Category: 4. Technology

YouTuber and Elon Musk stan Ellie Sheriff had a bizarre experience during her first Tesla robotaxi ride in Austin, Texas.

As seen in a video she shared on her channel, “Ellie in Space,” over the weekend, Sheriff got a strange call from the EV maker mid-ride, asking her and her fellow passenger to literally leave the vehicle due to incoming weather.

“So we had to get out of the robotaxi, because weather is coming in,” Sheriff said in the video while standing in the middle of a windy field.

Their ride had to be fully canceled, leaving them stranded. Worse yet, the app claimed there was “high service demand.” However, moments later, they were able to hail another robotaxi to get them back to the place where they started.

“I don’t want to just be a Tesla rah-rah cheerleader,” Sheriff said. “It is very cool. However, this is a limitation currently, how it is. You shouldn’t have to terminate the service cuz it’s about to rain.”

The head-scratching incident highlights some glaring shortcomings of Tesla’s long-awaited autonomous ride-hailing service. The company’s launch of an extremely scaled-down service that features human safety drivers in the passenger’s seat has already led to plenty of chaos, including violently jerking steering wheels, unexpected braking around cop cars, and a dangerous drop-off in the middle of a four-way intersection.

It’s unclear why exactly Sheriff’s ride was cut short beyond some wind and rain. However, considering Musk’s carmaker has long ditched light detection and ranging sensors known as lidar in favor of relying exclusively on cameras for its driver assistance features, it seems probable that Tesla is nervous about having the robotaxi drive in bad conditions.

Case in point, earlier this year, YouTuber and former NASA engineer Mark Rober published a damning video, demonstrating that Tesla’s erroneously-named “Full Self-Driving” software can be easily fooled by rain, bright lights, and even a fake, Wile E. Coyote-style wall painted to look like the road behind it.

The stakes are extremely high for the EV maker as Musk has bet the company’s fate on the tech. In light of cratering car sales, the CEO has gone all in on automation. Earlier this week, the company revealed it had delivered just 384,000 vehicles between April and June, compared to 444,000 over the same period last year, the biggest drop in the company’s history.

More on Tesla robotaxis: Tesla Robotaxi Terrifyingly Jerks Wheel Back and Forth While Carrying Passenger

Over the last couple of years, home labs have become a lot more accessible to consumers. On the hardware front, you’ve got everything from budget-friendly mini-PCs capable of running most DIY projects to dual CPU workstations that can crush any multi-core workloads without breaking a sweat. Likewise, virtualization platforms and container-hosting tools have mushroomed in recent times, and there’s so much documentation online that even the most technically-challenged folks can build their own home servers.

However, I’ve noticed a trend where beginners are often discouraged from using GUI-based operating systems, and there are plenty of good reasons for sticking to a CLI setup even as a greenhorn. But if you feel discouraged by the extra difficulty curve of a terminal-heavy interface, building a server on an OS with a desktop environment (or heck, even inside your Windows 11 machine) is perfectly valid and shouldn’t be treated as heresy.

What’s wrong with using a desktop environment on your home server?

Before I discuss the perks of choosing a GUI distro for your experimentation and self-hosting workstation, I wanted to go over the main issues of such a setup. When you’re working with multiple virtual guests, you’d want to keep the performance overhead of the underlying OS to a minimum.

Unfortunately, all desktop environments – including the lightweight ones – hog up your CPU and memory, which are precious resources that could otherwise be allocated to your VMs and containers. Then there’s the whole security conundrum about desktop environments increasing the attack surface of your home server, even when you’re not exposing your workstation to the Internet.

The GUI loses its utility since you’ll use web interfaces anyway

After deploying a couple of services on your home server, you’ll almost always access their web UI from another system over your local network. Whether it’s managing your container collection using Cockpit/Portainer, rummaging through your media collection on Jellyfin, or sharing files via Nextcloud, you’ll spend most of your time inside web UIs. This makes the graphical interface of the underlying OS rather redundant, since you’ll end up performing most operations over a handful of web UIs.

Nevertheless, a GUI distro is pretty useful when you’re just starting out

Especially if you aren’t familiar with virtualization platforms

Story-time: My first contact with self-hosting (and even Linux distros, for that matter) was in 2016 when I bought my first Raspberry Pi Zero. As someone who had used Windows up until that point, I was absolutely terrified of Linux commands. The GUI version of Raspbian Buster slowly helped me get accustomed to the intricacies of Linux, and before long, I became used to tinkering with packages, commands, and bash scripts. Over time, I began looking into Docker, before eventually hosting Linux virtual machines using VirtualBox on my daily driver.

Had I jumped straight into the CLI version of Rasbian Buster, I probably would’ve gotten overwhelmed with the usual terminal commands and would never have made it to Docker, let alone Proxmox or even VirtualBox. Although I know better now, my less-experienced self would have become intimidated at the prospect of using a full-fledged virtualization platform.

Container projects don’t require too many resources, anyway

While we’re on the subject of containers, you’ll be surprised at how low system resources most of the popular containerization utilities require. When I built a Docker hub on my Raspberry Pi 5 last year, I had no issues running dozens of services on the desktop version of the RPi OS.

Of course, your virtual machines will be a lot more responsive on a Type-1 hypervisor running on a CLI distro. But if you’re a casual user looking to replace privacy-intrusive premium applications with their self-hosted counterparts, you don’t really need to dabble in a home server OS yet. In fact, I’d go so far as to say that you can take your time getting used to things even on an “unoptimized setup” involving Docker containers inside a VM running on your Windows 11 system.

Troubleshooting is a cakewalk with a GUI

When you’re building a home lab, you should expect things to break time and again as you get used to the ins and outs of your virtualization tools. I’ve installed several virtualization platforms on SBCs, mini-PCs, NAS units, server rigs, and my daily driver over the last couple of months, and I still run the risk of rendering my cluster offline while tinkering with configuration files.

As such, having a graphical interface can make troubleshooting a lot easier. Sure, you’ll probably end up using terminal commands anyway, but being able to browse the web and access folders without running cd and ls commands is extremely helpful as a beginner.

What really matters is whether you’re comfortable with your home server

In the end, home servers are built with the sole purpose of learning about computing topics. So, it’s okay to take things slow and steady with a GUI operating system that lets you run containers and VMs using simple tools instead of jumping straight into the Type-1 hypervisor rabbit hole. Once you’ve gotten your bearings, you can always switch to a proper home server distro and enjoy the superior performance and security benefits offered by these platforms.

July 2025 has introduced exciting advancements in computer technology, highlighting innovations in compact gaming systems and high-performance mini PCs. These trends reflect the growing demand for powerful yet space-efficient computing solutions.

CyberPowerUK’s MNML line offers mini gaming PCs that combine compact design with high-performance components. Models like the Ion Elite SFF PC and Sigil Elite SFF PC feature Intel and AMD processors, Nvidia RTX graphics, DDR5 memory, and PCIe 4.0 storage. Designed in collaboration with Fractal Design, these systems cater to users seeking powerful gaming setups in limited spaces, providing pre-assembled configurations for convenience.

Bosgame has unveiled the M5 AI, a mini desktop PC designed for high-performance computing. Featuring AMD Ryzen AI Max+ 95 processors, Radeon 8060S iGPU, and 128GB of RAM, this compact system delivers immersive gaming and graphics capabilities. Its futuristic design makes it a standout piece, while multiple connectivity ports ensure versatility for various applications.

These trends highlight the continued evolution of compact computing, where performance and efficiency are increasingly prioritized in modern PC designs.

DXVK 2.7 released today as a major feature update for this translation layer for enabling Direct3D 8 / 9 / 10 / 11 based games and applications to run atop the Vulkan API. DXVK is a critical piece of Valve’s Steam Play (Proton) software stack for enabling Windows games on Linux.

DXVK 2.7 brings binding model changes with the descriptor management code being rewritten and modernized. This should significantly help with lowering CPU overhead compared to the legacy binding model and can improve performance in CPU-bound games such as with Final Fantasy XIV, God of War, Metaphor: ReFantazio, Watch Dogs 2, and other games.

DXVK 2.7 also now enables memory defragmentation by default on newer Intel graphics with the Arc B-Series “Battlemage” discrete GPUs as well as Intel integrated Lunar Lake GPUs.

DXVK 2.7 also brings support for planar video output views, D3D11 shaders will now zero-initialize all variables and group-shared memory by default, various other optimizations, and a number of game-specific workarounds.

Downloads and more details on today’s big DXVK 2.7 release via GitHub.

At HPE Discover 2025, I was walking through the Intel booth and stopped cold when I saw a few products. One series shown was its newest 10GbE and 2.5GbE NICs based on the latest Intel E610 chipset. This is a new lower-end networking solution that will bring lower power to some key markets.

Intel E610 NICs Shown for Low Power 10Gbase-T and 2.5GbE

The first adapter did not look like anything too exciting, until I realized what it was. This is a PCIe Gen4 x4 adapter for dual 10Gbase-T connectivity. It is based on the new Intel E610 chipset.

The dual ports support 10GbE, 5GbE, 2.5GbE, and 1GbE. At full dual 10Gbase-T speeds, this card is rated at only 5.1W! That is awesome.

Also at the show, we saw the Intel E610-IT4 in an OCP NIC 3.0 form factor (SFF with pull tab in this case.)

This card has quad 2.5GbE ports. Interestingly, this can use up to 8.6W with 7.2W typical power. For an OCP NIC 3.0 SFF slot, this is not much to cool, but it is also just a neat solution.

A lot of folks who might have used the Intel i350 4-port 1GbE NICs are probably looking for a 2.5GbE solution these days, and Intel now has one. That is pretty neat.

Final Words

The somewhat crazy part about this is that these cards were launched by Intel with very little fanfare. I spoke to an Intel product rep at the booth who is a STH reader (hello if you are reading this.) I simply said it is a bit strange that Intel would release new chips and cards in this segment and I did not hear about it. There is a lot of change at Intel these days. At the same time, I know a lot of folks would be interested in these cards. I certainly am. Hopefully we can get some to show-off soon.

Prime Day is just five days away, but the Galaxy S25 Edge is already enjoying a super-sweet $220 discount. Yep, you can grab Samsung’s latest ultra-slim flagship phone for 18% off in its 512GB variant. The promo only applies to select colorways, so keep that in mind.

The Galaxy S25 Edge is $220 off

$220 off (18%)

Looking for a super-slim flagship with a high-end Snapdragon 8 Elite chip and a 200MP main camera? The Galaxy S25 Edge might be the right fit! The device is currently $220 off at Amazon in select 512GB models, making it a real bargain ahead of Prime Day.

Buy at Amazon

With Prime Day just around the corner, some of you might be tempted to wait. But let’s face it—there’s no telling whether the Galaxy AI handset will drop any lower next week. So, if you don’t feel like waiting, this $220 discount is already a solid choice.While it doesn’t have the biggest battery or the longest battery life, the Galaxy S25 Edge is still quite attractive. Packing a large 6.7-inch OLED display with a 120Hz refresh rate and an impressive 200MP main camera in an ultra-slim titanium body, this bad boy is meant to turn heads.

The display gets incredibly bright, eliminating any issues with outdoor visibility. In fact, our tests showed it’s a bit brighter than the Galaxy S25+, and it’s also a bit more color-accurate. Discover more about display quality in our Galaxy S25 Edge review.

In case you’re wondering, this Samsung phone is also quite capable on the camera front. Aside from its 200MP main camera, it features a 12MP ultra-wide on the rear and takes pretty good-looking photos with superb detail and vibrant colors. That said, since it lacks a dedicated telephoto sensor, you won’t get the best results when zooming beyond 4x.

But that’s not all! The S25 Edge packs none other than the Snapdragon 8 Elite inside its 5.8mm-thin body. The flagship SoC ensures solid performance across the board, but it doesn’t outperform the Galaxy S25+ or the S25 Ultra in terms of raw horsepower.

So, if you’ve been planning to get the Galaxy S25 Edge this summer but don’t feel like waiting for Prime Day to kick off, now might be a great time to grab the ~$1,220 variant for just under $1,000.

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This year’s Fourth of July deals aren’t just about saving on big-ticket items. Though the official holiday is over, there are still plenty of discounts on some everyday tech, too. And they don’t get more everyday than this four-port USB-C charger that’s yours today for just $26, thanks to a limited-time 40% discount. This Baseus charger would normally sell for around $43, so this is a deal well worth taking advantage of.

This handy little charger offers three USB-C ports and a single USB-A port for charging all of your legacy devices. You can power phones, tablets and laptops thanks to a total 65-watt output. And you can charge your laptop at the full 65 watts when you use one of the two USB-C ports on the left-hand side.

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Other features worth calling out include a diminutive design thanks to the use of GaN technology as well as a collection of features designed to keep the charger cool when in use.

Frequent travellers will enjoy the ability to fold the charger’s pins so it won’t scratch anything in your bag — or dig into your back, for that matter.

Why this deal matters

You can never have too many USB-C chargers, and this one uses just one AC outlet to power four individual devices. That alone makes this a great option for travellers who want to be able to charge their stuff in a hotel room. At just $26, why not treat yourself to a handy dollop of convenience the next time you travel?

I don’t often get asked about the phones I’m testing when I’m out and about, unless it’s a folding phone. Then I usually hear some version of the same thing: “Oh, I thought about getting one of those! But then I just got a [insert slab-style phone name here].” My anecdotal data matches the actual sales figures; there are many more people curious about folding phones than there are buyers of folding phones. Samsung would very much like that to not be the case, and, by all indications, it’s about to pull out all the stops at at its Unpacked event on July 9th. But is putting the Ultra name on a folding phone enough?

The weak sales are not for lack of trying — Samsung has been trying to sell us on foldables for a good chunk of the last decade, and Google also got in the game a couple of years ago. Motorola has had substantial success selling clamshell-style flip phones; Counterpoint Research found that the brand’s foldable market share grew 253 percent year-over-year in 2024. But that’s a bigger piece of a very small pie. TrendForce estimated that foldables made up just 1.5 percent of the overall smartphone market in 2024. In the US, Samsung was the earliest and loudest folding phone maker, but a half dozen iterations of folding phones hasn’t managed to make a significant dent.

The company has all but confirmed that we’ll get an Ultra-branded Fold for the first time, with a thinner profile to rival the recent efforts from Honor and Oppo. The Z Flip 7 is likely to get a bigger, Razr-style screen that covers most of the front panel, and we might see a cheaper FE version with the old cover screen design. That all seems to address a couple of common complaints about foldables: they’re too pricey and come with too many tradeoffs compared to a slab-style phone.

I’m not quite sure it’ll be enough, though. Foldables remain more susceptible to damage from dust than a standard flagship phone — and repairs can be pricier. Despite saying years ago that it’s pursuing full dustproofing, Samsung doesn’t seem to have cracked the code on a fully IP68-rated foldable just yet. Taking a chance on an expensive phone that’s less durable than your typical $1,000 flagship? That’s kind of a big ask, especially with prices on everything else we buy going up, too.

It’s not all doom and gloom for foldables, however. Analysts are putting a lot of stock in rumors of a folding phone from Apple coming in 2026. An iFold or whatever it might be called could help expand the market, at least in the US, and maybe that rising tide would float Samsung’s boat, too. Maybe a couple of new models hitting different price segments is enough to get Samsung’s marketshare growing again — a strategy that has worked well for the company in the past. Maybe an Ultra foldable with ultra specs will convince some people who were on the fence about folding phones. And if anyone was holding out for an extra hinge, well, Samsung might just have that covered, too.

Photography by Allison Johnson / The Verge

Running out of juice when you’re on the move is a solved problem thanks to the many different portable power banks on the market. But you’re still going to need a cable to plug things in, and that can get messy. Cables get tangled at the best of times, but this Baseus retractable USB-C cable has the answer. It shrinks down to hide the cable when not in use, avoiding all those traditional wire problems we’re all so familiar with. And even better, Amazon’s Fourth of July sale has slashed the price of one of these cables to just $7. 

The Baseus retractable USB-C cable is an excellent option to stock up on and keep in your bags and luggage because it’s so small that it takes up virtually no space. The best part is that it comes in four fun colors: black, white, blue and purple. This way, you can get a cable to match your phone color or pick your favorites.

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The Baseus Retractable Mini USB-C Cable comes in two lengths: 3.3 feet or 6.6 feet. However, for this lingering Fourth of July offer, only the 3.3-foot version has the most significant savings. This also makes it the perfect cable for use in the car, with a portable power bank, with a computer, plugged into a nearby outlet, or wherever and whatever else that doesn’t need more than three feet in length. And with its super compact size, this is the perfect cable to simply throw and stash away in your purse, backpack, luggage or car. Anywhere you may need a charging cable, this is the perfect one to stash away as a “just in case” option.

With Baseus, this little cable packs quite a punch. It supports 100-watt fast charging, so you can even use it for your USB-C laptop, like a MacBook Pro or even tablets. Though you might use it the most for your smartphone, it’s more versatile than that. According to Baseus, it can fully charge a 16-inch MacBook Pro in just 2 hours, an 11-inch iPad Pro in 2.4 hours, a Nintendo Switch in 2.5 hours, and a Samsung S22 Ultra in 58 minutes.

Since it is retractable, you need only pull it out as much as you need, which helps reduce cable messes on your desk. When you’re not using it, just retract both ends. Since it’s just 15mm thin and weighs only 50 grams, it can even slide into your pocket.

And again, with four colors to pick from, you can get one of each and stash them all over the place. They’re small enough to do so, after all.

Why this deal matters

No one likes to be caught off guard with no charging cable. This one is super compact and retractable, simplifying the mess and excess. You can use it with your power adapters and power banks, and it works with all of your USB-C devices from your iPhone to your MacBook Pro. Although Amazon lists this currently at $13 not on sale, the original retail price is actually $17. So at just $7 a pop, there’s really no reason to not pick this up.