Daily Tech New 4 April 2024

• I think we've identified the problem.
  
  Microsoft, market cap $3.12 trillion: Hello random open source project, we have a customer-facing problem that we need fixed urgently.
  
  Open source project: We'll take a look, but our project is run by volunteers in their own time. If it's an urgent issue affecting commercial use might we suggest our friends at Z who offer 24/7 support contracts at very reasonable rates?
  
  Microsoft, market cap $3.12 trillion: No. (Reddit)
  
  Though it was a Microsoft researcher who found the xz security breach and averted global disaster.
  
  
  
• On the other hand, open-source friendly company Stability AI is apparently fast going broke because it's a little too friendly. (The Register)
  
  There's always two sides to every story, and in this case the other side is $100 million per year spent on cloud servers.
  
  

• If you comply with the rules, we'll change the rules: The US Commerce Department has banned Nvidia's RTX 4090D from sale in China. (Tom's Hardware)
  
  The 4090D was designed specifically to comply with the ruling that banned the 4090.
  
  A little too specifically, perhaps. But maybe Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo should post the rules she wants companies to actually follow rather than expecting them to play some psychotic game of red light green light.
  
  
  
• The LSST camera did not cost $350 billion dollars. (Gizmodo)

  To do this, the team needed a Rolls Royce of a digital camera. Mind you, the camera actually cost many million times that of an actual Royce Royce, and at 6,200 pounds (2,812 kilograms), it weighs a lot more than a fancy car.

  It's an amazing camera - the largest digital camera ever built, with a resolution of 3.2 gigapixels - but the entire LSST project - the buildings, the telescope assembly, the massive mirrors - the primary mirror is 28 feet across - and this camera is less than 0.2% of that.
  
  (A basic Rolls Royce Ghost costs around $350,000, and weighs 5700 pounds, so they're off on the weight too; just not by three orders of magnitude.)
  
  
  
• Can AMD's 3D Vcache improve game performance for low-end graphics cards? (Hot Hardware)
  
  I was fully expecting the answer to be no, but if you're doing a budget build with a previous generation AMD chip and a card like AMD's own 7600, Intel's 750, or Nvidia's 3060, it might actually be worth the extra money for a 5000-series X3D chip.
  
  The biggest difference was Cyberpunk 2077 with an Intel Arc 750, where average frame rates jumped 30% from 46 to 60 fps just by upgrading from a 5800X to a 5800X3D. About half the games tested showed negligible difference though.
  
  Which makes the newer 5700X3D an interesting proposition. It's 10% slower than the 5800X3D but 25% cheaper, and if you're on a budget might just hit the sweet spot.
  
  
  
• Cannot remove files, disk is full. Please remove files to free up space and try again. Lol. (Six Colors)
  
  Okay, Apple, I can understand that you were trying to make everything user-friendly so that you can un-delete files that were removed by accident, but what you actually achieved was users having to wipe and reinstall the entire system because you ran out of space.
  
  And these are experienced tech journalists we're talking about, who... Yeah, off by three orders of magnitude. Never mind.
  
  
  
• Ubuntu 24.04 might become Ubuntu 24.05. (Tom's Hardware)
  
  The unreleased beta version had the xz unpleasantness, and Ubuntu wants to be super-duper sure that it's been expunged with utmost prejudice. So the planned release data of April 25 could slip into next month.
  
  I doubt that anyone would be upset about Ubuntu taking that precaution. Except perhaps for North Korea.
  
  
  

posted by Pixy Misa at 04:00 AM

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