Hey there hive-mind. I need some help today, and any insights you can provide would be appreciated. I'm looking for a technology that is essentially a bare-bones Amazon Alexa unit that meets the following criteria.

- Does not use the internet to 'call home' for anything

- Does not use my phone as the main physical unit

- Does have the ability to speak with a synthesized voice

- Does have the ability to set routines, reminders, alarms, and snooze

- Does have the ability to program what the synthesized voice says

- Does have volume control either on the unit or on the remote/app as applicable

- Does have basic calendar function, even if there's no screen interface

- Ideally has the ability to sync a few units across the house by wifi or Bluetooth

- Ideally has the ability to understand and execute verbal commands within reason IE "Every Tuesday at 6pm, remind me to take out the trash by saying 'The trash needs to go out tonight'"

- Ideally will let me call it whatever I want if voice activated (I always wanted to call my Alexa "Chuck")

- Ideally allows me to increase the speed at which the unit speaks.

- Ideally has a unit I can wear on my belt or keys, like a Tamagotchi secretary that reminds me to drink water.

- Ideally can be controlled or programmed from my phone or PC

Does this kind of thing exist?

Is this the kind of thing I can realistically have commissioned by someone if it doesn't already exist?

Are there better / other places to ask about this?

My limited knowledge tells me this should be relatively easy to do, but I don't know how most of this technology works beyond basic use, so I genuinely don't understand the scope of what I'm looking for. Please let me know if I'm asking for something akin to an adamantium helicopter with a unicorn-leather interior.

My two year old 43 inch Sceptre “Dumb tv” blew out over the weekend and I need to find another. (I’m not tech guy but one of the internal components gave out, no clue what though lol) Ideally I wanted another Sceptre tv but those things are like $400 now! I paid $125 for it two years ago. I really don’t want a smart tv but I’m out of luck in that front. Does anyone have any suggestions for a decent tv that’s not more than $200?

I saw this 50 inch onn 4K UHD Smart Tv for $178 which seems like a decent price. Reviews looked decent enough, and mostly I just use an HDMI cord to stream my laptop to it for tv and stuff, and use it occasionally for my Xbox so I don’t need anything wild.

Thought I’d try and find something bigger this time, why not lol. I got the insurance on my last tv so I’ll have that as a base amount.

I’d appreciate any advice or suggestions if people know of anything that might be better. Like I said I don’t want/need anything crazy but I have little experience with smart TVs.

Thanks for reading.

Hello.

I've been moving all my snaps out of "My Eyes Only." When I see the main Snapchat Camera Roll, as I'll call it, it still shows the backup/loading symbol (as linked here), as to say that the picture is still backing up into the cloud. However, when I go to the Memories tab, it says that all my memories are backed up and the backup progress is complete, not the # of Snaps remaining. Yes I am connected to WiFi, near my router. My data is pretty strong. I don't know what's going on.

Thanks

hi.. so ive been having this issue for the last week or so, ive gotten 5 email notifications of someone trying to reset my password. idk why since im barely active on that account and i cant think of anyone who whould try to hack me... i always get rhese emails on unusual times too, 2 am or 5 am local time... idk what to do to make it stop. i consider my username quite "rare" since it is little characters no numbers no underscore or . help

I'm trying to find a video compression site that absolutely TANKS the quality of the video. I'm trying to drop a teaser of something im doing to my friends but I want it to be as low quality as possible, anyone know of a way to do this?

The TV of mine got the screen smashed and I took it apart was able to get out literally every bit intact except for the LEDs I know I could sell them on eBay, but I’m trying to figure out something that I could do with them. I know the jailbreaking community exists wondering if I could do something with that maybe use it as a crap board to test random stuff, but I don’t know how to go about doing that or any real fiddling I mean, worst case if there’s nothing I can just use it as Greebles for art projects or as previously stated, sell it

Similar how we transfer data trough optic fiber to transform this light in the computer for complex operations in almost real time. Was there anybody trying to do so? Like a processor that is based on light rather than transistors. What are the limitations? Hipotethically speaking.

Msi gs65Stealth has a monitor hinge that broke. I can still open and close it but who knows for how long and I gotta be real gentle with it. I also have an asus x550z that I can put a new battery in and itll be ready to go.

I want to get a laptop running again to do job apps and other stuff at cafes instead of always at home. The Asus I have to like lift the whole faceplate up to get to the battery from what i've seen its not as easy as replacing the battery that I did on the msi. But I already know a broken monitor hinge would also be a bitch to replace.

Basically one laptop gets saved, and the other gets its hard drive harvested for my desktop before being thrown away

Hello.

Since the cap on Snapchat memories, I bought a 250gb external hard drive (linked for reference) in December 2025 and haven't touched it since; completely empty with no media. I have begun the transfer process last night and have transferred 25gb so far. Where the issue comes in is this morning, I plugged the drive in and the media loaded very slowly. Luckily, it eventually appeared, but I'm worried about the long term ramifications of this. Will this eventually corrupt my photos and videos? What are some tips? Do I need a backup of my backup? Should I categorize my photos and videos based on month and place them in a folder based on what month I took them?

Replacing my Lenovo Yoga 9i Gen 7 which has been running on a 12th Gen Intel Core i7-1260P (2.10 GHz) with Iris XE 80EU 1400MHZ chip and 16 GB RAM.

I hate it. My next laptop will have at least 32 GB RAM, but every option I've come across that seems to meet my needs and budget still runs on an Intel processor.

Specifically:

• ASUS Zenbook Duo - Intel Core Ultra 9 386H
• ASUS Zenbook 14 (2025) - Intel Core Ultra 9 285H
• Galaxy Book6 Pro - Intel Core Ultra 7 356H
• Galaxy Book6 Ultra - Intel Core Ultra X7 358H

How do these processors compare to each other? To my current processor? To Mac's M5 Pro and Max chips?

I hope this question makes sense. I've started using google wallet and it requires me to turn on my phone's screen lock for security purposes. I understand why, but I was wondering why can google wallet, for example, not just interface with the security features and do the locking itself?

From basic googling, it's my understanding that the biometric sensors are isolated from the main OS, bridged by a security bus (Titan M for google, Secure Enclave for Apple).

So couldn't there just an secure API for apps to access it and require specific settings?

I used to charge my laptop with a 130w charger, but that charger broke last week, i ended up buying a new charger today but only has 90w, will it still charge? (Laptop is dell precision 7510 btw)

I’m looking for my first TV at 28, and would appreciate a bit of your help :)

My criteria
- budget of up to 200-250$
- 43-45 inches
- smart tv, with the ability to stream from my apple devices

Any ideas what I could get?
I don’t need anything too fancy, for the past 15 years I’ve been watching all my shows from my MacBook so anything better than that!

I've been wondering why SATA SSDs are so much slower than nVME. nVME uses positive charges to pull the data into the cells, SATA HDDs are basically record players in terms of how they work, but how do SATA SSDs work? Do they just use the same tech as nVME but with cables that somehow limit the data write/read speeds?

I recently graduated high school, which means my school-issued Microsoft account has been deactivated and I can’t use it to log into my (non school-issued) Windows laptop anymore. The problem is that I can’t seem to log in with my personal e-mail either. I’ve tried to log in my personal g-mail account and I’ve also created a new Microsoft account to see if that would work. But when I try to log in with either of those accounts, my laptop always says the username or password is incorrect, even though I know that’s not true.

Beneath the e-mail and password box it says ‘Sign into: your account for work or school’. Does this mean I need a professional school or work account to sign in and not my personal e-mail?

Another theory I have is that I need a paid Microsoft account/subscription to be able to sign in.

Could someone confirm if one of these theories is correct or if there’s another problem? I start university this week and I really need to be able to use my laptop and right now I can’t seem to get past the lockscreen.

I really hope this is the right place to ask. If not, then feel free to tell me. Anyways, like the title says, I need a new battery for my Samsung Galaxy A32. I've been looking for one online, but I can't find any that aren't on eBay or Amazon, and I'm not sure how reliable those are. If anyone could give me recommendations or push me in the right direction, I'd greatly appreciate it.

Hey all. So, we moved recently, and don't have internet yet, so we're borrowing a hotspot from the library. My daughter keeps having issues with her phone /an iPhone 16e) and is convinced it's because her phone "senses there is wifi nearby" and "is making itself work slower because it wants the wifi". I suggested she turn off the wifi entirely, and she says it still happens. She claims when the Hotspot is off, her phone works fine.

Is there any merit to that? I've never heard of a phone with mobile data just refusing to work because wifi exists nearby. In that case, the phone would never work because wifi is all over, right?

How could a lightweight and concealed flight suit could realistically be made?

I don’t ask if the tech is DOABLE, I mean like, if we had the hypothetical technology, what would make this plausible as a prototype.

Like an iron man suit with the same mobility, but not full armor and with solid battery, ducted engines etc

Volonaut air bike had shown a strong potential with compact flight engines smaller than a motorbike.
We are not so far away I think.

Also, I know some tech already exists like the gravity air suit. I am not asking for a chunky jet pack or anything but a real lightweight tech.

I purchased a Nanit Baby Monitor Camera that uses an app, rather than a dedicated viewing device. I was originally thinking we could just use our phones or laptops to view the baby. Upon reflection, that may be a bit of a PITA, so I'd like a cheap device to use this for this purpose.

Really don't plan on using it for anything else other than this, and not planning on keeping it once the baby ages out of needing a monitor. I've seen some tablets on TEMU for as little as $30. Really my main concern is a. Will the tablet crap out from just running a single app, and b. Will it be secure?

Thanks in advance!

Im looking for a gps tracker for my cat, trying to keep her inside is getting harder and harder so im just gonna cave in and let her out but she doesn't come when you call her name or shake the treats and is extremely curious and theres a dog park nearby, so im looking for a gps tracker

I have an android and is looking for a gps without a subscription but if i have no choice I'll get one

Sorry if this post isn't allowed since its more related to cats but i figured i would try to ask the technology people incase theres better gps devices then the pet ones

I have a Samsung S26. Whenever I use Chrome and have all my tab groups displayed, in the top center are two symbols - the lefthand symbol is a single square displaying the # of open tabs; the righthand symbol shows four squares. If I click on the symbol of four squares, I will see a list of countless tab groups I've opened throughout the past year. Most of these are tabs that I already closed and do not want anymore. It's annoying to have all the tabs I've closed within the past year still displaying whenever I open Chrome. How can I close all of these tabs and disable this feature?

I have asked this on several subreddits and still haven't gotten an answer, so hoping someone here might know!

5+ years ago if I had 4g on my phone this meant I was going to get fast internet. Apps would load quick, streaming services would load instantly and while I was in the 4g zone the world was at my E.T like fingertips!

Now if my phone is showing 4g I’m holding it up in the air, looking for better signal, praying for a glimpse of 5g so I can just load my banking app up without it timing out!

What the hell has happened? Did they just say we are all upgraded to 5g but really just moved numbers about? I feel like 15 years ago 3G was faster than the 4g I get now!

If you’re reading this, you know i managed to get a ray of 5g to quickly hit the post button.

God Speed.