While there remain regular laptops and gaming laptops, the line that separates them has nearly disappeared. Today, if you have a fast CPU and graphics card, along with perks like a big screen and a good cooling system, you can play a decent number of games on your laptop. Besides, not everyone wants a big, garish gaming rig, nor does everyone want to spend the money required to get one of those. If you’re considering a new laptop for school, there are more options now than ever before that can both get you through your most challenging studies and keep up with your next AAA play through. These are our top picks for the best laptops for gaming and schoolwork — but if you’re looking for a dedicated gaming laptop rather than an all-in-one machine, check out our best gaming laptops list for our recommendations.

Best laptops for gaming and school in 2025

Are gaming laptops good for school?

As we’ve mentioned, gaming laptops are especially helpful if you're doing any demanding work. Their big promise is powerful graphics performance, which isn't just limited to PC gaming. Video editing and 3D rendering programs can also tap into their GPUs to handle laborious tasks. While you can find decent GPUs on some productivity machines, like Dell's XPS 15, you can sometimes find better deals on gaming laptops. My general advice for any new workhorse: Pay attention to the specs; get at least 16GB of RAM and the largest solid state drive you can find (ideally 1TB or more). Those components are both typically hard to upgrade down the line, so it’s worth investing what you can up front to get the most out of your PC gaming experience long term. Also, don’t forget the basics like a webcam, which will likely be necessary for the schoolwork portion of your activities.

The one big downside to choosing a gaming notebook is portability. For the most part, we'd recommend 15-inch models to get the best balance of size and price. Those typically weigh in around 4.5 pounds, which is significantly more than a three-pound ultraportable. Today's gaming notebooks are still far lighter than older models, though, so at least you won't be lugging around a 10-pound brick. If you’re looking for something lighter, there are plenty of 14-inch options these days. And if you're not into LED lights and other gamer-centric bling, keep an eye out for more understated models that still feature essentials like a webcam (or make sure you know how to turn those lights off).

When Apple put its new M4 chip in the iPad Pro before adding it to a MacBook, that was a pretty clear sign that tablets are more than just idle couch companions. But with just one or two ports, you’ll need a hub if you want to maximize that potential. The same goes for laptops: they can be more powerful than desktops, but they almost always have fewer ports. USB-C hubs give you some combo of extra USB, HDMI, memory card, Ethernet and/or 3.5 mm ports so you can connect peripherals like monitors or wired mice and keyboards. You can hook up external drives for more storage — some hubs even have memory card slots. We tested 15 different USB-C hubs to see how they perform and put the best of what we tested below.

What to look for in a USB-C hub

Hub vs docking station

The first thing to decide is whether you need a USB-C hub or a docking station. There’s no set standard for what differentiates the two, but docking stations tend to have more ports, offer a separate DC power supply and cost more, with some reaching upwards of $400. We have a separate guide to the best docking stations to check out if you’re looking for something bigger than what we’re discussing here. USB-C hubs, in contrast, have between four and 10 ports, can support pass-through charging and typically cost between $30 and $150.

Hubs make more sense for smaller setups with just a few peripherals, such as a monitor, a wired keyboard and mouse, and the occasional external drive. They’re also more portable, since they’re small and require no dedicated power. That could be useful if you change work locations but want to bring your accessories with you, or if you want to replace your laptop with a more powerful tablet. A docking station makes more sense for someone who needs a robust setup for their laptop, including multiple external monitors, webcams, stream decks, microphones and so on.

Both docks and hubs make it easy to grab your laptop off your desk for a meeting or other brief relocation and when you get back, plugging in one cable gets all your accessories reconnected.

Ports

The first port to consider is the one on your laptop or tablet. For a USB-C hub to work, it needs to connect to a port that supports video, data and power — all of which is covered by anything listed as USB 3.0 or better. The port, of course, needs to be Type-C as well. The sea of laptops out there is vast, so it’s hard to make generalizations, but modern laptops should have at least one USB-C port that will suffice, and indeed, every one of our top picks for the best laptops do.

Next, it’s a matter of finding a hub that has the right connections for your needs. Most hubs offer some combo of HDMI, USB, memory card, Ethernet and 3.5 mm ports. If you have a 4K monitor and would like at least a 60Hz refresh rate, you’ll need a hub with an HDMI 2.0 port — HDMI 1.4 only goes up to 30Hz. HDMI 2.1 will handle 4K at up to 120Hz, but hubs that have adopted that standard aren’t as common just yet. Keep in mind that a low refresh rate can cause your screen to feel laggy, making your mouse appear glitchy and your webcam movements to look delayed.

Additional USB ports on these accessories are usually Type-A or Type-C. They can support data with different transfer rates, typically 5Gbps or 10Gbps. Some ports only handle passthrough power and no data, and some can do data, power and video, so it’s best to check the spec list to make sure you’re getting the support you need. Keep in mind that a hub may bill itself as a 7-in-1, but one of those ports may not be usable for anything other than charging.

Standard SD and microSD slots are useful for transferring data from cameras and the like. Ethernet ports may deliver faster internet speeds than your Wi-Fi and a hub with a 3.5mm jack can bring back the wired headphone connection that some laptops have ditched.

Photo by Amy Skorheim / Engadget

Power delivery

Nearly all of the USB-C hubs I tested support passthrough charging. That means if your laptop or tablet only charges via USB, you don’t have to take up another port on your laptop to keep everything topped up. Unlike a docking station, powering a hub is optional. The one exception is if you want to close the lid on your laptop while you work on an external monitor. Most computers will go into sleep mode if the lid is closed without power, so either the laptop or the hub will need to be plugged into the wall to prevent that from happening.

Many of the newer hubs include a 100W power delivery (PD) port, with a healthy 80 to 85 watts going to your computer (the hubs take a little of the juice for themselves, hence the 15-watt or so difference). In my tests, sending power through the hub made them run even hotter than they do already, so I prefer to charge the computer directly. But for tablets or other devices with no extra ports, that PD option is important.

Some PD ports are also data ports — which is both good and bad. On one hand, it feels wasteful to use a perfectly good data port just for boring old electricity. But on the other hand, USB-C connections that only carry a charge are less versatile, and it makes it seem like it has more accessory hookups than it actually does.

Design

There’s surprisingly little design variation among hubs. Most look like a flat slab, a little smaller than a smartphone, and have an attached Type-C host cable. The hues range from a silvery black to a silvery gray. Some are thinner than others, some have all ports on one edge and some have ports on both sides. All of this is just to say that aesthetics probably won’t make or break your buying decision.

One variation that could tip the scales is the length of the cable. A longer one will give you more freedom as you arrange the hub on your desk, potentially even letting you hide it behind your laptop. Or you may prefer a shorter one to keep the hub neatly set beside your laptop.

How we test USB-C hubs

Before we test anything, we take a look at what’s available and how they’ve been received by shoppers, forum-goers and other publications. I became familiar with a few reputable brands when I was testing docking stations, so I looked into hubs from those companies as well. I focused on items that would help with an average day of productivity — not high-end setups or demanding gaming situations. Once I settled on a dozen or so that would make good candidates, I had them shipped to my humble office in the desert and started testing them out over the course of a few weeks.

I used an M1 MacBook Pro as the host computer and plugged in accessories that include a 4K Dell monitor, a ZSA USB-C ergo keyboard, a Logitech USB-A gaming mouse, an Elgato USB-C 4K webcam, a Logitech streaming light, a USB-A 3.0 Sandisk thumb drive, a USB-C Samsung T7 Shield external drive and a pair of wired headphones I got for free on an airplane (I should probably invest in some wired headphones, but the cord dangling on my chest drives me nutty so all my earbuds are wireless). I used high-end HDMI and USB-C cables to ensure that any data or connectivity issues weren’t related to my equipment.

Then I put each USB-C hub through a gamut of basic tests. I looked at what could be plugged in at once, the resolution on the monitor, data transfer speeds, the overall build quality of the hub and general usability factors, like the placement of the ports and the length of the cords. And, finally, the price to value ratio helped determine the best ones for a few different use cases.

Best USB-C hubs for 2025

Other hubs we tested

HyperDrive Next 10 Port USB-C Hub

There’s a lot to like about HyperDrive’s Next 10 Port USB-C Hub. The tethered cable is a lavish 13 inches long, the HDMI 2.0 port outputs clear and crisp 4K visuals at 60Hz and the data transfers are screaming fast. It has the coveted two USB-C data ports plus a PD port, and there’s even a headphone jack. The only thing that holds back a full-throated endorsement is the way our unit handled a streaming light. Having it on at full brightness made the webcam flicker every time. The issue went away at 75 percent brightness, but the same problem didn’t happen on any other hub I tested.

Anker 341 USB-C Hub (7-in-1)

There’s nothing wrong with the Anker 341 USB-C hub. In fact it’s a current recommendation in our iPad accessories guide and it comes at a great $35 price. It gives you two USB-A ports as well as SD slots. But at this point, a 1.4 HDMI connection, which only supports 4K resolution at 30Hz feels a little retro. There’s also just a single USB-C downstream port and the data transfer tests proved to be a touch slower than the other hubs. But if you’ve got a lower resolution monitor and don’t need more than one USB-C, you won’t be disappointed with it.

Startech 4-Port USB-C Hub (data only)

I only became aware of Startech when I started researching for this guide. The quality is decent and the yellow accents are a welcome bit of color in the otherwise very gray world of hubs. The performance is solid, with no hiccups that I encountered. The brand’s 4-Port USB-C Hub has a long cord that wraps around the hub itself, which is unique. It doesn’t bother with power delivery, which isn’t an issue if you can power your computer directly. But the four USB ports (three Type-A and one Type-C) max out at 5Gbps and there’s no HDMI connector. It goes for $46, and unfortunately for it, there are cheaper ways to get a few more USB ports for your setup.

You might be tempted to get a Chromebook as your next laptop and we wouldn’t blame you. Chrome OS has come a long way: Chromebooks today have a good combination of build quality, battery life and power while also supporting years of software updates that will take you years into the future. If you primarily browse the web, or don’t need a ton of extra software on a regular basis, a Chromebook can be a powerful daily driver.

While Google did make things simpler last fall by introducing the Chromebook Plus initiative (more on that below), there are still multiple things to keep in mind when shopping for a new Chromebook. The market is saturated with machines at different price points and power levels; I’ve been testing and reviewing Chromebooks for years and know what you should be looking for, and what you can expect out of these laptops.

What is Chrome OS, and why would I use it over Windows?

This is probably the number one question about Chromebooks. There are plenty of inexpensive Windows laptops on the market, so why bother with Chrome's operating system? Glad you asked. For me, the simple and clean nature of Chrome OS is a big selling point. Chrome OS is based on Google’s Chrome browser, which means most of the programs you can run are web based. There’s no bloatware or unwanted apps to uninstall like you often get on Windows laptops, it boots up in seconds, and you can completely reset to factory settings almost as quickly.

Of course, simplicity will also be a major drawback for some users. Not being able to install native software can be a dealbreaker if you’re a video editor or software developer. But there are also plenty of people who do the majority of their work in a web browser.

Google and its software partners are getting better every year at supporting more advanced features. For example, Google added video editing tools to the Google Photos app on Chromebooks – it won’t replace Adobe Premiere, but it should be handy for a lot of people. Similarly, Google and Adobe announced Photoshop on the web last year, something that brings much of the power of Adobe’s desktop apps to Chromebooks.

Chromebooks can also run Android apps, which greatly expands the amount of software available. The quality varies widely, but it means you can do more with a Chromebook beyond just web-based apps. For example, you can install the Netflix app and save videos for offline watching. Other Android apps like Microsoft Office and Adobe Lightroom are surprisingly capable as well. Between Android apps and a general improvement in web apps, Chromebooks are more than just portals to a browser.

What do Chromebooks do well?

Photo by Nathan Ingraham / Engadget

Put simply, web browsing and really anything web based. Online shopping, streaming music and video and using various social media sites are among the most common daily tasks people do on Chromebooks. As you might expect, they also work well with Google services like Photos, Docs, Gmail, Drive, Keep and so on. Yes, any computer that can run Chrome can do that too, but the lightweight nature of Google Chrome OS makes it a responsive and stable platform.

As I mentioned before, Chrome OS can run Android apps, so if you’re an Android user you’ll find some nice ties between the platforms. You can get most of the same apps that are on your phone on a Chromebook and keep info in sync between them. You can also use some Android phones as a security key for your Chromebook or instantly tether your laptop to use mobile data.

Google continues to tout security as a major differentiator for Chromebooks, and it’s definitely a factor worth considering. Auto-updates are the first lines of defense: Chrome OS updates download quickly in the background and a fast reboot is all it takes to install the latest version. Google says that each webpage and app on a Chromebook runs in its own sandbox as well, so any security threats are contained to that individual app. Finally, Chrome OS has a self-check called Verified Boot that runs every time a device starts up. Beyond all this, the simple fact that you generally can’t install traditional apps on a Chromebook means there are fewer ways for bad actors to access the system.

If you’re interested in Google’s Gemini AI tools, a Chromebook is a good option as well. Every Chromebook in our top picks comes with a full year of the Google One AI Premium plan — this combines the usual Google One perks like 2TB of storage and 10 percent back in purchases from the Google Store with a bunch of AI tools. You’ll get access to Gemini in Gmail, Docs and other apps, Gemini Advanced (which runs on the 1.5 Pro model) and more. Given that this plan is $20/month, it’s a pretty solid perk. Chromebook Plus models also include tools like the AI-powered “help me write,” the Google Photos Magic Editor and generative AI backgrounds you can create by filling in a few prompts.

As for when to avoid Chromebooks, the answer is simple: If you rely heavily on a specific native application for Windows or a Mac, chances are you won’t find the exact same option on a ChromeOS device. That’s most true in fields like photo and video editing, but it can also be the case in law or finance. Plenty of businesses run on Google’s G suite software, but more still have specific requirements that a Chromebook might not match. If you’re an iPhone user, you’ll also miss out on the way the iPhone easily integrates with an iPad or Mac. For me, the big downside is not being able to access iMessage on a Chromebook.

Finally, gaming Chromebooks are not ubiquitous, although they’re becoming a slightly more reasonable option with the rise of cloud gaming. In late 2022, Google and some hardware partners announced a push to make Chromebooks with cloud gaming in mind. From a hardware perspective, that means laptops with bigger screens that have higher refresh rates as well as optimizing those laptops to work with services like NVIDIA GeForce Now, Xbox Game Pass and Amazon Luna. You’ll obviously need an internet connection to use these services, but the good news is that playing modern games on a Chromebook isn’t impossible. You can also install Android games from the Google Play Store, but that’s not what most people are thinking of when they want to game on a laptop.

What are the most important specs for a Chromebook?

Photo by Nathan Ingraham / Engadget

Chrome OS is lightweight and runs well on fairly modest hardware, so the most important thing to look for might not be processor power or storage space. But Google made it easier to get consistent specs and performance late last year when it introduced the Chromebook Plus initiative. Any device with a Chromebook Plus designation meets some minimum requirements, which happen to be very similar to what I’d recommend most people get if they’re looking for a laptop they can use every day.

Chromebook Plus models have at least a 12th-gen Intel Core i3 processor, or an AMD Ryzen 3 7000 series processor, both of which should be more than enough for most people. These laptops also have a minimum of 8GB of RAM and 128GB of storage, which should do the trick unless you’re really pushing your Chromebook. All Chromebook Plus models have to have a 1080p webcam, which is nice in these days of constant video calling, and they also all have to have at least a 1080p IPS screen.

Of course, you can get higher specs or better screens if you desire, but I’ve found that basically everything included in the Chromebook Plus target specs makes for a very good experience.

Google has an Auto Update policy for Chromebooks as well, and while that’s not exactly a spec, it’s worth checking before you buy. Last year, Google announced that Chromebooks would get software updates and support for an impressive 10 years after their release date. This support page lists the Auto Update expiration date for virtually every Chromebook ever, but a good rule of thumb is to buy the newest machine you can to maximize your support.

How much should I spend?

Chromebooks started out notoriously cheap, with list prices often coming in under $300. But as they’ve gone more mainstream, they’ve transitioned from being essentially modern netbooks to the kind of laptop you’ll want to use all day. As such, prices have increased: At this point, you should expect to spend at least $400 if you want a solid daily driver. There are still many cheap Chromebooks out there that may be suitable as secondary devices, but a good Chromebook that can be an all-day, every-day laptop will cost more. But, notably, even the best Chromebooks usually cost less than the best Windows laptops, or even the best “regular” laptops out there.

There are plenty of premium Chromebooks that approach or even exceed $1,000 that claim to offer better performance and more processing power, but I don’t recommend spending that much. Generally, that’ll get you a better design with more premium materials, as well as more powerful internals and extra storage space. Of course, you also sometimes pay for the brand name. But, the specs I outlined earlier are usually enough.

See Also:

• Best Laptops for 2025

• Best Gaming Laptops

• Best 2-in-1 Laptops for 2025

• Best Cheap Windows Laptops

• Best Laptops for College Students

Best Chromebooks in 2025

Other Chromebooks we tested

Samsung Galaxy Chromebook Plus

Samsung’s new Galaxy Chromebook Plus is one of the more unique Chromebooks out there. It’s extremely thin and light, at .46 inches and 2.6 pounds, but it manages to include a 15.6-inch display in that frame. That screen is a 1080p panel that’s sharp and bright, but its 16:9 aspect ratio made things feel a bit cramped when scrolling vertically. Performance is very good, and the keyboard is solid, though I’m not a fan of the number pad as it shifts everything to the left. At $700 it’s not cheap, but that feels fair considering its size and capabilities. If you’re looking for a big screen laptop that is also super light, this Chromebook merits consideration, even if it’s not the best option for everyone.

• Broadcom's stock surged in recent weeks, pushing the company's market value over $1 trillion.
• Broadcom is crucial for companies seeking alternatives to Nvidia's AI chip dominance.
• Custom AI chips are gaining traction, enhancing tech firms' bargaining power, analysts say.

The rise of AI, and the computing power it requires, is bringing all kinds of previously under-the-radar companies into the limelight. This week it's Broadcom.

Broadcom's stock has soared since late last week, catapulting the company into the $1 trillion market cap club. The boost came from a blockbuster earnings report in which custom AI chip revenue grew 220% compared to last year.

In addition to selling lots of parts and components for data centers, Broadcom designs and sells ASICs, or application-specific integrated circuits — an industry acronym meaning custom chips.

Designers of custom AI chips, chief among them Broadcom and Marvell, are headed into a growth phase, according to Morgan Stanley.

Custom chips are picking up speed

The biggest players in AI buy a lot of chips from Nvidia, the $3 trillion giant with an estimated 90% of market share of advanced AI chips.

Heavily relying on one supplier isn't a comfortable position for any company, though, and many large Nvidia customers are also developing their own chips. Most tech companies don't have large teams of silicon and hardware experts in house. Of the companies they might turn to design them a custom chip, Broadcom is the leader.

Though multi-purpose chips like Nvidia's and AMD's graphics processing units are likely to maintain the largest share of the AI chip market in the long-term, custom chips are growing fast.

Morgan Stanley analysts this week forecast the market for ASICs to nearly double to $22 billion next year.

Much of that growth is attributable to Amazon Web Services' Trainium AI chip, according to Morgan Stanley analysts. Then there are Google's in-house AI chips, known as TPUs, which Broadcom helps make.

In terms of actual value of chips in use, Amazon and Google dominate. But OpenAI, Apple, and TikTok parent company ByteDance are all reportedly developing chips with Broadcom, too.

ASICs bring bargaining power

Custom chips can offer more value, in terms of the performance you get for the cost, according to Morgan Stanley's research.

ASICs can also be designed to perfectly match unique internal workloads for tech companies, accord to the bank's analysts. The better these custom chips get, the more bargaining power they may provide when tech companies are negotiating with Nvidia over buying GPUs. But this will take time, the analysts wrote.

In addition to Broadcom, Silicon Valley neighbor Marvell is making gains in the ASICs market, along with Asia-based players Alchip Technologies and Mediatek, they added in a note to investors.

Analysts don't expect custom chips to ever fully replace Nvidia GPUs, but without them, cloud service providers like AWS, Microsoft, and Google would have much less bargaining power against Nvidia.

"Over the long term, if they execute well, cloud service providers may enjoy greater bargaining power in AI semi procurement with their own custom silicon," the Morgan Stanley analysts explained.

Nvidia's big R&D budget

This may not be all bad news for Nvidia. A $22 billion ASICs market is smaller than Nvidia's revenue for just one quarter.

Nvidia's R&D budget is massive, and many analysts are confident in its ability to stay at the bleeding edge of AI computing.

And as Nvidia rolls out new, more advanced GPUs, its older offerings get cheaper and potentially more competitive with ASICs.

"We believe the cadence of ASICs needs to accelerate to stay competitive to GPUs," the Morgan Stanley analysts wrote.

Still, Broadcom and chip manufacturers on the supply chain rung beneath, such as TSMC, are likely to get a boost every time a giant cloud company orders up another custom AI chip.

It’s been a few years since Samsung took a crack at making a premium Chromebook. In 2020, the company released the first Galaxy Chromebook, a $999 laptop with a gorgeous 4K OLED screen that barely lasted five hours away from a charger. The company fixed some issues with its 2021 model, which had a more pedestrian screen and a thicker design while costing $300 less — a fair compromise given that battery life was significantly better.

Since then, Google has also launched the Chromebook Plus initiative, which aims to standardize Chromebook specs to give people a more consistent experience. And now, Samsung has released its first entry to that lineup: the Galaxy Chromebook Plus. It’s a bit different than most of the other laptops in that space, though, with a large 15.6-inch OLED screen and a design that’s extremely thin and light for its size. It reminds me a little bit of the 15-inch MacBook Air, though its appearance is unmistakably Samsung. The Galaxy Chromebook Plus also has more of Google’s AI capabilities baked into it than any Chromebook thus far, thanks to a new “Quick Insert” key that grants fast access to Gemini.

Finally, it’s one of the most expensive Chromebook Plus options out there at $699. That puts it directly in competition with Acer’s Chromebook Spin Plus 714, my current favorite in the premium Chromebook space. And while it’s refreshingly different from the Acer and Lenovo models I usually use, there are a few quirks here you should know about.

Photo by Nathan Ingraham / Engadget

Hardware and design: Not your typical Chromebook

First, though, the good stuff. The Galaxy Chromebook Plus’ 1080p, 15.6-inch screen is crisp and bright, with excellent viewing angles. Somewhat surprisingly, though, it doesn’t have a touchscreen. Lots of Chromebooks do, as it makes interacting with some Android apps easier. But once I got used to the fact that poking the screen did nothing, I didn’t really miss it. Samsung says it’s the only Chromebook Plus with an AMOLED display, and while I wouldn’t mind a higher resolution, I know that would lead to worse battery life. All told, I think Samsung made the right choice not to go for 4K, especially considering that a computer this thin doesn’t have as much room for a bigger battery.

Speaking of: this laptop is seriously thin. It’s less than half an inch thick (0.46 inches to be precise) and weighs only 2.58 pounds. That’s essentially the same thickness as the 13- and 15-inch MacBook Air, and the Galaxy Chromebook Plus is lighter than both. It’s well-suited to going anywhere without being too much of a burden, not something you get often on a laptop with a large screen. Despite its thin-and-light design, Samsung didn’t skimp on ports here: it has HDMI, two USB-C ports (one of which you’ll need for charging), a microSDXC slot (that I wish was standard microSD), a headphone jack and an old-school USB-A port.

As part of the Chromebook Plus line, this laptop exceeds the minimum spec requirements. It pairs an Intel Core 3 100U processor released earlier this year with 8GB of RAM and 256GB of storage. That’s more than enough power for a Chromebook in this day and age, and I had no qualms with its performance across the board.

While the Galaxy Chromebook Plus is quite svelte, its 15.6-inch screen makes transporting it a little awkward. Thanks to its 16:9 aspect ratio, the laptop has serious surfboard vibes – it’s just very wide, and it’s a tight fit in my bag. Furthermore, the 16:9 aspect ratio makes the screen feel smaller than it really is. The 1080p panel defaults to a scaled resolution that works out to 1,600 x 900, almost 100 fewer vertical pixels than my 14-inch MacBook Pro. I’ve been yelling into the void for years now that the 16:9 aspect ratio is just not ideal for modern computing, given the verticality of basically every web site. I’d be much happier with a smaller panel that offered more vertical pixels, but that’s just me.

I have mixed feelings about the keyboard and trackpad. Since the Galaxy Chromebook Plus is so thin, the keys don’t feel quite as comfortable as those on most other Chromebooks I use, to say nothing of my MacBook Pro. But, they’re not bad at all; nothing like the terrible butterfly keyboards on the MacBooks of the prior decade. They have less travel and are a little clickier than I’d like but still easy enough to acclimate to.

Photo by Nathan Ingraham / Engadget

My real issue is that Samsung chose to include a number pad on the keyboard. This might be my own personal quirk, but I generally can’t stand number pads because I’d much rather have my hands centered below the display. I always feel slightly off-kilter and unbalanced using a laptop with a number pad, and it led to me making far more typos than I usually do. I’m sure if it was my only computer, I’d adjust and get used to it — but I don’t think I’d ever really like it. For me, the tradeoff just isn’t worth the number pad. I also found myself activating the trackpad by grazing it with the side of my palms while typing more often than I’d like. I eventually acclimated to how to type comfortably and avoid the touchpad, but between that and the number pad I found the Galaxy Chromebook Plus’s typing experience isn’t as good as some other Chromebooks I’ve used.

Perhaps the most notable thing about the keyboard, though, is the new Quick Insert key that goes where the traditional search key is. (Chromebooks have always had this instead of a caps lock key.) Quick Insert pulls up a small menu similar in size to what you see if you right-click something. But it gives contextual suggestions based on what you’re doing rather than showing the same options every time. In the very Google Doc where I wrote this review, it suggested various emoji (which would definitely be useful when using a chat app), links to a few Google Drive files it thought were relevant and a “help me write” prompt using Google Gemini. The menu also shows quick links to your Files folder, Google Drive, browsing history and a few other potentially helpful options.

Photo by Nathan Ingraham / Engadget

Samsung moved the traditional launcher key to the bottom row, nestled between Fn and Alt. That key still brings up the app launcher and a traditional search field for things on your computer; you can also easily search Google from here. The trickiest thing about this placement is that some shortcuts I was used to now require me to use the launcher in a new spot instead of Quick Insert. It’s a bit of a learning curve, and the benefit of Quick Insert doesn’t quite outweigh having to retrain my brain on new shortcuts. Hopefully the Quick Insert gets smarter and more useful over time, but right now it’s mostly a shortcut to grabbing emoji quickly. I have zero interest in having Google’s AI help me write anything, so for now its utility is limited.

Photo by Nathan Ingraham / Engadget

ChromeOS and Gemini

That’s the good and bad of the hardware, but that’s only part of the equation. By now, the usual caveats of ChromeOS are well-known: it’s still a primarily web-based system, but Android applications can extend its features. There are also plenty of web apps that are well optimized for ChromeOS, and Google Docs has a comprehensive offline mode at this point. And if you have a recent Android phone, ChromeOS has a pretty robust feature set when you pair it to your Chromebook, including shared notifications and streaming of some apps directly to your laptop.

Google has also added a lot of smart and useful features to ChromeOS over the last year or so that make it more useful. For example, clicking the date in the taskbar brings up your full Google calendar and anything in the Tasks app, making it a quick place to see what you have planned for the day without having to dive into the full Calendar or Tasks experience. There’s also a new “focus” mode for when you want to sit down and concentrate. It turns on Do Not Disturb, sets a timer and lets you pick a YouTube Music playlist or some “focus sounds” like ambient or classical music, or even the sounds of nature. It’s a small thing, but there are a lot of thoughtful tools like that now in ChromeOS that make it feel like much more than just a browser.

Naturally, AI is a bigger part of ChromeOS than ever. In addition to the “help me write” tools and suggestions that show up when you tap the Quick Insert key, Gemini is a click away with an app shortcut in the toolbar by default. There are also a few frivolous AI features thrown in, like a wallpaper generator with eight different categories to choose from (landscape, surreal, dreamscape, classic art and so on). Once you pick one, you’ll get a few more fields you can edit to get a handful of AI creations you can set as your wallpaper. You don’t get full creative control here; generally there are two things you can edit in each prompt. They’re hit or miss, but I did like the “classic art” avant-garde beach scene I created.

There’s also a beta test of the “help me read” feature that’ll summarize documents, PDFs and web pages. I made a PDF of this review from Google Docs and had the AI summarize it, which it did with no errors but also with very little detail. I asked it questions about the content of the document and it answered them accurately, as well. And the Magic Editor built into Google Photos on Pixel phones is also available on Chromebook Plus models, letting you alter the reality of your snapshots to your heart's content. None of this stuff is essential to me, but it’s clearly the way we’re headed, like it or not. One good thing is that Google includes a full year of its $20/month Google One with AI plan to Chromebook Plus buyers, this Samsung model included. That gets you 2TB of Drive storage and access to Gemini Advanced, Gemini in Google Docs and Gmail, as well as a few other AI perks. I don’t think it’s necessary at this point, but getting to try it for a full year is a pretty nice offer.

Finally, there’s the ever-present question of battery life. I’m getting between six and a half and eight hours off the charger, depending on what I’m doing; as usual, video calls really put a hurt on things. That’s not bad, but it’s still pretty far from the 13 hours Samsung claims. I don’t know what I’d have to do to come close to that mark. One day, with concentrated use, I burned through two-thirds of the battery in less than four hours. That’s pretty common for basically all Chromebooks I’ve tested in recent years, and my guess is that with Intel silicon we’re not going to see things improve in any meaningful way.

Wrap-up

Despite some misgivings, I actually enjoyed my time with the Galaxy Chromebook Plus. I probably wouldn’t pick it as my own personal computer, because the number pad I won’t use simply makes things too awkward. But there’s also a lot to like here – it’s so much lighter and thinner than other Chromebooks I usually use that it is a delight to travel with, despite the fact that its width is a bit cumbersome. And while I wish there was more vertical screen resolution, I did enjoy having such a large display combined in a very portable device.

For the right kind of buyer, the Galaxy Chromebook Plus might be just what you’re looking for (especially if the idea of a number pad on the keyboard excites you). For me, though, the slightly more boring but reliable Acer Chromebook Spin 714 Plus remains my favorite premium Chromebook. But Samsung has put forward a solid effort here, and I hope they continue on this path with future Chromebooks – Acer and Lenovo could use the competition.

One of the oldest maxims in hacking is that once an attacker has physical access to a device, it’s game over for its security. The basis is sound. It doesn’t matter how locked down a phone, computer, or other machine is; if someone intent on hacking it gains the ability to physically manipulate it, the chances of success are all but guaranteed.

In the age of cloud computing, this widely accepted principle is no longer universally true. Some of the world’s most sensitive information—health records, financial account information, sealed legal documents, and the like—now often resides on servers that receive day-to-day maintenance from unknown administrators working in cloud centers thousands of miles from the companies responsible for safeguarding it.

Bad (RAM) to the bone

In response, chipmakers have begun baking protections into their silicon to provide assurances that even if a server has been physically tampered with or infected with malware, sensitive data funneled through virtual machines can’t be accessed without an encryption key that’s known only to the VM administrator. Under this scenario, admins inside the cloud provider, law enforcement agencies with a court warrant, and hackers who manage to compromise the server are out of luck.

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When Sony first released the PlayStation 5, the console came with a paltry 1TB of storage. At the time, it wasn’t possible to add more space through the system’s SSD expansion slot. Thankfully, that quickly changed with a software update that arrived less than a year later. Since July 2023, Sony has allowed PS5 users to add up to 8TB of additional storage to their system. It’s a good thing too, with just how big some game installs are this console generation. Even when considering the PS5 Pro and its 2TB of built-in storage, it won’t take long for a dedicated gamer to fill up the included SSD. It will take even less time with the standard model’s 667GB of available storage.

The good news is a standard PCIe Gen4 x4 M.2 NVMe SSD can solve all of your PS5 storage woes. If that mess of acronyms has you recoiling, don’t worry: you’ll see that it’s not all that complicated. And if all you want to know is what the best PS5 SSDs are, they’re right at the top.

Read more: These are the best SSDs in 2024

Best PS5 SSDs in 2024

How we test PS5 SSDs

I’ve tested most of the SSDs recommended on this list, either for PS5 or computer use. I also bought and used our top pick in my own PS5.

How much PS5 storage do I need?

The PlayStation 5 and PlayStation 5 Pro can accept internal drives with between 250GB and 8TB of storage capacity. If you already own a PS5, chances are you have a reasonable idea of how much storage you need ​​for your game library. If you’re buying an SSD with a new PS5 or PS5 Pro, or buying for someone else, it’s more difficult to tell what you might need for a high-performance experience.

PS5 games are smaller on average than their PS4 equivalents, typically taking up between 30GB and 100GB, with some notable (and very popular) exceptions. If you’re a fan of the Call of Duty series, installing Black Ops 6 and Warzone 2.0 can eat up to 240GB. In other words, a full Call of Duty install will take up more than one-third of the PS5’s internal storage. If you’re not a CoD fan, though, chances are you’ll be good to store between six to 10 games on a regular PS5 internally before running into problems.

You also need to consider your internet speed. If you live in an area with slow broadband, the “you can just download it again” rationale doesn’t really work. At my old home, a 100GB download took me around eight hours, during which time it was difficult to simultaneously watch Twitch or, say, publish articles about upgrading PS5 SSDs. Keeping games around on the off-chance you’ll want to play them at some point makes sense.

Aaron Souppouris / Engadget

Off the bat, there's basically no point in going for a 250GB PS5 SSD. Economically, 250GB drives aren’t that much cheaper than 500GB ones — and practically, that really isn’t a lot of space for modern games to live on. 500GB drives can be a decent option, but after years of declining prices, I think the sweet spot for most people is to opt for a high-capacity 1TB or 2TB drive, which should run you at most $200. The latter will more than double the PS5 Pro’s storage without breaking the bank.

Unless you’re rolling in cash and want to flex, 4TB and 8TB models should mostly be avoided, as you’ll end up paying more per gigabyte than you would with a 1TB or 2TB drive.

While the 825GB PS5 only provides 667GB of storage, that’s largely due to storage being reserved for the operating system and caching. If you install a 1TB PS5 SSD, you'll have, within a margin of error, 1TB of storage available for games. Out of the box, the PS5 Pro offers 1.86TB of storage for games, though you can eke out more if you delete the pre-installed Astro’s Playroom (gasp).

Since neither the PS5 Slim nor PS5 Pro feature updated CPU architecture, all of our recommendations will work with whatever PS5 model you own.

Can you play PS5 games on an external SSD?

External hard drives tend to cost less than internal SSD counterparts (and there’s a good chance you might own one already). Unfortunately, there are restrictions on what you can do with them. An external SSD connects to your PS5 via USB, and is only suitable for playing PlayStation 4 games, or storing PS5 titles. That’s useful if you have anything but the best high-speed internet — it’s faster to move a PS5 game out of “cold storage” on an external drive than it is to re-download it — or want to keep your PS4 library on hand.

Due to the limitations here, you don’t need the highest-performing model, although you should opt for SSDs over HDDs for improved transfer speeds and load times. Any basic portable drive from a reputable brand will do, with the Crucial X9 Pro and Samsung T7 being options we’ve tried and can recommend.

Which SSD cards are compatible with the PS5?

The official answer to this question is an “M.2 Socket 3 (Key M) Gen4 x4 NVME SSD.” But even within that seemingly specific description, there are additional factors to consider. The main requirements Sony has laid out for compatibility come down to speed, cooling and physical dimensions.

For speed, Sony says drives should be able to handle sequential reads at 5,500MB/s. Early testing showed that the PS5 would accept drives as slow as 4,800MB/s, and that games that tap into the SSD regularly — such as Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart — would cause no issues. Pretty much the only thing the PS5 will outright reject is one that doesn't match the Gen4 x4 spec.

In our opinion, though, using a drive slower than the specification is a risk that, if you don’t already have that drive lying around, is not worth taking. Just because we haven’t found issues yet doesn’t mean there won’t be games that could be problematic in the future. The price difference between these marginally slower Gen4 drives and the ones that meet Sony’s spec isn’t huge, and you might as well cover all your bases.

Slightly more complicated than speed is cooling and size. Most new SSDs are going to be just fine; the PS5 can fit 22mm-wide SSDs of virtually any length (30mm, 40mm, 60mm, 80mm or 110mm, to be precise). The vast majority of drives you find will be 22mm wide and 80mm long, so no problem there.

It should be noted that the system can fit a 25mm-wide drive, but that width must include the cooling solution. Speaking of, Sony says SSDs require “effective heat dissipation with a cooling structure, such as a heatsink.” The maximum height supported by Sony’s slot is 11.25mm, of which only 2.45mm can be “below” the drive.

This previously meant some of the most popular heatsinked Gen4 SSDs, including Corsair’s MP600 Pro LP, would not fit within the PS5’s storage expansion slot. Since Engadget first published this guide in 2021, most NVMe makers, including Samsung, have come out with PlayStation-specific models that meet those requirements. That said, if you want to save some money, bare drives are often cheaper and it’s trivial to find a cooling solution that will work for the PS5.

The only component in an NVMe SSD that really requires cooling is the controller, which without a heatsink will happily sear a (very small) steak. Most SSDs have chips on only one side, but even on double-sided SSDs, the controller is likely to be on top, as manufacturers know it needs to be positioned there to better dissipate heat.

So, head to your PC component seller of choice and pick up basically anything that meets the recommended dimensions. A good search term is “laptop NVME heatsink,” as these will be designed to fit in the confines of gaming laptops, which are even more restrictive than a PS5. They’re also typically cheaper than the ones labeled as “PS5 heatsinks.”

One recommendation is this $6 copper heatsink, which attaches to the PS5 SSD with sticky thermal interface material. It works just fine, and in performing stress tests on a PC, we couldn’t find anything metal that didn’t keep temperatures under control. When you’re searching, just make sure the solution you go for measures no more than 25mm wide or 8mm tall (including the thermal interface material) and has a simple method of installation that’s not going to cause any headaches.

One last thing: When shopping for a PS5 NVMe, there’s no reason to buy a Gen5 model over a more affordable Gen4 model. As things stand, Sony’s console can’t take advantage of the new standard, and though Gen5 drives are backward compatible, they’re more expensive than their Gen4 counterparts. Just buy the fastest and highest-capacity Gen4 model you can afford.

How to install an SSD into your PS5

If you need guidance on how to install your new NVMe into your PS5 or PS5 Pro, we have a separate guide detailing all the steps here. Installation is pretty straightforward, but our how-to can help you if you're stuck. Just make note: Before attempting to add more storage via a PS5 SSD, ensure that you have Sony’s latest software installed.

Google has unveiled Willow, its latest quantum chip, marking a significant leap in quantum computing. This breakthrough chip addresses one of the field’s biggest hurdles: reducing errors as systems scale up. With Willow, Google claims to have solved a 30-year […]

The post Google unveils Willow: Breakthrough quantum chip that solves 10 septillion-year (10^25-year) problem in under 5 minutes first appeared on Tech Startups.

On Monday, Nature released a paper from Google's quantum computing team that provides a key demonstration of the potential of quantum error correction. Thanks to an improved processor, Google's team found that increasing the number of hardware qubits dedicated to an error-corrected logical qubit led to an exponential increase in performance. By the time the entire 105-qubit processor was dedicated to hosting a single error-corrected qubit, the system was stable for an average of an hour.

In fact, Google told Ars that errors on this single logical qubit were rare enough that it was difficult to study them. The work provides a significant validation that quantum error correction is likely to be capable of supporting the execution of complex algorithms that might require hours to execute.

A new fab

Google is making a number of announcements in association with the paper's release (an earlier version of the paper has been up on the arXiv since August). One of those is that the company is committed enough to its quantum computing efforts that it has built its own fabrication facility for its superconducting processors.

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• AWS has not committed to offering cloud access to AMD's AI chips in part due to low customer demand.
• AWS said it was considering offering AMD's new AI chips last year.
• AMD recently increased the sales forecast for its AI chips.

Last year, Amazon Web Service said it was considering offering cloud access to AMD's latest AI chips.

18 months in, the cloud giant still hasn't made any public commitment to AMD's MI300 series.

One reason: low demand.

AWS is not seeing the type of huge customer demand that would lead to selling AMD's AI chips via its cloud service, according to Gadi Hutt, senior director for customer and product engineering at Amazon's chip unit, Annapurna Labs.

"We follow customer demand. If customers have strong indications that those are needed, then there's no reason not to deploy," Hutt told Business Insider at AWS's re:Invent conference this week.

AWS is "not yet" seeing that high demand for AMD's AI chips, he added.

AMD shares dropped roughly 2% after this story first ran.

AMD's line of AI chips has grown since its launch last year. The company recently increased its GPU sales forecast, citing robust demand. However, the chip company still is a long way behind market leader Nvidia.

AWS provides cloud access to other AI chips, such as Nvidia's GPUs. At re:Invent, AWS announced the launch of P6 servers, which come with Nvidia's latest Blackwell GPUs.

AWS and AMD are still close partners, according to Hutt. AWS offers cloud access to AMD's CPU server chips, and AMD's AI chip product line is "always under consideration," he added.

Hutt discussed other topics during the interview, including AWS's relationship with Nvidia, Anthropic, and Intel.

An AMD spokesperson declined to comment.

Do you work at Amazon? Got a tip?

Contact the reporter, Eugene Kim, via the encrypted-messaging apps Signal or Telegram (+1-650-942-3061) or email ([email protected]). Reach out using a nonwork device. Check out Business Insider's source guide for other tips on sharing information securely.

Editor's note: This story was first published on December 6, 2024, and was updated later that day to reflect developments in AMD's stock price.

• Amazon is emphasizing customer choice over market dominance with its AI strategy.
• Amazon unveiled a new series of AI models called Nova this week.
• Amazon's Bedrock tool supports diverse models from multiple providers, unlike OpenAI.

Amazon believes AI models are not in a winner-take-all market.

The company drilled down on this message during this week's re:Invent, the annual extravaganza for its Amazon Web Services cloud unit. Even after unveiling a new series of homegrown AI models called Nova, which, by some measures, are as powerful as other market leaders, Amazon stressed the goal is to provide more choice to customers.

AI models have become the new battleground for tech supremacy since OpenAI released its popular ChatGPT service in late 2022. Companies have rushed to up the ante, trying to outperform each other in model performance.

Amazon has largely been absent from this race. Instead, it has tried to stay neutral, arguing that the generative AI market is so big and varied that customers will want more model choices that fit their different needs. Amazon still believes this is the right approach.

"There are some that would want you to believe there's just this one magic model that could do everything — we never believed in it," Vasi Philomin, AWS's VP of generative AI, told Business Insider. "There'll be many, many winners and there are really wonderful companies out there building some amazing models."

Different positioning

As part of this, Amazon has used Bedrock, an AI development tool that gives access to many models, as its main horse in the AI race. This approach differed from OpenAI, and Meta, which mostly focused on building powerful models or chatbots. Google has a leading AI model in Gemini, but also provides access to other models through its Vertex cloud service, and Microsoft has a similar offering.

This week, Amazon further leaned into its strategy, announcing an array of new updates for Bedrock, including a marketplace for more than 100 specialized models and a distillation feature that fine-tunes smaller, more cost-effective models. It also unveiled new reasoning and "multi-agent" collaboration features that help build better models.

Swami Sivasubramanian, AWS's VP of AI and data, told BI that AWS "pioneered" the model-choice approach and intends to continue to promote it as a "core construct" of the business.

"GenAI is a lot bigger than a single chatbot or a single model to reach its full potential," Sivasubramanian said.

More companies appear to be taking the multi-model approach. According to a recent report by Menlo Ventures, companies typically use 3 or more foundation models in their AI services, "routing to different models depending on the use case or results."

As a result, Anthropic, which Menlo Ventures has backed, doubled its share in the AI model market to 24% this year, while OpenAI's share dropped from 50% to 34% year-over-year, according to the report.

'Choice matters'

Amazon may have no choice but to stick to this narrative. When OpenAI captivated the world with ChatGPT a couple of years ago, Amazon was caught flat-footed, leading to an internal scramble to find answers, BI previously reported. Its first in-house model, called Titan, drew little attention.

Having its own advanced, powerful AI models could help Amazon. It might attract the largest AI developers and promote AWS as the leader in the AI space. It would potentially also encourage those developers to continue building within AWS's broader cloud ecosystem.

Amazon isn't giving up on building its own advanced models. Last year, it created a new artificial general intelligence team under the mandate to build the "most ambitious" large language models. On Tuesday, Amazon unveiled the early results of that effort with its Nova series, which includes a multimodal model capable of handling text, image, and video queries.

Still, Amazon's CEO Andy Jassy downplayed any notion of Nova going after competitors. He said he's been surprised by the diversity of models developers use and that Nova is just one of the many options they will have.

"There is never going to be one tool to rule the world," Jassy said during a keynote presentation this week.

It's hard to know how successful this approach is as Amazon doesn't break out its AI revenue. But Jassy was even more bullish on the AI opportunity during October's call with analysts. He said AWS was now on pace to generate "multi-billion dollars" in AI-related revenue this year, growing at "triple-digit percentages year over year." Amazon's AI business is "growing three times faster at its stage of evolution than AWS did itself," he added.

Rahul Parthak, VP of data and AI, go-to-market, at AWS told BI that Nova's launch was partly driven by customer demand. Customers have been asking for Amazon's own model because some prefer to deal with one vendor that can handle every aspect of the development process, he said.

Amazon still wants other models to thrive because its goal isn't about beating competitors but offering customers "the best options," Parthak added. He said more companies, like Microsoft and Google, are following suit, offering more model choices via their own cloud services.

"We've been pretty thoughtful and clear about what we think customers need, and I think that's playing out," Parthak said.

Do you work at Amazon? Got a tip?

Contact the reporter, Eugene Kim, via the encrypted-messaging apps Signal or Telegram (+1-650-942-3061) or email ([email protected]). Reach out using a nonwork device. Check out Business Insider's source guide for other tips on sharing information securely.

With the end date for Windows 10 less than a year away, people still using that operating system will need to start preparing to enter the Windows 11 era. And Microsoft is placing a hardware requirement on the current OS that could pose a problem for those of us using older machines.

Windows 11 will require computers to have TPM 2.0. Also known as a Trusted Platform Module, this is a dedicated chip or firmware used for device security, and the 2.0 version offers several useful features for improved cryptography and encryption. A blog post from Microsoft outlines all of the benefits and why it's being made a core part of Windows 11 installations. Notably, the latest TPM can help future-proof the three-year-old operating system "by helping to protect sensitive information as more AI capabilities come to physical, cloud, and server architecture."

That's all well and good, but many older machines don't have TPM 2.0. That version became the hardware standard for Windows computers in 2016. Savvy users may have been able to use Windows 11 on incompatible computers with workarounds, but Microsoft's language that "TPM 2.0 is not just a recommendation—it’s a necessity" indicates that the company will likely be getting more stringent about preventing those bypasses. You can check the TPM status of your computer with Microsoft's PC Health Check app ahead of the October 14, 2025 end of support date for Windows 10.

Despite Intel’s recent woes, I didn’t expect to see CEO Pat Gelsinger joining 15,000 or so of his colleagues being shown the door. Gelsinger is a storied engineer and business success who laid down an exhaustive rescue plan when he took the helm of the beleaguered chipmaker in 2021. It was never going to be a quick fix, given the company’s long legacy of missteps. Gelsinger may be the public face of Intel’s current malaise, but the problems started long before his tenure and will likely keep going.

How Intel got here

Gelsinger was tasked with addressing almost two decades’ worth of bad decisions, all of which have compounded. Intel became an industry-swallowing behemoth as one half of the Wintel alliance, producing chips that went hand-in-glove with Microsoft Windows. The vast profits that flowed from this partnership meant there was an institutional reluctance to look too hard at new business ventures that could distract from its golden goose, still going strong all these years later.

In 2005, then-CEO Paul Ottellini turned down the chance to make the iPhone’s system-on-chip. It would have been easy for Intel, since it already made XScale ARM chips for mobile devices. You could find an Intel ARM chip inside popular phones like the BlackBerry Pearl 8100 and Palm Treo 650. A year later, it would sell XScale to Marvell, believing it would be able to shrink its x86 chips to work on smartphones. The first Intel Atom handsets showed some degree of promise, but the Snapdragons of the day — produced by considerably smaller rival Qualcomm — beat them pretty easily.

At the same time, Intel was working on Larrabee, its own discrete GPU platform based on the x86 architecture. Despite several years of marketing bravado and suggestions it would “kill” AMD/ATI and NVIDIA, Intel axed it in 2010 in favor of bundling integrated graphics into its regular processor products. The decision would hand the bulk of the GPU market to NVIDIA, making it the go-to name for gaming, supercomputers, crypto and AI, posting quarterly revenues of $35.1 billion on November 20.

Could Intel have foreseen the meteoric rise of AI? Maybe not. But Reuters reported former Intel CEO Bob Swan turned down the chance to invest in OpenAI in 2017. It was looking for a hardware partner to reduce its reliance on NVIDIA, offering a generous deal in the process. Swan, however, reportedly said he couldn’t see a future for generative AI, and Intel’s data center unit refused to sell the hardware at a discount.

Intel’s core strength was in the quality of its engineering, the solidity of its product and that it always kept close to the cutting edge. (There are parallels to be drawn between Intel and Boeing, both of which are watching their reputation for quality erode in real time.) Sadly Intel’s bread-and-butter business hit the skids after the company failed to produce 10-nanometer chips by its planned 2015 deadline. The company’s famous “tick, tock” strategy of launching a new chip process one year and a refined version the next ground to a halt.

These issues enabled Intel’s competitors to step in and steal a march, harnessing more modern chip architectures. AMD, which held a little over 10 percent of the chip market for much of the 2010s, has seen its market share double in the last few years. The biggest beneficiary, of course, was TSMC, the Taiwanese chip factory that has become the envy of the world. Even if Intel controls the bulk of the x86 processor market, it’s TSMC that makes the chips for Apple, Qualcomm, NVIDIA and AMD, among others. Intel, meanwhile, was saddled with an older chip manufacturing process that it couldn’t use to catch up with its rivals.

The Gelsinger doctrine

Gelsinger was as close to an Intel “lifer” as you could imagine, joining the company at 18 and rising to the position of Chief Technology Officer by 2001. In 2009, he left Intel to become COO at EMC and held the position as CEO of VMWare for almost a decade. After taking the reins at Intel, he laid down a detailed plan to mastermind its glorious comeback.

Step one would be to separate Intel’s design and manufacturing business into two distinct entities. With one eye on US subsidies through the Biden administration's CHIPS and Science Act, Gelsinger pledged to build two new chip factories harnessing the same EUV (Extreme Ultraviolet Lithography) technology used by TSMC.

Gelsinger was also determined to reestablish discipline in Intel’s chip business and get back to the “tick, tock” structure. Unfortunately, the production delays that had been building up since 2015 meant that Gelsinger’s target was just to get back to parity. In the interim, Intel would also get TSMC to manufacture some of its newest chips which, while costly, would help address any concerns the company was lagging even further behind.

Nobody had any doubts as to the size of the task facing Gelsinger, but there was plenty of room for optimism. Gelsinger was humble enough to accept Intel couldn’t simply stay on its current course, and had to embrace its new status. He proposed Intel could grin and bear the short-term pain for the company's eventual benefit. If it could build for the future, harness its rivals to keep it in the game and restore faith in its processes, Intel would emerge from this as the winner. All it needed was for nothing to get worse.

Things got worse

At the end of October, Reuters reported Gelsinger made a colossal faux-pas when speaking about TSMC. The CEO was quoted saying “You don’t want all of our eggs in the basket of a Taiwan fab,” and that “Taiwan is not a stable place.” This offended TSMC to such an extent that it ended a discount Intel had taken advantage of for years

Sadly, Gelsinger’s desire to restore discipline to the chip division would also backfire, with the latest Core processors blighted by voltage instability issues. Intel was forced to extend those chips’ warranties, which came at an additional cost it couldn't really afford. In August, it posted a loss of $1.6 billion and pledged to cut 15,000 employees in an attempt to right the ship. But it was forced to post the biggest quarterly loss in its history three months later, losing $16.6 billion, albeit much of that tied to revaluing company assets and paying for the layoffs. Worse, Intel’s new production process, 18A, reportedly failed crucial tests ahead of its 2025 debut.

Perhaps the lowest point in Intel’s year was when its stock price fell low enough that it became a takeover target. Rumors suggested Qualcomm was potentially eyeing a takeover while others indicated ARM had made inquiries about purchasing Intel’s product unit.

Where does this leave Intel?

The New York Times reports Intel’s board grew frustrated with Gelsinger as his rescue plan was “not showing results quickly enough.” But Intel wasn’t going to hire Gelsinger in 2021 and suddenly bounce back in 2024. Building large and complex chip factories isn’t easy. Nor is getting thousands of engineers to solve difficult problems around chip yields. And obviously reversing a slide that started in 2015 was never going to happen overnight.

Intel’s board is presently looking for a full-time successor to Gelsinger but it’s hard to see what someone else would do differently. After all, the company still needs to build those factories in order to own and control its future, and it still needs to fix its processes. Unless, of course, the next CEO is going to be told to just stanch the bleeding and keep the money rolling in. Even in its deeply-wounded state after a few bad quarters, Intel is still the biggest name in the x86 chip world and will keep making money for years to come.

You could easily imagine Intel’s board sitting around, prioritizing a few years of healthy profits at the cost of the company’s long-term future. It can keep selling modified versions of its existing desktop chips, ceding the technological leadership to AMD, Qualcomm and others. There’s probably a decade or two of big industrial clients who would be happy using Intel processors for their hardware for as long as they’re still using Windows. Perhaps that would be fitting given how big and ossified Intel has become, admitting that it can’t move fast enough to evolve.

It’s likely that scenario won’t be allowed to happen given Intel’s broader role in the global tech space. Even if the incoming administration criticized the CHIPS Act — Intel is still set to be its largest funding recipient — having a domestic manufacturer of Intel’s scale will be an asset few sane governments would allow to fall. But just switching CEOs won’t suddenly fix the company’s big, hard-to-solve problems. It wasn’t Pat Gelsinger who screwed up power design for Raptor Lake, nor did he pass on the opportunity to make the iPhone CPU all those years ago. The TSMC stuff, he can own that, but while a CEO sets the direction of travel, he can’t micromanage every process in a company of Intel’s scale. So whoever replaces him will have the same big stack of issues to tackle, knowing that the board’s patience will be even shorter this time out.

Intel's second-generation Xe2 Arc GPUs are real, and once again, they could be compelling options for gamers looking for capable video cards under $250. Confirming leaks from the past week, Intel today unveiled the $249 Arc B580 and the slightly less capable $219 B570, both of which target 1,440p gaming. They feature the company's new XeSS2 AI capabilities (which are also coming to the older Arc cards), including Super Resolution upscaling (like the original XeSS), frame generation and low latency modes. The goal, according to Intel, is to deliver more performance per dollar compared to NVIDIA's $299 RTX 4060 and AMD's Radeon 7600.

It's a noble pitch, but one that's also a repeat of what Intel attempted with its previous Arc GPUs. We liked those cards well enough, and the company was diligent about rolling out driver updates, yet that hasn't stopped its overall GPU market share from falling to zero percent. I'd wager many gamers didn't want to take a chance on Intel's hardware and software when NVIDIA and AMD's offerings were battle tested and just a bit more expensive.

Intel

The power bump from the Xe2 cards might change the situation for Intel, though. The company claims the B580 is on average 24 percent faster than its previous A750 Limited Edition GPU in 1,440p with ultra graphics settings, and it also has a 10 percent lead on NVIDIA's RTX 4060. (Intel's benchmarks show the B580 performing 43 percent faster than the RTX 4060 in Cyberpunk 2077, but at the same time it's nearly 20 percent slower while playing RoboCop: Rogue City.)

Intel

Spec-wise, Intel's new GPUs should keep up with the demands of 1,440p-focused gamers. The B580 features 20 Xe cores, 20 ray tracing units, 12GB of VRAM and a 2,670 MHz clock speed. The B570 comes in with a bit less all around: 18 Xe cores, 10GB of RAM and a 2,500MHz clock speed. I'd wager most people would be better off spending the extra $30 for a bit more future proofing, but 1080p gamers might not see the need for much extra power.

In a briefing with media, Intel Fellow Tom Petersen explained that the company learned a lot from its previous GPUs (which also marked the first time Intel seriously worked on discrete graphics since 2010). "With XE2, we have a new hardware platform, and that allows us to deliver higher utilization, improved work distribution, and less software overhead," he said. "So at the end of the day, it's all about getting software efficiency up so that we can deliver the benefits of the hardware we're building."

Intel

At the very least, Intel's new XeSS AI features are competitive with NVIDIA's DLSS3. The B580 GPU can double the performance of Diablo IV when using XeSS, according to Intel, and the new frame generation feature should be able to push your fps count even higher. Just like NVIDIA's tech, it's not just upscaling graphics from a lower resolution, it's also interpolating entirely new frames. The company's XeSS2 low latency, or XeLL, also improves responsiveness by 45 percent. Intel claims the B580 trounces the RTX 4060 in AI LLM performance, achieving around 20 more tokens per second in Llama 2 and Llama 3.1 workloads.

While it would be interesting to see if Intel can ever scale its Arc GPUs beyond the mid-range (the previous Arc 770 was a solid RTX 3070 Ti competitor), I'm honestly more intrigued by how the company is innovating in the low-end. Thanks to the rising complexity of high-end GPUs, the idea of cheap and capable video cards has practically disappeared over the last decade. Intel could win over a loyal fanbase of budget gamers if it actually sticks with its GPU efforts.

Intel

If you're intrigued by these new GPUs, you won't have to wait long to get your hands on them. Arc B580 cards will be available on December 13 for $249, while Arc B570 models will arrive next month on January 16 for $219. Intel will be making its own Limited Edition version of the Arc B580 (above), but it's leaving the B570 cards up to its partners, including Acer, ASRock and Sparkle.

• AWS recently laid out growth plans for 2025 in internal documents.
• One of the initiatives is focused on working more with consulting firms.
• Accenture was among several consulting firms mentioned by AWS.

Amazon Web Services wants to work more with consulting firms, including Accenture, part of a broader plan to spur growth in 2025, according to an internal planning document obtained by Business Insider.

AWS is looking to expand work with external partners that can sell its cloud services to hundreds of their existing customers. AWS sees an untapped market worth $250 billion and thousands of contracts up for renewal, the document explained.

Beyond Accenture, AWS mentioned Tata Consultancy, DXC Technology, and Atos as partners in the planning document.

AWS will prioritize these partners' existing customers and proactively reach out to them before contract-renewal time, and help the partners become "cloud-first," the document explained.

AWS pioneered cloud computing and still leads this huge and growing market. Over the years, the company has done a lot of work with customers through in-house cloud advisers. So the plan to expand its relationships with outside consulting firms is notable.

Ruba Borno is the VP leading the initiative, which will "review and prioritize partner's incumbent customers based on workloads and relationship," the document also stated.

Borno is a Cisco veteran who joined AWS a few years go to run its global channels and alliances operation, which works with more than 100,000 partners, including consulting firms and systems integrators and software vendors.

These plans are part of new AWS growth initiatives that include a focus on healthcare, business applications, generative AI, and the Middle East region, BI reported last week.

These are part of the AWS sales team's priorities for next year and Amazon refers to them internally as "AGIs," short for "AWS growth initiatives," one of the internal documents shows.

A spokesman for Tata Consultancy declined to comment. Spokespeople at Accenture did not respond to a request for comment.

It’s Cyber Monday, which means it’s a decent time to be on the hunt for a new notebook. To help you avoid wasting cash, we’ve researched reviews, checked price histories and rounded up a few Cyber Monday laptop deals that are genuinely decent.

To be candid, most of the better discounts available today are the same ones we saw on Black Friday. In fact, a few are slightly worse. But that still means several notebooks we recommended in our various buying guides are cheaper than usual. The latest MacBook Air is $200 off, for instance, while Microsoft's latest Surface Laptop has received a $300 cut. Our favorite Chromebook and gaming laptop are each discounted as well.

Before you dive in, just keep in mind that many of the deals below are for pre-configured models from third-party retailers. If you want to spec out your notebook more precisely, it's still worth buying directly from the manufacturer.

Devindra Hardawar for Engadget

• Apple MacBook Air (13-inch, M3) for $899 at Best Buy ($200 off MSRP): The latest MacBook Air is our pick for the best laptop you can buy. It ticks nearly all the boxes for those who prefer macOS, from its premium design and comfy keyboard to its lengthy battery life and capable performance for everyday use. We gave it a score of 90 in our review. A recent Bloomberg report said that Apple will likely release a minor refresh early next year, but this is a decent price for the current base model, which includes Apple’s M3 chip, 16GB of RAM and a 256GB SSD. Amazon had it available for around $850 during Black Friday, but this is its lowest price otherwise. If you want more storage, the 512GB variant is also within $50 of its all-time low at $1,099. 

• Apple MacBook Air (15-inch, M3) for $1,234 at Amazon ($265 off): The 15-inch MacBook Air is more or less identical to the 13-inch version in terms of features and performance, but it has a more spacious display and better speakers. It is about 0.6 pounds heavier, though. This is the best price to date for the base model with an M3 chip, 16GB of RAM and a 512GB SSD. Also at Best Buy for $1,299.

• Apple MacBook Air (13-inch, M2) for $799 at Amazon ($200 off): If you’re on a tighter budget, the last-generation MacBook Air gets you most of the things we love about the newer M3 model at a lower price. The main sacrifices are a slightly lesser chip, technically slower storage in the base model and no ability to connect to two external monitors. This deal is for the entry-level variant, which includes an M2 chip, 16GB of RAM and 256GB of storage. Again, it's $50 more than the all-time low we saw during Black Friday but still $200 less than buying from Apple directly. Also at Best Buy.

Devindra Hardawar for Engadget

• Apple MacBook Pro (14-inch, M4 Pro) for $1,749 at Amazon ($250 off): The recently updated MacBook Pro is more laptop than most people need, but it's still a powerhouse for coders, media editors and those with more demanding needs. We gave it a 92 in our review earlier this month. Just keep in mind that there’s no USB-A port and, as with all Apple laptops, effectively no way to upgrade the device after purchase. This is the largest discount yet for the configuration with Apple’s M4 Pro chip, 24GB of RAM and a 512GB SSD. A version with 1TB of storage is $50 above its all-time low at $2,149 as well.

• Apple MacBook Pro (16-inch, M4 Pro) for $2,249 at Amazon ($250 off): The 16-inch MacBook Pro adds a roomier display and a couple extra hours of battery life to the same excellent performance, build quality and mini-LED display of its smaller counterpart. The downside is that it’s heavier at 4.7 pounds. This config includes an M4 Pro chip, 24GB of RAM and a 512GB SSD. As with the other MacBook deals above, it was $50 cheaper on Black Friday, but this deal is still $250 off its usual going rate. Also at B&H.

• Microsoft Surface Laptop 7 (13.8-inch) for $899 at Amazon ($300 off): We gave the latest Surface Laptop a review score of 88 earlier this year, and we currently recommend it as a great mainstream ultraportable in our laptop buying guide. The caveat is that it runs on an ARM processor, which performs well but may not work with every app or peripheral you use. If you can live with that, though, the bright 120Hz display, upscale aluminum design and long battery life all impress. This configuration includes a Snapdragon X Plus chip, 16GB of RAM and a 512GB SSD. It was technically available for $800 at Micro Center last week, but only with in-store pick up. Otherwise, this matches the best price we’ve seen. If you prefer a bigger screen, a 15-inch version with a quicker Snapdragon X Elite chip and a 256GB SSD is down to a low of $1,053. Also at Best Buy.

Sam Rutherford for Engadget

• HP Pavilion Aero 13 for $600 at HP ($300 off): The HP Pavilion Aero is the budget pick in our laptop buying guide. It feels a bit cheap, and its webcam is poor, but it’s thin and light, it has a decent port selection and its IPS display is solid for the money. This config with a Ryzen 5 8640U chip, 16GB of RAM and a 512GB SSD should be fast enough for typical web browsing, word processing and light photo editing. This is within $20 of the best price we could find for the 2024 model since its release.

• Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon (Gen 12) for $1,099 at Lenovo ($500 off): The ThinkPad X1 Carbon is an honorable mention in our laptop buying guide, and it earned a score of 87 in our review earlier this year. Its performance wasn’t quite top-of-the-line in benchmark testing, but it was still fast enough to handle the kind of web browsing, media editing and even light gaming that most people do with a notebook. The design is reasonably thin (0.6 inches), light (2.4 pounds) and highly durable, with a healthy array of ports (HDMI 2.1 included) and the kind of bouncy, responsive keyboard we’ve come to love from the ThinkPad line. The matte display virtually eliminates glare as well, though the 1080p webcam is just OK, and the side-mounted power button is somewhat awkward to press. This is the lowest price we’ve seen for the config with Intel's Core Ultra 5 135U chip, 16GB of (non-upgradeable) RAM, a 512GB SSD and a 14-inch 1,920 x 1,200 display. Just enter the coupon code X1G12TDDEAL at checkout. Other configs are similarly discounted, including a more powerful model with a Core Ultra 7 155U chip and 32GB of RAM for $1,391. Use the code HOLIDAYTHINKDB for that one.

Sherri L. Smith for Engadget

• Lenovo Flex 5i Chromebook Plus for $349 at Best Buy ($150 off): The Flex 5i Chromebook Plus tops our guide to the best Chromebooks. We like that its IPS touchscreen has a tall 16:10 aspect ratio, as it makes the device better-suited to word processing and reading web pages. It runs just fine for the basic tasks you’re meant to do with Chrome OS, and both its keyboard and trackpad feel reliable. Its battery life is mediocre, however, and at 3.6 pounds it’s fairly heavy for a 14-inch notebook. This ties the lowest price we’ve seen for the config with an Intel Core i3-1315U chip, 8GB of RAM and 128GB of eMMC storage.

• ASUS ROG Zephyrus G14 (2024) for $1,650 at Best Buy ($350 off): The 14-inch ROG Zephyrus G14 is the top pick in our guide to the best gaming laptops. We gave it a score of 91 in our review this past April, praising its aluminum and (relatively) understated chassis, beautiful 120Hz OLED display and sufficient port selection. It can get toasty under load, and we wish the RAM was user-upgradeable, but this config can handle more demanding fare at high settings and the screen’s native 2.8K resolution without much trouble. It comes with a Ryzen 9 8945HS chip, 32GB of memory, a 1TB SSD and an RTX 4070 GPU. You may not want to completely max out certain games, but you can still get over 60 fps much of the time. In general, you’d buy this because it gets that level of power from a design that’s more portable and elegant than most gaming machines. Outside of one drop to $1,600 back in July, this ties the best price we’ve seen.

Nathan Ingraham for Engadget

• ASUS ROG Strix G16 (2024) for $1,615 at Amazon ($285 off): While not a top pick in any of our guides, this configuration of the ROG Strix G16 should be a solid value for those in search of a 16-inch all-rounder gaming notebook. It includes an Intel Core i9-14900X chip, 16GB of RAM, a 1TB SSD and an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 GPU, which should be enough to run many games at high-ish settings without much hassle. The overall build doesn’t feel cheap, and the 2,560 x 1,600 240Hz display is both sharp and fast. The RAM and storage are user-upgradeable, too, though the battery life and 720p webcam aren’t ideal. This deal matches an all-time low. Another model with a 1080p panel, a Core i7-13650HX chip and a RTX 4060 GPU is on sale for a low of $1,100, but you’ll have to turn down game settings more frequently to get decent frame rates with that one.

• Apple iPad Pro (11-inch, M4) for $849 at Amazon ($100 off, clip $50 coupon): The iPad Pro is still overkill for most people, but its class-leading OLED display, remarkably slim frame and powerful M4 chip make it a tremendous tablet. It can work as a laptop replacement for certain creative types, but you’ll have to live with iPadOS’ continued shortcomings in multitasking, file management and other computer-y tasks. If you’re thinking of making the switch — or if you’ve just got money to burn and want a more portable companion to your current laptop — this matches the lowest price we’ve seen for the latest 11-inch model. Just clip the $50 on-page coupon. If you’re willing to pay for a roomier display, the 13-inch iPad Pro is also on sale for a low of $1,099.

Cyber Monday laptop deals that are no longer available

• Alienware M18 R2 for $2,300 at Dell ($500 off): The M18 R2 is an iteration of the top 18-inch pick in our gaming laptop buying guide. It’s an absolute tank, but it’s put together well, and this configuration can blow through new games at high settings in 1080p or 1440p. It comes with a 165Hz 2,560 x 1,600 panel, an Intel Core i9-14900HX chip, 32GB of RAM, a 1TB SSD and an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 GPU. This deal is $100 more than the price we saw on Black Friday, though it's still a good ways off the notebook's usual going rate. A lower-spec model is on sale for a new low of $1,700, though that one will run into issues sooner with more demanding games.

Check out all of the latest Black Friday and Cyber Monday deals here.

• AWS faces competition from OpenAI, Microsoft, and Google in AI, risking its cloud dominance.
• It offers new financial incentives for AI sales. That comes with higher pressure and new demands.
• AWS CEO Matt Garman wants his teams to move even faster.

This summer, Amazon Web Services rolled out a new internal campaign.

The initiative, called "Find One, Launch One, Ramp One," introduced goals, prizes, and other incentives for Amazon's huge cloud-support teams across North America.

The ultimate aim was to sell more of the company's new AI offerings. Sales architects, customer-success managers, and people in other roles were recruited into the broad push.

"This is a great time to partner with our sales teams for this #OneTeam effort," AWS said in an internal memo obtained by Business Insider.

These AWS staffers were asked to find at least one sales opportunity each month for Q, Amazon's artificial-intelligence assistant, and Bedrock, the company's AI platform.

Then, the initiative asked employees to launch one Bedrock or Q customer workload.

The final requirement, the "Ramp One" part, pushed teams to generate real revenue from these workloads.

AWS created a leaderboard for everyone to see the top performers. With December 1 as the deadline, the company dangled prizes, including an evening of pizza and wine at an executive's home (with guitar playing as a possibility).

A race for AI supremacy

This initiative is just one example of AWS trying to squeeze more out of its massive sales and support teams to be more competitive in AI. There's more pressure and urgency to sell AI products, along with new incentives, according to several internal documents and more than a dozen current and former AWS employees.

Messaging from AWS CEO Matt Garman, previously the cloud unit's top sales executive, is to move even faster, these people said. They asked not to be identified because they're not authorized to speak with the press. Their identities are known to BI.

Much is at stake for Amazon. OpenAI, Microsoft, and Google, alongside a slew of smaller startups, are all vying for AI supremacy. Though Amazon is a cloud pioneer and has worked on AI for years, it is now at risk of ceding a chance to become the main platform where developers build AI products and tools.

More pressure

The revamped sales push is part of the company's response to these challenges. As the leading cloud provider, AWS has thousands of valuable customer relationships that it can leverage to get its new AI offerings out into the world.

Many AWS sales teams have new performance targets tied to AI products.

One team has to hit a specific number of customer engagements that focus on AWS's generative-AI products, for instance.

There are also new sales targets for revenue driven by gen-AI products, along with AI-customer win rates and a goal based on the number of gen-AI demos run, according to one of the internal Amazon documents.

Another AWS team tracks the number of AI-related certifications achieved by employees and how many other contributions staff have made to AI projects, one of the people said.

Hitting these goals is important for Amazon employees because that can result in higher performance ratings, a key factor in getting a raise or promotion.

More employees encouraged to sell AI

Even people in roles that traditionally don't involve actively selling products are feeling pressure to find opportunities for AI sales, according to Amazon employees who spoke with BI and internal documents.

AWS software consultants, who mostly work on implementing cloud services, are now encouraged to find sales opportunities, which blurs the line between consultants and traditional salespeople.

The Find One, Launch One, Ramp One initiative includes AWS sales architects. These staffers traditionally work with salespeople to craft the right cloud service for each customer. Now they're incentivized to get more involved in actual selling and are measured by the results of these efforts.

"Customers are interested in learning how to use GenAI capabilities to innovate, scale, and transform their businesses, and we are responding to this need by ensuring our teams are equipped to speak with customers about how to succeed with our entire set of GenAI solutions," an AWS spokesperson told BI.

"There is nothing new or abnormal about setting sales goals," the spokesperson added in a statement. They also said that AWS sales architects were not "sellers" and that their job was to "help customers design solutions to meet their business goals."

There are "no blurred lines," the spokesperson said, and roles and expectations are clear.

Selling versus reducing customer costs

One particular concern among some AWS salespeople revolves around the company's history of saving cloud customers money.

Some staffers told BI that they now feel the company is force-feeding customers AI products to buy, even if they don't need them. The people said this represented a shift in AWS's sales culture, which over the years has mostly looked for opportunities to reduce customers' IT costs.

In some cases, salespeople have also been asked to boost the attendance of external AWS events. Several recent AWS-hosted AI events saw low attendance records, and salespeople were told to find ways to increase the number of registrations by reaching out to customers, some of the people said.

AWS's spokesperson said customer attendance had "exceeded our expectations for a lot of our AI events" and that the number of participants at the re:Invent annual conference "more than doubled."

The spokesperson also said the notion that Amazon had moved away from its goal of saving customers money was false. The company always starts with "the outcomes our customers are trying to achieve and works backwards from there."

A hammer and a nail

Garman, Amazon's cloud boss, hinted at some of these issues during an internal fireside chat in June, according to a recording obtained by BI. He said there were sales opportunities for AWS in "every single conversation" with a customer but that AWS must ensure those customers get real value out of their spending.

"Too often we go talk to customers to tell them what we've built, which is not the same thing as talking to customers," Garman said. "Just because you have a hammer doesn't mean the problem the customer has is the nail."

AWS's spokesperson said the company is "customer-obsessed" and always tries to consider decisions "from our customers' perspectives, like their ROI." The spokesperson added that some of AWS's competitors don't take that approach and that it's a "notable contrast," pointing to this BI story about a Microsoft customer complaining about AI features.

More pressure but also more rewards

Amazon is also doling out bonuses and other chances for higher pay for AI-sales success.

AWS recently announced that salespeople would receive a $1,000 performance bonus for the first 25 Amazon Q licenses they sell and retain for three consecutive months with a given customer, according to an internal memo seen by BI. The maximum payout is $20,000 per customer.

For Bedrock, Amazon pays salespeople a bonus of $5,000 for small customers and $10,000 for bigger customers when they "achieve 3 consecutive months of specified Bedrock incremental usage in 2024," the memo said.

Some AWS teams are discussing higher pay for AI specialists. Sales architects, for example, in AI-related roles across fields including security and networking could get a higher salary than generalists, one of the people said.

AWS's spokesperson told BI that every major tech company provides similar sales incentives. Amazon continually evaluates compensation against the market, the spokesperson added.

Fear of losing to Microsoft

Inside AWS, there's a general concern that Amazon was caught off guard by the sudden emergence of generative AI and is playing catch-up to its rivals, most notably Microsoft, the people who spoke with BI said.

Some Amazon employees are worried that Q is losing some customers to Microsoft's Copilot because of a lack of certain AI features, BI previously reported.

Microsoft has an advantage because of its wide variety of popular business applications, including its 365 productivity suite. That may make it easier for Microsoft to show customers how AI can improve their productivity, some of the Amazon employees told BI. AWS, meanwhile, has struggled to build a strong application business, despite years of trying.

AWS's spokesperson challenged that idea by noting that AWS has several successful software applications for companies, including Amazon Connect, Bedrock, and SageMaker. The spokesperson also said Amazon Q launched in April and was already seeing robust growth.

It's "no secret that generative AI is an extremely competitive space," the spokesperson added, saying: "However, AWS is the leader in cloud and customer adoption of our AI innovation is fueling much of our continued growth. AWS has more generative AI services than any other cloud provider, which is why our AI services alone have a multibillion-dollar run rate."

More speed

A major AWS reorganization earlier this year hasn't helped the AI-sales effort, some of the people who spoke with BI said.

The big change switched AWS to more of an industry focus rather than a regional one. That caused confusion inside the company, and some large customers lost their point of contact, the people said. AWS is still figuring out how to run as a more cohesive group, which has resulted in a slower sales cycle, they added.

AWS's spokesperson said it's inaccurate to say its sales process has slowed, adding that year-over-year revenue growth accelerated again in the most recent quarter and that the business was on pace to surpass $100 billion in sales this year.

In his June fireside chat, Garman stressed the importance of speed and told employees to "go faster."

"Speed really matters," Garman said. "And it doesn't necessarily mean work more hours. It means: How do we make decisions faster?"

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"Am I the first person to discover this?" is a tricky question when it comes to classic Macs, some of the most pored-over devices on the planet. But there's a lot to suggest that user paul.gaastra, on the 68kMLA vintage Mac forum, has been right for more than a decade: One of the capacitors on the Apple mid-'90s Mac LC III was installed backward due to faulty silkscreen printing on the board.

It seems unlikely that Apple will issue a factory recall for the LC III—or the related LC III+, or Performa models 450, 460, 466, or 467 with the same board design. The "pizza box" models, sold from 1993–1996, came with a standard 90-day warranty, and most of them probably ran without issue. It's when people try to fix up these boards and replace the capacitors, in what is generally a good practice (re-capping), that they run into trouble.

Doug Brown took part in the original 2013 forum discussion, and has seen it pop up elsewhere. Now, having "bought a Performa 450 complete with its original leaky capacitors," he can double-check Apple's board layout 30 years later and detail it all in a blog post (seen originally at the Adafruit blog). He confirms what a bunch of multimeter-wielding types long suspected: Apple put the plus where the minus should be.

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Cyber Monday gaming deals are plentiful this year, including consoles, video games and accessories. If you need more storage space on your Xbox, or want to preemptively pick up more storage for that new Series X you just purchased, there’s a great deal on Seagate’s expansion card you can get right now. The 2TB version is on sale for a record low of $200 right now, or 44 percent off its regular price.

Seagate's version is one of our picks for the best Xbox Series X/S accessories. The 2TB version should give you ample space — at least until you start filling it up with all of the huge Call of Duty games that have started hitting Game Pass.

Let's face it, proprietary storage stinks, but the choice for Series X/S owners looking for more space is largely between Seagate's Storage Expansion Card and WD's Black C50. It's possible to store Series X/S games on a regular external drive, but you'll need to move them to internal storage or an expansion card anyway to actually play them. If you don't want to deal with shifting large files around and waiting for transfers to complete, or you don't want to delete and download games more than is necessary, an expansion card is the way to go.

Check out all of the latest Black Friday and Cyber Monday deals here.