ComputersNews

Windows 11 has built-in settings to reduce CPU bottlenecks. Use them

Many Windows PCs feel sluggish in everyday use, despite their hardware specifications suggesting otherwise. The reason? The processor is handling tasks that the graphics card, SSD, or network chip could process more efficiently. Windows 11 offers several options to change this. You can shift the computational load by smoothing out performance peaks, reducing fan noise, and making the system more…
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ComputersNews

Ryzen AI Halo is AMD’s $3,999 answer to maxing out ChatGPT

With the big AI providers cracking down on usage limits for their most powerful agentic features, it’s tempting to kiss our ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini subscriptions goodbye and go all-in with local AI–and it’s certainly doable, if you’re willing to pay for it. AMD is the latest to step up to the plate with a local AI solution, a mini PC dubbed “Ryzen AI Halo.” At first blush it looks…
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ComputersNews

14 nifty USB-C gadgets you didn’t know you needed

I don’t know how your tech drawers look, but mine are filled with wires I’ll likely never use again because technology has advanced quite a bit. Thankfully, USB-C seems to be here to stay since there is no wrong way to plug these things in. It’s not just smartphones…
ComputersNews

Laptop makers, I’m begging you to add another USB-C port

Last week I spent a few days watching the Asus and Best Buy websites like a hawk, waiting for that slinky little Zenbook A14 to start shipping. It’s a really cool, lightweight laptop with battery life for days, literally. But it has one design problem that I see all too…
ComputersNews

Firefox 151 brings a big privacy boost and fixes 30+ security flaws

The latest version of Firefox for Windows, macOS, Linux, and Android brings a number of improvements to privacy protection, the built-in PDF viewer/editor, and the VPN feature, plus fixes for over 30 security vulnerabilities. Updates are also available for the ESR versions. The free VPN feature that was introduced back in Firefox 149 now offers a choice of several virtual locations. Firefox’s…
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ComputersNews

Google is turning the brain dump into a productivity feature

We’ve all been in this situation: You know what you want to say, but you’re too mentally exhausted, distracted, or confused to actually say it. Google’s new conversational AI, Docs Live, wants to help. The metaphor Google is using here is a “brain dump,” and Google is applying this technique to Docs, Gmail, and Google Keep. Google’s trying to offload more of the “thinking” away…
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