Looking to upgrade my NAS hard drives. Currently have two 4TB WD Red Plus hard drives but I wanted to get some large capacity drives. Was looking into getting 16 or 18TB drives. My current drives are basically whisper quiet and have been running great since 2019 but I feel like it's time to upgrade the capacity.

The NAS is currently on a desk beside my computer. I don't have any cabinets to place it in and would prefer not to connect to it through Wi-Fi. Hence why I'd like for the drives to be as quiet as possible.

I was considering getting a Seagate Exos or Ironwolf (and buying used for the great price) but I've read users online saying they regret buying those models because of their noise. I was also looking at the WD Red Pro but WD's own website only rates them at 3.6/5 with most of the negative complaints about dead on arrival drives. Additionally 25% of all reviews are 1 star; both of which don't fill me with much confidence.

TLDR: What's a quiet and reliable hard drive recommendation for a NAS?

Would it be better just to go with the WD Red Plus at a lower capacity?

I purchased a 2022 ROG Zephyrus G14 around Christmas 2023. It had some issues with the screen being blank on boot but rebooting it once or twice did the trick. I should have known that was a bad sign.

After less than 1.5 years, it got stuck in a boot loop after trying to update the graphics driver. After unsuccessfully trying to restore it to factory settings, I took it to my local Microcenter for diagnosis. They're listed by Asus as the only certified repair shop in my area.

It seems the motherboard has died and would cost more than what I paid for it to replace. The tech also said this is a common issue with this model. A quick search online shows I'm not the only one with this problem.

TLDR: A bad experience with the 2022 G14 makes me want to avoid ROG and Asus for a while. Any recommendations for a similarly sized gaming laptop? I like the Legion 5 Slim 14. 5" laptop but can't find it anywhere outside ebay and with this experience, I'd prefer something with a warranty.

Tried updating the voyager app on Android but I get this error message. Going from 2.24.0 to 2.24.1

Any help is appreciated!

From The Main Duties of the Vice President

Source: A Scummy Gap Student With a Hard Life Calls Upon a Lady of the Night (Ch 33)

Wanted to give my cousin (11) a handheld since he's never had a game console.

He saw my stepsister's PSP and was interested in it but she wanted to keep it.

Would like the system to be as simple as possible since he's not very tech savvy but also be able to play some PSP games since that's what piqued his interest.

Budget under $100 just in case he doesn't like retro games

I've got a lot of devices that need to plug into an outlet at my desk. Right now, I have 2 surge protectors completely full.

I wanted to get a smart surge protector to auto turn off/on devices I don't want left on all the time (ex: speakers, monitor, DAC/AMP, printer). But the smart surge protectors have fewer outlets than my current one.

My question is, how do you manage your outlets when you have a lot of devices that need to be plugged in? I don't want to have 3 surge protectors plugged into the wall. I'm already drawing a lot of power in my home office with my mini fridge also plugged in (on the opposite side of the room).

I've also heard of something called UPS. Would that be better than plugging it into a surge protector?

For those curios, the devices I have are:

• Two monitors
• Speakers
• DAC/AMP
• Router
• Modem
• Printer
• Ethernet Switch
• PiHole
• Solar panel monitor
• NAS
• Landline phone
• Backup external hard drive

I'm looking to replace my old Netgear Nighthawk with a new router. Currently my house does have some dead zones which we make up for using a powerline. But the powerline isn't always stable and we have to switch wifi networks depending on where we are in the house.

My question is, is it better to get a mesh network or a standard router with either range extenders (ex: TP-Link OneMesh) or mesh features (ex: Asus AiMesh)? I couldn't really find any article that listed the differences between mesh routers and standard routers with extendable features. They only compare mesh routers with standard routers.

More info:

Preferably, I would like to go with the standard router for the higher speeds and extra ports but I'm afraid that won't solve our dead zone issues. Also, buying two or three standard routers is way more expensive than a mesh network with multiple satellites.

Speed and signal strength are important for me since both I and my brother WFH and do online gaming. Unfortunately, the home office (where the router is) and bedrooms (where we game and where my brother works) are on opposite sides of the house. Another note is that when the garage opens, my brother loses signal in his room for some reason. I haven't experienced that despite being closer to the garage than him

I wanted to get my mom YouTube Premium for her birthday but don't want to pay the ridiculous annual price for my country (especially since she mostly just watches YouTube shorts). She uses an iPhone so trying to get adblocker would be too much of a hassle, especially if it stops working. She won't be able to figure out how to fix it.

I've tried using account sellers in the past but the last one I used had some issues and now I can't add my mom's YouTube account to a different family account for another year.

I am able to use a VPN to buy premium for cheaper from a different country but they require a credit card for that country. Is it possible to get a virtual debit/credit card for different countries?