In the tech community right now, it feels like there's a massive wave of ultra-settings fatigue. Between unoptimized PC ports, VRAM anxieties, and the sheer cost of flagship cards as well as other PC components, users are begging for someone to tell them it's okay to slide that graphics preset down to high. Booting up a new, highly anticipated game or even a recent 2025 or 2026 release and then immediately cranking everything up to Ultra feels like an instant reaction for many. As a result, you'll watch the frame rate tank into the choppy 40s and come to a realization and an immediate spiral of "Do I need a new GPU?" followed by the epiphany: "What if I just change the settings?"

What better way to unwind from a two-hour keynote presentation than to pore over the weirdest and wildest details, from a Gmail bot you can converse with to DeepMind's leader saying the singularity is near. The Vergecast went live right after the show, with senior AI reporter Hayden Field joining me to discuss the highlights.First up, we talk about the buzzword of the show: agents, which seem to be Google's new answer to making AI useful. Google has a new service called Spark that sounds a lot like a Gemini-flavored OpenClaw, upgrades to its Antigravity platform, and a bunch of agents that will shop for you and track search topics. We also …Read the full story at The Verge.

I had 19 NotebookLM notebooks on my dashboard, and some of their titles didn’t tell me exactly what was in them. Some notebooks were abandoned, while others remained active. I’d try to spot a notebook by its icon, but that didn’t always work either, since some were random ones I’d added in a hurry. I knew I had a Claude research notebook somewhere, but I had no idea if I had called it “Claude,” “Claude research,” or “AI notes.”

Among a flurry of AI-related announcements at I/O 2026, including more Search AI integration, Gemini 3.5, a new Gemini Spark AI personal assistant, Google revealed Gemini Omni, an AI model that can "create anything from any input — starting with video." The platform's first model, Gemini Omni Flash, is rolling out today to the Gemini app, Google Flow, and YouTube Shorts.

A used Tesla GPU listing on a used marketplace is one of the most tempting things for home labbers shopping around. 24 GB of VRAM on a card that originally sold for over $5,000, now hovering around the $300 mark on eBay. For anyone trying to run local LLMs or stuff a fat memory budget into a Proxmox box, the math is difficult to argue with. I almost pulled the trigger on one myself, but then I began to read forum threads from those who own them. If these GPUs were truly a home lab cheat code, everyone would be using them, but the driver situation and physical compatibility issues are just too much to bear for most enthusiasts, including myself.

Last year, after watching Google's I/O keynote, I wrote that it felt like Google's future was Google googling. After watching this year's I/O keynote on Tuesday, I don't think Google just wants to google for you - I think it wants to do everything for you, all from a search box.Take the trusty Google search bar itself, something Google is generally hesitant to update, which is getting some updates. It will "dynamically" expand as you type longer queries. It will offer "AI-powered suggestions" that Google claims will "go beyond autocomplete," which could cause you to fill in the blanks of a search in a way you didn't intend and that may or …Read the full story at The Verge.

I am dying to know how much money Plex is about to make the next six weeks charging people to stream their own video from their own homes. Today, it's giving every prospective customer until July 1st to lock in a lifetime subscription at today's rates - before it triples the price to $750. Plex already more than doubled the price of a lifetime Plex Pass subscription from $119.99 to $249.99 last March, and it'll triple again on July 1st to $749.99. At that price, you'd have to subscribe for 11 years (at the current annual rate) to make the lifetime sub worthwhile.Plex isn't choosing the new number because it expects you to pay $750. In a …Read the full story at The Verge.

Mario Kart World is one of three games you can choose from in the bundle. | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge Nintendo recently teased the “Choose Your Game” Switch 2 console and digital game bundle, coming in early June. However, multiple retailers (including Nintendo itself) are already offering the $499.99 bundle. The list currently includes GameStop, Amazon, Best Buy, and the Nintendo Store. It’s a deal worth hopping on ahead of the holiday season, since Nintendo is raising the price of the Switch 2 to $499.99 in September.While the Switch 2 console currently costs $449.99 by itself, the bundle includes a full-price game with up to a $30 discount. You can choose between one of three digital games to redeem upon setup: Donkey Kong Bananza, Pokémon Pokopia, and Mario Kart World. Each of those are regularly $69.99 except for World, which retails for $79.99. Nintendo Switch 2 “Choose Your Game” bundleChoose between Donkey Kong Bananza, Mario Kart World, and Pokémon Pokopia.Where to Buy: $529.99 $499.99 at Amazon $529.99 $499.99 at Best Buy $529.99 $499.99 at GameStopNone of the games offered as part of the bundle will take up much of the Switch 2’s 256GB internal SSD. Mario Kart World takes up the most space of the three, requiring 22GB. However, you may eventually own enough games to exceed its capacity, so we recommend considering a 256GB Samsung microSD Express card to double your available storage. There’s currently a deal on those happening at Amazon, where you can buy one for $47.99 (originally $79.99).To redeem your game, enter the eShop from the Switch 2’s home screen. Then select “enter code” on the left side of the page. You’ll then enter the 16-character code provided in your bundle, then make your game selection.

A Pixel Watch 4 running Wear OS 6, not Wear OS 7. | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge Amid the flurry of today's Google I/O announcements, Google shared details about Wear OS 7, the next major update to its smartwatch platform. To help you keep track of things like deliveries and sports scores, Wear OS 7 will get the iPhone-style Live Updates that were introduced on Android last year - which can appear on your watch or your smartphone - and you'll also be able to track automated tasks that an AI is working on right from your watch.Wear OS is also getting an upgrade from its widget-like Tiles for glanceable information. With the new update, Google is adding "Wear Widgets" to the platform, which look more like Android widgets …Read the full story at The Verge.

I have been trying to move away from VS Code and its forks, like Cursor and Antigravity, for the same reasons many developers are experimenting with newer editors. I switched to a leaner editor like Zed because it felt lighter, cleaner, and noticeably faster once I spent a few hours with it. It was far less cluttered than the extension-heavy and AI-integrated VS Code setup I had built over time.

Welcome to a "profound moment for humanity," according to Google DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis, who closed out Google I/O's keynote presentation on Tuesday, saying:Google's cutting-edge research and products will help unlock AGI's incredible potential for the benefit of the entire world. When we look back at this time, I think we will realize that we were standing in the foothills of the singularity. It will be a profound moment for humanity. This technology will be a force multiplier for human ingenuity and usher in a new golden age of scientific discovery and progress, improving the lives of everyone, everywhere. We look forward to bu …Read the full story at The Verge.

It's no secret that I love my Steam Deck, and one of the things that makes it better is the plugins supplied by Decky Loader. It's even better on more powerful hardware like the ROG Ally X if you install SteamOS, because it gives you more computing grunt to run your games, on top of the boost from Linux's lower resource usage.