Recently, I found myself in the market for a new television, but as someone who's not necessarily a television enthusiast, my focus was on features like overall brightness, how vibrant the image looked, and whether the blacks were deep enough.

A few days ago, I had this wacky idea that I should try turning my Raspberry Pi into a portable Linux server – one that’s hooked up to a power bank and connects to my smartphone’s portable hotspot for my tinkering experiments. And as unhinged as it may sound, this setup worked surprisingly well, even if the lack of a 5V 5A power adapter throttles my Raspberry Pi’s performance.

Following months of reports and a coordinated tease earlier this week, Microsoft has officially revealed the Surface Laptop Ultra, a new high-end laptop powered by Nvidia's long-rumored Arm-based RTX Spark chip. If this chip is coming out of nowhere for you, it's worth noting that it was known as the N1 and N1X in rumors leading up to its official reveal.

On July 1, the lifetime Plex Pass will triple in price, jumping from $250 to $750, while not providing any new noteworthy features. Anyone still on the fence about grabbing one for their own media server has until June 30th to lock in the old rate before it becomes one of the most expensive software purchases a self-hoster can make.

We recently caught wind that Microsoft, Nvidia, and Qualcomm were planning something big. We then saw a leak claiming that the trio was planning to pull back the curtain on the N1X and N1 chips, which would elevate Windows on Arm to a whole new level. Now, Nvidia and Microsoft have officially shown off the new chip to the world at Computex 2026, and it looks like it'll seriously shake up laptops.

This fall, Nvidia will officially become a consumer PC chipmaker like Intel, AMD, Apple, and Qualcomm, putting a complete computing chip - not just graphics - into the very heart of laptops and mini-PCs. After many months of leaks, it's finally announcing the RTX Spark, the first in a family of chips that will meet or beat the most powerful thin-and-light Windows machines ever, it claims."This is the most efficient PC chip ever built," says Nvidia senior director of product management Mark Aevermann - without sharing so much as a single statistic or chart to back that up. The RTX Spark is effectively the same GB10 chip that's in the DGX …Read the full story at The Verge.

A lot of details are still under wraps, but at least we know what the new Nvidia Spark laptops look like. | Image: Nvidia Nvidia has officially entered the world of consumer laptop chips with the RTX Spark, and several device makers already have hardware lined up for it. Microsoft, Asus, HP, MSI, Lenovo, and Dell are expected to launch RTX Spark laptops sometime this fall, and some of those partner companies have shared details about what we can expect.The common feature shared by all of the upcoming launches is that Arm-based Nvidia RTX Spark superchip, though several variations are in the pipeline. The flagship version unveiled by Nvidia at Computex includes 20 CPU cores, 6,144 GPU cores, and 128GB of LPDDR5X memory - making it near identical to the GB10 ch …Read the full story at The Verge.

This shadowy render is the best glimpse Microsoft is giving us so far. | Image: Microsoft Once upon a time, Microsoft had to write off $900 million betting an Arm-based Nvidia chip could power its first flagship Windows portable, the original Microsoft Surface. But today, it's trying again. Microsoft and Nvidia have just announced the Surface Laptop Ultra, a computer with a new Arm-based Nvidia chip at its core. There's a lot we don't know about the 15-inch Surface Laptop Ultra, such as its final specs or the foggiest idea of what it might cost. But Microsoft is promising it's the most powerful Surface, period: "This is the most powerful thing we've ever made," Microsoft Surface boss Andrew Hill replies, when we ask how it stac …Read the full story at The Verge.

The internet got safer, faster, and more accessible, and one company is responsible for a disproportionate amount of that — Cloudflare. Before building my own home lab, I spent enough time around self-hosting communities that Cloudflare appeared in every other conversation. CGNAT workaround? Use Cloudflare Tunnel. Need DNS? Cloudflare has that too. SSL and DDoS protection? Enable with one click on Cloudflare.

Although a barebones version of VS Code works as a reliable code editor for simple programming tasks, it’s evolved into a hardcore dev environment – and you can attribute this evolution to the sheer number of extensions available in its marketplace. Whether it’s adding support for the most obscure coding language out there, bringing QoL features into your programming environment, or simplifying snippet formatting, you’ll find a VS Code extension for practically every task you can think of.

Creating a holographic effect at home is a lot easier than you may first think. In fact, the tech to create simple and repeatable holograms has been around since the 19th century, and people have only been refining the technique since then. If you want to make your own at home, all you need is a Raspberry Pi, some special hardware, and a little bit of ingenuity, as one person proved.

The Xbox Ally X20, and the glasses you’ll have to buy with it. | Image: Asus If you asked me what I'd change about the Xbox Ally X handheld - aside from fixing Windows, I mean - I'd tell you two key things. First, give me a bigger, better screen. Even a little bit bigger, so games feel less claustrophobic and with less ugly bezel. Second, get rid of the "Library" button. I am so tired of an accidental press booting me out of my game and into the Xbox library without a simple way to get back.With the just-announced ROG Xbox Ally X20, Asus did both - and then some. It's now a slick translucent handheld with drift-resistant GuliKit TMR joysticks, a transforming D-pad that goes from 8-way to 4-way by dropping its cor …Read the full story at The Verge.