As I promised, my own Cyberpunk testing of Windows Vs Linux on mostly the same hardware (they are on different SSDs, but I don’t think that’ll have a drastic impact).

TLDR: Windows framerates seem inconsistent, it’s first benchmark I ran (the first Ultra without DLSS) was way faster with no explanation. Aside from that and Ray Tracing: Overdrive, Linux seems to win, and by a large degree (+28 FPS average on the Low preset seems ridiculous).

I don’t think these results are broadly applicable to more machines. You probably won’t get +28 FPS by switching to Linux.

My best guess is that the performance difference may have a lot to do with different power/thermal targets, or that Windows was doing a lot in the background (it was running an update, but I didn’t expect a huge impact).

I’m guessing that on most hardware the performance difference will be pretty small.

Hardware: ROG Zephyrus G15 GA503QR Laptop Ryzen 9 5900HS, 16 GiB DDR4 RTX 3070 Laptop GPU 2560x1440 screen, up to 165 Hz

All benchmarks: plugged into OEM power supply. I held the laptop vertically so there were no restrictions to its airflow.

Game: Cyberpunk 2077 V2.3 with Phantom Liberty DLC, fullscreen 2560x1440. Values are given as Min / Average / Max FPS displayed by the game’s built in benchmark.

Linux (Bazzite 42): NVIDIA driver 575.64.05 Samsung 980 Pro 2TB SSD Performance power profile

Low Preset ( no upscaling): 57.49 / 68.42 / 83.86 FPS

Ultra Preset(no upscaling): 32.91 / 39.27 / 49.71 FPS

Ultra (DLSS Transformer model, Auto): 41.11 / 48.70 / 61.30 FPS

Ray Tracing: Low Preset (DLSS transformer model, Auto): 44.12 / 51.70 / 61.63 FPS

Ray Tracing: Ultra Preset (DLSS transformer model, Auto): 29.24 / 34.26 / 39.81 FPS

Ray Tracing: Overdrive Preset (DLSS transformer model, Auto): 15.03 / 17.71 / 20.45 FPS

Windows (Windows 11 Home 23H2): GeForce Game Ready Driver 580.88 SK Hynix HFM001TD3JX013N SSD “Turbo” power profile (in ASUS Armoury Crate)

Low Preset (no upscaling): 35.68 / 40.68 / 45.17 FPS

Ultra Preset(no upscaling): 40.53 / 52.88 / 65 FPS

Ultra Preset (no upscaling, Round 2): 29.68 / 35.63 / 39.94 FPS

Ultra (DLSS Transformer model, Auto): 36.71 / 47.20 / 55.32 FPS

Ray Tracing: Low Preset (DLSS transformer model, Auto): 28.55 / 32.41 / 35.85 FPS

Ray Tracing: Ultra Preset (DLSS transformer model, Auto): 22.23 / 27.25 / 30.86 FPS

Ray Tracing: Overdrive Preset (DLSS transformer model, Auto): 17.74 / 19.96 / 22.64 FPS

Thank you very much, kind graphics wizard. I will put this knowledge to good use saving my ears from that fan. This is exactly what I was looking for!

I’ll have to look into seeing if I can mess with that! It’s a laptop 3070, so they:'ve already made some changes (fewer cores, lower boost clocks). My laptop sets a 100 W max TGP for it.

TBH though I’ve found myself caring more about the convenience of playing games (comfort, portability, ease of interrupting) more than graphics settings. Yeah it’s very pretty with ray tracing and all, but I’m totally fine with playing on medium or high.

Thanks for the ideas! Hopefully I can push the graphics up without turning into a pile of lava. I need to figure out how to record graphics power consumption for me to reference to evaluate changes.

“Teehee, we’ve been hard at work squashing bugs to provide the best experience for you!” And then they’ve removed some useful feature, added more invasive tracking, added more ads, etc.

I am not sure, as I’ve actually only played it under Linux. I have a laptop with an RTX 3070. It’s able to handle the raytraced low setting at 1080p, but I just run High instead so that the fan isn’t as loud. And in my opinion that even looks pretty good. I might try start it under windows and run its benchmark because I’m curious now! I’ll update here if I remember to do this test.

Plus, Google can normally install apps on your phone without any permission or notification.

• Cyborgs every time a Windows update comes out

That name may be taken, depending on how you look at it! Game developer Tim Cain wrote an OS abstraction library called GNW (GNW’s not Windows). That allowed games like Fallout to be built for DOS, Windows, and Mac without major changes. I highly recommend his Youtube channel!

Scooters definitely need more regulations. My experience as someone walking in a city with them hasn’t been very positive.

They’ve been frequently tossed on the ground after their use. It’s a rental, and people don’t care what happens to it because it’s not their problem.

They frequently block curb ramps for wheelchairs. Sometimes it’s even the company putting them there (all lined up nicely, just to block the way). Sometimes it’s just people tossing a scooter there after use.

My partner uses a wheelchair so scooters have been a pain in the ass for them.

Safety wise there are problems. The scooter app will tell you to wear a helmet and never ride on the sidewalk (to cover their asses) but no one wears a helmet on them.

A scooter rider hit my partner, then a stationary car once. At another time a scooter hit me and knocked me over (they were speeding down the sidewalk late at night).

But “stupid drivers” also applies to bikes, and cars. And the potential for harm with an F-150 is a lot greater than a scooter

Those World War 2 movies as well - like, we already had millions die during the war, and now we’re doing it again to make a movie out of it? (/s)

Even USB-C is a nightmare. There’s 3.0, 3.1, and 3.2, which were rebranded as “3.2 Gen X” with some stupid stuff there as far as what speed it supports.

Then it can do DisplayPort as well. There used to be an HDMI alt mode too!

An Intel computer might have Thunderbolt over the same cable, and can send PCIe signals over the cable to plug in a graphics card or other devices.

Then there’s USB 4 which works like Thunderbolt but isn’t restricted to Intel devices.

Then there’s the extended power profile which lets you push 240 W through a USB C port.

For a while, the USB-C connector was on graphics cards as Virtualink, which was supposed to be a one-cable standardized solution to plugging in VR headsets. Except that no headsets used it.

Then there’s Nintendo. The Switch has a Type-C port, but does its own stupid thing for video, so it can’t work with a normal dock because it’s a freak.

So you pick up a random USB C cable and have no information on what it may be capable of, plug it into a port where you again don’t know the capabilities. Its speed may be anywhere between 1.5 MBit/s (USB 1.0 low speed) and 80 GBit/s (USB 4 2.0) and it may provide between 5 and 240 W of power.

Every charger has a different power output, and sometimes it leads to a stupid situation like the Dell 130 W laptop charger. In theory, 130 W is way more than what most phones will charge at. But it only offers that at I think 20 V, which my phone can’t take. So in practice, your phone will charge at the base 5W over it.

Dell also has a laptop dock for one of their laptops that uses TWO Type-C ports, for more gooderness or something, I don’t know. Meaning it will only fit that laptop with ports exactly that far apart.

The USB chaos does lead to fun discoveries, such as when I plugged a Chromecast with Google TV’s power port into a laptop dock and discovered that it actually supports USB inputs, which is cool.

And Logitech still can’t make a USB-C dongle for their mouse.

At least it’s not a bunch of proprietary barrel chargers. My parents have a whole box of orphaned chargers with oddly specific voltages from random devices.

The scalp bird takes advantage of this by nesting in people’s hair and consuming the fruit. This causes another symbiotic relationship as it spreads the fruit seeds.

May not be it, but the shape reminds me of rat poop… It’s not clear enough for me to say for sure.

Well, they have a security advantage. I know Google moved over to requiring a USB MFA key for their employees a few years ago, and saw a reduction in successful phishing attacks.

I would imagine one of these fobs is cheaper than a USB key. It also can work without being plugged into a computer, which is good.

Authenticator apps are nice and all, but are not going to provide as much security as one of these. Apps live on people’s phones, and especially if it’s a personal phone, you may not want to trust its security. If it’s stolen or hacked, your multi-factor authentication just got less secure.

If you don’t want personal devices in a building as well, these are useful.

Lots of reasons these are still totally good today!

Grab the door handle too hard and it’s totaled. I’d say my car has maybe 250 health points. That’s even counting the rust and the broken plastic clips!

It’s survived being sideswiped - 150 damage, healed by using aftermarket panels and spray paint. Permanent -5 beauty debuff though.

It does have a curse (weakness to head gasket failure) though. But that hasn’t killed it yet!