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tomkatt

@tomkatt@lemmy.world

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A PR disaster: Microsoft has lost trust with its users, and Windows Recall is the straw that broke the camel's back (www.windowscentral.com)

It's a nightmare scenario for Microsoft. The headlining feature of its new Copilot+ PC initiative, which is supposed to drive millions of PC sales over the next couple of years, is under significant fire for being what many say is a major breach of privacy and security on Windows. That feature in question is Windows Recall, a...

tomkatt ,

Just be sure to get the edge release if you care about gaming or have current (like newer than 2021) hardware. Mint's main release is on an old kernel, 5.15 I think. Mint edge release is running kernel 6.5, which is from earlier this year.

tomkatt ,

“The incident is widely characterized by critics as an example of mishandled manhandled customer service.”

Just a typo.

tomkatt ,

Microsoft will just enable it via an update once all the fervor dies down. They haven’t abandoned the plan, and won’t, not while your data is pure profit for them.

Hell with them, no more Windows PCs in my home. I’m sick to death of everyone and their mother trying to both advertise to me and sell my data without my permission and at zero benefit to me.

tomkatt ,

This is why you should not trust them regarding Recall. They will not let it go. It will be forced on you eventually.

tomkatt ,

Face it, they can do whatever they want with your computer and you’re powerless to stop them.

Not my computer. They can't do shit if it's not installed.

tomkatt ,

The fact this is even necessary makes me want to shit a brick.

"Do you want to make an online account?" No.
"Okay, please set up your local account."

That should be it. And honestly, even that's egregious to me. Signing into online bullshit should be opt-in, not opt-out. Thank goodness I don't use Windows anymore, finally wiped the last Windows machine in my house this past week.

tomkatt , (edited )

Also if i want to make a plex server on an old PC, what would people recommend?

My plex server is headless, running Almalinux. Doesn't take much, I have it running on a very old NUC8 (NUC8i5BEK). The box is also running Asset UPnP and AudioBookshelf server too.

Personally, unless the server will also be the client (as in, you'll be watching from the server box and not a streaming box, tablet, TV app, etc), I'd skip any GUI and just install it from the terminal, save your resources for what matters. Desktop environment is pointless for a server machine.

If you were buying a cheap machine to handle it today, I'd probably recommend a Beelink (or other) mini-PC with a Ryzen 5000 series chipset (5500u/5560u models with 16GB RAM can be found very cheap, generally $215-$240 new these days). The 5000 series in particular are very power efficient for something you likely will leave on all the time, and have both 6c/12t and 8c/16t variants, though the 8 core ones will probably be more like $300-$320.

Whatever you buy, if it comes pre-installed with Windows, delete the OS. I wouldn't trust preinstalled on these boxes, and in any case Microsoft is getting really sketchy with this whole Windows Recall thing anyway.

tomkatt ,

For instance, you can’t factory reset an iPhone without connecting it to either an OSX computer, or a PC running their special program.

This is patently untrue. Settings -> General -> Transfer or Reset iPhone. You have the option from there to wipe all data, do a full factory reset, or transfer the phone's data to another device.

I've no idea where you're getting your info from.

tomkatt ,

Try entering the pin wrong repeatedly. May not work, but there’s a setting to force a wipe if it’s entered incorrectly 10 times. Will only work if that was enabled that at some point, but it’s worth a shot.

tomkatt ,

Amazon based search results integrated in the Unity dash beg to differ. Canonical has a history of being shitty.

tomkatt , (edited )

Well. in the modern day, there's Ubuntu 22.04 and up with their insistence on snaps for many otherwise native apps. For example, Firefox as a snap and taking anywhere from 30 seconds to up to 2 minutes to launch when you first open it.

I used Ubuntu for years, pretty much from 16.04 all the way up to 22.04 but that was a line for me and I ditched it for Manjaro. The experience has been much better overall.

Snaps should be for applications that may not receive updates on current systems or have a hard dependency on old libraries for some reason. Things like Spek come to mind. To use if for something like Firefox, and not only use it, but insist on it to the point you can't install the native version without ridiculous workarounds... it's absurd. And on top of this, it's especially dumb because flatpak already existed prior to snap, but as usual Canonical had to be special instead of working with community standards.

tomkatt ,

That delay happens on first launch every boot. Also the automatic updates happening basically whenever is nonsense. It should tell me an update is needed, not just kick it off whenever it feels like. That kind of crap is why I use Linux and not Windows, and now why I don’t use Ubuntu.

tomkatt ,

Too little too late. They lost what goodwill they might have had with me. I dealt with that for months until I decided to flip it. I won't be using Ubuntu in the future unless for some awful reason I specifically need an Ubuntu server (and in that case I'd still push for Almalinux or another alternative).

tomkatt ,

These are fantastic. I need more.

tomkatt , (edited )

Same. I main a Manjaro mini-PC but have a separate Windows gaming rig. No ads. I did use a reg key to disable start menu web search a while back but otherwise haven’t made any system changes.

tomkatt ,

I have some games I play that do not play nice with Proton. In particular, my wife and I are pretty obsessed with Solasta: Crown of the Magister (over 500 hours and counting), which has poor compatibility in wine and proton to my understanding.

Besides, for now I don’t need the hassle. I boot up gaming PC, Steam launches, I play, then I shut down. I don’t need an excuse to leave the gaming rig powered on when I’m not using it. Maybe if and when I end up rebuilding it.

tomkatt ,

That was just one example. And I’d you review that page you linked, they don’t all disagree, there were more than a few reporting issues with it. It’s gold rated, but not platinum.

I’m glad you’re enjoying the experience, but either way the point I was making is that my gaming PC is just an appliance. It works and I have enough other things to do that I don’t feel like reinstalling the OS and a butt-ton of games.

When I need to do a rebuild/upgrade in the future I’ll likely revisit Linux with it, but until then I don’t see the point. I only turn it on a few hours a week to game and otherwise it’s off. And when it is on, I just want to game, not potentially spend time fiddling or troubleshooting if something isn’t as expected.

tomkatt ,

I don’t need a push, a Linux machine is my daily driver (and has been for something like 8+ years now), and I’ve worked in IT doing virtualization/automation/data management and compliance for several years. I spend a lot of time in the terminal.

To me the Windows gaming PC is essentially a console, no different than a PS5 or a Switch is to someone else. It’s been up and running as such since before Proton was fully viable and for its use case I don’t see a need to change it until it’s due for a rebuild/replacement/upgrade.

tomkatt ,

I don’t see any of that. Cortana is disabled via settings toggle, no AI stuff, start menu web search is disabled. Updates are set to automatic download only and are only run upon shutdown if I choose “update and shutdown” instead of just doing shutdown.

I dunno, there are legitimate things to complain about with Windows, but none of this really fits.

In my case I power on, Steam launches, and I run a game. When done, I press the power button and it shuts down. That’s it.

tomkatt ,

These are things for any OS though. I mean, on XFCE I spend time setting up my preferred shortcuts, software, tools, etc.

On Mac, install rectangle, shortcuts, debloat. There’s no perfect default for everyone.

The Steam deck is a special case because it’s literally a gaming handheld (though the term handheld for that thing is admittedly loose).

And there’s still some things even with the deck. Did you set up emudeck? Heroic launcher? Configure it for desktop mode?

tomkatt ,

You’re not likely to do that for $150. You might be able to pull an old Dell Precision T5500 tower with a weak Xeon on eBay for cheap and refit it with more ram, better CPU and cheap non-redundant storage for $200 - $250.

For sake of power requirements though, seriously consider your use case and needs. You can get by pretty well with cheap mini-PCs like Intel NUCs or AMD minis like Beelink for pretty cheap and just cluster them with something like Proxmox to scale out instead of up when you need additional resources. This will be reasonably priced and keep the power bill and noise levels down.

tomkatt ,

I’m still working in tech (remotely), but otherwise living the “hermit in a cabin” lifestyle. It’s nice.

tomkatt ,

But otherwise I learned the hard way many years ago to just buy Logitech after purchasing a stupid expensive gaming mouse from a brand I’ve forgotten whose left click died in less than a year.

Seems to be a problem in general. I've been using Elecom trackballs for years, first one I bought still works. Ones I've bought in the last year all started wigging out on left click within a couple months. I took one apart recently to swap the mouse switch with a quick solder job and it's good as new. Seems like the newer ones are using really cheap Chinese Omron switches that die quickly. IIRC the older one uses a Japanese Omron switch. The new one I soldered in is a Kailh GM2.0.

tomkatt ,

Yeah, don’t accept trash from strangers.

tomkatt ,

Manjaro has a pretty great out of the box experience, everything just works via the GUI, including software management (and even pulling packages from the Arch AUR repos).

I use the terminal out of preference, and because it's where I'm comfortable, but I can't think of any situation it's actually needed for general desktop use.

tomkatt ,

Shit like this is why my LG C1 is restricted to LAN access only in my router (local network for automation purposes) and can't communicate with the internet.

Roku TV bricked until agreeing to new terms of service

See title - very frustrating. There is no way to continue to use the TV without agreeing to the terms. I couldn't use different inputs, or even go to settings from the home screen and disconnect from the internet to disable their services. If I don't agree to their terms, then I don't get access to their new products. That...

tomkatt ,

Shit like this is why my LG C1 is restricted to LAN access only in my router (local network for automation purposes) and can't communicate with the internet.

tomkatt ,

I bought a Brother laser printer some years back for like $120 and am still working on the starter toner cartridge. HP can fuck right off with this.

tomkatt ,

XFCE 4 Life.

tomkatt ,

Just use OSCAR to get the data locally from the SD card.

https://www.sleepfiles.com/OSCAR/

Learn more about the machine and do your own management as well. It’s very easy to get into the machine settings to control your air flow, temperature settings, and so on. Take the time to learn what the data from the machine means.

tomkatt ,

I currently use a Resmed Airsense 10 and can’t recommend it enough; best sleep I’ve ever had.

Just avoid anything by Philips Respironics. They’ve been messing around hard, class action suits and recalls and haven’t really made anyone whole from the debacle (myself included, I came out of pocket to replace my old Dreamstation).

tomkatt ,

Hey, check out the resmed airsense 10 autoset card-to-cloud version. It’s a lot cheaper and has no cellular connectivity, no wireless module. I just found out about it tonight, thinking of buying one as a backup machine. Looks like it ticks all your boxes.

CPAP.com has a starter bundle for it right now for $400.

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