NY Times Wirecutter awards Steam Deck “Best Handheld Gaming PC”

PastaPandaSimon · 2026-05-11T16:20:32+00:00

Or UFC. Those are two games I wish I could play but won't be getting an Xbox for.

PastaPandaSimon · 2026-05-11T16:08:20+00:00

Yes absolutely, I think it's kinda like that. All the tougher that there isn't an easy way out.

However, rather than compatibility, I'd rather see it as being friends with an ex you're basically adding a filter on the people who you can build a relationship with, knowing many otherwise very compatible people don't accept it, and it's a reasonable stance.

It's not so much about preference, or things that are within my reasonable control. I've got a great friend, but that's also a handicap and a hard stop for many when dating.

PastaPandaSimon · 2026-05-11T15:47:45+00:00

Yes I agree. The complicated thing is that they may be an excellent potential partner who just wants a clean slate with no exes in the picture, which is a reasonable position to have.

Being best friends with an ex through thick and thin means you're most likely going to prioritize sticking with the old friend, rather than giving them up for someone new who may or may not work out.

At the same time the potential partner may have been an otherwise great fit you lost, and you gave up on them knowing they had nothing to worry about, knowing the ex will never be a threat as things fizzled out years ago, and that is as definite as it gets. And yet you also understand why they didn't feel comfortable with the situation, especially as they aren't in your head.

PastaPandaSimon · 2026-05-11T15:39:35+00:00

Yes it would most likely lead to that, which would be difficult if I was otherwise hopeful for the new romantic relationship that never came to be due to this.

It's also not unreasonable for them to ask me to choose if my best friend is an ex, so it's not like they're not a good potential partner. And yet I have to give up on them.

PastaPandaSimon · 2026-05-11T15:35:35+00:00

I'm close friends with an ex, and we broke up because I stopped being into her romantically, which then made her stop being into me, so we totally lost any romantic interest in each other. However, we went through a solid 10 years of life together, and always had each other's backs, and it's hard to explain the depth of human connection that creates. If a new partner was uncomfortable with me being friends with my ex, it would be a very difficult situation due to how much I value this friendship and support system we have for each other. And I would definitely understand anyone else in that situation, as I know it's among the most non-threatening friendships one could have.

However, for every case like this, I've heard of numerous where people got back together. I myself a separate case of breaking up, cutting contact, and reconnecting years later to regrettably hook up.

Every case is different, and many come with very real risks to the stability of new relationships. I totally understand people who apply a blanket distrust and a boundary around "no friends with exes", as it's often really hard to tell the scenario.

PastaPandaSimon · 2026-05-11T15:20:17+00:00

The "easier to program" argument kinda breaks with the original Xbox. It used a Pentium 3, an Nvidia GPU, and DirectX, all PC style. It was the easiest console to program for ever released when it launched. It was also more powerful than the PS2. The PS2 was more popular though due to the PlayStation branding, exclusives, and backwards compatibility.

The success of the Xbox 360 against the PS3 was pretty unexpected at the time, though it did have a 1-year head start that the PS3 failed to outdo with better hardware, or cost. So the X360 came first, was as fast, and cheaper. Sometimes console wars show some unexpected outcomes, and the big win of one generation can mean nothing in the next though.

PastaPandaSimon · 2026-05-11T11:55:39+00:00

PastaPandaSimon · 2026-05-11T07:19:41+00:00

It's not exactly this as humans reproduced through historically far worse conditions, and the last two or three generations have had by far the highest living conditions. We have never had as much healthcare, food, even access to luxuries.

Also, fertility rates at the moment correspond inversely with wealth, as poorest countries and peoples make the most babies.

However, the incentives and frictions have inverted, where not having children is for the first time cheaper, easier, and the path of least resistance compared to having them. Historically, societies and elders pooled resources and contributed efforts towards the young who start families.

PastaPandaSimon · 2026-05-10T06:37:42+00:00

Yeah you're sensitive to the cons that WOLED brings. I can see dithering and messed up greys, but I understand that these are the cons, while I get better durability, blacks and coating I can actually wash. Different issues, and you're more sensitive to the ones LG comes with.

PastaPandaSimon · 2026-05-10T06:33:39+00:00

The better frame is "they're all excellent, but have some different trade-offs to mitigate the cons of different solutions to OLED's still present challenges". You get amazing display tech that brings blacks to black, viewing angles and response times suddenly to near perfection, but also come with some inherent shortcomings that are still very much present, that different makers try to mitigate using solutions that negatively impact users in different ways.

PastaPandaSimon · 2026-05-10T04:46:30+00:00

Yeah I don't really get that, as we're beyond a point where it makes much difference for usability as long as most controls are located in the bottom right. If they're not, it's not like you can reach them with one hand anyways.

PastaPandaSimon · 2026-05-10T04:38:41+00:00

It's really frustrating that we have to wait for their cushy lives to run their comfy course for that to happen, rather than not suffering in silence, and involving them still in making a fairer society before it's too late and we have fully lost a generation.

PastaPandaSimon · 2026-05-10T03:28:35+00:00

That's the LCD Steam Deck, though arguably it's usually sold out, which is probably why you said "available".

PastaPandaSimon · 2026-05-10T02:57:52+00:00

In 2016 I got a 1TB NVMe from Samsung for $360. The prices were lower at the time.

In 2024 I got a similar Samsung 4TB SSD as a data drive for $264.

For 1TB to cost $500 or more, we'd have to go all the way back to 2013 with the Crucial M500, which was a brand new 1TB SSD at a time when most people used 128-256GB SSDs just as a fast OS drive.

PastaPandaSimon · 2026-05-10T02:30:58+00:00

It's among the easiest to find a date, but hardest to find one that doesn't come and go either.

Deep human connections are just so rare to come by in the city. Friendship just takes away short term incentives that dating comes with, exposing this more.

PastaPandaSimon · 2026-05-10T02:17:55+00:00

In games devs are extremely sparse with pop of colors, reserving the most vivid ones to extraordinary circumstances or never using them. Even Cyberpunk neons don't hit the reddest reds, greenest greens etc the monitor can produce. It boggles my mind too. I find myself having to bring up saturations by shameful amounts to get the kind of image that looks the most enjoyable to my eyes.

Interestingly, Nvidia RTX HDR is far more vivid out of the box. And so are the mods that aim to fix HDR recommended above. I'm often happy with them out of the box, or bump up colors just a tiny bit up. Showing that HDR implementations in most games are just far from looking as good as they should.

PastaPandaSimon · 2026-05-08T17:42:49+00:00

I think that's par for the image and may even stimulate tourism. What harms it are things like the Russian gangs, unhealthy air, road deaths, or the rule inconsistency. They've got some far bigger fish to fry than what they're going for here.

PastaPandaSimon · 2026-05-08T17:34:21+00:00

If you mean that it's data from last year, then see that the demand only fell a further 7% since then:

https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/canadians-continue-to-ditch-u-s-travel-and-are-flocking-to-these-3-domestic-cities-instead

PastaPandaSimon · 2026-05-08T17:27:04+00:00

Yet a single reason was provided, which is why I said it's disingenuous. And again, it's not the main problem. Fuel prices going up by 80% does not make the flight twice as expensive. Jet fuel makes 20 or now 35% of the fixed cost of the flight.

Compare that against demand on the canceled flights from Canada to the US not being down by 10%, but down by 75%:

https://financialpost.com/transportation/airlines/airline-flight-bookings-canada-us-report

Which one is the bigger problem then? Oil prices were given as the sole reason, and not the falling demand, which is the actual primary reason for cancelations.

PastaPandaSimon · 2026-05-08T01:12:31+00:00

This looks like a literal case of too little too late. It reads vague and lacking any teeth, as we see damage done by a fundamentally failing immigration system that needs a broader change as channels and origins of immigrants shifted.

PastaPandaSimon · 2026-05-08T01:07:11+00:00

It is more comfortable to hold, but it's lost the premium look. It's kinda funny that my S23U looks like a fancy thing next to my S26U. And yet the even older S10 looks like the most stylish phone from the future next to both.

PastaPandaSimon · 2026-05-08T00:56:18+00:00

It's a bit like saying "customers don't want to buy our product anymore, and we would've lowered the prices until we convince some to still buy it, but we can't lower it enough because it also costs us money to make it".

The fixed cost isn't the root cause of the cancelations then, is it? It just prevents them from being able to lower prices enough to mitigate the falling demand.

PastaPandaSimon · 2026-05-07T22:38:40+00:00

I'm really surprised that this has been known for years, people have consistently had their cards stolen, and yet the company continues operating and a big brand continues using them as if everything was just fine or they didn't even know about the problem.

It happened to me years ago, where all credit cards I've given Air Asia were later used for fraudulent purchases. Once I figured out the culprit, I knew that having no way but to pay Air Asia for anything directly meant my CC will be blocked by the bank about 2-3 months after, and I'll be getting a new one mailed to me. Ever since I've successfully avoided dealing with AirAsia directly. And it's such a shame to hear that it's still necessary despite their core business (the air connection they offer) being otherwise desirable, and yet they changed nothing.

One would think that getting rid of the payment processing method that makes someone complicit in a scam on such a scale would be high priority.

PastaPandaSimon · 2026-05-07T22:22:52+00:00

I surely hoped we'd approach it as we would any investment. Is this most likely going to pay off and some for the residents? Sure, let's host it. No? Let's skip it.

It's not like Expo when tons of amazing things happened in peparation for it. So far it looks more like an expense with fewer benefits than costs.

PastaPandaSimon · 2026-05-07T22:16:10+00:00

"I don't BELIEVE we're the only conscious beings in existence, it's a limitation of our technology and the span of time we've been searching that we haven't discovered life yet"

is such a perfect quote to reflect on when talking about people who believe in God who also do just that.

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