The 5 Best Weekend Tech Deals on MacBooks, Soundbars, Monitors, More

How’re you holding up? It’s been a real roller-coaster of a week here at PCMag, as our livelihood depends on being able to judge the value of consumer electronics based on their prices. In the deals department, we’re always calculating whether items on sale are worth what you’re paying or artificially inflated to trick you into splurging with a fake sale. That’s where the PC Labs come in, with our product experts doing teardowns and benchmark tests to objectively show how new tech lines up. That’s not going to change, and we’re still going to pick out the five best deals every Friday. This week’s a good one, with a top-flight iMac, an Editors’ Choice-winning soundbar, and more at discounts of up to 54% off.

This 4K monitor definitely has some quirks, and you can read our detailed 2023 review for more information, but the high points definitely outweigh them. At a massive 43 inches from corner to corner, it’s nearly the size of a television set, and the mini-LED backlighting allows it to pump out enough brightness to be seen even in well-lit gaming caves. The variable refresh rate can pump up to 240Hz, but you’ll probably want to keep it at 144Hz for the best performance. It has a massive array of ports, including a pair of HDMI 2.1 inputs, Ethernet, DisplayPort and more. A 43% discount is as big as we’ve ever seen, so snap it up now.

Amazon’s Ring line of smart security cameras has staked out a position in the budget market with solid performance and easy integration with its Alexa ecosystem. In our review of the Ring battery doorbell, we lauded its sharp 1440 by 1440 video output, simple installation and two-way audio, but noted that you’ll need to purchase a Ring subscription for extra features like the ability to store video in the cloud to view it later. That said, with a 45% discount on the already affordable base unit, the money you save can be used for exactly that.

Apple’s shift to in-house silicon from Intel processors has revolutionized its hardware, with each new iteration delivering faster and more stable performance. The 2023 MacBook Pro, the company’s high-end laptop, was the first to use the M3 processor, and in our review we couldn’t say enough good things about the sleek and powerful machine. Not only does it have a bright, colorful Liquid Retina XDR screen that makes everything you’re working on look good, it even steps up to the plate as a gaming laptop. This is the deepest discount we’ve seen on this configuration, at a whopping 26% off retail.

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Garmin’s pivot into wearables has been extremely successful for the company, as it’s focused on fitness-forward smartwatches that fold in its GPS technology to keep you oriented no matter where you’re working out. In our review of the Vivoactive 5, senior analyst Andrew Gebhart said that the device “sits in the middle ground between a fitness tracker and a smartwatch, monitoring health metrics like heart rate, respiration, sleep, and stress levels, while offering lifestyle features like phone notifications, mobile payments, and weather reports.” You can even store your music on it so you don’t have to take your phone to the gym.

Sonos has discontinued its Arc soundbar, unfortunately, but that means you can get this Editors’ Choice-winning home entertainment speaker at a massive discount. In our 2020 review, we gushed about the Arc’s surprisingly large and deep Dolby Atmos sound field, giving rich and booming low tones without needing a separate subwoofer. It’s an assertive speaker that still keeps dialogue clear, and if you want to expand your home theater setup it’s a breeze to link more speakers in through the Sonos app. It also can connect to Alexa and Google smart home networks to enable hands-free control. Pick one up at 33% off before they’re all gone and you have to pay a fortune for one on eBay.

Need to save even more? Our deals page has all the discounts you need to ride out the crisis.

About K. Thor Jensen

Contributing Writer

K. Thor Jensen is a writer and cartoonist living in the Pacific Northwest. He has contributed to dozens of prestigious outlets, including PCMag, Tested, Clickhole, and Newsweek. His second graphic novel, Cloud Stories, was released in 2017.

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