Photo by Allison Johnson / The Verge Samsung is raising the price of its Care Plus device protection plans — but, in exchange, it’s throwing in unlimited battery repair. In an email spotted by Sammobile, Samsung tells customers that Care Plus and the more expensive Care Plus Theft and Loss plan will increase in price by $2.The new pricing goes into effect on May 1st, 2024, which is when Samsung plans on rolling out a new unlimited battery repair option for “eligible devices.” To qualify for a battery repair, Samsung says the phone must have a charging capacity below 79 percent and no “additional damage.” The Verge reached out to Samsung for more information on which devices are eligible for unlimited battery repairs, as well as whether it will be completely free, but... Continue reading…

When looking at the best CPUs and the best GPUs, it's easy to get overwhelmed by the investment that'll be required, which is exactly why a chip like Ryzen's 8600G is such a compelling choice, packing in both processing and graphics capabilities. However, you'll still need some solid memory. You can look at list after list of the best RAM out there, but why bother with that when we've got the ultimate memory choices specifically for the 8600G below?

Microsoft announced this month that it will be discontinuing the Windows Subsystem for Android — the thing that makes it possible to run Android apps on Windows PCs — in a year's time. The feature wasn't used by many, but that isn't the fault of Windows users. Android apps were irrelevant on Windows because the implementation of them was fundamentally unintuitive. A feature that enables phone apps to run on a desktop operating system is the kind of thing only Apple can do well thanks to its unparalleled cross-platform integration.

Super Mario Bros. Wonder director Shiro Mouri (left) and producer Takashi Tezuka (right). | Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge Super Mario Bros. Wonder is a game filled with oddball ideas. Thanks to magical flowers that, once collected, introduce some unexpected new element, players experience everything from a bunch of Piranha Plants simultaneously bursting into song to Mario turning into a sentient pile of goo. It has so many ideas, in fact, that director Shiro Mouri wasn’t sure the team could pull it off. “At first when I heard that we’d be creating one wonder effect per course, and that all of the courses are going to have different wonder effects,” he tells The Verge, “I thought: ‘That’s stupid. That’s impossible.’”As it turns out, the problem wasn’t so much coming up with ideas. The developers at Nintendo brainstormed a lot of potential powers — around... Continue reading…

“I’ve never seen a performance quite like that.” | Collage by Cath Virginia / The Verge | Photo by Victor J. Blue, Bloomberg, Getty Images ‘It’s his nature.’ Continue reading…

Philips Hue’s latest smart string lights offer plenty of preset scenes and a wide variety of vibrant colors. | Image: Philips Hue Philips Hue lights set the mood in a way other types of home decor can’t, but sadly, they can be pricey. Thankfully, Amazon and Woot have both kicked off a Philips Hue sale, making many bulbs, dimmers, light strips, and other accessories a little more affordable for a limited time. Amazon is also currently taking 20 percent off when you buy two or more items featured on this page, while Woot is slashing prices on a handful of both new and refurbished items. That includes a three-bulb kit with a smart button and Hue Bridge for $67.99 ($32 off).However, the real star of the show here is the Philips Hue Festavia string lights deal at Amazon, which drops the 65-foot smart lights to $175.99 ($44 off) when you clip the on-page coupon for an... Continue reading…

It’s pretty fast, too. | Photo by Victoria Song / The Verge The Shazam app for Wear OS just got a neat update: it can now work independently of your Android phone.The update, which was spotted by 9to5Google, basically removes the need for the wrist app to confer with the app on your phone. You don’t even need the app downloaded on your Android for it to work. I downloaded it directly onto the OnePlus Watch 2 that I’m testing without doing so on the Pixel 8 Pro it’s paired to. It still works! And quickly at that. It was able to correctly identify some bangers on my K-pop playlist within a second or two. (To be fair, there wasn’t any background noise in my office. Your mileage may vary in a coffee shop.) Another neat update is that if your watch is offline, the app will save a clip of the song... Continue reading…

Illustration by Nick Barclay / The Verge Apple is suing a former employee for leaking confidential information, including unknown details about Apple’s Journal app, the development of the VisionOS headset, and more, to journalists and employees of other companies. The lawsuit, filed ten days ago in California state court (24CV433319, pdf), says Andrew Aude also leaked regulatory compliance strategies, employee headcounts, and other product hardware characteristics. As reported previously by MacRumors, in at least one message, the company says Aude claimed he leaked information “so he could “kill” products and features with which he took issue.”Apple referenced many of the communications in the lawsuit:Between June and September 2023 alone, Mr. Aude connected with a Wall... Continue reading…

As cool as modern hardware is, there are plenty of examples of older tech had that a certain look and feel that still looks great today. Fortunately, there are plenty of ways to bring the past into the present and re-live the technology that got us to where we are today. 8BitDo has been making retro mechanical keyboards for a little while now, and the company has just announced its new Commodore C64-themed keyboard that you can preorder right now.

How much of an open-source fan are you? As good as the biggest and best products can be, nothing can beat an app or tool that lets you see exactly what it's doing. If you've always wanted to see what was going on inside your GPU, you're in luck; someone has created their own home-made open-source graphics processor, and while it won't be a staple in gaming PCs any time soon, it's still an amazing feat.

Image: Nintendo The world of Super Mario is a dangerous place. In the games, the plumber falls off cliffs, gets jabbed with spikes, and has everything from wrenches to fireballs hurled at him. But he always gets back up and goes again, which raises an important question: does Nintendo’s hero actually feel pain? According to Takashi Tezuka, who has worked on the series since the original Super Mario Bros. (including serving as producer on last year’s Wonder), there isn’t really a clear answer. “It may be that Mario does feel pain,” he tells me.But that ambiguity may be because I was asking the wrong question. The important part, he explains, is the emotions players experience when Mario plummets to his death or is fried by Bowser’s breath. “If the... Continue reading…

Illustration by Nick Little for The Verge Gmail revolutionized email with fast search and a whole gigabyte of storage. But where’s it headed next? Continue reading…