Great monitors don’t have to break the bank, and this Acer model is proof of that. It’s only $220 right now on Amazon, a sizeable drop from its original $300 price and a solid deal for the specs. This Acer XV272U is a 27-inch display that features an IPS panel with a crisp 1440p resolution—the “sweet spot” for many PC gamers—that delivers crystal-clear images, vibrant contrast, and impressive color accuracy. Whether you’re working, studying, streaming Netflix, or gaming, you’ll love the visuals here. The cherry on top is the 240Hz refresh rate, which is hard to come by at this price. If you have a PC that’s capable of pushing that many frames per second, you’ll have an amazing time with this affordable monitor. Even during fast-paced action scenes and boss fights, you’ll enjoy ultra-smooth visuals. And with its 1ms response time, ghosting is kept to a minimum. The monitor also offers solid connectivity, including DisplayPort 1.4, double HDMI 2.0, and 3.5mm audio. You can set this monitor up exactly how you need it, allowing you to adjust its position by tilting, swiveling, pivoting, and adjusting its height. Alternatively, the VESA mount makes it easy to set this up on a monitor arm. Don’t miss this chance to grab this 27-inch 1440p 240Hz gaming monitor for just $220 on Amazon, the best price we’ve seen this year. Save 27% on Acer`s budget 27-inch 1440p 240Hz gaming monitorBuy now at Amazon Read...

If there’s anyone you can trust to keep your copy of Windows up and running, it should be Microsoft, right? That’s true… until it isn’t. Some recent updates are causing severe stability issues for Windows 11, and the latest one might just make your solid-state drive (SSD) or hard drive (HDD) unreadable, though thankfully it seems to be an isolated issue. According to Japanese user Necoru_cat on Twitter/X, the Microsoft Defender update issued last week for Windows 11 and Windows 10 introduced a new bug that’s causing some storage drives to be inaccessible. That includes drives that are hosting Windows itself, effectively borking the entire PC. Neowin reports that it’s an issue specifically for the latest 24H2 versions of Windows 11 (KB5063878, KB5063875) and Windows 10 (KB5063709, KB5063877, KB5063871, KB5063889). Several other users are having the same issue, worried that their storage drives are broken. Neowin thinks that it might be a problem with some drives that have a specific NAND controller from supplier Phison, showing a mix of issues, some of which can be fixed automatically with a reboot and some of which can’t. Reportedly, this bug is being triggered by heavy write sessions to NVMe SSDs and hard drives, possibly resulting in file corruption. Rebooting might help, but the problem seems to be persistent in the small amount of users it’s affecting, apparently only showing up when writing or backing up 50 gigabytes or more. Unfortunately it hasn’t been narrowed down to a specific range of drive models affected, and which might be saved by a firmware update. A similar issue was resolved in that way last year. Read...

The private members` club chain is returning to private ownership after four years on the New York Stock Exchange. Read...

The film, showing the last years of Ozzy`s life, had been scheduled to be broadcast on Monday. Read...

If you’re a Gmail user, you need to be particularly careful right now as criminals are currently targeting Gmail accounts. Hackers from a group called ShinyHunters were recently able to gain access to Google’s Salesforce database systems, reports Forbes. Google has confirmed the attacks and states that general data like customer and company names were leaked, but not passwords. The resulting data leak means that users of Google services—including Gmail and Google Cloud—are now at risk of falling victim to phishing attempts. How the phishing attacks work Initial reports of attempted attacks have already been seen on Reddit, which are likely related to the data leak. Users describe how alleged Google employees have contacted them by phone to inform them of a security breach in their accounts. In these scam attempts, attackers are trying to take over Gmail accounts by triggering alleged “account resets” and then intercepting passwords to subsequently lock out the account holders. Another attack method involves “dangling buckets” (i.e., outdated access addresses) to steal data from or inject malware into Google Cloud. Both methods are extremely dangerous and currently threaten Gmail and Google Cloud users in particular, around 2.5 billion people worldwide. In theory, companies are of particular interest to hackers, but private individuals can also easily be targeted. How to protect yourself To be on the safe side, you should ensure that your account is protected against unauthorized access. Google has provided the following security measures for this purpose: Use Google’s Security Checkup to automatically identify security vulnerabilities and get account security recommendations. Activate Google’s Advanced Protection Program to get an additional security barrier that blocks the download of potentially harmful files and restricts non-Google apps from accessing Gmail data. Use passkeys instead of passwords to stay better protected against hacking attacks and phishing attempts. Above all, you must remain vigilant. Be particularly skeptical if you’re contacted by alleged support staff who can’t confirm their identity. Google employees will never contact you by phone or email to reset a password or make other changes to your accounts. Further reading: Gmail’s AI summaries can be hijacked by scammers Read...

Traveling is a true joy, but only when you’re at your destination. Getting there is a different story. The combined hours crammed onto planes, trains, or buses can really take their toll—especially if you’re 6’3? like me. Watching a movie or TV show can help distract from the tight seats and lack of leg room, but that has its own issue: ergonomics. Setting my phone on a tray table or holding it in my lap is fine for a couple of minutes… but on a long-haul flight or a slow train ride across state lines, it just won’t do. And even if you aren’t as tall as I am, you’ve probably felt the neck strain that comes from hunching too long over your phone. It’s that much worse when combined with the extra discomforts of travel. Who wants a kinked neck at the start of a trip? Mark Knapp / Foundry That’s why I’m a huge fan of Beyond Cell’s travel phone mount (also available via Walmart). This small, cheap, simple accessory has always been a huge help when I’m traveling far. It’s a hands-free alternative that holds my phone up in a more ergonomic position—and boy, what a difference it’s made. I don’t travel without it anymore. This phone holder has two key elements. First, a spring-loaded arm that clamps onto objects about 1.5 inches thick, with rubber grips to ensure a secure hold. Second, a hinged arm for my phone that can rotate, swivel, and pivot all over the place for exact positioning. Mark Knapp / Foundry It’s simple. It’s cheap. And it works wonders. On planes, I like to latch the holder onto the pamphlet pocket on the back of the seat in front of me. This lets me position my phone directly in front of my face for comfortable viewing. I’ve done the same on buses, trains, and even in cars. It’s surprisingly versatile. Where to get it Beyond Cell Travel Phone Mount Best Prices Today: $11.59 at Amazon What about planes with screens built into the backs of the seats? I still use it, except here I latch it to the top of the tray table in its upright position. Maybe that’s less than ideal, but it’s still decently comfortable and has some benefits: my phone isn’t paused by every announcement, and my phone continues to play while I wait for everyone to disembark. The flexibility of this little travel gadget (also via Walmart) really helps ensure that I can find somewhere to anchor it in most situations. If you’re in the back seat of a car, you could even anchor it to the height adjustment rails of the headrest in front of you. Plus, it’s extremely portable and easy to stash away when you’re done traveling. Mark Knapp / Foundry Truly, this cheap phone mount has been a gamechanger when I’m traveling. Now if I could just find a neck pillow that helps me out as much (or, you know, convince airlines to make their seats more spacious). Get this $10 travel phone mount for your next tripBuy now at Amazon Read...

This weekend, a friend of mine showed off their RetroPi setup along with their mad skills in Super Ghouls ‘n Ghosts and Yoshi’s Cookie. I wonder how well they’d do if they had to switch from a full TV to a tiny screen that would make a modern smartphone blush? I mean, $40 is all it would take for me to disguise a cruel joke as a gift, and I’m tempted. If you’re actually looking to use this thing for a project instead of a mean-spirited gaming handicap, then you’ll probably be doing so for some kind of small gadget or monitor. The Raspberry Pi’s 5-inch 1280×720 touchscreen (spotted by Tom’s Hardware) is perfect for that, mounting directly on the bottom of a Pi and featuring a 5-point multitouch panel. It’s powered directly from the Pi’s GPIO with just 5 volts, so it won’t take up one of your precious USB ports. A few simple settings in rasp-config is all it takes to get it all working. The new version of the screen shares almost all the same specifications as the 7-inch model (which has now been around for 10 years, wow) with the obvious exception of its size, and it’s compatible with all full-sized Pi models going back to the B+. It’s not especially impressive in terms of its panel, with a viewing angle of just 80 degrees and a rather chunky bezel. But for a standalone controller or some neat little project gadget that sits on your desk, it’s pretty darn cool. Read...

Have you heard this one before? A scrappy entertainment company launches a small catalog of ad-free streaming movies and TV shows for cheap. It doesn’t seem like a big deal at first, because the content is mostly B-movies and reruns, but it proves popular with consumers and goes on to change television entertainment as we know it. I could be referring to Netflix, which started down that exact path with its “Watch Now” streaming catalog way back in 2007. But I could also be prognosticating about Howdy, the $3-per-month streaming service that Roku launched just last week. The parallels are obvious. Roku is starting with a small catalog, heavy on filler, and claims it’s not trying to compete with incumbents. But it’s also arriving at a time when consumers are increasingly frustrated with the larger streaming services, which are becoming more like the bloated, expensive cable packages they once aimed to displace. Howdy might seem insignificant now, but like Netflix, it could become the start of something bigger. Howdy vs. Netflix Roku People tend to remember Netflix as offering an endless bounty of content in its early years, but in 2007, its catalog was tiny, with just 1,000 titles at the outset. Roku’s Howdy catalog is similarly small, with “thousands of titles,” according to Roku, and less than 10,000 hours of entertainment in total. This isn’t about quality over quantity, either. While Howdy has a handful of standouts, including Mad Max: Fury Road and Apocalpyse Now, it’s also filled with such forgettable TV shows as Nikita and Spartacus: Gods of the Arena. (The catalog has some overlap with The Roku Channel, Roku’s long-running free ad-supported streaming service, but there are unique titles on each.) That’s how it was with Netflix back in the day as well. “[T]he selection is fairly small, at least once you subtract the mind-boggling gigabytes of B movies — more like C or D movies — like Addicted to Murder III: Bloodlust and Witchcraft XI: Sisters in Blood,” David Pogue wrote of Netflix’s streaming launch. Early users created forum threads for recommending quality content—shows like The Office and films like Groundhog Day—from within the cruft. Of course, Netflix’s streaming catalog got better over time. The service struck a deal with Starz in 2008 to get new-release movies onto the service, and it outbid premium networks (including Starz) for Disney’s movie streaming rights in 2012. A series of deals with AMC brought such prestige TV shows as Breaking Bad, The Walking Dead, and Mad Men onto the service, where they became more closely associated with Netflix than the cable network that originally aired them. By 2013, it was launching its own buzzy originals with House of Cards and Orange is the New Black. One could imagine Roku scaling up its own service in similar ways. The subscription business requires big hits to encourage sign-ups (something Roku itself has acknowledged in the past), so the company will surely seek flashier content deals for Howdy in the future. Its original programming arm could play a bigger role as well. Not rocking the boat Roku Here’s another parallel to consider: In its early years, Netflix claimed it was not competing with the incumbent cable business. Speaking to Kara Swisher in 2011, Netflix co-founder and (at the time) CEO Reed Hastings noted that cable subscriptions were up even as Netflix grew. “So it appears that to the consumer, Netflix is complementary,” he said. We all know what happened next: While Netflix kept growing, cable began to stagnate. And pretty soon, most major media companies were preparing their own streaming services to take on Netflix directly. Netflix was always going to compete with the incumbents, but it had to insist otherwise because it needed to keep licensing their content. Now, Roku is taking a page from Netflix’s playbook. In a press release, Roku CEO Anthony Wood said Howdy is “designed to complement, not compete with, premium services.” I doubt he actually believes that, but it’s something he’s obligated to say while Roku builds up the Howdy catalog. The next wave Roku I’m drawing these parallels so we can better understand what else is next for streaming, because all we’ve seen from the incumbents looks a lot like cable. Netflix keeps getting more expensive as it pursues more high-dollar sports programming, and services like Peacock and Paramount+ are following suit. The endgame for major streamers now is to push people toward bundles they might not need, with ad-supported tiers that pack in more commercials than were originally promised. I believe a new phase of cord-cutting is inevitable, in which the folks who initially fled cable will start to reevaluate their relationship with major streaming services as well. Free streaming services such as YouTube, Tubi, and even TikTok will play a role in this shift, but there’s also a room for ad-free services that are cheaper than the likes of Netflix, HBO Max, and Disney+. That’s a gap that Howdy could fill. Just as Netflix was able to build its streaming business off the success of its DVD rental program, Roku can build up Howdy on the success of its streaming players and smart TV platform. Before long it could become what Netflix once was: a successful, affordable streaming service that disrupts everything that came before. Sign up for Jared’s Cord Cutter Weekly newsletter to get more streaming TV insights every Friday. Read...

TrustedTech rebrands to focus on Microsoft cloud and AI services, driving an eleven-fold revenue increase and expanding enterprise support across UK and US markets. Read...

Bullying and concerns for contestants` mental health were among the main issues in the complaints. Read...