Are you tired of your ever-growing subscriptions for productivity apps? You are not alone. Most of these expensive apps offer zillions of features that promise to streamline your life, but often just drain your wallet. For years, I found myself in this cycle, convinced that premium features were essential for peak efficiency.

I used to use the DNS servers provided by my ISP until I realized that they were using those nameservers to serve ads, block me from content they deemed inappropriate, and generally track my browsing habits. I went through a stage of trying different DNS providers to find those that were both safe and fast enough to use from my location. Mostly that was Cloudflare at 1.1.1.1, Google at 8.8.8.8, or Quad9 at 9.9.9.9.

After months of rumors and speculation, Microsoft finally pulled back the curtain on its Xbox handheld: the ROG Xbox Ally X. Really rolls off the tongue, doesn't it? It's supposedly the culmination of years of work from Microsoft, between enabling handhelds like the ROG Ally X, updating the Xbox app within Windows, building the Game Pass ecosystem, and expanding its coverage for cloud gaming. And yet, it feels like one of the most misguided hardware launches I've seen in years.

Switching to wireless peripherals felt liberating at first, as you'd expect. It meant that I no longer had to deal with dangling cables or restricted movement, especially while gaming, and my desk looked pretty clean. It all started when I purchased a wireless gaming headset in 2016; soon after, I started buying wireless gaming mice and controllers. The keyboard is the only thing that's currently on my desk that isn't wireless, but that's only because there's no wireless hall-effect keyboard on the market.

Google's AI-powered research assistant, NotebookLM, is the only AI tool that convinced me that AI can truly be a game-changer for productivity. It's been a while since I've been using the tool, and I'm always on the lookout for new ways to use it to streamline my workflow and get even more out of it.

Of all the jarring things I've witnessed on the National Mall, nothing will beat the image of the first thing I saw after I cleared security at the Army festival: a child, sitting at the controls of an M119A3 Howitzer, being instructed by a soldier on how to aim it, as his red-hatted parents took a photo with the Washington Monument in the background. The primary stated reason for the Grand Military Parade is to celebrate the US Army's 250th birthday. The second stated reason is to use the event for recruiting purposes. Like other military branches, the Army has struggled to meet its enlistment quotas for over the past decade. And according to very defensive Army spokespeople trying to convince skeptics that the parade was not for Donald Trump's birthday, there had always been a festival planned on the National Mall that day, and it had been in the works for over two years, and the parade, tacked on just two months ago, was purely incidental. Assuming that their statement was true, I wasn't quite sure if they had anticipated so many people in blatant MAGA swag in attendance - or how eager they were to bring their children and hand them assault rifles. There had been kid-frien …Read the full story at The Verge.

The Energy Saver mode on Windows 11 is a great way to keep a portable device going for a little longer. Once it's activated, it cuts down on power usage and makes the most of your battery, giving you time to find a power outlet or, at the very least, save your work and finish before the battery runs out of juice.

If you've lived under a rock or only used central processing units (CPUs), you may be unaware of AMD's Accelerated Processing Unit (APU) division. The company has been making APUs for years now and has almost perfected the process of combining the CPU and GPU on a single package. I'm not talking about the standard iGPU you'd find on many AMD and Intel CPUs to allow video output. These APUs have some serious GPUs with plenty of cores, processing power, and dedicated resources. An AMD Ryzen APU such as the Ryzen 7 8700G is ideal for small form factor (SFF) PC builds or those on a stricter budget.

It’s shaping up to be a massive year for gaming. From long-awaited sequels to brand-new IPs, 2025 is stacked with titles causing fans to refresh Steam pages and watch reveal trailers on repeat. Although not all of these games have been released yet, these titles are the most wish-listed games currently on Steam.

In the world of PC hardware, it's easy to get caught up in FOMO and waste money on needlessly expensive hardware you never needed. Every high-end, expensive component has a market, but many people don't buy it simply because they're swayed by the marketing and hype surrounding the product. And this isn't limited to high-end GPUs and CPUs; gaming monitors, motherboards, and SSDs are all part of this trend. Let's look at the most overrated components that don't deserve the attention they get.

I love launchers on my desktop. I never thought I'd become a keyboard snob, but nowadays, I'd rather keep my hands on my keyboard as much as I can, and launching apps and other tools this way is incredibly convenient. Windows 11 has a lot of these launchers available, with options like Listary, Ueli, or the two solutions built into PowerToys, whether that's PowerToys Run or Command Palette.

Demonstrators in Los Angeles marched alongside an inflatable Donald Trump baby dressed in a diaper.As President Donald Trump kicked off a birthday military parade on the streets of Washington, DC, what's estimated as roughly 2,000 events were held across the US and beyond - protesting Trump and Elon Musk's evisceration of government services, an unprecedented crackdown by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), and countless other actions from the administration in its first five months. Held under the title "No Kings" (with, as you'll see, one conspicuous exception), they're the latest in several mass protests, following April's Hands Off events and a wave of Tesla Takedown demonstrations in March.As The Verge's Tina Nguyen went to downtown DC, we also sent reporters to No Kings demonstrations spanning the country, plus a "No Tyrants" event in the UK. How would they unfold after promises of "very heavy force" against protesters in the capital, after the deployment of thousands of military troops in a move a judge has bluntly called illegal, and after promises to "liberate" the city of Los Angeles from its "burdensome leadership" by local elected officials? What about the overnight killing of a Minnesota Democratic state representative and her husband, and the shooting of …Read the full story at The Verge.