Articles by Jerry Hildenbrand

Home automation is both awesome and easy, provided you use the right stuff. Trust me, I’ve tried it both the hard way and the easy way and the most awesome way is when you just plug stuff in, follow a few simple instructions, and it all just works. Prime Day is the right day to get started doing it the easy way!

And that’s exactly the experience you’ll have with Kasa’s simple smart plugs. You don’t have to pull anything apart or wire anything because they plug right into the outlet that’s already on your wall and their tiny footprint makes them perfect for places like behind the couch or the dresser, which is exactly where I use them. Pair them with something like an Echo Dot or another of the Prime Day Amazon device deals going on and it’s like magic.

Set things up in a spot where you can easily touch the single button and see the color of the light, then move them anywhere thanks to integration in the Google Home or Amazon apps, where you can give them a proper name and assign them…

Wireless headphones of some sort are a must nowadays. Trust me, nobody wants to hear whatever show or music you happen to be streaming on the bus during the evening commute. And since most people don’t want a big pair of over-ear headphones hanging off their heads, it’s time to look at the best wireless earbud deals on Prime Day.

You don’t have to spend a fortune and get the most expensive set of earbuds if you’re just looking for something basic and solid, and that’s where Enacfire’s F1 earbuds come into the picture. They have the features most of us need, like water resistance, touch controls, long battery life, and a charging case plus one more great one — a low price.

ENACFIRE F1 wireless earbuds

You don’t have to spend a lot to get a pair of solid wireless earbuds with the features most people really want. This Prime Day deal gets you there for only $32!

$32 at Amazon

Sound quality shouldn’t be a problem either since these earbuds share the same Qualcomm chip you’ll f…

Millions of people use Chromebooks, but despite their simple and “for everyone” nature, not every power feature is easy to access. All the best Chromebooks are powerful tools that are just waiting to be used to their full potential, and once you know a few tricks, you’ll feel like you’re getting even more value out of your inexpensive computer. We’ve rounded up 25 Chromebook tips and tricks for you to try so that you can start making the most of your machine.

Chromebook tips and tricks:

Use third-party DNS
Type in Unicode
Use Chrome overview
Keyboard shortcuts
Refresh Google Drive
Chromebook perks
Move the shelf
Use an SD card for extra storage
Show hidden files and folders
Share your Chromebook safely
Do a barrel roll
Take a screenshot
Use app shortcuts
See your system info
Use Powerwash to clean up
Open new tabs easily
Love the Launcher
Open apps quickly
Control your open windows
Get organized with folders
TURN ON CAPS LOCK
Locking things down
Control your notifications
Use Ni…

If the upcoming Microsoft Game Pass standalone device supports more than Game Pass, it will be hard to recommend anything better.

A whole lot of people using any of the best Android phones have tried Microsoft’s Game Pass streaming service, and most people think it’s a hit. It’s not anything new — NVIDIA started streaming full-on console and PC titles to Android a long time ago, and now even Google is in the game with Stadia. Microsoft’s edge is its large library of titles that people actually want to play, and it has reasonable rates: $15 each month gets you streaming on your console, PC, and Android phone, plus Xbox Live Gold and EA Play membership. Not. Too. Shabby.

There’s plenty of content out there that goes into detail about Game Pass and why you should think about giving it a try if you haven’t. It could be the future of mobile gaming and it might even be a reason to not even bother buying an expensive console. If nothing else, it is a great way to play high-quality games…

When it comes to the web browser on your phone, security is the first and most important consideration. But it’s still possible to safely incorporate browser extensions for Chrome.

Almost everybody uses Google Chrome for their web browser. Yeah, I know plenty of people who don’t, and I have used different browsers from time to time myself, but the point still stands: Chrome is the world’s leading browser across both desktop and mobile, which makes it the best Android web browser.

The biggest reason for this is that it’s installed by default. If you decide you want to buy the very best Android phone, you set it up and see a Chrome icon front and center. You know immediately that the little multicolored ball is for browsing the web. But Chrome is also a decent web browser in its own right and has a good set of features and some of the best experts in the industry keeping the data you store inside the app secure. (Remember, there is a difference between security and privacy, so don’t …

Advertisers want the right people to see the right products, and Google uses the advertising ID to do it.

Google has built many of the products and services we use every day, but selling things to consumers isn’t how the tech giant makes the bulk of its money. Google is primarily an advertising company.

That doesn’t mean Google is creating ads and making sure you see all of them (though the company can help create captivating advertisements); it means that Google sells advertising space for other companies to use inside of its products and across the web. This is a very competitive space and one where Google has a unique (and potentially unfair) advantage: tracking our interests can focus on showing the right ads to the right people.

Google makes money because it knows what you like.

I’ll use the same analogy I always use here. I like fishing. I buy fishing equipment on the internet, research fishing spots on the internet, and watch videos about new fishing techniques on the …

Please, give me a Fitbit Charge 4 refresh that “just works.”

We all know that Google is in the midst of a huge shakeup of its wearable ecosystem. Wear OS has continued to underperform when it comes to sales, the company recently acquired Fitbit, and a completely new platform is coming with a new generation of chips to power it.

That’s great news for the future, but not so great news if you’re in the market right now. And that’s me. Well, my wife, actually. Her doctor thinks she needs to start monitoring things like calories, exercise, heart rate, and her weight because of an unexpected weight loss. Couple in the fact that she’s wrapped up in the tentacles of the Google Android ecosystem (not a bad thing, but still a total lock-in) Google Fit is the logical answer.

I thought this would be easier than it is. She has a nice Withings scale that does exactly what she wants. She also has a Mi Band 4 that she loves, but it doesn’t really do what she wants because the option to sync with …

Google always has grand plans whenever it develops something new and Fuchsia isn’t any different.

It all started in 2016 with a simple quip that initially appeared on the Fuchsia development page: Pink + Purple = Fuchsia (a new Operating System).

There was some meaning behind that simple sentence. Project Pink was a name that engineers from Apple and IBM gave to a new OS that used a new interface because the notes were written on pink index cards. Project Purple was the name given to prototype devices that eventually became the iPhone. These projects were new ideas that turned out to be wildly successful, and the original developers of Fuchsia, Google’s latest operating system were involved in them.

But a witty name isn’t an operating system and Google quietly worked on Fuchsia for the next five years. Occasionally we would get a little more news about the project or even a way to run it on devices like the Pixelbook. It was Google’s way of letting everyone know the project was mo…

Whether you love the look or hate it, Material You is Google’s way to make its Pixel phones stand out.

We’ll soon see a sixth year of Google building its own phones under the Pixel brand. Pixel 6 leaks and rumors look really interesting, and if even half of them turn out to be correct, we should see a heck of a phone when it comes to the market this fall. But hardware is only half the equation; if you’re Google, it’s even less than half.

Google is and always has been a software company. Most of the services Google produces are applications and software that people love, even though there are plenty of other things about the company that we love a lot less. Google has been under fire lately over privacy issues, but it’s worth remembering that Google has never hidden how it makes its money. We agreed to give our details away in exchange for services like Android, Google Photos, or Chrome because they really are that good.

We’ll talk more about privacy concerns and controversies in t…

I know Android 12 will come to my Galaxy S21 eventually, but as the great American poet Tom Petty once said, “the waiting is the hardest part”.

My Pixel 4 is broken. That’s how this all needs to start. Like too many other people, my Pixel 4 didn’t have the long and fruitful life an expensive smartphone should have and with one warranty replacement under my belt for a swollen battery, I’ve got a phone with a flakey battery connector. Worse, now there is no warranty to fall back on. Dammit.

Yes, the Pixel 4 has really bad battery life even when it works correctly and that is the reason I switched away to a Galaxy S21, but I assumed that I could switch back when Google did something cool that made me want a Pixel phone again. But it just didn’t turn out that way.

I can’t complain too much because the Galaxy S21 is a great phone that likely isn’t going to break twice in a year and it took very little effort to fix almost everything I didn’t really like about its software out of the bo…