You might be used to throwing out or giving away gadgets when they reach the end of their useful life, but listen: you’ve got options. Many of the electronics you consider outdated can be upgraded rather than abandoned or replaced. We’re not talking about projects that require a high level of technical skill or a lot of money, either—there are simple ways to give your gadgets years of extra life. Here are five of our favorite strategies for reinvigorating old tech.
1. Get more storage for console games
Upgrading the hard drive inside a PlayStation 4 or an Xbox One isn’t particularly difficult, and it’ll cost you a lot less than buying a new console. This fix will net you more storage space for games and downloads, and might even provide a slight improvement on loading times, too. Sony has its own step-by-step upgrade guide, and if you’re using a Microsoft console, we recommend iFixit’s walkthrough. In most cases, you’ll need nothing more than a new hard drive and a screwdriver. Of course, If you’re willing to spend a little more money for an easier upgrade, just buy an external hard drive and plug it right into your console.
2. Put more storage on your smartphone
Extra storage is a fine upgrade for your smartphone, too. You can never have too much room for apps, games, photos, videos, music, and Netflix downloads, and making more space is as easy as popping in a memory card—your phone will take care of the rest. The iPhones and Google Pixel phones, however, are among those that don’t have a memory card slot. Instead, you could consider upgrading to get more cloud storage. Apple iCloud upgrade prices start at $1 a month for 50GB of room, while Google One prices start at $2 a month for an additional 100GB.
3. Get a new keyboard, stand, or monitor for your laptop
4. Add smarts to an old speaker
That means you can keep the high fidelity and punchy volume of your existing hi-fi speaker or TV sound bar, and still access tens of thousands of Alexa skills at the same time. Check the weather, control your smart home, find the latest sports scores, set timers and alarms, and much more. The Echo Input requires a separate power connection, but once you’ve got the necessary cables in place, you can get up and running quickly with the free Alexa app for Android or iOS. These will easily connect accounts such as Google Calendar and Spotify for you.
5. Make any old TV smart
If your aging television set has an HDMI port, you can instantly add some smarts to it by plugging in a streaming dongle. You’ve got several inexpensive options to pick from, which will give you access to the likes of Hulu, Netflix, Spotify, and more.
