friday night date, or a long weekend off-grid excursion.

The Raspberry Pi Pico, and its newer sibling, the Pico 2, isn't designed to be a tiny mini PC like most of the Raspberry Pi family. Instead, it is designed for hardware projects and embedded applications. This is how to get started with one.

Are you looking for ways to cut your reliance on the cloud, bring the services you use in-house, and bolster your online safety? If so, then you absolutely should replace cloud-hosted services with self-hosted alternatives. Here's 12 privacy-focused self-hosted apps and the services they replace.

There are so many streaming services out there that have taken over the world with their movies and TV shows. Netflix has some great shows (even if their recommendations are broken), HBO Max has released some awesome films, and several other platforms have joined the party and created their own projects.

Home Assistant is a smart home platform that operates on a PC in your home, not in the cloud—so if you don't already have spare hardware lying around, you're going to have to find some. But what if I told you there's one type of computer you can buy that will save you money upfront, provide you with excess performance, and keep energy costs low at the same time?

You've paid the premium subscription fee, invested in a beautiful 4K television, and your home network is humming along far beyond Netflix's minimum Mbps requirement for Ultra HD and 4K streaming. Despite checking every box, you still catch distracting digital squares in dark scenes, or subtle color gradients turn into harsh, discrete stripes.

Long-time Android users know that there is a hidden set of developer settings where you can customize aspects of your phone not intended for the wider public. Turns out the same is true about Android Auto—sort of. Just like with your Android phone, there is a hidden page with car-related options that aren’t intended for the general populace, but it's not as deep nor nearly as good.

The clipboard, used when copying and pasting, is one of the most useful features on any computer or smartphone. Most platforms also have an even more powerful companion feature that's easy to overlook, but is a complete game-changer once you start using it. It's the clipboard history.

If you’re like me, you’ve had a rejuvenation of your love of reading that spurred you to buy an eReader like a new or used Kindle. There are so many different versions of Kindle out there, but what do they all have in common? The amazing Kindle Unlimited subscription.

Windows is prone to errors and bugs, and you might be tempted to download third-party optimization apps to solve the problem. Sometimes they can be helpful, but as often as not, PowerShell has a command that'll get the job done more quickly.

Got an old Mac mini or looking to pick one up? Apple’s smallest computer isn’t just a pint-sized box of tricks, it’s a very capable streaming device and media player. For many, it’s a better buy than the Apple TV 4K.

Proxmox is one of the most popular distros among homelabbers and self-hosting enthusiasts because it allows you to convert almost any PC into a server in the amount of time it takes you to install the operating system.

Recently, I’ve noticed the battery life on my Android phone is not as good as it used to be. So, I went digging around the battery settings to see what I could find. What I discovered was a few apps that have been sucking up battery despite rarely being opened.

Pirating TV shows and movies used to be a major problem that cost the industry huge amounts of money. Nothing seemed to be able to stop its rise until Netflix came along. Piracy declined sharply, but it's becoming increasingly popular again.

If you're a fan of Ryobi's bright neon-colored tools found at Home Depot, or even own several, you likely already know that the company makes a lot more than just tools for around the yard and house. The company has a bunch of obscure tools you'll love, along with outdoor items like coolers, camping lights, and so much more.

There are a lot of things Windows 11 has been criticized for, but some of the big problems are with seemingly basic features. Even years after they were implemented, these four Windows features are still giving me trouble.