The Spam Thread!

[huckleberrypie]

You know... since I'm starting to get into more mature themed games, I might give Mafia/Mafia II a shot. (no pun intended... maybe ) I'd be interested to see how well the gameplay is on an RX580. The Mafia II benchmark ran pretty well as long you keep PhysX off.

Batman Arkham Asylum has been a blast. It's dark and gritty, but not dark enough to be a complete turn off and the aesthetic is expected for a Batman game. It kind of makes me want to seek out other Batman films, except for Batman & Robin. That's the film where everything went total camp like 1960s Batman.

People came to associate the Batman series with the Adam West series especially here where those who grew up in the sixties know the "nananana" theme tune all too well.

The first Mafia had a bit of a difficulty curve and it was a relief when I managed to beat it after getting shot at and killed more than a dozen times. It's not to say that the second game wasn't as challenging though. The original Mafia II release should fly on your RX 580 but I've seen reports about the remaster being a bit of a bloated ObviousBeta due to a couple or so glitches and performance issues, on top of the remaster being nothing more than the original game having given a texture upscale, bonus outfits and vehicles.

[cpd2009]

In March and April, I was bombarded with these pre-roll YouTube ads for Lit Mobile, a company selling solar powered charging banks. The ads themselves look like random video reviews from other YouTubers, but right away, I noticed something fishy. The reviewers never showed their faces or named their channels, and the ad scripts were similar. My suspicion was correct...

[cpd2009]

My new Macbook Pro has arrived.




I chose classic gray since Space Gray is overrated, IMO. So far, it's working great. The Retina display is nice to look at, and everything scales nicely. As for the touch bar, it exists. Only time I really need to use it is to adjust the volume. It's what Apple wants the function keys to be, but it looks more like a Nintendo-esque gimmick so far. Depending on the application, it could be used for web shortcuts, displaying photo editing tools, or showing a playback bar to scrub through a video or music track. People's opinions on the touch bar are split. Some love it, others hate it. Maybe as time goes on I'll find it useful, but we'll see. I didn't watch any reviews of the 2020 MBP or the touch bar so I could form my own opinion on it. There is a dedicated Escape key now because other users complained about the lack of one in previous MBP models. Speaking of the Escape key, the magic keyboard is just like previous Apple keyboards before the butterfly fiasco, and typing is rather good.

I did get a Thunderbolt/USB-C to USB 3.0 adapter. I only have one USB 3.0 flash drive at the moment, and it's blazing fast. I also tested my old USB DVD SuperDrive from my Mac Mini days, and that works fine too. Oddly, the same SuperDrive doesn't work on my ancient iBook. The iBook detects it, but the SuperDrive won't accept any disc when connected to said iBook.

[huckleberrypie]

It's a shame Catalina dummied out support for 32-bit legacy apps though. What sort of use case scenario are you going to put your new Macbook to its paces, if you don't mind telling?

[cpd2009]

It's a shame Catalina dummied out support for 32-bit legacy apps though. What sort of use case scenario are you going to put your new Macbook to its paces, if you don't mind telling?

It's going to be my secondary daily use computer, as well as for using apps like iMovie. Sometimes while playing video games or watching TV, I need to use the internet to look up information on a topic I saw on the news or some other program, or to consult a video game walk through. Doing the former on the phone is easy, but the latter is rather cumbersome; video game walkthroughs tend to be either long documents or YouTube videos. The wake up speed of the MacBook compared to the old Gateway laptop is night and day. I have Touch ID setup, and opening up the MacBook and getting on the internet is much faster. The Gateway is a bit slow, even with the SSD I installed, because of the old low-end dual core Pentium CPU.

The MacBook is also far less bulky, making it easier to take on trips and whatnot.

In a few weeks here, I will be going back home to see family. It's risky given the current coronavirus climate, but I haven't been home since Christmas. The MacBook will definitely be fully tested out on that trip.

The iMac, Periwinkle, will also be a daily driver as well, though now, I will alternate between that and the MacBook. The iMac still has El Capitan, and it can run older 32 bit apps. I managed to find a cheap $20 brand new legal copy of MS Office for Mac 2008 that is 32-bit only, and another app I want to learn, Scrivener, is also only 32-bit unless I pay for the newest version. The iMac will also be the computer for my drawing programs.

And for Rusty, the Dell PC, I will use that for my gaming and occasional Linux experimentation.

The MacBook is also the first computer I have owned to have a fingerprint scanner. I've seen them in PCs dating back at least a decade. I'm also trying to get used to the much-lauded trackpad.

---

As for what I'll do with Greta, the old Gateway laptop, I haven't decided. I will pull her SSD and use it to replace the slow 5400RPM Linux disk in Rusty, and use that SSD as the Linux disk. I could swap the 5400rpm disk back into Greta, but it's horribly slow with Windows 10. I might just place Greta into storage in case the need arises for a spare Linux or Windows laptop. Other than being a bit slow, the old laptop is still fine for basic tasks.

[cpd2009]

I wonder if I should use part of the next possible stimulus check for a Huion Kamvas 13. I already have a drawing tablet, an ancient Wacom Graphire 4 that I found for $10 at a pawn shop. It works fine, but I'd rather have something with a screen you can draw on. Wacom display tablets are extremely expensive, but Huion tablets tend to cost far less and some get decent reviews. I was considering getting a Huion GT-190, but after seeing a video review, decided to look for something else. The GT-190 works well enough for drawing, but it has a TFT LCD with poor viewing angles and color accuracy. I also need a display tablet that I can fit on my desk, such as that Kamvas 13.

[huckleberrypie]

I wonder if I should use part of the next possible stimulus check for a Huion Kamvas 13. I already have a drawing tablet, an ancient Wacom Graphire 4 that I found for $10 at a pawn shop. It works fine, but I'd rather have something with a screen you can draw on. Wacom display tablets are extremely expensive, but Huion tablets tend to cost far less and some get decent reviews. I was considering getting a Huion GT-190, but after seeing a video review, decided to look for something else. The GT-190 works well enough for drawing, but it has a TFT LCD with poor viewing angles and color accuracy. I also need a display tablet that I can fit on my desk, such as that Kamvas 13.

I would've considered a drawing tablet as well but I don't have the time or resources for one.

[cpd2009]

I wonder if I should use part of the next possible stimulus check for a Huion Kamvas 13. I already have a drawing tablet, an ancient Wacom Graphire 4 that I found for $10 at a pawn shop. It works fine, but I'd rather have something with a screen you can draw on. Wacom display tablets are extremely expensive, but Huion tablets tend to cost far less and some get decent reviews. I was considering getting a Huion GT-190, but after seeing a video review, decided to look for something else. The GT-190 works well enough for drawing, but it has a TFT LCD with poor viewing angles and color accuracy. I also need a display tablet that I can fit on my desk, such as that Kamvas 13.

I would've considered a drawing tablet as well but I don't have the time or resources for one.

So you have drawn before then?  Interesting. I admit, I'm not a pro at illustration. There's still a lot of things I need to learn such as depth and shadows, along with finding the perfect illustration program that suits my needs. Right now, I'm being cheap and learning how to use FireAlpaca, a free drawing program from a Japanese developer. I'm learning the basics such as layers and brushes, and plan to consult tutorials on everything else.

One of the bigger names in the illustration industry is Adobe. I'm not too keen on their subscription model, and older versions of the software are a mixed bag. Really old CS versions can no longer be activated or won't run properly on newer OS'es, while the last standalone suite costs an arm and a leg for a used copy. Other popular tools are Affinity Designer, and Corel Painter. In terms of free programs, there's the aforementioned FireAlpaca, along with Krita. Autodesk even offers a free version of their Sketchbook software these days too.

What I find very odd is my ancient Adobe CS2 disc set doesn't require online activation. It just needs the serial number on the package. It did come from a college, so perhaps Adobe produced some disc sets for colleges that didn't require online activation?

[cpd2009]

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2020/06/...t-have-to/

Even for $139 USD, this particular Windows laptop is horrible.

[huckleberrypie]

If it's for something like a dumb terminal for accessing a remote or headless server, I guess that wouldn't be too much of a stretch. Otherwise it's still trash.