There's No Great Reason to Buy an Amazon Fire TV Anymore

Did You Know? The word eggplant was first recorded in 1767 and was originally applied to white cultivars grown at the time; some 18th-century European cultivars were also small, round, yellow, or white, resembling goose or hen’s eggs. Geek Trivia Which Of These Colors Appears Least Frequently In National Flags Around The World? Orange → Green → Purple → Teal → Advertisement Try The New and Improved CleanMyPC 1.8.9 with Smart Uninstaller If you want to clean up your PC the easy way, CleanMyPC is a great tool to get the job done easily, and it will even keep your computer clean automatically. The Uninstaller module can find and erase any app completely with no leftovers. The improved module includes the Safety Database to make uninstallation more accurate and safe. Free Download Want to Change Your Email Preferences? At some point in the past you subscribed to the How-To Geek newsletter, but if you'd like to change the frequency or unsubscribe, you can do so by clicking the button. Change my Subscription (or unsubscribe) Today's How-To Geek Articles Change How Long Your iPhone Screen Stays On Before Auto-Locking How to Share a Contact Over Text Message on Android How to Stop Websites From Asking to Show Notifications Smartphone Keyboards Are a Privacy Nightmare How to Install and Set Up the Nest Secure Security System There’s No Great Reason to Buy an Amazon Fire TV Anymore How to Lock Down TeamViewer for More Secure Remote Access What Is Microsoft’s TruePlay Anti-Cheat System? How to Charge Your iPhone or iPad Faster How to Make Your iPhone More Secure When Locked The Best “Lite” Versions of Your Favorite Android Apps Today's Review Geek Articles Top Photo Card Services for Spreading Holiday Cheer Protect Your Kids (and Your Beautiful New TV) with Inexpensive Safety Straps Geek Comic Today's Tech Term Toaster The word Toaster has been used as a slang term to refer to software and hardware in two different manners. Originally, it was used to describe outdated and/or slow hardware, but now it is commonly used to refer to software and/or hardware components combined into easy-to-use, task-focused packages (i.e. video editing, etc.). What We're Reading This section contains what we're reading from around the web, along with commentary from our editors. Think of it like your daily digest of the most interesting things online. Oath and Mozilla are in a legal battle over a Yahoo search deal Yahoo still has to pay Mozilla, even though Firefox's default search engine is Google, because of a clause in the contract regarding Yahoo's ownership. [Recode] Chrome Apps are dead, as Google shuts down the Chrome Web Store section Remember Chrome Apps? Well they're gone now for anyone not using a Chromebook. [Ars Technica] Steam ends support for bitcoin Transaction fees were as high as $20, according to Valve. That's just not workable for a currency [ Polygon] The Hidden Player Spurring a Wave of Cheap Consumer Devices: Amazon Affordable electronics on Amazon are going to change the way we buy things. [The New York Times] Change How Long Your iPhone Screen Stays On Before Auto-Locking By default, when you leave your iPhone or iPad unlocked, it will lock itself and turn off the display after one minute. This is great if you want to save battery life, but really annoying if you're using it as a cookbook or other reference that you occasionally glance at. The good news is you can change how long it takes before Auto-Lock kicks in on your iPhone or iPad. Here's how. Read This Article → How to Share a Contact Over Text Message on Android Sharing contact cards is actually the easiest way to handle situations like that—there’s no hassle of looking the number up, trying to remember it while you type it in (or jumping back and forth between apps to get it right), and then sending it. Instead, sending all of Dan’s information with a few taps is the way to go—and that way, your recipient can add them to their contacts instantly. Read This Article → How to Stop Websites From Asking to Show Notifications Web browsers now allow websites to show you notifications. On many news and shopping websites, you’ll see a popup telling you the website wants to show notifications on your desktop. You can disable these notification prompts in your web browser if they annoy you. Read This Article → Smartphone Keyboards Are a Privacy Nightmare Both Android and the iPhone allow you to replace the standard keyboard with a third-party one. By its very nature, though, a keyboard has full access to everything you type on it—from private messages to passwords and credit card numbers. Some of the keyboard’s data is often sent over the internet, where it could be stolen—or even abused by the keyboard’s developer. Read This Article → How to Install and Set Up the Nest Secure Security System Nest originally started with just a smart thermostat, but the company has grown quite a bit over the years. And now, they have their own security system called the Nest Secure. Here’s how to install it and set it up. Read This Article → There’s No Great Reason to Buy an Amazon Fire TV Anymore Amazon has a history of using hardware platforms to make people buy stuff. The Kindle and the Echo are both useful on their own, but Amazon’s long-term plan for both is all about selling things. Amazon’s Fire TV line is no different. Read This Article → How to Lock Down TeamViewer for More Secure Remote Access TeamViewer is a great free program, whether you want to access your computer from afar or help out friends and relatives with their computer. But its default settings are remarkably insecure, instead favoring ease of use. Here’s how to lock down TeamViewer so you can make use of its features without opening yourself up to attack. Read This Article → What Is Microsoft’s TruePlay Anti-Cheat System? Hey Internet people, did you know that Microsoft makes video games? Okay, you’re probably aware of the various incarnations of the Xbox, yes. But long before the Xbox, Microsoft was a video game publisher for the PC…and still is! It even has its own distribution platform, which is the rather terrible Windows Store. Read This Article → How to Charge Your iPhone or iPad Faster If you’re using the charger that came with your iPhone or iPad, you’re getting “slow” charging speeds. You can buy a much faster charger. And, with iOS 11.2, there are now even several different speeds of wireless charging as well. Read This Article → How to Make Your iPhone More Secure When Locked Locking your iPhone does a pretty good job at keeping people away from your personal information, but there are still some things someone unscrupulous can do without typing in your passcode. Read This Article → The Best “Lite” Versions of Your Favorite Android Apps If you’re looking for a good way to speed up your phone or cut down on your data usage, there are a lot of official “lite” versions of popular apps like Facebook or YouTube. These are generally less feature-rich than their full-powered counterparts, but they’re often a great middle ground between features and function. Read This Article → Advertisement Try The New and Improved CleanMyPC 1.8.9 with Smart Uninstaller If you want to clean up your PC the easy way, CleanMyPC is a great tool to get the job done easily, and it will even keep your computer clean automatically. The Uninstaller module can find and erase any app completely with no leftovers. The improved module includes the Safety Database to make uninstallation more accurate and safe. Free Download