1440p and ultrawide monitors have their place in PC gaming (and their place is on my desk). But if you want to go big and beautiful to show off your four-figure gaming desktop’s raw pixel-pushing power, you want 4K resolution. And today you can get it in OLED monitor form for a great price. Amazon has an MSI 32-inch 4K OLED for just $749.99. The MSI MAG 321CUP (catchy!) was already something of a budget design, at least in the very specific subcategory of 4K OLED monitors, at $900. With a $150 discount it’s cheaper than any 4K OLED gaming monitor I’ve seen, at least in new condition. It has a pretty standard array of specs for OLEDs at this point, including 165Hz of refresh and .03ms response time. That’s not the fastest in the world even for OLEDs, but at 3840×2160 resolution on its curved panel, it’ll push your PC to the limit on the newest games at the highest settings, no matter what’s under the hood. With DisplayPort and double HDMI inputs, this monitor is a great pick if you’re the kind of PC gamer who also has an Xbox or PlayStation sitting around. And with a USB-C port that can handle video and 98 watts of power delivery, it’s also a good companion to a gaming laptop. It really can do it all, including give you a little peace of mind thanks to a 3-year burn-in warranty on that dispaly panel. Amazon is showing this as a recent low price for this particular model, but there’s no time limit on the sale. I get the feeling that this one, or something substantially similar, will pop up during Amazon Prime Day…but I doubt you’ll find a much better price on a name brand. Be sure to check out our coverage of monitor deals, and PCWorld’s best picks for gaming monitors and more. View Deal Read...

As we’ve previously covered, Microsoft is working on another redesign of the Start Menu in Windows 11, and one of the new features is that apps will be divided into different categories automatically. According to Windows Latest, Microsoft has created a 15 megabyte JSON file with information about which apps should end up in which category. That’s right—pretty much every app on the Microsoft Store has been assigned a number, with 0 indicating Productivity apps, 1 indicating Social apps, 2 indicating Creative apps, and so on. As soon as you have at least three apps that belong to the same category, they will automatically be grouped together in the new Start Menu. The ranking of the apps will depend on how often you use them, so the apps in a category won’t be sorted in an alphabetical order. At the moment, it doesn’t look like Microsoft is going to give us the option to rename categories or add our own, so we’ll just have to accept the company’s categorization method… for better or worse. Read...

Crytocurrency hasn’t just ruined the hunt for an affordable graphics card, or the conversation at that little bar you used to like. Now it’s come for everyone’s favorite alt browser, too. Dozens of fake cryptocurrency wallet extensions—indistinguishable from their nominally legitimate counterparts—are flooding Firefox’s add-on repository. It’s a problem. Koi Security researchers report that a coordinated campaign has been going on since April of this year, posting fake versions of popular crypto wallets like Coinbase, Ethereum, and MetaMask, making copies of the open-source wallet programs and inserting malicious code. The fake versions of the wallets will steal user data—primarily the access to real cryptocurrency—allowing the allegedly Russian-speaking hackers to drain the legitimate crypto accounts. Copied names and logos, fake reviews, and the usual spammy nonsense are being used to impersonate the real versions of the cryptocurrency wallets. Though Mozilla has automated systems in place to prevent malicious extensions from getting into the repository, these systems seem to be overwhelmed, with at least 40 fakes making it through (most subsequently removed) as of this week. BleepingComputer was given an official comment on the situation, but it seems fairly boilerplate. Even well after the crypto and NFT boom has died down, there are still hundreds of billions of dollars’ worth of value tied up in Bitcoin and its many alternatives. If you need access to these systems, double- and triple-check your sources for software and tools, going directly to the necessary URLs if possible. Once “anonymous” cryptocurrency gets stolen, especially across international borders, it’s all but impossible to recover. Read...

Last week, I secured my lowest price for Spectrum internet in years. All it took was a call to Spectrum’s retention department, which is where you end up after telling the automated system you want to cancel your service. After a mildly tedious conversation with an exceedingly friendly rep, my monthly bill dropped from $68 to $45 per month for the next full year. Not only did I save money, but my speeds increased from 400 Mbps to 500 Mbps. While I can’t guarantee the same results everywhere, in general it’s a great time to threaten to cancel cable internet service. For years, Comcast and Charter (which operates the Spectrum brand) have boasted to shareholders that growth in home internet more than offsets the collapse of cable TV, but now they’re losing internet customers to vendors offering faster fiber and cheaper 5G wireless alternatives. They are highly motivated to keep potential defectors on board, so you should take full advantage of their collective insecurity. What competition looks like Last year, Spectrum and Comcast lost 508,000 and 411,000 home internet customers respectively . The year before, Comcast lost 66,000, while Spectrum lost 61,000. Stock prices for both companies are already below what they were two years ago. By contrast, fiber and wireless home internet are growing. T-Mobile and Verizon added 1.7 million and 1.5 million wireless home internet customers in 2024 respectively, while AT&T added 1 million customers to its fiber service. Both of their stocks are up from two years ago. This isn’t rocket science: Wireless home internet is cheaper than cable, with plans starting at $35 per month for T-Mobile and Verizon when bundled with mobile phone service. Fiber, meanwhile, offers symmetric upload and download speeds, which aren’t always available with cable, and it can be cheaper as well. (AT&T’s 500 Mbps plan, for instance, costs $75 per month on a non-promotional basis, $10 per month less than Comcast.) Cable providers should have reckoned with this new reality years ago. Instead, they resorted to scare tactics and misinformation. Comcast and Charter both rolled out ad campaigns to convince people that they didn’t actually want cheaper internet service, which they later had to modify for being misleading. Comcast then tried to advertise its internet plans as “10G” in a desperate attempt to look better than 5G (despite being unrelated technologically). Advertising watchdogs pressured Comcast to drop that line of attack as well. Cable’s response Only now are the cable giants doing what they should have done all along, which is to actually compete. Comcast, for instance, announced a somewhat-simplified set of home internet plans last week, starting at $40 per month for 300 Mbps service with a one-year price guarantee. (Customers can also pay a higher price of $55 per month to lock in that rate for five years.) These new plans also reverse a longstanding policy of enforcing data caps in most markets. Comcast’s internet service plans as of July 2025.Comcast Last year, Comcast also launched a separate pair of internet plans under its “Now” brand, priced at $30 per month for 100 Mbps and $45 per month for 200 Mbps. Those plans don’t include data caps either. Spectrum’s response hasn’t been as splashy. It’s been more focused on increasing internet speeds and bundling more services together, including free streaming services on its cable TV side, and an offer of $30-per-month home internet (at 500 Mbps) when bundled with two mobile lines. It’s also been scrapping hidden fees and trying to improve its customer service. But here’s the problem: Cable companies don’t want to hand out big discounts to existing customers if they can avoid it. While Comcast says its new packages are available to anyone, existing customers must call in to make the switch, and I’ve heard from a few readers who’ve run into problems getting the plans they want. As my experience with Spectrum has shown, it’s all a matter of reaching the right representative. What you should do about it Negotiating a lower home internet price is easy. You just need to bypass the standard customer service department and skip straight to the one with the goal of keeping you from cancelling your service. You can often accomplish this through the automated answering system by selecting the options that lead to cancelling your service. I understand this can be nerve-wracking. If you have no intention of switching providers, you certainly wouldn’t want the cable company to call your bluff and cut you off without warning. Trust me, that’s not going to happen. Cable companies operate retention departments for the express purpose of pumping the breaks on cancellations and talking things out first. They also have access to promotions that standard customer service reps don’t. (Every Spectrum retention specialist I’ve ever talked to has relished pointing this out.) If it makes you more comfortable, just approach the subject in a circumspect way. Once the retention rep is on the line, tell them you’re thinking about cancelling, or you want to discuss the logistics of cancelling at a convenient future date. In my experience that’s enough to set the promotional gears in motion. And if that doesn’t work, maybe it’s time to look into other options. There are more of them available now in more places, much to the cable companies’ dismay. Sign up for Jared’s Cord Cutter Weekly newsletter for more money-saving advice. Read...

SOCRadar has launched its MCP Server, enabling secure AI access to real-time threat intelligence and simplifying cybersecurity teams` workflows globally. Read...

Tiny design, tiny price. Mini PCs are growing ever more popular for how they pack so much power into such an affordable package. I mean, just look at this: the Acemagic K1 mini PC is on sale for $309 on Amazon, a sizeable 36% discount on its $484 MSRP. For what you’re getting in terms of specs, the original price was okay—this deal price is great. Acemagic’s K1 mini PC isn’t a full-on powerhouse, but it’s good enough that you’ll have no issue swapping it for your wimpy laptop or aging desktop PC. Expect good performance with this under the hood: AMD Ryzen 7 5700U, Radeon RX Vega 8 integrated graphics, 32GB of RAM, 1TB of SSD storage. Want more? You can self-upgrade the internals up to 64GB of RAM and 4TB of SSD storage. That’ll deliver a responsive experience with Windows 11, several apps, Chrome tabs, and basic everyday activities. But what really stands out here is the triple 4K@60Hz support via HDMI, DisplayPort, and USB-C video ports—no extra hub accessory needed! Other ports available include six fast USB-A, fast LAN, and a 3.5mm audio jack. Don’t miss out on this chance to get the Acemagic K1 for only $309! But if you aren’t fully sold on this one, you should also check out our ever-evolving roundup of the best early Prime Day deals on mini PCs. And for other great deals, check out our Prime Day deals hub! Save 36% on this Ryzen 7 mini PC with 32GB RAMBuy now at Amazon Read...

Nvidia has been a little circumspect when it comes to sending out review units for its newest RTX graphics cards as of late. (That’s why there’s no PCWorld review yet for the RTX 5050 or 5060 or the 8GB version of the RTX 5060 Ti.) But reviewers gonna review… and the first reviews for the new RTX 5050 aren’t great. Korean site Quasar Zone (spotted by Tom’s Hardware) has a full review and benchmark suite of the Colorful iGame version of the RTX 5050, which comes with a Blackwell processor, 2560 CUDA cores, 8GB of GDDR6 memory, a 128-bit bus, and a $250 USD price tag. (That’s the suggested retail price, anyway. As with all graphics cards at the moment, your results may vary when you get to the checkout screen.) The results of Quasar Zone’s tests are less than impressive. The RTX 5050 just barely manages to hold even with the RTX 4060 from two years ago in most straight benchmarks, losing by a small margin in some. Intel’s Arc B580 (12GB, $250 retail) beats it handily in most synthetic benchmarks, though an average of in-game testing shows it only winning out by a small sliver—there are still a lot of games where Intel’s hardware and drivers are at a disadvantage. There is a bright spot for team green, though, and it’s in frame generation. Flipping on the switch for the signature feature of the RTX 50 series allows the RTX 5050 to pull ahead of the RTX 4060 by a considerable amount—nearly double versus the older card with single-frame generation and DLSS enabled. That’s to be expected, since the Blackwell chips can, indeed, generate double or even triple the artificial frames of its predecessors. This led to some questionable claims when the series was introduced, and those who are interested in multiplayer competitive games (the “fake frames” crowd) won’t be won over. Even with the boost from frame generation, it seems that the RTX 5050 is not the budget competitor that Nvidia needs in this segment… or at least that consumers want from Nvidia in this segment. Nvidia is still making an obscene amount of profit from its wide portfolio on the AI boom, so it’s not as if it really has to compete on the lower end. And it has a virtual monopoly on desktop graphics, anyway. Read...

Everyone has a chore they hate doing. I’ll happily pull weeds, clear brush, do dishes, clean rain gutters — but when it came to scrubbing a shower, I hated it. Now, it’s almost fun. Some people use all sorts of chemicals to avoid getting on their hands and knees and scrubbing until all the grime goes away. No matter what I used, though, I’d still have to go in there and grind away, and it still never looked that great. Now I just use a drill brush. Yep, power tools! The $19 Drill Brush is a brush attachment for a cordless drill, and an absolute godsend for anyone who needs to clean a shower, sink, or bathtub. Rev the drill, the brush spins, any gunk comes off. Done. The base pack comes with three attachments: “flat” brushes with either a 2-inch or 4-inch diameter, as well as a rounded “corner brush” that allows you to get in and scrub any curves that your shower has. All three include nylon bristles, and they’re rated as safe for porcelain, fiberglass shower enclosures, and shower-door tracks. I’ve used them on all three, and haven’t noticed any nicks or scratching. Now, scrubbing a shower means spraying your shower cleaner of choice on the shower surface, then selecting the right head for the job. I wait a minute or two to let it soak in, scrub off the gunk, then rinse it with some clean water. (Just make sure to keep the drill out of the way of the rinse water to avoid the risk of shocking yourself.) I really appreciate the fact that I can just lean on the drill and let the brush do the work. Since each Drill Brush set is less than $20, you can either buy separate sets for other tasks or simply buy a three-pack for $56 if you want to use other brushes for cleaning grout, sinks, tires, or whatever. Just make sure you pay attention to which brush you’re buying — Drill Brush uses different colors to designate different levels of stiffness, so a yellow brush is best for a bath or shower, while red brushes are better for outdoor surfaces. I’ve never been too worried about burning out my drill — it’s not like I (or, let’s be honest here — my wife) waits for years before it’s time to clean the shower again. It doesn’t take too much effort for the grime to come right off. Using a drill brush does require you to get on your hands and knees, however, and use it at somewhat awkward angles. And if you are concerned about dedicating your drill to…drilling, this $30 Clelifove cordless shower scrubber offers an alternative: it includes a rotating scrubber with a 58-inch telescoping handle, eight brushes, a rechargeable battery, and it’s waterproof. I’ve never used the Clelifove scrubber, so I can’t personally recommend it. But I bought a set of Drill Brushes years ago on the recommendation of a colleague, and never regretted it. It’s one of those little gadgety things that made my life better. Buy the Drill Brush three-piece brush set for $18.95 at Amazon Read...

June’s big Patch Tuesday update for Windows 11 has caused a bit of a mess for users, so much so that Microsoft had to briefly pause the update and issue an emergency patch… that ended up causing even more issues. Microsoft now admits that the problems don’t end there. Subsequent issues that have surfaced include a bug where the Print to PDF feature no longer works, which occurs specifically on systems with Windows 11 24H2 and, according to Microsoft, isn’t dramatic because it mainly affects corporate customers. The problem occurs as follows: if you search for the “Print to PDF” option in the Settings app, you’ll no longer be able to find it. It’s normally found under the options for printers and scanners, but it’s no longer there. The option can also no longer be activated via PowerShell. Microsoft is already working on a solution for this with optional preview update KB5060829, intended to resolve PDF problems in Windows 11. However, this preview update is also raising more problems. More problems with update KB5060829 Let’s recap. On June 10th, Microsoft released Patch Tuesday update KB5060842, which caused issues. On June 11th, we got the out-of-band emergency update KB5063060, which caused more issues. Now, optional preview update KB5060829 is causing still more issues. Some users have been complaining about Windows 11 performance problems after installing the update. Others are running into cursor delays when certain key combinations are used in games. Yet others are saying it causes the Windows Firewall to go haywire, with one Reddit user reporting that they’re seeing Firewall-related system events. It appears as if Firewall is no longer working properly or trying to fend off an attack. Microsoft, however, says there’s no cause for concern. It’s a known problem that can be safely ignored by users who are getting it. Whenever the system is restarted, new Firewall-related system events are logged even without there being any real incidents. According to Microsoft, it’s due to a new feature that’s still under development, so the issue should resolve itself once the feature is fully implemented. If you don’t want to risk these problems, you should hold off on installing the optional KB5060829 update and instead wait for Microsoft’s big Patch Tuesday update in July. If you’ve already installed it, you might be able to resolve any issues by rolling back the Windows update. Read...

ChatGPT is rapidly changing the world. The process is already happening, and it’s only going to accelerate as the technology improves, as more people gain access to it, and as more learn how to use it. What’s shocking is just how many tasks ChatGPT is already capable of managing for you. While the naysayers may still look down their noses at the potential of AI assistants, I’ve been using it to handle all kinds of menial tasks for me. Here are my favorite examples. Further reading: This tiny ChatGPT feature helps me tackle my days more productively Write your emails for you Dave Parrack / Foundry We’ve all been faced with the tricky task of writing an email—whether personal or professional—but not knowing quite how to word it. ChatGPT can do the heavy lifting for you, penning the (hopefully) perfect email based on whatever information you feed it. Let’s assume the email you need to write is of a professional nature, and wording it poorly could negatively affect your career. By directing ChatGPT to write the email with a particular structure, content, and tone of voice, you can give yourself a huge head start. A winning tip for this is to never accept ChatGPT’s first attempt. Always read through it and look for areas of improvement, then request tweaks to ensure you get the best possible email. You can (and should) also rewrite the email in your own voice. Learn more about how ChatGPT coached my colleague to write better emails. Generate itineraries and schedules Dave Parrack / Foundry If you’re going on a trip but you’re the type of person who hates planning trips, then you should utilize ChatGPT’s ability to generate trip itineraries. The results can be customized to the nth degree depending on how much detail and instruction you’re willing to provide. As someone who likes to get away at least once a year but also wants to make the most of every trip, leaning on ChatGPT for an itinerary is essential for me. I’ll provide the location and the kinds of things I want to see and do, then let it handle the rest. Instead of spending days researching everything myself, ChatGPT does 80 percent of it for me. As with all of these tasks, you don’t need to accept ChatGPT’s first effort. Use different prompts to force the AI chatbot to shape the itinerary closer to what you want. You’d be surprised at how many cool ideas you’ll encounter this way—simply nix the ones you don’t like. Break down difficult concepts Dave Parrack / Foundry One of the best tasks to assign to ChatGPT is the explanation of difficult concepts. Ask ChatGPT to explain any concept you can think of and it will deliver more often than not. You can tailor the level of explanation you need, and even have it include visual elements. Let’s say, for example, that a higher-up at work regularly lectures everyone about the importance of networking. But maybe they never go into detail about what they mean, just constantly pushing the why without explaining the what. Well, just ask ChatGPT to explain networking! Okay, most of us know what “networking” is and the concept isn’t very hard to grasp. But you can do this with anything. Ask ChatGPT to explain augmented reality, multi-threaded processing, blockchain, large language models, what have you. It will provide you with a clear and simple breakdown, maybe even with analogies and images. Analyze and make tough decisions Dave Parrack / Foundry We all face tough decisions every so often. The next time you find yourself wrestling with a particularly tough one—and you just can’t decide one way or the other—try asking ChatGPT for guidance and advice. It may sound strange to trust any kind of decision to artificial intelligence, let alone an important one that has you stumped, but doing so actually makes a lot of sense. While human judgment can be clouded by emotions, AI can set that aside and prioritize logic. It should go without saying: you don’t have to accept ChatGPT’s answers. Use the AI to weigh the pros and cons, to help you understand what’s most important to you, and to suggest a direction. Who knows? If you find yourself not liking the answer given, that in itself might clarify what you actually want—and the right answer for you. This is the kind of stuff ChatGPT can do to improve your life. Plan complex projects and strategies Dave Parrack / Foundry Most jobs come with some level of project planning and management. Even I, as a freelance writer, need to plan tasks to get projects completed on time. And that’s where ChatGPT can prove invaluable, breaking projects up into smaller, more manageable parts. ChatGPT needs to know the nature of the project, the end goal, any constraints you may have, and what you have done so far. With that information, it can then break the project up with a step-by-step plan, and break it down further into phases (if required). If ChatGPT doesn’t initially split your project up in a way that suits you, try again. Change up the prompts and make the AI chatbot tune in to exactly what you’re looking for. It takes a bit of back and forth, but it can shorten your planning time from hours to mere minutes. Compile research notes Dave Parrack / Foundry If you need to research a given topic of interest, ChatGPT can save you the hassle of compiling that research. For example, ahead of a trip to Croatia, I wanted to know more about the Croatian War of Independence, so I asked ChatGPT to provide me with a brief summary of the conflict with bullet points to help me understand how it happened. After absorbing all that information, I asked ChatGPT to add a timeline of the major events, further helping me to understand how the conflict played out. ChatGPT then offered to provide me with battle maps and/or summaries, plus profiles of the main players. You can go even deeper with ChatGPT’s Deep Research feature, which is now available to free users, up to 5 Deep Research tasks per month. With Deep Research, ChatGPT conducts multi-step research to generate comprehensive reports (with citations!) based on large amounts of information across the internet. A Deep Research task can take up to 30 minutes to complete, but it’ll save you hours or even days. Summarize articles, meetings, and more Dave Parrack / Foundry There are only so many hours in the day, yet so many new articles published on the web day in and day out. When you come across extra-long reads, it can be helpful to run them through ChatGPT for a quick summary. Then, if the summary is lacking in any way, you can go back and plow through the article proper. As an example, I ran one of my own PCWorld articles (where I compared Bluesky and Threads as alternatives to X) through ChatGPT, which provided a brief summary of my points and broke down the best X alternative based on my reasons given. Interestingly, it also pulled elements from other articles. (Hmph.) If you don’t want that, you can tell ChatGPT to limit its summary to the contents of the link. This is a great trick to use for other long-form, text-heavy content that you just don’t have the time to crunch through. Think transcripts for interviews, lectures, videos, and Zoom meetings. The only caveat is to never share private details with ChatGPT, like company-specific data that’s protected by NDAs and the like. Create Q&A flashcards for learning Dave Parrack / Foundry Flashcards can be extremely useful for drilling a lot of information into your brain, such as when studying for an exam, onboarding in a new role, prepping for an interview, etc. And with ChatGPT, you no longer have to painstakingly create those flashcards yourself. All you have to do is tell the AI the details of what you’re studying. You can specify the format (such as Q&A or multiple choice), as well as various other elements. You can also choose to keep things broad or target specific sub-topics or concepts you want to focus on. You can even upload your own notes for ChatGPT to reference. You can also use Google’s NotebookLM app in a similar way. Provide interview practice Dave Parrack / Foundry Whether you’re a first-time jobseeker or have plenty of experience under your belt, it’s always a good idea to practice for your interviews when making career moves. Years ago, you might’ve had to ask a friend or family member to act as your mock interviewer. These days, ChatGPT can do it for you—and do it more effectively. Inform ChatGPT of the job title, industry, and level of position you’re interviewing for, what kind of interview it’ll be (e.g., screener, technical assessment, group/panel, one-on-one with CEO), and anything else you want it to take into consideration. ChatGPT will then conduct a mock interview with you, providing feedback along the way. When I tried this out myself, I was shocked by how capable ChatGPT can be at pretending to be a human in this context. And the feedback it provides for each answer you give is invaluable for knocking off your rough edges and improving your chances of success when you’re interviewed by a real hiring manager. Further reading: No, don’t threaten ChatGPT for better results. Try this instead Read...