Do you remember that one time we saw someone squash a whole Macintosh 128K onto a Raspberry Pi Pico? You'd be forgiven if you forgot, as it's been nearly a year since we last reported on it. Fortunately, we caught wind of how that project was going, and it turns out that you can now grab a kit that lets you make the entire thing for just under $25.

A few years ago, 3D scanners were primarily viewed as tools for high-end industries or specialized laboratories. They were expensive and often too complex for the average user. However, with advancements in technology, the process has become easier, thanks to cheaper 3D scanners and user-friendly software. Now, you can even get a good hand-held 3D scanner for less than $1000, and everyone, whether they are tinkerers or not, can use it to create their designs. There are also good 3D scanner apps for smartphones that work incredibly well.

Adding a 3D printer to your home opens a world of possibilities, from toys to tinkering to fixing broken things you'd normally throw away. If you're only printing models that someone else created, you don't need a very powerful computer at all. In many cases, you can get away with printing from a tablet or a Raspberry Pi. But once you get deeper into the hobby and start creating your own 3D models, those computing requirements change.

Synology is preparing to roll out new restrictions on third-party hard drives in its future network attached storage (NAS) devices later this year, the company confirmed to Ars Technica. The changes could make it much harder to use third-party drives in Synology’s devices for typical use cases, like backing up household computers or as local media servers. The good news is that if you already own a Synology NAS, the company says the change won’t affect you.Synology says in an EU press release that “starting with Plus Series models released in 2025,” only Synology-branded drives and those the company has certified to meet its specifications will “offer the full range of features and support.” According to Ars, Synology plans to update its compatibility lists to reflect which third-party drives that it has certified. The new restrictions mean that without Synology-approved drives, you might not be able to do things like pool storage between disks or take advantage of drive lifespan analysis offered by the company’s software. The change doesn’t apply to Synology J- and- Value-series devices, and won’t affect consumer-grade Synology Plus devices that were released in 2024 and earlier. Nor will it affect hard drives that are migrated to this year’s devices from its existing NAS systems, according to Synology’s press release.As for why it’s making this change, a Synology spokesperson told Ars, “Extensive internal testing has shown that drives that follow a rigorous validation process when paired with Synology systems are at less risk of drive failure and ongoing compatibility issues.” The company says similar things in its press release, writing that the restrictions will “reduce compatibility issues and increase system reliability and performance.” Synology did not immediately respond to The Verge’s request for comment. Restrictions like this are irritating. To Synology’s credit, it’s introducing them in a way that’s less egregious than something like a printer company blocking third-party ink with a software update. But that doesn’t fix the fact that owners of its future NAS devices will have fewer choices — and therefore fewer chances to save money — when it comes to buying the drives to stick into them.

For far too long, I've been navigating the ever-growing mountain of research notes and documents in a somewhat disorganized and inefficient way. I did hear about AI note-taking tools, but for one reason or another, I hesitated. That all changed when I finally decided to explore NotebookLM. The immediate clarity and efficiency that Google’s AI note-taking tool has brought to my research workflow has left me with one thought: I should have tried this sooner.

Despite Windows 10 losing support in October of this year, it's still the most popular version of Microsoft's operating system. Granted, the gap between the user bases of Windows 10 and Windows 11 is rapidly narrowing, with Statcounter claiming that 54.2% of Windows machines use Windows 10, compared to 42.69% for Windows 11; however, it's still large enough to be worth analyzing.

Adobe’s web design and development tools are dying software. Adobe XD — a UX/UI design tool — is only in maintenance mode, and Dreamweaver, Adobe’s web development tool, famed in the past, faces no more development, but still has support from Adobe. These two apps join a list of great Adobe tools that have been discontinued, but the modern day brings a ton of better web design and development tools to use instead. Although Adobe XD never took off in success, Dreamweaver has been considered a solid tool in the past. There are still plenty of others to choose from.

Capable of controlling a myriad of smart devices and IoT gizmos, Home Assistant is one of the best services you can self-host on your workstation. If you’re as much of a fan of Proxmox as I am, you may already have configured a HASS virtual machine on top of your PVE host.

Lakka is a lightweight Linux distribution built specifically for retro gaming, using the RetroArch emulator and the Libretro ecosystem at its core. It can turn devices like Raspberry Pi boards or old PCs into fully functional retro gaming consoles. While it's a newer option and doesn’t support as wide a range of hardware as some alternatives, it’s still very approachable. If you're using a commonly available controller, chances are it will work right out of the box without any extra setup.

A few weeks ago, I decided to set up a WireGuard VPN on my Raspberry Pi 5. I wanted a fastand lightweight way to securely access my home network whiletraveling, without relying on third-party VPN services. Since I already had the Pi set up and running 24/7, it just made sense to let it handle the job. What surprised me most was how quick and painless the whole process was — under 30 minutes from start to finish.

Last year, Microsoft announced that the classic Teams app, which is the original version of Microsoft Teams, would reach the end of support on July 1, 2024, and the end of availability this year, on July 1, 2025. Ever since, the company has made it its mission to encourage customers to switch over to the new Teams app.

While there sometimes isn't a lot that Windows users can see eye-to-eye on, there seems to be a pretty universal consensus that Windows File Explorer isn't good enough. Although it's undoubtedly been an integral part of Windows for decades now, and Microsoft has been consistently directing its efforts toward improving it, the application is still nowhere near as robust or customizable as it should be.