CATEGORIES

ESET NOD32 Antivirus: Way Beyond the Essential

An effective antivirus for the tech-savvy

Beats Fit Pro: Solid ANC

A bass-heavy alternative to the AirPods Pro

Apple iPhone 13: A Battery-Life Beast

The Apple iPhone 13 is a battery-life beast, with far greater longevity than previous midrange smartphones.

HOW TO USE SNAP LAYOUTS IN WINDOWS 11

Windows 11 may be better known for its centered taskbar and rounded window borders, but the new Snap Layouts feature (sometimes also called Snap Assist) might be a more useful UI innovation. Windows, as its name implies, has long been excellent at managing and rearranging program windows, but Snap Layouts elevate the operating system (OS) to the next level.

CAN MY PC RUN WINDOWS 11?

With rounded corners for all windows, relocated taskbar icons, and more elegant Settings dialogs, Windows 11 is a significant visual refinement of Windows 10. It’s also a free update, which means you’re probably keen to install it on your existing PC.

Amazon Fire TV Stick 4K Max: Excellent Media Streamer

Wi-Fi 6 is capable of higher speeds and better performance than the Wi-Fi 5 we’re used to, especially in crowded network environments, and Amazon’s Fire TV Stick 4K Max is the first media streamer under $100 we’ve seen to support the standard (the $180 Apple TV 4K also uses it).

HOW TO SET UP AND CUSTOMIZE YOUR WINDOWS 11 INSTALLATION

The Windows 11 setup process is similar to that of Windows 10, but there are a few surprises when it comes to account access, privacy, security, and other features. And installing the new OS is only half the battle. Afterward, you have to go through a host of setup screens to customize and configure Windows 11 the way you want it.

Holograms Are (Maybe, Finally) Real: Light Field Labs' SolidLight

In front of me is a wristwatch. Somehow, it’s floating in the air. It’s shiny, spotless, and seemingly solid. Light reflects across the metal timepiece like it’s on display at a jewelry store, ready to be handled and bought. But then I get closer and try to touch the floating watch. My hand passes through it and feels only air.

Microsoft Offers TPM 2.0 Bypass to Install Windows 11 on Unsupported PC

For months, Microsoft has been telling customers that Windows 11 requires your PC to have a special security chip called TPM 2.0—but you can actually skirt the restriction. Ironically, the company itself posted official guidance on its website detailing how to circumvent the TPM 2.0 requirement.

Microsoft Surface Go 3: Best Budget Windows 2-in-1 Tablet

Although it runs Windows 11 and can be used with an optional keyboard, the Microsoft Surface Go 3 is a tablet designed to compete with Chromebooks and the Apple iPad, not traditional laptops.

Microsoft Surface Laptop Studio: Great for Creative Pros

Perhaps you’re a software developer by day and a gamer by night. Or maybe you game and code simultaneously by night, and by day, you sleep.

Microsoft Windows 11: A Radically Modernized Design

Many people thought there would never be a Windows 11—understandably, after Microsoft announced in 2015 that Windows 10 would be the operating system’s last version number.

TorGuard VPN: Affordable and Robust

REVIEWS/SOFTWARE&APPS

How to Deal With a Swollen Laptop Battery

Lithium-ion batteries pack an amazing punch for their size. They’re robust enough to run our laptops for hours on a single charge, they’re at the core of the latest smartphones, and they even serve as the power plant behind cutting-edge electric vehicles such as the Tesla line.

HOW TO DISAPPEAR COMPLETELY FROM THE INTERNET

It’s not just government spying; big-tech behemoths including Amazon, Google, Facebook, and Microsoft have collected huge amounts of people’s data in order to serve up targeted ads—and then, there’s the personal data that’s scooped up in all the breaches and hacks.

Framework Laptop: True Modularity

REVIEWS/HARDWARE

Asus ROG Zephyrus G14: Blazing-Fast Gaming Machine

REVIEWS/HARDWARE

Demand for SpaceX's Starlink Satellite Internet Pushes Wait Times to 2023

Demand for SpaceX’s Starlink satellite broadband system may push wait times into 2023.

HAS A CYBERSTALKER TAKEN OVER YOUR LIFE? HERE'S HOW TO GET IT BACK

Picture this: You enter your house and find a stranger (or an enemy) sitting at your kitchen table chowing down on your leftover potato salad and reading your mail. You order him out, but before long, he’s back.

HP Instant Ink vs. HP Plus vs. HP Smart: Which Ink Program Saves You the Most?

When you buy and install an HP printer, the setup routine may ask you to make some choices depending on the printer model.

Vilo Mesh: Very Affordable

REVIEWS/HARDWARE

Polaroid Now+: A Terrific Tool

REVIEWS/CONSUMER ELECTRONICS

You Don't Need Millions to Get Started in NFTs

When the Paper Cats project launches, it should be a continually affordable non-fungible token (NFT) avatar.

Master Social Media Without Sacrificing Your Privacy

Some people have no filter. They’ll conduct the most personal phone conversations at maximum volume on the subway. Or they’ll regale perfect strangers with the excruciating details of their latest medical procedures. Most of us, though, have a better idea of how to maintain privacy for ourselves and our friends. But do you take the same attitude on social media? It’s easy to notice that you’re too loud on the phone in public, but it’s less easy to realize that your settings let any schmo read your social media posts. And yet protecting your privacy on social media is important, in more ways than you may realize.

Hulu: A Top Streaming Choice

As the competition between video-streaming services intensifies, differentiation is ever-important. Hulu continues to offer both a strong on-demand streaming library and a robust live TV option. The service is an excellent option for watching popular TV shows, and we like its broad platform support, even if Hulu’s original series are hit-or-miss. On the live TV front, Hulu’s channel coverage is top-notch, and its DVR features compare well to the competition’s. Despite a few missteps, Hulu keeps its Editors’ Choice award, because no other service can quite match its combination of streaming content.

FASTEST MOBILE NETWORKS 2021

It’s T-Mobile’s year at last. T-Mobile’s new mid-band 5G network is the only nationwide 5G that’s markedly faster than 4G, earning the carrier its first-ever PCMag award for America’s fastest mobile network.

Corel PaintShop Pro: A Worthy Photoshop Alternative

Photoshop is a magnificent tool, but many of its users could do everything they need to in Corel’s photo-editing software, PaintShop Pro, without having to pay a monthly tribute to Adobe. PaintShop Pro supports layers and lets you edit both raster and vector image formats—something you’d need two of Adobe’s Creative Cloud apps to do.

Clean Up Apple Messages to Free Up Space

My family and I love to share pictures and videos in an Apple Messages group text. Since COVID-19 struck, we’ve mostly shared pics and videos of dogs, babies, food, snow, hiking, and the 20-plus bananas I accidentally bought in an online grocery order.

Sony ZV-E10: A Camera for Vloggers

A year after introducing its first camera for vloggers—the fixed-lens ZV-1—Sony is bringing the concept to an interchangeable lens platform. The ZV-E10 is built around the same sensor as the stills-focused Sony a6100 but is made just for video.

Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 9 (2021): A Superlative Aspirational System

We won’t try to keep you in suspense. When we reviewed last year’s model, we called the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon the best laptop in the world—though we later decided it shared that title with the Dell XPS 13 OLED—and it hasn’t done anything in its latest revision to change that state of affairs. The X1 Carbon Gen 9 catches up with the Dell and other elite ultraportables by moving to an 11th Generation Intel “Tiger Lake” Core processor and a slightly taller 16:10 rather than 16:9 screen aspect ratio. Its premium price and lack of an SD card slot still knock half a star off what would otherwise be a perfect five-star rating, but it effortlessly collects yet another Editors’ Choice award as the most desirable executive notebook on Earth.