Information Technology

Kerry Wan/ZDNETGoogle last month released Android 16 to Pixel devices and select OEMs, bringing performance improvements, new Material You changes, and more upgrades. If you want to try this update but are hesitant because you’ve noticed your Android phone or tablet already feels too sluggish, clearing app and browser caches can give it a fresh boost and free up some storage space.Over time, cached data can accumulate, become corrupted, or simply get outdated, which may slow down your device. Restarting your phone often helps, but a targeted cache-clear is a quick way to boost responsiveness without upgrading hardware.Also: I changed 12 settings on my Android phone to give it an instant battery boostIn this guide, I’ll show you how to clear cached data on Android. If you’re an Apple user, here’s how to clear the cache on an iPhone.How to clear cached data from Android appsWhat you’ll need: Any Android device. The exact steps may vary slightly by manufacturer, but the general process remains the same. More

Google Love it or hate it, Google’s AI Mode has revamped the way you search for information. Instead of presenting you with tens of thousands of website links, Google serves up an AI-generated overview and summary of the results. Also: Sick of AI in your search results? Try these 7 Google alternatives with old-school, AI-free charm […] More

5./15 WEST / Getty Images AI age verification is coming to YouTube, and it’s almost certainly going to be a frustrating process for some people. Also: How to download YouTube videos for free – 2 ways, including my favorite In an announcement yesterday, the streaming video service says it’s “extending our built-in protections” by letting AI […] More

RayNeo Air 3S <!–> ZDNET’s key takeaways The RayNeo Air 3S is available for $225 These XR glasses provide advanced micro-OLED screens, dual speaker chamber design, and a 201-inch screen visual experience There are no light-blocking shades or electrochromic dimming capability, and productivity support is limited to native MacOS and Windows support. more buying choices […] More

Kospet Magic P10 smartwatch <!–> ZDNET’s key takeaways The Kospet Magic P10 and R10 are on sale on Amazon for $130 each. The associated app is robust, the watch battery lasts for more than a week, and the rugged design can handle all environments. The magnet on the charging cable is a bit weak and […] More

Yuichiro Chino/Getty Unless you’re using a computer from the ’90s or early 2000s, typically speaking, Ubuntu runs very well on most machines. I’ve found it to be fairly predictable in that respect. However, nothing is perfect, and you might run into an instance where the open-source operating system doesn’t perform up to your standards. Also: […] More

Prakhar Khanna/ZDNETSamsung phones are well known for One UI, one of the most functional and intuitive Android interfaces. While it’s highly customizable, these phones often come with preinstalled bloatware. Some built-in Samsung apps, such as Wearable and Wallet, are useful within the Samsung ecosystem. However, there are at least five first-party apps that even dedicated Samsung users rarely touch.The preinstalled bloatware apps can vary by device, price, and lineup, but many are common across all Galaxy phones. While you might not be able to uninstall all of them, they’re easy to disable and can be re-enabled if you ever need them.Also: I changed 10 Samsung phone settings for an instant performance boostWhile these apps aren’t necessarily useless or mindless bloatware, every user’s needs differ. If you’re not using them, it’s a good idea to uninstall or disable such Samsung apps to save memory and reduce background battery usage. More

synthetick / Getty Images I’ve had it happen before. Back when drives consisted of spinning, magnetic platters, that dreaded “tick” was a sure sign a hard drive was failing. Once upon a nightmare scenario, I waited too late and wound up losing everything on my drive. Sure, I could have recovered that data, but at […] More