Daily Tech News 18 June 2022

• The controls for the underfloor heating work. That just leaves the oven, I think, as the only thing I haven't tested yet. Oh, and the pump for the water tank.
  
  Temperatures hit zero this morning, but in C that's not all that cold. Here inside I was snug and warm.
  
  
  
• There's a flaw with - not in, but with - browser extension wallets like Metamask that could let anyone with access to your computer steal everything. (Bleeping Computer)
  
  When you set up Metamask, it gives you a twelve word password recovery phrase. You're supposed to keep that in a safe place, like, well, a safe.
  
  Your browser though sees it as form data that might be lost if you accidentally close the tab, so it writes it safely to disk. Where anyone sharing your computer can find it.
  
  
  

• Video card prices - at least here in Australia - seem to all be below MSRP. Well, up to the RTX 3080 and RX 6800 anyway. The 3090 Ti is still crazy expensive.
  
  The only reason not to buy one right now is new cards are on the way in the next few months. Probably.
  
  
  
• Speaking of which: When AMD says something will ship "this Fall" they don't mean November 30. (Tom's Hardware)
  
  The new Socket AM5 / Ryzen 7000 CPUs and motherboards are expected to be launched September 15.
  
  
  
• Everything you never wanted to know about USB-C but were forced to ask. (Tech Powerup)
  
  USB-C is now used by USB 3.0, USB 4.0, Thunderbolt 3, and Thunderbolt 4. Oh, and cheap USB-C charging cables (and some not-so-cheap ones) are often only USB 2.0.
  
  This article goes over all the features supported by USB-C generally and how to know which ones actually work with your devices.
  
  
  
• In this stunning exposé, BuzzFeed reveals that TikTok is owned by China. (BuzzFeed)
  
  TikTok assured everyone that US user data could not be accessed by the Chinese staff. They lied.
  
  
  
• Physicists have linked two time crystals into a single quantum system with two states. (Live Science)
  
  The time crystals are formed by cooling helium-3 to within a gnat's whisker of absolute zero - which unlike 0C is in fact rather cold - and creating a standing magnetic wave, which because helium-3 at that temperature forms a Bose-Einstein condensate, a state of matter where the entire system shares a single quantum state - keeps going forever so long as you maintain the super-cooling.
  
  In this experiment they built two of those, and then brought them together so that the two magnetic fields interfered with each other.
  
  Time crystals generally are perpetual motion devices, just useless ones. They'll keep going forever, but you can only create them by pouring tons of energy into maintaining the specific conditions the require, and also if you look at them they immediately break.
  
  I mean, literally. If you look at them they stop working.

posted by Pixy Misa at 05:21 AM

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