Imagine if that refrigerator you bought just five years ago suddenly up and died—and not because of some technical glitch, but because the manufacturer deliberately reached out and deactivated it, permanently. You’d be furious, right? And you’d probably want a refund, too.  As wild as that scenario sounds for a major appliance like a refrigerator […]

Apple’s big fall event just wrapped up, and we rushed out of the Steve Jobs Theater to get our hands on the latest iPhones. Here’s a look at the new iPhone 17, Apple’s base model this year, which is joined by the thinner iPhone Air and beefier iPhone 17 Pro and Pro Max — there’s

With any luck, Arm’s new Lumex CPU platform may give us a hint at what to expect for upcoming Windows on Arm PCs: four tiers of CPU power, plus an improved ray-tracing engine and graphics upscaling. Arm says that its new Lumex C1-series chips will deliver 25 percent more performance than the Cortex X925 series

I took a first look at the battery pack this afternoon, and it has a significantly slimmer design than the old version. This version of the battery pack is thinner and longer, stretching as far across the back of the phone as it can before bumping into the camera bar. Slimming it down reduces the

At a glance Expert’s Rating Pros Roku’s least expensive 4K HDR player Compact design fits behind a TV and is suitable for travel Better performance and Wi-Fi reception than the cheaper Roku Streaming Stick Cons Increasingly cluttered home screen Some old TVs might require a separate power adapter No Dolby Vision or Dolby Atmos support

Firmware is the low-level software that is deeply integrated into the hardware of your device. It sits beneath higher-level software and your PC’s hardware and acts as a kind of bridge running the critical operations of your PC. As such, it enjoys privileges that higher-level software doesn’t have. These privileges mean it can access all your

At a glance Expert’s Rating Pros 2.4GHz Wi‑Fi adapter onboard—no hub or bridge needed Triple-A BHMA and ANSI Grade 1 certifications Buttons provide tactile feedback Supports up to 250 PINs Cons No support for Apple Home or Matter No door open/close sensor Wi-Fi connectivity decreases battery life Our Verdict The Schlage Arrive Smart WiFi Deadbolt

Jim Johnson has been named head of Intel’s Client Computing Group, headlining a list of changes Intel made Monday to its leadership team. As part of the moves, Intel announced the departure of Michelle Johnston Holthaus, the former co-chief executive and head of Intel Products. Johnson had served as the interim head of Intel’s CCG

ChatGPT, Google Gemini, Microsoft Copilot, Grok… that’s just scratching the tip of the iceberg. There are now so many AI chatbot services out there, most of them run by American tech giants, and most of them are monitoring our conversations, collecting our inputs, and possibly even sharing that data with others. Is there an alternative

At a glance Expert’s Rating Pros Big touchpad Large, clear 16-inch display with 120Hz refresh rate Lots of connectivity including USB4, Wi-Fi 7 Good CPU performance for the price Cons Keyboard with numpad can feel a bit cramped Modest integrated graphics performance Battery life is good, but some Snapdragon alternatives last longer Our Verdict The