The Latest from Gadget Hacks: Page 10

Apple is reportedly building an entirely new operating system, possibly called homeOS, to run a long-rumored smart home hub. Bloomberg's Mark Gurman describes it as blending tvOS, watchOS, and iOS elements, and it would join iOS, iPadOS, macOS, watchOS, tvOS, and visionOS as a distinct Apple smart home operating system if it ships (MacRumors, today).

Google Drive's "Organize My Files" tool lets Gemini scan loose files sitting outside your folder structure and suggest where they belong. Nothing actually moves until you review the recommendations, select the files you want moved, and approve the batch.

Google has spent the past several months steadily expanding what the Gemini overlay can do, and the latest round of Gemini overlay new features makes the strategic intent hard to miss. The overlay the assistant panel you pull up from any Android screen is gaining video generation, music creation, Canvas, and Guided Learning directly on its surface. Taken together with a persistent floating bubble still in testing and a Gemini Live redesign that eliminates its own dedicated screen, the changes...

Windows 11 tucks a small bell icon next to the clock to flag unread alerts, and the Windows 11 taskbar notification icon settings that control it live in one spot: Settings > System > Notifications. This guide covers how to add or remove the notification bell icon on the taskbar in Windows 11 using that toggle, what to try if the checkbox goes missing or does nothing, and how to tell a hidden bell apart from a Notification Center that's actually broken.

The 78th Emmy Awards aired live on September 14, 2026, but anyone who missed the ceremony can still watch the 2026 Emmy Awards without cable.

New European pricing figures suggest the S26 FE could cost meaningfully more than its predecessor, while confirmed upgrades still fall short of justifying the gap

An old Mac mini doesn't have to end up in a drawer once a newer model takes over your desk. Turning an old Mac mini into a home server is one of the more practical uses for hardware that's small, quiet, and easy to tuck away where noise and space matter.

As of this week, a Samsung Messages alternative app called Messages by OzarksMade is undergoing closed testing through Google Play, with a public launch set for 14 days after its testing Google Group hits 12 members and a post-launch price of $0.99. Treat that as a snapshot, not a finished product. Betas shift, thresholds get hit or missed, and pricing plans change before launch.

Xbox confirmed today that Activision is taking over development of the next flagship Halo game, handing the project to a newly formed team inside the Call of Duty publisher. The announcement arrived alongside 268 additional job cuts across Halo Studios and other Xbox teams, detailed in an internal memo from chief content officer Matt Booty titled "Continuing Our Reset" (Game Informer, today; The Verge, today).

Google Photos has grown well past a backup app. It can search your library in plain English, answer questions about a single photo, edit images from a text description, and create new AI-generated images through templates.

Microsoft confirmed yesterday that Activision is taking over Halo, with the Call of Duty publisher developing the next flagship game in the franchise through a team built specifically for that job. Halo Studios, the current caretaker of the series, isn't building that next game and instead shifts into a support role for existing titles. The confirmation came from an internal memo by Xbox chief content officer Matt Booty, shared by The Verge.

Google has confirmed the Made by Google 2026 keynote for Wednesday, August 12, six days from now, kicking off at 6 p.m. ET / 3 p.m. PT, notably later in the day than usual (9to5Google, last month). This is a practical guide to how to watch the Google Pixel 11 event: exactly when it starts, where the stream is expected to show up, and what Google and outside reporting expect to land on stage.

Apple began offering new and qualifying returning subscribers three free months of Apple One with the purchase of an eligible device on September 17, 2026. If you're trying to figure out how to get the Apple One 3-month free trial after buying a new device, the first question isn't which iPhone you bought. It's whether your Apple Account qualifies at all.

Ask "what is Microsoft Copilot" and you'll still get several different correct answers, because Microsoft uses the Copilot name across a unified chat app, AI features inside Word and Excel, a class of Windows PCs, work-account licenses, and tools for building custom agents.

Google Meet's web homepage now displays conference room and physical meeting location details directly on upcoming meeting cards, so in-office workers can see where they're headed without opening a Calendar invite first. Google confirmed the change, saying it lets in-office users see where they need to go directly from the Meet landing page.

If you mostly use Apple Podcasts to press play and nothing else, there's a handful of useful controls sitting untouched: a library that actually surfaces what you want to hear, playback settings you won't have to hunt for every session, chapter and timestamp navigation for long episodes, and syncing that's supposed to carry your spot across every Apple device you own.

Anyone searching for whether Pixel 11 voice typing is coming to Google Play Books needs to separate two different claims. Google has now confirmed a Pixel 11-specific Gboard feature called Rambler, but it has not announced a Google Play Books-specific voice typing update.

Some PCs upgrading from Windows 11 23H2 or 24H2 to 25H2 have run into a confusing failure: "We couldn't update the system reserved partition," sometimes accompanied by error code 0x800F0922 or 0xC1900104.

The iPhone 18 Pro Max and Galaxy S26 Ultra have now been through the same controlled drop test, giving buyers a much cleaner comparison than the separate durability tests available immediately after Apple's phone launched.

Microsoft's Microsoft 365 Copilot app now goes by a different name: Microsoft Copilot. That's not just cosmetic. As part of the same round of Microsoft 365 Copilot app updates, Microsoft is merging existing Microsoft Copilot and Microsoft 365 Copilot installations into one client on Windows and Mac devices.