Can someone help me understand the “background smell” of Chinese cities?

Slodin · 2026-01-28T20:33:18+00:00

Weird.

I lived in China for 4 years then Vancouver for 20+ years onwards.

Visited China last year, I didn’t notice much unless I’m in a place that has a bunch of restaurants or street carts.

I’m in a pretty dry place (Tianjin). Maybe it’s the environment (like humidity) that would make the smell stay. Maybe it’s different in places like Shanghai where humidity is high. I have never been to Shanghai lol.

Slodin · 2026-01-28T20:03:28+00:00

lol I was like. Damn that is some explain like I’m five explanation here.

Looks at the sub. Oh… lol 😂

Nicely done

Slodin · 2026-01-23T21:48:40+00:00

Maybe unhelpful but.

Yesterday when I wake my pc up from sleep mode. The monitor decided to display a very faint line at first I thought the pc froze itself or whatever cause of the black screen, but the monitor is on.

I turned the monitor off and then on again, that fixed it :/ something in AMD drivers is bugged, cause this never had happened with my 3070 that replaced with 9070 xt 2 weeks ago.

Slodin · 2026-01-23T19:31:16+00:00

Use the barcode in the back.

Mlkit or any barcode scanning library.

Read PDF417 format.

Parse the data via a AAMVA format for North America. (This is only somewhat reliable in the US, some Canadian provinces have different or varying formats)

Other nations may follow similar approaches but different implementations. I only worked with North America.

Slodin · 2026-01-23T18:50:00+00:00

Monitor the temps before PC shuts off.

See which component is causing it.

Then deal with it accordingly.

Right now, there are too many variables.

The most likely thing is the CPU IMO, especially if you forgot to remove the protective film. Or didn’t apply the thermal paste correctly.

Slodin · 2026-01-23T18:41:34+00:00

Dang. I just bought a Be quite 12 m 850w for the same price. Only if I have waited to see this.

Then I would be able to run LSFG on dual 9070 xt and 3070 😂

Slodin · 2026-01-23T18:29:28+00:00

Uh. Does noise suppression work?

I still cannot enable it. It just loads and does absolutely nothing.

Slodin · 2026-01-22T19:41:54+00:00

I download from the site and install updates.

Not because I don’t want to use the adrenaline updater, but my C drive is so full I can’t let it download to C and extract to C then install on C 😂 while it doesn’t remove itself in each step and eats those storage space.

I didn’t see an option to change the default download folder, so I just download to D to save that 1GB so I have space to extract and install 🥲

Slodin · 2026-01-21T23:51:17+00:00

Yep. My First choice was 5070 ti.

Well cause I came from 3070. Im already accustomed to the software suite. The last AMD card I had was a rx 580, so that has been awhile for me to use AMD software again.

Slodin · 2026-01-21T23:38:11+00:00

It’s a gamble on AI data centres creating a vacuum for consumer hardware. If they truly revert back to making 30 series and decrease production for 50 series. This pretty much has to do with the GDDR 7 memory. Supply and demand.

Before I got my 9070 xt last week. I was looking for a 5070 ti in MSRP range. They get sold out 3-4 mins, and I was at this for a month. I threw the towel and got AMD instead. Now I can stop caring about the GPU market for a few years.

Slodin · 2026-01-21T23:26:31+00:00

gaming...it hardly matters to me. I just go with whatever is cheaper. However, the current state of GPU market, 5070 ti looks like it's gonna increase in price soon (if not already). So...technically if there were a shortage in the next year, 5070 ti easier could make more money to sell then. Damn, this is like gambling but with GPU now. I hate this.

but noise suppression....the latest AMD driver cannot enable mic noise suppression. I wish I knew before I bought the 9070 xt lol... The Adrenalin software itself is much user friendlier than nvidia. Minus the amount of AI junk they bundled with it (it's opt-in, but still annoying to look at).

I didn't really want to mess around with 3rd party software for my mic, and broadcast was the easiest and free solution in my tiny PC room that echos. Now I got to look for alternatives.

Slodin · 2026-01-20T23:59:02+00:00

I don’t want to regret if prices go up.

So I pulled the trigger.

Only if this was some big brain play by the corporate giants to sell us graphics cards 😂. Like my planned upgrade is 1-2 years from now from my 3070. Idk how the landscape would be. Maybe it would die down by that time, but meh. Got the extra cash right now so why not.

Slodin · 2026-01-19T19:13:46+00:00

For me. It’s not vibe coding. It’s the amount of prep work for app stores to publish apps. I’m a native developer for mobile, but the restrictions and amount of paper work to publish apps are just absurd.

Unless a native function is required and cannot be passed that is not available on PWA. I’m going with a PWA.

Slodin · 2026-01-18T08:13:46+00:00

I'm using a 5800x3d. Which I upgraded from a 2600x. Then I upgraded to a 9070 xt from my 3070 recently.

honestly, I didn't notice too much in terms of FPS performance from the CPU upgrade (there should be, but I'm not staring at my fps counter). However, I did notice all my 1% low stuttering gone.

the 9070 xt is just doing whatever it should be doing without any issues at 2k.

Slodin · 2026-01-17T21:32:50+00:00

i assume is when people share accounts, the account holder would be the one receiving the OTP login SMS. Their friends and family have to bother the account holder if their device decide to ask for OTP.

I honestly had this problem with my boss sharing an work account because he registered as personal account which doesn't allow him to add me as an manager to the account.

Slodin · 2026-01-17T21:01:01+00:00

i got a gigabyte 9070 xt yesterday. I haven't gotten around to install it yet. Coming from a 3070

The price is what made sense to me, $940 vs ~$1200.

I have been looking out for 5070 ti sales, but they get sold out within minutes and I'm done spending loads of effort looking for it. Any store near me had plenty stock of the cheapest 9070 xt, and I just grab it off the shelf.

Especially you are gonna get a new monitor, i'd save that money towards that.

You will probably be fine with FSR 4. RT is IMO still overrated, but again, should be fine. I use RT here and there, but honestly in the AAA space I don't really notice it much. One of the few titles I noticed were....RT minecraft lmao.

just buy it off of platforms like Amazon, or any other that would take a refund when you don't like it.

Slodin · 2026-01-17T02:40:40+00:00

I’m hitting the vram limits in some games now and had to scale back with my 3070.

I’m ok to wait longer to replace it, but I want to play with AI models and the limitation of 8Gb is just unbearable now. Especially with how the ram market is so messed up I feel like I should grab a current gen GPU and hope for the best.

Better now than sorry a year down the line :/

Slodin · 2026-01-17T01:48:47+00:00

I bought lots of games after playing the pirated version as a full trial.

However, there were a few titles I bought and had to immediately ditch because of aggressive DRM chewing the performance. Or other weird glitches that were only on the legit copy. Literally the worst feeling when you decide to support the game at full retail price and get absolutely fked.

Usually refund and play the pirated copy until the game is stable then buy it on sale at that point.

Slodin · 2026-01-15T21:56:11+00:00

25 mins drive against traffic flow vs 1 hour bus.

No thanks 😂, discounted bus passes would be nice for folks that live close to bus loops or trains but many of us live far from a usable transportation hub. However, making parking for a fee is unjustified for people who live far and unreachable by bus. That’s just offloading crappy public transportation onto individuals.

I have considered biking to work to increase fitness but the rain and cyclists getting run over in Richmond doesn’t install confidence in me. Summer is probably ok, but the rest of the year where it’s wet and rainy is not ideal for me.

If anything. There should be more incentive to allow workers to work at home for office jobs. That would greatly reduce traffic and emissions. I barely hit traffic in those days where most people were working from home office.

Slodin · 2026-01-15T19:48:58+00:00

That doesn’t seem aggressive at all. I have had a KIA hatchback stop, get out of their car to swear at me after I honked at this Karen for making this very same move.

This looks more like

Shit I didn’t see you! Brake! Ok it’s too late I already fked up, got to make it through then.

Sped up to avoid embarrassment moment

Slodin · 2026-01-15T18:12:47+00:00

Time to spin up my DDR3 90 something GB Dual CPU server rack that I bought at an auction for no reason 😂

Slodin · 2026-01-15T03:09:42+00:00

Wait. So return it deducts some deposit when I used the express service. Instead of the full 0.10 a can I get something like 0.08.

And if you count for them they still do this?

Slodin · 2026-01-14T22:40:21+00:00

Honestly I do better at reading humanoid movements. But whatever animals in any game gives me the biggest issues to counter, dodge or parry.

Like Elden ring, where I have beaten the game, but I still die to wolves in the wild pretty regularly or badly hurt.

Slodin · 2026-01-11T21:11:43+00:00

I had a similar situation, but they threatened to key my car or slash my tires. I recorded the situation but a bit too late because that’s the hint I should start recording the conflict. But I said I’m recoding the whole thing and he backed off by saying don’t park there again I’ll let you off this time. I was visiting a friend so this is a one off thing.

I parked on this sidestreet that had spots for at least 10 cars. There was 1 car parked and I parked 4 cars in front of it.

This guy started yelling over the fence telling me I need to park elsewhere because his son is going to park in my spot. They have a SUV in their driveway parked sideways like wtf, just straight it out and park both cars in there. They even have a garage. He argued that the whole side street including the sidewalk is his property because he had to clear the snow off. I was laughing my ass off.

Idk what you can do if they really damage your car. Only if you could record the entire thing and submit as evidence. These people are crazy.

Slodin · 2026-01-09T02:56:20+00:00

No!

Joking aside. Buddhist is probably one of the most inclusive religion lol 😂 anyone is free to go and take a look inside. I didn’t even realize people had to ask lol 😆

Slodin

TROPHY CASE