The Verge Holiday Gift Guide 2012

Let's face it: most of the speakers we all use are terrible. Whether it's on our phones, our tablets, our laptops, even our TVs — we're all too used to listening to music and movies on terrible equipment. You can solve that problem for your giftees in style, or on a budget — and if you choose right, sometimes both. Give someone the gift of good sound this year, and they'll remember why they liked music in the first place — before it sounded like it was coming out of a tin can.

Finding the right gift for someone is hard. Sometimes it's not just about knowing what they want or what they like, but about knowing what kind of person they are, then trying to find something unexpected for them. Something they never see coming. Something completely unique. Gifts from the world of art, home goods, design, and personal items are the kinds of things that can often require a rather deep knowledge of the giftee, but can also have an impact that far exceeds gifts from other categories. The Verge team has compiled some of its favorite left-field items from the various corners of the web — art prints, wearables, and even lighting fixtures — in the hopes that someone out there sees that perfect gift. Then buys it. Then becomes a hero to a child in need. Of a super expensive light.

Buying a decent set of headphones is tough. There are just so many choices: noise-cancelling, or earbuds, or in-ear, or those weird ones that you have to go to a doctor and have molded? Plenty of people will try and convince you that you get what you pay for with headphones, and that a good set are worth their weight in gold. That may be true to an extent — those $1,000 molded ones do sound awesome — but you don't have to take out a second mortgage in order to get a good pair. Whether you're buying for the audiophile in your life, your running-obsessed relative, or the friend you can't bear to see ruining their ears and their music with those those horrible Apple EarPods, there's a great set of headphones here for you.

Seeing as it's the essential piece of your home theater setup, you'll face few household decisions as stressful as deciding on the HDTV you'll be staring at for the next several years. Big or small? Plasma or LCD? Where does 3D fall on the priority list? The holiday season typically isn't the best time to fork out cash for a new television — you’re best holding off for the weeks before the Super Bowl if you’re in the US and can wait for it. But if you're determined to unbox a new TV in the near future, we've tried to steer you in the right direction with these recommendations.

It's a slightly odd time to have a gamer in your life, since two of the three major consoles appear to be only months away from a huge revision. The flood of great games never slows, though, and there are plenty of new titles to hold over even the most avid player. Plus, Nintendo's Wii U is now out, and as we found in our review the console has plenty of potential — and it's already great, when its games take advantage of what it can do. Whether you're looking to give someone their next Halo fix or get them into a whole new way of gaming, there's plenty to buy this season.

There are few gifts more important than a personal computer, but it’s also one of the easiest to screw up. Buy a laptop based on price, brand, or a spec sheet alone, and you’re sure to run into unexpected tradeoffs. That’s why we review laptops here at The Verge, but also why we penned this guide: here are the best recommendations we have to offer, and some excellent choices at every price.

For the first time in a few years, buying a tablet isn't necessarily a simple decision. The prevailing wisdom has always been “just buy an iPad,” but that’s not always the case anymore. Google, Amazon, and Barnes & Noble are all promoting their own tablets and e-readers, and they’re all good products getting better quickly. Then there’s the whole “tablet” versus “reading tablet” versus “ebook reader” dilemma, in which companies make it impossible to figure out what their devices are even for. Plus, even if you do want an iPad, do you get the big one or the small one? The cheap big one or the expensive big one?

Here’s a handy guide to make sure you don’t go to Best Buy and end up walking out with the wrong thing.

Digital cameras have been one of the most popular holiday gifts for over a decade, and they are still desired by gift givers and gift receivers alike. Now more than ever, it can be difficult to decide which camera to get someone, as the market is seemingly saturated with cameras of every size, spec, and shape. We’ve rounded up the best cameras across a few categories to help guide your purchase, with alternative options that you may not have considered when you initially started your hunt for the perfect camera gift.

There's nothing like the challenge of the "content" gift. Granted, it's often more affordable than a new camera, but there's that little thing called taste. Choose a book well, and you may inspire a friend to look at writing in an entirely new way. Gift the wrong album, and you could end up never talking about music again. After plugging the Verge staff into our Recomendo5000 — ten thousand times more accurate than Pandora's recommendations — we've come up with a list of music, games, movie, TV, and book recommendations perfect for the picky humans in your life.

Assuming your offshore accounts held up fine in 2012, then why not take the opportunity to really treat yourself and your closest friends and family, and those schlubs covering for you at the office. Hanging cocoons for napping over your pool away from the kids? A special edition Leica that costs for more than your first two cars combined? Your very own Bitcoin mining rig? We’ve got you covered.

Let’s call it the "thoughtful" gift — the one that thinks outside of the box. It’s not the typical "game console" or "off-contract smartphone" that loved ones expect you to buy. No! It’s something else entirely. It’s the tacit acknowledgement that you shouldn’t be burdened to lock a friend or family down into one ecosystem or another. That’s not your job, that’s a very, very personal decision that requires deep soul-searching.

Instead, maybe you know your friend just upgraded to an iPhone 5 but has a ton of long 30-pin connectors that will now go unused. An Apple Lightning adapter shows that you care, that you listen. Or maybe your friend’s phone keeps dying at inopportune times and that’s why he or she totally couldn’t call you about the party that seems like everyone else went to — buy him or her a portable battery pack so that it never. happens. again. These are the thoughtful gifts that show you care, that you’re listening.