If you're in the market for a new laptop, but you're holding out for Black Friday deals to pick one up (smart move, by the way), you may be surprised as to what you can find before the date arrives. Companies are putting early Black Friday deals up on their sites all the time, and if you know where to look, you can snag a ton of money off your favorite hardware before anyone else realizes it is even on sale.

For years, PC gamers have been promised a one-click shortcut to peak performance through the fabled 'game modes'. These modes can be found buried in Windows settings, BIOS, and some third-party apps, all of which claim to squeeze extra frames and responsiveness out of your rig.

NotebookLM is already a pretty awesome tool on its own. It transforms messy notes and heavy research into something you can actually understand and interact with. And it explains things in plain language without talking down on you. I have very few complaints. However, NotebookLM doesn’t hit its full potential until you feed it better information or pair it with other apps - and this is where a tool like Readwise comes in.

This is one of those discounts that only comes along every so often. Samsung's ultrawide OLED gaming monitor, the Odyssey G950SC, is now well below its retail price of $1,800. The sharp discount comes from Best Buy ahead of Black Friday, knocking $950 off, dropping it to just $850. That's a Samsung 49-inch OLED ultrawide monitor for just a fraction of its original price, which makes it an absolute no-brainer. If you've been on the lookout for something new, this monitor is going to be a great one to pick up.

Being able to connect to a high quality internet connection is absolutely essential in this day and age. And while most homes and offices will provide that without any issues, other setups need help. Whether it's the distance being covered or the obstacles in the way, or interference from other devices, an internet connection can suffer for any number of reasons. The good news is that there are great solutions available in 2025, with a mesh system being one of them.

Roblox will soon require that users go through an age estimation process if they want to be able to chat with other people on the platform. The requirement will be in effect for all users starting in early January.Roblox has come under significant scrutiny over child safety on the platform, with multiple states filing lawsuits this year against the company. The plan to require age estimation for chats is just one of several safety-related announcements the company has made in recent months.Beginning in the first week of December, Roblox will require users in some markets, including Australia, the Netherlands, and New Zealand, to go through the age estimation process to be able to chat with others. In early January, the requirement will expand to other countries where you’re able to use Roblox’s chat.After going through the age estimation process, Roblox will assign users into groups: Under 9, 9–12, 13–15, 16–17, 18–20, and 21 plus. Users will only be able to talk to users in their same group “and similar age groups as appropriate,” Roblox VP Rajiv Bhatia said in a briefing.In its newsroom post, Roblox gives a couple examples of how these groups work and who they let people chat with:Elisa (estimated age 12): Elisa has access to chat with users aged 15 or younger in Experience chat. All users 16 or older are prevented from initiating or engaging in chat with her.Marcus (estimated age 18): Marcus has access to chat with users aged 16 or older and could add a younger sibling as a Trusted Connection, as long as they are 13 or older.The images and video used for Roblox’s age verification checks are processed by Persona, and Roblox says the images and video are deleted immediately after they are processed.

BIOS updates have remained my Achilles' heel throughout my two decades of PC building. The idea that a BIOS update gone awry can brick my PC had been drilled into my psyche long ago, and it's precisely why I hadn't touched my AM4 PC's BIOS since the day I built it. A few months ago, however, I dared to take on the challenge. I downloaded the latest BIOS version from Gigabyte's website, started the process the old-school way, and waited with bated breath. As you might expect, everything went smoothly. The update even fixed some weird power issues on my PC, which made me realize I should have done this sooner.

The DJI Osmo Action 6 can better handle extreme light conditions. | Image: DJI After initially launching it exclusively in China last week, DJI has announced a global release (not including the US) for its new Osmo Action 6 action camera. The camera is not a radical departure from the physical design of last year’s model, but DJI is introducing some innovative new functionality. For example, it features an adjustable aperture that uses a mechanical iris (rather than relying on software tricks) and a larger square format sensor that offers more flexibility when you want to crop footage to various horizontal and vertical aspect ratios.As with many of DJI’s launches over the past year, including the recent Neo 2 selfie drone, the company hasn’t confirmed if or when the Osmo Action 6 will be available in the US. Chinese pricing starts at 2,998 yuan, or around $422. In Europe it starts at €379, in the UK it’s £329, and in Japan it’s ¥61,270, or around $396. Last year’s Osmo Action 5 Pro, like action cameras from DJI’s competitors such as the GoPro Hero 13 Black, used an aperture fixed to f/2.8. The aperture on the new Osmo Action 6 can be opened to f/2.0 to let in twice as much light and improve the camera’s ability to capture high-quality video in low-light conditions. The size of the aperture can also be narrowed to f/4.0 to reduce the amount of light coming into the camera. That increases the depth of field and brings more of what’s in frame into focus, and can also eliminate the need for using darkening neutral density filters when conditions are too bright.The Osmo Action 6 uses a new 1/1.1-inch CMOS sensor that’s larger than the 1/1.3-inch sensor found in the Action 5 Pro, but its square shape is similar to the square sensor Apple now uses in the front-facing selfie camera on the iPhone 17 lineup, which lets the iPhone capture landscape photos and videos without rotating the phone. The Osmo Action 6 offers similar shooting flexibility, but the advantages of that square sensor especially come into play during postproduction, making it easier to crop and reformat videos into various aspect ratios, including vertical formats for smartphones and social media, while still keeping the action in frame.The camera can capture up to 4K/120fps videos in a 4:3 aspect ratio, but its slow-motion capabilities improve to 240fps with the resolution reduced to 1080P, and can be boosted to up to 960fps using interpolation to generate additional in-between frames. Internal storage gets a small bump to 50GB that can be expanded using a microSD card up to 1TB in capacity. DJI claims the Action 6 can record for up to four continuous hours using its 1,950mAh battery, but keep in mind that the company’s testing is done in ideal conditions while video is only captured at 1080P/24fps. Battery life will be reduced when capturing at 4K and higher frame rates, or while using it in temperatures that drop well below freezing. DJI says the camera can function properly at temperatures as cold as -4 degrees Fahrenheit, and it remains waterproof to depths of over 65 feet.

When gaming, having a spare device or monitor for tracking discord or stream chat, and keeping up with non-game communications is a serious bonus. Whether you use your phone on a monitor mount, a tablet, or a second monitor, having a gaming sidecar is an absolute must for any kind of multiplayer game session or highly-coordinated raid night.

It's not often that we get to see a DIY project as beautiful as this one. It's even rarer to see a project that also includes all the files you need to make it yourself. However, when a project manages to check all of those boxes, that's when you know you're looking at something really special.

Though Thread and Matter-based devices are gradually going mainstream, dedicated hubs, or routers to manage them remain expensive. If you are a DIY enthusiast like me, you can create an OpenThread Border Router without breaking the bank. And it integrates instantly with Home Assistant to streamline communication between Thread and Matter devices.

I don't know about you, but when I was a kid, I always dreamed of turning my toy cars into RC ones. Of course, I didn't have nearly enough expertise and patience to actually make one, but the idea was always there in the back of my mind. It would have made my Hot Wheels tracks a ton more fun if I drove them myself.