Once upon a time, there were two ways to overclock a CPU. Raising the multiplier has been the simplest and easiest option since it came to be, but old hardware nerds like this author will recall the days of raising motherboard front-side bus (FSB) clocks to accelerate memory accesses, as well as goosing the CPU clock rate. That technique more-or-less
Source: Hot Hardware – Locked Intel Core i5-12400 Gets Overclocked To 5.2GHz For A Huge Gain In Performance
Monthly Archives: January 2022
How to Tell When You're Struggling With Repressed Anger
We’re not even three weeks into 2022, but there’s already plenty to be angry about. In fact, that’s been the case for a long time now—especially during the last two years of living through a global pandemic.
Source: LifeHacker – How to Tell When You’re Struggling With Repressed Anger
Dark matter asteroids (if they exist) may cause solar flares
An X1.6 class solar flare flashes in the middle of the sun on Sept. 10, 2014. (credit: NASA/SDO)
Dark matter is proving to be a rather frustrating topic for physicists, cosmologists, and other outward-looking scientists. All the data for dark matter is gravitational, and the lack of other evidence only draws a box on the particle map where scientists have scrawled, “Here be dark matter.”
Dark matter interacts so weakly with ordinary matter that we simply don’t notice it over the racket of ordinary matter drunkenly shouting at the Universe’s particle bar. What we need is to give it a place to shine—to let it take the spotlight and sing karaoke. It turns out that the inside of a star might just be that place.
Disappointing flashes in the dark
Most proposals for dark matter candidates use the simplest possible extension to the Standard Model. These extensions allow theoretical physicists to estimate how such particles would interact with ordinary matter.
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Source: Ars Technica – Dark matter asteroids (if they exist) may cause solar flares
Google, Amazon, Meta and Microsoft Weave a Fiber-Optic Web of Power
To say that Big Tech controls the internet might seem like an exaggeration. Increasingly, in at least one sense, it’s literally true. From a report: The internet can seem intangible, a post-physical environment where things like viral posts, virtual goods and metaverse concerts just sort of happen. But creating that illusion requires a truly gargantuan — and quickly-growing — web of physical connections. Fiber-optic cable, which carries 95% of the world’s international internet traffic, links up pretty much all of the world’s data centers, those vast server warehouses where the computing happens that transforms all those 1s and 0s into our experience of the internet. Where those fiber-optic connections link up countries across the oceans, they consist almost entirely of cables running underwater — some 1.3 million kilometers (or more than 800,000 miles) of bundled glass threads that make up the actual, physical international internet. And until recently, the overwhelming majority of the undersea fiber-optic cable being installed was controlled and used by telecommunications companies and governments. Today, that’s no longer the case.
In less than a decade, four tech giants — Microsoft, Google parent Alphabet, Meta (formerly Facebook ) and Amazon — have become by far the dominant users of undersea-cable capacity. Before 2012, the share of the world’s undersea fiber-optic capacity being used by those companies was less than 10%. Today, that figure is about 66%. And these four are just getting started, say analysts, submarine cable engineers and the companies themselves. In the next three years, they are on track to become primary financiers and owners of the web of undersea internet cables connecting the richest and most bandwidth-hungry countries on the shores of both the Atlantic and the Pacific, according to subsea cable analysis firm TeleGeography. By 2024, the four are projected to collectively have an ownership stake in more than 30 long-distance undersea cables, each up to thousands of miles long, connecting every continent on the globe save Antarctica. In 2010, these companies had an ownership stake in only one such cable — the Unity cable partly owned by Google, connecting Japan and the U.S.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot – Google, Amazon, Meta and Microsoft Weave a Fiber-Optic Web of Power
Open source, closed wallets, big profits – nobody wins the OSS rock, paper, scissors game
There’s much talk of the Open Source Sustainability Problem. From individual developers to Google’s White House lobbying, the issue seems simple but intractable. Is the willingness of volunteer coders a solid enough basis for the long-term health of essential infrastructure?
Source: LXer – Open source, closed wallets, big profits – nobody wins the OSS rock, paper, scissors game
Intel's Former Vulkan Driver Lead Dev Lands Great Role For Improving Linux Graphics
Jason Ekstrand who was the lead developer of Intel’s open-source “ANV” Vulkan Linux driver left Intel in December and has now revealed details about his new role…
Source: Phoronix – Intel’s Former Vulkan Driver Lead Dev Lands Great Role For Improving Linux Graphics
How to Make Home Buying Better, Without Being Rich
Buying a home is always stressful. Whether it’s your first home and you spent the last decade eating wish sandwiches in order to cobble together the down payment or a dream retirement house, the process is a rollercoaster ride of surprise costs, stressful road bumps, and endless paperwork (somehow still involving the…
Source: LifeHacker – How to Make Home Buying Better, Without Being Rich
FedEx Wants To Put Fricken Lasers On Its Planes To Defend Against Missile Attacks
Quick! You’re a multinational shipping conglomerate what is something that stays forefront in your mind on the regular? If you are FedEx (NYSE:FDX) then missile defense systems is exactly what’s on your mind!
In what seems like a scene from an Austin Powers movie a recent proposal to the US Federal Aviation Administration the shipping company
Source: Hot Hardware – FedEx Wants To Put Fricken Lasers On Its Planes To Defend Against Missile Attacks
The Pixel 6 gets its first stable update since November
Enlarge / The Pixel 6 Pro. (credit: Ron Amadeo)
Google is getting back on the update horse for the Pixel 6. After numerous delays and a recalled update, the company finally got caught up on patches for its flagship smartphone this past weekend. Assuming everything goes well, this will be the first Pixel 6 update that has stuck since November.
Software updates are supposed to be a major selling point of the Pixel line, but Google hasn’t been doing so well delivering them. The phone shipped with the “November” Android security patch, and in the middle of November, Google patched the fingerprint reader. Early December should have brought the December security patch to the Pixel 6, but Google delayed that update to the middle of the month, saying that a mile-long list of bug fixes would be included with it. The December Pixel 6 update launched in the middle of the month, but Google didn’t push the update to most users. The company ended up pulling the update due to connectivity issues and some broken features. January rolled around with more security patches and a fix for Android’s emergency call issues, but the Pixel 6 didn’t get that patch on time, either, with Google saying that the update would be out in “late January.”
Well, the time has finally come. This past weekend, Google started releasing the January security patch out to Pixel 6 users. For most users, this will be the first patch since November. The update includes everything in the November and December Android security bulletins, plus these two sets of Pixel 6-specific bug fixes. The list goes on forever. The update is rolling out now, and I was able to pull it down on demand by hitting the “check for updates” button.
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Source: Ars Technica – The Pixel 6 gets its first stable update since November
The Expanse Series 6: 4 Things We Loved (and 2 Things We Didn't Love)
The Expanse is over. Long live The Expanse! With season six now in the books and the show wrapped for good, we’re looking back at the final season. Obviously, it’s still one of the greatest sci-fi shows of all time (it made io9’s list of best TV of 2021!), but we had a few nitpicks this final go-round… keeping in…
Source: Gizmodo – The Expanse Series 6: 4 Things We Loved (and 2 Things We Didn’t Love)
How to Write the Perfect Personal Letter
It’s cliche to say that letter-writing is a “lost art,” but try to think of the last time you sat down and wrote a personal letter. Nothing to do with business or networking—an actual letter to another person in your life for the purpose of communicating information, messages, and checking in. For most of us, it’s…
Source: LifeHacker – How to Write the Perfect Personal Letter
eNom Data Center Migration Mistakenly Knocks Sites Offline
New submitter bolind writes: A data center migration from eNom web hosting provider caused unexpected domain resolution problems that are expected to last for a few hours. Customers started to complain that they could no longer access their websites and emails due to Domain Name System (DNS) issues. My google apps gmail is not getting email, turns out DNS is not working because @enom is doing “a datacenter move” that ran into problems. What medieval times are these when a datacenter move brings down DNS for organizations? Advance warning would have been nice @enomsupport.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot – eNom Data Center Migration Mistakenly Knocks Sites Offline
Review: An archivist gets drawn into a spooky cold case in addictive Archive 81
Enlarge / Dina Shihabi co-stars as Melody Pendras, a documentary filmmaker whose fire-damaged 1994 tapes end up in the hands of archivist Dan Turner (Mamoudou Athie) in the Netflix series Archive 81. It’s loosely based on a podcast of the same name. (credit: Netflix)
A troubled archivist finds himself drawn into the mystery of a woman who disappeared two decades ago in Archive 81, a new horror series from Netflix. Technically, the show belongs to the found footage subgenre of horror, but tonally, this spookily addictive eight-episode series evokes classic supernatural horror fare like Rosemary’s Baby—exactly what one should expect when James Wan (of the Insidious and Conjuring franchises) is among the producers.
(Some spoilers below, but no major reveals.)
The series is loosely based on the popular found footage podcast of the same name created by Daniel Powell and Marc Sollinger, in which the creators play fictionalized versions of themselves. The podcast tells the story of Daniel Powell, an archivist who goes missing after taking a job with the Housing Historical Committee of New York State. After Daniel’s disappearance, his best friend Mark Sollinger finds hundreds of hours of audio tapes that Daniel had been archiving; the audio features interviews with residents in a high-rise building in 1994. Mark releases the tapes in the form of a podcast. The podcast is now in its third season.
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Source: Ars Technica – Review: An archivist gets drawn into a spooky cold case in addictive Archive 81
God Of War Dev Says Game Studios Are Pressuring Sony To Embrace The PC Master Race
The 2018 unsubtitled God of War game is out on PC, and we’ve been testing it to see how it runs. We’ll have that article for you sooner than later, but in the meantime we’ve been checking out all the chatter surrounding the game. Among that noise is a brief interview with two lead developers from the game’s creator Santa Monica Studios, Cory
Source: Hot Hardware – God Of War Dev Says Game Studios Are Pressuring Sony To Embrace The PC Master Race
Apple's 24-inch 8-core iMac M1 is back down to $1,399
If you’ve been patiently waiting to pick up the new iMac, now is your chance to do so at a discount. Amazon has reduced the cost of the 8-core GPU model to $1,399, down from $1,499. That’s a price that matches the previous all-time low the retailer established for Apple’s latest all-in-one computer back in December.
Buy Apple iMac M1 at Amazon – $1,399
We like the new 24-inch iMac a lot. We awarded it a score of 89 when we reviewed it last year. Featuring the same M1 chip that’s found in the 2020 MacBook Air, the 2021 iMac is fit for most computing tasks, including photo and video editing. It’s also 50 percent quieter than its Intel predecessor thanks to a more efficient thermal design. The 24-inch model also comes with an excellent 4.5K display that covers the entire DCI-P3 color gamut. Another handy upgrade is the included 1080p FaceTime camera. It makes use of AI software to enhance the color and exposure of your footage.
Some of the few drawbacks to note are that the display isn’t HDR-capable and the included Magic Mouse and Keyboard aren’t for everyone. Specific to this promotion, Amazon has only discounted the green and silver models.
If you want to save as much money as possible, Amazon has had the base model discounted to $1249 for a couple of weeks. That said, we think the 8-core GPU model is a better value. In addition to a more capable GPU, it comes with two extra USB-A ports (its more affordable sibling only has USB-C connectivity), Gigabit Ethernet and a Magic Keyboard with Touch ID. Those might seem like small additions, but they add a lot to the useability of the machine.
Follow @EngadgetDeals on Twitter for the latest tech deals and buying advice.
Source: Engadget – Apple’s 24-inch 8-core iMac M1 is back down to ,399
GeForce RTX 3090 Ti Allegedly Delayed And Could Cost $4,000 When It Does Arrive
One of the many announcements NVIDIA during its CES event was the crowning of a new flagship graphics card, the GeForce RTX 3090 Ti. Not that the regular GeForce RTX 3090 we reviewed last year is long in the tooth by any stretch, but for those who want the fastest consumer GPU on the planet, the Ti model will soon occupy that space. As to
Source: Hot Hardware – GeForce RTX 3090 Ti Allegedly Delayed And Could Cost ,000 When It Does Arrive
God Of War Nears 75K Concurrent Steam Users, How To Play On Windows 7 And 8
There may still be some of you who own a PC that still runs Windows 7 or 8. If you were wondering if you could still bask in the glory of being able to play God of War, you are in luck as a mod has been created to do just that.
The one time Sony exclusive has been a fan favorite since its release back in 2018 on the PlayStation 4. Santa
Source: Hot Hardware – God Of War Nears 75K Concurrent Steam Users, How To Play On Windows 7 And 8
You Can Now 'Repost' on TikTok (Maybe)
TikTok is getting a new feature that looks a bit like one we’re all familiar with. The “retweet” feature has been a staple of Twitter since the button was added in 2009. Now, TikTok is beta testing a new “repost” feature that many are calling the app’s retweet.
Source: LifeHacker – You Can Now ‘Repost’ on TikTok (Maybe)
Safari Bug Can Leak Some of Your Google Account Info and Recent Browsing History
A serious Safari bug disclosed in this blog post from FingerprintJS can disclose information about your recent browsing history and even some info of the logged-in Google account. From a report: A bug in Safari’s IndexedDB implementation on Mac and iOS means that a website can see the names of databases for any domain, not just its own. The database names can then be used to extract identifying information from a lookup table. For instance, Google services store an IndexedDB instance for each of your logged in accounts, with the name of the database corresponding to your Google User ID. Using the exploit described in the blog post, a nefarious site could scrape your Google User ID and then use that ID to find out other personal information about you, as the ID is used to make API requests to Google services. In the proof-of-concept demo, the user’s profile picture is revealed. FingerprintJS says they reported the bug to Apple on November 28, but it has not yet been resolved.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot – Safari Bug Can Leak Some of Your Google Account Info and Recent Browsing History
Linux to Adopt New Multi-Generation LRU Page Reclaim Policy
Based on observed behaviour on Android and Chrome OS, Google began working on a new page reclamation strategy for its Linux-based OSes aimed to improve how the virtual memory subsystem reclaims unused memory pages. More recent work shows the new MGLRU policy can benefit server environments, too.
Source: LXer – Linux to Adopt New Multi-Generation LRU Page Reclaim Policy