This may come as a surprise: Though I work at PCWorld, I don’t build computers.
Well, I can. I have. But it’s one thing to buy a few thousand dollars’ worth of parts and then build a desktop on a budget that’s not my own, versus me plonking down several hundred precious dollars and messing around inside of a desktop when I have several perfectly good laptops very nearby and might screw it…
Trump demands resignation of Intel’s new CEO
August 8, 2025
Intel is a company in crisis, failing to compete with the products of its booming rivals and struggling to get back on its feet after a high-profile leadership shakeup and devastating layoffs. The last thing it needs is to be in the crosshairs of an increasingly retaliatory…
Microsoft Copilot is now powered by GPT-5 too, mostly
August 8, 2025
Microsoft has added GPT-5 to Copilot, a day after adding OpenAI’s open-source GPT model to its local services.
GPT-5, which also powers ChatGPT, is now live within Copilot, at copilot.microsoft.com, Microsoft said Thursday. Presumably the same model will eventually power…
How to get Windows 11 cheap (or even for free)
August 7, 2025
Windows licenses cost a lot—painfully so. Paying $139 for Windows 11 Home or $200 for Windows 11 Pro feels expensive when Linux is free. That much money can easily swallow a third of a budget PC build. Yet with less developer support for Linux, Windows is a necessity for most people.
What’s not a given is paying full retail price. Yep, you can snag discounts on Windows 11. How much you’ll…
Nvidia is sitting on an absolutely mind-boggling amount of money… like, enough to make Solomon and Midas and Croesus go, “Wow, that’s a lot of money.” It’s become one of, if not the, richest companies on the planet by riding both the crypto and AI chip booms. But…
When Microsoft introduced Recall for Windows 11, data privacy and protection experts were horrified. Why? Because Recall continuously takes screenshots of your screen and saves them on your computer, even if those screenshots contain sensitive data like passwords and credit…
Free alternatives may exist for Microsoft Office components, but sometimes they can’t stand in for the original. And as a student, the new cost of $100 per year for a Microsoft 365 Personal account is pretty expensive—but fortunately, you may not have to pay to use the software.
Depending on where you go to school, you may qualify for a free or heavily discounted Microsoft 365 subscription.
Want ad-free streaming without paying through the nose for Netflix or HBO Max? Roku’s new budget streamer serves up a tempting selection of movies and TV shows for a lot less, provided you can deal with some caveats.
Slated to launch today, Howdy costs just $3 a month for…
Interest in Sonos’s smallest portable speaker is heating up—literally—following word that at least one of the units came close to catching fire.
A Sonos user on Reddit posted images of the “singed” and “bulging” USB port on the back of his Roam, a portable…
If you’re going to college, the first thing you’re going to need is a laptop, obviously. And the best accessory for a laptop is an external monitor. If you’ve got those basics covered, the next accessory you should apply is a VESA monitor arm. Here’s why.
Dorms and student apartments are tiny. Odds are pretty good that they’ll be equipped with a desk, and that desk is going to be on the…
