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Zodiark1593

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  1. Informative
    Zodiark1593 got a reaction from emothxughts in Is long term blutooth speaker harmful for health?   
    Given the extremely low power levels that Bluetooth emits (a handful of milliwatts), as well as being non-ionizing, it’s pretty negligible. 
     
    Compare that to something we’ve been exposed to since antiquity, the Sun, which outputs vast energy, and kicks out a fair bit of ionizing radioactive such as Ultraviolet, which actually is harmful. 
     
  2. Like
    Zodiark1593 got a reaction from leadeater in The US Department of Justice accuses Apple of having an illegal monopoly over smartphones   
    Yeah, everything is electric here. And the stove is legit older than me (30+ years). 
     
    At least my cast iron pans help make the electric stove more tolerable (because sheer thermal mass). The frequent heat cycling definitely isn’t great with thinner non-stick pans. 
  3. Agree
    Zodiark1593 got a reaction from Mark Kaine in Can someone explain Overclocking to me?   
    Yields are probably the largest impediment, as only an ever-diminishing portion of chips can reach higher speeds, at given power targets. At some point (whether power, or finding chips that can go fast enough at all), it becomes not worthwhile to make a dedicated sku. 

    Additionally, nowadays, chips are pushed pretty close to the edge out-of-the-box. Unless you’re willing to dump a fair bit more power into it, it’s hard to achieve meaningful gains anywhere. Definitely unlike the C2D days, where you can push a 1.8 GHz chip to near 3.2, or even Celery days, where you can outright double clocks. 
  4. Like
    Zodiark1593 got a reaction from AngelaHornung in I agree with Microsoft's decision to keep using AA batteries in their console   
    The newest controller I have on hand right now, is a 360 controller I got at a work raffle back in 2014, that is currently connected to my laptop. I keep my stuff for a while. 
     
    The next oldest ones are some PS3 controllers that I seldom use outside blu-ray duty, because the batteries last maybe 40 minutes at most nowadays. I can replace the batteries, but never really cared enough to bother, as It’s a bit of work to do so (not that it’s hard, just somewhat tedious), requires ordering online, and I can’t really use them (the controller, and the batteries) anywhere else. 
     
    With the AA cells, not only do they take mere seconds to swap out, I’ve some potent flashlights at home that also run on AAs (Some of the Fenix and Lumintop ones use a single AA, and can crank out over 200 lumens at full power), and one of my camera flashes uses them as well. Not only do I benefit from easy replacement and availability, but also flexibility in that I’ve lots of things that can use them. 
     
    That said, I’d really like to see controllers adopt more standard lithium cells. A 14500 LiIon cell is of similar form factor to a AA, but more than doubles the voltage, so a controller can easily run a single cell. Lots of single-AA flashlights can also run a 14500 for increased brightness too. 
     
    18650 cells are relatively more commonplace (primarily due to vaping) but are too large for controllers, and many other consumer applications we’d want to actually use them in. I’ve a few for my more powerful flashlights. 
     
    If we can figure out a standardized LiPo cell that many devices can use, I’d be on board with that too. Though that’s a massive pipe dream. 
  5. Agree
    Zodiark1593 got a reaction from Poinkachu in Are there still consoles or options for kids if we don't want them exposed to the advertising and psychology of modern consoles?   
    In that case, I think a PC with networking disabled will offer OP with the desired level of control. 
  6. Agree
    Zodiark1593 got a reaction from starsmine in Help me to understand. People upgrading their GPU but still using their 10 YO CPU   
    I run an i7-4790 here, Haswell being about 11 years old.  

    The CPU does limit me a bit on the newest games, but the GPU upgrade (went from a GRX 960 2GB to the RTX 3060 12GB) allows me to run the games I already play, at higher settings and greatly higher resolutions (generally stuff I used to play at 900P 60 fps, I can hit 1440P 60FPS, or even higher now), without putting additional load on the CPU. 
     
    Being able to run my favorite game, Final Fantasy XII, at 4K 60 FPS, with a hint of MSAA, really validated throwing the GPU in my old system. Big upgrade from what my old 960 could do. 
     
    And surprisingly, my config actually holds its own when it comes to Cyberpunk 2077. This was beyond my expectations for this old platform. This is the most demanding game I play semi-regularly. 
     
    Though once Stardew Valley 1.6 comes out, that will probably be my primary game for awhile again, and that runs on potatoes. So I seldom need the capabilities a more modern system offers at this time. 
  7. Agree
    Zodiark1593 got a reaction from NobleGamer in Help me to understand. People upgrading their GPU but still using their 10 YO CPU   
    I run an i7-4790 here, Haswell being about 11 years old.  

    The CPU does limit me a bit on the newest games, but the GPU upgrade (went from a GRX 960 2GB to the RTX 3060 12GB) allows me to run the games I already play, at higher settings and greatly higher resolutions (generally stuff I used to play at 900P 60 fps, I can hit 1440P 60FPS, or even higher now), without putting additional load on the CPU. 
     
    Being able to run my favorite game, Final Fantasy XII, at 4K 60 FPS, with a hint of MSAA, really validated throwing the GPU in my old system. Big upgrade from what my old 960 could do. 
     
    And surprisingly, my config actually holds its own when it comes to Cyberpunk 2077. This was beyond my expectations for this old platform. This is the most demanding game I play semi-regularly. 
     
    Though once Stardew Valley 1.6 comes out, that will probably be my primary game for awhile again, and that runs on potatoes. So I seldom need the capabilities a more modern system offers at this time. 
  8. Funny
    Zodiark1593 got a reaction from Alex Atkin UK in Nikon acquires RED Digital Cinema   
    My hopes and dreams involve a room of rich people, bidding obscene sums of money over my “fine art” photos, for the purposes of tax evasion and laundering, long after I’m deceased. 
     
    Probably a tad ambitious. 😝
  9. Agree
    Zodiark1593 got a reaction from Needfuldoer in I Built the Slowest Brand New PC and it Sucks.   
    A warranty does not come close to making up the difference in value, between the shit-tier PC that was built, vs one that was built with competent components. 

    A warranty may justify a slight downgrade (maybe a 25% performance cut overall), but what is exhibited here is easily an order of magnitude, and arguably, reasonably good vs borderline unusable. No warranty justifies such extreme difference. 
  10. Like
    Zodiark1593 got a reaction from Mark Kaine in Intel seeks to get inside Microsoft's next-gen Xbox console, potentially snatching away lucrative share from AMD   
    Cell wasn’t super interesting in the end, ngl. The PPE was really no better than netburst (dual-issue, in-order), if not considerably worse at general-purpose code. Sure, the SPEs acted as psuedo compute-shaders, but I think Sony would’ve been far better off scrapping the exotic Cell idea, delaying a year, and launched with C2D, 8800 GTX, and 1 gb total ram. Would’ve flattened the 360 out the gate, be far easier to utilize than Cell, and carried them well into the gen after. 
     
    As for the gap between the PS2 and PS3, Sony could’ve probably launched a sort of PS2 Plus, with a 4x sized Graphics Synthesizer unit (or 2x the pixel pipes and double up on clocks). Given that it’s literally just a rasterizer, it should be relatively easy to force games to run at 4x resolution for no performance hit. Throw in some extra memory for texture enhanced games, and you’ve got something that would satisfy the Sony crowd for a bit longer. 
  11. Like
    Zodiark1593 got a reaction from Sir Beregond in Buying a New Car is Stupid   
    Would sooner buy a motorcycle, than ever paying out current, post-covid prices for a new car (of which, I already have a license for).
     
    That said, happily, at 204K miles, my 2013 Mazda 3 is doing pretty decently. 
  12. Agree
    Zodiark1593 got a reaction from Techstorm970 in Kickstarter bans AI-generated art enthusiast group "Unstable Diffusion" and refuses to deliver their successfully raised $56k funds   
    Case law from Author’s Guild v. Google (https://fairuse.stanford.edu/case/authors-guild-v-google-inc/) suggests that data mining in this particular use case, very likely falls within the Fair Use Doctrine, as the end result is transformative. 
     
    https://www.copyright.gov/fair-use/

    It doesn’t matter if copyrighted data was used to train the AI, rather, what matters is the end result, and if it meets the standard for Fair Use. And with the case law above, the standard is surprisingly lax. 
     
  13. Agree
    Zodiark1593 got a reaction from Kombatant in Buying a New Car is Stupid   
    I like the concept of electric cars. I don’t like how they’ve turned out (so many missed opportunities, such as standardizing on batteries and motor components), and I loathe the condescension and classism dripping in this comment. 
  14. Like
    Zodiark1593 got a reaction from Kombatant in Buying a New Car is Stupid   
    Would sooner buy a motorcycle, than ever paying out current, post-covid prices for a new car (of which, I already have a license for).
     
    That said, happily, at 204K miles, my 2013 Mazda 3 is doing pretty decently. 
  15. Agree
    Zodiark1593 got a reaction from Jstowe56 in Buying a New Car is Stupid   
    I like the concept of electric cars. I don’t like how they’ve turned out (so many missed opportunities, such as standardizing on batteries and motor components), and I loathe the condescension and classism dripping in this comment. 
  16. Like
    Zodiark1593 got a reaction from da na in Buying a New Car is Stupid   
    I like the concept of electric cars. I don’t like how they’ve turned out (so many missed opportunities, such as standardizing on batteries and motor components), and I loathe the condescension and classism dripping in this comment. 
  17. Agree
    Zodiark1593 got a reaction from smcoakley in Buying a New Car is Stupid   
    I like the concept of electric cars. I don’t like how they’ve turned out (so many missed opportunities, such as standardizing on batteries and motor components), and I loathe the condescension and classism dripping in this comment. 
  18. Like
    Zodiark1593 got a reaction from nhand42 in Buying a New Car is Stupid   
    I like the concept of electric cars. I don’t like how they’ve turned out (so many missed opportunities, such as standardizing on batteries and motor components), and I loathe the condescension and classism dripping in this comment. 
  19. Agree
    Zodiark1593 got a reaction from Red :) in Buying a New Car is Stupid   
    I like the concept of electric cars. I don’t like how they’ve turned out (so many missed opportunities, such as standardizing on batteries and motor components), and I loathe the condescension and classism dripping in this comment. 
  20. Agree
    Zodiark1593 got a reaction from Middcore in Buying a New Car is Stupid   
    I like the concept of electric cars. I don’t like how they’ve turned out (so many missed opportunities, such as standardizing on batteries and motor components), and I loathe the condescension and classism dripping in this comment. 
  21. Agree
    Zodiark1593 got a reaction from Mark Kaine in Hyperloop Bankrupt and Busted.   
    I’m in agreement here. If the US really had the willpower to make rail the dominant public transportation, utilizing and updating existing rail network in addition to repurposing some highway routes, can do the job without needing to acquire private-owned property. 
     
    The US simply lacks the willpower to do the job. 
  22. Informative
    Zodiark1593 got a reaction from Joe Bauers in Saving passwords in a txt doc inside 7 Zip? (bad idea?)   
    Pen and paper is quite more vulnerable to physical access, such as a police search, for example. I wouldn’t have the password stored in plaintext anywhere. 
     
    I’ve personally moved to passphrases (in conjunction with randomly generated passwords from my password manager), as they’re far more characters, and more easily remembered. 
  23. Like
    Zodiark1593 reacted to StDragon in iMessage on Android (For Real this Time)   
  24. Informative
    Zodiark1593 got a reaction from Toesichan in I did this on purpose... ask me why   
    Encryption itself is a very strong, potentially insurmountable, layer of security. But it’s only one layer, and should be a last resort at that.
     
    Ideally, I’d prefer not to even provide attackers the opportunity to perform brute force attack. 
  25. Like
    Zodiark1593 got a reaction from dogwitch in I did this on purpose... ask me why   
    Encryption itself is a very strong, potentially insurmountable, layer of security. But it’s only one layer, and should be a last resort at that.
     
    Ideally, I’d prefer not to even provide attackers the opportunity to perform brute force attack. 
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