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Blog Posts

Assessing the Worth of Hard Drives in 2026

a range of devices is anticipated to experience a price increase due to the memory scarcity, and some firms are already raising the prices of their offerings, with Sony revealing a second series of PlayStation 5 price hikes in March 2026.

The German website ComputerBase has been monitoring the costs of SSDs and HDDs since September 2025, and according to the latest data from the site, they have surged by an average of 86.59% and 50.83%, respectively. The highest-priced HDD has gone up by approximately 72%, while the priciest SSD observed by the site has increased by about 170% since September 2025. Consequently, if you intended to assemble your PC in 2026 or had already begun sourcing components in 2025 but had not yet purchased storage solutions, the current prices of SSDs and HDDs might strain your budget.

Given that HDDs have not escalated in price as significantly as SSDs, you might be thinking about opting for one to save some money. Nonetheless, SSDs outperform HDDs regarding speed, durability, and energy efficiency. Yet, with their elevated cost, you may be questioning if purchasing an HDD would be a better option. While we typically advise against opting for HDDs, they are a sensible choice in 2026 since their prices have not surged as much as those of SSDs, making them an excellent solution for bulk storage to potentially supplement cloud storage services.

Reasons HDDs remain a viable option in 2026

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Five Useful Travel Devices You Can 3D Print on Your Own

purchase a variety of useful travel gadgets on Amazon; alternatively, you can utilize a 3D printer to create custom items such as chargers and earphones storage, phone stands, and camera tripods.

Although you could theoretically acquire storage solutions and holders at an airport souvenir shop in an emergency, it’s uncertain whether they would offer gadgets that fulfill your specific travel technology requirements, including your phone, charger, headphones, and others. You won’t discover this until after you’ve paid and unwrapped the item. To avoid that uncertainty, use a 3D printer at home to develop different secure storage options and practical gadgets that you can be sure will suit your requirements. You can customize these gadgets to fit your preferred technology, but if you need inspiration, you can explore popular 3D printing enthusiast sites like Printables and Creality Cloud. Here are five suggestions to spark your creativity.

Charger Container

America’s Sophisticated Surveillance Towers Are Quickly Growing

the covert cameras installed above roadways, COWs are visible. These swiftly proliferating surveillance devices are becoming increasingly prevalent across the United States, outfitted with cutting-edge video and audio monitoring and deterrent technologies.

COWs are produced by a range of security and surveillance technology firms, including the contentious Flock Safety and the Texas-based ECAM, and subsequently leased to various local and state law enforcement agencies or private security firms. These cameras have emerged as the preferred crime deterrent for police departments in multiple U.S. States due to their capacity to observe and listen to everything within their range.

With the addition of artificial intelligence capabilities, they serve as a straightforward set-and-forget solution that enables officers to effectively and thoroughly oversee a specific area utilizing a blend of multifunction cameras and two-way audio functionality. The COWs’ tall poles and somewhat disconcerting blinking lights have earned them the unwelcome moniker of “scarecrows,” prompting security contractors to increase production to satisfy police demand.

The Scarecrows come equipped with an array of intelligent surveillance technologies

Grasping the Purple Dot Appearing on Your MacBook Display: What It Signifies

like the MacBook Pro and desktop devices such as the iMac. As macOS progresses, users frequently encounter new functionalities and configurations, even if it’s something as trivial as a purple indicator dot hanging out near the Control Center symbol. Speaking of which, what does that purple dot signify anyway?

Launched with macOS Sonoma in late 2023, the purple dot serves as a privacy indicator. Its appearance indicates that an application is recording system audio or capturing your screen. Features like FaceTime and screen sharing — along with video conferencing applications such as Zoom and Microsoft Teams — can trigger the purple dot to light up. Fortunately, there’s no need for worry, provided you have granted these applications permission to record and track.

The purple dot is indeed part of a small collection of Control Center indicators. There are two additional colored dots: an orange one indicates that your Mac’s microphone is active, while green shows that your Mac’s camera is in use. There’s also an arrow icon to denote that your location is being utilized. You might be able to click the Control Center icon to check which apps are using your system audio, microphone, camera, or location (shown beneath the Control Center icon).

A compact indicator with significant importance

You have the option to allow or deny screen and audio-recording permissions for supported applications on your Mac. To do this, access System Settings, then navigate to Privacy & Security and Screen & System Audio Recording. Locate the application for which you wish to enable or disable permissions, then simply toggle the recording option on or off. You can also opt for an application to capture screen and system audio simultaneously, or to record audio exclusively.

You can add new applications to the list by clicking the plus icon at the bottom of the screen. We also suggest removing applications you no longer utilize; this way, you’ll have fewer choices to scroll through while using the privacy menu and

Mac mini and Mac Studio out of stock – is it the RAM crisis or an M5 refresh?

In short: Several high-RAM Mac mini and Mac Studio configurations disappeared from Apple’s online store in the US on 11 April 2026, listed as “currently unavailable” with no delivery estimate and no option to order. The affected models are Mac mini configurations with 32GB or 64GB of RAM and Mac Studio configurations with 128GB or 256GB […]

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The Present Worth of Your Initial iPhone

the $599 iPhone 17e, aligning with the cost of the 8 GB version of the first iPhone, priced at $599. Original iPhones remain available for purchase, as past owners frequently list pre-owned iPhone 2G units on auction platforms like eBay. The condition greatly influences the price buyers are willing to pay. The most sought-after models are those with 4 GB of storage that remain in their original, unopened packaging. Such original iPhone units can command prices in the hundreds of thousands. For instance, a factory-sealed 4 GB original iPhone sold for $190,372.80 during the summer of 2023, beginning at a bid of $10,000. In the spring of 2024, a comparable unit was auctioned for $130,027.20, while another reached $147,286.

Nevertheless, Apple enthusiasts looking to acquire a second-hand iPhone 2G will spend significantly less. A brief search on eBay indicates that pre-owned first-generation iPhones can be priced below $100, although these are not highly coveted collector’s versions like the sealed 4 GB models. The starting price can escalate to several hundred dollars for a used, original iPhone that includes the original box and all accompanying accessories.

What makes the 4 GB original iPhone so unique?

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All iPhone 17 models feature

How to Resolve the Router Configuration That Could Be Hindering Your Internet Velocity

household devices disrupt your Wi-Fi since they function within the same frequency range. This includes microwaves, smart home gadgets, and baby monitors. Therefore, if this disruption begins after the initial scan, your router won’t automatically change channels, resulting in reduced internet speeds.

Choosing channels manually can resolve the issue

By manually selecting the channel in the router’s admin interface, you can significantly reduce interference from other networks and household devices and remove channel overlap. For the 2.4 GHz band, you need to select 1, 6, or 11, as these are the only channels that do not overlap. If your router supports the 5 GHz band, you’ll have 30 channels available, of which 24 are non-overlapping. Ideally, you should pick 36, 40, 44, or 48, although other selections such as 149, 153, 157, 161, or 165 should also be effective.

The procedures for manually adjusting channels differ based on the router brand. However, in most instances,

The Netherlands becomes the first European country to approve Tesla’s FSD Supervised

In short: The Dutch vehicle authority RDW approved Tesla’s Full Self-Driving (Supervised) software on 10 April 2026, making the Netherlands the first European country to authorise the system under UN Regulation 171, the EU standard governing driver control assistance systems. The approval follows 18 months of testing, 1.6 million kilometres of European road data, and more […]

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