Tech Corner

[MattW]

I'm starting to get irritated with subscription services now.. For some reason, after checking, Spotify changed my type of subscription.. Leading to an increased charge. Similarly, Disney+ did this a few months back, which I caught just in time before the payment went through. I'm glad I only have a few subscriptions because if I had loads, I'd end up with an empty bank account in no time

On a separate note, I was discussing with a friend from Switzerland about Apple not adjusting the price rates of RAM upgrades on its current available models, compared to PC companies having 30-50% increases in pre-built PCs due to the AI boom. Which I thought was a rare W for Apple, until I noticed that those of us in the UK have been done a disservice when it comes to the price..

(M4 Mac Mini base spec)
Apple US / Apple UK

I wonder if buying one in the States and having it shipped over would be cheaper

 

[gimme30]

It's the instruction manuals. They have to add all those extra letters for you UK guys.

I completely agree about the subscriptions; they've gotten out of control. For music I put up with the adds to avoid the ever-increasing charges. For the tele, it's almost cheaper to pay for a standard satellite/cable package. At least you get a lot more channels, even if a bunch are shopping/spanish/ppv. I've gone back to good old over-the-air. Completely free and almost every station in my area broadcasts in HD.
Does anyone besides me remember when cable first came out? The idea was you'd pay for tv and not have to sit through commercials. (not sure if it worked the same way across the pond)
It was great while it lasted. Now we pay for it and see twice as many ads.

 

[jaylach]

If you are using Google Chrome as a web browser you may find the following read of interest. Personally I don't allow anything Google on my systems but many do.

Update Chrome now: Zero-day bug allows code execution via malicious webpages

Google has released an emergency update to patch an actively exploited zero-day—the first Chrome zero-day of the year.

www.malwarebytes.com

 

[MattW]

AMD just gave me a mini heart attack. I have auto updates on for GPU & CPU drivers, and while I was away from my pc they must have released a new update. I came back to my monitor in 1024x768 res and 60hz refresh rate.. Turns out the GPU was no longer detected in Task Manager, which made me immediately think there was something wrong with my 7900xtx . Thankfully, a patch was just posted on AMD's website, which fixed it for me! I don't think I'd ever fully recover if this GPU broke..

 

[jaylach]

Lost my main system due to myself. Did a restart today and it totally failed on both my main system drive and and clone. due to things seeming fine and cloning my system drive to my clone. Used system restore through the advanced troubleshooting and the system is back up. Since my data and media drives are separate from the system drive I lost nothing but it was a bit of a pain.

I did the fix process on my clone drive and am now cloning the clone back to the system drive.

I will look at installing the update that probably caused this but will boot many times with success before cloning again. All is looking fine right now running on my clone drive and I expect that it will be the same when I go back to my normal boot drive after the reverse clone is done.

 

[plebian]

42 pages on this thread? Seriously?

 

[MattW]

42 pages on this thread? Seriously?

42 pages and counting

 

[jaylach]

Reapplied the updates and all seems fine after a few boots. I figure either a bad patch that was corrected or just a faulty install the first time.

 

[seangee]

Lost my main system due to myself. Did a restart today and it totally failed on both my main system drive and and clone. due to things seeming fine and cloning my system drive to my clone. Used system restore through the advanced troubleshooting and the system is back up. Since my data and media drives are separate from the system drive I lost nothing but it was a bit of a pain.

I did the fix process on my clone drive and am now cloning the clone back to the system drive.

I will look at installing the update that probably caused this but will boot many times with success before cloning again. All is looking fine right now running on my clone drive and I expect that it will be the same when I go back to my normal boot drive after the reverse clone is done.

Sounds like an attack of the clones

 

[jaylach]

Sounds like an attack of the clones

LOL! More like an attack of the DUH!. Can't believe that I cloned before fully venting the last updates. Just not something I normally do.

There is something I'm beginning to wonder though. I use Disk Management to set the clone drive to off-line for 2 reasons.

• Cleans up the view of drives in File Explorer as the clone drive is not listed.
• A little added security for the clone drive as it makes it unseen by Windows so, hopefully, also not seen by an infection.

Still I use EaseUS ToDo to do my clones and it sees the clone drive even though it is off-line. I'll still keep the clone drive set to off-line, if for nothing else, to have it not show in file explorer but EaseUS still seeing it I have to wonder if I'm really adding any security.

I guess a REAL security aspect would be to just remove the clone drive from the system which is easy as it is mounted on an adapter in a PCIe x16 slot. If needed, just plug the thing back in. Of course this would be a better security move but, since I'd have to pull the system out if its niche, I would likely do fewer backups.