Blogroll

Sure, Zune was a commercial flop, and it never had a large enough user base to justify Microsoft keeping it around. But if you used it, you'll probably agree with me that nothing else felt, feels, or will ever feel quite like it. Yes, at the end of the day, it was a music player you used to play your music. But it did so with a design language so distinctive and iconic that it still looks modern today. And so, with Zune turning 20 this month, I decided to bring the software back with a little help from Claude.

SAVE $50: As of Nov. 11, the Bambu Lab P1S is on sale for $349 at Amazon. That's a 13% discount on the list price.

Opens in a new window Credit: Bambu Bambu Lab P1S $349 at Amazon
$399 Save $50   Get Deal at Amazon

If you've been eyeing up a 3D printer for custom creations or personalized gifts, you might not have to wait until Black Friday to find a decent deal. Early discounts are already appearing, including this latest deal on the Bambu Lab P1S, a ready-to-use FDM 3D printer designed to make creating your own objects from digital designs more straightforward.

This 3D printer is designed to make creating detailed, multi-color models quicker and easier, with printing speeds of up to 500 mm/s and an acceleration of 20,000 mm/s². It supports up to 16-color printing when connected to a compatible Bambu Lab AMS system, giving you more flexibility when working on different designs.

Its fully enclosed body makes it suitable for printing with a range of advanced filaments, and the automatic bed leveling simplifies setup, making it much easier to achieve consistent prints.

And you don't need loads of prep time either; in fact, you can get started in around 15 minutes. According to the product listing, compatible filaments include PLA, PETG, TPU, PVA, PET, and ABS, as well as ASA, PA, and PC, and carbon- and glass-fiber-reinforced polymers aren't recommended.

Get this deal from Amazon now.

It's been 13 years since Rockstar dropped a new mainline Grand Theft Auto, so there was always going to be a fairly large crowd for the next one. A week before launch, we're getting a sense of just how big that crowd is.

Eight days before its Nov. 19 release, GTA 6 has already topped $1 billion in preorders, according to an estimate from market research firm Sensor Tower. The firm also estimates that players worldwide have preordered more than 10 million digital copies for PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X and S. (About three out of every four orders were for PS5, The Washington Post reported on Nov. 11.) The previous game, GTA V, hit that same $1 billion milestone three days after it went on sale in 2013, according to publisher Take-Two Interactive.

Take-Two has yet to share its own preorder tally for the sequel, though CEO Strauss Zelnick wrote in a release on Monday that orders were reaching "unprecedented levels." Both Sony and Microsoft also said it's already the most preordered game in the history of their respective digital stores.

Rockstar opened preloads on Nov. 10, so players can get the download out of the way before launch day.

The hype for GTA 6 has been building for nearly three years, ever since Rockstar released its first trailer in December 2023. It drew more than 90 million YouTube views in 24 hours, setting a Guinness World Record, and has 302 million views as of Nov. 11, 2026.

Rockstar gave fans more than trailers to watch while they waited. In August, it premiered Grand Theft Auto VI: An Extended Look, a 27-minute preview made entirely from in-game footage, on Netflix before putting it on YouTube later that day. The rollout spilled into music, too. The official album drops alongside the game on Nov. 19, and two days later, Rockstar and PlayStation will host a music festival in Miami with performances from Cardi B, Travis Scott, and Justice, who composed the game’s score.

Streamers have made their own entertainment out of the countdown. IShowSpeed reacted to the launch trailer on YouTube, amassing 1.7 million views, while Twitch streamer Kai Cenat has gone back through the series, spending more than 130 hours playing five older GTA games.

SEE ALSO: Kai Cenat beats four GTA games in under 100 hours ahead of GTA 6 and isn't done yet

The anticipation has reached a level where Hollywood's ears have perked up. When Screen Engine and The Wrap asked people which upcoming movie, show, or game they were most excited about, GTA 6 came out on top for the sixth week in a row, drawing 8.3 percent of mentions in the latest survey, ahead of Avengers: Doomsday at 6.7 percent.

That's unfortunate data to see as an entertainment exec, especially considering The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping opens the next day, when new seasons of Yellowjackets and Percy Jackson and the Olympians also premiere. All three are arriving on a weekend when some fans have already taken time off to spend in Vice City. "Hollywood should look at the hours as closely as the dollars," The Game Awards founder Geoff Keighley told The Hollywood Reporter.

When I say time off, by the way, I mean literally. Some fans have already blocked off those hours on their work calendars. As Mashable's Amanda Yeo noted in September, a Thursday release means two vacation days can buy a four-day weekend playing the game, though some were already talking about taking a week or more. HR software company BambooHR found that employees requested Nov. 19 off at a rate 13 percent higher than for comparable days in 2024 and 2025. In a separate survey, 18 percent of salaried workers said they planned to take launch day off to play.

SEE ALSO: Want time off for 'GTA 6'? Here's how to ask your boss.

As for workplaces, the company Logitech is giving employees a day off to play a game of their choice, and its gaming division will stream from its San Jose headquarters on launch day. Even an Army unit at Fort Stewart in Georgia allegedly offered eligible soldiers a four-day pass timed to the release if they reenlisted by Nov. 14.

By the time Avengers: Doomsday opens in December, those launch-day vacation days will be long gone. The question for Hollywood is how many people will still want to spend their precious free time in Vice City versus watching TV or going to the movies. If preorders are any indication, quite a few.

Want more tech and digital culture news delivered to your inbox daily or sent straight to your device? Sign up for Mashable's Top Stories newsletter or get Mashable push alerts today.

Switching outdoor string lights on and off manually gets old fast. The Kasa Apple HomeKit Outdoor Smart Plug lets you control them from your phone or with voice commands. Right now, you can get it for $16.99 as part of an early Black Friday deal on Amazon.

AirTags have had their moment, but their time has passed. The push for universal compatibility and Google's efforts to revitalize its Find Hub have led to an explosion of competition in the Bluetooth tracker market. Previously known as Find My Device, the Find Hub creates a web of Android devices to help you locate your lost mobile devices. Popular trackers now offer dual compatibility for Google and Apple's findability networks, but users still have to choose a single ecosystem to rely on at a time.

Linux is everywhere, even when it looks and feels nothing like the desktop operating system most people think of when they hear the name.

Ryobi's latest lineup of Power Source chargers are truly versatile, turning your boring charger into go-anywhere portable power for everything from phones to laptops. And yes, you can charge your tool battery and your phone at the same time. But while they nail utility, a silly design choice keeps them from being an absolute home run.

You never know what delays to expect when traveling, and the last thing you need is your phone or laptop running out of power while you're trying to catch up on work or watching content while waiting for your flight. You won't have to worry about this during the holidays with the Baseus 20000mAh USB-C Portable Charger, which offers ample capacity to meet all your charging needs.

Going to a Disney park is supposed to transport you somewhere magical, but for many, the experience requires a very rote part of modern life: staring at your phone.

Disney has separate apps for its resorts in California and Florida, as well as those in France, Japan, and China. Booking Lightning Lane appointments (an extra charge that lets guests jump long lines for rides), nabbing meal reservations, and ordering mobile food items all require checking times on the app. It’s something that Disney guests have to do often if they don’t want to wait hours for Space Mountain or a meal at the Blue Bayou restaurant.

Disney brass even acknowledged that its tech-forward approach has lessened the park experience, with Walt Disney Imagineering President Bruce Vaughn saying last year that reliance on the various apps "breaks the spell" of visiting a Disney resort.

Disney’s first experiment to reduce phone use at its parks was revealed this week. The company just launched the Disney Imagineering Labs app (yes, a new app to reduce smartphone use). The first offering of the app is now available to select Magic Key participants (annual passholders) — Secrets of the Spire in Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge. Described by the Disney Tourist blog as an interactive game within the parks' Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge section, the app offers minigames and challenges. It’s not very clear how this reduces phone usage while at the park, though.

The more promising part of the Imagineering Labs app is the Disneyland Enchanted Guide, which does not yet have a release date but is likely to drop early next year, according to Disney Tourist Blog and the Micky Visit blog.

Want more film and TV news and reviews delivered straight to your inbox? Sign up for Mashable’s Top Stories newsletter or get Mashable push alerts today.

The AI-powered app allows text-based and voice-based questions, e.g., "How long is the line at Pirates of the Caribbean?" "Where should we eat at around noon near Tomorrowland?" The most promising aspect of the Enchanted Guide is the ability to set alerts for when a ride or restaurant's wait time drops below a certain time. Rather than constantly checking the app, you can go about your day until you hear that ding from your phone. 

SEE ALSO: Why friction-maxxing could be good for your tech usage

As part of the early app rollout, Disney is soliciting feedback from users in-app. Acknowledging that the Imagineering Labs app isn’t a finished product, Disney is asking park power users to weigh in on what aspects of the app truly improve the park experience.

Time will tell if the new app really reduces phone usage at the park. There has been no word on the Disney blogs that the Imagineering Labs app will replace the various Disney park apps, which means you could get an alert on Lightning Lane availability via the Enchanted Guide app and then have to open the Disneyland app to actually book your Lightning Lane appointment. Hopefully, if successful, the apps will be integrated. 

Adding to the mixed messages is the partnership between the Enchanted Guide app and Meta for the latter's Ray-Ban smart glasses. Users will be able to pair the glasses with the app, where they can ask the AI about things they see in the park. Again, more offerings can be good, but this doesn’t seem to align with the goal of making visiting a Disney park more of an offline, in-the-moment experience.

Every time I've tried to use Google Sheets from my phone, I've ended up frustrated and gone back to my laptop. But I spent a week living in Microsoft's Excel app on Android, and I can't believe a Microsoft app is built better than any other version I've seen. I am normally against Microsoft's ports, but this one is a whole new app when used on a phone.

Full-size desktop towers can take over your desk or the floor beneath it and crowd your workspace. A compact PC like the Lenovo Yoga Mini Desktop fixes that by fitting a Core Ultra 5 system into a 0.65L chassis. As part of Best Buy's early Black Friday sale, you can pick this little PC up for just $600.

I used to think mini PCs were not for me, but that's not the case anymore. In fact, I think that buying a trio of cheap mini PCs might be the better option compared with buying one expensive desktop.

Trends among teenagers are an ever-changing hellscape, and finding the best gifts for teen girls (that they'll actually use for longer than a month) is a coveted skill. Even millennials — people who are not that old, thank you very much — can have trouble keeping up with the world predominantly ruled by TikTok and content creators.

An important reminder: Don't just wing it. Gen Z girls are clearly loyal to a defined handful of brands and have very specific aesthetic goals. Goals that could be torched by the honest mistake of grabbing generic white earbuds instead of the best AirPods or not realizing that Owala has eclipsed Stanley in the hierarchy of trendy water bottles.

SEE ALSO: Claire's is betting Gen Alpha wants creators, not celebrities

But you know who does know what teenage girls want this year? Other teenage girls. I'm regularly tracking viral TikTok products and compiling the most popular stuff with items that the high schoolers in my own life have mentioned. So even if you don't know what terms like whimsymaxxing mean, you're definitely in the right place to find a gift that a teenager thinks is cool. Whether it's for a birthday, holiday, high school graduation, or just because, here are 35+ unique gifts for teenage girls in 2026.

Reddit is full of posts from people who have designed yet another launcher for their rooted TV. There's so much more that's possible, however. I decided to bring back a TV feature from the good old days before the internet was even a thing, and it's become a genuinely useful part of our lives.

Finding a file on Windows is far too slow for its own good. I have waited minutes only to never find the file I was looking for. I tried the popular fix, and it worked well enough that I kept it around for a long time. Then I found something that did the same job without making me feel like I needed a manual.

Back in the day, before Android had support for gesture navigation, custom launchers were on a level playing field with the stock launcher your phone comes with. But starting with Android 9 Pie, when Google introduced gesture navigation to Android, something changed.

Adapting a video game into a movie is more than a little tricky, as plenty of studios have discovered over the years. From the 1980s to today, we've had our fair share of really poor video game movies, some so bad that they've gone down in history among the worst movies of all time. It isn't all doom and gloom, though. While it definitely feels like there have been more bad adaptations than good ones, occasionally we get a gem that reminds us just how good a video game movie can feel when it is done right.

The more software you install on your computer, the longer it may seem to take to start up Windows. Many programs add themselves to the list of programs started when you boot your computer, and that list can get long. Here's how you can disable startup programs in Windows to speed up your boot time and free up system resources.

Going home for the holidays? Or simply traveling for Thanksgiving, Christmas, or New Year's?

Firefox and its built-in VPN has your privacy covered — at not cost to you.

Mozilla, the organization behind the Firefox web browser, has announced that it will be providing free unlimited data for its built-in VPN to all of its users from Nov. 10, 2026 through Jan. 31, 2027. That's now up until the end of January.

Firefox advertises its VPN first and foremost as a privacy feature. A VPN hides a user's real IP address, thus masking exactly what location that user is browsing from. 

For example, Firefox says its VPN will help hide the sites you visit from shared WiFi networks in public spaces or at a relative's home.

However, Firefox knows that many VPN users also utilize the feature to change their location in order to access region-locked websites and platforms. And, according to its announcement, Firefox is cool with that too.

How to try the Firefox VPN

Firefox's free built-in VPN is available for Firefox on both desktop and Android. Mozilla says the feature is coming to iOS devices soon too.

In order to take advantage of Firefox's offer of unlimited data use via their VPN, simply sign up for a Mozilla account. Then, in the Firefox web browser, select the VPN icon in the toolbar on desktop. On Android, tap on the three-dot menu and select Settings followed by VPN. From there, follow the setup process and turn the VPN on.

Mozilla explicitly reminded users in its announcement that VPNs do not make users anonymous or hide on-device browsing history. As Mozilla points out, websites can still identify users through cookies or when signed into an account.

In addition, Firefox's built-in VPN only works with browsing within Firefox. Users cannot utilize the VPN when surfing the internet via another web browser or using a mobile app. Mozilla has a separate paid subscription-based product, called Mozilla VPN, for users looking for a VPN that works across apps.

Mozilla has been heavily investing in Firefox, promoting its privacy features and AI controls for users who aren't fans of AI taking over every facet of other web browsers. The company recently launched an ad campaign for Firefox that went viral, uniting some of the web's earliest internet-famous stars.

Want to learn more about getting the best out of your tech? Sign up for Mashable's Top Stories and Deals newsletters or get Mashable push alerts today. 

Windows Search is one of the features I use most in Windows 11. Most of the time, I'm looking for something simple: an app, a file, or a setting. That's why I've never been particularly keen on Search trying to do other jobs at the same time.