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Nintendo just dropped details on its various Black Friday promotions, all of which go live on November 24 and end on November 30. These include fairly steep discounts on first-party Switch titles, which rarely happens. The deals will be available at retailers like Best Buy, GameSpot, Target and Walmart, though it doesn't look like the Nintendo eShop will host these sales.
Perhaps the jewel in Black Friday's crown is a $20 discount on The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom. The game is normally $70, so this drops the price down to $50. The game is an absolute blast and builds on all of the good stuff originally introduced in Breath of the Wild. This time, however, new abilities allow for even more unique solutions to puzzles.
The sale also applies to the long-gestating Pikmin 4 and the sublimely creative Super Mario Maker 2. Both will be available for $40. Animal Crossing: New Horizons,
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This Denver suburb has fiber and cable internet for every budget. Here are the best options based on your needs.
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Amazon just unveiled a new line of Fire TVs, just ahead of Thanksgiving and, more importantly, Black Friday. The Fire TV Omni Mini-LED series is being advertised as "the most powerful and innovative Amazon-built TV yet." Let's take a look at some specs.
These TVs all include QLED Mini-LED panels that deliver up to 1,400 nits of peak brightness and up to 1,344 dimming zones. They offer support for Dolby Vision IQ and HDR10 Adaptive, which should result in "more vibrant colors, deeper blacks, and richer contrast."
Amazon says these sets include AI-assisted Intelligent Picture technology, which automatically enhances image quality to optimize scenes "in real-time." The TV's light and color sensor take the living space into account, making the appropriate brightness and color temperature settings as needed.
Amazon
They also allow access to Amazon's Fire TV Ambient Experience, which turns the TVs into a display for art. It's sort of like the well-regarded Samsung Frame series only, well, without the whole frame part. This software doesn't just display static pieces of art, as it can also handle custom animations and various widgets.
This is the
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The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has started the process of placing Google under federal supervision, an action which could create new standards for how the federal government can oversee big tech if the effort is successful. Falling under the CFPB's supervision would subject Google to regular inspections and scrutiny, although the exact aims of the department's efforts have not been fully disclosed. However, it has been an ongoing project for some time, as sources told The Washington Post that Google has been fighting against this move by the CFPB for months.
This department was created in 2008 in response to the financial crisis that year, and its objective is to protect consumers from unfair or deceptive financial practices. The CFPB primarily focuses on businesses such as banks and credit unions, but Director Rahit Chopra has voiced an interest over recent years in subjecting tech companies that offer financial products to similar oversight. For instance, the bureau began an investigation into app store payments systems from Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Google, PayPal and Square back in 2021.
The preliminary moves by the CFPB to oversee Google, and the agency's entire scope of operation, will likely be impacted by Donald Trump's return to the presidency in early 2025.
This article originally
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The executive arm of the European Union isn't shying away from slapping major tech companies with hefty fines. The European Commission has fined Meta €797.12 million ($842 million) for violating antitrust regulations.
The EC says that by tying Facebook Marketplace to Facebook and "imposing unfair trading conditions on other online classified ads service providers," Meta "abused its dominant positions" in the social networking space. Regulators determined that all Facebook users are "regularly exposed" to Marketplace, even if they don't want to be. To that end, the link between the two services gives Meta "a substantial distribution advantage which competitors cannot match."
In addition, the EC found that third-party classified ads services that advertised on the likes of Facebook and Instagram were subject to unfair trading conditions. "This allows Meta to use ads-related data generated by other advertisers for the sole benefit of Facebook Marketplace," regulators contended.
The fine was determined based on the duration and extent of the infringement, as well as Meta's revenue. The Commission also told Meta to end the practice and avoid repeating such conduct or trying something similar.
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The rapid spread of false claims about election fraud has experts worried. While not being promoted by politicians or the media, as similar claims were in 2020, the conspiracy theories are still gaining traction.
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This Asus laptop features an Intel Core i7-13620H processor and 16GB of DDR5 RAM, so you're going to be able to run pretty much any app or game and multitask like a pro. If you feel the 16GB isn't enough, you can swap out the two RAM sticks and upgrade to 32GB later.
But the best part is that this laptop features a Nvidia GeForce RTX 4070 GPU, which is fantastic at this price. It's rare for an RTX 4070 laptop to drop below a grand, so consider this akin to a miracle. With it, you can push graphics settings to the max without batting an eyelash, and those games will look great on the 1080p IPS display with 144Hz of refresh.
There's a 1TB SSD on board this laptop, too, so that's plenty of room for any kind of content you intend to keep on there. From games to photos to documents to videos, you're good to go.
If you've been waiting to snag a top-tier gaming laptop for the price of a mid-range option, your day has come. Grab this Asus TUF 15 right now at Best Buy (was $1,400, now $1,000) while you can!
Save $400 on this top-tier RTX 4070 gaming laptop
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Apple on Wednesday released Final Cut Pro 11 for the Mac, with key new features including AI-generated captions, spatial video editing, and a Magnetic Mask tool for isolating people and objects in videos. The update also includes some smaller new features, changes, and bug fixes, as outlined in the full release notes on Apple's website.
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Anker makes a lot of our favorite charging gear, not only because their products tend to perform quite well, but also because there are options for all kinds of budgets. Black Friday tech deals can present good opportunities to get some of Anker's more expensive gear for less, and we're already starting to see solid Black Friday Anker deals. For example, the 200W Prime Power Bank is 41 percent off right now and down to $110 — and this includes the power brick and its dedicated charging base.
Anker's 200W portable charger is our choice for best premium power bank thanks to features like charging an iPhone in an average of one hour and 48 minutes. One of the best parts of the power bank is its sleek screen, which shows the power coming in or out and how much battery the accessory is holding. This feature is much more exact than the four dots on my cheaper (but still loved)
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It's worth noting that Black Friday 2024 may be the last chance to buy a discounted dock for a while. In 2025, America's new president has promised tariffs that could reach 60 percent on Chinese goods, and a number of smaller dock manufacturers are headquartered in China. (Larger ones, however, have moved outside the country.)
I'm compiling the best early Black Friday deals on Thunderbolt docks at major retailers like Amazon, Best Buy, and elsewhere. I've listed each Thunderbolt dock deal below, followed by an explanation of why I picked them. (For more details, scroll down to the FAQ at the end that explains what to look for in a Thunderbolt dock and how much you should pay.)
Best early Black Friday Thunderbolt dock deals
HP Thunderbolt Dock G2, Thunderbolt 3, 100W charging, now $70.52 (26% off at Amazon)
Targus USB-C Docking Station, DisplayLink, 65W charging, now $103.99 (58% off at Amazon)
OWC Thunderbolt Go Dock, Thunderbolt 4, 90W charging, now $249.99 (17% off at Amazon with Prime)
Belkin Thunderbolt 3 Dock Plus, Thunderbolt 3, 60W charging, now $109.97 (63% off at Amazon)
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If you live in a large home or are simply done dealing with shoddy Wi-Fi, a mesh router might be the solution. Black Friday tech deals have come in handy in this space already, with one of our top picks falling to a record-low price. Google's Nest Wi-Fi Pro 6E in a three-pack is down to $279 right now, a steep sale from its original $400 price tag.
This is our pick for the best mesh Wi-Fi system for folks who are using the tech for the first time. There isn't a great deal of customization here and there are more powerful options out there. But the Nest mesh system is easy to set up and then just let it do its thing.
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If you still prefer Windows laptops, you'll want to check out PCWorld's roundup of the best laptops available today.
Why you should trust us: PCWorld has been going strong since 1983, back in the days when print magazines were more common. Now that we've made the leap to digital, we've been reviewing more than 70 laptops every year. Every laptop that passes through our doors goes through an arduous testing process, in which we evaluate everything from processor performance to display quality. We're committed to reviewing laptops in every price range too.
Quick links to select top picks:
Best overall Chromebook: Lenovo Flex 5i
Best budget Chromebook: Lenovo IdeaPad Slim 3 Chromebook
Best Chromebook for gaming:
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Black Friday is set to soak the world in glorious deals, but why wait until later in the month? Some of these deals are already live. For instance, the M2 MacBook Air is available via Amazon for just $749. The regular price is $1,000, so this is a discount of 25 percent. It even boasts 16GB of RAM.
This model easily made our list of the best MacBooks, even with the presence of the newer M3 MacBook Air. Here are the takeaways. This laptop, obviously, includes Apple's proprietary M2 8-core CPU, which is more than fast enough for basic tasks and fine for even many advanced tasks, like music-making. We called it "Apple's near-perfect Mac" in our official review.
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Today we're tracking all-time low prices on both the 9th and 10th generation iPad, both of which are available on Amazon.
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With its biggest update to Final Cut Pro (FCP) in years, Apple may be re-embracing the professional video creator crowd it has neglected since the launch of FCP X in 2011. The company finally unveiled its successor, Final Cut Pro 11 (FCP 11), an update that leans heavily on AI tools. At the same time, it introduced spatial video editing to produce content for the Vision Pro headset.
The key AI feature is Magnetic Mask, which lets you cut out people and other moving subjects, then stylize them or put them in another location altogether. "This powerful and precise automatic analysis provides additional flexibility to custo
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Google Maps has been given a fairly substantial update in time for the holidays, with the introduction of an in-app product search function to help users find specific items at nearby stores. The new feature allows shoppers to search for electronics, home goods, grocery items, and last-minute gifts directly within the Maps interface.
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Physical Intelligence has assembled an all-star team and raised $400 million on the promise of a stunning breakthrough in how robots learn.
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