sonofsanta

Yeah, 980Ti is completely pointless now. 1070 beats it in every way.

Given how often there have been problematic patches in the last 12 months alone, I am firmly against this. We'll end up missing security patches to avoid show stoppers like KB3170455 and its printer nonsense.

GTX660 is nowhere near enough to play anything other than MOBAs these days, not at 1080p. It's 3 generations old. Some good recommendations here. OT: you can create a powerful media editing workstation with a desktop i7 and gobs of RAM. The only thing server style stuff would gain you (apart from a bigger hole in your wallet) would be ECC RAM, which isn't overly relevant. Don't need hardware RAID these days, Windows Storage Spaces is surprisingly good. If you can get a workstation from @ICTDirect_Dave, though, and stick a new GPU in it, you can get hella spec for not much dollar. EDIT: I see he has beat me here already.

N-n-n-necro! This laptop (eBuyer, £260) is too good not to post about. Normal sort of price for a 15" i3 + 4GB, from a decent brand, but it already comes with a 128GB SSD installed. Can't find anything useful about what SSD it is, but as far as most people's needs are concerned, any SSD is good enough SSD.

This game sounds so good. I am going to lose all my time and sleep to this, aren't I? Civilization 6: The most in-depth Civ to date | Ars Technica

Will give it a go later anyway, just in case. EDIT: Saying that, I had to disable the "OK Google in any app" setting because of a bug on the OnePlus One, where it destroyed voice quality and made you sound like a robot. So may not even work for me at all. Bah.

Of the two network infrastructure updates I've done so far: * 2012: wanted a redundant core. We were only running a single 3COM 5500 switch, so a straight out single point of failure. Looked at the HP redundancy chassis models (5406zl, iirc) but went with a stacked pair of HP A5800 as they were cheaper and allowed us to re-use our 3COM SFPs. Did it then because the Bursar came down and told me she had £15,000 she needed to spend in the next two weeks, could I help? Yes I could * 2016: move to 10GbE. Future proofing, because in five years the number of devices had grown by 50%, we were allowing BYOD, our file server capacity was up five fold, web page size had doubled, we'd added VoIP, CCTV... did it now because (a) 10GbE was finally getting to reasonable prices after years of keeping an eye on it (b) this was the year for server refresh, which only costs about half of the usual desktop refresh, so it was now or 2021. And who knows what paltry state school funding will be in by 2021... tl;dr: reliability; performance & future proofing.

You do know what o2 customer service is like, don't you?* £28 is for a 500mb plan, works out at £672 over 24 months. Or buy the OnePlus 3 direct @ £329 and get a GiffGaff 500mb SIM for £7.50pm for a total of £509--and as GiffGaff runs on o2's network, your signal will be just as good. *Okay, so, a brief story. Wife's Lumia 930 was due for upgrade, she wanted to go to Android because even major apps like Facebook were going unsupported and starting to break. I wanted a Nexus 5X for her (best option for a number of reasons) but o2 didn't sell them, so ended up buying one off Amazon (£250, bargain) and getting another BT SIM (only £5 a month with our broadband). Got onto o2 support chat to get the PAC code and got asked why I wanted to leave. "I want the Nexus 5X but you don't sell it," I said. "Oh," replied the man, "that's a good reason. We do the Nexus 9 if you'd be interested in that instead?"

Yeah, "indie games" is about as related to independence as "indie music" these days. It's the aesthetic and style, innit. Just remember what my Christmas red wine game is going to be this year: Firewatch.

Indie games are the majority of my playtime now, because I'd rather have something short and self contained than a AAA game that will end up spread over 6 months of minimal playtime. I have my own Christmas holiday tradition of taking a bottle of red wine into my man cave and playing through an entire 3-4 hour indie game in one sitting. Very satisfying Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons is always my number one recommendation. It will make you cry. If it doesn't then you are a heartless monster. To The Moon is similarly emotional. I'm a fan of the old walking simulators, because I'm happy to play a game for its ambience and setting, so Dear Esther, Gone Home, The Vanishing of Ethan Carter and MIND: Path to Thalamus get my vote for all the pretties. Play the last one with the sound muted, though, and your own music over the top; the story is absolute bobbins, and the narration even worse, so you're better off drifting through inventing your own explanation for WTH is going on. Stanley Parable is hilarious; if you liked Portal, you'll like that. +1 Limbo, and Bastion is amazing. Such a beautifully balanced game. If you liked Guacamelee, check out Shank and Mark of the Ninja (same developer) and Gunpoint. Orcs Must Die! is lotsa fun. Super Meat Boy is the most insane platformer you will ever see and Hotline Miami is just insane. Nidhogg is amazing multiplayer fun. I know it doesn't look like much, but I promise, it is some of the best fun you can have with two players. And you all know Rocket League already, yeah? On my playlist in the near future (whenever I have time around the writing i.e. not often): 35mm; Her Story; Kentucky Route Zero; Never Alone; That Dragon, Cancer; Transistor; Year Walk.

What were Hamilton and Alonso in Belgium--50 odd places each? The penalties stack up but can't apply any more than the grid allows, which leads to things like Mercedes deliberately using three new engines over the three practice sessions, because after the first penalty the rest come free--he can't be pushed any further back. At least they don't roll over onto the next race, like the 2014 situation--one new engine could really scupper you then...

We tried a few options four or five years back and went with LanSchool for its simplicity from a user perspective. It just does classroom management, and it does it well. Easy to deploy with an MSI and easy to configure with GPOs. No on-going cost if you don't want to pay for support, which we've chosen not to, and we've been fine. Been very happy with it

Has anyone let on what the star prize is this year?

Don't. Or if you do, turn it off twenty minutes before the end and pretend it ends the way the book does. It, er, ends in a way that means the title doesn't make any sense at all anymore. Top work!

Never claimed they were any good. Only did it so I could be the first one to make the obvious joke every time instead of getting beaten to the punch while I'm faffing around with Quick Select.

Last time round I actually went to the effort of saving PSDs of Al & Colin's heads cut out on a transparent background, to make Photoshopping quicker. They're still in the same place, ready for loading Here's some favourites from previous years (and by favourites, I mean ones I could find in my attachments here while peering at the tiny tiny thumbnails)

Years, computers slept, not waking, never rising in Humanities. It turns out I am an idiot with a bad static route at core.

Missed this thread over the summer. Just caught up now. Good God O_O Lucky for the school that they'd employed an Edugeeker, eh?

As the tide rises, The clock turns; sighing like wind, I go home at last.

Why do we need wires For this new wireless system? Isn't that the point?

Like roots beneath earth, All life is connected. So: Have you checked cables?

Without my fingers I would surely miscount beats And end up with a line far too long to work in the form

When my sunset dims, These words will be carved on stone That marks my death

Once the habit starts It is difficult to break Like a stone mountain

Has Al already Misplaced all our details? Or just poor filing?