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CNET Member Giveaway: Fitbit Flex

After a great CES full of exciting tech and new ideas, we are back and hard at work. A little tired, but also thrilled to bring an exciting opportunity to the CNET audience. We'd like our users to be able to experience a little CES, so we are giving five lucky CNET members the chance to win the Best of CES award-winning Fitbit Flex. Coming out this spring, the Fitbit Flex won for best in Wearable and Health Tech, beating out a large and extremely competitive set for the coveted title.

The Flex is an activity monitor designed to … Read more

Get a $117 Mac app bundle for free

Let's be honest: Mac users don't usually get a lot of freebies.

Sure, there are software bundles from time to time, but usually they cost around $50 -- nothing free about that.

That's what makes this deal so special: it doesn't cost a dime. For the next two weeks, StackSocial is offering the Mac Freebie Bundle, a collection of eight Mac apps with a combined value of $117 -- and a total cost to you of $0.

What's included? Here's the rundown:

Clipboard manager ClipBuddy. Icon organizer IconBox2. Image tweaker Image Smith. Screen-capture tool … Read more

Get nine indie PC games for $5.91

Calling all gamers! Can you scrape together at least six bucks? For about the price of a venti cafe mocha, which takes maybe 10 minutes to drink, you can get enough games to last you maybe 10 months.

Yep, it's another Indie Gala game bundle, this time with nine PC titles that can be yours if you pay at least $5.91.

The games include the fantasy-action side-scroller Trine, city-management sim Cities in Motion, humor-tinged Diablo clone Magicka (along with mission pack Magicka: Vietnam), and blood-and-guts FPS Painkiller: Black Edition.

Most of these date back a few years and … Read more

Get Windows file manager XYplorer for free

Windows Explorer has never been what I'd call a user-friendly tool. In fact, I find it pretty unintuitive. Yet it's what Windows users are stuck with for moving, copying, deleting, and organizing their files.

If you've often wished for an easier, more robust replacement, today is your lucky day: Giveaway of the Day is offering Donald Lessau's XYplorer 11.90 Windows file manager free of charge. It normally sells for $29.95.

WARNING: Do not click the big blue Download button that appears alongside the description of XYplorer. That's actually an ad, and clicking it … Read more

Get one year of Web hosting for $10

This is a rerun of a deal I posted last year. It was sweet then, and it's equally sweet now.

Is 2013 the year you make it big on the Web? Only if you have a home for your Web site. It's easy to find hosting packages for less than $10 per month, but 10 bucks for a whole year? Nice.

For the next 48 hours, Web Hosting Hub is offering your first year of Web hosting for just $10. That's $50 off the usual price.

Update: Sorry, folks, someone forgot to flip the switch: The deal … Read more

Why Adobe (and other vendors) should give away older software

No doubt you heard earlier this week that Adobe is giving away Creative Suite 2, an older version of its popular (and pricey) image-editing and design bundle.

Then it turned out that, no, the software wasn't free; Adobe's Don Isaacs wrote that the company was merely "terminating the activation servers for CS2," and that the download page was only for those who already owned licenses for the product.

Ah, but it was too late: the story had gone viral (big time), and it appears Adobe has decided not to try stuffing the genie back into the … Read more

Two amazing deals on PC games

Got plans for the weekend -- or, for that matter, the month? Cancel 'em, because you're about to score a boatload of PC games on the cheap.

For a limited time, GameStop has Command & Conquer: The Ultimate Collection for $16.99. Let's just round that up to $17, which means you're paying a buck apiece for 17 C&C games. Nice!

The collection includes everything from the original Command & Conquer to C&C Generals (my personal favorite) to the most recent entry, Command & Conquer 4: Tiberian Twilight, with all the various expansion … Read more

Three things I saw at CES that I'd actually buy

LAS VEGAS--So I've pretty much wrapped up my visit to CES 2013, and you know what? I enjoyed it. Most of my fellow bloggers and journalists will tell you it's a crowded, noisy, soul-sucking waste of time with nothing good to see, but I discovered some pretty cool stuff this week.

Stuff I'd actually buy, in fact. And as most of you well know, it takes a lot for me to unshackle my credit card from my wallet. Here are three things I saw at CES that I'm looking forward to owning:… Read more

The best times of year to buy tech gear

I'm often asked if there's a particular time of year that's best to buy certain tech items, like tablets or TVs, or laptops.

My typical response is that it rarely makes sense to delay your purchase in hopes of scoring a better deal, because you can end up waiting forever. The TV you buy today will almost certainly cost less six months down the road -- but that's true of just about everything.

What's more, there are great bargains to be found pretty much every day of the year (as proven by my Cheapskate blog), … Read more