- There're only two things I'm afraid of.
One: Goombas from "Super Mario."
What are they? Are they sentient?
Am I a murderer?
And the other:
not having the tech news.
Ooh.
Owners of AMD 500-series motherboards
are reporting that USB devices are randomly disconnecting
on both X570 and B550-based motherboards.
These boards have been around since 2019,
but it looks like the issue started popping up
when the Ryzen 5000-series CPUs came to market,
although some boards with older processors
seem to be experiencing the problem as well.
As if trying to plug in a USB
after flipping it one way and then the other 10 times
isn't annoying enough.
It's another thing to add to my Afraid Of list, I guess.
AMD claims that the bug
is only affecting a small number of users
and has reached out to people on Reddit
to better understand and isolate the problem.
In the meantime, some affected users are reporting
that setting your PCI Express mode to 3.0 instead of Auto
fixed the problem, so try that workaround
if you don't the maximum bandwidth
for moving around tons of high-res pictures of Linus
in LTT Store-branded boxer-briefs.
- [James] You're on to me!
- If you do do that, we understand.
Who needs USB ports anyway, you know?
In other Ryzen 5000 CPU news,
supply is relatively tight,
but one way you might be able to get your hands on one
for a bit cheaper than expected
is to order a pre-built PC.
Yeah, it looks like Dell is offering PCs
with a Ryzen 7 5800 non-X,
so you'll still get 8 cores and 16 threads,
but the chip has just a bit less power
than what X version could go an' give it to ya.
At the time of this writing the PC in question
is the Alienware Aurora R10
and is only available in Canada.
Wait! We got something first?
Yes!
- [James] Other than winter?
- Apparently this hasn't happened since we invented hockey,
Jon claims, so-
- [James] We invented basketball.
That, yeah! Wait a second!
Anyway, the non-X system saves you
a whole 150 Canadian rubles off the X edition.
Hopefully an OEM as large as Dell
starting to sell additional SKUs
means that we'll have more supply in the near future.
Realistically, though, that's not what that means at all.
- [James] Dell is a scalper.
- Basically. (James chuckles)
"Oh, so you want this chip, eh?
Why don't you buy a whole PC with it inside?"
There's a weird bit of malware out there
that's running on around 30,000 Mac computers
in 153 countries,
but no one really seems to know what it does.
Apparently the malware,
called Silver Sparrow, (birds chirping)
check in with a command server every hour
to see what it's supposed to do,
but there have been no reports of the malware
actually harming systems yet.
- [James] It's just so Mac people know:
they're vulnerable.
- "I'm sending a message."
This thing could be bad, but I'm also getting Batman vibes.
The mysterious vigilante runs on both the new M1 chips
and Intel-based Macs,
and Apple has already deployed measures to contain the virus
including revoking certificates of certain dev accounts
that signed off on the packages that contain the malware.
However, Silver Sparrow could remain a threat
as it uses well-built CDNs like Akamai and AWS.
We also don't know its secret identity
or if it has a sidekick
dressed in extremely bright colors and no pants.
- [James] This is exactly like Skynet, actually.
- Basically, yeah.
No pants. Skynet doesn't wear pants.
Now it's time for Quick Bits,
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It has configurable encryption levels and a kill switch
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and when combined with private browsing
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What are they... (cackles)
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So try it at the link below
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Quick Bits. Huh. (snorts)
I knew it was you.
Comcast is backing down
after heavy backlash from customers and legislators
over a planned 1.2-terabyte data cap
in the Northeastern U.S.
The company has taken a cue
from Facebook's recent WhatsApp debacle
and is simply delaying the data cap's rollout.
"Fuggedaboutit, it'll come back later, I dunno."
I don't know what that voice was.
However, customers in 27 other states
still have to deal with said data cap,
so remember to vote with your wallet if you're affected.
If you're lucky enough to even have another ISP to switch to
because the internet isn't a utility!
(giggling) Come on, it's a luxury product, guys.
Come on! (laughs)
Apple finally beat out one of its major Android rivals,
Samsung, you mighta heard of 'em,
by a wide margin in the final quarter of last year,
selling nearly 80 million iPhones
against Samsung's 62 million...
Samsung phones.
- [James] Whatever those are.
- It's the first time since 2016
that Apple beat Samsung head to head,
although the report this data came from
also shows that basically no one bought the iPhone 12 Mini,
and now Jon wrote a joke about size not mattering,
uh, huh-huh, moving on.
If you're a Spotify user,
be on the lookout later this year
for its new Spotify HiFi offering
which offers lossless CD-quality audio.
Spotify Premium, as it stands,
only offers 320-kilobit streaming,
so you're probably gonna want this fancy subscription
so you can hear every tiny detail in the new podcast
hosted by Barack Obama and Bruce Springsteen.
(James ululates shrilly)
- That's what they sound like. - That's a little detail.
- Remember that tabletop RPG-lookin' box
that the Core i9-9-9-90K came in?
Stupid Intel. Come on!
Well, it looks like Team Blue
is giving us another fancy package
for its new top-end 11th-gen i9,
which is called what, the i9-9-11-90K?
Kill me.
The box has a zigzag look with translucent windows,
which I'm sure will make you feel much better
about buying this one instead of a Ryzen CPU.
And guys, if you're doin' Zoom meetings,
please check your privacy settings first.
An entire school board in California
has resigned after a Zoom meeting
in which they were complaining
in a less-than-nice way about parents
was accidentally set to public.
Needless to say the parents were none too happy,
especially because not a single participant
was pretending to be a cat.
- [James] Those parents are a bunch of Karens.
And Kevins.
- And I'm afraid this episode is over.
Come back on Wednesday for more tech news,
unless you scared.
(cackles) You're so...
What? Ha ha!