JustSomeGuy1

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JustSomeGuy1
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  • Asustor Lockerstor 2, Lockerstor 4 review: Quiet, speedy network storage for your Mac or i...

    JustSomeGuy1JustSomeGuy1
    Mike, good overall review. I think you missed one major aspect of this, though, except for a tiny mention at the end: ongoing support.

    This is a serious issue because a device like this requires serious LONG-TERM support. For an example of how this sort of product can go wrong, look no further than last week's news about zillions of WD My Book devices being remote wiped due to security flaws not being patched.

    This device runs a Linux OS whether you install a fully accessible interface to it or not, and a pile of app code on top of that. Over time flaws will be discovered, and probably (if the devices gain any traction in the market) exploited. Will Asus support it long-term? I have no idea. They make a LOT of things, most of them of good quality and a few not, but supporting their own distro of Linux - which is effectively what we're talking about here - is a whole new thing for them. I'd be cautious.

    That doesn't mean you should always buy Synology instead. But it would be a big factor in any decision I'd make about this sort of gear. (Though in general, I'd build my own - I'm not exactly their target market.) And thus I think it should have been a bigger part of the review. What's their track record with these devices? How long have they been in the market? What's the support like? Do they have any track record with other software-heavy products? Etc.
    dewmewatto_cobra

  • Design failure in Apple's Time Capsule leads to data loss

    JustSomeGuy1JustSomeGuy1
    The "parking ramp" is the part of the HDD that connects the drive to the external enclosure. Unfortunately, as the poorly-ventilated Time Capsule heats up, the two materials heat at different rates, leading to eventual wear and destruction of the parking ramp.
    This is embarrassing. Stop writing about tech you don't understand. You have at least two quite clueful writers on staff, why not run this stuff by them?

    The parking area is INSIDE the drive itself. It provides a place where the heads can stay when the drive is sleeping/off (or idle for long enough, depending on drive and OS). This protects the media against damage if the drive sustains mechanical shocks (g-forces, not electricity) while the heads are parked. It improves survivability especially when moving or shipping drives.

    tenthousandthingsh4y3sStrangeDayspscooter63IreneWdewmewatto_cobra

  • Questions raised about M1 Mac SSD longevity, based on incomplete data

    JustSomeGuy1JustSomeGuy1
    Mostly decent article but some of your important numbers are WAY off. You wrote:
    The cells in an SSD are durable for at least 5,000 read and write cycles in the cheapest Triple Level Cell-based flash memory chips, though more typically around 10,000 cycles for mid-range Multi Level Cell-based chips. Even at the low end of the scale, that still equates to over a decade of usage based on the one complete drive-write per day rating.
    TLC can be 3000 cycles at the high end, less at the lower end, with 1000 cycles typical today. MLC is irrelevant, as there are no MLC consumer drives, nor have there been for quite a while. (Maybe Samsung still sells one? They're going to rare and costly, if they exist at all.

    Typical warrantied DWPD on consumer TLC drives is 0.3. Some go lower. 1DWPD is firmly within the domain of Data Center SSDs, and not even all of those (though some will go to 3DWPD or more).

    All your math after that is wrong because the base number are wrong.

    I've got one of these Macs and I have zero worries about this. Apple uses more flash than anyone else in the world and they're not going to screw this up. They couldn't, really - that much bad flash isn't available. I mean, if they wanted to cheap out they could have gone to QLC, and they didn't.

    OTOH, it's possible that the 8GB machines are so fast even when paging that users don't realize that they're thrashing their disk. That's unlikely to be a real problem for most people, but I guess time will tell. If you are a heavy-duty user and you buy an 8GB machine... you were just asking for trouble. But I still doubt you'll find it.
    h4y3sFileMakerFellermacplusplusjony0Detnatorwatto_cobra

  • Bug in macOS Fast User Switching logs out M1 Mac users

    JustSomeGuy1JustSomeGuy1
    This article, like the one on MacRumors, is way behind, and quite inaccurate.

    The problem is with Big Sur (and possibly earlier OSes), not the M1 macs. It can occur on Intel too. It's possible that it's more common on M1s because 3rd-party software is a little more unstable on M1s. (This would have to do with CrashReporter coming up more often; see the comments on MacRumors for details.)

    This bug is also reported as fixed in 11.2 beta, though I can't confirm that as I'm not running it.
    watto_cobradewme

  • Apple 16-Inch MacBook Pro vs Lenovo X1 Extreme Gen 2 - portable power head to head

    JustSomeGuy1JustSomeGuy1
    wallym said:
    Finally, comparing two devices that are actually about the same.  Lenovo as the successor to the IBM PC Company is really where you can get the apple to apple comparison, if you will pardon the pun.  

    I haven't tried the apple 16" keyboard, but I can't imagine it being better than my 2018 Macbook Pro 15" keyboard.  My lenovo keyboard with the pointing stick is just better than the apple keyboard.  The workflow feels better.  It is just more comfortable.

    specwise, they are both great machine with top quality hardware.  
    Argument from failure of imagination is basically what creationists do. You should avoid it.

    The keyboards of those two Macs are completely different, mechanically. One is butterfly, the other scissors.
    watto_cobrawilliamlondon