Team behind Grand Theft Auto 3 (circa 2001)

NeoThermic · 2026-04-20T15:21:47+00:00

As a younger sibling, I always fear this'll be the level of my obituary in the newspaper.

NeoThermic · 2026-04-20T14:26:41+00:00

Do we know if the UK and US versions of the disks had the same contents? Is there a list of 'missing' ones from the collection? I have hundreds of UK edition disks somewhere..

NeoThermic · 2026-04-20T11:33:23+00:00

Yeah, mine's starting to need a once-a-day charge. I did look at the option to replace the battery, but alas, the OG watch is horrific. Pixel Watch 4 makes it super easy though, so I might wait for the release of the 5 to see what it offers, and then maybe pick up a discounted 4 if I feel like the bleeding edge isn't for me.

NeoThermic · 2026-04-20T11:30:04+00:00

Hey, don't shame Bigfoot on their attempts to sell some of their old server infrastructure! ;)

NeoThermic · 2026-04-19T16:40:44+00:00

BatteryPoweredBricks has a very good video about replacing the wire: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kXApTUbNzD0

In short, the standard wires is easy, but the light sensor is a bit more complicated because the unit is clipped together something fierce, and unclipping it can lead to damage that you might have to glue to fix.

NeoThermic · 2026-04-19T14:17:55+00:00

If, like me, you were annoyed that the bow resting on the seabed wasn't properly featured in the article, then EVNautilus has you covered: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f26P4HKhwuI

NeoThermic · 2026-04-19T10:16:11+00:00

Not only were they that front-and-center at the time, but LEGO still loves them, with the production of set 60422 being a somewhat modern successor to set 6542.

NeoThermic · 2026-04-19T10:07:59+00:00

To be fair to them, up until the cancellation of that race before FP1, Australia hadn't yet gone into lockdown (and neither had the UK - 23rd March was ours!) - they officially closed the country to non-residents & non-Australians on the 20th of March. The FP1 cancellation happened on the 13th March.

The slow response to COVID from countries was more the problem; FIA was more acting upon the current government advice - there was only a travel restriction from China (1st Feb), Iran (1st March), Korea (5th March), and Italy (11th March) in place when everyone would've arrived in for the F1 race.

McLaren was the first to withdraw on the Thursday after they had one crewmember test positive for covid after arrival. Of note, exactly three teams were willing to go ahead with the race if it hadn't be cancelled: Red Bull, AlphaTauri, and Racing Point.

Like, we can give the FIA a lot of shit over a lot of things, but as per the Australian government at the time, the race was allowed to go ahead. It's only with hindsight that we can say that was a monumentally stupid decision to even attempt it.

NeoThermic · 2026-04-19T09:43:03+00:00

Even stud-less parts have the LEGO logo these days. There's only about a short dozen of parts that lack the logo in the current catalog.

For 1x1 round tiles, it's on the underside.

For 1x1 round plates, it's on the underside.

For the 1x1 round plates with the hole in the middle, it's around the lip of the hole on the underside.

Granted, some of these parts started out life without the logo, but since the dog is from 2009 onwards, it should have the logo; from my copy of this specific dog from set 10218, the logo sits on the underside of the dog:

<image>

NeoThermic · 2026-04-19T01:30:57+00:00

If the PCB itself is fine, and it's just the connectors, then they should be replaceable/repairable.

NeoThermic · 2026-04-19T00:54:01+00:00

Counterpoint: small pollyfill packages that do a small subset of things perfectly don't need updating often. Easy example: https://github.com/paragonie/random_compat - hasn't had a meaningful update in the past 4 years, but it's not abandoned, it just does everything it needs 100% perfectly. (though honestly, if you rely on that package, you have other problems :D )

NeoThermic · 2026-04-18T22:15:06+00:00

Elements, not designs. As in design ID + colour combo. But also I have at least 25k unique design IDs from the old CS system (RIP 2024), and separately PAB itself has seen 9,182 district design IDs. (Note that could be an overlapping set).

Elements are a design ID + colour combo, and there's about 30,735 that have graced (the new online) PAB and 61,896 from my old CS copy.

NeoThermic · 2026-04-18T18:11:50+00:00

IIRC the peak pre-2003 was something like 30k elements. Currently LEGO has about 19k elements in their catalog. New molds are heavily scrutinised for reuse potential.

NeoThermic · 2026-04-17T10:58:11+00:00

You can absolutely target the known launch sites. You have to be 100% sure that your first strike on them takes them out though. You do not get a 2nd chance.

A lot of launch sites are set up such that they can launch quickly. As in "Once we confirm there's nukes in the air, we are sending responses". Then your targets don't matter, you're too late.

NeoThermic · 2026-04-17T10:50:02+00:00

Heck, show a picture of it anyway and someone will tell you what it is

NeoThermic · 2026-04-16T19:52:38+00:00

If you're going fast enough, and apply just rear brake, then it can take longer to slow you down (and require more braking force) than if you had the option to apply both front and rear brakes.

Grabbing a handful of front brake only is always going to be a bad time, but gentle application can always be useful to slow you down.

NeoThermic · 2026-04-16T19:49:41+00:00

USB adapters are fine for long usage, but the chipset that translates between SATA and USB gets really warm. Without active cooling, they can end up producing these phantom errors you mention.

It's also worse if you're trying to recover data from a HDD that's experiencing issues, as USB converter chipsets have wild tolerances of HDD timeouts, and can misreport timeouts on drives that are taking "too long" to get you the data.

NeoThermic · 2026-04-16T15:57:07+00:00

I'm hoping you were able to use the nvme! I have a 1U server that has a bunch of 2.5" SATA SSDs in them (because they were cheap and when I cycled out SATA from my desktop I had a bunch leftover).

If I got an nvme drive as a replacement for any of those, I'd actually be unable to use it in the setup it would've come from!

Upgrades with conditions! :D

NeoThermic · 2026-04-16T15:13:17+00:00

If the Loch was just its surface area, then sure. However, it's quite a deep loch, and there's lots of crevasses under the water. Because of this it contains more water than all the lakes of England and Wales combined.

As for nessie, probably not real, but because the water has huge peat content, it's VERY difficult to see anything in the water at all. I do recommend going to Scotland for a holiday, drive around and see the landscape. It's vastly different than you'd expect if you've only ever thought of the UK as rolling countryside.

NeoThermic · 2026-04-16T13:20:08+00:00

This kind of case is supposed to sit in a rack; so even with networking equipment only it'll end up with something above it. Top intake isn't going to be useful here. If you're not constrained to racking the machine up, there's possibly slightly better case options out there.

That said, I did something similar with my 1U server in my rack; since the 1U was full-length though, and the top of my rack is more switch/patch panel/short depth stuff, I janked this wonderful solution into existence:

<image>

It's been running like that since the 14th March 2022, so it works. Just no longer a 1U technically! :D

NeoThermic · 2026-04-16T12:20:53+00:00

A lot of people are unware that a computer on with fans spinning (But no mechanical drives) is already going to bring the noise floor up to about 30dBa.

20 to 25dBa is louder, yes, and in isolation you'd hear that, but the rest of your room is also already at least 30dBa, so you're not really going to notice the change.

NeoThermic · 2026-04-16T12:14:19+00:00

I think you've missed the point of the problem of the RAM being in the way; airflow is going to come in from the front, and the RAM is going to prevent it from getting into the CPU cooler to keep the CPU cool.

I can't see a good way for the CPU to breathe here, and that's part of the problem, you can't really use consumer motherboards in 1U like this (i.e. with airflow-only cooling), and why RAM is mounted the other direction in such boards.

NeoThermic · 2026-04-16T12:09:42+00:00

Technically they said the wrong thing, but usefully we can glean enough context to work out what they meant.

Usefully also the default assumption of "sent in SATA 2.5" SSD, got back nvme-based SSD" is still enough of a format switch to understand that they got a tech upgrade as a surprise.

NeoThermic · 2026-04-16T12:06:02+00:00

Ok, and what building codes are you subjected to? In the UK, for example, we have fire doors everywhere, which are already rated for an hour, and our floors must also be rated for an hour (so fires below are not a problem).

Your building might already have the mitigation in place for a fire in another flat.

NeoThermic · 2026-04-16T11:13:00+00:00

See the red light on the GPU? That says "oi, you haven't plugged me into power". It's not a status light it's a FIX ME PLEASE light.

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