MudMan
@MudMan@fedia.io
- Comment on What have you played this week? 3 months ago:
It is really cool. I don't always love the achievement design some of the volunteer coders land on, but it's still a wonderful way to revitalize old games. And the recently added completion tracking stats, where you don't just get an award for 100% every achievement, but also for beating the main campaign, is incredibly fun and useful to track which games you've playted through. Sony and Microsoft should steal that immediately.
- Comment on What have you played this week? 3 months ago:
They put Reatroachievements on Gamecube games so apparently I'm now balls deep into OG Animal Crossing. Don't even know how it happened, but Tom Nook is saying my kneecaps are at risk if I don't come up with 150K bells by the end of the month.
- Comment on There is no fix for Intel’s crashing 13th and 14th Gen CPUs — any damage is permanent 3 months ago:
Oh, I absolutely could have. It would lose a couple of cores, but the 13th gen is pretty linear, it would have performed more or less the same.
Thing is, I couldn't have known that then, could I? Chip reviews aren't aiming at normalizing for temps, everybody is reviewing for moar pahwah. So is there a way for me to know that gimping this chip to run silently basically gets me a slightly overclocked 13600K? Not really. Do I know, even at this point, that getting a 13600K wouldn't deliver the same performance but require my fans to be back to sounding noticeable? I don't know that.
Because the actual performance of these is not to a reliable spec other than "run flat out and see how much heat your thermal solution can soak" there is no good way to evaluate these for applications that aren't just that without buying them and checking. Maybe I could have saved a hundred bucks. Maybe not. Who knows?
This is less of a problem if you buy laptops, but for casual DIY I frankly find the current status quo absurd.
- Comment on There is no fix for Intel’s crashing 13th and 14th Gen CPUs — any damage is permanent 3 months ago:
Whoa, that's even worse. It's not just the uncertainty of knowing whether Intel will replace your hardware or the cost of jumping ship next time. Intel straight up owes you money. That sucks.
- Comment on There is no fix for Intel’s crashing 13th and 14th Gen CPUs — any damage is permanent 3 months ago:
You're not wrong, but "we've been winging it for decades" is not necessarily a good defense here.
That said, I do think they did look at their performance numbers and made a conscious choice to lean into feeding these more power and running them hotter, though. Whether the impact would be lower with more conservative power specs is debatable, but as you say there are other reasons why trying to fake generational leaps by making CPUs capable of fusing helium is not a great idea.
- Comment on There is no fix for Intel’s crashing 13th and 14th Gen CPUs — any damage is permanent 3 months ago:
"Clearly damaged" is an interesting problem. The CPU would crash 100% of the time on the default settings for the motherboard, but if you remember, they issued a patch already.
I patched. And guess what, with the new Intel Defaults it doesn't crash anymore. But it suddenly runs very hot instead. Like, weird hot. On a liquid cooling system it's thermal throttling when before it wouldn't come even close. Won't crash, though.
So is it human error? Did I incorrectly mount my cooling? I'd say probably not, considering it ran cool enough pre-patch until it became unstable and it runs cool enough now with a manual downclock. But is that enough for Intel to issue a replacement if the system isn't unstable? More importantly, do I want to have that fight with them now or to wait and see if their upcoming patch, which allegedly will fix whatever incorrect voltage requests the CPU is making, fixes the overheating issue? Because I work on this thing, I can't just chuck it in a box, send it to Intel and wait. I need to be up and running immediately.
So yeah, it sucks either way, but it would suck a lot less if Intel was willing to flag a range of CPUs as being eligible for a recall.
As I see it right now, the order of operations is to wait for the upcoming patch, retest the default settings after the patch and if the behavior seems incorrect contact Intel for a replacement. I just wish they would make it clearer what that process is going to be and who is eligible for one.
- Comment on There is no fix for Intel’s crashing 13th and 14th Gen CPUs — any damage is permanent 3 months ago:
No, I have a DDR5 setup. Which is why my motherboard was way more expensive than 100 bucks.
The problem isn't upgrading to a entry level AM5 motherboard, the problem is that to get back to where I am with my rather expensive Intel motherboard I have to spend a lot more than that. Moving to AMD doesn't mean I want to downgrade.
- Comment on There is no fix for Intel’s crashing 13th and 14th Gen CPUs — any damage is permanent 3 months ago:
I mean, happy for you, but in the real world a 200 extra dollars for a 400 dollar part is a huge price spike.
Never mind that, be happy for me, I actually went for a higher spec than that when I got this PC because I figured I'd get at least one CPU upgrade out of this motherboard, since it was early days of DDR5 and it seemed like I'd be able to both buy faster RAM and a faster CPU to keep my device up to date. So yeah, it was more expensive than that.
And hey, caveat emptor, futureproofing is a risky, expensive game on PCs. I was ready for a new technology to make me upgrade anyway, if we suddenly figured out endless storage or instant RAM or whatever. Doesn't mean it isn't crappy to suddenly make upgrading my CPU almost twice as expensive because Intel sucks at their one job.
- Comment on There is no fix for Intel’s crashing 13th and 14th Gen CPUs — any damage is permanent 3 months ago:
The article is... not wrong, but oversimplifying. There seem to be multiple faults at play here, some would continue to degrade, others would prevent you from recovering some performance threshold, but may be prevented from further damage, others may be solved. Yes, degradation of the chip may be irreversible, if it's due to the oxidation problem or due to the incorrect voltages having cuased damage, but presumably in some cases the chip would continue to work stable and not degenerate further with the microcode fixes.
But yes, agreed, the situation sucks and Intel should be out there disclosing a range of affected chips by at least the confirmed physical defect and allowing a streamlined recall of affected devices, not saying "start an RMA process and we'll look into it".
- Comment on There is no fix for Intel’s crashing 13th and 14th Gen CPUs — any damage is permanent 3 months ago:
So here's the thing about that, the real performance I lose is... not negligible, but somewhere between 0 and 10% in most scenarios, and I went pretty hard keeping the power limits low. Once I set it up this way, realizing just how much power and heat I'm saving for the last few few drops of performance made me angrier than having to do this. The dumb performance race with all the built-in overclocking has led to these insanely power hungry parts that are super sensitive to small defects and require super aggressive cooling solutions.
I would have been fine with a part rated for 150W instead of 250 that worked fine with an air cooler. I could have chosen whether to push it. But instead here we are, with extremely expensive motherboards massaging those electrons into a firehose automatically and turning my computer into a space heater for the sake of bragging aobut shaving half a milisecond per frame on CounterStrike. It's absurd.
None of which changes that I got sold a bum part, Intel is fairly obviously trying to weasel out of the obviously needed recall and warranty extension and I'm suddenly on the hook for close to a grand in superfluous hardware next time I want to upgrade because my futureproof parts are apparently made of rust and happy thoughts.
- Comment on There is no fix for Intel’s crashing 13th and 14th Gen CPUs — any damage is permanent 3 months ago:
I have a 13 series chip, it had some reproducible crashing issues that so far have subsided by downclocking it. It is in the window they've shared for the oxidation issue. At this point there's no reliable way of knowing to what degree I'm affected, by what type of issue, whether I should wait for the upcoming patch or reach out to see if they'll replace it.
I am not happy about it.
Obviously next time I'd go AMD, just on principle, but this isn't the 90s anymore. I could do a drop-in replacement to another Intel chip, but switching platforms is a very expensive move these days. This isn't just a bad CPU issue, this could lead to having to swap out two multi-hundred dollar componenet, at least on what should have been a solidly future-proof setup for at least five or six years.
I am VERY not happy about it.
- Comment on Google Is the Only Search Engine That Works on Reddit Now Thanks to AI Deal 3 months ago:
Yeah, the notion that Lemmy is a Reddit replacement is misguided. It definitely doesn't have the same Q&A balance Reddit does. It feels a lot more like 90s and early 2000s forums than the large-scale self-service link and customer service churn Reddit encourages.
Which I'm all for. I was never a Reddit guy and I do like it here. But in terms of how bad it is now that Reddit is not happy to host most of the actually useful online content for free... well, that's a different conversation.
- Comment on Google Is the Only Search Engine That Works on Reddit Now Thanks to AI Deal 3 months ago:
Okay, hear me out, we should make a different service, like a network of computers where people can freely post information on some sort of page that other people can freely access without needing to log in to a million services. Maybe we could also add like little conversation boards to those to allow people to ask and answer questions, too.
Wild, I know, but I think there is some opportunity there.
- Comment on Somehow USB disks are still the easiest and most reliable way 3 months ago:
Old USB implementation used to be a finicky nightmare, though. You make it sound like it wasn't changed for a reason, MTP connectivity on Android as it is now is so much more functional, as well as safer.
In any case, that solves the misunderstanding. I thought you meant you couldn't directly access phone storage anymore, which isn't the case.
The printer scenario seems like an edge case to me. I mean, MTP has been the default for what? Over a decade? If you have a recent printer you're probably fine (also, it probably has wifi and a dedicated mobile app or at least enough third party support to be used from your phone regardless). If your printer is older than that you're probably better served by going through your PC first anyway. Sure, you don't get direct USB access to printing photos, but now we're talking about a very specific feature that was in use for a very specific sliver of time, and it requires you to be tethered to a device anyway. I don't think that's enough to justify legacy storage support on phones.
- Comment on Somehow USB disks are still the easiest and most reliable way 3 months ago:
Cx Expolorer on Android can access network shares and Samba shares like a desktop OS. It really isn't a particularly outdated option, it's so much less fiddly than direct drive access from a PC and it effectively works just like a USB stick, interface-wise, without having to do the whole "where did I put my thumbdrive" dance each time.
- Comment on Somehow USB disks are still the easiest and most reliable way 3 months ago:
Wait, what feature? You can't access the phone's storage? I'm pretty sure I can access my phone's storage.
- Comment on Imperfect, Linux-powered, DIY smart TV is the embodiment of ad fatigue 3 months ago:
Yeeeeah, I was gonna say. There are easier, nicer looking ways to drive your media consumption through a computing device on a TV. Hell, there are very nice vertical mounts for laptops that look good as a showpiece, no need to strap the thing to the back of the TV.
But hey, it's a kid doing a hobby project. It's a fun thing to do. I support it.
- Comment on Local AI is one step closer through Mistral-NeMo 12B 3 months ago:
Yeah, it seems more interesting to reverse engineer why they chose this line of marketing. They are clearly misrepresenting the challenge and cost of running a LLM locally, so... why?
- Comment on You can't act fabulous after a hip surgery. 3 months ago:
Yeah, the content itself makes perfect sense, I think what got me was the airplane security leaflet pictures. Makes it seem like you pulled your hip from a vaguely disappointing Amazon cardboard box along with a cheap gadget.
- Comment on You can't act fabulous after a hip surgery. 3 months ago:
So I'm the only one having weird posthumanist body horror type feelings at the concept of being given an instruction manual for your artificial body parts, including the equivalent of a void warranty sticker?
Just me? Cool, cool. Quietly unlocking new phobias over here.
- Comment on Meta Reportedly Unhappy With How Much Money Its VR Division Burns 3 months ago:
Yeah, well, don't tell the local patrons, I'm in like post a hundred below of "how dare you acknowledge anything remotely serviceably about a Meta-related product".
But yeah, no, you're pretty much right. They're subsidizing a huge chunk of that entire corner of tech. I don't think it's a mainstream type of device, but I'm glad we all got to spend a few years messing with it as a semi-viable consumer product, even if it's just a bit of an overengineered novelty thing.
- Comment on Meta Reportedly Unhappy With How Much Money Its VR Division Burns 3 months ago:
That is a way more legit reason to still be mad, in my book, and it predates the Facebook acquisition. Oculus had made all that noise about how their devices would be platform agnostic and they wouldn't try to railroad you into buying games through their platform and the moment there was money buzz around the idea Luckey dropped that stuff like it was red hot and we ended up with the travesty that is the PC Oculus store.
I don't think VR was ever going to be mainstream, but imagine what the software ecosystem would be if tecbro Smeagol hadn't gotten greedy for that precious, precious investment money.
- Comment on Capcom and GOG join forces to release the original Resident Evil™ trilogy! 4 months ago:
It's the PC version with controller support patched into the old Sidewinder support. It works super smoothly, although these days you can get the PS1 version to look a lot better with emulation tweaks.
Still, go get it. It's so cool to have this DRM free. The installer is safely in my library now.
- Comment on The Amiga Is Getting A Dune II Remaster From One Of The Original Developers | Time Extension 4 months ago:
Neat. Not the version I played, and arguably a lot of those issues were fixed in the PC port. But then, there are a lot more options for accurate hardware-level emulation and preservation of period-appropriate Amiga than the much muddier explosion of PC specs, so it's weirdly a cleaner way to preserve an optimal version.
I'm never sure how much to push early releases like these, though. Is the clumsy one-unit-at-a-time approach to Dune 2 worth messing with? Or do you just go play the (extremely good) remaster of Command & Conquer at that point?
- Comment on Apple Hits a Major Roadblock as EU Targets App Store 4 months ago:
I wonder, too. Pro-EU centre-right parties and social democrat parties still hold a majority, so on these things I'm not sure we'll see a major shift, but I genuinely haven't checked the voting record to see if the far right parties generally take a different stance on the more pedestrian consumer protection regulations or not. I probably should do that.
- Comment on Was it a good thing that SNW explicitly said the Federation is socialist? 4 months ago:
Oh, yeah, it's ALL handwavy bulls#!t. It's a 60s sci-fi TV show. A great one, but... you know.
I'll say that the transporters are some of the most consistent pieces of tech they came up with, though, at least as they get explored over time. They need a beam, they are disrupted by shields and interference, they turn people into a data buffer "pattern" that seems to follow the way data would behave, in that they can add and substract to it. You need to assume they don't use them as full-on cloning machines because of regulations, rather than tech limits, but it mostly makes sense.
Unfortunately the version that makes sense is the most disturbing interpretation, so they still need to handwave the crap out of it.
- Comment on Was it a good thing that SNW explicitly said the Federation is socialist? 4 months ago:
Yeah, I think in canon the curvy bit at the front of the ship (or the nacelles, sometimes) is just gathering dust to then burn into energy. It gets trickier with the transporter, because in theory the dust is going into a matter/antimatter thing, but if the transporter is fueling itself from the body it's disintegrating... well, where's the antimatter?
I think in their minds the transporter isn't doing that, and is instead taking energy to both turn a person into a pattern and then build the pattern back into a person. Seems like a waste, but I guess the raw matter isn't the real concern here.
- Comment on Was it a good thing that SNW explicitly said the Federation is socialist? 4 months ago:
But we know that's not how transporters work. If that was the case you wouldn't be able to get "accidents" where you end up with two copies of the same guy. The transporter must work like the replicator, not the other way around.
Also, that doesn't work with some of the stuff they say, like how they don't replicate anything alive, and so food does taste noticeably different. Plus... you know, no massive farm deck anywhere on the Enterprise and no transwarp to beam that in from a planet, so... we're going to have to accept this stuff may be just handwavy bulls#!t at some point.
- Comment on Was it a good thing that SNW explicitly said the Federation is socialist? 4 months ago:
I'm a bit shocked that nobody has pointed out the obvious:
The economics of Star Trek are super inconsistent and make no sense because multiple writers had a crack and they each liked and believed different things.
Sometimes it's a post-scarcity socialist utopia where money is obsolete. Other times, Picard invites someone out for a date and she answers "you buying?".
This is obvious enough that multiple people have tried to fix it, which as always in franchise worldbuilding only makes things less consistent and more complicated. So now some things just can't be properly replicated. Sometimes it's because of regulations and laws, other times it's because of technology limitations. Sometimes the Federation doesn't use money but they still have it for trade, other times they use money, just for random commodities.
The middle of the road for Trek seems to be some form of socialdemocracy where you're provided with anything you need and labor is largely vocational, but out in space there is enough variation over time and different areas that there is still a bit of a pseudo-capitalist economy even in regions where Federation-level post-scarcity tech is still available. Go in any more detail and the whole thing breaks down.
This goes for other political elements of the series, too. Picard gets super mad at the notion of endorsing religious beliefs in a prewarp society because he finds it barbaric. Meanwhile, Sisko is out there becoming Bajoran Space Jesus and everybody is just cool with that.
It's almost like Rick Berman's, Ronald D. Moore's and Gene Roddenberry's political beliefs were different from each other's, huh?
- Comment on Was it a good thing that SNW explicitly said the Federation is socialist? 4 months ago:
You know the irony of this interpretation? By canon, replicators are energy to matter conversion devices. Basically a 3D printer using relativity to poof atoms into existence from an energy source.
Replicators are straight-up the most expensive way to make anything. Using that technology to make you a cup of tea is the most inefficient use of any resource put on screen in media history. It's absurd. The notion that instead of heating up water you would go ahead and make the atoms out of energy is so much worse than just filling in a space station's worth of water and carrying it with you into space just to keep Picard's Earl Grey habit going.
It's not the replicator at all that drives the post-scarcity, it's whatever nonsense antimatter generator stuff dilithium is enabling where they get infinite energy forever. Although we know dilithium is a limited resource, since they don't seem to just replicate some when they need it, so... somebody should do the math there and figure out how expensive all those Janeway coffees actually are.