The best Black Friday 2016 laptop deals: Surface Books, MacBooks, HP Spectre x360, Dell XPS 13, and more

Here’s the bad news about Black Friday laptop deals this year: the new MacBook Pro isn’t on sale (surprise!). Sorry. However, I do have some good news. There are pretty decent markdowns on the Surface Book, as well as on the reliable Dell XPS 13. Yay! And Apple is offering gift cards up to $150 with the purchase of select laptops. We compiled some of the biggest Black Friday deals here for you to check out. Maybe this is the year to treat yourself to a new laptop.

The best laptop to buy on Black Friday

Costco’s deal on the Dell XPS 13 is our pick for the best laptop deal. The Verge’s own Tom Warren called it the “best Windows laptop,” and while it’s still expensive at $1,299, that $300 discount helps. We can’t complain about saving money.

Our runner-up is the Surface Pro 4 because it’s $500 off, which is just an insanely good deal. That said, it’s an older device so not top of the line.

Apple

Online or in Apple stores on November 25th

$150 gift cards when buying a MacBook (from $1,299), MacBook Pro 13-inch or 15-inch (from $1,299; no late-2016 models are included so that means no TouchBar), MacBook Air (from $999), iMac (from $1,099), or Mac Pro ($2,999)

Gift cards up to $100 when buying an iPad Pro (from $599), iPad Air 2 (from $399), or iPad mini 4 (from $399)

Best Buy

Online from November 24th through November 26th, with physical store doors opening on Thanksgiving day at 5PM

Microsoft Surface Pro 4 (128GB, Intel Core m3) with Type Cover for $599.99 (usually $999.99)

Lenovo Yoga 900 (Intel Core i7, 8GB RAM, 256GB SSD) for $699.99 (usually $1,199.99)

HP Envy x360 (Intel Core i7, 16GB RAM, 1TB HDD) for $699.99 (usually $899.99)

Microsoft Surface Books for up to $400 off

ASUS Q534UX (4K display, Intel Core i7, 16GB RAM, GTX 950M, 2.5TB HDD) for $1,099 (usually $1,599.99)

HP Spectre x360 (Intel Core i7, 16GB RAM, 512GB SSD) for $999.99 (usually $1,499.99)

Staples

Thursday online and Friday in-store or pickup

Microsoft Surface Pro 4 (Intel Core i5 processor, 4GB RAM, 128GB SSD) for $799.99 (usually $999)

HP Pavilion 15 (Intel Core i7 processor, 12GB RAM, 1TB HDD) for $499 (usually $779.99)

HP Pavilion 14 (Intel Core i5 Processor, 12 GB RAM, 1 TB for $389.99 (usually $639.99)

Lenovo Flex 4 (Intel Core i5 processor, 8GB RAM, 256GB SSD) for $499.99 (usually $749.99)

Costco

Starting Friday at 9AM through Monday, November 28th

Dell XPS 13 (Intel Core i7, 16GB RAM, and 512GB SSD with one year of Office 365) for $300 off (usually $1,599)

Microsoft Surface Pro 4 bundle with Surface Pen and Type Cover for $250 off

Walmart

Black Friday only

Samsung Chromebook 3 for $119 (usually $149.99)

Microsoft

Available online in Microsoft’s online store at 12:01AM ET on Black Friday

Surface Pro 4 (Intel Core i5, 256GB SSD, included Type Cover) for $999 (usually $1,428)

Surface Pro 4 (Intel Core i5, 128GB SSD) for $799 (usually $999)

Surface Book (Intel Core i5, 256GB SSD) for $1,499 (usually $1,899)

Dell Inspiron 15 (Intel Core i5, 8GB RAM, 1TB HDD) for $399 (usually $749)

Alienware 15 Touch (Intel Core i7, 16GB RAM, GeForce GTX 970M) for $1,497 (usually $2,499)

HP

Available from Black Friday through Monday November 28th

HP Spectre x360 13t OLED touch for $999.99 (usually $1,499.99)

HP Spectre x360 13t touch for $949.99 (usually $1,049.99)

HP Spectre 13t for $969.99 (usually $1,169.99)

HP Pavilion Laptop 15z touch optional for $319.99 (usually $579.99)

HP ENVY 15t Touch for $649.99 (usually $949.99)

Dell

Available now

Inspiron 11 3000 for $329.99 (usually $369.99)

Inspiron 13 5000 for $479.99 (usually $549.99)

Inspiron 17 5000 for $549.99 (usually $649.99)

Inspiron 15 5000 for $849.99 (usually $899.99)

Inspiron 15 7000 for $899.99 (usually $999.99)

Newegg

Available now through Saturday November 26th

Lenovo ThinkPad Yoga 12 (Intel Core i5, 4GB RAM, 16GB SSD) for $499.99 (usually $599.99)

Asus K501UW-NB72 (Intel Core i7, 8GB RAM, 128GB SSD, GeForce GTX 960M) for $719 (usually $999)

Gigabyte P55Wv6-NE2 (Intel Core i7, 16GB RAM, 128BG SSD, NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060) for $1,149 (usually $1,499)

MSI GL62 6QF-627 (Intel Core i7, 8GB RAM, 1TB HDD, NVIDIA GeForce GTX 960M) for $799 (usually $999)

MSI GL62 6QF-1445 (Intel Core i7, 12GB RAM, 128GB SSD, NVIDIA GeForce GTX 960M) for $849 (usually $999)

HP 250 G5 (Intel Core i5, 8GB RAM, 256GB SSD) for $419.99 (usually $599.99)

Acer Aspire E 15 (Intel Core i5, 8GB RAM, 1TB HDD) for $419.99 (usually $599.99)

Acer Aspire E5-575G-728Q (Intel Core i7, 8GB RAM, 1TB HDD) for $669.99 (usually $699.99)

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Google perpetuates cycle of confusion, renames Google Cast back to Chromecast

Google appears to be removing the Google Cast name and switching it back to the original Chromecast moniker. As noted by Android Police, Google has already renamed the @GoogleCast Twitter account back to @Chromecast, and the Google Cast website now describes Google Cast as “Chromecast built-in.”

The Google Cast name was originally introduced when Google began expanding Chromecasting to other devices; earlier this year, Google renamed the Chromecast app to a matching “Google Cast” name. The name change was a nod to the fact that there were now lots of non-Chromecast products out there that had Casting built in, a decision that seemed to make sense at the time.

This cheap fitness watch has GPS tracking and an always-on display

Huami is now selling its Amazfit Pace smartwatch in the US, a product that was previously only available in China, where Huami is based. The GPS-equipped Amazfit Pace tracks daily activity and calories burned, along with running distances, speed, and cadence. It tracks elevation, which some fitness-focused smartwatches don’t do, and has optical heart rate sensors. Huami claims it gets up to 11 days of battery life on a single charge, despite its always-on, transflective display, and 36 hours of battery life with continuous GPS-tracking.

And, like every other smartwatch, it wirelessly pairs with your phone over Bluetooth to show you incoming phone calls, texts, and app notifications. It’s running on customer software built on top of Android, and syncs with both iOS and Android phones.It’s hard to judge the Pace’s looks without seeing and feeling the watch in person, but the round-faced, ceramic-bezeled smartwatch looks like it has at least some style to it; TheNextWeb even went as far as calling it “gorgeous.”

The Huami Pace costs $129 now through Cyber Monday (November 28th), and then jumps up to $159. That’s cheaper than a lot of smart fitness watches, but not less expensive than basic activity trackers. It’s currently sold through the company’s own website, and will be sold on Amazon starting mid-December.

These stickers have a unique fingerprint, so you can unlock your phone with your gloves on

The cold and bitter winds of winter are here, which means one important thing: it’s glove season! Gloves are a marvelous creation, except for the part where they make it impossible to use a touchscreen device that requires a fingerprint. This nifty sticker, TAPS, provides a unique fingerprint that may be able to ease your woes.

TAPS, funded on Kickstarter, is Touch ID compatible and waterproof; each sticker promises a one-of-a-kind fingerprint, even if they come from the same pack. They’re made with an “extremely adhesive conductive material” that stick to your gloves. This means that rather than buying a pair of gloves specifically made for touchscreens, you can add compatibility to those you already own.

Telegram launches Telegraph, an anonymous blogging platform

Telegram now has a blogging platform to go along with its popular messaging app. It’s called Telegraph and, according to VentureBeat, offers fast publishing and anonymous posting — without requiring you to register an account or sign in through social media.

TELEGRAPH IS FAST AND ANONYMOUS

The app’s user interface looks very similar to Medium and allows for easy embeds. You can also embed images from your computer by clicking on the camera button. In comparison to Medium, the loading time for embeds is relatively fast. Publication is instantaneous upon hitting “publish.” Posts are shareable on social media platforms but are designed to work best on Telegram’s new Instant View layout, which works similarly to Facebook’s Instant Articles feature.

The simplicity and speed of Telegraph are not without its downsides. As TechCrunch points out, the lack of user history means that if you accidentally delete the link to your published post, it would be very difficult to track down unless you have cookies enabled on your browser. The anonymous nature also opens up opportunities for abuse, potentially paving the way for internet trolls and spreaders of fake news — a problem that has put tech giants like Facebook and Google under scrutiny.

Telegram’s user base has grown significantly since its inception, though it continues to lag behind WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger. In February this year, founder Pavel Durov announced that the company hit 100 million active users.

The introduction of Telegraph continues Telegram’s expansion beyond just messaging. The company recently added games, and in a blog post, it teased “Something big is brewing in our secret dungeons. Stay tuned.”

This Majora’s Mask fan film is better than most Hollywood video game adaptations

As far as adaptations go, The Legend of Zelda peaked with a questionable cartoon. We’re still holding out hope for a live-action show on Netflix at some point. But absolutely nothing has made us fall harder in love with a reimagining of the iconic video game series than this animated fan film based on The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask.

The short was created by Ember Lab, a company focused on animation, VFX, and games for commercial projects. The company that draws inspiration from the likes of Pixar and Hayao Miyazaki, and it shows. “Majora’s Mask — Terrible Fate” is animated with all the care and detail you’d expect from a beloved kid’s movie like Toy Story or Finding Nemo, and one wonders if this is an unsolicited audition for a professional project. It’s not unheard of; Dan Trachtenberg would eventually go on to direct 10 Cloverfield Lane, but it was the short Portal: No Escape that initially shot him to fame.

Ember Lab’s YouTube channel calls the clip a labor of love, one that imagines how the Zelda universe might be imagined in film. I think the succinct answer is “very well.”

Someone spent over four years and $1,000 building the perfect keyboard click-testing machine

So you like clicky keyboards. If that’s the case, you probably have a favorite model (or switch type) — maybe, for example, the one my colleague Paul Miller recently dubbed “the clickiest keyboard of all time.” But Deskthority forum member and mechanical keyboard expert HaaTa reminds us that these pronouncements are a fool’s errand, for there is no way a mere human could really, objectively judge the nature of a click.

For that, you would need something like the Force Curve Gauge, a fairly remarkable side project that HaaTa lays out in detail. As the name suggests, it’s a jury-rigged device that measures force curve — the relationship between the distance of a keypress and the force it transfers, or to we users, how much tactile feedback we get while hitting keys. So instead of describing whether a keyboard feels good or bad, you can point to something like this:

The catch is that coming up with any kind of consistent, meaningful data requires serious precision and solid equipment. Just one of the pieces, the force gauge stand, apparently cost about $1,000, and setting the entire machine up took a substantial amount of tinkering — the picture above is from an early prototype. You’re probably not going to buy your next keyboard based on a force graph, but if your co-workers complain about the clicking, maybe you can point to one to explain just why you love it.