Tech: Open thread

2021-06-03 17:47:46

#12551

unnamednewbie13: Moderator; +2,053|6988|PNW

I would honestly be fine with universal broadband. It would probably help out Teh Small Bidnezzes too.

Who probably wouldn't like it are cell phone companies charging so much to people who go over their data plan.

2021-06-03 18:19:37

#12552

KEN-JENNINGS: I am all that is MOD!; +2,978|6848|949

SuperJail Warden wrote:
I checked my Amazon account and it was already disabled. Still don't trust them.

The idea is still cool. If we had something like "universal broadband" in the U.S., I would be okay the government using the modem they give me to host public wifi or the Amazon Echo developing self awareness by talking to the door bell.

They said they would only use 500 MB for your first device. If you have 2 devices 300 MB etc. as you link more Amazon devices. I have a bunch of devices so if Amazon is truthful I probably wouldn't contribute much to their network by their own algorithm but yes more questions.

Finally, imagine universal broadband in the U.S. You would have people being angry that they pay $20 a month for broadband but have to share it even though they only check their email. "I only use mine for email. Why should I pay the same amount as the kids on TikTok all day?" As if broadband is a scarce resource.

Most internet subscriptions now come with some sort of "public wifi" where you can connect to any AP in range that also has your company's service. Which means your cable modem/router most likely already has some band reserved for public wifi access.

2021-06-08 19:32:20

#12553

RTHKI: mmmf mmmf mmmf; +1,741|6953|Oxferd Ohire

I've had my gpu connection go out 4 times the past 2 days. Thought it was windows updating VR but no. Still maybe a Windows update, or SSD going out again. Windows says some update files are missing when I try to install. Other potential causes those are top right now.

2021-06-08 19:40:33

#12554

unnamednewbie13: Moderator; +2,053|6988|PNW

Have fun with that. Windows Update failures are always such a blast to troubleshoot.

2021-06-10 17:18:08

#12555

RTHKI: mmmf mmmf mmmf; +1,741|6953|Oxferd Ohire

I tried a manual download and that failed. Just gonna let it run its course for now.

2021-06-16 14:57:56

#12556

SuperJail Warden: Gone Forever; +640|3935

Saw a tech youtuber with 1.3 million subs complaining that views across "Tech Youtube" is down. He believes it has to do with the GPU and chip shortages. Basically people don't want to watch videos where people benchmark products they cannot or refuse to buy.

2021-06-16 18:07:28

#12557

uziq: Member; +493|3668

guy who gets free stuff complains about viewer figures when people suddenly lose interest in $2000 GPUs.

2021-06-16 18:40:06

#12558

SuperJail Warden: Gone Forever; +640|3935

It's even worse than that when you consider most 'tech YouTube' is 'look at these numbers on the screen from a popular game from 2018.'

As I predicted Cyberpunk failed so no one is interested in seeing the numbers on that with every different card they can find.

But yeah, people just lost interest. A lot of YouTube people are shifting their videos to 'should you buy this video card from 2017?' now. This is because even cards like the RX 580 are listed for $700ish on Amazon while it retailed for $230 in 2017.

2021-06-16 21:24:11

#12559

unnamednewbie13: Moderator; +2,053|6988|PNW

What channel was this? As I understand it, how-to-YT stuff and youtube itself have been pushing content creators to lay on that sub-guilt and "slap that notification bell" for awhile for awhile now. Maybe it's petty but fewer things make me want to flick off a video than having a gaudy clicky animation appear with a loud mechanical clack. I'd rather watch an incorporated ad.

Certainly my views of tech videos are down. I would recommend they shift some of their focus on how to get the newest cards, not whether you should buy an ancient card for double the price.

A suggestion to shoppers would be to sign up for shopping notifications and see if you can get a purchase in. I did that for the Nintendo Wii (I think I responded in about a minute), and ended up with the Walmart bundle. Barring that, maybe you can find a DIY kit. Barring that, buying prebuilt is about the only way you're going to get a newer card. I wouldn't be surprised if there was a delay on exchanges for DOA RMAs on the card alone.

The pandemic did affect this stuff, but honestly something should probably be done about shopping bots grabbing this stuff almost immediately. Short term, it's easy, reliable bucks, but long term I can only see it slowly eroding interest. Even a captcha for buying video cards would be better than nothing.

e: as one article put it,

slate wrote:
If there is any lesson here, perhaps it’s that our sense of entertainment and play has become way too wrapped up in our consumerist appetites. Somewhere along the way, the fun—along with a great deal of disposable income—is lost. There’s peace in acknowledging you don’t need something.

Can't wait for "millennial gamers are killing the graphics industry."

e2: for now, it's nice that I'd gotten the 2070 super back when they weren't that difficult to find. if I do build a new pc soon, that thing should be perfectly fine for another 5 years at least.

2021-06-16 21:33:48

#12560

unnamednewbie13: Moderator; +2,053|6988|PNW

Supposedly CP2077 has improved a bit and is now actually "fun." Reminds me of all that No Man's Sky stuff.

Remember when the CP2077 devs were telling people not to preorder? Maybe that wasn't just a way to pander to the anti-preorder fervor.

2021-06-16 22:34:13

#12561

uziq: Member; +493|3668

i read enough about CP2077 to see that it's a shallow, facile and ultimately pointless take on the cyberpunk genre anyway. it promised this radical new open world experience, in a setting with so much potential, and instead served up a bunch of hollow clichés and an ultimately very silly world. for a 'mindblowing' RPG experience it seems very thin on actual story and substance.

even if they fix the bugs it'l be a modest GTA clone, peopled with gangs with paper-thin back stories and a bajillion pointless side missions just for the sake of it.

and now i need a $3000 GPU to play it smoothly? lol. no thanks.

best thing is the semi-conductor-related industries, and in particular the gaming GPU industry, don't anticipate the prices to come back down for quite some time, either. just as well that basically nothing interesting or 'good' in pc gaming for the actual consumer has happened since, er, the orange box.

2021-06-16 23:05:33

#12562

unnamednewbie13: Moderator; +2,053|6988|PNW

The Orange Box was an incredible bundle. I don't think I'm being too rose-tinted nostalgic when I say there hasn't really been anything like it since. Bloodlines, HL2, CSS, TF2, L4D were all great post-BF2 fun. Even Dark Messiah (also Source) with the mixed reviews it got was OK, but its multiplayer just wasn't fun to me. The matches were too long for usually being decided within the first couple of minutes. Legends was much better, I think.

on dark messiah wrote:
GameSpot criticized the game's control problems and graphics, stating that it "may be the ugliest game powered by [the] Source engine".

I think that's taking things a little too far. Bloodlines was a brutal to look at, though I guess it made up for that with its own little charms.

Right now my PC gaming consists a lot of the early access survival stuff. Outside that, I'm close to finishing Subnautica: Below Zero which could have run well enough on a 970 I think. The 2070 is still brute forcing stuff that doesn't rely too much on CPU power, but I certainly wouldn't buy one at today's expected prices. If it fritzes out, I'd be dead in the water if I didn't still have my old card nearby.

Still disappointing that attempts to revive old style stuff like Quake, Serious Sam, Unreal Tournament, seem to fall flat under new IP. But I can't really see myself getting back into that, so whatever.

2021-06-16 23:14:19

#12563

uziq: Member; +493|3668

i just looked on ebay for my midrange GPU from last christmas. 5700 XT by aorus. it’s now worth 250% as much - even used.

tempted to just sell it now and pocket the $1000.

2021-06-17 00:03:45

#12564

unnamednewbie13: Moderator; +2,053|6988|PNW

That's not a horrible idea, actually. I could probably make some decent short-term bank selling my 9x, 20x, and maybe even 7x. Certainly if I was 100% done with PC gaming, I would. If I bought pre-built PC with a 30x0, I could probably fund a huge chunk of it just reselling the 20x. I'd certainly consider it to offset if I got a Mac and found myself using that more often.

I would feel kind of gross about it though, even if it's resale of a used product and not just flipping an unopened GPU.

2021-06-17 05:05:58

#12565

SuperJail Warden: Gone Forever; +640|3935

I have seen people suggest buying pre-built systems and yanking the video card from them before reselling the rest of the PC. Pre-built system makers get their GPUs straight from manufacturers so there is no scalping tax built into the price of the system. Buying a pre-built system under any circumstances feels wrong though.

2021-06-17 06:24:08

#12566

unnamednewbie13: Moderator; +2,053|6988|PNW

That's a thing that's done by the scalpers. The GPU resale pays for the system plus some. Still, I see systems available where the cards individually are not.

I used to have a disdain for pre-built systems. "Build it yourself! Save money!" Yeah, that's pretty old hat with these parts prices when you can now get a better deal from pre-built.

Why is it fine to buy a pre-built laptop but not a pre-built desktop.

"Ha! You buy cars from the dealership? Cobble it from scrap like a real man."

2021-06-17 06:31:07

#12567

Dilbert_X: The X stands for; +1,813|6322|eXtreme to the maX

SuperJail Warden wrote:
I have seen people suggest buying pre-built systems and yanking the video card from them before reselling the rest of the PC. Pre-built system makers get their GPUs straight from manufacturers so there is no scalping tax built into the price of the system. Buying a pre-built system under any circumstances feels wrong though.

Who exactly is going to buy a used PC without a GPU?

Fuck Israel

2021-06-17 06:33:57

#12568

unnamednewbie13: Moderator; +2,053|6988|PNW

Someone who already has a video card. Or the remainder of the computer can be scrapped and sold on ebay.

2021-06-17 07:31:32

#12569

SuperJail Warden: Gone Forever; +640|3935

unnamednewbie13 wrote:
That's a thing that's done by the scalpers. The GPU resale pays for the system plus some. Still, I see systems available where the cards individually are not.

I used to have a disdain for pre-built systems. "Build it yourself! Save money!" Yeah, that's pretty old hat with these parts prices when you can now get a better deal from pre-built.

Why is it fine to buy a pre-built laptop but not a pre-built desktop.

"Ha! You buy cars from the dealership? Cobble it from scrap like a real man."

Ever heard of "kit cars"? It's a cool concept.

The only issue I would have with pre-built is them cheaping out on power supplies and boards. Probably the two most vital components. Also other weird stuff builders do like hot gluing stuff in place etc.

2021-06-17 07:36:06

#12570

SuperJail Warden: Gone Forever; +640|3935

unnamednewbie13 wrote:
Someone who already has a video card. Or the remainder of the computer can be scrapped and sold on ebay.

That's funny to think about. If you want a GPU upgrade, buy a pre-built PC and take the card from it. Put your old card in your new PC. And now you have a backup computer. You will still be ahead by a few hundred dollars than if you bought the card alone.

Or just buy a PS5

2021-06-17 08:07:31

#12571

unnamednewbie13: Moderator; +2,053|6988|PNW

Cheaping out on stuff and bizarre assembly practices isn't true of all builders. I'd select a well-regarded one that tells you what you're getting in terms of board, psu, w/e.

Also, the PS5 is a myth.

2021-06-17 08:30:46

#12572

uziq: Member; +493|3668

unnamednewbie13 wrote:
That's not a horrible idea, actually. I could probably make some decent short-term bank selling my 9x, 20x, and maybe even 7x. Certainly if I was 100% done with PC gaming, I would. If I bought pre-built PC with a 30x0, I could probably fund a huge chunk of it just reselling the 20x. I'd certainly consider it to offset if I got a Mac and found myself using that more often.

I would feel kind of gross about it though, even if it's resale of a used product and not just flipping an unopened GPU.

i am not even going to be in front of my desktop PC for the next year or two.

by the time i return home my 5700XT will probably be fairly ancient tech, actually.

getting £875 for a £350 card doesn't seem like a bad idea. i only need to find someone in the UK who can disassemble my PC for me ...

Last edited by uziq (2021-06-17 08:31:19)

2021-06-19 04:36:46

#12573

unnamednewbie13: Moderator; +2,053|6988|PNW

tl;dr 1 - niche hardware post, "put it in your blog"

I thought it was nearing time to upgrade tablets again. As I'm usually a wacom sort of person, I headed over to their site. Now I haven't been in awhile, and it site wanted me to accept a range of cookies. I could have just clicked "agree and continue," but instead I chose the option that let me see what was going on. I guess by default, it's the required cookies, extra cookies for stuff like login info, and advertising cookies. Advertising cookies on a site where I'm thinking about buying a piece of professional equipment. More on this later.

Slightly annoyed, I decided to shop somewhere else, and began looking for alternative options. Found the seemingly quite reasonable Huion Kamvas. Now Huion doesn't lack cookies, and doesn't show as much detail as Wacom, but pettiness turned into thrift and I continued to dig. Their Kamvas 22/Plus 22" screen is under $600, while the Cintiq 22" is $1200 on 'zon, at the same resolution. Two different Kamvas 22's have better color and response time. Additionally, The Kamvas Plus has etched glass vs plastic film to provide texture. Of note, Kamvas works with some versions of Samsung androids and I would assume mine, but it's not a feature I plan on heavily using. Comparable stands, pens. Nice things to say about it from art sites. Time to visit the mfg website:

https://www.huion.us/products/huion-kamvas-22-plus $530 (-$20 sale)
https://www.huion.us/products/huion-kamvas-pro-24 $700 (-$200 sale, better resolution, looks like older tech specs probably reflected in that sale; also has buttons)

I'll take a look at the smaller models too, but I don't really want to shrink areas or stay the same size from the tablet I'm using now. I'll have to adjust my workspace a bit.

Wacom has better driver support for on-screen shortcuts, but that could change, and their 24" Cintiq bumps up to 4k resolution which is something to think about, but at $2000 I would rather get a new computer (and a 4k screen) first.

Already eyeing the 22 plus from what I know about both, but earmarked some reviews to watch tomorrow, from reddit:

Teoh Yi Chie did a review of both back to back recently each vid has a written article in the description.

24 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OOTBWP-ETN8

22 plus https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s41Svr_7HWg

experience comparison https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kEQzdF0cOmg

tl;dr 2 - fwp followup, wacom cookies

I was about to proceed with just the required, but then saw that there was an option to see them in even more detail. This is a peek in rare detail that I haven't often seen just offered up front (ahem, after a few clicks) like that. Which would be a redeeming factor, if it weren't for the fact that accepting everything appears to be the default? I think it's pretty useful to show to people who might not think twice about just accepting whatever a popup says.

You shouldn't have to trick out your pc with a giant suite of preventative bloat just to put an end to this sort of thing. I understand that advertising is income, but why does it have to come in the form of under the table nonsense.

The copy/paste from this list highlights even more websites.

Required Cookies

These cookies are necessary to enable the basic features of this site to function, such as providing secure log-in or remembering how far you are through an order.
HIDE COOKIES
Company Domain
Google Inc.
google.com
SAP Customer Data Cloud (formerly Gigya)
cdns1.gigya.com, cdns2.gigya.com, cdns3.gigya.com, cdns.gigya.com, cdns.ru1.gigya.com, gigya.com
Show All
Wacom
101.wacom.com, account.wacom.com, bonus.wacom.com, community.wacom.com, connectedink.wacom.com, content.wacom.com, creativeenterprise.wacom.com, developer-demos.wacom.com, developer-docs.wacom.com, developer.wacom.com, edusummit.wacom.com, estore.wacom.com.cn, estore.wacom.com, eu.shop.wacom.eu, forum.wacom.eu, inkspace.wacom.com, investors.wacom.com, promotions.wacom.com, storelocator.wacom.asia, store.wacom.sg, store.wacom.tw, support.wacom.asia, support.wacom.com, support.wacom.com.hk, tablet.wacom.co.jp, us.wacom.com, wacom.com, wacom-for-business.jp, wacom.jp, www.wacom.com, www.wacom.eu, www.wacom.jp
Show All

Functional and Analytics Cookies

These cookies allow us to analyze your use of the site to evaluate and improve our performance. They may also be used to provide a better customer experience on this site. For example, remembering your log-in details, saving what is in your shopping cart, or providing us information about how our site is used.
HIDE COOKIESNoYes
Company Domain
ArtStation (formerly Spirit of the Hero)
artstation.com
Baidu
hm.baidu.com
Clicky Web Analytics
in.getclicky.com
CloudCare
cdns.cn1.gigya-api.cn, gigya-api.cn
Crazy Egg
crazyegg.com
FONTPLUS
webfont.fontplus.jp
Free Stream Media Corp. dba Samba TV
ads.samba.tv
Giphy
giphy.com
Google Advertising Products
doubleclick.net
Google Inc.
drive.google.com, google.com
Hotjar
hotjar.com
Intimate Merger
im-apps.net
JazzHR
app.jazz.co
Klarna Bank AB
cafea271.klarnauserservices.com
MetaLocator
code.metalocator.com
Neustar, Inc.
agkn.com
Nielsen Marketing Effectiveness (Formerly Visual IQ)
myvisualiq.net
Optimizely
rum.optimizely.com
SAP Customer Data Cloud (formerly Gigya)
cdns.eu1.gigya.com
Scorecard Research
scorecardresearch.com
SheerID
services.sheerid.com
Spotify
spotify.com
Taobao.com
cloud.video.taobao.com, vodcdn.video.taobao.com
Triblio
tribl.io
TrustArc (formerly TRUSTe)
arachnid-api.truste.com, consent-pref.trustarc.com, prefmgr-cookie.truste-svc.net
Show All
Vimeo
vimeo.com
Zendesk
zendesk.com
iSpot.tv
ispot.tv

Advertising Cookies
These cookies are used to show you ads that are more relevant to you. We may share this information with advertisers or use it to better understand your interests. For example, Advertising Cookies may be used to share data with advertisers so that the ads you see are more relevant to you, allow you to share certain pages with social networks, or allow you to post comments on our site.
HIDE COOKIESNoYes
Company Domain
Adform
adform.net
Adobe Audience Manager, Adobe Experience Platform
demdex.net, dpm.demdex.net
Amazon Advertising
amazon-adsystem.com
Comcast International France SAS
ads.stickyadstv.com
Criteo SA
criteo.com
Digital Advertising Consortium Inc.
impact-ad.jp, y.one.impact-ad.jp
Facebook Inc.
facebook.com, www.facebook.com
FreakOut Holdings
fout.jp
Google Inc.
youtube.com
IPONWEB GmbH
bidswitch.net
Index Exchange, Inc.
casalemedia.com
LinkedIn
ads.linkedin.com, linkedin.com, www.linkedin.com
Microsoft Advertising
bing.com
NinthDecimal (formerly JiWire)
ninthdecimal.com
OpenX
openx.net
Placed Inc
placed.com
PubMatic, Inc.
pubmatic.com
Salesforce DMP (formerly Krux Digital, Inc.)
krxd.net
SpotX, Inc.
spotxchange.com
Taboola Europe Limited
taboola.com
Tapad, Inc.
tapad.com
Twitter
twitter.com
Verizon Media EMEA Limited
advertising.com
Xandr, Inc.
adnxs.com
Yahoo Inc.
analytics.yahoo.com, yahoo.com
Yahoo! Japan
yahoo.co.jp
i-mobile
i-mobile.co.jp
zeotap GmbH
zeotap.com

2021-06-19 16:38:15

#12574

Finray: Hup! Dos, Tres, Cuatro; +2,629|6004|Catherine Black

EU: People are fed up of having their data harvested and being tracked all over the internet! Companies now must give you the option of disabling this!
Websites: Lol okay we're just gonna get the same result by gaming our system so people don't spend the 30-45 seconds to disable all the cookies, whilst misleading them with default selection coloured buttons being "accept all", hope you enjoy more popups that make visiting a brand new website a fucking hassle

2021-06-19 19:11:08

#12575

unnamednewbie13: Moderator; +2,053|6988|PNW

Very nice summary.

Also gotta love when half the features won't work on a site without accepting cookies. I couldn't even view a video on a wacom notetaker if I wasn't going to accept. Why? Bro, I was just going to buy one of your things. Why do I have to let Google and several dozen other actors know about it.

I like that Wacom put it up there, but it still has that misleading "accept" on page one. And you still have to click through a couple of screens to get there. My goodness.

The descriptions too are misleading:

These cookies allow us to analyze your use of the site to evaluate and improve our performance. They may also be used to provide a better customer experience on this site. For example, remembering your log-in details, saving what is in your shopping cart, or providing us information about how our site is used.

"lol so anyway we installed vimeo and spotify cookies on this person's computer"

What a mess.

BF2S Forums Tech: Open thread

SuperJail Warden wrote:

slate wrote:

on dark messiah wrote:

SuperJail Warden wrote:

unnamednewbie13 wrote:

unnamednewbie13 wrote:

unnamednewbie13 wrote:

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