Bren's stats
- Review count230
- Helpfulness votes1,732
- First reviewDecember 27, 2016
- Last reviewJuly 12, 2025
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- Average rating4.8
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- Answer count11
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- First answerDecember 27, 2016
- Last answerNovember 4, 2021
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Inspiron 14 Copilot+ PC with on-device AI. Fly through your to-do list with the Copilot+ Inspiron 14 PC, featuring responsive performance and exceptional battery life, virtually anywhere.
Customer Rating
5
Excellent performance at a 2025 budget price!
on July 12, 2025
Posted by: Bren
The Dell Inspiron line of laptops is not one that has ever stood out in my mind in terms of high quality or excellence. However, this laptop offers the right blend of price, features, and performance that I think many students and or businesses will appreciate for general productivity and web application use!
The build quality of the laptop is reasonable but not incredible. The laptop lid is not one-finger open capable, with a poorly tuned and very tight hinge that does not go flat or flip entirely over. The keyboard has a standard layout with a surprisingly excellent, quiet, and gentle typing feel. People with achy fingers or arthritis will love typing on this keyboard. The keycaps are a soft touch and quite comfortable to type on for extended periods of time. I am currently typing the review on this keyboard, and I would have zero problems using this for a full day of work or college-level essay typing. The only major disappointment for me is that the keyboard is not backlit. This is a surprising and disappointing finding in the setting of laptops in this same price range that have backlit keyboards. I don’t know why Dell decided to cheap out on this, but I do not appreciate it. The touchpad on this laptop is a traditional springboard-style trackpad with easier mechanical clicks at the bottom and impossible to click at the top. It is pleasant to use but not as great as haptic trackpad offerings out there.
The speakers on this laptop are slightly above average in the world of Windows laptops in terms of loudness and sound quality. The screen is a “good enough” 300 nits’ brightness 1920x1200p screen (basically full HD) that looks great and performs as expected at this price. It has a 60hz refresh and does not support a variable refresh rate that can drop lower or higher based on your needs, which is a bummer as this can contribute to improved battery life. This is not a touch screen, and the scaling of the desktop in the Windows settings was set at 150% out of the box, which looked terrible to my eyes. I set it to 125% and it looked much better scaled with more usable workspace for apps and web browser pages on the 14” screen.
Regarding some of the key specs, here is what you have on this particular laptop. It is equipped with a new 2025 Snapdragon ARM chip which is one of QUALCOMM’s newer 8 core 8 thread models that is still equipped with a ‘neural processing unit’ or NPU that is capable of handling modern AI tasks. This is not the fastest Snapdragon chip currently available, but I think it is going to be perfectly serviceable for most users. It has 16 GB of blazing-fast RAM built into the laptop, no upgradable RAM here after it leaves the factory. However, 16 GB is precisely the minimum of RAM I would recommend to most users these days, so I am glad Dell didn’t cheap out here with 8 GB of RAM. The 512 GB SSD in this laptop is large enough to be serviceable for most and is quite fast with well over 6400MB/s read speeds!
Benchmarks: The Geekbench 6 scores show an interesting comparison between the higher end Snapdragon Plus chip available in some of the other Dell Inspiron line up offerings. I got a single core score of 1707 and multicore score of 5869. This is quite a lot slower than the Snapdragon Plus processor with a single core score of 2285 and a multicore score of 12790. However, this chip is more than powerful enough for basic computing tasks, productivity, and web apps. I personally noticed no difference in the speed of my workflow compared to my other computers that I am used to using, like my desktop PC with an i7 13700F processor. I also got a Speedometer 3.1 score on balanced mode on battery of well into the high 20's, which is highly respectable given that the test is all about how rapidly a computer can cycle through a demanding web app task sequence. This test is very relevant in an era where more and more workflows are being done through web apps rather than programs downloaded onto the computer itself.
Now, to clear up a few expectations on this laptop. This Inspiron model is NOT one of these proclaimed 20-hour battery-life laptops. Based on my real-world mixed power use and screen brightness on balanced battery life, this is shaping up to be a 10–12-hour battery to me, tops. This is still excellent and vastly better than what higher-end mobile Intel processors have managed to return in recent times, so I know Windows lovers are going to be stoked to have a powerful and efficient laptop. Another expectation to clear up is that this is not a silent machine. This has a fan built in, and I was surprised to find that it spun up a lot to cool the laptop, even when doing low-intensity tasks like web browsing and Word processing. I will say that according to HWmonitor, my temperatures stayed nice and cool even during intensive benchmarking. Regardless, hearing fans is never my favorite thing on a professional on-the-go laptop.
Altogether, I give this specific Dell Inspiron five stars out of five. This is a high-performing laptop that can be had, particularly on sale, at an amazing price-to-value ratio. Thanks for reading my review. I hope it has been helpful!
Altogether, I give this specific Dell Inspiron five stars out of five. This is a high-performing laptop that can be had, particularly on sale, at an amazing price-to-value ratio. Thanks for reading my review. I hope it has been helpful!
I would recommend this to a friend!
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Meet the eufy Robot Vacuum E28—your new cleaning sidekick that makes life easier. With HydroJet™ one-pass deep cleaning, it wipes away dirt without smearing. Need extra help? The detachable spot cleaner tackles pet messes and spills fast. Forget maintenance—its intelligent station auto-empties, washes, and refills, so you never touch the mess. With 20,000Pa turbo suction and anti-tangle brushes, it grabs pet hair and debris from any surface. CornerRover™ tech reaches every edge, while AI navigation dodges obstacles. Control everything from your phone and enjoy a cleaner home—effortlessly. E28 does the work, so you don’t have to!
Customer Rating
5
Incredible product for the busy, messy household!
on July 9, 2025
Posted by: Bren
I cannot begin to describe what an upgrade and overall boon this robot vacuum and carpet cleaner combination has been in our lives! We have a very busy household with wood floors in the dining room and kitchen with carpet in the rest of our house that see a lot of use between two adults, a labradoodle, and a 14-month old toddler who is finding new ways everyday to exercise her new mobility while creating messes and spills in the process. Enter the Eufy cleaning station I will call it. I would say that is probably taking a cumulative 2 hours of vacuuming weekly off of our plate with the consistent vacuuming cycles we are assigning it to do each day. Furthermore, the mopping is really quite handy for keeping the floors generally tidy. It is not a substitute for a real mop if you have a super large mess on the floor or a lot of debris (i.e., handfuls of macaroni and cheese tossed into giant globs on the ground by a eager toddler), but it really helps to keep a general shine to the floors between our spot cleaning! The carpet cleaning station has also been really valued by us! I spent quite a lot of time with it on our couches, chairs, and some area rugs that had small spills and stains and I was quite impressed by the results it yielded!
Altogether, this is a 5 out of 5 star product for me. I think your expectations have to be reasonably in line with what this is really meant to do!
I would recommend this to a friend!
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Experience the height of gaming innovation with the ROG Zephyrus G16. Featuring an all-new premium aluminum chassis with customizable lighting, this laptop merges style and durability. Its ultra-slim 0.59” profile and lightweight 4.08lbs 16” chassis redefines portability, but does not compromise on performance. Powered by Windows 11, the latest Intel® Core™ Ultra 9 285H processor, and an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 GPU, the Zephyrus G16 seamlessly aligns with your lifestyle, meeting all your gaming and creative demands. ROG Intelligent Cooling features liquid metal for reduced CPU temperatures and upgraded Arc Flow Fans for improved airflow to sustain peak performance on the Zephyrus G16 no matter the task. Immerse yourself in the OLED Nebula Display and enjoy rapid 0.2ms response times, vivid 2.5K resolution, and a smooth 240Hz refresh rate.
Customer Rating
5
One of my favorite laptops ever!
on July 2, 2025
Posted by: Bren
I am having difficulty even starting this review, not because of any problem or negative views of the laptop, but just because of how good it is! I suppose one way I could sum up this laptop is that, in the present time, in entering quarter three of 2025, this is what a two-thousand-dollar laptop should look like, feel like, sound like, perform like! It cannot be denied that this is a pricey device. Nor can it be accurately stated that this is the greatest dollar-to-performance gaming laptop in the category. However, no gaming laptop I have ever reviewed in over a decade of doing laptop reviews has ever quite captured this grouping of features that just launches this sixteen-inch screen beauty into a high place of honor for both everyday productivity/school use and gaming. Let’s go on to detail some of those now.
First of all, the hardware and build quality of this laptop is basically perfect for what I look for in laptops. Full aluminum chassis, smooth one-finger-opening screen hinge, lusciously comfortable keyboard typing experience, generously sized and smooth-feeling trackpad, speakers loud enough to fill a couple of rooms with quality and full-range audio (in point of fact, the best gaming laptop speakers I have EVER heard, period). A screen with such rapid response and vivid beauty! It is all – just - here!
My normal strategy with my laptop reviews is to give super nerdy, in-depth insights into the laptop. In this era of amazing YouTube reviewers and quality blogs, though, I feel like my best served purpose in this instance is to try to convey to the best of my ability the emotional and visceral feeling of using this laptop.
When you first boot it on, you are greeted by the deep, perfect blacks of a certified OLED screen in all of its inky glory. The 16” screen brightens with the Windows login page and, when set up, you are welcomed into the use of your device with the handy Windows Hello camera option for login. Loading the home page of this device is lightning fast, the 16GB of soldered on 7467 MT/s RAM and 6700 mb/S speed NVMe SSD work in cooperation with the Core Ultra 9 285H CPU to ensure you have a fantastic workflow experience on day to day productivity tasks. And when you are ready to game plugged in, this machine stands up admirably to the task, delivering triple A gaming at max settings on almost all newer titles tested including Doom The Dark Ages, the latest update of Hunt: Showdown 1896, and on intensive VR games like Pavlov VR hooked up to a MetaQuest two! The fans can get a little noisy, but since it is a larger laptop with bigger fans and more breathing room, they make more of a constant “whooshing” sound rather than an aggravating whine and whir sound that some smaller gaming laptops tend to emit at high fan speeds.
At the risk of being repetitive, I just want to touch on a couple more of my absolute key features. First, as a MacBook user (yes, I admitted it), this laptop is a true match in build quality while possessing GREATLY more utility for a gamer-centric laptop user. Furthermore, the device possesses greater versatility in use with more I/O built in, like USB-A ports, while remaining a highly comfortable thickness. The keyboard is also a fantastic one, perfect for day to day typing of essays, emails, or whatever else you have in mind! This very review is being written on the laptop keyboard and I have no greater fatigue with it over my usual keyboards I type on.
This also almost goes without saying, but this laptop is NOT an all-day device on battery. It is super optimized with Nvidia Optimus built in which switches the laptop to using the built in graphics on the Intel Core Ultra 9 chip instead to the dedicated GPU which saves power, and it is also capable on silent mode in the Armory crate settings of toning down the power factors overall so you can enjoy about 3 to 4 hours of unplugged basic productivity use. Thus, my favorite way to use this laptop is on Silent mode for the battery savings and quieting of the fans, while switching the screen to 240hz refresh. I know that this is a source of inefficiency, but I just value a smooth display so much and since you are paying for this gorgeous OLED high refresh speed panel, I recommend you take full advantage of it for gaming and non-gaming scenarios! One MASSIVE benefit I found with this laptop that you are going to love. It is capable of charging at partial power over USB-C!!! Yes. You read that right, you do not have to bring around the 200watt power brick and dedicated charger all the time! I hooked up my 100-watt capable power supply to this laptop via USB-C, and it was pulling in the full 100 watts! Albeit, you do get warnings from the system that this is not enough power to run at full performance for gaming, etc., but the scenario I imagine using USB-C for is when I am at work with a laptop and just need to top it off without bothering to lug around a 200-watt charging brick! This is a great feature that honestly takes this laptop above and beyond competitors who do not offer this feature in terms of flexibility and versatility!
The ONLY thing on this laptop I can find some fault with is the trackpad. It is gigantic, which is super handy for navigating a large screen like this, but I have encountered some palm rejection issues while typing. Additionally, despite my griping and complaining on every platform I can manage, the trackpad is STILL not being offered with a haptic trackpad option. With companies out there like Sensel creating incredible haptic trackpads for Windows laptops, I would just truly hope that someday one of these gaming laptop companies gets on board with adding one. I know that for most gamers, this is not a necessity, given most of us will game with a mouse. But for those wishing to use a device like this as a multi-purpose work, school, and gaming device, it would be so great to have that option! A couple of other, far more minor complaints are the following: The outside does pick up fingerprints quite a lot; I am really hoping that a company like dbrand eventually releases as high-quality skin to help mitigate this issue. I basically find the slash lighting on the lid to be kind of silly and show-offy, so I keep it turned off most of the time.
Altogether, I will give this laptop an absolute 5 out of 5 stars. My very few complaints are so minimal compared to the veritable landslide of incredible features found on this laptop. I am so grateful to have this machine in my possession, and I would highly recommend that anyone comparing a gaming laptop in this category and price range give this one some serious consideration!
Altogether, I will give this laptop an absolute 5 out of 5 stars. My very few complaints are so minimal compared to the veritable landslide of incredible features found on this laptop. I am so grateful to have this machine in my possession, and I would highly recommend that anyone comparing a gaming laptop in this category and price range give this one some serious consideration!
I would recommend this to a friend!
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SimpliSafe delivers advanced security solutions that put you, your home, and your safety first. With optional professional monitoring powered by Fast Protect™ Technology, SimpliSafe combines innovative hardware with advanced AI and real people — for 24/7 professional monitoring that delivers fast emergency response when you need it most. The award-winning SimpliSafe system is effective, intuitive, and affordable – so that home can be safe and secure for everyone. You can protect every inch of your home. SimpliSafe has sensors for every room, window and door. HD security cameras for inside and out. Smarter ways to detect motion that alert you only when a threat is real. Hazard sensors that detect floods, and other threats to your home. Powerful sirens that can help stop intruders in their tracks. That’s the unmatched combination that separates SimpliSafe Home Security from the others. At SimpliSafe, we believe everyone deserves to feel safe at home. That's why our bundles are designed to be effective yet affordable. And with no long-term contracts or hidden fees. This 8-piece wireless security bundle provides 24/7 protection from the outside in. Starting outside, the Outdoor Security Camera Series 2 keeps watch with a 140 degree field of view, 1080p HD resolution and color night vision, and includes 2-way audio. With the included power cables, the Outdoor Camera can help prevent crime before it happens with SimpliSafe Active Guard Outdoor Protection (available with select monitoring plans). The Base Station is the brains of the system. It sends alarm signals to the monitoring center with a built-in cellular connection with a professional monitoring plan, plus a back up battery that lasts up to 24 hours and a loud, 100 dB siren. The smash-safe Keypad is soft to the touch, easy to use during the day and night, and requires no plug so it can be placed anywhere. Entry Sensors (4 total) protect your doors, windows, and cabinets and are designed to blend into the background. And the Motion Sensor is designed for human detection, not pet detection.Advanced security, whole home protection. There's no safe like SimpliSafe.
Posted by: Bren
Until I became a husband and I father, I never really took my home security into much consideration. In the last five years of my life, finding a wonderful woman to marry and now having a beautiful toddler together has made me realize just how important it is that I fortify and guard our “castle” against intruders. Particularly in this state of the world, where civil unrest is rampant and it seems like manners and common human decency have gone by the wayside, I have wanted to have better monitoring of our home for protection. Enter this system: SimpliSafe has outdone itself in creating a smart and cost-effective package that allows you to get set up with a DIY security system that has a monthly professional monitoring plan that starts at less than the cost of a Netflix subscription each month. This, to me, way outdoes the old days of SOS alarm systems paying their exorbitant installation costs and having to deal with customer service that felt like it was from the 20th century. Oh, wait, much of it is, haha! Not so with this system!
I really can appreciate what is included in this package. I think you get just the right equipment to get started for an average lower-middle-class American home with one public-facing entrance (great place for the outdoor camera to canvas) and two to four doors leading to the outside. Even some additional aids are present here, like the motion sensor camera, which is a great pick for an indoor living space where you expect movement of an intruder to occur. In our use and testing of it, our 55-pound labradoodle has not triggered the motion alarm! Way to go, SimpliSafe!
The only additional thing I wish this package had included was their doorbell camera. That way, that could have been used for the front public-facing entrance, and then the outdoor camera used elsewhere. Speaking of that outdoor camera, it can be used wirelessly or wired, but the so-called Active Guard Outdoor Protection requires a wired connection. The Active Guard Outdoor Package seems like it has some great benefits, particularly for high-crime or break-in areas where you want a live agent to be able to actively confront an intruder via the camera’s speakers and siren. However, this requires some of the higher-tier, more expensive monthly plans, and for me, I just don’t think I am going to pony up the price for that yet. It is important to know that this is available, which will be very attractive for some prospective buyers!
Altogether, I would give this system 5 out of 5 stars for just getting me the right gear in one package to pretty well blanket my home in sensors and intruder protection that certainly are worth their price for the best peace of mind I have felt in a long time!
I would recommend this to a friend!
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CRUSH THE ACTION WITH MIND-BENDING BASS. Meet your ultimate workout buddy. Crusher 540 Active is packing the power of Crusher Bass to fuel your most intense sessions. Our premium active headphone keeps you cool with breathable fabric ear cushions and makes post-workout wipe-downs effortless with its sweat- and water-resistant nano-coating. It’s Crusher for the gym — feel the bass, feel the burn.
Posted by: Bren
These headphones are, without a doubt, one of the most fun and entertainment value providing electronics I have acquired to memory in the last years! The haptic bass experience on these is beyond amazing. If you have ever been a passenger or owner of a vehicle that has true aftermarket subwoofers installed, such as dual 12’s or the like, then you have an idea of what that kind of powerful bass feels like: it is immersive and not just flowing into your ears but conducted throughout your whole body in a pseudo-emotional experience. That is what these headphones remind me of when I listen to my bass music on them! I am taken back to 2011 when I had my first car with Kicker dual 12’s in the trunk, and my friends and I would turn up Skrillex or Bass Hunter so loud that we made the rear-view mirror pop off the front windshield once. Anyway, I digress.
These headphones are made for bass; if the above paragraph did not convey that point enough. From the moment you first turn them on and plop them on your head, you feel like you are about to experience something different. The haptic slider on the left headphone allows you to control the intensity of the bass, while the other nicely tactile controls allow you to distinguish between the various buttons like power, volume/track up, etc. While this headphone set is a little plasticky in appearance and no great beauty visually compared to its competitors in the price range, the bass experience is 100% the best I have ever experienced on an over-the-ear headphone set.
I think those are the most important things I want to convey here! Know what you are buying in terms of these not necessarily being up to the build quality of competitors, but man, do they thump the bass like no one’s business!! 5 out of 5 stars for sure!
I would recommend this to a friend!
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Samsung's 37" ViewFinity S8 Monitor with 4K UHD Resolution reveals crystal-clear visual excellence with higher pixel density. More screen space and exceptional color detail enables professionals to create intricate designs, complex diagrams, and dynamic video content. With 1.07 billion colors, HDR10 provides near-limitless hues and true-to-life color representation with deeper contrast for darker darks and brighter brights. A USB-C port allows up to 90W charging and data transfer at the same time, while a built-in LAN port provides seamless Ethernet connectivity for laptops. The built-in KVM switch enables you to choose split screen, Picture-in-Picture, or Pictureby- Picture for enhanced efficiency when multitasking. The Ergonomic Design with its height-adjustable screen tilts and swivels for optimal viewing at any angle, while the Easy Setup Stand requires just the simple push of a button – no tools necessary. TÜV-certified for intelligent eye care, reduces screen flickering and protects against excessive blue light; brightness and color temperature are automatically optimized for your environment.
Posted by: Bren
For the dedicated productivity enthusiast or digital professional committed to highly efficient, multitasking work, you have found the right monitor for you! This monitor is honestly so well featured and gorgeous to behold. 37” of 4K resolution pixels just baffles me as a young millennial who remembers our first flat screen TV in 2008 being a 1080p 37” television that just boggled our minds back then. Now, my work and leisure-use monitor is the same size and many times greater the resolution!
I love the use of this monitor. I have a 2021 MacBook 14” M1 Pro that I do all of my work and productivity activities on, and thanks to the USB-C display and 90-watt power delivery charging of this monitor, I can easily hook up to the monitor with just a single click of a USB-C cable! The monitor also has the right blend of features that help keep the price from being astronomical while still providing most end-users exactly the right experience they are looking for. Allow me to elaborate.
First of all, this is no gaming monitor. It is only 60Hz refresh, which I will admit is vaguely disappointing. My MBP can go up to 120Hz refresh, so sometimes when I am running the Samsung monitor as an extended monitor to the MacBook, I find the slower refresh rate to be a little jarring, as it is evidenced in aspects like clunkier scrolling and more jarring mouse and page movements. However, I should confess that I am a first-person shooter gamer in my spare time, and I am used to screens with 165Hz refresh and higher, so I am very sensitive to frames (or their absence). The average user won’t even notice, so that is a good value here. An additional good value is that they went LED on the display type with a VA panel on this monitor. Neither of these technologies is the cutting edge available in 2025, but they are, again, perfectly adequate for average users and allow this to be a 37” 4K monitor with excellent I/O, even if it is not the most featured panel they have used.
All of this in composite has resulted in a monitor that I think is going to be just right for 95% of users. As to the color accuracy or higher refresh needs of some users, you may want to look elsewhere. Thanks for reading, and I hope this review has helped guide your purchasing decision!
I would recommend this to a friend!
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ASUS Chromebook Plus CX14 is made to enable ultrasmooth productivity with Google AI in a compact form factor. This lightweight, ultraportable device is powered by an Intel Core processor with a vivid slim-bezel NanoEdge display that fits more screen into the compact chassis for easy multitasking and immersive entertainment. It’s fast, secure, and perfect for any task.
Customer Rating
5
Highly usable, well-featured Chromebook Plus!
on May 30, 2025
Posted by: Bren
I am very happy with this Asus Chromebook Plus. It has far exceeded my expectations in several categories and even stood to downright impress me in others! I will bounce around on the things I like about this Chromebook, but the TLDR is that if you are in the market for a Chromebook in this price range, this is absolutely one that should make it to the top of the list for you!
First of all, I am just impressed by how usable and versatile Chromebooks are nowadays. The setup of this computer is as smooth as any I have experienced, and waaaayyy smoother than the still bloated and clunky setups of even high-end Windows 11-based machines. Because I have already been an avid Google Chrome user with a Gmail account and other Google-oriented devices, logging in and setting up this device felt almost as simple as logging out of my daily use desktop computer, opening up this laptop, and picking up where I left off. Because Chrome OS is the operating system here, all of my Google-related content just loaded up perfectly as soon as this device was set up and ready to go. My main activities on my home computer, including web browsing, Spotify, YouTube content consumption, and productivity on Microsoft 365 apps (Word, Excel, etc.), were as easy as pie to get into on this Chromebook. In fact, I wrote this review on Microsoft Word via the Microsoft 365 app available to download in the Chrome app store! I have to admit, as some background, that I am a diehard MacBook Pro and Air fan for my day-to-day portable computing tasks and for use at my work. But this Chromebook is absolutely giving them a run for their money in terms of general usage at a fraction of the price! Let’s talk about that performance next.
One of the reasons I picked this Chromebook is that it is equipped with what I feel should be the minimal specs for a laptop computer these days. It has 8 GB of RAM, which, on an optimized lightweight OS like Chrome, is plenty for the majority of people to have multiple apps open in the background, along with plenty of Chrome web browser tabs open without the system getting bogged down. Adding to that is the Intel Core i3 processor, which is perfect for keeping plenty of power fed to the computer programs to allow for intensive CPU tasks to be completed without stuttering or delayed load times. This chip is also cooled with a stout copper heat sink and a fan that rarely spins up during normal use. I really appreciate the fact that the fan is here if needed, but that it doesn’t have to be spinning and making noise all the time! Finally, in this era of cloud storage and web application-based school and work programs, I find that the onboard 128 GB of eMMC storage (essentially a fancy SD card) is adequate for most users’ needs in 2025. In my opinion, many computer users today who have changed with the times have moved past the era where we had 100s of GBs of music libraries and photo albums all stored on local storage. Now life has moved towards music streaming services like Spotify Premium and YouTube Premium and cloud storage like Google Drive, OneDrive, and iCloud. As a quick aside, that is one of the things I am grateful for too: I can access my OneDrive storage from the Microsoft 365 app on this computer with ease! It even offers the option in settings to add and be able to manage your files on this computer via OneDrive. That is honestly so cool that Google has made the concession with the device that some users are just more entrenched in the Microsoft 365 suite and will be better suited using those programs than Google-based ones.
There are a few things where this Chromebook is definitely punching above its weight class. First of all, the keyboard, although it is not backlit, is one of the nicest budget keyboards I have typed on in a long time. Asus killed it with how tactile yet gentle these keys are while typing, and the eggshell texturing on them makes for a great tactility while I am rapidly typing. It is also a rather subdued “thonk” sound that these keys make as opposed to a high-pitched or plasticky “click”. This keyboard would be highly welcome in a library or other quiet typing environments. The webcam of this laptop is ridiculously good for a $600 device. It is 1080p and, frankly, looks better than my older MacBook Air camera with a very smooth 30FPS frame rate and good lighting as well! The physical privacy shutter is a bonus, too. The next part of this Chromebook that is outstanding is the screen. This screen can get respectably bright, which is great while typing in a brightly lit area, even outdoors in indirect sunlight! And counter to this, it also has an easy-to-toggle eyecare/blue light elimination night time screen mode, which yellows everything out and makes it easier on your eyes as you are winding down in the evening. Plus, the fact that the whole screen can fold down flat is nice for a variety of uses. However, the lid and hinge combo of this laptop is not super optimized, and opening the lid is a two-handed deal. Not a big problem, but some people may want to know that! The speakers on this laptop will not be winning any awards or filling a whole living room with dance party music, but they are reasonably loud and of high enough quality to manage their tasks. I am only picking up two bottom-firing speakers at the front of the laptop. The track pad on this laptop is in the goldilocks zone: just the right size, the right smoothness, and is easy to click in the appropriate positions for your typical springboard style trackpad with physical click and feedback. Gestures on it work well, like three fingers brushing up to show your app and window view of the desktops.
Some additional random things I love about this laptop and OS. It has excellent standby time. What I mean by that is I can confidently close the lid at night with the device unplugged, let’s say, at 97% battery, and the next morning when I open the laptop up, it will still be at 97%! This is something that is still sloppy and annoying with Windows OS-based laptops: you will close the laptop thinking it is going to sleep, but the next day it will practically be dead in your bag! Not so with this laptop. Having Gemini and the AI engine thereof built into this Chromebook Plus is absolutely awesome. I have recently become a strong adherent of AI assistants and use them often in both my personal productivity work and in my paid work. Having a simple app I can pop open on this Chromebook and start firing away questions with it is really wonderful, especially considering how this laptop is specifically optimized around AI implementation.
One of the BEST parts of this laptop is that I feel like Asus has finally listened to my bellyaching and others as well: they are finally using USB-C charging on one of their budget laptops! Not only that, but they gave us TWO USB-C ports on this laptop capable of charging the machine! That is amazing! This uses an included 45-watt USB-C charger that is compact and easy to transport, but it is so wonderful that it is not proprietary now, and that any appropriately powered USB-C charging method will work to top this excellent little ChromeBook off! This Chromebook is also equipped with a great range of additional I/O: HDMI 1.4, USB-A 3.2 with 5 Gbps connection speed, 3.5mm headphone jack, and a Kensington security lock on the right side! This laptop is ready to go “dongle-free” into your school and workbag unlike so many other ultrabooks and laptops these days!
Altogether, if you are in the market specifically for a Chromebook or just want to get into a highly featured and usable laptop computer in this price range and don’t have a specific need for a Windows or Apple-based computer, I think that you have found the right one in this Asus CX14 Chromebook Plus!
I would recommend this to a friend!
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With 16 buttons, an adjustable 12-button Key Slider, the astonishingly accurate MARKSMAN S 33K sensor, and low-latency SLIPSTREAM WIRELESS, the CORSAIR SCIMITAR ELITE WIRELESS SE MMO Gaming Mouse is legendary MMO gaming gear. Embrace wireless freedom and enjoy up to 150 hours* of gaming on a single charge. Control the situation during intense raids and boss fights with 16 customizable buttons and the patented adjustable Key Slider which puts 12 buttons in comfortable reach of your thumb. Also control your stream like never before with native Elgato Stream Deck integration giving you quick access to your most important functions.
Customer Rating
5
Excellent choice for Corsair fan MMO players!
on May 28, 2025
Posted by: Bren
I was very excited to review this mouse when it caught my interest. I have always been interested in trying an MMO-style mouse with the number pad on the side, but I was always dismayed when I would try them to find that my annoyingly stubby thumb really wasn’t a good fit on the majority of those I have tried. Enter the Corsair Scimitar Elite. This mouse has one of the single coolest features I have gotten to try on a mouse: you can loosen a screw on the bottom with an included high quality hex screwdriver and adjust the number pad back and forth on the side of the mouth to the EXACT place you want it! This feature alone, I think, is going to win the game for Corsair with MMO players. I myself am not a hardcore MMO player, but friends of mine who are some of the most exacting and finicky gamers I know in terms of every accessory in their gaming arsenal needing to be precisely on point to meet the demands of their competitive gaming. The adjustability present here is going to give those folks the kind of dialing in they will want to make this mouse fit into their ergonomics just right.
As for the rest of the build of the mouse, I like it reasonably well, but there could be improvements. I find that the overall feel of the mouse is to slick for my liking. This can be ameliorated with some skateboard tape or other grip tape available for mice online, but I would have liked some more texturing or stippling on some of the gripping surfaces of the mouse. This mouse is a brand-new release mouse as of the writing of this review in late May 2025, but I could not for the life of me get it to connect to the iCue software. No problem really since it is adjustable for DPI setting with the top middle button out of the box, and since the number pad comes already set to corresponding numbered buttons, so you are able to assign weapon slots and actions as usual on your game to corresponding number keys. But I will look forward to more customization as soon as the updates come out.
Overall, this mouse gets 5 out of 5 stars for the innovation and cleverness of design in consideration of the demographic of gamers Corsair is targeting with it. Corsair peripherals have been reliable in my experience in general, and I found that this mouse is a beautiful pairing with my Corsair low-profile keyboard. I highly recommend you give this mouse a try and get it customized to your needs!
I would recommend this to a friend!
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In competitive gaming, every frame matters. Introducing Acer's XV240Y gaming monitor - the Full HD (1920 x 1080) resolution monitor that can keep up with your game play. Through AMD FreeSync Premium Technology, the game’s frame rate is determined by your graphics card, not the fixed refresh rate of the monitor, giving you a serious competitive edge. Plus, users can enjoy comfortable viewing experience while gaming via flicker-less, low dimming and ComfyView display. The design saves space on your desk and lets you place multiple monitors side by side to build a seamless big-screen display
Customer Rating
5
Gorgeous and affordable gaming monitor!
on May 9, 2025
Posted by: Bren
I am super happy with this monitor. It checks all the boxes I cared about and is really the perfect blend of features for a 24” monitor at such a great price! The 200hz refresh is so amazing. My 4070 super is able to pump out so many silky-smooth frames to this monitor at maxed out settings on 1080p resolution. This is great for esport games like CSGO and I have really enjoyed it with Overwatch 2 as well. I also have found that for an IPS panel like this, the black and gray shades are truly well defined and disparate in games like Hunt: Showdown 1896 where you really want to be able to make out different shapes and enemies in the darkness of night maps. I have also enjoyed connecting this monitor to my MacBook Air and MacBook Pro I respectively use for work and personal productivity. It behaves well with the Apple devices and I have had zero connectivity issues via HDMI to HDMI, HDMI to USB-C cable, or display port to display port on my gaming PC. Overall, from such a highly renowned and consistently quality producing monitor maker like Acer, this is a great buy. Don’t miss out, especially when this is going on sale!!
I would recommend this to a friend!
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Upgrade your home network with the Deco BE68 (3-Pack) Whole-Home Mesh System, powered by cutting-edge Wi-Fi 7 technology for ultra-fast, reliable connectivity. With speeds up to 14 Gbps and coverage up to 8,100 sq. ft., this tri-band system ensures seamless performance in every corner of your home. Advanced features like Multi-Link Operation, 4K-QAM, and a powerful 6 GHz band let you connect up to 200 devices with unmatched speed and stability—perfect for streaming, gaming, and working from home. Equipped with a 10G WAN/LAN port, a 2.5G port, and a USB 3.0 port, the Deco BE68 delivers lightning-fast downloads, uploads, and data transfers. Setup is quick and easy with the Deco app, while TP-Link HomeShield provides enterprise-grade security to keep your network safe. Upgrade today and enjoy seamless, high-speed Wi-Fi without limits.
Customer Rating
5
A Wifi Set Up worthy of the Price
on May 4, 2025
Posted by: Bren
This TP-Link deco Wi-Fi Mesh system is truly, for all the testing I can do, one of the best options on the market right now for covering a large single family home, duplex, or small office building in a blanket of versatile, truly high speed Wi-Fi connectivity that is up to snuff for use in 2025 and likely many years beyond! The latest connectivity protocols and antennas are all here. Wi-Fi 7 is ready to go, full 2.4 Ghz, 5 Ghz, AND 6 Ghz connections! The 6.0 GHz band alone is something that makes this mesh wifi setup so worthy. For those of you not in the know, 6 Ghz has many benefits. Among the best are the faster speeds available (with the appropriate internet provider plan) for activities like 4K and 8K video streaming, online gaming, and more. Because 6 GHz is a newer connection protocol, there is likely to be way less congestion than on the 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz bands, given the scarcity of devices that currently can connect. There is also way less latency on 6 Ghz bands than even 5 Ghz, so it looks like a really bright future for your gaming and streaming needs when you have this Wi-Fi Router set up!
As for the setup and the physical Deco hubs, they are amazing. Each is capable of offering wired ethernet connection, local USB-A input for shared storage access across the network, and the three of them total can cover up to 8000 square feet of space! This setup is positively overkill for most single-family homes as it goes for coverage but is honestly what we were looking for in terms of future-proofing our internet and not having to worry about upgrading again for many years. Internet connection is one of those items on my list that should be something I don’t even have to think about in day-to-day life. Just able to connect my electronics and smart devices and go. With these set up, I have confidence I will enjoy this convenience for many years to come!
I would recommend this to a friend!
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Only at Best BuyPlay your way to the top with this HP OMEN notebook. The Intel Core i7 processor provides lightning-fast response times, and the 1TB hard drive is enough for all your favorite games and apps with room to spare for music and video files. This HP OMEN notebook has a full-size backlit keyboard for fast, easy typing.
What is the RPM of the 1 terabyte hard drive?
7200rpm, much better than the 5400rpm hard drive found in my $1600.00 MSI Stealth Pro :(
8 years, 6 months ago
by
Bren