Spotlight search is a hallmark of macOS. It's a powerful tool for accessing apps, files, or searching the internet without your hands needing to leave the comfort of the home row. It's been replicated across Linux and Windows, and is a hugely popular feature. But it hasn't improved vastly over the last few decades, and is slowly being overtaken by more extensible, flexible options. That's where Alfred comes in.

Image: Samar Haddad / The Verge From the earliest pixelated games to the outrageously realistic experiences of today, flight simulators have always been pushing the boundaries of what can be visually recreated in a video game. It’s one thing to make space look good; it’s another thing entirely to faithfully recreate the cockpit of a 747 and the whole world around which it might fly.On this episode of The Vergecast, the fourth and final installment of our series on the five senses of video games, we asked Polygon’s Charlie Hall to help us make sense of the current state of the art in flight simulation. Hall, who once spent more than four months in VR mapping the edge of the Milky Way galaxy in Elite: Dangerous, has more experience in a virtual cockpit than most. We... Continue reading…

Did you keep up with all the news that happened this week? You'd be forgiven if you didn't; so much news hit the channels this week that it was hard to keep track of everything that happened. Microsoft's new Copilot+ PCs began making the sounds, and people started getting worried over potential privacy concerns with it. But underneath all that news was some legitimately good stuff that got swamped by all the Microsoft news. As such, here are the five best news picks for this week.

Bambu P1P vs. Creality K1C: an ‘easy’ 3D printer showdown. Continue reading…

When you're on the hunt for a great laptop, it's worth checking out the best Apple machines as well as the top Surfaces. But even still, actually making a choice can be confusing, especially if you're considering Microsoft's newest Surface Laptop and Apple's most premium portable computer.

Over time, even the best PCs and laptops can accumulate junk files that take up valuable storage space and slow down your PC. While we recommend that you keep an eye on your files and free up space occasionally, there may be a time when your PC just needs a completely fresh start. Installing major updates can also sometimes cause issues, which is one example of when it would be a good idea to reset your Windows 11 PC entirely. We'll show you everything you need to know to get this done.

Illustration: The Verge Apple will finally tell its own AI story at WWDC 2024, but it may not mean the sorts of showy features demoed by the likes of Google, Microsoft, or OpenAI. Instead, the event may see Apple rolling out basic AI features like transcribing voice memos or auto-generated emoji — and announcing a rumored partnership with OpenAI, according to Mark Gurman’s Power On newsletter for Bloomberg today. Recent rumors have held that Apple will be allowing chatbots to integrate more deeply into its operating systems, and it seems that OpenAI is getting the first crack at that with ChatGPT. But Apple is still working on an agreement with Google to do the same with Gemini, according to Gurman. It’s also been rumored to be talking to Anthropic. (Those... Continue reading…

Ventje’s eVentje. The eVentje custom buildout is a worthy all-electric successor to the iconic VW Camper. Continue reading…

I've used Windows for over 24 years now, and can't imagine ever moving to a different operating system. I'm so used to how my PC is supposed to look, feel, and work that switching to something else is too big of a transition at this point.

Natively, a lot of computers don't support all file formats, and even the best Macs are no different. At some point, you might receive a collection of compressed files that you don't know how to open. If it's a ZIP file, macOS Sonoma will allow you to open it natively. You can't say the same for RAR files. Both formats are used for file compression, but RAR is more efficient and provides better compression. To open this file type on a Mac, you'll need to employ the help of a third-party app.

While Apple offers a rock-solid macOS experience for Mac, it's not entirely void of issues. After all, every operating system can cause issues from time to time, and moving to a new platform could mean dealing with a fresh set of bugs. Fortunately, you can easily solve many common Mac problems through simple fixes. Before you head to the nearest Apple store, use the tricks below to troubleshoot common Mac glitches in no time.

Image: David Pierce / The Verge Hi, friends! Welcome to Installer No. 39, your guide to the best and Verge-iest stuff in the world. (If you’re new here, welcome, get ready for gadgets this week, and also, you can read all the old editions at the Installer homepage.) This week, I’ve been writing about Surfaces and other tablets, chatting with some internet friends about the fall of Red Lobster, reading about Magic: The Gathering and the history of emoji, watching MoviePass, MovieCrash, weeding my patio with a literal flamethrower, and for some reason, eating a lot of popcorn. Like, a lot of popcorn.I also have for you a bunch of cool new gadgets, a new YouTube channel you’re going to love, a new-old Mario game, a clever new AI tool for Windows, lots and lots of fun... Continue reading…