icedterminal

https://knockout.chat/thread/49305

Test Drive Unlimited 2 in particular is one I use on occasion. https://www.tduworld.com/

The Crew server side is being reverse engineered so you can eventually play it in the future.

Adobe used to house all the licensing mechanisms in a single file named amtlib.dll. The people who cracked it just nulled out the function. And since it was the same for every piece of software, just repeat the null process for each one. Bam, the entire suite for free.

When Adobe switched from CS to CC subscription, it was cracked in 24 hours. Largely because they didn’t change much.

Adobe then axed the crippling DLL file and baked the mechanism right into the executable. A patcher tool was released that could crack each one. The upside is you could install and keep them updated from the CC Desktop and just run the patcher each time. Sometimes you had to wait for an update to the patcher. So before you clicked “update” you had to double check to make sure it worked.

To stop the free trial abuse (which is how people installed anyway) Adobe started requiring billing information during setup before you even get to downloads.

Later on, Adobe prevented users from updating apps if there wasn’t an active subscription.

The patcher eventually stopped working because it was abandoned (this around 2019 when I gave up using it because Resolve and Affinity were more affordable and met my needs.) Months later someone else picked up the patcher development. There’s also pre-cracked versions you can download and install.

I’ve not touched Adobe since and find Resolve to be significantly more stable and at $300, much more affordable. The Affinity Photo and Designer apps are great and affordable too at $170 for the bundle.

An out of the box OS should include a browser. Microsoft takes a ham-fisted approach, however, Apple makes it entirely possible to uninstall Safari. You do have to jump through the hoop of disabling System Integrity Protection to remove it, but it’s simple as trashing the app and deleting the data. I speak from experience. Very easy to do.

There is one actually.

https://github.com/revoltchat

It’s obviously a WIP. A discord clone essentially

It’s always been bad practice to just blindly update software. That’s why we have different distros.

Ubuntu and Mint hold your hand and make it easy for newcomers. Great way to dive into Linux. I completely agree these are great for “it just works” and no fuss. I’ve not had one break on me.

Arch and Gentoo expect you to have experience and know what you’re doing. You build it up how you want it. That’s what makes these so great. But you need the experience and knowledge.

I’ve personally tried openSUSE and in my opinion it feels like a good middle ground between both ends. In the past I’ve recommended Mint to get started, openSUSE once you’ve got experience, and then Arch for when you want total control.

Vivaldi does have it’s own built in adblocker. You can add sources. It’s not as robust at uBO, but than nothing

You can move the drives. Just have your recovery key/password in hand. No problem.

You either set the DNS settings per device to the system running PiHole / AdGuard Home, or if your router allows, set the DNS there. It’s ideal to set it on the router.

Any time a device makes a DNS request to a domain, it’s checked against the list. If found, it’s stopped. If not found, it gets sent upstream to your choice of a public DNS configured during setup. I use Cloudflare (1.1.1.1, 1.0.0.1).

By being ripped out and sandboxed the same way other apps are, Google services isn’t free to siphon battery. This means you can restrict battery use and cut the constant communication down. Thus saving battery. If you allow it, yes it is not different than if it was preloaded.

Tagging on here: Both the first model PS3 and Xbox 360 were hot boxes with insufficient cooling. Both suffered from getting too hot too fast for their cooling solutions to keep up. Resulting in hardware stress that caused the chips solder points to weaken until they eventually cracked.

Solving too fast. I shit you not. Sometimes you have to go really slow. Like you’re 80 and can’t see very well trying to discern what’s in those boxes.

The battery is sourced from Ganfeng Lithium, CATL, Panasonic, and/or LG Chemical. The majority actually comes from CATL. The world’s leading EV battery manufacturer. Various automakers work with them. The cells arrive at the automakers manufacturing and all they do is pack it into a case. The statement they have leading battery tech is disingenuous. No matter which automaker you look at, they’re using the same cells from the same sources.

Due to a bunch of political mess with China, both CATL and automakers are trying to get around it. https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/catl-talks-with-tesla-global-automakers-us-licensing-wsj-reports-2024-03-25/

Lastly, Tesla isn’t ahead. China is. It’s why automakers are going to them. Credit where it’s due, Tesla did push for EV adoption outside of China. But that’s about it.

Being able to do this is why Linux is so amazing. If Windows finds a corrupt file and can’t repair itself, you gotta find the package it’s part of (Windows update catalog), or create an ISO that’s updated to do an offline repair. If the registry gets fucked, good luck fixing that.

Pretty sure you can see their email address. This should give you the opportunity to message them stating you’ll be canceling the subscription. They’ll still be able to subscribe on their own.

Arch is not meant to be a daily driver if you’re expecting “shit just works” stability long term when you just blindly run updates. You have to understand what you’re updating and sometimes why.

It is targeted at the proficient GNU/Linux user, or anyone with a do-it-yourself attitude who is willing to read the documentation, and solve their own problems.

• https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Arch_Linux

If you want to use Arch, you need to invest in snapshots using rsync or dd. Given how it’s a rolling release, you should do this weekly. If something fucks up, grab all your logs and put them somewhere safe. Roll back and look at your logs to see what broke. Then apply updates as needed. You can ignore packages for quite a while. If you’re not smart enough to understand it now, you may in the future. It takes time and practice.

Debian based is only “out of date” feature wise because they do a package freeze. They ensure stability before release. Updates are largely security related.

Your use of the Platform is licensed, not sold, to you, and you hereby acknowledge that no title or ownership with respect to the Platform or the Games is being transferred or assigned and this Agreement should not be construed as a sale of any rights.

From the Blizz terms.

WoW has always revolved around having a server handle everything and your client is just the textures/models viewer where you tell the server what to do, I have been fine with this. But I do agree, it should say something else on the button. Other games that are not MMO shouldn’t be a “license” to play. If you buy it, you can play it whenever and wherever. Features that are not multiplayer should work regardless. Some things just shouldn’t be tied to a server. I really despise modern gaming because of this.

Anecdotal experience: Gran Turismo Sport recently lost its servers. When they went down, the Mileage Exchange shop went with it. This means all the cosmetics for cars. and a few unique cars, are now unobtainable for future players. PD could have patched the shop to be a complete list of everything and you buy it with the plethora of points you will collect in the future as you race. But no, they didn’t.

It’s called a relay attack. Thieves just amplify the normally very weak signal and intercept communication. This allows them to unlock the door, and if push start, bypass the immobilizer to start the car. If a key is still required, this doesn’t work for starting the car.

The general rule for key fobs is never keep them near the door where the car is parked. Place them on the opposite side of the house. If you want to, some suggestions around the web include making a homemade Faraday box to put your key fob in.

The evidence you want to see is literally something you can do or search the Internet yourself. There’s thousands of results. CPU is better than a GPU no matter codec you use. This hasn’t changed for decades. Here’s one of many direct from a software developer.

https://handbrake.fr/docs/en/latest/technical/performance.html

It’s not odd at all. It’s well known this is actually the truth. Ask any video editor in the professional field. You can search the Internet yourself. Better yet, do a test run with ffmpeg, the software that does encoding and decoding. It’s available to download by anyone as it’s open source.

Hardware accelerated processing is faster because it takes shortcuts. It’s handled by the dedicated hardware found in GPUs. By default, there are parameters out of your control that you cannot change allowing hardware accelerated video to be faster. These are defined at the firmware level of the GPU. This comes at the cost of quality and file size (larger) for faster processing and less power consumption. If quality is your concern, you never use a GPU. No matter which one you use (AMD AMF, Intel QSV or Nvidia NVENC/DEC/CUDA), you’re going to end up with a video that appears more blocky or grainy at the same bitrate. These are called “artifacts” and make videos look bad.

Software processing uses the CPU entirely. You have granular control over the entire process. There are preset parameters programmed if you don’t define them, but every single one of them can be overridden. Because it’s inherently limited by the power of your CPU, it’s slower and consumes more power.

I can go a lot more in depth but I’m choosing to stop here because this can comment can get absurdly long.