Steam is the most popular online storefront for gaming. Think of it like an electronic version of GameStop or an Amazon dedicated to software and entertainment. You'll always find some enticing deals, it's incredibly easy to get your favorite games up and running, communicate with friends and family, and even stream games to another device. There's one feature that keeps me using Steam, however, and it's not the summer sale.

Even with the TikTok divest-or-ban law officially in effect since January, the app has only shut down service in the US for one day. Now, The Information reports that an agreement for a sale satisfying the law’s requirements is close and would come with a new, separate version of the app. Any deal, however, would need approval from the Chinese government, which is also still wrangling with the Trump administration over tariffs.The outlet reports that the Trump administration says it’s close to working out a sale to a group of “non-Chinese” investors, including Oracle, with current majority owner ByteDance maintaining a minority stake that would satisfy the terms of the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act.Earlier today, the Wall Street Journal reported that the General Services Administration says Oracle has reached a new agreement with the federal government that “is the first of its kind that provides the entire government with a discount on cloud infrastructure,” with a 75 percent discount on licensed software.TikTok’s staff is reportedly working on a new version of the app — dubbed M2, to the current app’s internal M designation — for release in app stores on September 5th. Trump issued a third legally questionable extension of the deadline to ban TikTok from US app stores last month, which is set to expire in mid-September. According to The Information’s unnamed source, under the current timeline, the original TikTok app would leave app stores as the new one launches and then stop working entirely in March 2026.

I started self-hosting apps a few months ago by using Docker Desktop on my Windows PC. While I one day want to create a home lab to run these services, I continue to self-host using my main PC, which I also use for work and gaming.

I'm a tech hoarder, and by that, I mean I hoard accessories and small gizmos that help me extend the functionality of my gadgets. For instance, I carry a ton of dongles with me that help plug in external SSDs, SD cards, or various types of cables into laptops that have limited ports. Similarly, I have a MagSafe attachment for my phone that helps me grip it better when clicking photos and adds a ring light for better luminance. Owing to this, I end up spending more money than I would like on accessories. So, I decided to curb the expenditure without really putting an end to my accessory obsession — all thanks to my 3D printer. I found several useful laptop accessories that I could easily 3D print instead of buying — thus saving me a good chunk of money.

While you may not instinctively think about using an app with "CPU" in its name to check out how your GPU is faring, CPU-Z does have its own "Graphics" tab where you can get a quick rundown on your card's specs. For a little while, CPU-Z didn't officially support some of the latest GPUs that hit the market; if you owned one of them, you were just out of luck.

Working with Home Assistant is relatively easy when using popular integrations with newer hardware. Its versatility as a community-built open-source software shines in crafting automations that don’t require any additional hardware. If you like to tinker, you can unlock Home Assistant’s true potential by automating the devices already on your network, apps with cloud integration, and app-based services. Wondering how? Here are a few hand-picked examples of Home Assistant automations anyone can use without any additional hardware. Of course, they do require some setup work.

With a note-taking app, a task management solution, and documents scattered across various clouds, my digital workspace felt like a chaotic collection of half-solutions. I tried Capacities, Notion, Obsidian, and even Anytype, and yet the promise of seamless productivity often felt just out of reach. That all changed the moment I discovered Craft. It’s an intelligent, all-in-one productivity tool that has redefined how I organize my thoughts, manage my projects, and tackle my daily workload.

If you've ever scrolled through PC hardware threads on Reddit, you've probably seen gamers obsessing over CPU bottlenecks. Some of them act like it's a crime to pair a high-end GPU like the RTX 5090 with anything less than a 9950X3D or 9800X3D. But is that really justified? In the past five years, I've owned two AMD CPUs — the Ryzen 9 5900X and 5800X3D — and two high-end Nvidia GPUS — the RTX 3090 and 4090. And from my experience, CPU bottlenecks are often overstated.

I'll be honest — when I first heard about an operating system that runs entirely on a browser, I didn't take it seriously. It sounded like a fun little experiment, not something you could actually use. I figured it would be sluggish, buggy, and barely of any use. But curiosity got the better of me, and I decided to give Puter a spin. To my surprise, it worked. Like, actually worked. Not only was it responsive, but it also had a surprisingly intuitive interface that mimicked traditional desktop behavior.

The Nintendo Switch Online service has a collection of classic Nintendo game releases readily available for everyone to play. Depending on whether one gets the Expansion Pass or not, there is a large selection of retro games to play that people have loved over the years. While the Nintendo GameCube classics section recently started alongside the release of the Nintendo Switch 2, the company has plans to add more GameCube titles to the service for subscribers to have access to. But for Nintendo fans to really take advantage of the service, and for more people to join, Nintendo needs to add more multiplayer GameCube titles to the library of Switch Online classics.

I don't mean to alarm anyone, but I think that Microsoft has finally remembered that the Windows 11 lock screen exists. A few days ago, I reported on how Microsoft is adding a battery indicator to Windows 11's lock screen, and honestly, while it should not have taken Microsoft four years to get around to adding one, I'm just glad we finally got there. Now, another lock screen feature has emerged from the woodwork in the beta builds, and honestly, I'd take just about anything at this point.

When I started self-hosting apps with Docker containers in my home lab, I followed the advice to manage them with a widely recommended tool — Portainer. Like many, I loved the comfort of using a GUI to manage the containers. When I tried Dockge to improve my enjoyment of working with code in Docker Compose files, I liked it more. It’s not as feature-rich as Portainer, though it’s a worthy alternative. So, I used Portainer and Dockge to manage Docker containers in my home lab to help me discover a winning combo. Over time, using both the apps turned out to be a game-changer for managing containers and stacks in my home lab.