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Thread: No2FolkARPS
- Join Date
- Oct 2012
- Posts
- 10
Found helpfully at the site with the url that no one can ever type because it's his name :D
~ Ferrard
Oh god, did I really offer to do that? Well I guess it at least means someone read some part of that wall of text.
Neither story is actually as interesting as it may sound, and I have to be very careful about the dizzle one for fear of being unfairly demonising/outright libellous/breaking trusts.
Well start with TG/UO.
(At least, I think it was TG/UO, its been so long... Im suddenly inclined to think UO is a euro group so the following doesnt make sense, but I know it was two of the bigger communities so Ill use those names for now)
Now, back in the day, TG and UO came to an agreement with regards to hardware: Theyd share an absolutely massive server through a single provider, whichd let them defray costs and reduce administration overheads. It also let them keep their subcommunities, such as the TG aerosim wings, together. Theyd still play separately because they had different crowds and approaches, but the idea was that theyd both work better and cheaper because of it. I have no idea if this is still how they operate. I havent paid any attention at all to other groups and only realised Id committed a minor faux pas by accident.
Up in that second wall of text I explain what a good idea it was to go through RPS for recruitment rather than get into a drama-laiden fight on the bisforums. I wasnt the only one who had this great idea.
In the very early days of what would become ARPS we had a lot of trouble with the server. BIS had donated a bunch of copies of Arrowhead to RPS to hand out as prizes just as BAF was releasing and Jim had organised a free server for a month with a cool provider called Jest (Jestservers.com). His plan was that hed host a big session and write it up to give people one of those you should really play this diaries we all love.
(I somehow won one of the copies, and even got a mention in the eventual write up, though I dont think they ever got around to handing out the copies of BAF that were supposed to be awarded for noteworthy play)
However, ARMA is not the most bug-free of games and to top it off some of the missions available on default dedicated servers are designed for listenservers and can cause the server to hang or crash. We bitched about this a bit. Probably a lot.
Now the leadership(s) of the TG/UO consortium had seen that this hugely popular pc gaming website was suddenly promoting their game of choice and that it wasnt mentioning anything about the modding scene or communities, both of which are a huge part of arma to most players. To top it off a bunch of stupid newbies were complaining about the server being shit. They had the great idea of offering to help out the RPS crowd at their own expense, with a natural side-effect of an influx of new players to those groups. Let me be clear here: Im pretty sure they were going to offer an actual server for designated sessions, not just invite people along to join the TG/UO groups. A pretty damn nice offer!
Except some idiot went and ruined it all by shilling for donations to set up an independent server, which being an explicit part of the RPS community sort of put a damper on potential incidental recruiting.
Its ok though, such endeavours die all the time and its not like RPS itself is going to disappear overnight. Plus this stuff isnt as easy as it sounds! The config files are insane! (NOBODY SAID OR THOUGHT THIS, I AM EMBELISHING FOR DRAMATIC EFFECT)
Then I started pinging for help on a few alternative forums, trying to find more details on setup than were covered in the Kellys Heroes guides. I bumped into the chief server admin for those groups and more and eventually wheedled a really useful wall of text out of him.
Eventually he signed off with its kind of funny, I didnt realise you were with that group. Id already been instructed by the leadership to help those guys out.
It was quite a bit later when I puzzled out the possible implications of that.
Now, saying I pissed them off is making a mountain out of a molehill. Ive never been in contact with anyone from either group with the exception of that one admin and he didnt say anything more than that one throwaway phrase. Im pretty sure that the upper echelons of the consortium didnt actually care that much, want us to fail, etc etc etc. But its also quite possible that if proto-ARPS hadnt have fumbled around like it did one of the other groups would have gotten a mention and all the players. That was a pretty big boon for us around the time of the DayZ-gasm.
On Dizzle:
(I have never spoken to him so as I disclaimed above I have to be very careful to not misrepresent him)
If youve watched the ShackTac videos you know a bit about Dizzle (yeah I could paste his name from the clipboard, but I like this way better). Hes very, very calm and methodical. Hes got great attention to detail (see the TTPP). Hes downright ruthless under the right conditions (see the video where he tricks someone on the other team into giving away all of that teams secrets before executing him, its pretty funny but holy shit). Hes also very, very driven (He, and shacktack as a whole, create content. Videos, training material, mods, etc). Then theres the building of shacktac itself.
If youve ever thought about joining shacktac you might be aware of the application process. You apply, giving a bunch of details which are meant to tell them whether or not youll be a good fit for the community or a disruptive outlier. If you pass that, you get a one-to-one interview. Its pretty in-depth as a recruitment process but obviously it works for ST and creates the kind of community Dizzle wants.
However, the applications are not taken at face value. Why would they be? Its easy to google stuff. So theres basically a background check process too the name gets put into a search engine and checked. If there are related names recognised by the checkers, they might get hit up and asked for character references, that sort of thing.
Honestly its probably not that bad, but it does get to sounding a bit like internet detective / dox work, even if it is well intentioned. If he wasnt working on VBS2 I could quite well see him working for an intelligence agency and its a little scary because it makes a computer game just so serious.
(NOTE: Different strokes for different folks and all. Its not like hes making everyone get a full body tattoo of his beard or something. Its just an approach that is a little creepy in my view.)
Ive also been told Dizzle likes to keep an eye on other communities, just in general. It helps to predict the metacommunity, and if you know another group is folding you can predict an increase in applications or something. The general observation thing is how Folk and ARPS got a mention on the shacktac blog we hadnt asked for it, it came out of the blue.
So yeah, all of this gives him a bit of mysticism that makes me slightly afraid of him.
(Also cannot confirm or deny sacrificing of virgins for wicked sick skills. It works in Dominions 3 so why not?)
Hes downright ruthless under the right conditions (see the video where he tricks someone on the other team into giving away all of that teams secrets before executing him, its pretty funny but holy shit)
- Join Date
- Jul 2012
- Posts
- 123
HA! nevermind, i found it. Here it is!
Poor, poor fellow.
Last edited by Synesthesia; 08-12-2012 at 05:24 PM.
- Join Date
- Feb 2012
- Posts
- 220
Let's stop making shit up and explain how shit got made up: How ARPS got those Aesthetics (name, logo, etc).
Easy one, this.
Most RPS related groups take the Rock, Paper, Shotgun pun and apply it to the game in question. Rifleman, Platoon, Sergeant? Eh. Rifleman, Pilot, Sniper? Ehhh.
When you start shilling for donations you have to be absolutely clear what the donations are relevant to. Once money is involved, things get serious. Remember that you can donate/subscribe to RPS itself. So because I was insecure about people accidentally donating to the wrong place (this never happened) I wanted us to be SLIGHTLY distinct. Also I was under the impression that we'd need permission to use a name-a-like or something. Turns out Jim and co don't mind, I guess.
Anyway, nothing really seemed fit so we opted for the simplest: ARMA, (with), Rock, Paper, Shotgun. Regularly picked up as ARma Paper Shotgun. Also you can say the acronym itself like harps with a silent H and pretend you're DED POSH WOT. There were probably some other early interpretations as well. The word "Auxiliary" rings a bell, but that might have been because I've been reading up on Rome again. RPS A-Team? Maybe. Don't think so, though. Anyway, you get the point – there wasn't an idea except "unique and special snowflake that is actually the same".
The Herosquad stuff came later from former players Dartt and Ansob, mostly by osmosis. A subset of players started using "ARPS Herosquad" as a sort of joke after a couple of people had a really fun time during a frontpaged event and basically won the mission for the rest of the team. It's sort of a worthless a gimmick/meme suffix along the lines of "Bravo Squad Best Squad" or something. It wasn't offensive, politically loaded or completely asinine/stupid, so we made use of it. Unlike ARPS, A-RPS, etc etc it's a nice little phrase that wasn't already being domain squatted. Herosquad.org was purchased and basically to give us a nice easy redirect for IPs and info without having to fit everything into the first post of the single thread we had on the old wordpressbb forums RPS had back then. (( Apparently there's more to the Herosquad thing that goes all the way back to Planetside 1 for Dartt and co, but I don't know anything beyond that and it never became an issue that we hijacked it. ))
As far as I know, the only people to ever read the site were myself, a couple of steam chatters and the then-admins-now-hosts who proofed and helped provide the content.
It also hosted the squad.xml, including the logo.
The squad.xml is a neat little webpage that the game can be read and use to give players an in-game description, a logo. Most usefully, it can describe the group they're part of. It's free advertising and you get a cool picture on your truck when you're set up properly. It also has the slight benefit of implying "these people hang out here a lot, you might want to listen to them" when used in conjunction with a server name or message of the day / connection notice.
I'd made myself one when I first got arma2 and spent a few weeks playing on a mix of public servers, heavily featuring that one Russian server with 500 slots (Berzerk?). I was playing solo at the time and the game was still new / buggy so I didn't really click with MP but I thought the customisation thing was pretty cool. So I used that as a template and fixed up a new one for the group and offered to stick people on it. Washington pulled together the logo on request.
It might look like some horribly clichéd world-police gun-eagle-globe patch from a distance, but there was a little more thought to it than that. Obviously the gun is a shotgun. The bird is actually a crow. The default dead state in BIS' games is respawning as a bird. In OpFlash it was a seagull. In Arma2 it got changed to a crow. (I'm not sure what it was in Arma1, probably the crow again? I skipped from OpFlash to A2).
That's right, even when we played nothing but unstructured, over-gunned revive missions the group was always confident in (our ability to avoid) success. So much so that a sign of failure was in the logo!
(The rest of the logo is pure artisté-ry by Wash, who was going to have real difficulty fitting the shotgun and crow elements together without some sort of background element. I don't think even he can remember the exact process these days.)
Next was the motto. There was a motto? Yeah, there were a few. The first one to not just be a repeat of the ARPS name was "Non Audi Alexum", or "Don't Listen To Alex". Alex was an early regular who liked to "fly" choppers. Into the ground. One time he managed to take out not one, but TWO choppers full of people in one go. He still has a reputation for crashing things. Anyway, injokes suck so we decided to replace it. A player who had recently returned from military service proposed "Spectumur Agendo", translating to "Let us be judged by our actions". Turns out that's actually used by a few military units, but the intent was to say "Look at us have fun, why don't you join in?", not present ourselves as a mimic/realism community like the 99th Virtual MEU or whatever.
Again I don't think that was ever picked up by anyone independently. It did get printed below the logo on some vehicles and aircraft, but the text was too long so a couple of characters would get cut off.
The descriptions people got on the squad.xml varied a lot.
A couple of them I took requests for. Some are straight up compliments (Washington's "Superior Scenariosmith" was put in place after he made the first in-house mission) or complaints (Helios has "I WILL NEVER FORGIVE YOU FOR THAT HEADSHOT" after he sniped me in an adversarial where I'd just slaughtered an entire enemy fireteam and was looting the corpses. I'd have been more offensive if he'd been on my team at the time...).
Other times I'd get a request and twist it into something silly (Unaco wanted "First one in, last one out", so I added "the buffet never saw it coming").
Most were just my random insanity.
Harlander got "There can only be VON". Highlander? In-game VoiceOverNetwork was unreliable as hell at the time so why not? Harakka got "Cutting the stomach, slicing the pie, staying frosty" from my reading his name as Hara-kiri and his professing a love for SWAT (use the LASH, pup!). Anthile used an avatar with a monocle and got "Utterly Monoculous". Ebass got "No, YOU shut up" for his horrible, horrible microphone noises. ShowMeTheMonkey got an obvious "Zoologist? No, just a terrible criminal." And so on.
The only thing left was a theme tune.
Unofficially I considered the group theme tune to be the intro song from Cannon Fodder.War! Never been so much fun. Go to your Brother, Kill him with your gun, Leave him lying in his uniform, Dying in the sun. War!
I was the only one to think this was awesome though and it was only ever used in the single video I (badly) edited together. Kind of a shame, really. Though I did later make in-game binds to play a couple of riffs from a remix version of the track.
So that's everything I can remember on the aesthetics of the group.
- Join Date
- Jun 2011
- Posts
- 123
Lets not forget "PHP phrrrt".
PSA: I am now running "Throwback Thursdays" in the style of pre-Folk/DayZ Tactical Tuesday. This means:
- Less people
- Less srsbsns
- Revive
- Mumble
Thursdays, 7:30PM UK time (same as the other sessions, but on Thursday). So yeah, if you prefer that kind of playstyle, join us for that. If you prefer Folk style, play on Sundays and Tuesdays. If you don't care play on both. There's no reason that this community has to be exclusive in the way it plays/enjoys the game.
Edit: On using mumble - Some people, myself included, simply prefer it to TS3. Personally I'm a huge fan of its capabilities in audio attenuation (especially compared to TS3), and I know many prefer mumble's overlay. Other things mumble has going for it in my book are its sheer familiarity, and that it's an open source project.
It seems that the main argument for TS3 is the way it manages CC, and it's a valid one. I never had any issues putting up with the way mumble does things, but that said it is indeed cumbersome and complicated (particularly in setting up) relative to TS. It's all down to whether the bad outweighs the good, and when we had a similar discussion I seem to remember mumble winning the popular vote.
All of this is a moot point however (as indeed is the rest of this thread), as it seems that all the decisions have already been made; and that's what disappoints me most. Why were we not having this discussion sooner, before any "final sessions" or other such nonsense? I don't really check the forums that much so there may have been a poll I missed, but on the other hand I'm not willing to be Arthur Dent having his planet destroyed because he didn't check the demolition orders in his local planning department in Alpha Centauri.
Last edited by Bodge; 09-12-2012 at 05:32 PM. Reason: correct dayUnacosamedarisa: Egg, kiss me, you're beautiful.
- Join Date
- Jun 2011
- Posts
- 578
The only major change is the move to TS3, lets just see how it goes. If it is a massive problem then changing things again in the future is not a massive issue but for now TS3 makes in session changes (moving people, disabling CC etc) easier and it is a bit easier for anyone new to CC as well. It makes little sense using two voip so lets try this for a bit.
Have another history essay, this one revolving around hardware. It might well be my last as Im running out of ideas and dont really fancy describing our evolution through M16 ACOG/MAAWS to M110/SMAW to Mk17 RCO EGLM/Utility to AK 74 to AK 74 Kobra (which took us from 8 man squads with in-squad marksmen, medics and engineers down to the 4 man sections in use today along with changing how we viewed revive). Also, this one is BLOODY LONG.
Over the years we went through several boxes. Ive always maintained that as I rent them, take the donations, and so forth, I am the last authority. This was to avoid drama (see how well that worked out for me?)
It was also because I considered running a single server a surefire path to disaster. People eventually lose interest and move on. Arma2 is actually a real surprise in some ways because I enjoyed it for so long and others continue to do so. That said, if you check the names (slightly out of date for REASONS) on the donations, a good proportion of donors have indeed stopped playing.
So if we couldnt run a single server we could run multiple ones and use the overall effect to get sufficient donations to run the server, right? Sort of like how Game Service Providers rent out a dozen different game servers on a single box. Weve had instances of Minecraft, Brink, Red Orchestra 2, Mechwarrior: Living Legends, Mount & Blade: Warband and Killing Floor under the (A)RPS brand. None of them really earned any money but they were all fun for a while.
Lets go back in time.
When Jims server from Jest ran out we got an offer to continue using it at the standard rate. By that point we knew that it was a hassle to maintain Arma servers and we were also vaguely aware that mods would probably require intervention by a hardware level admin (eg Jest himself), though JestServers is actually pretty great with Arma as they have some custom utilities that make things easier. The servers on offer were also in America and for a premium we could have affinity to a single, dedicated core. We could just about afford a 30 slot server. Or we could go elsewhere.
Most Game Service Providers/GSPs dont offer Arma as a slotted server because it doesnt fit the profitable pattern of high bandwidth, low cpu. A machine that can run 200+ good slots for CounterStrike: Source cant handle Arma at all. Most GSPs like to buy prefab rack servers rather than bespoke setups. A select few go with higher end kit like Blades using Xeons, which are almost as good as bespoke stuff or desktop setups. Others grab cheaper unbranded 1Us that were cobbled together using parts cannibalised from the sale of old machines during the annual IT department upgrade at a local office of some multinational. The common factor is the use of processors designed for reliability and low energy consumption rather than raw power. Game server hardware lags behind because most servers dont need high end stuff. Physics are often client side, for example. It was only recently, when 64-player Red Orchestra 2 and Battlefield 3 matches got popular, that GSPs started shelling out for some more powerful kit.
Theres no real upper limit to the CPU an Arma server instance will eat. For most of the missions weve played, from 20-70 players with a proportional number of AI, Ive seen the process eat up the entirety of one core and spread another 2-3 GHz of demand across other cores. Performance varies by mission a lot, but with some few notable exceptions we never had any real issues. A single instance will use up to about 700 megs of RAM, but Ive seen it peak at 1.2 gigs or so on the Free server... usually shortly before a crash. You also need about 20-25 gigs of HDD space as the server uses all of the files of the client. I forget what the bandwidth usage tends towards, but a 100mbit line is generally standard and more than sufficient for well over a hundred simultaneous user and multiple voip servers. Windows is preferential simply because sometimes the linux server binaries lag behind a patch or contain unexpected bugs.
Back when we were looking to rent our first box most offerings were either a dual or quad 2.00 to 2.40 GHz CPU machines, commonly coming with about 100 GB of HDD and 1-4 GB of RAM. There were still a hell of a lot of Q6600 (Quad 2.66 GHz P4s) floating around, repurposed into new shells. I spent several days compiling various offers from different providers. I fired off a dozen or more emails and quickly got to know who the good providers were. Some never responded to any queries at all, others replied in ALL CAPS AND MISREAD THE QUESTION. Still others tried selling virtual servers (i.e. software on the machine splits the assets of the machine amongst users) as full servers (this doesnt work unless you pay for the expensive software, as otherwise load spikes will interfere with other users. Fine on cheap webservers, useless for processor intensive activities like game servers). Two providers stood out: JestServers (dude REALLY knows his stuff and how to sell it, but his dedicated hardware choices tended to simply beyond the price point of many) and KillerCreation.
I spent our entire first wave of donations on a one-month lease of a dual 2.8 GHz P4, 2 GB of RAM, 100gb HDD box in London. It was pretty terrible and within a couple of days Id double-dipped into my own pocket and upped us to a quad 2.66 Xeon machine (new chip, so the lower clock rate STILL did more lifting than the 2.8s) with 4 GB of RAM. KillerCreation were really great about the upgrade process, we got credit for the unused time on the weaker machine and a couple of days to transfer the files over. The new machine ran much better and towards the end of the month people realised that things were working out and actually started to donate a decent chunk of change.
Trivia for you: the server files used today originally came from the KillerCreation internal ftp, and were taken from an image of the German release of Arma2 prior to the English/international one. It was just so much easier to transfer the data between servers rather than upload a couple of DVDs myself. Copy protection applies only during patching for servers, and it only takes a few moments to find the correct registry entries to put your own key into the server! (Yes, all above water)
We stuck with KillerCreation for what I think was about eight months. Wed put up a mumble server because teamspeak3 was a pain in the rear end and wanted to know all of my personal details in addition to being clunkier. Itd only be much later that DrPiD and I would experiment enough to figure out how to restrict whispers by token, though.
Around our third or fourth frontpaged event I asked in the comments for mission ideas. Enter Fer, who linked the Folk mission packs and recommended Fort, Moonless and Bend. Massively different from the repeats of Domination wed been forced into before due to player counts. Also a hell of a lot easier for the server to run.
Shortly thereafter we had our first joint session. I later learned that folk was renting slots from Jest. We spent some time discussing the state of the world and eventually came to an agreement. For a small monthly sum (which I never actually enforced and ended up being a case of "Fer hosts stuff and we don't ask him for money"), Folk would move onto our hardware. This gave Folk hardware level access and effectively unlimited slots instead of the 20ish they had at the time. I guaranteed a dedicated core at all times and pointed out that so long as we were doing joint sessions, thered be at least one other core free at all times, plus two that werent accounted for at all (but could conceivably have been in use for other games).
With the enhanced playercount and slightly more money I decided that the best way to get out of my Doctoral Thesis Blues was to look at the current hardware market. This time instead of looking at GSPs I went straight to datacentres. At this point, a 'little' company called OVH had started offering Sandy Bridge machines with SSDs. Cheap for what they were, expensive for our budget, but hella powerful. Oldmanbob had helped set up serverdoc, which let us manage server processes a little better, but I was still under the impression that our then-current box was struggling.
The following paragraph is in bold because IT IS (mostly) A JOKE:
OVH offered a free months trial to business clients of any server they wished. So Fer got his papers back from the Cayman Islands and asked for a trial on the behalf of Folk and ARPS. We got an i5-2400 (quad 3.1 GHz), 16 GB of RAM and 2x1TB HDDs running under linux as a free trial for a month. At Fers request it was named K19.
This is where we first encountered issues with the Linux server binaries not being fully up to date. Linux is pretty awesome and I got some good stats logging and stuff running, but game developers basically assume you're hosting under Windows these days. Aside from the cases like Arma where there are sometimes bugs or delays, there are others that dont have linux binaries at all. Even given Windows (or WINE) there are some REALLY obscure requirements for server software out there. Section 8: Prejudice stands out in my memory, as that required you to run an independent instance of GFWL with a unique key. Took people quite a while to figure out how to make that work under the "multiple servers, one box" model. There was also the mess that was Red Orchestra 2. Some of the big and popular GSPs Id previously regarded as actually being less than stellar went on to prove themselves as such by throwing fits on the server admin mailing list about requirements and flaws that were entirely within their own heads.
One problem with Linux was the uploading of new missions. For some reason its actually a huge amount of effort to set up an FTP on a linux box that actually locks users in directories rather than giving them free listing of the entire file structure. On Windows you use the filezilla server and "jobs a good un". Linux requires obscure daemons to be installed and configured and there arent any real readmes for it. So instead I installed a webserver stack and Head wrote a php script that, once I tidied it up, let people upload missions without having to use an FTP. (Thats how he earned PHP? Phrrrrrpt. as his squad.xml remark) It worked pretty well because the permissions (eg file locking) of Arma are much more forgiving under linux. You could even hot-delete missions!
But linux didnt give us flexibility to host other games and even though I wrote a guide to its usage, nobody else wanted to put up with a command line interface through PuTTy.
At the end of the Free trial month I said a regretful goodbye to KillerCreation (Justin, the main man over there, bent over backwards trying to give me a better deal but just couldnt match a Sandy Bridge machine) and budgetted up the extra cash (good GSPs like KC throw it in for free) for a Windows 2008 Web R2 box at OVH. We also switched to 2 x 128 GB SSDs at no extra cost, which helped keep disk access times down despite there now being three or four Arma instances running off a single set of files. K19-IIc was born.
The biggest non-Combined Ops resource hogs were Red Orchestra 2 (which I ended up capping at 48-50 players to avoid lag) and the Arma2 Free server, which basically needed to be set up with a 24-48 hour restart timer for fear of crashes.
Working under Windows was simply much easier for other people and thats about where we leave off. After a little over a year(?) on the new box there are a couple of new deals from available but none have been worth the hassle of moving yet.
There are a few more months on K19-IIc before the Hosts have to figure out what theyre doing next. Ill be separating the mumble server from that endeavour and have stopped taking donations for anything but that. Although Im still legally liable for K19-IIc, Im washing my hands of the hosting business and Arma. All donations made to date, totalling over TWO THOUSAND FIVE HUNDRED POUNDS have gone directly to the Arma-related hardware as promised and without massive drama. (IceRaiser is responsible for a huge proportion of that money, so be sure to thank him.)
Aside: At one point I did price up outright buying a box and putting it through collocation (i.e. paying other people to house it, power it and connect it to the internet) but decided replacement guarantees and upgrade opportunities were worth more than what wed have saved. The decision was almost instantly vindicated when K19-IIcs power supply failed only a few months in. It was replaced four hours later at no cost to us.
On top of this were other incidental features I worked on because we had a server: the herosquad.org domain, multiple iterations of the website (nobody used any of them), a mission manager/hosting spreadsheet (which apparently was too complex for anyone but me to maintain despite it taking seconds for me to do so), tracking donations, and so on. At one point I hacked together a missions database that let you search by all sorts of criteria, but I never populated it.
Thus (probably) ends my tale of how being a blustering, ignorant, money-grabbing, workshy fool resulted in my having the ultimate power to ruin all of your fun.
- Join Date
- Sep 2012
- Location
- Bradistan
- Posts
- 108
OVH are fantastic. Simply brilliant.
Until recently I was paying less than £5 a month for a virtual machine with 50Mbyte/s download speed running an insanely fast web server. (That service also killed off. No way could they be making a profit on that)
Sadly they recently killed off their budget range where you could get something with similar specs to this:
OVH offered a free months trial to business clients of any server they wished. So Fer got his papers back from the Cayman Islands and asked for a trial on the behalf of Folk and ARPS. We got an i5-2400 (quad 3.1 GHz), 16 GB of RAM and 2x1TB HDDs running under linux as a free trial for a month. At Fer's request it was named K19.
EDIT: They still provide it, just moved to the main OVH website
It really doesn't come across as a surprise to see Folk/Arps using them too.
Last edited by SpecialSoup; 12-12-2012 at 12:57 AM.
- Join Date
- Oct 2012
- Location
- Portugal
- Posts
- 20
- Join Date
- Aug 2011
- Posts
- 259
As a couple of people made donations explicitly for mumble I will be continuing to run that as an independent thing. Partly because I still use it myself. Hardware will change at some point, obviously.
I've long since stopped having fun with arma and obviously there's this entire thread so...
It was actually good to try a Linux box even though we ended up going with a Windows one because stuff like bash scripting is occasionally useful in my current job.
I bet you thought I was a Psych major studying the fine art of the Troll?
Last edited by Nullkigan; 12-12-2012 at 09:05 PM.
Can we change this thread to "Storytime with Nullkigan" and sticky it?
- Join Date
- Aug 2011
- Posts
- 259
My PhD is in Structural Engineering. Tangent: It's counterproductive to have a PhD in the 'real' world, and any company that says they're hurting for Science/Tech/Eng/Maths grads is lying through their teeth.
I bet you thought I was a Psych major studying the fine art of the Troll?
Last edited by JimTheDog; 12-12-2012 at 10:53 PM.
- Join Date
- Oct 2012
- Location
- Portugal
- Posts
- 20


text:
Things are not looking good for Mariano Rajoy, Spain's prime minister. Luis Bárcenas, the treasurer of his right-wing Partido Popular for 20 years until 2009 who is at the centre of a series of interlinked illegal party financing scandals, was feared to be a ticking bomb. On Monday he started ticking very loudly indeed.
Giving evidence to an investigating judge on an alleged multi-million euro slush fund, Mr Bárcenas confirmed the existence of covert corporate donations and off-the-books cash payments to senior party figures. Leaked photocopies of the former treasurer's secret accounts were published by the left-liberal El País newspaper on January 31. On July 7, El Mundo, its conservative rival, published a patchy interview with Mr Bárcenas, jailed last month in case he fled the country.
In the interview, Mr Bárcenas for the first time confirmed the existence of the secret ledgers; affirmed that the PP had been financing itself illegally for 20 years; and that the totality of the documents in his possession could bring down the government – a thinly veiled threat presumably aimed at trying to get Mr Rajoy to intervene in the judicial process. Read more

subset: commoncrawl


text:
Jakarta: Indonesian authorities are giving full rein to their anti-Western sentiments in the wake of child rape allegations at the Jakarta International School, introducing new requirements that would all-but force it to shut down.
The alleged rape of a five-year old expatriate boy by a large group of Indonesian cleaning staff in February and March has already prompted a furious bureaucratic response against the school which was founded partly by Australian diplomats and still has an embassy representative on the board.
The ministry shut down the preschool program in April saying it did not have the correct licence, and the immigration department and the religious affairs ministry both conducted raids.
But on Friday, Lydia Freyani Hawadi, Indonesia's senior public servant in charge of early childhood and non-formal education increased the pressure, said she may not grant a licence for the preschool to be reopened in August unless the principal, classroom teacher and vice principal were sacked "because they were negligent in doing their duty" to protect the children.
She also said she would enforce a new decree that all teachers at international schools must be fluent in the Indonesian language, and the school's curriculum needed to change, as did its ownership and name.
The curriculum — currently based on an American model, but which includes the International Baccalaureate — should be adjusted to the Indonesian national standard for local students, Ms Lydia said, and foreign students should be taught cultural studies.
The school should also be majority locally owned and should prove it has enough capital to run for six years.
"Most importantly, there will no longer be 'international schools'. They must change their names," Ms Lydia said.
News agency Antara reported that, if a school does not comply with the ministry's demands, its management could be sentenced to 10 years in prison and fined 1 billion rupiah ($95,000).
Before Ms Lydia's intervention, sources say government officials threatened the immigration status of a large number of teachers. The religious affairs ministry — whose minister was last week declared a suspect in the corrupt theft of money in trust for pilgrims to Mecca — demanded access to the campus to check the school's religion curriculum.
In April the school was rocked by revelations that a teacher who had been there for 10 years in the 1990s, William Vahey, was under investigation over photographs of him sexually assaulting scores of boys, apparently while they were unconscious.
The Australian embassy helped found the Jakarta International School in 1951 and has a representative on the Board of Trustees. It is attended by the children of hundreds of western diplomats and expatriates as well as the children of well off Indonesians.
Disclosure: The author has two children attending the Jakarta International School.


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A MAN who sent his estranged partner seven threatening text messages has been given a community order.
Burnley magistrates heard that John Anthony Fletcher, 45, had a record, but that he had not been in trouble since 1996.
The defendant, formerly of St Stephen's Way, Colne, admitted sending a communication conveying a threatening message to Christine Harrison, at Colne, last October 26.
The hearing was told Fletcher that was currently on benefits but was hoping to soon find work.
Fletcher was given a six-month community order, with supervision.
He was also ordered to take part in the Lancashire Safer Relationships Specified Activity Requirement.
The bench said the activity requirement was to help him to address abusive behaviour and help him deal with anger management.
The defendant must also pay £50 compensation to the victim, a £60 victim surcharge and £85 costs.


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WORCESTERSHIRE are set to hold preliminary talks with Phil Hughes about a possible return to New Road next year.
Director of cricket Steve Rhodes is in Australia on a 10-day trip and is due to meet the left-hander, a star performer for the County last season, during that period.
He is also Down Under to look at potential Worcestershire recruits as well as keep tabs on some of his current crop plying their trade in the southern hemisphere during the winter months, including wicketkeeper Ben Cox.
But sounding out Hughes, now playing for South Australia, over spearheading Worcestershire's LV= County Championship Division Two promotion challenge is high on the agenda. The 23-year-old averaged 35 from nine Championship matches last term as well as 100.50 in the Friends Life t20 and 83 in the club's dismal Clydesdale Bank 40 campaign.
Rhodes, who would be keen to see Hughes back for a second stint next summer, said: "He is part of the reason for going.
"Fingers crossed, we can have a good chat about the future but at the moment we haven't got anything concrete on Phil. It will be good to have a chat with him about that."
Meanwhile, construction work has begun on the £10 million ground development at New Road. Bulldozers have spent the past few weeks pulling down the offices, executive suite, club shop and reception to make way for a 120-bedroom Premier Inn hotel and restaurant along with new offices and conferencing facilities.
The plan is for the offices to be ready by early June and Worcestershire have asked the England and Wales Cricket Board for permission to start the 2013 season away from their headquarters.
The hotel is set for completion next October and it is hoped both developments will create more than 45 new jobs when they open.
County chief executive David Leatherdale said: "Like all sports clubs we have to look carefully at our resources to safeguard the future of our club.
"The new Premier Inn hotel and executive suites will continue to develop our ground into a 365-day venue, attracting additional visitors to the ground and diversifying the club's finances.
"This can only help to improve our performance on the pitch and we aim to be up and running in time for the start of our T20 campaign in late June and to welcome Australia in the lead up to their 2013 Ashes campaign.
"We will be working with contractor Gilbert Ash who have been appointed to build both the Premier Inn hotel and restaurant and executive suites to minimise disruption during the early part of the 2013 season."


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The ARC Centre of Excellence for Functional Nanomaterials is an internationally renowned research centre in the field of Functional Nanomaterials read more about the Centre
Biological systems often feature natural, functional nanomaterials. The dwelling of foraminifera and viruses (capsid), the wax crystals covering a lotus or nasturtium leaf, spider and spider-mite silk,[2] the "spatulae" at the base of gecko feet, some butterfly wing scales, natural colloids (milk, blood), horny materials (skin, claws, beaks, feathers, horns, hair), paper, cotton, nacre, corals, and also our very own bone matrix are natural organic nanomaterials.
Natural inorganic nanomaterials occur through crystal development in the diverse chemical conditions in the earths crust. As an example clays display complex nanostructures as a result of anisotropy of the underlying crystal structure, and volcanic activity can bring about opals, that are an instance of any natural photonic crystals because of their nanoscale structure. Fires represent particularly complex reactions and may produce pigments, cement, fumed silica etc.
Inorganic nanomaterials, (e.g. quantum dots, nanowires and nanorods) for their interesting optical and electrical properties, may be utilized in optoelectronics.[4] Furthermore, the optical and electronic properties of nanomaterials which be determined by their size and shape might be tuned via synthetic techniques. You will find the options to utilize those materials in organic material based optoelectronic devices like Organic solar panels, OLEDs etc. The operating principles of the tools are governed by photoinduced processes like electron transfer as well as transfer. The performance of your devices is dependent upon the efficiency from the photoinduced process liable for their functioning. Therefore, better knowledge of those photoinduced processes in organic/inorganic nanomaterial composite systems is important to use them in organic optoelectronic devices.
Nanoparticles or nanocrystals manufactured from metals, semiconductors, or oxides are of particular interest with regard to their mechanical, electrical, magnetic, optical, chemical and also other properties. Nanoparticles are already used as quantum dots so that as chemical catalysts including nanomaterial-based catalysts. Nanoparticles are of great scientific interest because they are effectively a bridge between bulk materials and atomic or molecular structures. A bulk material must have constant physical properties no matter its size, but in the nano-scale this could be untrue. Size-dependent properties are observed including quantum confinement in semiconductor particles, surface plasmon resonance in certain metal particles and superparamagnetism in magnetic materials.
roseAmal | ARCCFNConf | maxLu | publications | publications2008 | aboutNano | visionAndMission | annualReports | Commercialisation | latestPublications | directors2009 | chiefinvestigators | administration2009 | associatedInvestigators2009new | postgraduateStudents2009 | researchFocus2009 | FundamentalProgram | Comp
Nanoparticles exhibit several special properties in accordance with bulk material. As an example, the bending of bulk copper (wire, ribbon, etc.) occurs with movement of copper atoms/clusters at regarding the 50 nm scale. Copper nanoparticles small compared to 50 nm are viewed super hard materials which do not exhibit exactly the same malleability and ductility as bulk copper. The alteration in properties may not be desirable. Ferroelectric materials small compared to 10 nm can switch their magnetisation direction using room temperature thermal energy, thus causing them to be useless for memory storage. Suspensions of nanoparticles are possible since the interaction in the particle surface with all the solvent is sufficiently strong enough to beat variations in density, which often lead to a material either sinking or floating within a liquid. Nanoparticles frequently have unexpected visual properties as they are sufficiently small to confine their electrons and create quantum effects. By way of example gold nanoparticles appear deep red to black in solution.
The often extremely high area to volume ratio of nanoparticles gives a tremendous motivator for diffusion, especially at elevated temperatures. Sintering is achievable at lower temperatures and also over shorter durations than for larger particles. This theoretically fails to impact the density from the final product, though flow difficulties and also the tendency of nanoparticles to agglomerate do complicate matters. The outer lining effects of nanoparticles also cuts down on the incipient melting temperature.
Centre Foundation Director Professor Max Lu elected to the Australian Academy of Science
Centre Director Rose Amal in Engineers Australia's Top 100 Most Influential Engineers for second year
Professor Max Lu, foundation director of the Nanomaterials Centre, was elected to the AUstralian Academy of Science at the end of March. Professor Lu is now one of only a very few who are elected to both the Australian Academy of Science and the Australian Academy of Technological Science and Engineering.
Prof Amal is one of 11 women on the list this year, and says one of the most rewarding parts of her career is seeing the development of her former students. "Hearing their stories you feel that you contribute in shaping someone's life and career," she said.
Recent centre research published in the journal Small and featured in Science Alert
Centre Director Rose Amal honoured as Fellow of the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering (ATSE)
The paper, Induced Adaptation of Bacillus sp. to Antimicrobial Nanosilver, published in April, highlights that although nanosilver has effective antimicrobial properties against certain pathogens, overexposure to silver nanoparticles can cause other potentially harmful organisms to rapidly adapt and flourish.
Feature in Science Alert can be read here
Image courtesy of Science Alert
Centre Director Rose Amal was the headline inductee and one of 11 women honoured in this year's class.


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Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 8/11/2012 (1749 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.
Snowblower tuned up? Snow tires on the car? It's here: a snowfall warning has been issued for the city of Winnipeg.
A Colorado low is headed to southern Manitoba this weekend. Snow is expected to begin falling Friday afternoon in the province's southwest and the storm will move east overnight.
The snowfall is expected to be heaviest during the day Saturday, bringing 15 to 25 centimetres of snow -- though "some pockets of up to 30 cm are possible," Environment Canada said in a snowfall warning issued Thursday afternoon.
Areas near the Turtle Mountains and east of Riding Mountain National Park are likely to receive the most snow.
Winds will be in the 30 km/h range, and combined with the heavy snow visibilities are expected to be near zero. Motorists should be prepared for "very poor" driving conditions across southern Manitoba on Saturday.
The heavy snow is expected to taper off Saturday night, though light snowfall could continue in eastern Manitoba on Sunday.
Temperatures are expected to hover just below zero for most of the weekend.


text:
Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 13/12/2012 (1712 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.
DEAR MISS LONELYHEARTS: I love two women and must decide what to get them for Christmas. One is my ex-wife, who doesn't seem to give a damn about me, but whom I still love. (I cheated on her in the marriage.) The other is my new girlfriend, who would do anything for me. I am in love with my girlfriend but I still love my wife, who is the figurehead of the large family we have together. She and the five kids are all getting together Christmas Day and I have been invited for a couple of hours at lunch. What do you suggest as gifts to be sent out, kind of like surprises to these women? That's how I like to do things. They both like jewelry, especially diamonds. -- Stymied, River Heights
Dear Stymied: How about doing things the way other people would like them for a change? Your ex-wife doesn't want jewelry from a guy who hurt her. Jewelry is sentimental and symbolic. It would feel awful for her to wear it at this point, like you're trying to claim her or chain her up and after she's told you to get out of her life. And a delivery to the door? Very impersonal and tacky! What you could do is give her a gift for the whole family to enjoy like a karaoke machine, which you could bring over at lunch time all wrapped up and hand it to her to open for the gang. As for your girlfriend, poor dear, jewelry would be more appropriate -- unless she's dying for a diamond ring, and you're not giving one, in which case she should be warned it's not happening this Christmas. Diamond earrings (of the larger variety) are better than pendants as they are fun and more casual. Give it to her with a big bouquet of roses. Big is good. Whatever you do, don't have the jewelry delivered like she's a kept woman! For yourself, this Christmas, you should buy the biggest etiquette book you can find, and digest it.
Dear Miss Lonelyhearts: I caught a disease in early November from the person who sits next to me at work, and it took me four weeks to recover. Now she's starting to cough again, the first symptom of this horrible flu. Is it too much for me to ask to have my desk moved? I am close to having panic attacks every time she starts to hack up phlegm. Yesterday I said, "Stay home for God's sake! Don't make us all sick" to which she replied, "I can't! This project is due before Christmas and it's worth a lot of money to the company." -- Dying To Escape, West Kildonan
Dear Dying: She will probably be just as happy to get you out of her sight as you would be to see her banished to another room. At least try to find a desk that's vacant while somebody's on holidays and make a deal to sit there while she coughs and hacks her way through this pre-Christmas project. Meanwhile, try to protect yourself with healthy food, vitamin pills and extra sleep. If there's nowhere else for you to perch for a few weeks, ask your boss if you can move the desk and explain why plainly. If it's a very casual office, you could just quietly move it, and apologize later. Sometimes that works better.
Questions or comments? Write Miss Lonelyhearts c/o Winnipeg Free Press, 1355 Mountain Ave., Wpg, R2X 3B6 or email email@example.com


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AMD's New Year Refresh: Athlon II X4 635, Phenom II X2 555, Athlon II X2 255 & Athlon II X3 440by Anand Lal Shimpi on 1/25/2010 12:00 AM EST
- Posted in
- CPUs
63 Comments
Back to Article
Alouette Radeon - Wednesday, March 10, 2010 - linkI didn't want to believe it but you really ARE biased towards Intel! After all the harm they've caused in this industry how could you be? Do they threaten to stop sending you testing material if you don't sound like they're the second coming of Christ and AMD is just a second-rate company? Reply
computerfarmer - Monday, February 01, 2010 - linkGood article.
Trying to find these to buy. AMD Athlon II x4 635 is the only one I have found available (newegg.ca). I live in Canada.
Are the rest of them expected soon? Reply
th3rdpartynation - Tuesday, January 26, 2010 - linkI want to build a WHS and the 3 things I consider most important are Video Encoding performance, Low Power, and Price. That being said I have narrowed it down to Athlon II X4 vs Core i3. A matchup I would love to see would be an undervolted Athlon II X4 vs. an Overclocked Core i3. If not then maybe everybody could tell me which they recommend?
blowfish - Tuesday, January 26, 2010 - linkfor the video encoding part, that's easy enough - just check out "Bench", and factor in your underclocks and overclocks, since encoding scales fairly well with clock speed for a given cpu.
Price is easy enough to figure out.
The i3's probably have the best power/performance. Reply
jackylman - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkAs a fan of silent computing, the 45W TDP quad-core 910e is the most exciting chip in this round, and I don't see it in the power consumption graphs. Disappointed.. :( Reply
MrSpadge - Tuesday, January 26, 2010 - linkYou see in the charts that:
- idle power isn't that much different between the AMDs
- at load they consume about their "ACP" (former TDP)
So if you're not running under load the choice doesn't matter. If you run under load you could take any of the current 45 nm CPUs and lower its ridiculously high stock voltage of 1.4 V to maybe 1.2 V at 2.6 GHz. That should get you to maybe 80 W instead of 65 W for the specially binned chips. Close enough I'd say. If it's still too loud: go to 2.5 GHz and lower the voltage again.
BTW: Core i3/5/7 can be even more energy efficient if you don't push them to 4 GHz. Reply
leexgx - Sunday, January 31, 2010 - linkACP that AMD use now not very helpful 95w/65w may had just be 125w/95w,
the Athlon II are far better on heat output (X2 more so) then the Phenom II or the older hotcake 9xxx Phenoms (guessing most due to L3 cache) Reply
mindless1 - Saturday, January 30, 2010 - link... but for some purposes you have to look at an o'c system being more efficient, since CPU is only a fraction of total system power consumption and we are free to turn a system off when the tasks are completed. Reply
jackylman - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkerrr 65W Reply
Taft12 - Wednesday, January 27, 2010 - linkIf you are a supposed fan of silent computing, I'm surprised you aren't aware that you are better off buying a "standard" AMD CPU for much less and undervolting and underclocking to get even better results (ie. cooler and lower-power-consuming) than buying AMD's e-series (like MrSpadge describes). Reply
mindless1 - Saturday, January 30, 2010 - linkNot necessarily, some e-series run any given frequency at a lower voltage, so by the same token whatever a non-e can do undervolted, an e- might do a bit higher speed at same voltage.
Further, not all boards allow undervolting much, if at all, especially when you're trying to build a very small system. Big system with full mATX or ATX board with full o'c features, and silent fans is something just about any Tom, Dick, and Harry can build with no need to pick an e-series or undervolt a regular CPU. Reply
play2learn - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkNot everybody have up to date CPU:s. Anand, it would be fun if you sneak in an old processor like pentium 3, 4 or Pentium D next time. Reply
Taft12 - Wednesday, January 27, 2010 - linkAnand did just that back in when Phenom II X2 and Athlon II X2 were released:
It was an embarrassment, no self-respecting hardware geek should be using that crap when the cheapest CPU and motherboard on the market today buries that stone-age technology. Reply
mindless1 - Saturday, January 30, 2010 - link... but to many geeks, it's the love of tech, not the ePenis you claim by virtue of your system performance.
I mean really, there is a point where even a geek takes a sensible position about what is appropriate for the work or play they actually do. Would you be amazed to know I still have a Celeron 500MHz fileserver running? The geek in me made it right in the first place including beefed up mobo capacitors, very open heatsink that takes years to get appreciable dust in it, filtered intake/positive pressure, and a few others things faster, but inferior for the purpose, systems have today. Reply
mindless1 - Saturday, January 30, 2010 - linklol, meant ... DON'T usually have today. Reply
play2learn - Thursday, January 28, 2010 - linkYou have a point there. But then there are people like me that's still not satisfied with today's technology and just sit and wait and wait for that ultimate experience to show up. If you want me to buy a new system today (which is not going to happen) I need to be humiliated more than once. Reply
ssj4Gogeta - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkWon't it skew the graphs (eg. a bar too long to fit or a bar too small to be visible) Reply
NJoy - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkSure it would. Last week just out of curiosity I decided to run CinebenchR10 on a Dell Precision with dual Xeons (PD 3Ghz based, 4 threads) against C2D E8400. Guest what? Over 4 minutes for Xeons whilst about 2:20 for C2D. Humiliation... Reply
mattscottshea - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkThese are assumptions made by current naming standards. However, if these were to hold true, it would be quite a coup by AMD as there current unreleased top of the line 975 will run at 3.6GHz with 4 cores at 140W using the C3 stepping.
AMD Phenom II X6 1075T 3.6GHz 6 cores / 125W (D1 stepping?)
AMD Phenom II X6 1055T 3.2GHz 6 cores / 95W
AMD Phenom II X6 1035T 2.9GHz 6 cores / 95W
AMD Phenom II X4 960T 3.3GHz 4 cores / 95W Reply
MrSpadge - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkLOL. Naming conventions are there to lure people into buying just when you break the convention (*looking at the greenteam*)
Anyway, their process has not magically changed - otherwise todays CPUs would be more energy efficient. And a new stepping is not going to turn the world upside down.. maybe a gain of 5% power at similar settings and a slightly higher clock speed at similar power levels.
And today you're getting 4 cores at 3.4 GHz for 140 / 125W. They'll be lucky and need heavy speed binning to get 3 GHz at 140W for the best 6-core CPU. Reply
blowfish - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkAnd today you're getting 4 cores at 3.4 GHz for 140 / 125W. They'll be lucky and need heavy speed binning to get 3 GHz at 140W for the best 6-core CPU.
Well that depends on the process - it might well be feasible at 32NM. Reply
MrSpadge - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkBut these CPUs aren't going to be 32 nm. I'd even bet a beer on that. Reply
blowfish - Tuesday, January 26, 2010 - linkyes, you're right. I sniffed around a bit online and it seems like they're going to use 45NM, so it's hard to see anything much more than 3GHZ, and even then only on a very mature 45NM process. The die size is also huge - bigger than the Intel 975 EE, so prices will also be well above mainstream. Reply
blowfish - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkAnand, since anyone doing x264 encoding is interested in the total time required, rather than the times for the first and second passes themselves, don't you think it would make sense to simply combine the two charts into one overall one?
The AMD's seem to do well on the first pass, but less well on the second, and whilst that might be of some interest, it's the overall that's actually of any use in determining the ranking order of different cpu's for anyone building an encoding pc.
As ever, love the reviews though! Reply
dgingeri - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkWhich would be better for a home/ small business server with a base Linux OS and virtualized Windows file server, Linux web and SQL servers?
The Athlon II X4 555 or the Core i5 530? I have the drives, power supply, and case, but I'd need to get a MB, Processor, and 8GB memory. Reply
ChristopherRice - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkYou would find either of these would do a fine job of that. Really you can throw together an old p4 to do that type of work. All you need to ensure is that you have the ram to support your applications. Reply
dgingeri - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkNot for the things I would be looking to do with it: SQL server and web server as virtuals for web based POS/ Accounting/ inventory system, or a Virtual machine based streaming web server for music and movies around the house or on mobile devices that would use wireless networking to connect and update.
Imagine: turning on your tv, pulling up your home Hulu type app, and bringing up the movie or tv show you want to watch.
Imagine: a small store, using thin clients as cash registers and e-mail, iPhones as inventory and ordering modules, centralized printing with nightly backup and RAID 1 mirroring. Reply
Taft12 - Tuesday, January 26, 2010 - linkWell why didn't you just say so in the first place?! Reply
dgingeri - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkoops, I meant the Athlon II X4 635, not 555 (getting these stupid numbers mixed up. Why not go with regular clock rate and core count?) Reply
Pastuch - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkA huge number of us own a Core2Duo E8xxx series CPU. Can you please post the benchmarks of one of them in this review to give us an idea of how it compares to an overclocked I3 530 or Phenom 2 555? Thanks. Reply
Nfarce - Monday, January 25, 2010 - link"A huge number of us own a Core2Duo E8xxx series CPU. Can you please post the benchmarks of one of them in this review to give us an idea of how it compares to an overclocked I3 530 or Phenom 2 555? Thanks."
Actually you can take their data on the E7500 here and extrapolate the information from that vs. where an E8600 (or whatever) is in other similar tests and then plug it back in here.
At least, that's what I do. It doesn't take much time and usually there's a reason why AT will leave a certain chipset out (not sure why they chose the E7500 here over an E8500 however). Reply
Taft12 - Wednesday, January 27, 2010 - linknot sure why they chose the E7500 here over an E8500 however
Because the E8000 series is in a different pricing universe compared to the CPUs discussed here. They should not under any circumstances be considered by any buyer in today's market.
But indeed you can use the E7500 as a good baseline. The clockspeed is nearly the same so the performance will be marginally better than the E7500 based on larger cache and faster FSB, but not by a whole lot. Reply
Tamdrik - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkWow, is the newer X58 platform that much more energy efficient than the X48? I was shocked to see the Core i3 system at load consuming less power than the Pentium E6300 at idle, especially considering the latter is a 65W TDP part, which is less than the i3 at 73W. I think the GT280 by itself idles at around 50W, so the rest of an X58 system idles at under 40W (presumably including ~10W or so of PSU losses) vs. twice that for an X48? That's crazy. Reply
IntelUser2000 - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkAnand seems to have completely forgot that X58 chipsets only run LGA1366 CPUs. The test page should show either a P55 or H55.
The TDP of the Clarkdale's are with iGPU, so it'll fare better comparatively against Core 2 with discrete GPUs. Reply
ET - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkThe Athlon II X2 255 beats the Phenom II X2 555 BE in Far Cry 2, and it's slower and has less cache. So what's its secret?
BTW, it looks from these benchmarks that the slowest CPU works well for these games. I wonder if there's a larger difference in the minimum frame rate. Reply
nubie - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkLatency.
The Phenom X2 is a cut-down X4 with level 3 cache.
The Athlon II X2 is a designed Dual-Core with no level 3 cache (and LARGER level 2 caches per core.)
Anandtech did a review on the Athlon II X2:
I for one had been waiting about 5 years for them to come out with this chip. And it is about time. The 65nm process never got 1MB level 2 Cache per core, we had to stick with 90nm and wait for these 45nm chips.
GeorgeH - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkActually, "ET" is right - something very weird is going on.
Athlon II X2 250 @ 3.0GHz - 36FPS
Athlon II X2 255 @ 3.1GHz - 45.8FPS
That's got to be the most magical 3% clockspeed bump in the history of the PC. Reply
Taft12 - Wednesday, January 27, 2010 - linkI am not seeing what you are talking about. I see 45.8FPS for the X2 255, but there is no 36FPS except for the quad-core. I don't see Athlon II X2 250 on any of these graphs...
Anyway, I agree with nubie that the Athlon II X2 is the real gem in AMD's current lineup with the jacked-up clockspeeds and huge L2 cache per core. These allow for fantastic systems at unbelievable prices! Reply
GeorgeH - Wednesday, January 27, 2010 - linkThe benchmarks were taken from Bench (Anandtech's CPU benchmark repository). Just so what's going on is a bit clearer:
Phenom II X2 550 BE @ 3.1GHz – 41FPS
Phenom II X2 555 BE @ 3.2GHz – 43.6FPS
100MHz gets you 2.6FPS or 6%
Athlon II X4 630 @ 2.8GHz – 40FPS
Athlon II X4 635 @ 2.9GHz – 40.2FPS
100MHz gets you 0.2FPS or 0.5%
Athlon II X3 435 @ 2.9GHz – 40FPS
Athlon II X3 440 @ 3.0GHz – 42.8FPS
100MHz gets you 2.8FPS or 7%.
Athlon II X2 250 @ 3.0GHz – 36FPS
Athlon II X2 255 @ 3.1GHz – 45.8FPS
100MHz gets you 9.8FPS or 27%.
To quote Firefly's Jubal Early – "Does that seem right to you?" Reply
StormyParis - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkI conclude that I still wouldn't use 4 cores for anything... Reply
SmCaudata - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkIt is very good to look at the CPU vs CPU cost for performance but look at the total cost. Comparing these chips isn't that fair really. I can go to Microcenter and pick up an x4 620 for $90 and get my choice of 2 motherboards from $20 - $60. Even without these package discounts the AMD motherboards are much cheaper. The cheapest Intel boards are dipping in the low $90s right now for the i3s and i5s. You do get a few added features with the H44/H57 boards but it is a big price difference in the end. I personally have owned intel for my last 3 builds but at the low end it isn't nearly as close of a competition as your article points out. Heck, even P45 boards are still in the $90 range for one with needed features. Reply
Penti - Tuesday, January 26, 2010 - linkBTW look at this deal, http://www.newegg.com/Product/ComboDealDetails.asp...">http://www.newegg.com/Product/ComboDealDetails.asp...
It's not much. Sure you can get 785G boards for $42 after rebates and MIR. $138 USD total for 785G and X4 620. But the Intel is still a good platform for them money. Board comes down to $71 after rebates any how. I guess you can compare the $100 boards with AMDs $85-105 dollar 785G/790GX boards. You get quad-core, but a slower processor. Reply
strikeback03 - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkAnd you would really trust a $20 motherboard? Reply
formulav8 - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkYes I would and do. I've built many upon many computers and $20-$50 mobo's work very well. Its not like the older days. Manuf like ECS even make the higher end boards for the higher end names. I believe Abit is one of their customers.
So yes a $20 mobo works just fine. Obviously don't expect all of the bells and such, but the bang for the buck systems is definitely on AMD's side.
They give me a nice profit margin. Which is always a good thing. :)
PS: Apart from my own desktop and my wifes desktop which both uses Intel chips, customer builds has been using AMD for quite awhile now do to the bang you get from them.
Jason Reply
Penti - Tuesday, January 26, 2010 - linkAbit had their own manufacturing, now they are owned by contract manufacturer USI or Universal Scientific Industrial Co., Ltd.
ECS is a contract manufacturer (ODM) like all the others but mostly makes low end stuff especially under their own brand. (ECS/PC Chips). And of course supplies the OEMs. I wouldn't rank them higher then any of the others.
Companies like EVGA, XFX and BFG are factory less and their products are produced (mostly) by Foxconn. They are of course also american companies so theres no surprise there. Reply
kmmatney - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkFrom a stability point of view, I've had better luck with cheaper motherboards, since they usually have very limited overclocking options. Cheaper boards also tend to run a little slower, but as i said I've always found them to be stable, since there is not much than can go wrong. Reply
medi01 - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkAgreed, motherboard costs should be taken into account. Reply
StevoLincolnite - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkDid you guys try and unlock the cores? I was a lucky sod that managed to get an Athlon 2 X4 620 to have all of it's cache unlocked, essentially turning it into a Phenom 2 X4 910 but at a much lower price. Reply
PCWizKid - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkI unlocked all 4 cores on the Phenom II X4 555 BE , check out my review here http://tinyurl.com/phenomii555">http://tinyurl.com/phenomii555 Reply
v12v12 - Friday, January 29, 2010 - linkWow... I don't know how old you are, but that was an excellently narrated review. Very few, if any hang ups or awkward pauses; you seem to have a talent for that... could be worth something to you in the future buddy. All these tech-TV shows/websites need competent reviewers and such for shows like CES etc. Could have a future out there doing something unusually nice!
As for the 555... WOW now that's a legendary sized unlock! Where have chips like these been lately, in AMDs line up? I haven't seen something like that from AMD since the L1-L2 bridge Pen/super-glue gap-able AXPs and unlocked mobile XP-Ms. That was quite a long time ago... haha.
Hope AMD comes with more than a few fancy OC tricks though... then again, Intel's pet project group will take notice of this very unusually easy unlock trick, and hopefully release a special batch of chips as retort. Gotta love CPU competition, esp when OC'ing potential comes into factor for the Manus... b/c really, they could completely lock up all these chips for no OC'ing period... so they do occasionally toss use nuggets.
...OC 4 Life. Reply
Eeqmcsq - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkI'm surprised AMD will release a 95W TDP X6. I hope the clock speed sacrifice isn't too bad on those. Reply
AmdInside - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkDumb question but none of these processors will work on older AM2 plus motherboards? Reply
Taft12 - Tuesday, January 26, 2010 - linkPardon the yelling, but this is the only answer that matters:
Many old boards don't get BIOS updates. Some do, but you won't know until you check. Reply
nubie - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkIt all depends on the board and manufacturer bios support.
If your motherboard is recent (within 1-2 years old), or has a bios update from the manufacturer, then it will work.
Apparently some older boards don't have room on the bios chip to support AM2+ or AM3 processors as well as maintain backwards compatibility, it is a shame.
(I probably just have the rare board that isn't upgradeable.) Reply
nubie - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkOops, you said AM2+ , but you spelled out the plus
AM2+ is guaranteed to support AM3 processors. Reply
Rand - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkI can't imagine why they wouldn't, their predecessors all did and there is nothing in the C3 stepping Phenom II's themselves that prevent it. Reply
AmdInside - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkWell, I wasn't sure if these were AMD3 only or AM2/AM3 processors. Reply
Slaimus - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkThere are no such thing as AM3-only processors. AM3 processors work in AM3 and AM2+ boards.
All AM3 motherboards are AM3-only, and will not work with AM2 processors. Reply
Rand - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkWhat is the stock VCore on the X4 910e? Reply
pattycake0147 - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkThe link referencing hardware C1E on page 1 is broken. Reply
Jovec - Monday, January 25, 2010 - linkAlso, I'm not sure the X2 255 belongs in the Thuban chart. Reply
forum123 - Friday, May 07, 2010 - linkAble to unlock Athlon II X3 440 to Deneb core Phenom II x4 B40. No L3 cash though. Interesting enough the voltage automatically went up to 1.472V which on stock cooler raised the temperature up to 46-48C idling. Lowered to 1.275V (not stable at 1.25V), idles at 37-39C, does not go over 50C on load. Wonder how much the power consumption increased from 95W for 3 cores when unlocking the 4th core.
Anyways, it's a good marketing strategy for AMD to release unlock-able processors, which can additionally overclock. Hooks you up. Reply
Vaavazodu - Sunday, August 29, 2010 - linkHey Guys, This is my first comment of question Ever, I want to buy a PC with good stability and Speed , I m gonna use it for bussiness and gaming, which Processor should I choose..
i have some options..
PHENOM ii x4 945
Phenom ii x3
phenom ii x2 higest
Athelon ii x4
Plz get me info.. and show me what to buy... Reply


text:
Thursday, March 15, 2012
Change of plans.
29 comments:
- Lindsey @ Running Down A Dream said...
Praying for a quick two months and a healthy baby in May!
- March 15, 2012 at 6:07 AM
- Krystal said...
I'm so sorry to hear ! Though there are some good shows to catch up with on Hulu or Netflix! I watch TOO much TV nowadays thanks to our Hulu Plus account!
- March 15, 2012 at 6:55 AM
- Emily said...
Bummer! Laying around all day always sounds so much more glamorous than it really is :-/
- March 15, 2012 at 7:34 AM
- Amanda said...
Sorry to hear that you're on strict bed rest :( On the bright side, you can watch The Price is Right, and become one of those bloggers who posts 7 days a week... (except don't because I can't keep up with the bloggers who post 7 days a week). Wishing a speedy 2 months for you :)
- March 15, 2012 at 7:55 AM
- Sarah E. said...
Awww that is so rough :( *fingers crossed* for a lot more baking!
- March 15, 2012 at 7:57 AM
- asj said...
It's going to fly by and it's going to be so worth it when you have the precious baby girl in your arms... thinking of you!
- March 15, 2012 at 8:36 AM
- Di said...
High BP is nothing to fool with so keep baby girl baking!
- March 15, 2012 at 8:44 AM
- Ashlee Miller said...
Praying for a fast two months! Though I will say you'll enjoy the relaxation!
- March 15, 2012 at 8:46 AM
- Crazy Shenanigans-JMO said...
Oh no! At least you can catch up on tons of movies and reading in the mean time.
- March 15, 2012 at 9:17 AM
- Phil and Darby Hawley said...
It's a bummer about all the rescheduling, but you've got a great attitude and just want her to stay put for a while. Hang in there girl!
- March 15, 2012 at 9:19 AM
- Lauren said...
Sorry to hear, hope the next few weeks go by quickly and your little girl is here soon :-)
- March 15, 2012 at 9:20 AM
- Michelle said...
I hope the next two months go by fast for you! I'm sure she will continue to bake and of course come out healthy and beautiful!!
- March 15, 2012 at 9:24 AM
- Cole said...
I hope reality TV and the fur babies keep you entertained as baby BUB keeps cooking!
- March 15, 2012 at 9:53 AM
- Vicki said...
Sorry your on bed rest. At least you have trashy tv and lots of reading to keep you company :) But seriously I hope bedrest allows your blood pressure to normalize a bit! xoxo
- March 15, 2012 at 9:54 AM
- Nichole said...
I hope these two months go fast for you!
- March 15, 2012 at 9:58 AM
- Aliya said...
awww sweets! So sorry... I was on "moderated" bed rest with my first and I know what a pain it can be... just take this time to rest and relax without worrying (while you can!) about house stuff and random errands... easier said than done, I know... but your body will thank you for it later!! xoxo
- March 15, 2012 at 10:12 AM
- ImarriedAtexan said...
Praying for you two...
- March 15, 2012 at 10:17 AM
- ImarriedAtexan said...
Praying for you two...
- March 15, 2012 at 10:18 AM
- Rebekah said...
I can't imagine bedrest being completely easy but I'll be praying that she stays put until you're ready for her!
- March 15, 2012 at 10:23 AM
- Meghan @ Shine On said...
Wow! Bed rest for two months?! I'll be thinking of you!!
Keep Shining,
- March 15, 2012 at 10:38 AM
- poptartyogini said...
Make sure to watch some basketball too! I'm pretty sure my husband tried to use bedrest at work as an excuse to watch the games. In all seriousness, take care of yourself and your maternity picture is awesome.
- March 15, 2012 at 11:48 AM
- Christianna said...
Bummer about the bed rest! But at least you have plenty of time to talk to your blogger pals!
- March 15, 2012 at 12:43 PM
- tara said...
- March 15, 2012 at 1:15 PM
- Amber said...
Boo for bedrest, yay for trashy daytime TV!
- March 15, 2012 at 2:01 PM
- Jules said...
ugh- Maury. can't they come up with anything better to watch?!! Do you have netflix???? You can also get way ahead of schedule on book club friday. :) I'm trying to see the good here. ... :/
- March 15, 2012 at 3:26 PM
- Michelle @ The Vintage Apple said...
Sending lots of love to you!!!! I'll come visit you!
- March 15, 2012 at 4:53 PM
- The McFall's said...
Good Lcuk! I was on bed rest for almost 7 weeks. I lived on soap operas and Netflix. I may have cried when Netflix stopped working for a whole day. :)
- March 15, 2012 at 8:07 PM
- Shelley said...
Ah, and so it begins. Baby will always do whatever she wants and your wants will come second, haha. Sorry!
- March 15, 2012 at 8:19 PM
- Heather said...
Poo for being on bedrest. But hey atleast you'll be all caught up on Maury and get lots of reading done :).
- March 17, 2012 at 10:56 AM


text:
An expanded and renovated Colonial cape house at 33 Old Hill Road offers a hint of life as it was in the 19th century while also providing the amenities important to today's families.
Built in 1812, this house features wide-planked wood floors and papered walls in a blue floral print.
By contrast, it also has a gourmet kitchen, updated baths, in-ground swimming pool and two garages -- one attached, one detached, accommodating four vehicles. Some of the newer rooms have strip oak flooring. The detached garage has walk-up storage.
The 1.11-acre level parcel also boasts a large bluestone patio, an outdoor stone fireplace and a wisteria-covered arbor.
"It has all the character and charm of old Connecticut," said one of the Realtors. "It's one of those real Connecticut homes, which you just don't see any more. They're being torn down."
The 3,792-square-foot house sits on a corner lot in the Old Hill section of town.
Despite its private setting, the house is conveniently located only five minutes from the Merritt Parkway in one direction and the same distance from I-95 and the Saugatuck train station in the other.
Nearby is the Earthplace nature center.
There are three fireplaces in the home. The first is over-sized and is located in the formal living room. It has a yellow brick firebox, red brick surround and a hand-hewn beam mantle.
The second one is a floor-to-ceiling stone fireplace in the den or office, which also features a stone floor, paneled walls and built-in bookshelves and cabinets.
The dining room houses the final fireplace. This one sits kitty-cornered in the room, which also has a door to the large patio in the backyard.
In the gourmet kitchen there are high-end appliances, including a six-burner Viking range top.
One of the interesting features of this house is in the kitchen: A hand-painted tile mural backsplash over the range top that depicts this house.
The kitchen has honed granite and marble counters, deep double stainless sinks, a built-in desk area, a window seat with storage and an eat-in area looking out onto the stone patio.
There are two doors in the kitchen, one on either side of the room, that access the patio.
A butler's pantry has glass-front cabinets and a marble counter. There is also a walk-in pantry. Off the kitchen, there is a mudroom with a laundry area that leads to the attached garage.
The first-floor guest suite, with a full bath and steam shower, has a separate entrance near the part of the yard that has the outdoor fireplace.
On the second floor, the master bedroom suite has a cathedral ceiling and ceiling fan. The master bath includes a jetted tub with a marble surround, walk-in marble shower, double marble vanity, his-and-hers walk-in closets and an electronic skylight for ventilation.
There are three other bedrooms on this floor, one of which is en suite, two of which have walk-in closets.
For more information or to set up an appointment to see the house, call Pat Abagnale of Halstead Property at 203-858-1576 or email her at email@example.com, or Bobbie Poeltl Abagnale at 203-240-9537 or email her at firstname.lastname@example.com.
TYPE OF HOUSE: Colonial Cape
ADDRESS: 33 Old Hill Road
AMENITIES: beach rights, in-ground swimming pool, corner lot, proximity to Earthplace nature center, 1.11-acre level parcel, proximity to downtown Westport and Saugatuck train station, large bluestone patio with outdoor stone fireplace, sound system in several key rooms, central air conditioning, stone walls, split rail fence, three interior fireplaces, ample parking for entertaining, covered porch, wisteria-covered arbor, walk-in pantry, wide-planked hardwood floors and wall-to-wall carpeting, pantry closet, security system, ceiling fans, storm doors, exterior lighting, breezeway, recessed lighting
OTHER INFORMATION: five bedrooms, four full and one half baths, two two-car garages (one attached and one detached), shed, landscaped grounds, skylight, gas and propane heating, septic system, city water, mudroom, laundry area, built-in bookshelves, basement crawl space, attic
SCHOOL: Kings Highway Elementary, Coleytown Middle, Staples High
TAX RATE: 17.91 mills
Saturday, March 23, 2013


text:
Western Digital Launches WD Se Hard Drive Lineup for Datacenters and High-end NAS Unitsby Ganesh T S on 5/28/2013 8:00 AM EST
- Posted in
- Western Digital
- datacenter
- Enterprise
23 Comments
Back to Article
Jeff7181 - Tuesday, May 28, 2013 - linkWow, that's quite a small segment of the market they're targeting with this. I wonder if these are just RE's that didn't pass QA. We've all heard of CPU binning... maybe they're binning HDD's... Reply
bobbozzo - Tuesday, May 28, 2013 - linkSince these are for 'datacenter NAS' use; I'm guessing they as good as or better than the RE's. Reply
Gigaplex - Tuesday, May 28, 2013 - linkGiven they're quoted with a lower workrate and MTBF rating than the REs I doubt they're better. Reply
joel4565 - Tuesday, May 28, 2013 - linkGanesh T S,
What is wrong with using the Red series in larger filer servers? I see your comment in the article "WD wanted to make sure that it wasn't used for units with more than 5 bays"
I thought WD's Red series were extremely popular in FreeNAS and Unraid boxes. And those boxes often have more than 5 drives. Is there an inherent problem with using the Red series in a larger array?
I currently have a 10 drive Unraid setup build with WD green series, but I am thinking of migrating to FreeNAS next year and building a RaidZ2 array with 8-10 drives and was planning on using WD red drives. If the price difference is not much for SE over Red, I will get SE drives, but I have a feeling there will be a 50-100 difference per drive. Reply
Jeff7181 - Tuesday, May 28, 2013 - link"And those boxes often have more than 5 drives." They do? I think the majority of home NAS setups are the 2-3 disk setups people buy off the shelf at Best Buy. Not a 8-10 disk home built FreeNAS box. Reply
joel4565 - Tuesday, May 28, 2013 - linkI didn't mean that most of Red drives are used in FreeNAS or Unraid boxes. I am aware that most people who buy Red drives would be using them in some like a Buffalo, drobo, etc box that holds 2-5 drives.
I meant that many people who make FreeNAS or Unraid boxes would consider using WD Red drives. I know many Unraid users used WD green drives, before the Red series existed. Reply
mfenn - Tuesday, May 28, 2013 - linkWD wanted to make sure that the Red drives didn't cannibalize sales of their RE (and now SE) drives. Thus the arbitrary NAS slot limitation. They have that sort of leverage over NAS makers because they can withhold discounts, limit quantities, and other various tricks.
Are such practices anti-competitive? You betcha.
Does that stop WD? Nope. Reply
garcondebanane - Tuesday, January 07, 2014 - linkHow exactly is this practice anti-competitive? Reply
watersb - Tuesday, May 28, 2013 - linkI have 10 WD Red 2TB in a ZFS array for the home office. I am very interested in more storage coverage. Reply
roberta - Tuesday, May 28, 2013 - link@joel4565
The problem(s) are vibrations from the HDDs themselves. Reply
JDG1980 - Wednesday, May 29, 2013 - linkWouldn't that be easily solved by using decent hard drive bays with anti-vibration grommets, like the ones that come with Fractal Design cases? This is fairly routine in modern enthusiast cases, but for some reason server enclosures are still built like it's 1997. Reply
Dentons - Tuesday, May 28, 2013 - linkWhile Google's comparative hard drive report is now somewhat dated, at the time of their analysis they found little value in enterprise drives. Longevity is the primary, perhaps now the only concern. I'm far from convinced that the features these drives advertise is worth the significant added expense.
I wouldn't go so far as to say this is snake oil, but at double the price of consumer drives, there would have to be objective third-party analysis for our group to justify purchasing these, or any other enterprise class drive. Reply
ganeshts - Tuesday, May 28, 2013 - linkThink of it as paying for the extra four years of warranty. If a HDD company is willing to accept returns on the drive for five years instead of the standard one year (on consumer drives), there must at least be some amount of extra stress testing / different technology involved. Reply
joel4565 - Tuesday, May 28, 2013 - linkI agree in principle, in practice I am not so sure. As long as hard drive capacities keep increasing, you will probably end up changing them anyway to either increase capacity/decrease number of drives (power, heat, etc).
When I started my Unraid server a few years ago 2 TB drives were the norm, now 3 TB are the normal and 4 TB are becoming affordable. So I could either double my capacity or half the number of drives which would reduce the power usage, heat generated, as well as make it quieter. Reply
Dentons - Tuesday, May 28, 2013 - linkExactly. Also consider that when WD has to replace warranty units, it's typically done many years down the road, and with refurbished stock.
So when they charge double for a drive today, it's truly a no lose proposition. Even if they have to replace the drive inside a year, they've charged double, it covers their cost and still permits a profit. A 3TB drive today typically has three platters, in three years, it may be two or even one platter. If the drive lasts two or three years, the decrease in manufacturing costs will see WD profit further.
In all likelihood, a large percentage of units with either last the full five years or if they fail, will not be turned in for warranty replacement. It's on these units where WD makes a stellar profit.
I wouldn't be at all surprised if many big data centers preferred the cheapest drives on offer. Their numbers may tell them that at the mean age of drive failure, it's cheaper to buy a new drive at half the price than pay double upfront (quadruple at mean failure) for a lengthy warranty. Reply
Dentons - Tuesday, May 28, 2013 - linkNo, a longer warranty doesn't mean the drives have better longevity. It only means the drive has a longer warranty.
This could just be an insurance policy. No one knows actual reliability better than Western Digital. If their actuarial tables line up properly, charging double for the same drive with 5 times the warranty could be a large revenue center for them.
My strong suspicion is that's exactly what's going on here. I suspect these drives are nearly identical to consumer units, and that WD and Seagate are selling thinly disguised insurance policies in the form of their 'higher end' units. Reply
watersb - Tuesday, May 28, 2013 - linkBetween 2003-2008 I had to replace about half of my Seagate hard disk collection. They were still on a 5-year warranty. But with 2 or 3-year warranty as standard these days, at a lower price point, I just stay at the 2TB capacity and purchase more drives. The effective cost per drive per year seems to be about the same. Reply
Jaybus - Tuesday, May 28, 2013 - linkNot entirely. When you get to larger arrays, PM2/ACPI staggered spin-up support is needed to protect against the power requirements momentarily exceeding the power supply. All drives require more power when spinning up than in operation, so you either have to have a large ps or else staggered spin-up. Desktop drives like the red do not usually support this and other enterprise features such as TLER, etc. needed in larger RAID arrays.
But I agree that the difference, aside from the durability guarantees, is entirely firmware related. I get that the extra firmware work makes them more expensive, but NOT twice as expensive. Reply
JDG1980 - Wednesday, May 29, 2013 - linkThe WD Red drives do have TLER, so that isn't an issue. As for the spin-up power, maybe if you try to skimp out by getting a crappy 300W no-name power supply, that might be a problem, but I don't see even a dozen hard drives spinning up at once being a problem for a modern 860W Seasonic or Corsair PSU. Reply
Dentons - Wednesday, May 29, 2013 - linkYou're right. Google uses silicone pads to isolate their hard drives from vibrations in their DIY data centers. Why don't most rack mount server vendors do this? Good question. It's little wonder that Facebook, Microsoft, Amazon, and the others are either already rolling their own solutions, or preparing to.
I'm far from convinced that these higher end drives offer any hardware benefit over consumer drives. Different firmware and sometimes longer warranties, but better hardware?
It would be nice to learn what Google and the rest are using in their data centers. My suspicion is that they're using an OEM data center drive that in price and specs, is nearly identical to consumer drives. Reply
lukewayne - Thursday, May 30, 2013 - linkGanesh, thanks for the article, is there a reason you put "Se" instead of "SE" ? Also "Re" was confusing if you were trying to be short for "Red" or referring to the old "RE" Raid Edition. I wish I would have known these were around the corner, I just picked up some Red drives because I didn't want to spend on RE drives. Reply
brshoemak - Thursday, May 30, 2013 - linkWell, because they are called "Se" by Western Digital. There also was a WD Caviar SE drive in the past (before they started using colors of the rainbow) so I guess it's some sort of method of differentiation. Of course, if you type 'Western Digital Se hard drives" it will be awhile before the first results returned will be these new drives.
btw, I keep hearing about this 5 drive limitation, that's just a suggestion from WD right? I mean they can't tell a RAID controller not to stripe across drives. What's the deal? Reply
Foeketijn - Saturday, June 01, 2013 - linkI'd also love to see some failure rate nubers or percentage RMA's from the big sellers. Until then I can only say, I sold about a hundred RE/Raptor/Veliciraptor drives. One DOA (which had a dent on arrival) and the rest is, as far as I can tell still running. I can't say the same about the two to three hundred desktop drives. Of-course this isn't comparable since a semi (not SCSI/SAS) enterprise disk comes with a quality PSU and motherboard. And the fact that a 19" isn't very likely to be knocked over.
And there is the conception that Murphy only bricks harddrives when there isn't a decent backup. Reply


text:
The deadline to submit an application for an officer or cadet position with the Baltimore County Police Department is next Friday, May 2. Applications will be accepted online only. Interested individuals can go to www.joinbaltimorecountypd.com or www.baltimorecountymd.gov to apply.
- Candidates for police cadet must be between 17 ½ and 20 ½ years old.
- Candidates for police officer have to be 21 years old by graduation from the academy.
The last information session for the cadet position will be held at 6:00 p.m. on Wednesday, April 30 at Baltimore County Police Headquarters ( 700 E Joppa Rd 21286 ). Space is limited for this information session, so you must register online at www.joinbaltimorecountypd.com.
Anyone with questions can call the Baltimore County Police Recruitment Unit at 410-887-5542.


text:
A 33-year-old woman from Brisbane has died in Bali.
Denni North, who had been living in Kuta and working in public relations, was reportedly found lying face down in a swimming pool.
The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade confirmed this morning a Queensland woman died in Bali on December 30.
"Consular officials in Canberra are providing assistance to the woman's family in Australia," a department spokeswoman said.
Managers of the Cocoon Beach Club in Kuta, where Ms North worked, have remembered the 33-year-old as a "beautiful and vivacious" young woman.
"It is with incredible sadness that we announce that one of our Cocoon family Denni North passed away suddenly on Sunday morning," reads a post on the club's Facebook page.
"Our sincerest condolences go out to the family and friends of this beautiful and vivacious young woman. Denni you will be so missed by so many. RIP beautiful girl."
One close friend remembered Ms North as a ''loving caring soul who always put others first''.
''I still don't believe my beautiful friend is gone. My dearest closest friend we shared so many stories and travelled the world together,'' the friend wrote on Facebook.
''I love her so much. She will be missed every single day of my life.''
Foreign Affairs Minister Bob Carr has expressed his condolences to the family of Ms North.
''The sadness is enhanced by the fact that this has happened during the holiday season,'' Senator Carr said.
''And we can understand the grief that has engulfed her family and the community that she was a part of.''
Australia has offered consular assistance to local authorities.
Indonesian authorities are investigating Ms North's death.


text:
Legislators from Taiwan's ruling Kuomintang party and opposition try to seize the parliament's podium on Tuesday. Fighting broke out in Taiwan's parliament as legislators scuffled and threw coffee during a debate on whether a controversial capital gains tax on share trading should be revised less than a year after it was brought in.
© The Financial Times Ltd 2016 FT and 'Financial Times' are trademarks of The Financial Times Ltd.


text:
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text:
STAFF at Taunton's Halcon Primary School say there are plenty of positives to take from its latest Ofsted report, published last week.
The school was given an overall rating of "requiring improvement", but Ofsted did single out areas for praise.
The report said children in reception and years one and two have made good progress, and that head teacher Vanessa Coles and staff have taken positive action to strengthen teaching, particularly in years three to six, which has led to most children making good progress.
Ofsted said pupils have good attitudes to learning, behave well and are taught in a safe environment.
Halcon missed out on a 'good' rating because Ofsted said pupils' progress through years three to six was not consistent enough, and attainment in reading, writing and maths over the past two years has been below average.
Mrs Coles said: "I am privileged to work with such a highly dedicated and hardworking team of staff and governors who strive to achieve the very best for the children, parents and local community.
"The whole school team remains committed to striving to secure a good or better judgment from Ofsted."
Chair of governors, Rev David Fayle said: "This is a dedicated school which has the respect and admiration of all of the children, the staff and the community. It is a caring and nurturing place to be.
"Mrs Coles is a highly professional and skilled head teacher who is devoted to Halcon."


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