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Comment Re:Erm (Score 2) 55

Why was it removed in the first place,

I do not know why it was removed from linux. But the same phenomena happened on Windows. I do not remeber if it was on Vista or 7, but around that timeframe. Which makes me suspect there is a technical reason behind doing it.

I guess it has something to do with 3D-rendered Desktop environments not being able to leverage said functions.

Comment Re:*FIRST* PCIE Gen 6 device? (Score 1) 30

And no consumer mother boards until 2030? The spec was finalised in 2021! Gen *7* finalised almost a year ago. If I were still with Teledyne, I would be working on a Gen 8 analyser that would almost likely ship in early 2027, maybe even this year. It looks consumer motherboards are going to be four PCIe versions behind when they finally ship with Gen6.

At around PCIe5, the speeds were so big, that Datacenter came first, consumer came (much) latter, and that gulf will only widen. Think of the datacenter as paying the early adoper tax for these technologies.

And by the way, When they released the PCIe 6 spec all those years ago, the PCIe-SIG knew full well that consumer boards with PCIe6 would come at the end of the decade. The president of the PCIe Sig said as much in interviews at the time.

Comment Re:Who cares? (Score 1) 30

Consumers will never be able to get any of these...they'll all go to the fucking AI shit companies.

Read TFS. These PCIe 6 SSDs were never designed for consumers. More so, ever since PCIe 6 Spec was Released in 2022~2023, the PCI-SIG knew that it would be datacenter only ontil the latests part of the decade... And clearly communicated that.

Comment Re:Higher the fewer (Score 1) 30

Just great I have some 5.0 slots free and not a single 5.0 card.

PCIe 5.0x16 can handle about 64GB... more than enough to support a lowly 28GB/s but no.. you had to go with 6.0x4 instead of 5.0x8 fine... don't take my money... I really was going to buy one... honest ... not anymore. Elitist bastards... Oh and say hi to your AI girlfriend for me, last time I saw her she ignored ALL of her previous instructions.

The bumps for bonding the controller chip to the PCIe bus take significant silicon area, worth hundreds of logic transistors. The (analog) transistors driving the PCIe pins take silicon area worth hundreds of logic transistors.

Minimizing the ammount of pins dedicated to buses, be it memory in VideoCards or CPUs, or PCIe in expansion cards drives massive savings in chip production.

That's why consumers get 2 channel (4 dimm 128 Bit) memory, while servers get 4 channel (8 Dimm 256bit) Buses. That's why nVIDIA Blackwell for datacenter has a 8192-bit memory bus while nVIDIA blackwell for consumers has 128-512 mem buses...

And that's also why SSDs are going to PCIe Gen 6 x4 instead of PCIE Gen5x8

Also, bear in mind that Mobo standard sizes have phisical limits on the ammount of traces that can be dedicated to PCIe Lines and slots (i.e. mobo space is not infinite), therefore, for serves, It makes sense that as amny as your lanes are as fast as possible

Comment Re:Yes and no (Score 1) 36

The secondhand market is falling apart for machines that have been stripped of RAM and/or storage.

So Apple integrating the RAM into their M-processors was just forward thinking!

Until the advent of CAMM2 (and the inminent advent of SO-CAMM2) the only way to have LP-DDR4 or LP-DDR5 was to solder it to the mobo, as per JEDEC Spec. If the Laptop had SO-DIMM, it used DRR4 or DDR5, which consumes more power AND generates more heat, not ideal for Laptops, Tablets or Phones.

So Apple integrating the memory in the same organic substrateas the processor was not forward thinking, but rather, something dictated by JEDEC, product requirements and economies of scale

Comment Re:Also good for desktop Linux (Score 1) 36

There's also the small issue of Linux dropping 32-bit support going forward. Sure, if one has a 32-bit only CPU, one can run an old distro. But will it still require periodic security updates?

For the last year and pocket change, I've been giving away 32Bit only Laptops with Linux. Mostly to my Venezuelan country-folk and cuban visitors. I settled for Mageia for "Upper end" 32bit machines (think Intel T2080 or similar ilk) and AntiX Linux for lower end Machines (Think P4 or P3).

Both will be supported until 2028 at the very least.

Yes, one could install Win10 IoT on the T2080 types (and the P4 and P3 only get to Win7 POSReady Tops) and get done with it. But it is slower, and the license is a grey area I do not want to get into. If the recipient wants to erase linux and Install Win7 POSReady or Win10 IoT, is their choice, and the will bear the consequences.

But Even on 64 bit capable machines, the linux kernel went from AMD64 V1 to V2, and some linux distros demand V3*. So, some hardware is inevitably left behind, Just like Win11 left behind machines without MBEC**

All OSes leave behind hardware after a while. Is the nature of things.

* Mr. Torvals behemently opposes the V1, V2 and V3 designations.
** The real reason Win11 left behind 7th gen intel and lower was lack of MBEC and/or lack of intel commitment for drivers and microcode updates. For details, see my post here:
https://ancillary-proxy.atarimworker.io?url=https%3A%2F%2Farstechnica.com%2Fcivis%2F...

Comment Re:Also good for desktop Linux (Score 1) 36

Put a desktop distro on an old Laptop and you no longer have to worry about [...] arbitrary end of support deadlines.

1.) Even Linux Distros have "Arbitrary support dates". I guess there are not too many distros that will support a version released in 2021 beyond 2032 without making you go to the next version of the distro, with newer kernel (which may or may not work in your equipment), new builds of the Apps (which again may or may not work in your equipment), and potentially a new UI (as your desktop/window manager and aps may have evolved their UIs in the interim)...

2.) In the end, and OS is a means to run Apps. As the old adage says, the job of the OS is to allow you to run your apps and be unobstrisive/invisible. If the Apps you want/need/have to run are not in Linux, Linux will do you no good. This is not a reflection on how good is Linux technically (I use it extensively in servers, when I refurbish machines for donations, and in specialty cases like TAILS and Kali VMs), just a reflection that the fundamental job of the OS is to run Apps, and the Apps you want/need/have to use need to be available in said OS.

Comment Upgrading Memory on Second Hand Laptops (Score 1) 36

Problem with "old-ish"second hand laptops is that, for the most part, the memory and SSD, while adequate for the laptop's release date, is insuficient for the needs of today, and sourcing Memory and SSD upgrades for an old Laptop is prohibitive in the current climate, even taking into account the savings in the rest of the laptop by going used.

At this point, by sheer volume, HP, Dell, and Lenovo will secure better prices on the RAM and SSD than you, or a refurbisher/recycler. Of course, if you find a used Laptop with the excat configuration you need, for a low price, more power to you.

Comment Re:Why would they even bother until about 2030? (Score 2) 37

4. Microsoft is starting to have no choice but to target PS5; Gears of War Reloaded and Halo Combat Evolved Remaster are two major examples.

This is in large part due to regulatory commintments when they bought Zenimax and later Activision-Blizzard... as those comitments start to fade away, expect Microsoft to revert to XBox/Windows timed exclusives...

Comment Release the PS6 Pro as the base model and get done (Score 1) 37

At that point, it does not make sense to Release the base model with 2 years of delay (2029). Just release the PS6 Pro model (that they must be also planing right now) as the base model, and have that for the life of the console...

No drama, no Fuss, more performance, more reason for developers to target the PS5 Pro + PS6 (accelerating the move away from PS5 base), or to move to PS6 exclusively due to the delta in performance.

Comment I remember my "SlackWare Linux Unleashed" book (Score 3, Interesting) 51

Bought in 1996. At the time, I had 14Kbps @ home, and less at the uni (The uni had a 64K link, shared amongst all the uni, you "cron-ed" your FTPs at night). Just the CD with slackware alone was worth the cost of admision

Having said that, if this is true:

" Interestingly, the Slackware team tested hundreds of Linux Kernel versions before settling on Linux Kernel 5.15.19."

Then the distro mantainers (Volkerig et al) are doing something wrong. You only need to test the LTS releases and the SLTS (supported by the Linux civil infrastructure project) releases.

For a distro as Small as Slackware, and which also does not depend on any other distro (like ubuntu depends on Debian, and mint depends on Ubuntu), is madness to test anything more kernel-wise.

PS: LTSs get support for 2~3 years, SLTSs are a subset of LTSs that get support for 10 years (limited support after the LTS period ends)

Comment 5mg Tadalafil a day (Score 4, Interesting) 35

Tadalafil (the active ingredient of Cialis) used in 5mg doses (instead of the 20mg used fo ED), was originally recomended for pulmonary arterial hypertension, latter for penile oxigenation during low-sex periods (say, you become a widower). And later still, for prostatic hyperplasia.

The good thing is that, you can be using the 5mg doses, and the days there will be "action" you can substitute your 5mg dose for a 20mg dose, easy peasy, no interactions, no different side-effects, no nothing.

So yes, like with many other drugs, they can be used/beneficial for many more conditions. And since the drugs already got approved, and have a known safety profile, discovering alternative uses is very beneficial for society. And many of these drugs, like Sildenafil and Tadalafil, have already generics available, making them cheaper to boot.

Comment Start Stop, the bane of anyone's existance (Score 0) 304

Lucky for me, I only find that when I travel abroad and get it on a rental. First order of the day after turning on the car: Deactivate the start-stop.

It increases engine, battery, and starter motor wear and tear. Leading to earlier disposing of the car, and increases trafic, as non-smooth stop-start cycles lead to amplification down the queue.

Plug-In series hybrids using Methane only for the Win.

Comment Re: Pretty soon everything will be rented/subsc mo (Score 1) 54

I've been using PCs since 1983, in an academy, or hand-me-downs. The first PC I specked myself was U$D 3000 in 1994 dollars. I would have killed for a rent option at that time... Probably would have diched my 286 a couple of years sooner, and ditched that P90 for a P233MMX sooner...

Renting/leasing is not intrinsically bad, as long as you can do the math to know what option is right in each particular case.

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