Android puts a little widget inside the Quick Settings panel when you’re listening to music or casting media. While useful, sometimes the widgets duplicate or stick around longer than they should. We’ll show you how to easily remove them. When the media widgets work as they should, it’s super handy. You have quick access to controls and you can even swipe left-to-right between apps playing media. However, it’s not without issues....

Removing a distracting background from an image allows your audience to focus on the subject matter. Though it’s not known for its image editing suite, you can do this using Microsoft Excel. Here’s how it’s done. First, open the Excel application and insert an image (Insert > Picture) that contains the background that you want to remove. Once it’s been inserted, you’ll automatically be in the “Picture Format” tab. Here, click “Remove Background,” which is found in the “Adjust” group....

Android Wear is a rather useful addition to your arsenal of technology, but getting to know a completely new device can be overwhelming. Here’s everything you need to know about setting up, tweaking, and using your new Android Wear watch. RELATED: How to Use Android Wear with an iPhone NOTE: These instructions assume you’re using the latest version of Android Wear, 2.0. If your watch is still on Android Wear 1....

While there isn’t a device limit for Spotify subscribers, it’s a good practice to sign out of devices you’re no longer using. If you no longer have access to a device that you’re signed in to, you can sign out of all devices at once from your account settings page. To start, open the Spotify website in your browser of choice. If you are already signed in, click Profile > Account from the Spotify front page to access the settings page for your account....

AMBER alerts are pretty useful as they keep you updated about the things happening around you. Keeping them enabled ensures you aren’t missing out on any important updates. However, if you find the alerts arrive at odd hours or aren’t relevant, you can choose to disable them. This way, your phone won’t notify you of any alerts. Later, you can turn the feature back on if you want. RELATED: How to Disable Notifications on Android...

To work, Face ID needs your eyes, nose, and mouth to be visible. That’s obviously not possible while wearing a mask. But as long as you’re running iOS 14.5 or higher on your iPhone, you can authenticate yourself using an Apple Watch running watchOS 7.4 or higher. You can use any Series 3 or newer Apple Watch to unlock your iPhone. The authentication handoff process is very similar to how Mac owners can unlock their computers using Apple Watch....

Well the day is finally here: the day Google brought to light its newest Pixel phones. While none of what was announced today was particularly surprising, it’s at least officially official. The real question here is, of course, should you buy a new Pixel phone? What’s New in the Pixel 2 and Pixel 2 XL? With the first Pixel phone, Google tapped HTC to handle both models (the “regular” one and the XL)....

When Apple refreshed the venerable Mac Pro desktop in 2013, reception was mixed to say the least. While the second-gen machine’s tiny footprint and polished case (aka the “trash can”) are certainly eye-catching, and there’s an undeniable amount of engineering in its design, the official line that only the memory can be upgraded after purchase put off a lot of power users. Apple has apparently taken those criticisms to heart, publicly declaring that a new Mac Pro will be coming in 2018 with a traditionally modular construction, allowing parts to be swapped and upgraded like a standard desktop....

RELATED: The 10 Best Stephen King Movies to Stream in 2022 The Black Phone Play Video Two horror forces combine when director Scott Derrickson (Sinister) adapts Joe Hill’s short story The Black Phone. In suburban Denver in 1978, a serial killer known as the Grabber (Ethan Hawke) has been abducting local kids, and 13-year-old Finney Blake (Mason Thames) is his latest target. Held captive in the Grabber’s basement, Finney discovers a phone that allows him to talk to the ghosts of the Grabber’s previous victims, giving him the strength and knowledge he needs to escape....

When you message someone through WhatsApp, little ticks or checkmarks appear next to it. These tell you the status of your message. Let’s look at what they all mean. One Gray Checkmark One gray checkmark means that the message has been successfully sent from your phone, but that it hasn’t been delivered to your recipient yet. When you send a message, it will normally show a single gray checkmark for a few moments while it’s sent....

An OTA Box Turns Free TV into a Cable-Like Experience To watch free over-the-air TV channels, all you need is an antenna—you don’t need an OTA box. But an OTA box adds quite a few features, including the ability to record channels. At its core, an OTA box is a DVR for over the air TV. Even the most basic (or cheapest) OTA box can be programmed to automatically record your favorite shows, football games, and late night infomercials....

SMS, or Short Messaging Service, has been around for a long time, but soon it will be replaced by RCS, a newer and much better standard for sending messages. But what’s RCS all about? Here’s how it works. RCS is also known as Rich Communication Service, and it is the future of “texting” on your phone. As its name suggests, this service adds a much richer experience to text and multimedia messages....

The Player tab in the bottom right-hand corner of the Alexa app is a recent addition—there, you can see what media your Echo is currently playing. However, within that section there’s a mysterious “Queue” tab. Here’s what it actually does. First off, if you don’t know what we’re talking about, open up the Alexa app and tap on the Player tab down in the bottom-right corner. Then tap on the “Queue” tab up near the top of the screen....

Smoke alarms are cheap and pretty basic, but they can definitely be life savers. However, there might be some things you don’t know about smoke alarms that could make you rethink the ones you have now. Smoke Alarms vs. Smoke Detectors Before we dive deep into discussing smoke alarms, it’s important to talk about the differences between smoke alarms and smoke detectors. These two terms are colloquially interchanged, but they’re actually different types of devices....

Bluetooth audio is good now, right? That’s what I’ve been hearing, so I purchased a $300 Bluetooth headset for my Windows PC, expecting to have a good experience. It was terrible. I blame Bluetooth—and Windows. Full disclosure: My coworkers have had great experiences with Bluetooth audio on both Android phones and W1-enabled Apple devices. This is about PC headsets. Windows Won’t Tell You If It’s Using AptX Bluetooth is confusing....

If you switch from iOS to Android and send or receive video messages, you probably had to accept a harsh reality: video messages look terrible on Android. Let’s take a look at why this happens, and ways to combat the problem. Why Does This Happen? When you send a message from iPhone to iPhone, it doesn’t send over standard MMS like other platforms—it sends over Apple’s iMessage system. This is something you don’t have to think about, as it happens passively in the background on the phone....

First: You May Need to Upgrade Whether you already have a Wi-Fi extender or you’re shopping for a new one, these tips can both help inform your purchase and help you deploy the Wi-Fi extender more efficiently in your home. If you find, while reading through the tips, that the extender you have doesn’t quite cut it for your needs, it’s worth considering replacing it with a new one. The difference between an old bargain Wi-Fi extender you picked up off the shelf at Best Buy five years ago, or even longer, and newer models is pretty substantial....

Advertisers have found a new way to track you. According to Freedom to Tinker, a few ad networks are now abusing tracking scripts to capture the email addresses that your password manager auto-fills on websites. But it gets worse: they could use that tech to capture your passwords too, if they wanted. This affects everyone using a password manager, whether it’s a built-in password manager like the one in Chrome, Firefox, or Edge, or a browser extension like LastPass....

You might think that smart locks are a security disaster just waiting to happen. After all, why would you trust an internet-connected device with the security of your house and everything in it? But consider this: locks are pretty insecure in general. RELATED: Are My Smarthome Devices Secure? Since the rise of smarthome technology, many users have voiced their concerns about the security of these devices, arguing that hackers could get a hold of their thermostat, lights, switches, and even the locks that keep our house safe from burglars....

Google Similar Pages in Action We chose three different types of websites for our test. The first was for “fileforum”, a software download site. Note: If a website is still new to the Internet you may receive a “No similar pages found.” message. Clicking on the “Toolbar Button” opened a “Popup Window” that displayed four similar and very useful recommendations for software download websites. Our second example was “photobucket”, a photo and video hosting website…...