ComputersNews

Microsoft’s smarter Outlook taps AI agents to save you time

I never really thought I’d welcome AI as a part of my ongoing business day. But Microsoft’s ongoing productivity updates to Outlook actually have me tempted. By now, drafting an email using AI is old hat, and something that I generally wouldn’t do. But Microsoft has begun adding agentic AI to Outlook via its experimental “Frontier” program…and it actually sounds like something that…
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ComputersNews

Best external drives 2026: Fast SSDs and roomy hard drives

External USB/Thunderbolt SSDs and/or hard drives (aka direct-attached storage, or DAS) are a super-convenient way to add storage capacity to your system as well as back it up. External drives are also extremely handy for transporting data between locations and devices in…
ComputersNews

I don’t want a thinner laptop. I want a better one

I used to think thinner laptops were the better option. I don’t anymore. Thinner just seemed like the natural direction for laptops, especially given how they first started out (big and boxy!). I get the appeal, too. A featherlight laptop is seriously impressive…
ComputersNews

Sync.com review: Superb online device sync and backup

Where online storage services such as Dropbox, iCloud, and others only allow you to sync data across devices, Sync.com adds discrete unsynced storage to the mix via its Vault folder. This makes it particularly well-suited for backup. I like the approach, and I think the company should take it even further. Sync.com is an online storage service that sports a web interface that you can use to drag…
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ComputersNews

Framework’s new Linux laptop is selling faster than its Windows one

Framework has had a big week, announcing a brand new “Pro” variant of its excellent Laptop 13 design. Rebuilt from the ground up and featuring top-of-the-line Intel and AMD options, the 13 Pro still has the company’s fully repairable, upgradeable ethos at its core. That’s the kind of thing that turns heads in the FOSS world, and indeed the company says the Ubuntu variant is outselling the…
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ComputersNews

Investigation: RAM prices are falling. Don’t fall for it

Rising prices are the biggest tech story of 2026. Well, the biggest consumer tech story, anyway — the biggest story in a broader sense is “AI” in general. And that’s the answer to why prices are going up. AI data centers are gobbling up memory manufacturing capacity.
ComputersNews

Seagate Firecuda X Vault review: The cheap answer to rising SSD prices

If you’ve been shopping SSD prices recently, you may be suffering a severe case of sticker shock. 1TB external SSDs are around $200 — more than twice what they cost just six months ago. And forget 8TB SSDs — $1,300 and climbing. What if I told you you could get 8TB of storage for only $270? Alas, it’s not going to be nearly as fast as it is vast, but Seagate’s X Vault external 3.5-inch…
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