Over the last couple of months, I’ve started looking into ways I can repurpose old hardware. PC rigs are the easiest to revitalize, as Proxmox is all they need to turn into functioning LXC (and sometimes, even VM) hosting workstations. Meanwhile, individual components like graphics cards, RAM sticks, and storage drives serve as decent additions to my existing home lab nodes.

I stopped playing hide-and-seek with the Sonos app and finally removed it. The app just kept getting in the way, and the subscription nag got to me. It turns out, it’s not just me; several other Sonos users are tired of app woes as well. Lately, I’ve been running Snapcast on my Raspberry Pi to replace Sonos entirely.

The browser homepage is the page you look at the most when you use your computer, yet it's often not that useful. Aside from quick links to your most visited pages, most browsers just show you a barely-curated news feed or something. Vivaldi does have a heavily customizable page I like a lot, but I wanted to take things to the next level.

According to the Wall Street Journal, the export control directive that led to Anthropic cutting off access to Fable 5 and Mythos 5 was triggered in part by cybersecurity research from Amazon and conversations between CEO Andy Jassy and the White House. According to the report, the paper from Amazon claims that, through a series of prompts, it was able to get Fable 5 to serve up information that could be used in cyberattacks. Amazon has yet to respond to a request for comment.Shortly after Jassy shared the company's findings with the government, it made the call to block its use by foreign nationals. Complicating this issue is that many of …Read the full story at The Verge.

Modern PC builders spend countless hours researching CPUs, GPUs, SSDs, and memory kits, but many overlook one of the most important performance settings hidden inside their motherboard's BIOS. I used to assume that if my hardware was physically installed correctly, it would automatically run at its maximum speed. After all, PCIe standards are designed to negotiate the fastest supported connection between devices and the motherboard.

You know this came for free bundle with the console for $150, right? | Image: Heritage Auctions A copy of Super Mario Bros., still in the box and sealed with its original sticker, just sold at Heritage Auctions for $3 million. That absolutely crushes the previous record of $2 million, also for a copy of Super Mario Bros., in 2021. That sale also came hot on the heels of a controversial auction of Super Mario 64 for $1.56 million.Part of what drove the price of this particular copy so high is that, according to Heritage Auctions, instead of shrink wrap, this 19895 second run was sealed with a glossy sticker, which was discontinued shortly after. The site claims it's the earliest known sealed copy of the game in existence. It's also gr …Read the full story at The Verge.

In 2026, Marvel and Mattel are both releasing projects designed to capitalize on people's love for iconic animated heroes from their childhoods. Masters of the Universe has put a live-action He-Man on the big screen, and the second season of X-Men '97 is about to fling some of Charles Xavier's mutants into an apocalyptic future. Both projects were clearly made by people who love the source material, and they are similarly filled with nerdy Easter eggs meant to get hardcore fans hyped up. X-Men '97 and Masters of the Universe are both nostalgia plays, but the biggest difference between the two - and arguably the reason one of them hasn't been …Read the full story at The Verge.

Even though wireless standards have advanced all the way to Wi-Fi 7, many people don't even think about their routers until their internet's down or their Wi-Fi acts up. When I first switched to fiber in 2014, I didn't care which router my ISP offered as long as I could get online and stream videos without issues. Back then, my home network was pretty simple. A phone, a desktop PC, and an iPad were about all I needed to connect. And considering I used Ethernet for my gaming PC, I barely paid attention to the Wi-Fi side of things.

Backups are one of those home lab chores that can quietly turn into decoration. You set them up, watch the first job complete, and then slowly stop thinking about whether they still work. The Proxmox dashboard may show a task as completed, but that doesn’t always mean the backup is useful, recent, complete, or easy to recover from. That gap is where my trust started to fray.

I consume a lot of media and information every day. Between books, articles, research papers, and, of course, videos, it's a lot of information overload. The problem isn't finding all this information; it's turning it into something I can actually use.

Over the past year, I've fallen in love with Linux and everything it has to offer. The immense variety of options in distros, desktops, and software make Linux a very fun space where you never run out of things to talk about. But as fun as it is, the future of Linux may depend on something far more boring: immutability.

Modern PC hardware often has more interlinked elements than the average user can keep track of. Sure, seasoned gamers may know about XMP/EXPO, Resizable BAR, and GPU power limits, but the majority of users are unaware of these settings. I want to highlight some other PC settings that directly impact your gaming performance, thermals, noise levels, stability, and security. You may not know these settings exist, or even if you do, you may not consider them worth the hassle. Some users are also overly cautious about fiddling with the firmware, BIOS settings, and voltage/frequency settings out of fear of lasting damage. Thankfully, the settings on this list are perfectly safe to tweak, and will almost always deliver positive results for your system. The default settings might work, but you're unknowingly leaving performance on the table.