Posts by Compuserve User

Time to Ryzen shine, Intel: AMD has started shipping 7nm desktop CPUs like it's no big deal

OK if you want 20% better performance

There is a YouTube video that puts a Ryzen 5 with a RX 580 against a FX 6350 with same GPU. Most of the games tested yielded 20% increase in favor of the Ryzen, most of the time the Ryzen was bottle-necking the GPU. Most people use there PCs for gaming and have a dedicated rig for video production/etc. I was nearly caught on upgrading until I watched that video.

I cannot justify spending money on kit when my 6 year old processor ($60) keeps up with the latest AAA games. I think it is all hype to get you to keep up with the Jones'.

Guy is booted out of IT amid outsourcing, wipes databases, deletes emails... goes straight to jail for two-plus years

A Cryptic Response

Would it not be safer to encrypt the data instead of deleting it? Stick the files in one big container and 512 bit scramble it.

Let the management types figure that one out. The data is there..kinda. That would get you 12 months vacation in minimum security.

While we are at it, where are the backups? The activity we all supposed to do, but find out later we didn't.

Atari finally launches its VCS console. Again.

Marketing Tools

This is clearly a wind up to get punters interested in a new pi-esque console. Atari doesn't make hardware the same reason as Sega. No money in it.

There are plenty of reasons why not to shake the bushes and the trees for low hanging fruit. The design looks right, the size could also guesstimation. Ryzen CPU? lol More like a Rock chip.

After all this is video game marketing right? Whisper Atari in your ear and you drop 300 quid without thinking.

After years of listening, we've heard not a single peep out of any aliens, say boffins. You think you can do better? OK, here's 1PB of signals

After 3 years we found enough examples of life in our seti. One of the reasons we bought another.

Virgin Media to chop 800 jobs in Wales call centre

IVRs are cheap and can reduce a call center down to minimal staff. I feel sorry for the VM teleworkers, but I am sure they will be taken by Apple as they are short staffed. Unless you can go to your MP and demand that VM provide a redundancy package and pay back any tax incentives, then it is time to start looking for a new job.

Time to reformat the old wallet and embiggen your smartmobe: The 1TB microSD is here

Take Away

How big was that micro SD card Snowden used to copy all that data he downloaded from the NSA?

How much damage can your disgruntled employee do with one of these micro SD cards?

How much damage can be done to your life/business if this card gets corrupted?

Oracle AI's Eurovision horror show: How bad can it be? Yep. Badder

Oldies but goodies

They need to get ABBA back.

Salesforce? Salesfarce: Cloud giant in multi-hour meltdown after database blunder grants users access to all data

Wash, Rinse, Repeat.

It will happen time and time again until we get back to a local server mindset. I have never trusted cloud and thanks to Experian I have to be ever more diligent with my data. Maybe the next fad is pen names? This Salesforce drama was something that could have been avoided, but penny pincher IT management and poor HR practices are to blame. Get the data local and then worry about security locally. DO NOT TRUST YOUR DATA TO CLOUD.

The Year Of Linux On The Desktop – at last! Windows Subsystem for Linux 2 brings the Linux kernel into Windows

Think of it another way.

Now Windows will not have issues with anti competitive EU or US laws. Windows comes with its own alternative.

This puts Linux more in the mainstream, and it will make sense to actually have a Linux certification inside a MCSE.

Court doc typo 'reveals' Julian Assange may have been charged in US

Things come to those who wait.

N/T

Fed up with 72-hour, six-day working weeks, IT workers emit cries for help via GitHub repo

I feel like I am 13

I work from home and projects always carry themselves over the 72 hour mark. My work ethic is like when I was 13. I can go out to play once my homework was done. Roll on 37 years and it is exactly the same ethic. I do not see what the big deal is, unless the said Chinese workers are commuting on those 8 hour train journeys we see on TV. http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/english/doc/2006-01/24/content_514899.htm

Just the small matter of the bill for scrapping Blighty's old nuclear submarines: It's £7.5bn

There is an alternative

Twenty plus years ago I was working on a project to resolve the very same issues as presented in this article, unfortunately this location sits 50 miles away from Las Vegas. The project I am referring to was Yucca Mountain. Most of the infrastructure is still awaiting certification and the transport containers cannot be ruptured during an accident. The Las Vegas public doesn't know about the many nuclear underground tests that was on the site (more than you know). I'm sure some bright spark will come along and find a use for all those isotopes stuck somewhere, but I like to know where they are being stored.

If Trump allows the repository licensing, there will be an alternative location for spent fuel rods. We just have to get this issue resolved, before all you lot starts glowing, and radiation exposure is a nasty way to die, especially from a dirty bomb. Pester your MP about it.

Razer – perfectly happy to sell you a laptop for over $2,000, but when it comes to fixing security holes... tough sh*t

Need floppy disk drive to update main board firmware.

Why is this Razer's problem? It is your responsibility to make sure your laptop/computer is safe especially if it is a specialized piece of kit.

If I build you a PC (back in the day we had cover disks on magazines) and you fill it full of crap, it is not my problem (people learned the hard way) If the motherboard dies it is, but if you expose your rig to places it shouldn't be connected to, that is your problem. Thus, Razer is not to blame. I am sure it is in the Razer EULA somewhere.

Prince Harry takes a stand against poverty, injustice, inequality? Er, no, Fortnite

Prince Harry doesn't have any real responsibilities and will probably not sit on the throne, so he is free to make all kinds of whimsical comments that get media exposure for 15 minutes and then the issue disappears in the ether. We are all entitled to our opinion. Harry has done some remarkable things (research them if you must) and I agree with him in principle. If we were living in a world of 1980 where kids can go playing out after dark safely or after tea go play on your spectrum or commodore, then there should be no obesity in children and more future competitors in the Olympics.

Unfortunately it is not 1980 or 1990, knife crime is on the rise and kids have to stay home where it is safe. We had Team Fortress for frickin ever, and nobody complained about the violence in that game. It is like a cartoon, just like Bugs Bunny cartoons and the violence that was contained in each episode was much worse. So kids relate to cartoon as not being real. I notice Harry doesn't refer to call of duty or CSGO which I bet he is an avid player.

If Harry wants a change in social media and violent comic type video games, maybe he should resolve the gang and knife crime problems in the UK, so the kids can you out and play like we did in 1980. He deserves a pint for trying, but something tells me he won't even think about it.

Ethiopian Airlines boss confirms suspect flight software was in use as Boeing 737 Max crashed

Checking your own work

So do you think there will be any criminal prosecutions due to the deaths from a faulty aircraft(s)?

Should the FAA remove Boeing from their own internal QA process and employ a trusted 3rd party like NASA or SAIC?

Iranian-backed hackers ransacked Citrix, swiped 6TB+ of emails, docs, secrets, claims cyber-biz

Will we see some competitive Citrix alternatives in the coming months?

ReactOS 0.4.11 makes great strides towards running Windows apps without the Windows

I wonder why...

Reactos reminds me of BeOS for some reason. Will it go the same way - into specialized devices?

Customer: We fancy changing a 25-year-old installation. C'mon, it's just one extra valve... Only wafer thin...

Funny you should mention Siemans

I was working as a contractor for Siemens and by some unfortunate luck I got pulled to work Christmas Technical Support. Not really a big problem triple time and all that, but I had a new crafty co worker that liked to skive off. So the place is pretty much dead, feet on the desk watching youtube, and my co worker decides to forward all the phones to his mobile and goes down for a pint at the local. He doesn't tell me this. A couple of hours later he doesn't reappear and nobody is calling in. Didn't see anything different. Well while this was going on we had a DDOS incident and nobody could get on the website (it is a very much used one and has a million quid draw on Christmas Day) so my boss calls me and asks why all the calls are going to a swearing joke voice message and the mailbox is full. What was funnier that the PBX was down too. I got the web server and PBX back up in record time. My co-worker turned out to be a senior manager, and got the sack. I didn't have to work Christmas again, but everyone else had to in my department. Fun times.

Linus Torvalds pulls pin, tosses in grenade: x86 won, forget about Arm in server CPUs, says Linux kernel supremo

ARMed and Dangerous

I am sure Mr. Linux knows what he is talking about. It is just the many skeletons in the closet with regard to ARM that are more frequent and scary than in x86. The constant security issues in ARM is bewildering. It is better summed up as "Better the devil you know than the devil you don't." I could not trust an enterprise ARM server for anything really, except maybe home lab use...

Crash, bang, wallop: What a power-down. But what hit the kill switch?

Remote Support in the dark

Worked with an outfit supporting small medical office in the UK. We were still using XP (haha) and I had to manually patch each machine with the latest updates. We had one particular office that was unable to be contacted, and we had to call in for the office manager to check the server. She was compliant and the server came back on but only for a few minutes then it was not responding.

I picked the short straw and had to go down to the facility to see what was going on. Log story short, the office manager replaced the server power cable with the kettle cable as the other one was longer, and every time she went into the server room and plugged it in and left, the door closing would pull the plug out. Even better, the server was moved next to the door as the kettle plug didn't reach and damaged the patch panel.

Hold horror stories: Chief, we've got a f*cking idiot on line 1. Oh, you heard all that

Getting Bogged Down

Back in the day when we had YTS (Youth Training Scheme) I was working for an IT outfit, up North of the UK that recently hired a young girl to answer the phones. When one day the managing director of our glorious entity called in looking for the Supervisor (Tim). This young girl (17 years old) poked her head around the door asking where Tim was. I told her "he went to his secondary office to do some paper work" (the warehouse) she made a face and went back to the phone and said "he's on toilet".