You may be familiar with the "OC" branding that comes with many aftermarket GPUs. These cards advertise higher boost clock speeds compared to their non-OC counterparts and Nvidia's Founders Edition variants. On paper, that sounds like a guaranteed way to get a card that performs slightly better than what Nvidia originally advertised. At least that's what I thought when I paid a premium for the OC editions of the RTX 4090 and RTX 3090 in recent years.

Building a PC is fun, but if you just want to buy something to get yourself up and running, then a pre-built PC is the way to go. Naturally, there are plenty of great options to go with, but if you've been looking for a powerful gaming PC that also looks pretty sleek, then this Alienware is a good place to start.

Splitgate 2 is relaunching its beta, and this time the team at 1047 Games wants to get it right. The first launch in June 2025 was a stumble: the game arrived with technical issues, awkward balancing, and mechanics that drifted away from what made the original Splitgate stand out. Player counts dropped fast, and the studio made the choice to hold off on fully releasing the game until they worked on it more. This past weekend, August 29–30, marked the first public playtest. So, here’s how it went.

For people who started Windows this side of the 21st Century, it's hard to imagine what operating systems looked like back in the late 70s to early 80s. For some, however, they don't have to imagine; they were there at the very origins of this now-gigantic tech, long before Windows ever got, well, windows.

With the release of the Nintendo Switch 2 in June 2025, many people are buying Nintendo's latest console. While bundles for the Switch 2 include games like Mario Kart World to keep everyone busy when they open the box, there are other items that new owners are going to want to have. Most home consoles have an array of accessories that make aspects of playing games a little better. This can include extra storage space, parts for controllers, and other hardware that make the experience better than what it was originally. And with the Nintendo Switch 2 being a portable device as much as a home system, Nintendo fans are going to need to accessorize.

As a solo creator, juggling tasks, ideas, inspiration, and execution can feel like entire projects of their own, and they often live scattered across different apps and tabs. So I’ve been on a journey to find apps that pair well with Figma to keep my project chaos in line, and I’ve found a perfect combo in Google Keep.

Linux has a reputation for being flexible and powerful, but for me, the real value lies in how it makes daily life easier. With the right tools and a little configuration, I’ve been able to automate tasks that used to eat up a surprising amount of time. These automations aren’t limited to servers or coding projects; they also help me in my everyday life. Here are some of the ways I’ve used Linux to take repetitive work off my plate.

We liked this motherboard when we reviewed it, praising its sleek design, great features, and overclocking support. However, with this recent discount from Woot that drops it down to $150, it becomes an absolute no-brainer to pick up if you're looking to build a new Ryzen-powered AM5 PC.

Network-Attached Storage distros include a barrage of features to enhance the utility of your backup and data archival server. On the file system front, you’ve got the Copy-on-Write and checksum facilities offered by ZFS and Btrfs. For folks with spare storage drives in their home lab, you can put together a reliable RAID cluster, and with enough memory in your NAS, you can even leverage RAM caching to push your HDD (and even SSD) speeds to the next level.

When it comes to making a video game experience feel cinematic and epic on multiple levels, there are very few series that ever get it done like Metal Gear Solid. For years, gamers have followed the deep and complicated plot of the series involving a CIA spy named Snake, and the many shadowy powers that would steer the world towards chaos. But rather than remaking the very first game in the series, Konami decided to revisit the first tale in the chronology of Metal Gear Solid games, Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater, and give it an entirely revamped look. But like the series itself, there are more layers that go deeper than you realize, showing why Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater is a beautiful rehashing of the tale of Naked Snake.

I used Grammarly for about 10 years before finally switching to LanguageTool. It wasn't the easiest switch since I had become accustomed to Grammarly's UI. I also couldn't take anything away from Grammarly's performance, which likely explains its popularity among many writers. There are several Grammarly alternatives, and I have used quite a few of them. However, after testing LanguageTool a couple of times, I realized that it's equally a great tool. And as a cherry on top, this relatively new app also has a free version.

Like most users, I used to instinctively reach out for my mouse to perform almost everything on my PC: launching apps, arranging app windows, shutting down the PC, and more. I mean, it's what we've all grown used to. But then I thought of minimizing the use of the mouse and relying more on the keyboard to make my workflow more efficient and become more productive on Windows.