Over the past couple of weeks, users on the r/alexa subreddit have reported getting automatically upgraded to Alexa Plus as a perk for their Prime memberships. The update doesn’t appear to be opt-in, but there’s an option to roll it back.

Screenshots of a message from Amazon sent to users state that, “After your device updates, you can still revert to the original Alexa by saying, ‘Alexa, exit Alexa+.’”

Alexa Plus is an LLM-powered overhaul of Alexa that’s intended to help Amazon’s voice assistant compete with rivals like Google Gemini. Not everyone is eager to use the latest version of Amazon’s AI, though, and the rollout of the Gemini update for Google Home has had its own issues, like misidentifying objects and hallucinating camera activity.

Some users on Reddit have responded to Amazon’s update with a variety of reasons for wanting to stick with the original Alexa, including disliking Alexa’s new voice and attitude and experiencing longer wait times for Alexa Plus to respond to queries. Users also report an influx of ads for Alexa Plus, including one user who said that after they turned off the updated Alexa, they got “flooded with ads” until they turned it back on.

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CES 2026 took place in Las Vegas last week, and as usual, we’re looking at the most interesting monitors from the show. Not every display is a monitor in the strictest sense, but they all provide a display for computers and have a unique twist that make them worth exploring.

Dell’s massive UltraSharp

Dell’s biggest UltraSharp has a 21:9 aspect ratio.

Credit: Dell

It was a pretty safe bet that Dell would announce new UltraSharp monitors at CES. The displays are a solid recommendation for reliable USB-C monitors, including for Mac users and people needing something polished for professional or creative work. In recent years, UltraSharp monitors have also boasted more modern features, including integrated web cameras and IPS Black tech.

This year, the strategy was clear: Bigger is better.

At 51.5 inches, the UltraSharp U5226KW that Dell announced at CES is the biggest UltraSharp monitor yet. It has a resolution of 6144×2560, for a pixel density of 129 pixels per inch. The IPS Black monitor also has a bevy of ports via a Thunderbolt 4 hub that supports up to 140 W power delivery. There’s a separate pop-out box with 27 W USB-C and 10 W USB-A ports, and the monitor can connect to up to four PCs simultaneously via an integrated KVM. There’s a bounty of connectivity options across this massive display.

The U5226KW lacks any other noteworthy innovations beyond its size, but Dell is still hoping to impress professionals who frequently use numerous apps simultaneously, and especially those currently using multi-monitor setups.

Dell’s giant UltraSharp launched last week for $2,900 with a stand or $2,800 without a stand.

Lenovo’s tall AIO

All-in-ones (AIOs) are often overlooked, but Lenovo arrived at CES with a unique take on the computer-monitor combo.

The Lenovo ThinkCentre X AIO Aura Edition differs from other AIOs, including Apple’s 24-inch iMac, in its square-like panel. Its 16:18 aspect ratio means it’s not a true square, but the display is still much taller than other AIOs and most regular computer monitors, which are both usually 16:9.

The Aura Edition’s specs include a 27.6-inch IPS panel with 2560×2880 resolution, up to an Intel Core Ultra X7 Series 3 processor, up to 64GB of LPDDR5x RAM, and two M.2 SSD storage slots.

Lenovo expects the PC to appeal to “creators, programmers, and data professionals who benefit from seeing two A4 pages or full data sets in an easy-to-view portrait display,” the company said in a press release.

Additionally, Lenovo will preload the system with business-friendly features, like Lenovo DeskView, which can “digitize documents placed in front of the screen for instant sharing.” And in case there’s any debate over whether the ThinkCentre X AIO is truly a monitor, Lenovo says the device will launch with Lenovo Share Zone, which lets the screen support both the AIO and a second, connected system simultaneously.

A marketing image for Lenovo’s tall AIO.

Credit: Lenovo

Noteworthy AIO releases are infrequent these days (Lenovo also announced a 32-inch 4K-resolution Yoga AIO I Aura Edition aimed at consumers who want their monitor’s base to light up in different colors depending on what’s on the screen. That machine is expected to release in Q2 for $2,400). Laptops, smartphones, and improvements in monitor technology and affordability have largely supplanted some of AIOs’ primary benefits, like saving space and providing an ample screen.

 

But with many companies pushing employees back into offices full-time or part-time, there’s an incentive to explore alternative ways to equip offices, from AIOs to big-screen tablets, and even keyboard-PCs. AIOs are easy for IT teams to set up and use minimal space. Simultaneously, Lenovo is offering an option for the growing number of people who prefer taller screens, perhaps due to the nature of their work or the increasing presence of taller displays in consumer laptops.

 

Lenovo didn’t announce a price or release date for its tall AIO.

RGB-stripe OLED monitors

A return to classic OLED subpixel layouts from panel-makers LG Display and Samsung Display is a promising sign for the versatility and legibility of future OLED monitors.

 

Most OLED computer monitors use either a WOLED panel from LG Display or a QD-OLED panel from Samsung Display. WOLED panels feature a red, white, blue, and green (RWBG) subpixel layout or, for newer monitors, an RGWB subpixel layout. QD-OLED monitors have a triangular RGB layout.

 

Both subpixel layouts have issues with text legibility on Windows. That’s because ClearType, Windows’ subpixel font-rendering software, is built for LCDs with an RGB-stripe subpixel layout. The result for OLED monitors is “fringing,” which, to astute eyes, appears as a colorful border around text. Fringing is especially common on OLED monitors with less than 4K resolution and is often more associated with QD-OLED than WOLED.

 

A diagram of the subpixel structures of WOLED (left), QD-OLED (center), and LG Display’s RGB-stripe OLED (right) panels.

Credit: LG Display

As is common in emerging, expensive computing peripherals, OLED monitors first targeted gamers, making fringing less of a concern. WOLED and QD-OLED panels were also favored by panel suppliers because they were easier to manufacture in large sizes for TVs.

 

And after Japanese panel maker JOLED went bankrupt (it has since been acquired), we stopped seeing new RGB-stripe OLED monitors, which should be more suitable for reading, working, and other non-gaming applications.

 

But this year, LG Display is making OLED panels with RGB-stripe subpixels. As the company announced in December, “the RGB stripe structure arranges the three primary color subpixels—red, green, and blue—in a straight line, significantly reducing visual distortions such as color bleeding and fringing, even at close viewing distances. Although OLED panels using the RGB stripe method existed before, their maximum refresh rate reached around 60 Hz, making them unsuitable for use as gaming monitors.”

 

To enable an RGB-stripe subpixel and high refresh rates, LG Display said it increased “the proportion of the pixel area that emits light.”

 

Similarly, Samsung Display announced at CES that this year, Asus and MSI will release monitors with Samsung’s new QD-OLED panels, which use a vertical RGB subpixel structure the company has named “V-stripe.”

A depiction of text on a QD-OLED monitor with RGB subpixels in a triangular shape (left) and on QD-OLED monitor RGB subpixels in a vertical stripe (right).

Credit: MSI

“The biggest technical challenges in mass-producing high refresh rate panels with a new pixel structure include reduced organic material lifespan, heat generation, and brightness degradation,” Samsung Display’s announcement said. “By leveraging QD-OLED’s top emission structure, which offers brightness advantages, along with improvements in organic material efficiency and design optimization, we were able to mass-produce a high-performance monitor.”

 

Some publications that demoed RGB-stripe OLED monitors at CES reported text looking noticeably better than on other OLED monitors.

 

LG and Gigabyte also announced that they will release OLED monitors with RGB-stripe subpixels this year.

Samsung’s 6K, 3D monitor

The IPS monitor has two ports: HDMI 2.1 and DisplayPort 2.1.

Credit: Monitors Unboxed/YouTube

In true CES fashion, Samsung’s latest Odyssey 3D monitor one-ups its predecessor in every way it can.

 

Samsung launched its first Odyssey 3D monitor last year. We found that while the glasses-free 3D experience was impressive, the monitor was hard to recommend given its limited game support.

 

Back then, Samsung’s Odyssey 3D Hub app, which is used to launch stereoscopic content, had 14 games. As of this writing, there are 29 3D-supporting titles (you can see a full list at the Microsoft Store), but that still may not be enough to warrant a purchase price of what we expect will be over $2,000, based on the preceding Odyssey 3D’s release price.

 

The lack of applications for a glasses-free 3D gaming monitor didn’t stop Samsung from releasing a larger option, though. The Odyssey 3D that came out in 2025 has a 27-inch 4K IPS screen with a 165 Hz refresh rate. The 2026 model is 32 inches and supports 6K resolution (6144×3456) at a refresh rate of 165 Hz. The monitor is also supposed to easily drop down to 3K resolution (3072×1728), at which point it will run at 330 Hz. So although you don’t need glasses to get the most out of this monitor, you will need a decently powerful GPU.

 

In addition to glasses-free 3D gaming, Samsung’s 3D monitors can make 2D videos appear to be in 3D. In our testing of the 27-inch Odyssey 3D, this worked well enough on YouTube videos, albeit with a bit of a cardboard-cutout effect.

 

Most gamers or people seeking 6K resolution won’t opt for a 3D monitor. But Samsung’s investment in improving 3D displays alongside (slowly) growing game support should be welcome for people who have been waiting 15 years for glasses-free 3D to really take off.

Nvidia G-Sync Pulsar monitors

Asus’ ROG Strix Pulsar XG27AQNGV monitor came out last week.

Credit: Asus

G-Sync Pulsar is a backlight strobing technique designed to reduce perceived blur when viewing fast-moving content on supported monitors.

 

The backlight on a Pulsar monitor pulses for one-fourth of a frame right before pixels are overwritten. This enables pixels to be the proper color before they’re lit up so you don’t see pixels fading from one hue to another. The approach differs from that of most monitors, which use always-on backlights, and is reminiscent of plasma TVs, which didn’t have backlights but lit up pixels in quick pulses, helping to reduce motion blur. Pulsar also differs from other forms of backlight strobing, such as Nvidia’s Ultra Low Motion Blur, in that it works with variable refresh rates.

 

Speed-hungry gamers have been awaiting Pulsar monitors since Nvidia announced the technology at CES 2024. As of this writing, three Pulsar monitors are available to purchase: Acer’s Predator XB273U F5, Asus’ ROG Strix Pulsar XG27AQNGV, and MSI’s MPG 272QRF X36. 

 

For more, check out our previous coverage on Nvidia’s new G-Sync Pulsar monitors.

Odinn’s Omnia display

Two-year-old California startup Odinn reportedly held limited demos at CES last week of Odinn’s Omnia X,  a provocative approach to the idea of a “portable data center.”

 

The term “data center” is a stretch, though, as Omnia X is far from matching the computing capabilities of even a modest data center. The PC can support up to two AMD EPYC 9965 CPUs, four Nvidia H200 NVL GPUs, and 6TB of DDR5 memory.

 

That’s an impressive amount of power to fit in a chassis that Odinn claims is the size of carry-on luggage. The system also has a flip-down keyboard and a pair of handles, which are essential since Omnia X weighs 77 pounds. That’s more than what you’d expect from a"portable” gadget, but Omnia X’s form factor is more about simplifying “data center” access for businesses and employees with demanding and sensitive computing needs who work in various locations.

 

In an interview with Las Vegas Sun, Oddin CEO Carl Liebel compared Omnix X to about half of a data center rack and said it could replace a company’s need to rent space in a data center.

 

The Omnia X makes this list due to its (optional) integrated, 23.8-inch 4K display that flips out from the system’s side. With the display and max specifications, the Omnia X could be the most well-equipped portable computing solution we’ve seen.

 

OMNIA by ODINN

 

Odinn says that Omnia X uses a redundant power supply unit (PSU) with a high Platinum rating for efficiency. In a PSU, efficiency means less internal heat and lower energy consumption—key areas of concern in a system like Omnia’s. Interesting Engineering reported that Omnia X uses a proprietary closed-loop cooling system.

 

Odinn’s website targets Omnia X at heavy-lift projects, like “military AI missions,” “enterprise-grade simulations,” and portable data centers.

 

“Run large models without ever connecting to the cloud. Omnia AI was built for mission-critical inference at the edge, from battlefield computer vision to real-time autonomous navigation,” Omnia’s website reads. “With dual GPUs, massive RAM, and hardware-level isolation, it delivers the kind of raw AI horsepower previously reserved for large-scale data centers, right where your team needs it most.”

 

Odinn is also pitching the computer to cinematographers, 3D artists, and VFX editors who work on location. Analysts, investigators, and cyber operators could also benefit by using the system for “mapping threat surfaces, performing forensic investigations, or searching across massive, disconnected data sets,” the California startup claims.

 

Omnia X will cost at least $550,000 Liebel told Las Vegas Sun. You can see pictures of it at the show here and here.

1,000 Hz monitors

Every year at CES, a new panel claims to be the fastest monitor that has ever existed. Sure, most people don’t need a monitor that can refresh 1,000 times per second. But extremely high refresh rates do offer visual benefits, including less blur and fast objects looking sharper. It’s also just cool to see how far professional-grade gaming monitors can go.

 

One of the fastest monitors at CES 2026 is Acer’s 1,000 Hz Predator XB273U F6. Last month, Philips and AOC announced upcoming monitors that could run 720p at 1,000 Hz, too. But Acer appears to be the closest to actually releasing such a monitor. The OEM gave demos of its 1,000 Hz, 27-inch display at last week’s trade show. Unlike the other monitors, Acer’s speedy screen has a launch timeframe: Q2 2026. (Samsung also announced a 1,040 Hz monitor at the show, but the additional 40 Hz seems negligible at this point, and Samsung hasn’t provided details about how it purportedly reached that speed. Further, there seemed to be minimal demos of Samsung’s 27-inch Odyssey G6 G60H at CES 2026.)

 

While 1,000 Hz monitors target gamers playing games at the highest levels, they are also built to support a 2560×1440 resolution at a slower—but still amazingly fast—500 Hz.

 

You can take a look at the Predator XB273U F6 in this video from CNET or the video from Monitor Unboxed below.

 

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Posted Tuesday 13 January 2026 at 3:56 am AEST (my time).

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AMD launched its FSR "Redstone" update in December 2025 as part of the AMD Adrenalin 25.12.1 driver package, bringing to a close months of speculation after the upgraded upscaling tech was first revealed at Computex 2025.

As expected, AMD's ML-powered FSR Redstone update launched with availability only for its latest Radeon RX 9000 graphics cards using the RDNA 4 architecture. PC gamers using AMD's older RDNA 3 GPUs were largely left out in the cold, watching as adopters of the newer hardware got to test out new FSR Upscaling, Frame Generation, Ray Regeneration, and Radiance Caching techniques.

Why didn't AMD launch Redstone on its older hardware? It all comes down to performance. The new ML-powered techniques are designed specifically for RDNA 4's newfound AI performance, just like NVIDIA's latest AI-powered DLSS 4.5 improvements are largely reserved for its latest RTX 5000 Blackwell GPUs.

In a recent interview at CES 2026 with PC World, AMD's Senior VP of GPU Technologies and Engineering, Andrej Zdravkovic, reiterated that the full set of Redstone features will remain closely linked to RDNA 4.

Zdravkovic explains that the latest Redstone features simply don't perform as they should on older AMD GPUs. Subext? It's not a case of barring older hardware to drive sales of the latest Radeon RX 9000 cards.

Zdravkovic adds that while some of the Redstone features are useful and can actually be performed on some of AMD's older cards, internal testing reveals that "the net result is not going to improve the experience."

When pressed about PC enthusiasts forcing the latest FSR updates onto unsupported GPUs, Zdravkovic has a very reasonable response.

Generative AI has caused a paradigm shift in the tech industry, with every major tech corporation, including Microsoft, Google, and Amazon, quickly hopping on the bandwagon with multi-billion-dollar investments.

Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates has been critical of the technology. Last year, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella revealed that the philanthropic billionaire was against his $1 billion investment in OpenAI in 2019. "You're going to burn this billion dollars," Gates warned.

The Microsoft co-founder indicated that the world is in the midst of an AI bubble while likening it to the dot-com era, fueled by investor enthusiasm and overvalued companies. "There are a ton of these investments that will be dead ends," Gates added.

More recently, the executive indicated that AI could be used as a bioterrorism weapon against the world if it landed in the wrong hands. In his annual letter titled "Optimism with footnotes," Gates indicated that “of all the things humans have ever created, AI will change society the most.”

While the technology shows great promise and advances across computing, education, medicine, and more, it also poses a significant threat to humanity. Last year, Google DeepMind's CEO, Demis Hassabis, indicated AGI (artificial general intelligence) is coming but warned that society isn't ready, further revealing that the prospects keep him up at night.

Quick links:

1. Windows 10 and 11
2. Windows Insider Program
3. Updates are available
4. Reviews are in
5. Gaming news

Windows 11 and Windows 10

Here, we talk about everything happening around Microsoft's latest operating system in the Stable channel and preview builds: new features, removed features, controversies, bugs, interesting findings, and more. And, of course, you may find a word or two about older versions.

At CES 2026, ASUS confirmed that Windows 11 version 26H1 is coming in the first quarter of 2026 on devices equipped with Qualcomm's Snapdragon X2 processors. All the other existing computers will get new features and platform updates in the second half of the year, once Microsoft releases Windows 11 version 26H2.

Bloatware in Windows 11 is a major problem these days, and with Microsoft not willing to listen to feedback from its customers, third-party devs and enthusiasts offer their solutions to the problem. FlyOOBE, a popular tool for debloating Windows 11, has been updated this week with a new tool for detecting and removing AI components. If you are sick of unsolicited AI everywhere, try it out.

Later, the maker of FlyOOBE released a new tool called Winslop, which aims to give users a flexible, modular utility for debloating Windows 11 and removing AI slop.

Other useful stuff for Windows 11 this week included a new support document from Microsoft that explains how to properly remove junk files from your computer, and free up a few dozens of precious gigabytes.

Finally, Microsoft confirmed that Windows activation over the phone is now dead. However, users still have one method for offline activation.

Windows Insider Program

Here is what Microsoft released for Windows Insiders this week:

In addition to releasing a new Dev and Beta build, Microsoft issued an important message to Windows Insiders who are currently in the Dev Channel. The channel will soon move to higher builds, and the ability to switch to Beta without reinstalling Windows will close soon. If you do not want to risk using less stable Dev builds, it is time to switch.

Also, there are signs of Microsoft injecting even more AI into File Explorer. Users discovered that recent Windows 11 preview builds have a blank button on the toolbar, which will reportedly work as a Copilot button so that you can have a chat with AI right in your File Explorer window. Ugh...

Updates are available

This section covers software, firmware, and other notable updates (released and coming soon) delivering new features, security fixes, improvements, patches, and more from Microsoft and third parties.

Outlook for Windows is getting an interesting meeting feature. Microsoft is working on a new capability that will allow customers to set up and schedule meetings through the Outlook chat interface available in the side pane. Additionally, Microsoft confirmed an annoying bug plaguing users of Outlook Classic.

A useful update is coming to Word as well. Microsoft announced that users will be able to paste links more quickly by simply highlighting a word and pressing Ctrl + V. Pressing Ctrl + K or selecting the corresponding option is no longer necessary. Very nice. What is not nice is the fact that Microsoft is taking away the ability to send documents from Word to Kindle. Microsoft killed that feature, so now, you have to use other methods to send documents to your e-reader from Amazon.

Finally, Microsoft shut down fake news about its renaming Office apps to Copilot. Many users got confused by poor wording, but as it turned out, Office apps are not going anywhere with their name, at least for now.

If you use PowerToys, particularly its Peek and Light Switch modules, look out for a few more features in upcoming updates. The app may soon let you keep Peek on top of all windows, while Light Switch may get the ability to customize wallpapers for each mode.

Speaking of useful tools, Raycast for Windows received a new update, which introduced a properly modern Run dialog that lets you do much more and much better than the standard Run dialog in Windows 11 and its upcoming redesigned variant.

On the browser side, we only have two updates for Microsoft Edge. One patches a high-severity security vulnerability in Edge 133, while the other adds more Copilot nudges to Edge 134 in the Beta Channel.

Here are other updates and releases you may find interesting:

• Microsoft cancels Exchange Online configuration change because no one liked it.

• Microsoft acquires Osmos to bring autonomous AI data engineering to Fabric.

• Microsoft warns IT admins against using this unsupported Exchange Online configuration.

• Samsung patches high-risk security vulnerability in its SSD software; update yours now.

• Rumours suggest Microsoft may cut up to 22,000 jobs in early 2026.

• Microsoft reveals itself as the firm behind the controversial Michigan data center.

   

Here are the latest drivers and firmware updates released this week:

• NVIDIA 591.74 WHQL driver with DLSS 4.5 support and bug fixes.

Reviews are in

Here is the hardware and software we reviewed this week

Christopher White has a new NAS review for you. This week, he published a detailed review of the Zettlab D4 NAS, an interesting storage device that uses AI in its operating system to work with your local profile. Check out its in-depth review here.

We also have a new gamepad review, this time, the Hyperkin The Competitor. This interesting-looking mix of Xbox and PlayStation Controllers ticks all the boxes of a good, budget controller. It has Hall Effect sticks and triggers, a removable USB Type-C cable, swappable sticks, customizable rear buttons, and more. It also works with PC and Xbox, plus you get a free month of Xbox Game Pass Ultimate with it.

Finally, Steven Parker reviewed the Honor Magic8 Pro, a high-end smartphone with a fantastic display, plenty of storage, a big battery, and good cameras. There are some software quirks here and there, but overall, the device turned out to be fantastic.

On the gaming side

Learn about upcoming game releases, Xbox rumors, new hardware, software updates, freebies, deals, discounts, and more.

The first Xbox Developer Direct in 2026 is now confirmed. Microsoft announced the date of its January 2026 gaming event, where the company will show some of the upcoming games, including Forza Horizon 6, Fable, and more.

The first wave of new games for Game Pass in 2026 is here, and it packs a few big titles, including Star Wars Outlaws, Atomfall, Resident Evil Village, and more. Additionally, Microsoft announced that Xbox Cloud Gaming is coming to Hisense TVs.

NVIDIA is expanding the number of platforms where its cloud streaming service GeForce NOW is officially available. This week, the company announced that GeForce NOW is heading to Linux with an official app. In addition, a native client is coming to Amazon's Fire TVs. Additionally, there are new games that you can play if you own them on Steam, Epic Games, or Xbox.

Deals and freebies

Epic Games Store is giving away Baloons TD6, a tower defence game. If you're into games like this, you can grab it for free until next Thursday. As usual, you can find more deals in the latest Weekend PC Deals article.

Other gaming news includes the following:

• 007 First Light system requirements are here, and they are surprisingly reasonable.

• Call of Duty: Black Ops 7's massive Fallout crossover lands with Ghouls, Deathclaws, more.

• Minecraft's kittens, puppies, and other baby animals are getting a major upgrade soon.

• Avowed announced for PS5, will land alongside a massive anniversary update.

   

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ExplainingComputers (1.16m subscribers)

January 12, 2026

Video length: 13m 46s

00:00 Titles & Intro

00:43 RAM Prices Rises

06:13 Storage Price Rises

08:26 The Year Ahead

10:16 Implications

12:32 Wrap

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Paul's Hardware (1.54m subscribers)

January 12, 2026

Video length: 15m 26s

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Posted Monday 12 January 2026 at 5:06 am AEST (my time).

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•     Chinese AI firms positioned to co-develop hardware and software, industry experts say
•     Lack of advanced lithography machines a main hurdle to having a Chinese AI world leader, they say
•     Younger Chinese AI entrepreneurs have more appetite for risk

BEIJING, Jan 10 (Reuters) - China can narrow its technological gap with the U.S. driven by growing risk-taking and innovation, though the lack of advanced chipmaking tools is hobbling the sector, the country's leading artificial intelligence researchers said on Saturday.

China's so-called 'AI tiger' startups MiniMax and Zhipu AI had strong debuts on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange this week, reflecting growing confidence in the sector as Beijing fast-tracks AI and chip listings to bolster domestic alternatives to advanced U.S. technology.

Yao Shunyu, a former senior researcher at ChatGPT maker OpenAI who was named technology giant Tencent's (0700.HK) chief AI scientist in December, said there was a high likelihood of a Chinese firm becoming the world's leading AI company in the next three to five years but said the lack of advanced chipmaking machines was the main technical hurdle.

"Currently, we have a significant advantage in electricity and infrastructure. The main bottlenecks are production capacity, including lithography machines, and the software ecosystem," Yao said at an AI conference in Beijing.

China has completed a working prototype of an extreme-ultraviolet lithography machine potentially capable of producing cutting-edge semiconductor chips that rival the West's, Reuters reported last month. However, the machine has not yet produced working chips and may not do so until 2030, people with knowledge of the matter told Reuters.

MIND THE INVESTMENT GAP

Yao and other Chinese industry leaders at the Beijing conference on Saturday also acknowledged that the U.S. maintains an advantage in computing power due to its hefty investments in infrastructure.

"The U.S. computer infrastructure is likely one to two orders of magnitude larger than ours. But I see that whether it's OpenAI or other platforms, they're investing heavily in next-generation research," said Lin Junyang, technical lead for Alibaba's (9988.HK) flagship Qwen large language model.

"We, on the other hand, are relatively strapped for cash; delivery alone likely consumes the majority of our computer infrastructure," Lin said during a panel discussion at the AGI-Next Frontier Summit held by the Beijing Key Laboratory of Foundational Models at Tsinghua University.

Lin said China's limited resources have spurred its researchers to be innovative, particularly through algorithm-hardware co-design, which enables AI firms to run large models on smaller, inexpensive hardware.

Tang Jie, founder of Zhipu AI which raised HK$4.35 billion in its IPO, also highlighted the willingness of younger Chinese AI entrepreneurs to embrace high-risk ventures - a trait traditionally associated with Silicon Valley - as a positive development.

"I think if we can improve this environment, allowing more time for these risk-taking, intelligent individuals to engage in innovative endeavours ... this is something our government and the country can help improve," said Tang.

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It's that exciting time of the year for tech-heads of all kinds, as the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) once again threw open its doors and invited the public to see the latest devices in a massive range of categories. Naturally, the Windows Central team was some of the first on the floor in Las Vegas, Nevada, to meet representatives from our favorite manufacturers and see the best of what they had to offer.

There was plenty to see, and much of it (unsurprisingly) involved AI in one way or another. Nevertheless, our top picks of each category stood out with individual strengths and come with a strong sense of excitement for their release, whether current or far off in the future. 2026 looks especially exciting, with new components inside redesigned hardware, and these are our 13 favorites.

Best innovation: HP EliteBoard G1a

Yet it's been something that has pervading every product announcement, presentation, or pre-briefing I've been a part of in recent times from any company even tangentially related to tech. To the point where I now have a bullshit AI bingo card I fill out just to distract myself from the barely resistible desire to stab a pen through my own hand just to feel something real.

Every new piece of technology, whether that's a laptop, graphics card, mouse, keyboard, BBQ, whatever, is now presented as being powered by AI or comes with an AI assistant, or just has an 'AI' sticker on the box.

So thank you, Dell, for making your CES 2026 pre-briefing so blessedly free of effusive AI chat that I just had to mention it.

It started off with Dell vice chairman and COO, Jeff Clarke, taking to a small stage to talk about the state of the industry and where Dell and its Alienware sub-brand is going this year. He talks tariffs, the slow transitioning of the industry (he says CPU, but I'm presuming he meant OS and Windows 10 → 11), and then "we have this un-met promise of AI, and the expectation of AI driving end user demand," as well as the fact that "we're about ready to enter 2026 with a memory shortage that is pretty significant."

Clarke and his co-presenters then go on to introduce the return of the XPS laptop lineup, some new high-end ultraslim Alienware laptops, as well as some entry-level Alienware laptops (cheap Alienwares? Really?), new spins of its Area-51 desktops, and a handful of new monitors.

All of this is very "consumer-first" and aimed at dialling in to both expand the numbers of people using Dell/Alienware tech and the areas in which it operates. And the only mention of AI in the entire thing is Jeff's little line at the beginning. It's clear, concise, focused on the tech and, in the Q&A that followed, refreshingly honest.

"One thing you'll notice is the message we delivered around our products was not AI-first," Dell head of product, Kevin Terwilliger says with a smile. "So, a bit of a shift from a year ago where we were all about the AI PC."

It's not that Dell doesn't care about AI or AI PCs anymore, it's just that over the past year or so it's come to realise that the consumer doesn't.

"We're very focused on delivering upon the AI capabilities of a device—in fact everything that we're announcing has an NPU in it—but what we've learned over the course of this year, especially from a consumer perspective, is they're not buying based on AI," Terwilliger says bluntly. "In fact I think AI probably confuses them more than it helps them understand a specific outcome."

They're not buying based on AI. In fact I think AI probably confuses them more than it helps them.

Kevin Terwilliger, Dell head of product

In a way, you could argue that's tantamount to dumbing down the technology for the end user. But this isn't like withholding information about the core counts of the chips inside your machine, or the TGP of the mobile GPU at its heart for fear of confusing some fictitious customer. There are people who care about the hardware inside these devices, but it's becoming clear there are precious few who care about the AI components or theoretical capabilities of those machines.

The fact that a huge PC brand such as Dell/Alienware has decided to ditch the AI-first marketing that seems to otherwise permeate everything—and honestly still permeates—is entirely welcome, very refreshing, and hopefully the mark of things to come.

Because, until AI becomes a valid, useful technology for the end user of these devices, and not just some marketing check box or buzzword for investors, every company ought to take a leaf out of Dell's book and just keep schtum. And that's honestly not something I've said many times about the big PC box shifter in the past.

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Posted Saturday 10 January 2026 at 6:19 am AEST (my time).

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ZDNET's key takeaways

•      Dell executives have been disappointed by the response to AI PCs.
•     Dell's head of product said AI features are likely confusing consumers. 
•     Microsoft's CEO has become the company's "most influential product manager" to try to fix things.

Microsoft wants you to replace your old Windows 10 laptop with a new Copilot PC, one that's ready for the AI-powered "agentic OS" that Windows 11 will become. But one of the world's biggest PC makers says consumers aren't buying the Copilot hype.

At a press briefing ahead of CES 2026, two of Dell's top executives threw a bucket of ice-cold water on the idea that consumers are clamoring for AI. Vice Chairman and Chief Operating Officer Jeff Clarke, in his opening remarks, referred to the "unmet promise of AI." The company had "an expectation of AI driving end-user demand," he noted, but "it hasn't quite been what we thought it was going to be a year ago."

In the Q&A portion, the company's head of product, Kevin Terwilliger, stressed that Dell's messaging about its 2026 PC lineup is not "AI first." 

Customers aren't buying it

That's "a bit of a shift from a year ago, where we were all about the AI PC," he acknowledged. "What we've learned over the course of this year, especially from a consumer perspective, they're not buying based on AI. In fact, I think AI probably confuses them more than it helps them understand a specific outcome."

Those remarks didn't mention Windows or Copilot, but it's pretty clear that the executives are talking about Microsoft's AI products, which haven't exactly delivered obvious benefits for home users or taken much share from ChatGPT. Google's Gemini has gotten high marks, and Anthropic's Claude continues to get praise for its coding skills. And none of those competitors require a fancy new "AI PC" to work their magic. 

This development doesn't bode well for Microsoft's CEO, Satya Nadella, who saw the company miss the platform shift to mobile devices and tablets and desperately wants to avoid chalking up another failure in yet another momentous platform shift. 

The problem(s) with Copilot

A recent report from The Information painted a picture of a CEO who's not pleased with Copilot's progress. "Over the past several months, Nadella has morphed into Microsoft's most influential product manager," the report said. "He is conscious of the perception that [the consumer version of Copilot] lags behind competitors like Gemini, the people said. He recently sent notes directly to product groups working on Copilot's consumer app with feedback on bugs and shortcomings he noticed in the chatbot, according to a third person who saw the emails." 

This isn't exactly a new problem for Microsoft, which has a reputation for shipping half-baked products, then iterating slowly as the market experiments with its product. That approach might work for a startup in a new category, but it's a proven recipe for failure for a company of Microsoft's size. Customers get a chance to try your unfinished product and develop a negative impression; those negative word-of-mouth reviews spread even as the flaws in the product are fixed. The result? Microsoft's reputation takes another hit.

On top of all that, the real revenue engine for Microsoft isn't consumers -- it's business customers, where licenses are sold 100,000 at a time, and where IT controls the ecosystem and can mandate what's installed. But even there, it's easy to imagine scenarios where enterprise customers decide they really don't need to pay another $20 per user per month for a benefit that isn't there.

AI PCs are here to stay

Technically, every new PC that the leading OEMs ship this year will be an AI PC, with either a Qualcomm Snapdragon X processor or one of the new Intel Core Ultra Series 3 or AMD Ryzen AI CPUs. That's good news for customers who are trying to future-proof their purchases -- maybe in a year or two or three, the powerful neural processing units in those machines will have workloads where they can show off their stuff.

But Microsoft's many Copilots aren't ready for that role today, and until they are, the makers of Windows PCs are going to have to sell their new hardware the old-fashioned way. 

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You can’t shake a stick without hitting an AI gadget at CES this year, with artificial smarts now embedded in just about every wearable, screen, and appliance across the show floor, not to mention the armies of AI companions, toys, and robots.

But those are just the beginning. We’ve seen AI pop up in much stranger places too, from hair clippers to stick vacs, and at least one case where even the manufacturer itself seemed unsure what made its products “AI.”

Here are the gadgets we’ve seen at CES 2026 so far that really take the “intelligence” out of “artificial intelligence.”

An extremely normal hair-cutting experience.

Photo: Dominic Preston / The Verge

This is a product that would be silly enough without the AI add-on. These smart hair clippers help amateur hairdressers deliver the perfect fade by dynamically altering the closeness of the cut, helped along by an ominous face mask that looks like it belongs in an optician’s office.

But it’s taken to the next level by the real-time AI coach, which gives you feedback as you cut. Glyde told me it’s working on voice controls for the AI too, and that eventually it will be able to recommend specific hairstyles, so long as you’re willing to trust its style advice. Are you?

Gotta love a CES booth that hands out mystery pills like they’re candy.

Photo: Dominic Preston / The Verge

“Where Pills meet AI.”

That was the message emblazoned across the SleepQ booth, where company reps were handing out boxes of pills — a multivitamin with ashwagandha extract according to the box, supposedly good for sleep, though I wasn’t brave enough to test that claim on my jetlag.

Manufacturer Welt, originally spun out of a Samsung incubator, calls its product “AI-upgraded pharmacotherapy.” It’s really just using biometric data from your smartwatch or sleep tracker to tell you the optimal time to take a sleeping pill each day, with plans to eventually cover anxiety meds, weight-management drugs, pain relief, and more.

There may well be an argument that fine-tuning the time people pop their pills could make them more effective, but I feel safe in saying we don’t need to start throwing around the term “AI-enhanced drugs.”

I always wished my vacuum was more intelligent.

Photo: Antonio G. Di Benedetto / The Verge

Startup Deglace claims that its almost unnecessarily sleek-looking Fraction vacuum cleaner uses AI in two different ways: first to “optimize suction,” and then to manage repairs and replacements for the modular design.

It says its Neural Predictive AI monitors vacuum performance “to detect issues before they happen,” giving you health scores for each of the vacuum’s components, which can be conveniently replaced with a quick parts order from within the accompanying app. A cynic might worry this is all in the name of selling users expensive and proprietary replacement parts, but I can at least get behind the promise of modular upgrades — assuming Deglace is able to deliver on that promise.

You too can hang beautiful art like this in your home.

Photo: Dominic Preston / The Verge

Most digital picture frames let you display photos of loved ones, old holiday snaps, or your favorite pieces of art. Fraimic lets you display AI slop.

It’s an E Ink picture frame with a microphone and voice controls, so you can describe whatever picture you’d like, which the frame will then generate using OpenAI’s GPT Image 1.5 model. The frame itself starts at $399, which gets you 100 image generations each year, with the option to buy more if you run out.

What makes the AI in Fraimic so dubious is that it might be a pretty great product without it. The E Ink panel looks great, you can use it to show off your own pictures and photos too, and it uses so little power that it can run for years without being plugged in. We’d just love it a lot more without the added slop.

Into the ModuVerse.

Photo: Dominic Preston / The Verge

Infinix, a smaller phone manufacturer that’s had success across Asia for its affordable phones, didn’t launch any actual new products at CES this year, but it did bring five concepts that could fit into future phones. Some are clever, like various color-changing rear finishes and a couple of liquid-cooling designs. And then there’s the AI ModuVerse.

Modular phone concepts are nothing new, so the AI hook is what makes ModuVerse unique — in theory. One of the “Modus” makes sense: a meeting attachment that connects magnetically, generating AI transcripts and live translation onto a mini display on the back.

But when I asked what made everything else AI, Infinix didn’t really have any good answers. The gimbal camera has AI stabilization, the vlogging lens uses AI to detect faces, and the microphone has AI voice isolation — all technically AI-based, but not in any way that’s interesting. As for the magnetic, stackable power banks, Infinix’s reps eventually admitted they don’t really have any AI at all. Color me shocked.

This looks pretty smart, but it really is just a microwave.

Photo: Dominic Preston / The Verge

There’s a growing trend for AI and robotic cooking hardware — The Verge’s Jen Tuohy reviewed a $1,500 robot chef just last month — but Wan AIChef is something altogether less impressive: an AI-enabled microwave.

It runs on what looks suspiciously like Android, with recipe suggestions, cooking instructions, and a camera inside so you can see the progress of what you’re making. But… it’s just a microwave. So it can’t actually do any cooking for you, other than warm up your food to just the right temperature (well, just right plus or minus 3 degrees Celsius, to be accurate).

It’ll do meal plans and food tracking and calorie counting too, which all sounds great so long as you’re willing to commit to eating all of your meals out of the AI microwave. Please, I beg you, do not eat all of your meals out of the AI microwave.

Yes, that is just a Dell monitor with a Logitech webcam stuck on top.

Photo: Dominic Preston / The Verge

The tech industry absolutely loves reinventing the vending machine and branding it either robotics or AI, and AI Barmen is no different.

This setup — apparently already in use for private parties and corporate events — is really just an automatic cocktail machine with a few AI smarts slapped on top.

The AI uses the connected webcam to estimate your age — it was off by eight years in my case — and confirm you’re sober enough to get another drink. It can also create custom drinks, with mixed success: When asked for something to “fuck me up,” it came up with the Funky Tequila Fizz, aka tequila, triple sec, and soda. What, no absinthe?

Photo: Dominic Preston / The Verge

Should you buy your kid an AI toy that gives it a complete LLM-powered chatbot to speak to? Probably not. But what if that AI chatbot looked like chibi Elon Musk?

He’s just one of the many avatars offered by the Luka AI Cube, including Hayao Miyazaki, Steve from Minecraft, and Harry Potter. Kids can chat to them about their day, ask for advice, or even share the AI Cube’s camera feed to show the AI avatars where they are and what they’re up to. Luka says it’s a tool for fun, but also learning, with various educational activities and language options.

The elephant in the room is whether you should trust any company’s guardrails enough to give a young kid access to an LLM. Leading with an AI take on Elon Musk — whose own AI, Grok, is busy undressing children as we speak — doesn’t exactly inspire confidence.

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Posted Friday 9 January 2026 at 5:29 am AEST (my time).

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This year's winners were selected by experts from outlets including CNET, PCMag, Mashable, ZDNET, and Lifehacker, with awards spanning 22 categories plus a single Best Overall winner. The list paints a clear picture of where consumer and enterprise technology is heading in 2026: more local AI, lighter and more modular hardware, practical robotics, and a renewed focus on solving everyday problems rather than chasing specs alone.

AI quietly dominated, but not always in obvious ways

Artificial intelligence was everywhere at CES 2026, but the Best of CES winners show a shift away from flashy demos toward more integrated, usable implementations. In the Best AI Tech category, Lenovo's Qira assistant stood out for blending on-device and cloud AI into a single system that follows users across phones, tablets, and PCs without forcing them to think about where processing happens.

At the silicon level, platforms like Intel's Core Ultra 300 "Panther Lake," Qualcomm's Snapdragon X2 Plus, and AMD's Ryzen AI Max+ chips were recognized not just for raw TOPS numbers, but for making local AI workloads practical in thinner, more affordable devices. This trend showed up across categories, from laptops and mobile devices to robotics and smart home tech.

Laptops got lighter, more modular, and more repairable

The Best Laptop category reflected a clear design philosophy change. Lenovo's ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 14 Aura Edition won for embracing modularity and serviceability, proving that premium business laptops do not have to be sealed, disposable devices. The ability to replace individual components aligns closely with sustainability goals and right-to-repair efforts that gained momentum throughout 2025.

Other finalists, such as dual-screen and rollable-display laptops, showed that experimentation is still alive, but the winner emphasized practicality over spectacle. Thin, powerful laptops that can be maintained over years, not just replaced, resonated most with judges.

Robots moved beyond novelty into real jobs

Robotics had one of its strongest showings in years. Boston Dynamics' Atlas humanoid robot took the Best Robot award, not because it danced or performed tricks, but because it is already being prepared for real deployment in manufacturing environments.

Unlike earlier humanoid concepts, Atlas demonstrated stability, repeatability, and task-focused movement, signaling that robots are finally crossing from demo stage into practical use. Other winners in sustainability and yard tech reinforced this theme, with robots designed to clean pools, mow lawns, and monitor ecosystems with minimal human intervention.

TVs and displays pushed color and flexibility, not just size

TV technology at CES 2026 leaned heavily into color accuracy, brightness, and installation flexibility rather than chasing resolution alone. Samsung's S95H OLED won Best TV or Home Theater Tech by combining higher brightness, wired and wireless connectivity options, and support for art-display modes without burn-in concerns.

RGB-based display technologies from multiple manufacturers also earned recognition, showing that the industry is serious about expanding color gamuts beyond traditional OLED and mini-LED approaches. These advances matter less on spec sheets and more in real-world viewing, especially in brighter rooms.

Gaming innovation focused on form factors, not just power

Gaming winners reflected a similar maturity. Instead of simply rewarding the most powerful hardware, the judges highlighted devices that rethink how and where games are played. Lenovo's Legion Pro Rollable concept took Best Gaming by bringing ultrawide gaming to a laptop without permanently increasing its footprint.

Augmented reality gaming accessories and dual-screen designs also earned attention, reinforcing that portability and flexibility are becoming just as important as raw GPU performance for players who game across multiple environments.

Health, accessibility, and everyday problems took center stage

Some of the most compelling winners were not flashy at all. Devices like Coro, which helps parents measure infant feeding, and Peri, a wearable designed to track perimenopause symptoms, showed how technology is increasingly addressing overlooked health needs.

In accessibility and transportation, autonomous mobility aids and electric wheelchair attachments demonstrated how AI and robotics can improve independence rather than simply automate tasks for convenience.

Startups and "weird tech" still had a place

CES would not be CES without some strange ideas, and the Best Weird Tech category delivered exactly that. While not every concept is destined for mass adoption, the presence of experimental products alongside serious enterprise tools highlights the role CES still plays as a testing ground for unconventional ideas.

At the same time, the Best Startup category rewarded companies focused on safety, sustainability, and practical utility, including portable allergen detection and compact recycling solutions.

What the Best of CES 2026 list really says

Taken together, the Best of CES 2026 winners point to a technology industry that is becoming more grounded. AI is no longer treated as a standalone feature, but as infrastructure baked into hardware. Devices are getting lighter, more repairable, and more specialized for real-world use. Robots are moving into jobs that make sense, and consumer tech is increasingly judged by how well it fits into daily life.

CES will always be about bold ideas, but this year's awards suggest that the most exciting advances are the ones that quietly work, scale, and last.

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Posted Friday 9 January 2026 at 5:28 am AEST (my time).

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A supply shortage is the last thing tech companies want to talk about at CES. The annual trade show is their chance to promote new products and drum up excitement for what's coming, not discuss the one thing that could make selling new products in 2026 an uphill battle.

But I've read the reports. I've seen the RAM kits selling for thousands of dollars. I've heard the statements from laptop suppliers and part manufacturers warning investors about what's coming. You probably have too. The memory chip shortage is already dire for companies and for individuals who build their own PCs. But don't think because you only use a laptop and a phone you're going to get out of this so easy.

While the situation remains grim, I met two companies who have engineered ways out. Their plans aren’t guaranteed to work, and they won’t be easy to pull off. But they just might be our only hope.

Waiting for the Bubble to Pop

“We're waiting for the AI bubble to pop,” a spokesperson from a small PC manufacturer who wished to remain anonymous told me when asked about how they were handling the memory shortage.

None of the big laptop manufacturers or PC builders would say something quite that direct, but actions speak louder than words. While happily selling “AI PCs,” Lenovo, Dell, Asus, and HP have all stated that they'll be doing everything in their power to secure their supply of DRAM for the foreseeable future.

DRAM, or dynamic random-access memory, is the kind of memory used in laptops and phones, and it’s what the three main memory manufacturers are now turning their backs on in favor of high-bandwidth memory for AI data centers. Lack of memory is the main reason you can’t run ChatGPT on your PC and have to outsource every prompt to the cloud.

I spoke to Dell COO Jeff Clarke in December about what his company was doing to remedy the situation. “Our focus has been to secure the supply. That has always been the number one rule of our supply chain—to never run out of parts. We’ve been at this for a while. This just didn’t show up. So we’ve been out there for a while securing our supply.”

It’s a sentiment similar to what competitors like HP and Asus have told shareholders. But hoarding memory will only have two effects: It will raise prices even more or further tighten supply. Rumors of higher prices on electronics have begun to flood the internet. On the last day of 2025, Asus went first, officially announcing that it would be raising prices and tweaking configuration options on existing products. This was the follow-up to a leaked internal document from Dell stating that prices could rise by as much as 30 percent in 2026.

When I asked him how bad things really were, Clarke looked at me with a sigh. "Look, I've been at this a long time. This is the worst shortage I've ever seen. Demand is way ahead of supply. And it’s driven by AI. It’s driven by infrastructure. You’ve seen the spot market price—it’s up to five times from September. That will manifest. It already has in contract pricing.”

While the average person can buy straight from a retailer, laptop manufacturers have to negotiate contracts on DRAM. According to an analyst from Citrini Research, prices on DRAM increased by around 40 percent in the final quarter of 2025. It’s not slowing down; it’s escalating. Prices will be up to 60 percent higher in the first quarter of this year. From everyone I talked to this week, I got the impression that the memory shortage would last not months but years.

So, if waiting this one out isn’t the solution, what is? As it turns out, there are some very clever people in the world with some incredible ideas, all based around reducing our dependency on AI in the cloud.

The Real AI PC

You may not have heard of Phison, but the multibillion-dollar Taiwanese company has been building critical controllers for NAND flash memory chips for decades and even claims to be the inventor of the original removable USB flash drive. The founder and CEO of the company, Pua Khein-Seng, has been outspoken for months about warning about the coming memory shortage.

Pua explained to me that the current storage shortage isn't necessarily about revenue. It's about storytelling. “Every CEO, every company—they want to increase valuation,” he says. “Stock price is storytelling. Memory companies need a story.”

From his perspective, that’s how we ended up where we are. But at CES, Pua didn’t just bring more concern and warnings. He brought a solution. The product is called aiDAPTIV, an add-in SSD cache for laptops that can “expand” the memory bandwidth of your PC’s GPU. Flash memory, such as what’s found in an SSD, is typically used for long-term storage, leaving the DRAM for the fast, temporary storage that your system needs to function. AiDAPTIV, which is built using a specialized SSD design and an “advanced NAND correction algorithm” can, Phison claims, effectively expand the available memory bandwidth for AI tasks, which are currently bottlenecked.

What does all that have to do with solving the memory shortage issue? Well, while enabling more AI is what aiDAPTIV was originally developed for, Pua also positioned it as a solution to the DRAM shortage. As he explained, manufacturers could lower the DRAM capacity of laptops, going from 32 GB to 16, without reducing the PC's capabilities. That sounds like a great deal, especially since it’s what Dell, HP, and Lenovo were planning to do anyway.

One of the great advantages of aiDAPTIV is that it doesn’t require any internal changes to the existing hardware. It just slots into an open PCIe slot. MSI and Intel have announced early support, and theoretically, things could begin to shift rather quickly. We might all have to accept laptops with less DRAM, but if Phison’s claims are true, that might not matter in practice as much as we used to think.

The Hail Mary

I also spoke to Carl Schlachte, the CEO of a company called Ventiva, which has invented a novel thermal approach that replaced laptop fans with a specialized iconic cooling engine. No fans, just a solid-state thermal solution that ionizes air to create a silent way of moving air. That’s fascinating on its own, but again, there’s a way this new technology also addresses the long-term problem of the memory shortage. Once you remove fans from a system, it opens up lots of extra space for other things, such as extra memory.

“The holy trinity of memory is capacity, bandwidth, and topology,” Schlachte says. Topology is the distance the RAM modules are from the CPU. While this isn't a huge concern in data centers, it's a severe limitation when it comes to the allocated space for more memory on laptops. By designing a smaller motherboard, freed from the clutter of cooling fans, more physical space for DRAM suddenly becomes possible. Schlachte believes this is the piece of the puzzle that memory manufacturers are missing.

“High-bandwidth memory is solving for bandwidth in the data center in a space where the need is so great that they’ll pay anything,” he says. “Not sure that makes a lot of economic sense for the long haul.”

As Schlachte explains, making memory for AI data centers isn't actually cost effective; it's far more difficult to manufacture compared to DRAM. Given the proper incentives and signals from the market, there's no reason memory makers wouldn't return to pumping out DRAM again.

Training foundational AI models will always need the cloud, but if AI PCs could handle the vast majority of how people use AI today, specifically with running large language models, it’ll make less and less sense for memory manufacturers to be solely focused on the data center. In other words, if you build it, they will come. That's both Phison’s and Ventiva's theory, at least.

This whole rescue plan hinges on building enough demand on the PC side for on-device AI processing—enough demand that it makes an impact on the bottom line for memory makers. And to do that, individuals and corporations need to be persuaded not only to fully embrace AI but also to want to do their computations on-device. Schlachte pointed to Goldman-Sachs and similar institutions that buy laptops and require private, secure AI that doesn't send sensitive data to the cloud.

By putting more AI performance in the hands of PC buyers, the hope is to wean us off our reliance on the cloud. But these players won’t be able to turn this ship on their own. They'll need to convince laptop manufacturers, who need to talk to Intel and AMD, who then all need to tell a concerted, unified story to memory manufacturers. It's a big lift. But if all these companies want to avoid ta serious drop in PC sales as a result of increased prices, it's an effort that needs to happen.

I ended my interview with Schlachte by asking him what he thought might happen if none of these ideas go as planned and we decide to just wait it out—beyond just having to pay more for worse laptops.

“We blow our inheritance money on the data center,” he said. “And in order to pay for it, we enshittify the whole thing. We take this opportunity to literally lift people up, and we turn it into another vehicle for advertising. It stays in the data center, because a limited number of companies control your access to and from it. They’re going to rent this back to you. I’m passionate about this, because think I could actually have a hand in switching the powers back to you and I, the human beings.”

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Posted Friday 9 January 2026 at 5:27 am AEST (my time).

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This is Lowpass by Janko Roettgers, a newsletter on the ever-evolving intersection of tech and entertainment, syndicated just for The Verge subscribers once a week.

Every year, TV makers flock to CES in Las Vegas to show off bigger, brighter, and better-looking displays. And every year, the same companies also use the show to throw a bunch of spaghetti against the wall as they try to figure out how to sell those big TV sets to consumers busy watching TikTok videos on their phones.

In recent years, TVs have gotten cameras for video chats and AI-powered workouts. They became cloud-powered game consoles, smart home hubs, and art displays. Two years ago, Samsung even wanted to convince people that their television would be a great telehealth platform — for pets.

I’m in Las Vegas this week, walking the show floor and talking to industry executives to find out what’s next for TVs. Not in terms of picture quality and quantum dot technology, but with regard to the apps running on these devices, the platforms making them work, and the bells and whistles manufacturers resort to to make us look up from our phones.

Here’s what I found.

It’s been a rough few years for the TV industry. Covid messed with supply chains, tariff threats added a lot of uncertainty, and fears of an economic downturn have consumers rethinking big purchases. As a result, TV sales have stagnated. Global TV shipments declined 0.6 percent year over year in Q3, according to Omdia.

In that environment, many TV makers are betting on what works, which is why everyone is now making art TVs. Samsung invented the category with its Frame TV close to a decade ago, and surpassed 1 million in annual sales of art TVs in 2021. Since then, Hisense, TCL, and many others have copied the concept. Just this week, Amazon introduced its own Artline TV at CES.

“TVs are often big portions of the rooms they’re in,” says Fire TV VP Aidan Marcuss when asked about the success of this category. “I think these devices look great in those rooms. They become a part of the furniture of the room.”

Amazon also came to Vegas to show off its newly revamped Fire TV user interface, which will launch on a bunch of Amazon-made devices next month and expand to additional TVs later this year. It’s the first major revamp of Amazon’s TV interface in years, and a lot has changed in that time. Consumers are subscribing to more streaming services than ever, and companies like Amazon keep adding their own features on top of that.

“We’ve been adding things in terms of capabilities,” Marcuss says. “Games, art, music. [It’s] hard to organize that.” The new UI is meant to remove a lot of that complexity, he explains.

How do you keep TVs simple as streaming gets more and more complex? It’s a question many TV makers are trying to tackle, and the industry is increasingly looking to AI for an answer. The latest iteration of Google’s Gemini on TV, for instance, not only tells you what to watch next after you finish a show, but also patiently explains why you should watch Severance if asked to do so. Alexa Plus lets you add titles to your watch list, and LG even switches the viewing recommendations on its TV’s homescreen to those of an individual family member based on voice recognition.

But TV makers’ use of AI doesn’t stop there. Samsung used its First Look event Sunday night to paint a vision of the future in which you’ll ask your TV for anything from sports predictions to recipes — recipes that you then share with a display in the kitchen, because who needs cooking instructions in the living room. Hisense demonstrated an AI integration that identifies products featured in select shows, and then simplifies ordering from your phone with a QR code.

Amazon showed off Alexa Plus on TVs, complete with the ability to jump to scenes just by describing them within a Prime Video movie. And Gemini’s new features also include the ability to create custom “deep dives” on a subject and, for instance, generate age-appropriate explanations of the solar system for your kids.

Google also leaned heavily into generative AI by bringing both Veo and Nano Banana to TVs. In a demo I saw, someone asked Veo to generate a video from a photo of a woman on a beach. After prompting it, we had to patiently wait about two minutes, only to see her awkwardly come to life for eight whole seconds. Why anyone would want to do that on their TV is lost on me, but the company clearly thinks that there’s a use case for it.

A lot of the new AI features shown at CES also suffered from serious screen real estate creep. Time and again, booth personnel would ask a TV a question about something that was happening on screen, and the video would get minimized, with sports scores, knowledge facts, and other information taking up precious space on the screen. As noticeable as this was on the 70-inch-plus demo displays, I imagine it will be a nightmare on a screen sized 50 inches or less.

Hisense inadvertently made that case with an internally developed prototype AI agent capable of displaying stats for every player during a soccer game. This required so much screen real estate that the company also built a prototype 21:9-sized TV for the showcase. Here’s another idea: Why not let people look up that kind of info on their phones, as they’ve been doing for years?

Some AI integrations shown in Vegas were admittedly pretty useful. Gemini will let you change the display settings on supported TVs, and Samsung and others also use AI to tweak the sound on the fly. But these enhancements are largely in service of, and not distracting from, actual TV viewing. That may ultimately be the best use of AI on TV: something that’s working in the background to help you get more out of the onscreen action.

It’s a lesson that also rings true for TV makers and their eternal quest to figure out what’s next for their products. Sure, TVs are increasingly becoming part of the smart home, and cloud gaming may have its place on the big screen. But what people really want from these big screens is often quite prosaic: “Primarily, consumers are using their television to watch content,” says TCL sales and marketing exec Chris Hamdorf. “That’s still where the majority of the usage is.”

In other words: Even in the age of AI, the real killer app for TVs may just be watching TV.

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Posted Friday 9 January 2026 at 5:25 am AEST (my time).

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There are three realistic ways to expand your HDMI connectivity, each with its own trade-offs.

HDMI switches are the easiest solution

An HDMI switch is the simplest and most affordable way to add more ports. You connect multiple devices to the switch, plug the switch into a single HDMI port on your TV, and select which device you want to use.

For most users, this is more than enough. Basic models are inexpensive and easy to use, while mid-range switches offer four or five inputs and include a remote. Many modern switches support 4K at 60Hz, which is sufficient for streaming devices and older consoles.

The main thing to watch for is feature support. Not every switch handles HDR, surround sound, or high refresh rates like 4K at 120Hz. If you're using newer consoles or a gaming PC, make sure the switch explicitly supports those features. It's also smart to buy a switch with more inputs than you currently need, as devices tend to accumulate over time.

AV receivers work, but only if you need better audio

AV receivers can also function as HDMI hubs. Most models include multiple HDMI inputs and a single output to the TV, effectively acting as a high-end switch while also managing audio.

However, buying a receiver just to gain HDMI ports rarely makes sense. They're far more expensive than HDMI switches and take up more space. Where they shine is in setups where audio quality matters. If you're planning to use speakers or upgrade your home audio, an AV receiver solves both sound and connectivity in one device.

Before buying, check that the receiver supports HDMI passthrough and the video features you need, especially if you care about HDR or high refresh rates.

Soundbars with HDMI inputs are a niche option

Some soundbars include multiple HDMI inputs alongside eARC support. In theory, this lets the soundbar handle both audio and video while adding extra ports.

In practice, this option is limited. Many soundbars only include one HDMI input, and models with two or three inputs are often expensive. Passthrough support can also be inconsistent, especially for gaming features like VRR or 4K at 120Hz.

Soundbars make sense if you already want one and don't need advanced video features. Otherwise, they're usually not the best way to expand HDMI connectivity.

The bottom line

For most people, an HDMI switch is the best answer. It's cheap, simple, and effective. AV receivers are worth considering only if you also want better audio, while soundbars with HDMI inputs tend to be the least flexible option.

If your TV still meets your needs, adding more HDMI ports is a small upgrade that can save a lot of frustration-and it doesn't require buying a new display.

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Posted Friday 9 January 2026 at 5:25 am AEST (my time).

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In its earnings guidance for the fourth quarter of 2025, Samsung has estimated revenue of 93 trillion Korean won ($64.2 billion), yielding an operating profit of roughly 20 trillion Korean won ($13.8 billion). This is a massive increase from the 75.79 trillion Korean won ($52.2 billion) revenue and 6.49 ($4.5 billion) that was reported in the same quarter last year. It will also be Samsung's highest quarterly profit ever.

While these figures are undoubtedly excellent, they come as no surprise. Samsung is a one of the three major memory chip suppliers, which means that the astronomical increase in demand for AI hardware has also led to an increase in sales for the South Korean giant. Apple recently crowned Samsung as its leading memory supplier amid the global chip shortage as well. The Cupertino firm also sources iPhone memory from SK Hynix and Micron Technology, both also the two other players in this particular supply chain.

Although the results in this quarter have been excellent, it remains to be seen if Samsung can sustain them. Demand for memory is still ramping up as vendors struggle to match in terms of supply. This is further putting a strain on the consumer market too where the shortage has led to exorbitant prices for RAM and related hardware. Samsung is expected to reveal its full quarterly earnings toward the end of this month, and we'll likely find out then what the firm projects to happen in the next quarter.

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Posted Friday 9 January 2026 at 5:24 am AEST (my time).

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It looks like a golden chandelier and contains the coldest place in the universe.

What I am looking at is not just the most powerful computer in the world, but technology pivotal to financial security, Bitcoin, government secrets, the world economy and more.

Quantum computing holds the key to which companies and countries win - and lose - the rest of the 21st Century.

In front of me suspended a metre in the air, in a Google facility in Santa Barbara California, is Willow. Frankly, it was not what I expected.

There are no screens or keyboards, let alone holographic head cams or brain-reading chips.

Willow is an oil barrel-sized series of round discs connected by hundreds of black control wires descending into a bronze liquid helium bath refrigerator keeping the Quantum microchip a thousandth of a degree above absolute zero.

It looks, and feels, very eighties, but if quantum's potential is realised, the metal and wire jellyfish structure in front of me will transform the world, in many ways.

"Welcome to our Quantum AI lab," says Hartmut Neven, Google's Quantum chief, as we go through the high security door.

Neven is something of a legendary figure, part technological genius, part techno music enthusiast, who dresses like he has snowboarded here straight from the Burning Man music festival – for which he designs art. Perhaps he has, in a parallel universe - more on that later.

His mission is to turn theoretical physics into functional quantum computers "to solve otherwise unsolvable problems" and he admits he's biased but says these chandeliers are the best performing in the world.

Faisal Islam was shown around a Google facility in Santa Barbara.

Secret temple of high science

Much of our conversation is about what we are not allowed to film in this restricted lab. This critical technology is subject to export controls, secrecy and is at the heart of a race for commercial and economic supremacy. Any small advantage, from the shape of new components to the companies in global supply chains, is a source of potential leverage.

There is a notable Californian vibe in this temple of high science, in its art and colour. Each quantum computer is given a name such as Yakushima or Mendocino, they are each wrapped in a piece of contemporary art, and various graffiti style murals adorn the walls illuminated by the bright winter sun.

Neven holds up Willow, Google's latest Quantum chip, which has delivered two important milestones. He said it settled "once and for all" the discussion about whether quantum computers can do tasks that classical computers can't.

Willow also solved a benchmark problem in minutes that would have taken the best computer in the world 10 septillion years, so more than a trillion trillion, or one with 25 zeros on the end, more than the age of the universe.

This theoretical result was recently applied to the Quantum Echoes algorithm, impossible for conventional computers, which helps learn the structure of molecules from the same technology used in MRI machines.

Neven reels off the ways he believes this Willow quantum chip will be used "to help with many problems that humankind has now".

"It will enable us to discover medicines more efficiently," he says. "It will help us make food production more efficient, it will help us produce energy, to transport energy, to store energy..solve climate change and human hunger..."

"It allows us to understand nature much better, and then unlock its secret to build technologies that make life more pleasant for all of us," he tells me.

Some researchers believe that actual Artificial Intelligence will only be truly possible with Quantum.

Members of the team here have just received the Nobel prize for the original research into "superconducting qubits" used here.

The Willow chip has 105 qubits. Microsoft's quantum effort has 8 qubits, but uses a different approach. The race around the world is to get to 1 million qubits for a "utility scale machine" that can do quantum chemistry, drug design, without error. The technology is fragile.

< View the video at the source page >

What is going on here is being watched carefully around the world. Professor Sir Peter Knight, Chair of the National Quantum Technology Programmes Strategy Advisory Board, says Willow broke new ground.

"All the machines are really still at the toy model stage, they make mistakes. They need error correction. Willow was the first to demonstrate that you could do error correction, through repeated rounds of repairs, which improve," he says.

This puts the technology on a path to being scaled towards accurately doing a trillion operations, perhaps within seven or eight years, rather than the two decades previously assumed.

If the first quarter of this century was defined by the rise of the internet and then Artificial Intelligence, the next 25 years will surely be the start of the Quantum era.

How does it work?

Imagine trying to find a tennis ball in one of a thousand closed draws. A classical computer opens each one in order. A quantum computer opens all of them at the same time. Or similarly, instead of having to need a hundred keys to open a hundred doors in normal computing, quantum enables you to open all one hundred, with one key, instantly.

These machines will not be for everyone. They will not shrink down into phones or AI glasses or laptops. But the point is that the power of these computers grow exponentially, and everyone is getting in on the act.

I ask Nvidia chief Jensen Huang whether this poses a threat to his model of providing the specialised chips for AI. "No, a quantum processor will be added to a computer in the future," he replies.

And one of the UK's leaders in the field points out what is up for grabs in the quantum world - the eventual power to decrypt almost anything from state secrets to Bitcoin.

All of cryptocurrency will also have to be re-examined because of the quantum computing threat," Sir Peter says.

A top partner to Nvidia last year said that while Bitcoin had a few years yet, the technology needed to fork to a stronger blockchain by the end of the decade.

Tech industry sources refer to the process of "Harvest Now, Decrypt Later" to describe how state agencies are believed to be saving all of the worlds encrypted data at home and abroad with the expectation of future generations being able to access it.

Global race

And then there is the race across the world. China's approach is very different to the commercial race in the US and the West.

At around $15bn (£11bn), the total resource committed to quantum technology in China is possibly of the order of all the rest of the world's government programmes put together, says Sir Peter.

Since 2022 China has published more scientific papers on quantum than other countries, the efforts have been led by a pioneering physicist called Pan Jianwei. It is a key part of Beijing's 14th five-year plan.

China took a decision to stop its tech companies such as Baidu and Alibaba from developing their own quantum research – and concentrate the people and the infrastructure into a state-run enterprise. China is trying to get the edge on quantum communications and satellites.

Last year, Jianwei developed and tested the Zuchongzhi 3.0 quantum computer using similar technology though a different approach to that of Willow, claiming similar results. In the Autumn it was opened up for commercial use. It all feels a little like the World War II Manhattan Project to produce the first nuclear weapons, or the Space Race of the 21st Century.

The UK is one of the scientific heartlands for quantum research. It was a British scientist who did the original research on superconducting qubits. There are dozens of companies and cutting-edge research here. The government plans to make a significant investment around this in the coming weeks. It is vital for economics, for military use, and for geopolitics. There is a hope that the UK will be the third power in this area.

Parallel universes

Back at the Willow lab, there are perhaps even more existential questions being posed. Last year Neven suggested that Willow's unprecedented speed supported some conceptions of the existence of a multiverse. Basically this speed could be explained by Willow having tapped into parallel universes for its compute power. Not all scientists bought this.

"There is still a spirited debate," he tells me. "As you have learned in your lab visit, the reason quantum computers are so powerful is that within one clock cycle it can touch 2 to the 105 combinations simultaneously. It makes you question where are these different things?… There's a version of quantum mechanics to think about - the many worlds formulation - parallel universes or parallel reality."

Willow had not proved this, Neven was careful to say, but was "suggestive that we should take this idea seriously".

This is the cutting edge of the frontier of the world, of technology, of growth, and the British Government will soon pour hundreds of millions into catching up with Willow and the Chinese. It sounds like science fiction...it is rapidly becoming economic fact.

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Dell has revealed that consumers aren’t buying PCs for AI features right now. In an interview with PC Gamer ahead of CES, Dell has made it clear its 2026 products aren’t all about being AI-first, and it’s moving beyond being “all about” AI PCs.

“We’re very focused on delivering upon the AI capabilities of a device—in fact everything that we’re announcing has an NPU in it — but what we’ve learned over the course of this year, especially from a consumer perspective, is they’re not buying based on AI,” admits Kevin Terwilliger, Dell’s head of product, in the PC Gamer interview. “In fact I think AI probably confuses them more than it helps them understand a specific outcome.”

It’s a surprisingly honest admission from one of Microsoft’s biggest PC partners, especially as the software giant continues to push AI features into Windows and try and convince consumers to buy Copilot Plus PCs. Dell was one of Microsoft’s partners for the initial Copilot Plus PC launch in 2024, adding Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X Elite chips to its popular XPS 13 and Inspiron line of laptops. Dell even added Qualcomm’s Cloud AI chips to its high-end laptops last year, boosting AI performance for local models.

But most of the benefits in Copilot Plus PCs come from the improved battery life and performance of Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X Elite chips, instead of AI features alone.

Microsoft even struggled to launch its Recall flagship AI feature for Copilot Plus PCs. The controversial feature eventually launched nearly a year after it was originally scheduled, because the feature was delayed following concerns raised by security experts.

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Posted Thursday 8 January 2026 at 4:59 am AEST (my time).

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Satya Nadella has noted that 2026 could be a messy year as the industry moves past demos to actually integrating AI more deeply. Microsoft, for example, is reallocating capital expenditure toward GPUs and data centres. To cover this, it needs to make savings on human capital, in English, it is going to fire people.

Nadella has also called Microsoft’s size a “massive disadvantage” in the AI race at over 220,000 employees. It has already begun cutting out middle management to try and flatten the organization after overhiring during the pandemic.

According to the HR Digest, rumours suggest that the reduction could see 5 to 10 per cent of jobs cut across Microsoft’s global workforce, that’s between 11,000 and 22,000 jobs. The most at-risk jobs in the company are middle management, Azure Cloud Operations, gaming/Xbox, sales, and non-core engineering.

Obviously, Microsoft has not announced any cuts yet, these are just rumours and hopefully won’t be necessary. The US unemployment rate has been on the rise since June 2025, meaning people looking for work are having a harder time finding a job because there are fewer available roles. It’ll definitely be interesting to see how fast new AI-oriented jobs pop-up after killing off so many jobs.

What is your opinion? Will AI create new jobs quickly enough to make up for the job losses? Leave a comment.

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Posted Thursday 8 January 2026 at 4:57 am AEST (my time).

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At CES 2026, where AMD announced a bunch of stuff, including new Ryzen AI 400 processors, 9850X3D, and others, AMD's product manager of Ryzen, David McAfee, teased a potential return of some of AMD's previous-gen processors. In an interview, David said that AMD might reintroduce some of the AM4 chips based on the Zen 3 architecture.

David McAfee explained that bringing back products from the AM4 ecosystem could "satisfy the demands of gamers," and it is something that AMD "is definitely very actively working on." Why? The answer is simple: memory. The AM4 socket is a DDR4-only platform, and the previous-gen RAM is less affected by the insane price increases. A bunch of new or reintroduced AM4 chips could give existing AM4 users a performance boost or be a viable budget-friendly option for a new build. Ryzen 5000 chips, particularly their 3D variants, remain very capable chips that still deliver good performance in gaming and productivity work.

AM4 is a record-breaking socket that is turning 10 this year. Initially introduced in 2016, it became a turning point for AMD and its grand comeback into the CPU world, with Ryzen chips giving Intel a run for its money. Years later, AMD is still releasing new AM4 processors, and with everything that is going on right now, the legendary platform may stick around for even longer.

Source: Tom's Hardware

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Posted Wednesday 7 January 2026 at 1:24 pm AEST (my time).

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For the first time in years, Nvidia declined to introduce new GeForce graphics card models at CES. CEO Jensen Huang’s characteristically sprawling and under-rehearsed 90-minute keynote focused almost entirely on the company’s dominant AI business, relegating the company’s gaming-related announcements to a separate video posted later in the evening.

Instead, the company focused on software improvements for its existing hardware. The biggest announcement in this vein is DLSS 4.5, which adds a handful of new features to Nvidia’s basket of upscaling and frame generation technologies.

DLSS upscaling is being improved by a new “second-generation transformer model” that Nvidia says has been “trained on an expanded data set” to improve its predictions when generating new pixels. According to Nvidia’s Bryan Catanzaro, this is particularly beneficial for image quality in the Performance and Ultra Performance modes, where the upscaler has to do more guessing because it’s working from a lower-resolution source image.

DLSS Multi-Frame Generation is also improving, increasing the number of AI-generated frames per rendered frame from three to five. This new 6x mode for DLSS MFG is being paired with something called Dynamic Multi-Frame Generation, where the number of AI-generated frames can dynamically change, increasing generated frames during “demanding scenes,” and decreasing the number of generated frames during simpler scenes “so it only computes what’s needed.”

The standard caveats for Multi-Frame Generation still apply: It still needs an RTX 50-series GPU (the 40-series can still only generate one frame for every rendered frame, and older cards can’t generate extra frames at all), and the game still needs to be running at a reasonably high base frame rate to minimize lag and weird rendering artifacts. It remains a useful tool for making fast-running games run faster, but it won’t help make an unplayable frame rate into a playable one.

To Nvidia’s credit, the new DLSS 4.5 transformer model runs on GeForce 20- and 30-series GPUs, giving users of older-but-still-usable graphics cards access to the improved upscaling. But Nvidia said that owners of those GPUs would see more of a performance hit from enabling DLSS 4.5 than users of GeForce 40- and 50-series cards would, and initial testing from some outlets seems to be bearing that out. Compared to the DLSS 4.0 transformer model, Mostly Positive Reviews found that the new DLSS 4.5 model reduced performance on an RTX 3080 Ti by between 14 and 24 percent depending on the game and the settings, though performance is still presumably better than it would be on the same card if you tried to run those games at native resolutions.

The DLSS 4.5 transformer model is available now, after a driver update, and you can use the Nvidia App to select the new transformer model in games that already support DLSS upscaling (whether the option appears in any in-game menus remains up to the game developer). The Multi-Frame Generation updates will be available sometime in spring 2026.

One feature that hasn’t broken cover yet? Nvidia’s Reflex 2, an update to its input lag reduction technology that the company announced at CES last year. Upscaling and frame generation technologies generally, something that Reflex helps to offset, and the company claimed an up to 75 percent reduction in lag when using Reflex 2 on a 50-series card. But Nvidia didn’t mention Reflex 2 this year, and hasn’t provided any updates on when it might be released.

Why no GPUs?

In another era, CES 2026 would have been a good time to introduce a 50-series Super update, a mid-generation spec bump to keep the lineup fresh while Nvidia works on whatever will become the GeForce 60-series. The company used CES 2024 to launch the RTX 40-series Super cards, helping improve the value proposition for a bunch of cards that had launched at prices many reviewers and users grumbled about.

Indeed, the rumor mill suggested that Nvidia was working on a 50-series Super refresh for the 2025 holiday season, and its biggest improvement was going to be a 50 percent bump in RAM capacity, said to be possible because of a switch from 2GB RAM chips to 3GB chips. This would have given the theoretical 5070 Super 18GB of RAM, and the 5070 Ti Super and 5080 Super were said to have 24GB of memory.

Assuming those rumors are correct, those plans could have been dashed by the abrupt RAM shortages and price spikes that started late last year. These have been caused at least in part by sky-high demand for RAM from AI data centers; given that modern-day Nvidia is mainly an AI company that sells consumer GPUs on the side, it stands to reason that the company would allocate all the RAM it can get to its more profitable AI GPUs, rather than a mid-generation GeForce refresh.

In fact, none of the major dedicated GPU manufacturers has introduced new products at CES this year. AMD and Intel announced products with improved integrated GPUs, which use system RAM rather than requiring their own. But there wasn’t a peep about any new dedicated Radeon cards, and Intel hasn’t introduced a new dedicated Arc graphics card in almost a year, despite some signs that a midrange Arc B770 card exists and could be nearly ready to launch.

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Posted Wednesday 7 January 2026 at 1:23 pm AEST (my time).

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The mini PC market had a great year, and with laptop and desktop prices expected to continue climbing in 2026, I foresee many users considering a switch to a more affordable device that's powerful and compact.

Lenovo is kicking off CES 2026 with a new Yoga Mini i PC that weighs just 600 grams (1.32 pounds) with a 0.65-liter chassis. That's even more impressive considering the chassis is made from aluminum, matching the aesthetic of Lenovo's premium Yoga laptops.

It's absurdly small, with its round design measuring just 5.12 x 5.12 x 1.91 inches (130mm x 130mm x 48.6mm). Forget a backpack or messenger — you could slip this into your back pocket when you leave the office.

And despite having such a tiny frame, Lenovo has packed in some impressive performance hardware and additional features to improve the user experience. The mini PC runs on Intel's latest Core Ultra X7 Series 3 chips, up to an X7 358H with integrated graphics. These chips have more than enough power to run Windows 11's Copilot+ AI tools.

You can configure the Yoga Mini i with up to 32GB of LPDDR5x-8533MT/s RAM and up to 2TB of M.2 PCIe 4.0 NVMe SSD storage. There's no word if the SSD is user-upgradeable, but I do know that the LPDDR5x RAM is soldered to the board. It all runs on a 100W USB-C power adapter.

A look at the sleek aluminum shell of the Yoga Mini i. It fits in the palm of your hand.

(Image credit: Future)

 

A look at the rather generous port selection on the back of the Yoga Mini i.

(Image credit: Future)

 

A top-down look at the Yoga Mini i's aluminum chassis.

(Image credit: Future)

 

A side look at the USB-C and 3.5mm audio ports on the Lenovo Yoga Mini i.

(Image credit: Future)

 

Here's where things get interesting. The Yoga Mini i comes with Wi-Fi sensing abilities, which can automatically wake the PC when it notices changes in Wi-Fi signals (caused by, say, you walking through your office). That's a bit too much sensing for my liking, but I'm sure some will appreciate the feature.

 

A built-in ambient light will pulse when it senses your presence, and the same light will show up for certain notifications and reminders. The small power button on the side of the device includes a fingerprint reader for additional security through Windows Hello, something that's not often seen on even the best mini PCs currently available.

 

I don't blame you for thinking that a mini PC this small might lack the port selection for a full workload. However, that's not quite the case. Lenovo managed to fit in dual Thunderbolt 4 ports, one USB-C 3.2 (Gen 2) with 100W charging capabilities, another USB-C 3.2 (Gen 2), 2.5Gb Ethernet, HDMI 2.1, 3.5mm audio combo, and one USB-A 3.2 (Gen 2).

 

That covers video, data, internet, and power, and Lenovo says the Yoga Mini i can support "up to four high-resolution displays" with its native port selection. A built-in speaker and microphone make it easy to conference without any additional hardware.

 

Lenovo expects to launch its new Yoga Mini i in June 2026 with a starting price of $699.99.

 

Mini PCs are becoming more popular all the time, and companies like Lenovo are pushing the limits in terms of size, power, and features. Will your next PC be a mini PC?

 

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Posted Wednesday 7 January 2026 at 1:21 pm AEST (my time).

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After making the obviously poor decision to kill its XPS laptops and desktops in January 2025, Dell started selling 16- and 14-inch XPS laptops again today.

“It was obvious we needed to change,” Jeff Clarke, vice chairman and COO at Dell Technologies, said at a press event in New York City previewing Dell’s CES 2026 announcements.

A year ago, Dell abandoned XPS branding, as well as its Latitude, Inspiron, and Precision PC lineups. The company replaced the reputable brands with Dell Premium, Dell Pro, and Dell Pro Max. Each series included a base model, as well as “Plus” and “Premium.” Dell isn’t resurrecting its Latitude, Inspiron, or Precision series, and it will still sell “Dell Pro” models.

This is how Dell breaks down its computer lineup now.

Credit: Dell

XPS returns

The revival of XPS means the return of one of the easiest recommendations for consumer ultralight laptops. Before last year’s shunning, XPS laptops had a reputation for thin, lightweight designs with modern features and decent performance for the price. This year, Dell is even doing away with some of the design tweaks that it introduced to the XPS lineup in 2022, which, unfortunately, were shoppers’ sole option last year.

Inheriting traits from the XPS 13 Plus introduced in 2022, the XPS-equivalent laptops that Dell released in 2025 had a capacitive-touch row without physical buttons, a borderless touchpad with haptic feedback, and a flat, lattice-free keyboard. The design was meant to enable more thermal headroom but made using the computers feel uncomfortable and unfamiliar.

The XPS 14 and XPS 16 laptops launching today have physical function rows. They still have a haptic touchpad, but now the touchpad has comforting left and right borders. And although the XPS 14 and XPS 16 have the same lattice-free keyboard of the XPS 13 Plus, Dell will release a cheaper XPS 13 later this year with a more traditional chiclet keyboard, since those types of keyboards are cheaper to make.

The XPS 14’s deck.

Credit: Dell

Dell’s about-face comes amid ongoing declines in its consumer PC revenue and global PC market share. It also represents a divergence in Dell’s messaging to computer shoppers.

Last year, Dell, as well as many other computer makers, committed to convincing people that they not only needed to buy a new computer but also a new “AI PC.” Corporate desire to leverage newly mainstream interest in AI to push PC sales was part of the reason Dell made new brand names for its 2025 computers.

“The AI PC market is quickly evolving,” Kevin Terwilliger, VP and GM of commercial, consumer, and gaming PCs at Dell, told reporters last year when announcing the new branding. “(E)veryone from IT decision makers to professionals and everyday users are looking at on-device AI to help drive productivity and creativity. To make finding the right AI PC easy for customers, we’ve introduced three simple product categories to focus on core customer needs,” he said.

But this week, as Dell unveils its ultralight laptop lineup, AI is taking a backseat.

“We’re getting back to our roots with a renewed focus on consumer and gaming,” Clarke said in a statement accompanying Dell’s announcement today.

Clarke holding the upcoming XPS 13.

Credit: Dell

The website for the new XPS laptops makes an obligatory nod to Microsoft’s Copilot+ PC program but is primarily focused on the computers’ thin build, low weight, battery life, and display. It seems Dell has accepted that these are the things that the average person cares about in their primary laptop, not the computer’s ability to run AI locally.

The XPS 14 launched today starting at $2,049, and the XPS 16 launched with a starting price of $2,200. A Dell spokesperson told Ars Technica that Dell will release additional configurations in February that are “well under $2,000.” Dell hasn’t shared final specs, pricing, or a release date for the 2026 XPS 13.

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Posted Wednesday 7 January 2026 at 1:20 pm AEST (my time).

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X3D AMD CPUs are already well known to be very fast thanks to that enormous stack of L3 Cache. If the OS is aware of how to put that to good use, all the extra vertically stacked cache can lead to big performance boosts.

Compared to the 9800X3D, the new 9850X3D gets a higher boost clock as it can reach 5.6 GHz compared to 5.2 on the 9800X3D. The base clock was not revealed to the press in our briefing but according to the company, users can expect up to 27% better gaming performance on average versus an Intel Core Ultra 9 285K, which has remained Team Blue's flagship mainstream desktop processor till 25.

Rest of the core specifications of the 9850X3D remain similar to the 9800X3D which means it is refresh rather than a major upgrade. Still AMD is probably going to enjoy great success with the 9850X3D too just like it has been with the 9800X3D, 9950X3D, and most other 3D V-cache processors.

As you can see in the benchmark chart above, the new AMD Ryzen 9850X3D enjoys some really hefty performance leads over the 285K in CPU-heavy games like Baldur's Gate 3, Counter-Strike 2, Hogwarts' Legacy, Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2, among others. Testing was done on Windows 11 24H2.

AMD also shared some productivity benchmarks and has even admitted to losing heavily to the Ultra 285K in V-Ray which is a CPU rendering and visualization app. However, in the other tests, it competes well with the Intel chip.

The 9850X3D will be available this quarter.

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Posted Wednesday 7 January 2026 at 6:35 am AEST (my time).

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