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Thursday Random Stuff…

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Stuff I bookmarked recently. Some off topic, some not:

One Windows Kernel
“In this blog post, I will talk about the evolution of the core pieces of the Windows kernel that allows it to transparently scale across a low power NVidia Tegra chip on the Surface RT from 2012, to the giant behemoths that power Azure data centers today.”
Good read.

GM’s data mining is just the beginning of the in-car advertising blitz
“GM captured minuted details such as station selection, volume level, and ZIP codes of vehicle owners, and then used the car’s built-in Wi-Fi signal to upload the data to its servers. The goal was to determine the relationship between what drivers listen to and what they buy and then turn around and sell the data to advertisers and radio operators. And it got really specific: GM tracked a driver listening to country music who stopped at a Tim Horton’s restaurant. (No data on that donut order, though.)”
Is there nowhere you can go to get away from this crap?

Red Sox vs. Astros fan interference: Everything you need to know about the controversial call in ALCS Game 4
It was a home run. The Red Sox “win” should have an asterisk next to it. If they move on so should their title. If they win it all, ditto.

How America’s top CEOs are spending their own money on the midterm elections

Tuesday Random Stuff…

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Google Chrome Updated
“The Chrome team is delighted to announce the promotion of Chrome 70 to the stable channel for Windows, Mac and Linux…Chrome 70.0.3538.67 contains a number of fixes and improvements.”
Download | Download standalone(full) | Download standalone 64-bit Windows version(full)

MediaMonkey 4.1.22
“V4.1.22 is a strongly recommended update with about 20 fixes including several urgent issues.”
Download | Changelog

Stuff I bookmarked recently. Some off topic, some not:

Winamp returns in 2019 to whip the llama’s ass harder than ever
Good to see. Still rockin’ out with Winamp in Windows and Android.

Windows 10 October 2018 Update Performance Against Ubuntu 18.10, Fedora 29
“Of all the benchmarks ran on this Intel Core i7 8086K + ASUS Z370-A + MSI Radeon RX 580 box, Windows 10 came in first about 10% of the time but it ended up being in last place about 50% of the time.”

A thread written by @real_vijay
“Google is working on a new search engine code-named “Dragonfly” that will aid China’s effort to censor information from its citizenry.
As a former Google engineer I wanted to share some information on what it’s like to be inside Google as these decisions are made.”

Stephen Hawking warns that AI, ‘superhumans’ could wipe humanity in posthumous book
“While primitive forms of artificial intelligence developed so far have proved very useful, I fear the consequences of creating something that can match or surpass humans”
“Once such superhumans appear, there are going to be significant political problems with the unimproved humans, who won’t be able to compete”

Friday Random Stuff…

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Nvidia GeForce Game Ready Driver 416.34 WHQL
“Provides the optimal gaming experience for Call of Duty: Black Ops 4, SOULCALIBUR VI, and GRIP”
Download | Release Notes

AMD Radeon Software Adrenalin Edition Optional 18.10.1
Support For: Windows 10 October 2018 Update, Call of Duty: Black Ops 4
Download | Release Notes

Intel Solid State Drive Toolbox
Version: 3.5.6 Date: 10/8/2018
Download | Release Notes

Intel SSD Firmware Update Tool
Version: 3.0.4 Date: 10/8/2018
Download | Release Notes

Stuff I bookmarked recently. Some off topic, some not:

Stephen Hawking’s final scientific paper released
“The work, which tackles what theoretical physicists call “the information paradox”, was completed in the days before Hawking’s death in March. It has now been written up by his colleagues at Cambridge and Harvard universities and posted online.”

Def Leppard
One of my all time favs.
Def Leppard’s First-Ever Live Album, ‘Mirror Ball – Live & More’, Certified Gold In U.S.
Not a big live album fan but this one is OK.
Rock Hall of Fame: Def Leppard, Stevie Nicks, Radiohead, Rage Lead Nominees
I don’t much care about the R&R HoF and the guys in Def Leppard have pretty much said the same thing. Too many good acts are not in there and too many bad acts are.
Why the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame should be put out of its misery
I will leave you with videos from some of my favorite songs. Have a great weekend!

(I always listen to Bringin’ On The Heartbreak with Switch 625 but there is no official video for that)


Wednesday Random Stuff…

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I know there are several TweakHound readers in the path of Hurricane Michael. Hope you all make it through OK.

Intel Graphics Driver for Windows 10
Version: 25.20.100.6326 Date: 10/9/2018
Highlights
Launch Driver Games
Fix for FIFA19*
Launch Driver Games:
Pathfinder: Kingmaker*
Battlerite Royale*
FIFA19*
Download | Release Notes

Stuff I bookmarked recently. Some off topic, some not:

Intel Announces 9th Gen Core CPUs: Core i9-9900K (8-Core), i7-9700K, & i5-9600K
“Leading from the top of the stack is the Core i9-9900K, Intel’s new flagship mainstream processor. This part is eight full cores with hyperthreading, with a base frequency of 3.6 GHz at 95W TDP, and a turbo up to 5.0 GHz on two cores…Also featuring 8-cores is the Core i7-9700K, but without the hyperthreading. This part will have a base frequency of 3.6 GHz as well for a given 95W TDP, but can turbo up to 4.9 GHz only on a single core. The i7-9700K is meant to be the direct upgrade over the Core i7-8700K, and although both chips have the same underlying Coffee Lake microarchitecture, the 9700K has two more cores and slightly better turbo performance, but less L3 cache per core at only 1.5MB per.
The other important overclocking focused processor is the Core i5-9600K, with six cores without hyperthreading. Users will also see a lot of similarity in this part to the Core i5 of the previous generation, but with added frequency.”
Intel and their minions got caught fudging their benchmarks.
The minions admitted some of it and are retesting.
The NDA embargo ends on October 19th so we will have to wait until then to see real benchmarks.

Privacy Badger Now Fights More Sneaky Google Tracking
“With its latest update, Privacy Badger now fights “link tracking” in a number of Google products.”

Former Google boss launches scathing Silicon Valley attack urging tech giants to end the delusion that it’s making the world a better place
Jessica Powell said she had become tired of defending the company in her role as its top PR chief.
“This is an industry that takes itself far too seriously, and its own responsibility not seriously enough…You can’t go about telling your advertisers that you can target users down to the tiniest pixel, but then throw your hands up in front of the politicians and say your machines can’t figure out if bad actors are using your platform.”

Thursday Random Stuff…

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Reports everywhere about Win10 1809 issues. That is why I advise to wait before updating and backup before you do.
AskWoody is keeping a running tally of all the issues.
Win10 version 1809 buglog – including troubling tales of lost user data

Nvidia Geforce Game Ready 416.16 WHQL Drivers
“Provides the optimal gaming experience with support for the Windows 10 October 2018 Update including the public release of DirectX Raytracing (DXR)”
Download | Release Notes

The Big Hack: How China Used a Tiny Chip to Infiltrate U.S. Companies
“The attack by Chinese spies reached almost 30 U.S. companies, including Amazon and Apple, by compromising America’s technology supply chain, according to extensive interviews with government and corporate sources.”
Another reason we need to manufacture this tech stuff here.

Wednesday Random Stuff…

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I’ve got Win10 1809 running on 3 machines. Although I have a few minor errors in the logs I’ve no issues yet.

Firefox 62.0.3
Download (all) | Download 32-bit EN-US | Download 64-bit EN-US
Release Notes
Thanks Scott!

Winaero Tweaker for Windows 10 version 1809
A few fixes and several new features
Download & Info

Intel Graphics Driver for Windows 10
Version: 25.20.100.6323 Date: 10/1/2018
Highlights
Windows 10 October 2018 Update Launch Driver
HDR for embedded laptop panels Launch Driver
Download

Stuff I bookmarked recently. Some off topic, some not:

‘Star Wars: The Last Jedi’ Negative Buzz Amplified by Russian Trolls, Study Finds
“finds evidence of deliberate, organized political influence measures disguised as fan arguments…Overall, 50.9% of those tweeting negatively [about the movie] was likely politically motivated or not even human”

How Likely Are You To Have a Deer Collision?
“West Virginia continues to top the list of states where an individual driver is most likely to run into a deer. Some good news for West Virginian’s though, this year while West Virginia continues to be No. 1 on the top 10 list, the likelihood of having an insurance claim involving a deer was 1 in 46 — down three points from last year.
Montana (one in 57 chance of a crash), Pennsylvania (one in 63 chance of a crash), and Wisconsin also remain at the top of list. Rounding out the top 10 states where drivers are most likely to collide with large animals like deer, elk, moose or caribou are Iowa, South Dakota, Minnesota, Michigan, Wyoming, and Mississippi. The months drivers are most likely to collide with a large animal in the U.S. are (in order) November, October, and December.”
Interactive map there too.

1-in-3 pass ‘US Citizenship test,’ just 19% for Americans 45 and younger
“Among the embarrassing errors uncovered in the survey of questions taken from the U.S. Citizenship Test and conducted by Lincoln Park Stragtegies:
72 percent of respondents either incorrectly identified or were unsure of which states were part of the 13 original states.
24 percent could correctly identify one thing Benjamin Franklin was famous for, with 37 percent believing he invented the lightbulb.
12 percent incorrectly thought WWII General Dwight Eisenhower led troops in the Civil War.
2 percent said the Cold War was caused by climate change.”
Perhaps it is time to require you pass this test before being allowed to vote?
Try for yourself. Took me less than 2 minutes.
USCIS – Civics Practice Test
Washington Times – US Citizenship Test – Could You Pass?
CNN – Can YOU pass the U.S. citizenship test? Take this quiz

Monday Random Stuff…

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Win10 1809/October 2018 Update
“They” say it is coming out tomorrow.
“They” said 1803 would release on April 10, 2018. It was released on the 30th as I recall.
At any rate, you should to a full system image backup today.
I would also consider delaying the update. Every tech site out there has posted a how to. TweakGuide readers already have my advice.
IMHO the update is another “meh” update as the reward is negligible and the risk medium/high.
The only changes I see worth anything are a better Dark Theme and Windows HD Color settings adjustments.
Storage sense (which I don’t use) now has the option to do a disk cleanup. That reminds me…
As the above link stated, “The Disk Cleanup experience (“cleanmgr.exe”) is being deprecated.” Some sites took that and acted like the sky was falling. Either they have no command of the English language or they stopped reading right there. The very next sentence reads, “We’re retaining the Disk Cleanup tool for compatibility reasons.”
Relax, Disk Cleanup isn’t going anywhere.

Audacity 2.3.0
Audacity is an easy-to-use, multi-track audio editor and recorder for Windows, Mac OS X, GNU/Linux and other operating systems.
Download | Release Announcement

Stuff I bookmarked recently. Some off topic, some not:

NASA At 60: A Driving Force For Materials Science And Technology Innovation
“Today, NASA (the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, a federal agency of the United States of America) celebrates its 60th birthday. Founded on 29th July 1958, NASA first started operating on 1st October in the same year. Sixty years ago, the United States and what was then the Soviet Union were locked in a so-called ‘Space Race’; the competition between these two nations to become the first to escape Earth’s gravitational pull and prove the strength of their technology and innovation.”
Happy 60th NASA!

That sign telling you how fast you’re driving may be spying on you
“The next time you drive past one of those road signs with a digital readout showing how fast you’re going, don’t simply assume it’s there to remind you not to speed. It may actually be capturing your license plate data.”
I guarantee they have pics of me using a universal hand signal toward the camera. I also went by one going downhill my bicycle. Challenge accepted. 32 in a 25.
woohoosmiley

Jury Verdict Thrown Out in Led Zeppelin ‘Stairway to Heaven’ Lawsuit
“The ruling reopens the battle over whether Led Zeppelin borrowed from the 1968 song “Taurus” when it composed the classic rock anthem that appears on the 1971 release “Led Zeppelin IV.
Michael Skidmore, the trustee of the Randy Craig Wolfe Trust, sued the band in 2014, arguing that “Stairway to Heaven” ripped off elements of Wolfe’s composition. Wolfe, Spirit’s frontman, died in 1997. A jury ruled in favor of Led Zeppelin in 2016, finding that the two songs were not substantially similar.”
Google “taurus stairway to heaven comparison” if you want to compare. Lots of good videos out there.

Justin Verlander
Saturday we drove up to Baltimore to watch my homeboy Justin Verlander (aka “Kate’s husband“) pitch.
It is supposed to be a 3 hour drive but it was closer to 4. As anyone familiar with Northern Virginia & DC area knows, I95 is a freaking mess. Somehow I always seem to be headed opposite the open E-ZPass lanes.
We stopped at Faidley’s Seafood in Baltimore as we do whenever we are in B’more. Best crabcakes you’ll ever have.
The game was a success as JV pitched 6 scoreless innings and had 10 K’s. Opinion of the Houston sports press is he will pitch game 1 of the ALDS vs the Indians.
This was my first time seeing him in person in a uniform other than the Tigers. I still can’t get used to it.
(click on pic for full size)

The Weekend Is Here!

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Nvidia Geforce Game Ready 411.70 WHQL Drivers
“Provides the optimal gaming experience for Assassin’s Creed Odyssey, Forza Horizon 4, and FIFA 19”
Download | Release Notes

Stuff I bookmarked recently. Some off topic, some not:

Facebook Blog – Security Update
“On the afternoon of Tuesday, September 25, our engineering team discovered a security issue affecting almost 50 million accounts…Since we’ve only just started our investigation, we have yet to determine whether these accounts were misused or any information accessed. We also don’t know who’s behind these attacks or where they’re based.”

Yes Facebook is using your 2FA phone number to target you with ads
“Facebook has confirmed it does in fact use phone numbers that users provided it for security purposes to also target them with ads.”

That’s all I’ve got. Have a great weekend!

Thursday Morning Random Stuff…

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FYI, I’m running Windows 10 October 2018 Update / 1809. So far everything seems to be OK. As with every other major update I had to reinstall SoundBlaster drivers.

AMD Radeon Software Adrenalin Edition Optional 18.9.3
Support for Assassin’s Creed and Forza Horizon 4.
Download | Release Notes

Intel Solid State Drive Toolbox 3.5.5
Download | Release Notes

LibreOffice 6.1.2
Download | Release Notes

Stuff I bookmarked recently. Some off topic, some not:

Product updates based on your feedback
“We’ve heard—and appreciate—your feedback. We’re going to make a few updates in the next release of Chrome (Version 70, released mid-October) to better communicate our changes and offer more control over the experience…While we think sign-in consistency will help many of our users, we’re adding a control that allows users to turn off linking web-based sign-in with browser-based sign-in—that way users have more control over their experience. For users that disable this feature, signing into a Google website will not sign them into Chrome.”
Condensed version, you’ll bee able to disable the universal sign in.

Almost Every Major Free VPN Service is a Glorified Data Farm
“While many VPN service providers would want you to believe that they have charitable aims in offering VPN access for free, the reality is that most free VPN services are glorified data farms. I will know because I specialize in testing and reviewing VPNs. In a recent study my organization conducted, analyzing the most popular free VPN services, we discovered that pretty much every popular free VPN service is a glorified data farm or abuse access to user’s data and resources in some form. Hotspot Shield, in particular, is a major culprit.”
I use TorGuard. Use coupon code TweakHound for 50% Off for Life.

Hurricane Florence
Has anyone found a charity like the one JJ Watt set up for Houston?

Save up to 35% on select PC Gaming Laptops, Components, and Monitors Most prices TODAY ONLY.
Examples:

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Corsair Vengeance LPX 16GB (2x8GB) DDR4 2400MHz RAM List Price: $195.99 Deal of the Day: $127.49 You Save: $68.50 (35%)
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Tuesday Morning Random Stuff…

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VMware Workstation Player 15.0
Download | Download for Windows | Release Notes

Intel Graphics Driver for Windows 15.40
Supports Intel(R) Iris(R) graphics, Intel(R) Iris(R) Pro graphics and Intel(R) HD graphics on:
– 4th Generation Intel(R) Core(TM) Processor Platform (codename Haswell)
– 5th Generation Intel(R) Core(TM) Processor Platform (codename Broadwell)
– Braswell Processor Family
– CherryTrail Processor Family
Download | Release Notes

Stuff I bookmarked recently. Some off topic, some not:

Google search is adding a news feed to its homepage on mobile
“It leads a big pile of search improvements the company announced today”
“Big pile”. Hehe…

Hey, Microsoft, stop installing third-party apps on clean Windows 10 installs!
“With Windows 10, a clean install stays that way for about two minutes, because the second you hit the desktop, the Microsoft Store immediately starts trying to download third-party apps and games. And these apps keep trying to install themselves even after you cancel the downloads.”
You’re a little late to the party there bro.

Study: Girls ‘Significantly’ Better Than Boys At Reading, Writing
“The authors found that girls fared markedly better in both reading and writing in the fourth grade, only to see the gap widen in eighth and twelfth grades, especially when it came to writing.”
Hmmm… Maybe it’s because the boys are paying attention to other things?!