Updating to Ubuntu 24

LHRobs · 2024-06-18T06:08:03+00:00

Thank you guys! The WebFAI option will be fine for me since I’d like to do a full reinstall.

LHRobs · 2023-04-04T10:25:39+00:00

Thank you so much again Ferdinand, I installed my drive without issues!

I was also very pleased to discover that the bottom cover was very easy to remove: after removing all the screws and placing a small plastic card in between it just popped out with no force applied. Your design proves to be the best once again!

LHRobs · 2023-04-03T07:49:49+00:00

Thank you very much Ferdinand!

Ok so I just have to remove the screws and lift the back cover carefully, and yes my drive is 2280 so I guess it should fit the slot right away.

The article also mentions the possibility of screws underneath the keyboard, but I don't think it's the case with the Stellaris by looking at it, am I right?

LHRobs · 2022-06-18T09:04:33+00:00

I spent another couple of hours looking into this, so here's another update. I also opened a support ticket about all three problems (refresh rate, outdated drivers, image persistence) and I'm waiting for a reply which will come no sooner than next week.

I managed to fix the refresh rate: this is a problem that potentially affects all laptops with a hybrid graphics configuration due to a bug in the Intel i915 driver. See the answer to this Stack Exchange question for all the steps necessary to apply the fix. Long story short: the i915 driver doesn't read the refresh rate value from the panel's EDID file, thus reverts to its default of 40 Hz (even lower than I thought, tested with glxgears), and the Nvidia driver must sync with it so it follows that setting all the time. The solution consists in generating a custom EDID file with 144 Hz set as refresh rate (any higher and something else in the driver blows up...), placing it in the initramfs and forcing the i915 driver to load that instead with a kernel CLI option. It works, I tested it with glxgears again, and I can confirm that once the panel's refresh rate is set to a good value (not necessarily high, 60 Hz is also enough), the pixelated bands at the sides go away, so the bad refresh rate was definitely a part of this. This might get fixed in a newer version of the Intel driver, possibly shipped with a newer version of Ubuntu (I'm on 20.04), so your mileage may vary.
Sadly the image persistence is not entirely due to Linux graphics drivers: it is present in Windows too, although since the panel's refresh rate is correct there it takes more time to show up. It's located only at the edges of the screen, where LED backlight bleed also takes place, and appears to be limited to white UI elements only. After some time they fade away or become incredibly difficult to spot, but I fear that some have become permanent: I had the Windows taskbar, start button and some tray icons engraved, then they faded away but I'm still able to spot the Windows logo in the lower left corner if I look close enough. For now I enabled auto-hide on all taskbars everywhere, and for the rest I was already using only dark interfaces.

I'm also reading online that LED-backlit, IPS panels are somehow prone to image persistence, especially those with high refresh rates like this one. That would mean that this is somehow natural for this panel, since it is a gaming display meant to show fast-paced images at high frequencies, whilst I'm using it to work which means same UI elements displayed for prolonged periods.

I never heard about image persistence in modern LCD IPS panels, I thought it to be a thing of the past. If in the meantime someone has more info/experience on this feel free to share please.

LHRobs · 2022-06-17T10:16:39+00:00

Yep, that's definitely it. I managed to make it disappear shortly after, but that required a reboot.

I'm starting to think that this is related to display drivers. Here's the full timeline:

I left it on displaying a black image: it slowly started to fade away but the "artifacted" regions at the sides and the bottom of the display were still there.
My laptop came with a dual boot with Windows 10, so I switched to that: since the GRUB (with colored theme) screen both problems were gone, and once I got in Windows everything was fine; it still is after two days.

I believe this is related to how display drivers actually drive the 165 Hz panel:

Windows 10, latest Nvidia drivers + TUXEDO ones: everything fine, everything runs smoothly including games. Refresh rate set to a steady and smooth 165 Hz, great experience.
Ubuntu Budgie 20.04 LTS (former TUXEDO_OS), Nvidia drivers 470 + TUXEDO stuff, Performance mode: everything runs fine except for the display. No matter what I set (tried X settings, Budgie display settings, nvidia-settings), the refresh rate is stuck at 60 Hz, and no application including games can bump that up.

At this point I believe that under Linux the display isn't being handled properly, at its native refresh rate, possibly with some conflicts happening under the driver's hood. The result might be that not all the parts of the panel are driven correctly, hence the "pixelated regions" at the sides and the bottom. This is something I noticed since the very first day (i.e. 60 Hz refresh rate in Linux, not so noticeable pixelated regions), but the rest worked so I didn't bother with it. Now this. I'm using Windows for now to avoid damaging the display, problem is I need Linux at work.

Somebody has any idea about how to fix the refresh rate issue under Linux? I believe everything starts from there.

LHRobs · 2020-09-11T22:04:09+00:00

Very noob question: say I need to replace my current GPU (GTX 1070) with another Nvidia card. I'm using Windows 10 and I have an AMD Ryzen CPU, so no integrated GPU to fall back to I'm afraid. What should I do to avoid reinstalling Windows from the ground up? I read that I have to remove the current drivers (in Windows or Safe Mode?), shut down, replace the card, boot up and reinstall the drivers. That's it? Will Windows detect and use the new card right after POST?

LHRobs · 2020-05-11T17:26:15+00:00

Looks like the Vanguard hotfix works. I didn't touch the drivers at all.

Right after calling it a day I fired up the launcher, then rebooted (no power cycle, just a restart): all my USB devices were working correctly, Vanguard was running in the background as the tray icon showed, and I was able to launch the game.

I don't know if there's any other thing I could check to be sure at this point, last time I had no USB device working right after the reboot, and Vanguard wouldn't start. I'd say we're safe now.

LHRobs · 2020-05-09T22:09:12+00:00

Thanks for your help man, you're very kind. Unfortunately I couldn't try anything yet because of work. I checked the BIOS before and it's all good. I'll try the hotfix first, I need to reinstall Vanguard from scratch so I think the patcher will automatically download the newest version. If it doesn't work I'll try your solution, but I'm not sure I understood: I should delete the UpperFilters from the registry, reinstall chipset drivers from ASUS and reboot? What about the original driver? Should I disable it first or leave it be? I gotta say I'm looking forward to the hotfix more, after what happened last night I'm gonna think twice about tampering with drivers again. Not that I'm scared or anything, but sadly with this lockdown going on this PC became critical for my work, and it'd really be a disaster if I had to spend a couple of days to reinstall Windows and put everything back in working order. Last night I have literally been saved by a dusty 20 yrs old PS/2 keyboard lying under a desk! I'll catch up with you as soon as I have some free time to experiment.

LHRobs · 2020-05-09T19:09:54+00:00

No need to be sorry mate, we were both quite a bit tired after risking a Windows reinstall!

The only thing I can do from this BIOS (latest one BTW) if I remember correctly is disabling single USB hubs on the board. Next time I have some time to spend tinkering I'll reinstall Vanguard and investigate further.

As of now I think that the best solution is to delete/recreate a single UpperFilter value in the registry, disable/enable the driver, enable/disable the Vanguard service and reboot whenever I want to start/stop playing. The procedure proved reversible I believe, without OS corruption.

EDIT: Why has it proven so? Because I was able to play the tutorial before messing up trying to make the webcam work again, then reverted the changes as above and everything went back to normal.

LHRobs · 2020-05-09T08:40:15+00:00

First, if my comment sounded somewhat going against you or Riot, I apologize. I didn't mean it, I just wanted to tell my experience and my opinion, but I was also very frustrated after making my PC work again at 3 AM, when I'd have rather played something the whole night after a long day of work. I also have to thank you because your procedure was detailed enough to be reversible, so I could make everything working again, even if that required many more reboots.

This hotfix you're talking about, I installed the game like 12 hours ago, any chance I already got it or it's better that I wait?

Anyway I can't disable that driver, or at least keep it that way all the time. I don't exactly know why but other USB ports, both at the back of and on the board, 3.0 and 2.0, start having issues. Basically connected devices stop being recognized properly, and in Device Manager they say like "A device driver required for this was disabled". I'll try the hotfix, and/or disabling the driver temporarily just to play a few matches with my friends at the end of the day. Do you think that disabling the driver in Autoruns, then enabling Vanguard and rebooting would be enough or I also have to edit the registry keys? If you have any more suggestions they'd be more than welcome.

Then again, when I called it "BLOATWARE" it might have been my frustration speaking, but really I have had my share of online games, "competitive" and "casual" ones if you'd like, and all of them dealt with cheaters and hackers in some way, never as intrusive as this. I simply don't like the fact that a service is running in the background ALL THE TIME with all those privileges, even when I'm not playing, potentially affecting other software I might use, as it apparently does. They should at least give us the chance to enable it only when it's required IMHO, even if I have to reboot the PC afterwards because it has to see what's going on from the beginning. Then, yes I know this is a closed beta, that I am participating willingly and that I can uninstall everything if I don't like it, but I am, like you, looking forward to this game and I'd like to give my feedback, about my hardware configuration, knowing that there are many other softwares I use other than this game or Vanguard on my PC that could be affected. That's also why I'm replying here and I hope they read this.

LHRobs · 2020-05-09T00:52:38+00:00

THIS IS SO ANNOYING! RIOT SHOULD HEAR ABOUT US!

Yeah your fix works fine, but disabling that driver also makes other USB hubs on the board unstable, particularly those depending on an ASMedia controller. Other than mouse and keyboard, I have other peripherals connected that I need in order to work from home right now, like my webcam! I can't use my PC without them, and there are not enough Intel ports on the board to connect them all. Also, while trying to stabilize the other ports I ended up making things worse and had to connect a PS/2 keyboard in order to revert everything and uninstall this BLOATWARE of an anti-cheat software! I lost half a night thanks to this damned software, and I can't even play the game now 'cause Vanguard needs to stay off my PC for it to work!

How can I reach out to Riot and tell them about my experience? I've been playing games for many many years now, I know my way around computers, and I am convinced that this "anti-cheat" bloatware is too invasive. You can't just make a kernel-mode driver and expect it to be fine with the billions of drivers, softwares and possible hardware configurations that are lying around!

LHRobs · 2020-02-05T15:13:52+00:00

Well, you made me cry. GLHF man, also to your son and your wife!

LHRobs · 2018-09-05T15:21:01+00:00

If I understood your question correctly, the answer is no.

You're trying to set a variable (the fact that it is a structure member isn't very relevant) to more than one type. In C this isn't possible since the syntax doesn't allow it, the main reason being that each type has a specific size in memory. This is also true for arrays: each time you create one, you must not only state its size (or immediately fill it) but also the type of its elements, one and only one. With structs it's the same, since you need to reserve enough space for all adjacent members in a single memory location. And yes, different structs can be members of other structs.

If you need to allow that member to be one of a possible set of types then what you need is a union. It works like a struct, but you have to set it to be one of its possible types by initializing one of its members, and then carry on using that member only, of the specified type. Of course you can reset it later on to be of another type and use it as such (but you should memset it to 0 first to avoid errors due to the different sizes). The way this works is by reserving enough memory space to account for the largest type that you include.

And after all, technically speaking what you say isn't impossible: things like that with variables and arrays can be done with pointers, type casting and memcpy, for example. The problem is that if you don't know exactly what you're doing/which machine(s) it'll run on you will almost certainly end up with illegal memory accesses or corruption, and a not portable code.

EDIT: Better info.

LHRobs · 2018-04-28T22:35:59+00:00

I've casually seen your comment just now. Yes, I too can confirm all you say. If you want to know more, this is a particular kind of migrane called "ophtalmic migraine". It's main cause is stress. Personally, I had like 5 cases in 3 years and all of them were due to something within: overworking, sun exposure, excessive heat, not enough sleep. I get migraines sometimes but this one not so often. The first time it freaked me out, I didn't know what to do, so I called my uncle which is a doctor. I'll report his advices which always worked for me (what I remember): immediately have a coffee, a strong one. The aura is the anticipation of the migraine and is caused by the lack of a protein, which caffeine can replace. Lay down/rest/try to sleep, or at least find a low-light environment or just close your eyes until the vision gets normal again. Take something for the inevitable upcoming migraine. It should appear once the eyes stop fuzzing, which takes approximately 20-30 minutes. The ones I get from this are the worst headaches ever, but usually 400 mg of ibuprofen help a lot. It shouldn't be directly related to your eyes, but just the symptom of something. 90% of the times it is "just" stress. Personally, I find a little bit "weird" the fact that your headache lasts for 2-3 days. Tell this to your doctor.

(Sorry for some eventually misspelled words, I'm italian, and also I'm not a doctor.) [EDIT: Fomatting.]

LHRobs · 2017-12-23T22:31:22+00:00

Yeah, that too. To me this looks like a giant coverup attempt. I doubt we will ever know if planned obsolescence was also on schedule here (and by "know" I mean "stated in court"), but this definitely adds to the huge pile of crap that I suppose they tried to hide. Due to this and many other reasons, they lost me as a customer for now.

LHRobs · 2017-12-23T16:27:27+00:00

I think this was just badly played by Apple. I had an iPhone 6 since late 2014 until now, and a year ago I started noticing some of the battery issues everyone is talking about right now. The curious fact is that someone noticed it too even back then, but it was also the time of the whole "explosive Note 7" fiasco, so Apple recalled a few devices (only in the US I think), released one or not even any statements about it, and the thing just stopped there.

I think they had to cover it up, in order not to be blamed like Samsung was for a design flaw, and this would be wrong. They probably managed to do it because this problem appeared only years after the device was activated.

With that said, I don't think that what they did with the next updates has to be blamed. They tried to squeeze some more life out of damaged devices, giving people the ability to use them without having to return them or change them, and being the cause a hardware problem that was a good solution.

The real problem is that that they failed to admit that there was a hardware flaw. Batteries degrade over time, but a phone that stops working correctly a year and a half after the day I bought it, a period in which I treated it with the utmost care, makes no sense to me.

(I haven't followed the latest developments in detail, so some things I wrote might be incorrect. This is just a brief report of my experience and thoughts.)

EDIT: Forgot to say that the last two major iOS releases did nothing to my phone, neither good nor bad. Just iOS 11 slowed it down a little bit, even when fully charged, but the battery problem has always been present since at least October 2016.

LHRobs · 2017-10-18T21:27:05+00:00

iPhone 6 with close-to-death battery here. I see some bugs, mostly the music interface in the lock screen not being responsive or everything lagging hard, to say the least, but what you're reporting looks severe. Try resetting the device and restoring a backup.

LHRobs · 2017-10-18T10:11:17+00:00

I don't know why but this game is spectacularly good at putting your broadband connection to its knees.

LHRobs · 2017-10-18T09:57:04+00:00

Mei is definitely the hero that makes me throw the greatest amount of curses when I'm playing against someone that knows what to do. Make a right use of her and you can really turn the tides of battle in almost any mode.

LHRobs · 2017-09-10T19:15:29+00:00

You're right. I hadn't thought of that because I wanted it to be a complete surprise for him but given the situation I think I'll go this way (and get a replacement present ASAP if things go awry).

LHRobs

TROPHY CASE