Memorial Day Tech Deals Live: Best savings this holiday weekend
From gaming laptops to monitors and SSD upgrades, these are the top sales.
Memorial Day this year falls on May 26th in the U.S. Traditionally a day to honor those who made the ultimate sacrifice, it's also a time when many retailers have huge sales on everything from mattresses to M.2 SSDs.
In the tech world, this is a great time to save money on everything from peripherals to components to pre-built PC and gaming laptops. It's also the biggest sale you're going to see before Prime Day arrives sometime in July.
To help you find savings on the PC hardware and other gear you need, we're live-blogging Memorial Day tech sales all weekend long. Check out the latest and greatest Memorial Day tech deals below.
Quick Links: Memorial Day Tech Deals
- AMD Ryzen 9950X3D: Now $699 (normally not available)
- Samsung 990 Pro (4TB): Now $309
- WD Black SN850X (8TB): Now $589
- Alienware RTX 5090 Desktop: Now $4899
- Newegg: Up to 23% off SSDs
- Amazon: Save up to 40% on tech deals
- Best Buy: Up to $300 off laptops, monitors, & more
- Dell: Up to $700 off gaming PCs
- Lenovo: Save up to 59% on Lenovo laptops
- HP: Save over $50% on HP, HyperX, Omen, and Victus in the Memorial Day sale
Hottest Memorial Day Tech Deals
Memorial Day Tech Deals Live
Snag a 13-inch MacBook Air for $899 and up
If you like Mac laptops, but not breaking the bank to get one to get one, now is a great time to act. In honor of Memorial Day, Amazon is selling the 2025 MacBook Air with M4 CPU, 16GB of RAM and your choice of SSD depending on the price.
A config with a 256GB SSD, which is pretty sparse but you can make it work if you need to, is just $899. The same config, but with a 512GB SSD goes for $1,099.
When we reviewed the MacBook Air back in March, we had our hands on the 15-inch version of the model, which had the same M4 chip with 16GB of RAM. Overall, we found it nearly matching the speeds of the MacBook Pro and exceeding Intel-powered laptops like the Lenovo Y oga Slim 7i and Dell XPS 13.
You can expect similar performance from the 13-inch MacBook Air that's on sale, but in a smaller form factor. The 15-inch Air weighs just 3.3 pounds but the 13-inch model tips the scales at just 2.7 pounds.
Our favorite gaming monitor is now $259
Dell's 32--inch, S3222DGM has long been at the top of our list of the best gaming monitors overall, thanks to its epic 3700:1 contrast ratio, 165 Hz refresh rate and sharp, 2560 x 1440 resolution. Sure, there are fancier monitors than this curved display, but none that fall within its very affordable price range.
Now, the S3222DGM is on sale for just $259 at Best Buy as part of the store's Memorial Day tech deals. That's a nice discount off of its $329 typical price and easy for almost anyone to afford.
When we reviewed the Dell S3222DGM in 2022, we were really impressed with its combination of vibrant images and tear-free gaming. "There is nothing better than a high-contrast VA panel, and the Dell S3222DGM is one of the best I’ve seen," Contributing Editor Christian Eberle wrote. "It strikes a rare balance between gaming performance and image quality."
In our tests, the monitor showed a contrast ratio of 3,718:1, which even beats other VA monitors we tested and it absolutely destroys IPS monitors, which usually can't even hit 1000:1.
According to our colorimeter, the Dell S3222DGM can reproduce a strong 122.6 percent of the sRGB gamut and 85.9 percent of the DCI-P3 gamut. The color quality also stands out because of the high contrast ratio. Those bright colors will look extra bright when the dark pixels next to them look really dark.
The monitor also has excellent build quality and comes with two HDMI 2.0 ports, a single DisplayPort 1.2 port and a 3.5mm audio jack.
Grab an Alienware RTX 5090 PC for less than $5000
If you want the ultimate gaming experience, nothing beats RTX 5090 graphics. The top card in Nvidia's stack, the 5090 can do smooth ray tracing at 4K or really high frame rates at lower resolutions and without ray tracing on.
Unfortunately, RTX 5090 cards are hard to come by as scalpers snap them up almost immediately and they are not available at anywhere near the $1,999 MSRP. Right now, it's about $3,400 at least to buy a new RTX 5090 card on eBay.
So good news. You can get a decked-out Alienware Area-51 desktop with RTX 5090 inside for just $4,899 right now as part of Dell's Memorial Day tech deals. This config has a 2TB SSD, 32GB of RAM and a Core Ultra 9 285K CPU.
We recently reviewed a similarly-configured Alienware Area-51, which came complete with the same Core Ultra 9 285K CPU and RTX 5090 graphics. As you can see in the graphic below, it delivered really strong frame rates in Cyberpunk 2077 with ray trancing enabled, both at 1080p and 4K. All of its competitors were using RTX 4090 cards.
On Shadow of the Tomb Raider, which does not have ray tracing, the Area-51 delivered even stronger frame rates.
This isn't a cheap PC, but it's a great deal for what you get.
Samsung's 49-inch monitor deal comes with a second monitor
If you're looking for a really large gaming monitor with plenty of screen real estate, the Samsung Odyssey G9 G95C could be a great choice. The monitor as a DQHD resolution of 5120 x 1440, which is the same as putting two QHD monitors next to each other. It even has a picture-by-picture mode which would allow you to put output from two computers next to each other.
The screen runs at up to 240 Hz, which is more than enough for all but the most demanding, professional eSports players.
Right now, Samsung has the Odyssey G9 G95C for just $799. And it comes with a second monitor, a 27-inch G55C QHD, which itself is a 165 Hz monitor with a 2560 x 1440 resolution. It has a 1000R curve just like the G95C so you could it next to the larger monitor and treat the two monitors like one giant 7680 x 1440 desktop.
MSI's RTX 4060 Laptop is less than $700
If you're shopping for a gaming laptop, the minimum good graphics card you should consider is an RTX 4060. Yes, you can get low-cost models with RTX 4050 inside, but if you want to run games at 1080p and high or sometimes ultra settings, then you want an RTX 4060.
In non-sale times, an RTX 4060-powered laptop usually costs more than $1,000, but today you can snag an MSI Thin 15 with RTX 4060, a Core i5 CPU-13420H CPU, 16GB of RAM and a 512GB SSD for just $698 at Walmart. That's about $300 off its list price of $999.
The 15.6-inch, 1920 x 1080 screen runs at 144 Hz, giving you a high enough refresh rate for whatever the GPU can dish out.
Ryzen 9 9950X3D is Available
AMD's Ryzen 9 9950X3D is on the top of its CPU stack, with 16 cores, 32 threads and a whopping 144MB of cache memory. This gives it the best combination of productivity performance and game play that you can get.
Normally, the 9950X3D has been hard to get, but now it's in stock at Amazon for its list price of $699. This is not a sale, but it is noteworthy because this processor has been very hard to get and available mainly from scalpers.
If you look at the chart below, you can see that the 9950X3D is nearly at the tops in temrs of performance, within about 1 fps of the cheaper, but only 8-core Ryzen 7 9800X3D. It beats the pants off of Intel's offerings, including the Core i9-14900K and Core Ultra 9 285K.
LG gives you an extra 27-inch monitor with its OLED gaming screen
Giving away second, somewhat lesser but still powerful monitors is a trend this Memorial Day Sales season. Right now, LG is offering a 27-inch UltraGear OLED QHD monitor that's eye-popping OLED with a 480 Hz refresh rate and 0.03ms response time for $799, reduced from $999.
This screen has almost everything that a gamer could want: vibrant colors, extremely high refresh rates and a sharp, 2560 x 1440 resolution. Meanwhile, it comes with a second monitor that's 180 Hz, 27 inches and also 1440p (but not OLED).
Put the two monitors next to each other and you can use one for work and one for play.
This tablet was such a good deal, I ran out to buy it for my daughter
We had what I'll call a tablet emergency at the Piltch house. My daughter loves to watch YouTube kids but she's constantly grabbing my phone to watch it. This was causing some problems for me because I'd miss important alerts while she was off playing with it.
My daughter already had a kids' tablet, an Amazon Fire Tablet that we bought her a couple of years ago, but Amazon doesn't allow you to install YouTube Kids, which is the number one app that she wanted to use.
This weekend, I have to work and did not want to miss anymore important messages from the job so I looked into what inexpensive Android tablet I could buy her. The answer was obvious: the Lenovo M9, which is now on sale at Best Buy for just $79.
I bought one of these tablets for in-store pickup yesterday and brought it home. It took just a few minutes to set up and now my daughter is off and running.
The best part is that, unlike some Android tablets, the Lenovo M9 comes with Google Kids Space, an optional child-limited UI that my wife and I can control and use to choose what apps our daughter can and can't have.
Even if you're not a child, the Lenovo M9 has a lot going for it. It's inexpensive, charges over USB-C and is ideal for watching videos, reading, or playing casual games. It has a generous, 9-inch screen, a good-enough MediaTek Helio G80 processor, 3GB of RAM and 32GB of storage. Its 1340 x 800 resolution is more than sharp enough for the job.
My daughter loves the Lenovo M9 and I love having my phone back.
Grab this 8TB, Super-Speedy SSD for $589
These days, 2TB is a bare minimum for anyone serious about their computing. And 4TB capacity is ideal, particularly if you play games and need lots of room for the installs. However, 8TB is the pinnacle of capacity, but very few drives are available in that capacity.
Today, Amazon has the WD Black SN850X, one of the very fastest PCIe 4.0 drives, available in 8TB capacity for just $589. The drive promises sequential read and write speeds of 7,200 / 6,600 MB/s. And it normally goes for $639.
If you're looking for high-speed, high-capacity storage, you really can't beat this deal.
Get Asus's 380 Hz gaming monitor for just $299
If you're an eSports gamer, you need as high of a refresh rate as you can get. Most low-cost gaming monitors will give you 144 or 165 Hz but when you want to step up above 200 or even 300 Hz, you have to pay a premium.
Right now, Amazon has the Asus ROG Strix XG259QNS for $299, reduced from $379. This 25-inch IPS gaming monitor operates at up to 380 Hz with a response time of just 0.3 ms. The screen runs at 1080p, which is what a lot of professional eSports gamers play at, particularly when you want to push 380 fps or so.
Cooler Master's 27-inch, 240 Hz OLED Monitor is Now Just $364
There's no doubt that the best color and image quality you can get comes from an OLED monitor. Because all of the pixels are individually lit, you get superior contrast -- an off pixel is totally black -- and that really makes everything pop.
However, OLED panels are still very expensive. Typically, you'll spend $700 or more for an OLED monitor and many cost closer to $1,000 more. However, today, Woot has the Cooler Master Tempest GZ2711 for just $364. This monitor is currently $699 at Amazon and $999 at Cooler Master's own site.
The Tempest GZ2711 is a 2560 x 1440, 27-inch display that uses an OLED panel to achieve 98.5 percent coverage of the wide, DCI-P3 color gamut. It also offers up to a 240 Hz refresh rate which is enough for everyone but the pickiest professional eSports gamers.
This is the lowest price we've ever seen for an OLED gaming monitor. So, if you want the color gamut of OLED and plenty of refresh rate, this is a tough deal to beat.
SK hynix Tube T31, an external SSD speed demon, hits all-time low
SK hynix's Tube T31 has long been one of our favorite external drives. Whether it counts as an external SSD or a USB Flash drive is open for debate. It's fast enough to be called an external SSD, but it has the form factor of a USB Flash drive.
Whatever you call it, the Tube T31 is revalation, delivering 1,000 MB/s reads and writes, along with real-world transfers of similar speed. It's fast, it fits in a pocket and now it costs only $59, matching an all-time low.
When we reviewed the Tube T31, we noted that it delivered 1,061 and 1,033 MB/s sequential reads and writes.
When copying a large set of files in Windows, the rates were a real-world 802 and 467 MB/s.
Both sets of results put the SK hynix Tube T31 well ahead of the competition.
Hoto's excellent rechargeable screwdriver is great for PC builds and back down to $38
I build a lot of PCs and also do a fair bit of home improvement work around my apartment. So a cordless screwdriver is a nice thing to have. I also own a much slimmer Wowstick, but have found Hoto's NEX O1 Pro to be handier thanks to its extra (and variable) torque. It's great for loosening those factory-installed screws on PC cases that just don't want to let go, and also good for assembling small pieces of furniture.
The Hoto hasn't replaced my DeWalt impact driver or drill for bigger, tougher jobs, but I can confirm it's ruggedly constructed. While helping relatives move into a new condo recently, I used it for a full day and dropped it off a six-foot ladder at least three times while installing shelves and curtain rods. It still looks and functions like it did when it was new. The Hoto screwdriver is powerful enough for most common household tasks, easy to charge over USB-C, and even looks good on my workbench. I just wish it came with and stored more than 12 bits.
Get a Windows 11 Pro key for less than $10
If you're building a new PC, perhaps using one of our parts lists on the best PC builds page, you almost certainly want to install Windows 11 on it. To install Windows 11, it helps to have a valid product key. Sure, you can leave your Windows unactivated and deal with a few annoyances (like not being able to change your theme or having an "unactivated" watermark), but that's less than ideal.
Microsoft would like you to buy a retail product key for $139 for Windows 11 Home or a whopping $199 for Windows 11 Pro. That's ridiculous as $199 might be a third to a quarter of the price of a low-cost build. You could practically buy a 4TB SSD for that price.
Fortunately, Groupon (using vendor MyCodes24) has a Windows 11 product key available for just $9.52 when you use the code SAVEINMAY at checkout.
There is a catch here. This is an OEM key so you can only use it once and not recycle it for future builds. However, considering the low cost versus a retail key, it's well worth the sacrifice.
Key vendors like MyCodes24 resell unused OEM keys and some folks are worried about buying this way. But I've bought a lot of Windows codes from Groupon and elsewhere and never had a problem.
How much does a 4TB SSD cost these days?
It's not a great SSD sales day, but still there are plenty of good prices to be had on 4TB SSDs if you know where to look. If you want, you can score a 4TB Silicon Power drive for as little as $205 ($0.05 per GB) or a Samsung 990 EVO for as little as $245.
These aren't Memorial Day sales, but they are good prices, particularly if you're doing a major build or system upgrade right now. Below is a list of all the major 4TB PCIe 4.0 and PCIe 5.0 models and their lowest prices.
Drive | Price | Cost Per GB | Read Speed | Write Speed |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Silicon Power UD90 | 0.05 | 5,000 MB/s | 4,800 MB/s | |
PNY CS2241 | 0.05 | 5,000 MB/s | 4,200 MB/s | |
Crucial P3 Plus | 0.05 | 5,000 MB/s | 5,000 MB/s | |
Silicon Power US75 | 0.05 | 7,500 MB/s | 6,500 MB/s | |
TeamGroup MP44 | 0.06 | 7,400 MB/s | 6,900 MB/s | |
Samsung 990 Evo Plus | 0.06 | 7,250 MB/s | 6,300 MB/s | |
Addlink A93 PS5 SSD | 0.06 | 7,400 MB/s | 6,500 MB/s | |
WD Blue SN5000 | 0.06 | 5,500 MB/s | 5,500 MB/s | |
Crucial P310 | 0.06 | 7,100 MB/s | 71,00 MB/s | |
WD Black SN7100 | 0.07 | 7,250 MB/s | 6,900 MB/s | |
WD Black SN850X | 0.07 | 7,300 MB/s | 6,600 MB/s | |
Kingston Fury Renegade | 0.07 | 7,300 MB/s | 7,000 MB/s | |
Samsung 990 Pro | 0.08 | 7,450 MB/s | 6,900 MB/s | |
Crucial T705 | 0.09 | 14100 MB/s | 12,600 MB/s | |
Samsung 9100 Pro | 0.12 | 14,800 MB/s | 13,400 MB/s |
Get an RTX 5090 for less than $3,000
Good news! You can actually buy an RTX 5090 card without purchasing it from a scalper on eBay where cards start at around $3,400.
Even better news! You can get an RTX 5090 card from a reputable seller, Newegg, for less than $3,000. If you want one, you might need to hurry. Here's what they have right now.
- The MSI laptop in the article is sold by a third party on Walmart's website (A&Z Wholesale Corp a.k.a. AZ Tech). Not sure I'd be recommending a laptop that's not really that big of a sale compared to other similar equipped laptops on sale from other big name outlets from a third party.
- The M4 Macbook Air was $849.99 last week, so it's increased by $50 this week for this "sale".