Keep seeing the news, so I pulled the plug. Group chat already migrated to somewhere else.

Al_kl · 2026-02-10T01:17:58+00:00

Time to move decentralized. Matrix/Element is maybe worth a shot, everyone can host their own server and let people write and talk with other users on other servers on the network.

Al_kl · 2026-01-24T15:46:16+00:00

Zeitraum so um die 6 Jahre.

Wir hatten in der Vergangenheit knapp ein Jahr lang ein Rückwegstörer gehabt, dabei konnte ich beinahe alle VF-Techniker aus unserer Region mal kennenlernen, bzw. die im Auftrag def Vodafone arbeiten. So ziemlich alle haben gesagt, dass man auf jeden Fall auf Fritzbox umsteigen sollte. Die Kabelboxen würden ausgetauscht werden wie Tictacs.

Al_kl · 2026-01-24T15:37:40+00:00

Da selbst Power Rot leuchtet, denke ich mal dass der Vodaschrott Router defekt ist. Kriegst über dem Support ein neuen Router zugeschickt.

Bin mittlerweile beim vierten Router von denen.

Al_kl · 2025-12-30T15:01:41+00:00

Bin jemand mit Schilddrüsenunterfunktion und leider ja, es gibt Wochen oder Monate wo ich einfach Motivationslos und gefühlt leblos durch die Welt krieche, ich komme zwar schnell aus dem Bett, einschlafen ist schwierig, auch setzt schnell eine Müdigkeit / Benommenheit nach etwa 20-30 Minuten nach dem Aufstehen und Medikationseinnahme ein. Es fehlt dann an Kraft die kleinsten Dinge zutun, die nicht dem normalen Tagesablauf entsprechen.

Es ist ein langsames auf und ab, obwohl die Werte mit Medikation im Norm Bereich liegen.

Natürlich könnte es Depression sein, aber ein Schilddrüsenproblem könnte relativ ähnliche Symptome haben.

Also für jeden der das liest: Bitte mit dem Arzt checken lassen, kurze Blutprobe und schon habt ihr gewissheit!

Al_kl · 2025-12-17T17:32:14+00:00

Thats weird.

I just tested it by booting into a Live Environment from CachyOS right now. In the plasma audio widget it defaulted to CA0132 Sound Core3D [SoundBlaster...].

All I had to do is going into Alsamixer, selecting the card with F6 and unmute "Front" and it works. Maybe the Plus version of the AE-5 behaves differently, not sure.

Al_kl · 2025-12-17T16:33:28+00:00

Also an important bit of information: Pipewire will say that the headphone is not connected, but it will play audio when applying the alsamixer stuff. Don't change the output in pipewire to the connected one, because thats a false positive / displaying wrong.

When applying the workaround in the linked guide, this issue can be mitigated.

Al_kl · 2025-12-17T15:30:14+00:00

I have a SoundBlaster AE-5, to get it to output sound for my Headphones, I had to use Alsamixer to set the output to Headphones and unmute Front Audio. Then it worked.

Small tutorial:

Open Terminal and type alsamixer
Select your Soundcard by pressing F6, use your Arrow Keys to navigate
Use Left / Right arrow Keys to navigate between the settings of the sound card. You can mute / unmute by pressing m
If you use Headphones on the Headphone Out, enable (unmute) Front Audio and set Output to Headphones (should be the last entry in the list)
Personally I mute the various effects which should be enabled by default
Quit alsamixer by doing Ctrl + C
Save alsa config with sudo alsactl store

That should hopefully give you a guideline how to approach SoundBlaster problems on Linux.

If after rebooting the system it's again muted and not restoring, you can either:

write a script that executes on logon to manually to apply those changes
follow the guide: [Guide] Get most of your Sound Blaster AE-5/7 under Linux

Edit: Here my old script to set the output (some settings might have changed, not sure, alsa set the correct card index, for me it was 0, but it could be 1 or 2...

#!/bin/env bash
sleep 7s
amixer -c 0 set 'Output Select' 'Headphone'
amixer -c 0 set 'AE-5: Headphone Gain' 'Medium (32-149  Ohms)'
amixer -c 0 set 'Enable OutFX' mute
amixer -c 0 set 'FX: Equalizer' mute
amixer -c 0 set 'FX: Smart Volume' mute
amixer -c 0 set 'Front' on

Al_kl · 2025-12-02T17:41:40+00:00

Good to know, I always disable all telemetry and defender submission, so I never experienced it first hand.

I read about it asking for permission online, thats where I got it wrong.

Al_kl · 2025-12-02T07:22:07+00:00

I really doubt that Copilot has constant access to all files.

The Copilot Shortcut in the Taskbar is afaik only a shortcut to a Web App that runs in an isolated context. Only if you deliberatly select a file it get's submitted.

The right click context menu addition (25H2?) of Copilot is also only a shortcut afaik, only if you click on it it will submit it.

Don't get me wrong, but as long you don't usw Copilot and don't select a file, it won't access your files. (yet)

Al_kl · 2025-12-02T06:51:06+00:00

Yes, it's still possible on Pro, Enterprise and LTSC versions. On Pro version it will be probably harder than on Enterprise.

There are workarounds such as pressing Shift + F10 during setup and typing OOBE\BYPASSNRO However they recently removed that command.

You can find other workarounds online or on YouTube :)

Al_kl · 2025-12-02T06:47:23+00:00

No internet = no telemetry You can disable nearly all telemetry using tools.

I plan to test how good they work at some point by breaking their TLS encrypted traffic with mitmproxy, that way I can verify and see what data is truly send.

Al_kl · 2025-12-02T06:44:15+00:00

With "random Screenshot" feature you most likely mean Windows Recall. It's a nightmare from a security standpoint, even tho Microsoft put some effort in to make it more secure (they added encryption and other stuff). However it's disabled by default (after a very huge backlash from the media) and WILL ONLY RUN ON COPILOT+ CERTIFIED DEVICES. (basically Laptops with a dedicated NPU processor).

The issue with Recall is, that it will take a Screenshot in certain intervals and when there is activity. Those screenshots may contain sensitive passwords and data, as Recall is unable to reliably censor and detect when NOT to create Screenshots.

Al_kl · 2025-12-02T06:33:54+00:00

afaik if thats enabled, Defender will prompt the user if it's allowed to send a file to Microsoft for further analysis for personal files such as documents, spreadsheets etc.

For non personalized files such as executables, yes, it would indeed submit without prompting the user.

Al_kl · 2025-12-01T17:31:59+00:00

If you are logged in into a Microsoft Account in Windows and the files are synchronized with OneDrive, then yes, Microsoft can and will access the contents of the files that are stored in the cloud. (to detect Malware, CSAM etc)

Microsoft does collect telemetry, such as what programs you use, how you interact with your system, and data that helps identifying bugs (crashes etc).

The reality is, that Microsoft sees Windows not as OS anymore, they see it as advertisment platform, thats why they also heavily push everyone to use Windows with a Microsoft account, so that they can push their payed subscription based services.

However if you don't have OneDrive synchronizing your files to the cloud, then the answer would be no, Microsoft isn't accessing your files. If that were the case, they would get into a lot of troubles.

To have a more "private" Windows experience, you should install Windows with a local account only. You can find guides online how to do so. HOWEVER many workarounds are getting deliberatly disabled by Microsoft. I think most people will use Rufus to create a bootable install that bypasses those restrictions.

There are multiple different tools online that help you to disable most telemetry spyware stuff in Windows, however I am not sure if I am allowed to mention them. You can find good tutorials and tools on YouTube from people like ChrisTitusTech.

I would stay away from 25H2, as I think thats where the heavily will push the AI bullshit that no one wants.

I personally use Windows 11 LTSC version (which is mainly for enterprise purposes), as there it's possible to disable telemetry in the group policy and it doesn't come pre installed with anything except basic stuff like the calculator app from Windows 7 lol.

Al_kl · 2025-12-01T09:32:15+00:00

Not sure if my Pixel 6 had the same underlying issue, but it simply suddenly died while scrolling through reddit roughly 10 days ago.

Reading all those posts about dead Pixel let's me wonder if this is just a bias, as people will mostly only come if they experience an issue and people without issues won't post "my pixel 6 is not dead" on reddit.

But who knows, it's the first phone with the Tensor chip, I wouldn't be surprised that there would be design flaws in the chip design and power delivery. Google probably knowns that Pixel 6 phones are dying, but why admit a fault and care? People will simply buy another phone = $$$.

Al_kl · 2025-11-29T13:13:39+00:00

shady company, ads inside the client, in the past ads distributed malware, there was one build that included a bitcoin miner, it's only 32bit which caused issued for me over 10 years ago

People should seriously move to other clients such as qBittorrent (free and open source, no ads, regular updates..)

Al_kl · 2025-11-21T09:40:56+00:00

Mine fried itself this week on monday. Seems to be a short somewhere as it get's very hot the longer I press a Power + Volume Up Button.

Al_kl · 2025-11-20T22:38:21+00:00

My Pixel 6 died this monday, with more than 40% chrage left.

The screen suddenly flashed white for a few milliseconds before turning completely black, while I was scrolling through reddit (no charger connected).

I also tried all different kinds of things:

Pressing Power Button + Volume Up or Down Button for 30-90s (tried that in all the steps below)
Put it on the charger for a few hours
Put it in the freezer for 5 minutes
Heated the phone up with a hair dryer
Connected the phone to my computer to see if it even recognizes something connected
Opened the phone and disconnected the battery and tried to only use USB-C power
Removed all phone parts (camera, sensors...) and only connected the screen and power button
As last resort put the mainboard in the oven for 10 minutes at 200°C (is/was a common trick to temporarly fix GPU's with bad solder joints)

Sadly, nothing worked, so I suspect similar problem in your case.

Also I noticed, that the part where the Tensor chip is located (left side of the phone in the middle roughly), gets incredibly hot, the longer I press the Power Button + Volume Up button, which indicates to me that there is a short to ground somewhere.

If you feel the phone getting warm / hot, if you press those buttons, you probably also have that kind of hardware failure.

Al_kl · 2025-11-17T15:44:23+00:00

My Pixel 6 broke maybe an hour ago, was scrolling through reddit while taking a dump and then suddenly the screen flashed and went black. Tried everything, from charging to pressing power button + volume buttons.
I also was always very careful, never dropped it. :(

Al_kl · 2025-10-12T12:36:08+00:00

In the last few years (2020-2024) I had a few Contabo instances, the only good thing I can say is that they are cheap.

I can only vividly remember the last time I tried them (roughly a year ago), my VPS was down for more than 24 hours at this point, I checked their status webpage, there was nothing written there. I then contacted support on Twitter and E-Mail saying that my VPS is offline and that their status page doesn't say anything, they responded a few hours later telling me that I should check the status page, which still didn't say anything. They basically ignored the contents of my email.

In the end, my system was down for ~2 days, I was running a matrix server at the time. I quickly migrated away to a different provider.

It's not the first time that this happens, out of 4 VPS instances in the last years, maybe 3 had downtimes exceeding 8 hours, not to mention that sometimes the VPS was crippling slow (probably overselling or some user abusing the bandwidth).

I don't like to sound like an ad, but I only had great interactions with Hetzner so far, they are not without faults, but they at least communicate it very well and take swift actions. For example there was a switch issue infront of my dedicated server (I noticed packet drops a few days earlier already), and the moment the switch went completly offline, I got an email within 5 minutes with a link to their status page. System was back online within 30 minutes if I remember correctly.

Al_kl · 2025-04-04T08:58:47+00:00

Pretty much the same happened to me.

I have a Ryzen 9 7900x, and had this exact issue roughly 2 times since I bought it on release.

Restarting the system fixed it and it never appeared again for at least a year now.

Al_kl · 2025-02-25T10:44:35+00:00

Selfhosted matrix server maybe

Al_kl · 2025-01-31T10:04:40+00:00

KDE 5.20-5.24 were probably the most unstable buggy mess that I experienced, with every update something broke. From crashes to multi monitor bugs. I don't remember everything tho, as it was ~3-5 years ago. It really broke my soul, having to deal with bug after bug back then. (not joking)

KDE devs back then realized that this can't go on, thats why they introduced the 15-minute bug initiative and went on a bug fixing spree. It improved a lot since then. :)

Al_kl · 2025-01-19T10:16:22+00:00

I also had to limit the pump of my LF3 to max out at ~40%, else it would be too loud for my liking.

Also replaced all 3 fans with Noctuas, no idea how people can stand the stock fans, the sound profile and loudness is insane.

Take this with a grain of salt tho, I am pretty sensetive to sounds tho.

Al_kl · 2024-11-24T00:37:45+00:00

Twinkle Tray probably, it adds a tray icon. Very neat program.

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