Windows Patch Tuesdays, of late, haven't been the most reliable, but once every new update is installed and the PC finally restarts, there's one screen that greets everyone — the one that says "Getting things ready." I've spent enough time staring at that screen to know what it means: absolutely nothing useful. There's no percentage bar, no estimate for completion, or any indication of whether my PC is actually working while Windows apparently "gets things ready."

As audio-focused generative tools and platforms have gotten more sophisticated, the internet has become increasingly filled with AI-generated music whose melodies and vocals are algorithmically derived from the work of human artists. While some of the people pumping out this kind of content immediately own up to using AI, others have denied using the technology until increasing public scrutiny forced them to tell the truth. For musicians - especially those creating art in technologically-focused spaces like electronic dance music - the increasingly complicated question of what is "real" and what isn't feels particularly urgent and personal …Read the full story at The Verge.

One of the cooler aspects of getting into tinkering and 3D printing is that, if you need a specific piece of furniture or a gadget for your home, there's a good chance you can just make it. For example, if you're feeling the need for a plant-shaped lamp for your room that glows pretty colors, someone has already filled that niche for you. Best of all, you can grab all the files, build instructions, and the Bill of Materials right now.

Not many people know that you can install Linux on your phone, and I don't mean Android, either. It's not exactly ideal, as you may find some apps and services won't work, but it is entirely possible to install a Linux distro on your phone like you would on a PC. For instance, someone dug up an iPhone 6S and slapped Linux on it, and while it was a pain to get working, it's a cool example of how you can give old tech a new lease on life.

The Xbox gaming scene is a little strange right now. This time last year, Xbox was moving to scrap as many of its exclusivity deals as possible, allowing its titles to migrate over to rival consoles and PCs. It seemed to be working (to the point where Xbox games dominated the PlayStation's top-selling charts), but recently, the new Xbox CEO has pulled back, instead citing exclusives as required for the brand.

As much as I want to say that Linux is perfect in every single way, the truth is, it isn't. Some companies handle their driver updates via a bespoke app, and getting that same app onto Linux may not be ideal. Fortunately, perhaps inspired by the number of people moving to Linux to game, 8BitDo has fixed the issue with its own controller drivers with a website that lets you download your drivers.

An Android phone comes with several Google apps built in. You get Maps, Photos, Gmail, and Chrome, along with a bunch of others that you rarely open. Chrome has a large user base on desktop, and this strategy expands its reach to most Android users. The browser is the default gateway to the internet and to browsing websites, and its popularity pushes you to use it instead of any other pre-built browsing app.

It seems like Adobe Acrobat has been the default PDF viewer and editor for so long that most people don't give it second thought. I still keep the mobile app on my phone because it's informally required for some of my documents, but I've stopped paying for any of Adobe's products - I just don't think it's worth it when there are free options that give you the same stuff.

Sometimes, when you make the jump from Windows to Linux, you have to let some of your beloved apps go. However, some people take it upon themselves to make their own version of the app for everyone to use. Such is the case with this Reddit user, who coded up their own version of CrystalDiskInfo because they missed it so much.

Ever since I realized the sheer potential of the tools within Nextcloud’s App Store, it has become an essential part of my self-hosted stack. Thanks to Collabora Office, I was able to edit conventional text documents, spreadsheets, and presentation slides directly from Nextcloud, while Tasks, Notes, and Collectives fill their own niche roles in my productivity toolkit.

I have used both Ollama and LM Studio to run local models, and neither is particularly difficult to set up. But if you actually want to integrate local LLMs into working systems, you'll find Ollama just a little cumbersome. As your stack grows, your AI setup will become hard to maintain and even harder to rebuild. I faced this recently and started exploring options. I now run my models through Docker Model Runner and keep the rest of the setup in a Docker Compose file. The file defines how the services connect and where they store data. If something breaks, I run one command, and Docker recreates it. Mind you, the whole process takes about four minutes.

SSD prices show no signs of coming down, so making your existing drive last for longer has become more important than ever. My main drive is a 1TB Gen4 NVMe SSD, with a 1TB Gen3 drive reserved solely for games. My C: drive is decently large at around 230 GB, but that doesn't stop Windows from nearly filling the partition every few months.