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GeekyBear

13,904 karma · joined May 27, 2017

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GeekyBear··on Windows 1.0 and the WinAPI, 40 Years Later
Heroes of Might and Magic 3
GeekyBear··on macOS 27 Beta breaks the ability to boot Asahi Linux
> AMD PSP is little more than an embedded TPM

Again, you've got some reading to do.

> the subsystem is "responsible for creating, monitoring and maintaining the security environment" and "its functions include managing the boot process, initializing various security related mechanisms, and monitoring the system for any type of activity or events and implementing an appropriate response".

Critics worry it can be used as a backdoor and is a security concern.

https://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/AMD_Platform_Security_Process...

GeekyBear··on macOS 27 Beta breaks the ability to boot Asahi Linux
Asahi Linux already does use an open source UEFI implementation (U-Boot) to boot Linux.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Das_U-Boot

The Asahi installer will also allow you to install UEFI alone, in case you want to use UEFI to install some other OS.

The hardware management engines in modern x86 chips are backdoors running at a higher privilege level than the installed OS's kernel.

It's hard to see them as anything else.

GeekyBear··on macOS 27 Beta breaks the ability to boot Asahi Linux
You should probably do do some reading on the subject to gain a bit more understanding:

> This puts [Apple Silicon Macs] somewhere between x86 PCs and a libre-first system like the Talos II in terms of freedom to replace firmware and boot components; while a number of blobs are required in order to boot the system, none of those have the ability to take over the OS or compromise it post-boot (unlike, say, Intel ME and AMD PSP on recent systems, or the DMA-capable chips on the LPC bus running opaque blobs that exist on even old ThinkPads).

https://asahilinux.org/docs/platform/introduction/

The Secure Enclave is equivalent to a PC's TPM (a TPM is now required to run Windows) not any form of a management engine.

GeekyBear··on macOS 27 Beta breaks the ability to boot Asahi Linux
> M series macs are weird

More weird than the opaque Management Engines on Intel or AMD chips that can take full control of your system at any time that you have no control over?

> Can't help but to think the goal of this wasn't to actually allow third-party OSes

Apple has explicitly stated that allowing third party OSes is exactly the purpose of the new bootloader.

GeekyBear··on macOS 27 Beta breaks the ability to boot Asahi Linux
Apple designed a bootloader for Apple Silicon Macs that allows you to run an unsigned OS without degrading security when you boot into MacOS. This wasn't an accident.

Macs have always allowed you to run another OS.

iDevices have always had a locked bootloader.

People shouldn't confuse the two.

GeekyBear··on Apple decided not to roll out Siri in EU after denied request for exemption
> rather than opening their platform a tiny bit

Handing full access to the data on a user's device over to a company with the scruples of somebody like Facebook is a privacy nightmare, not "opening their platform a tiny bit".

GeekyBear··on The iPhone's Last Stand?
> I think agents are scary and complicated and dangerous enough that it is genuinely scary to give an agent an instruction like go buy this ticket.

Once again, early 1990's General Magic looks prescient.

They were working on smartphones with agents capable of completing remote transactions before we had wireless data networks.

> General Magic: The Greatest Tech Company You’ve Never Heard Of

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=tuFl4WEXBrk

> allowing end-user equipment with limited capabilities to upload Telescript programs to servers to allow them to take advantage of the server's capabilities. Telescript could even migrate a running program... transfer it to another Telescript engine (on a device or a server) to continue execution, and finally return to the originating client or server device to deliver its output.

https://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telescript_(programming_langu...

GeekyBear··on Apple WWDC 2026 Livestream
Apple has always tweaked new UI designs over the first few OS releases.

They did it with Aqua when MacOS launched and again with the iPhone's original skeuomorphic UI and yet again with the flat redesign of iOS.

GeekyBear··on Apple WWDC 2026
You can't scrub back and forth on the timeline until the live stream is finished.
GeekyBear··on Nvidia is proposing a beast of a CPU system for Windows PCs
Macs were known for far longer standby times while sleeping long before MS completely screwed the pooch with their "modern" standby.
GeekyBear··on Nvidia is proposing a beast of a CPU system for Windows PCs
Until LPCAMM2 came along, using low power LPDDR RAM meant soldiering RAM to the motherboard.

If you wanted to get sleep right and improve battery life, that was the trade off.

GeekyBear··on Nvidia is proposing a beast of a CPU system for Windows PCs
> However, it will make decent machines to play video games."

Where you will need games to be rewritten for ARM to get full performance, just like on Apple's M series chips.

GeekyBear··on India's surprise baby bust
It's worth remembering that schools in American farming regions would shut down during planting and harvest seasons just 100 years ago.

Large families were your source of farm labor.

GeekyBear··on MacBook Neo is so popular that Apple doubled production
They have the cheap one, the little one, the premium consumer one, and the Pro.
GeekyBear··on MacBook Neo is so popular that Apple doubled production
There wouldn't be so many people who see no need to upgrade their M1 series computers if this were a real concern.
GeekyBear··on MacBook Neo is so popular that Apple doubled production
I saw a recent report stating that the Neo was selling well in India, where the iPhone's share is negligible.
GeekyBear··on MacBook Neo Is So Popular That Apple Doubled Production
I actually have seen a business upgrade PCs that were fairly recently purchased once, back during the transition from Windows 3.1 to Windows 95.
GeekyBear··on MacBook Neo is so popular that Apple doubled production
Dell has just announced an 8 Gig of RAM version of their XPS laptop and the PR surrounding the launch is pretty funny.

> "Apple's MacBook Neo is a capable machine, and its arrival confirms that there's real appetite for premium quality at accessible prices," said Dell.

Who could have known that people wanted quality AND affordability?

GeekyBear··on MacBook Neo Is So Popular That Apple Doubled Production
Apple's advantage is that they design a large share of their own parts, and their partners build them at a very high volume since they are used in more than one product line.

They don't have to pay a margin to so many component vendors in addition to economy of scale gains.

At a lower Neo volumes, they were using already manufactured iPhone Pro chips that were binned due to a bad GPU core, but they reportedly have already blown through that supply.

They also came up with a new process that uses extruded recycled aluminum for the case, which needs much less CNC time to clean up.

GeekyBear··on DuckDuckGo makes its 'no-AI' search engine easier to access as its traffic booms
I personally switched to DDG months ago when Google opted me into AI search against my will.
GeekyBear··on Windows GOG DOS Games on M-Series Macs
The Apple Silicon dev kit shipped in 2019 and the cutoff date is 2028, so it's a pretty mild form of hurry.

If you want to continue to run older software, do what you would do in Windows 11 and spin up VM with an older version of the OS.

I keep a Windows 2000 VM with no network access around just to occasionally play Heroes of Might and Magic 3.

GeekyBear··on Windows GOG DOS Games on M-Series Macs
x86 gaming and running x86 Linux software are the exceptions.

> Starting with macOS 28, Rosetta 2 will be largely discontinued. Apple says that after that point, it “will keep a subset of Rosetta functionality aimed at supporting older unmaintained gaming titles, that rely on Intel-based frameworks.”

https://9to5mac.com/2026/02/16/macos-26-4-will-notify-users-...

It's the Mac native x86 software that hasn't been updated in most of a decade that would be affected.

GeekyBear··on 'Backrooms' Stuns with $81M Debut
> The unremovable U2 album is also a cause for concern

Open the settings and uncheck "automatically download purchased music that isn't on the device".

Fixed.

> movies require another level of trust

When Apple paid the studios extra to alliw them to upgrade previously purchased 480p movies to HD, I'd say they earned it.

GeekyBear··on 'Backrooms' Stuns with $81M Debut
Steam games with DRM can be revoked as well.

We've also seen Apple upgrade 480p movies purchased in the past to HD which is an improvement compared to buying physical media.

GeekyBear··on Jef Raskin, the Visionary Behind the Mac (2013)
Jef did go on to create a computer along the lines of his original vision after leaving Apple.

> The Canon Cat used a text-based user interface, without any pointer, mouse, icons, or graphics. All data was seen as a long "stream" of text broken into several pages. Instead of using a traditional command-line interface or menu system, the Cat used its special keyboard, with commands activated by holding down a "Use Front" key and pressing another key.

https://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canon_Cat

It was nothing like the Macintosh Apple shipped.

GeekyBear··on It's hard to justify buying a Framework 12
A patch set landed shortly there after.

https://asahilinux.org/2026/02/progress-report-6-19/

GeekyBear··on It's hard to justify buying a Framework 12
USB display support was demoed at a conference at the end of last year.
GeekyBear··on It's hard to justify buying a Framework 12
The current leadership team at Asahi decided to prioritize upstreaming their existing work over reverse engineering on newer systems.

Given that you can score a used M1 Air for half the price of a new Macbook Neo (and have Linux be supported), it's an even better value compared to the Framework, for those who prefer Linux.

GeekyBear··on It's hard to justify buying a Framework 12
> it's about paying a bit extra now to be able to go from decent-in-2026

Does "slower than an iPhone chip from a couple of years ago" meet that bar?

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