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The Best Mini Desktop PCs

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If you’re looking for a simple, small desktop computer for your home or office, consider a mini PC. These computers are best for everyday tasks such as working on documents and spreadsheets, browsing the web, taking video calls, or watching TV. However, our top picks are also powerful enough for editing media or compiling code. The best mini PC for most people is the Apple Mac mini (M4, 2024) . This tiny, powerful desktop operates silently enough to reside on your desk, and it has USB-C ports on the front for you to easily plug in flash drives or memory card readers. If you want more processing power for editing 4K video or running multiple virtual machines, we recommend the Mac mini with Apple’s M4 Pro processor . Nearly every kind of computer or PC component has gotten more expensive this year , with budget or niche products like mini PCs and lower-cost laptops increasing in cost by hundreds of dollars. However, we still think Apple makes the best mini PCs — even...
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The Very Best Labor Day Deals You Can Already Buy

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Don’t squander these final blissful moments of summer, moping around as the inevitable draws near — back to school , back to work, back to real life. Savor these fleeting hours and return feeling renewed, refreshed, and ready to tackle the rest of the year. Instead of trudging into autumn, make an entrance. Trade those thin tees and sandals for chunky sweaters and toasty socks . Swap your billowy summer bedding for something more cocoony . Establish a new get-ready routine, with juicier moisturizers , richer balms , and hydrating hair-care . Or, if you’re not ready to let go of summer yet, make your last beach days extra-special with a snazzy swimsuit or bright and breezy beach gear . Of course, we wouldn’t expect you to sacrifice summer’s swan song by spending hours scouring Labor Day sales. Our experts did that for you. Here are the best Labor Day deals — all of them truly great products at great prices, including some exclusive deals you won’t find anywhere el...
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Are You Using Conditioner All Wrong?

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Listen and follow The Wirecutter Show Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Amazon Music | YouTube | iHeartRadio It’s easy to overlook the conditioner sitting in your shower. But the right conditioner can do so much for your hair, like add moisture and shine, reduce frizz, and make hair easier to detangle. Yet the wrong one can leave your hair greasy or weighed down. In this episode, Wirecutter beauty writer Amanda Rosenthal explains how conditioner actually works and how to choose one based on your hair type and texture. She also clears up some common conditioner confusion, including who needs to use one, how to apply it, and whether “hair masks” are worth the extra money. This episode covers Why your hair type matters when choosing a conditioner. Rich conditioners can leave fine hair greasy and weighed down, while thicker or curlier hair may need heavier conditioning ingredients. How to tell if you actually need conditioner. Dullness, frizz, difficulty detangling, and ...
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The Best Salad Spinner

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Pushing aside the milk and the half-full jar of pickles, you reach into the back of the fridge, looking for that bag of romaine you bought on your most recent grocery trip. You emerge, produce in hand, only to notice that it’s slimy . The lettuce has gone bad, forgotten behind so many leftovers. It happens to the best of us. Salad greens seem to last for only a few days before they more closely resemble a third-grade science project. But it doesn’t have to be this way. Enter the salad spinner. Washing greens won’t make them last longer, but getting them as dry as possible will. You can then keep them fresh in an airtight container, along with a damp paper towel, and since they’ll be ready to go, you may even use them up faster. (Plus, salad dressing sticks better to dry leaves.) A good salad spinner makes washing and drying easy. We’ve compared dozens of models and tested over 20 spinners since 2014, and the OXO Good Grips Salad Spinner has remained our top pick. ...
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The Best Maple Syrup You Can Find at the Grocery Store

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I love maple-sugaring season. Every year, just as the temperature starts to thaw in New York City, I know it’s time to make my annual pilgrimage to the rural outskirts of Western Massachusetts where my family lives. We drive along winding roads and rolling hills dusted with snow, and we look for trails of smoke snaking over the sugar shacks, signaling that the boiling of maple sap is underway. It’s here, in cozy wooden shacks nestled among maple trees, where the fresh maple sap is reduced to a syrup, and those in the know come to celebrate (and stock up on) the season’s latest offerings. As a kid growing up in California — far from the maple-harvesting regions — I was no stranger to pouring corn-syrup–based “pancake syrup” on my hotcakes as I watched my Saturday-morning Looney Tunes. But I can remember the first time I tried real maple syrup at a diner. And it was a transcendent experience — from the silky way the syrup poured to its robust flavor and how it absor...
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The Best Uncrustables and Their Dupes

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Small children and endurance athletes have a lot in common. A strict nap schedule. Boundless energy. And a love for crustless peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. When the prepackaged iteration showed up in the freezer aisle in the early 2000s, easy to eat and easy to store, it was an obvious hit with the lunch-box set. But they’re not just for kids. In recent years, they’ve shown up on the sidelines of college basketball games. They’re popping up in group chats with my marathon-running friends. The NFL reportedly pounds over 80,000 of them a year . And of course, the freezer aisle has boomed. From the decades-old stalwart, Smucker’s Uncrustables, to a burgeoning field of competitors, crustless sandwiches now promise to be more wholesome, more protein-packed, more exciting, more chef-backed, and more athlete-approved than the classic offerings. Wirecutter’s kitchen experts tasted over 20 crustless sandwiches, looking for the best out there — great texture, great f...
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8 Very Practical Gifts That Are Unexpectedly Great

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In this edition of The Gift, we're talking about the very best practical gifts — that are anything but boring, actually. I am not what one might call a “practical” person. I live in a fifth-floor walk-up apartment — with a dog. (It gets great light, okay?) When I decided I wanted to run my first race, I signed up not for a 5K, but for a half-marathon. I own not one, but three, of Wirecutter’s most opulent gifts and have gifted many more. I relish in life’s decidedly unpractical, at times irresponsible, delights with abandon. (I am, obviously, a Sagittarius.) Gift-giving is a space we’ve collectively carved out to say, “Hello, this is beautiful. Please have it for no other reason than being born.” And sullying that with something practical (a six-pack of white socks, a gas-station gift card, an extra charger) has always seemed sacrilegious to me. But after a weekslong informal survey of Wirecutter’s most practical gift givers and receivers, I’m realizing I’ve p...
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