Hacker News Reader

buccalon The X220 ThinkPad Is the Best Laptop in the World

Many Asus Expertbook laptops support RAM replacement, has multiple storage slots, ethernet and other ports.

buccalon Fighting unwanted notifications with machine learning in Chrome

Microsoft 365 [whatever/copilot] apps on Android. If you enable notifications in Outlook you course get notifications when it updates to new version. Or the Office app shows a notification that it can open every PDF you download.

buccalon Show HN: Free, in-browser PDF editor

Not open source but free and works in Windows: PDFGear.

buccalon Attacking My Landlord's Boiler

There are many wireless OpenTherm thermostats. Wired is better but is not required for modern thermostats.

buccalon Attacking My Landlord's Boiler

Cool project.

Speaking of newish natural gas (CH4) heaters, they all should have modulating thermostat capability with OpenTherm/eBus or other protocol. Combined with a thermostat with outdoor temperature sensor system efficiency is increased a few percent and that should help offset thermostat and installation costs. In the end you have more efficient modern heating system.

Same should apply for heat pump systems.

buccalon Significant performance improvements with Edge 134

Graph with misleading y-axis does not give any credibility to Microsoft.

buccalon HP avoids monetary damages over bricked printers in class-action settlement

Speaking of HP firmware updates: https://h30434.www3.hp.com/t5/Notebook-Video-Display-and-Tou...

buccalon RISC-V Mainboard for Framework Laptop 13 is now available

I had same issues with some quite new Dell XPS Carbon and Asus ROG gaming laptops. Battery disconection is first thing I do after laptop is not turning on.

Crappy BIOS/power management controller does not depend on price of the laptop or manufacturer.

buccalon OpenWrt 24.10.0 – First Stable Release

It should be noted that GL-Inet does not support or is affiliated with OpenWRT in any way. More on that: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42285923

buccalon Reverse-engineering and analysis of SanDisk High Endurance microSDXC card (2020)

Kingston Industrial pSLC are less than 30 € for 32 GB.

buccalon Thunderbolt 5 vs. Thunderbolt 4: Everything you need to know

Currently I am looking at a Asus Zenbook Intel notebook that is connected by single USB-C cable. It charges and displays on 2 external monitors at the same time. One is QHD, other FHD. Also, gigabit network is provided through the same cable. I am not joking: try fully updating all notebook firmware AND display/docking station firmware.

buccalon Show HN: ImPlot3D – A 3D Plotting Library for Dear ImGui

Total size of GIFs in that page is 46.7 MB. GitHub allows for real video upload which could be compressed much more efficiently: https://github.blog/news-insights/product-news/video-uploads...

buccalon Microsoft Recall still storing credit card, social security numbers

Try out Organic Maps for a more fluid mapping experience.

buccalon Fire risk assessment of battery home storage compared to general house fires

It should be noted that it is a preprint of a paper that is not peer reviewed. I would wait a bit for a peer reviewed paper.

buccalon Making Screenshots of Test Equipment Old and New

Nice overview. What should be mentioned is that HPGL and EPS (PCL maybe as well) are vector formats and you can use Inkscape to edit and convert them to SVG or PDF files. Vector formats provide great lossless scaling and other advantages.

buccalon New iMac with M4

HP does HDMI-in in somo of its AIOs: https://www.hp.com/us-en/shop/pdp/hp-eliteone-840-g9-all-in-...

buccalon Raspberry Pi announces branded range of NVMe SSDs and SSD kit

If you want modern features and low power consumption you can get a new NUC style PC like MINISFORUM UN100L https://www.newegg.com/p/2SW-002G-000H0. For $ 151 you get a computer with normal full size ports (there are options with 2 LAN ports, etc.), storage expansion capabilities and maybe Windows 11 license that is mentioned in manufacturer website.

buccalon Apple Watch sleep apnea detection gets FDA approval

The papers are mentioned here:

https://web.archive.org/web/20200714114922/http://www.glasse...

buccalon Unveiling Mac Security: Comprehensive Exploration of Sandboxing and AppData TCC

Talking about random names. I really hate when binaries named by what seems like smashing some keys randomly are running on computers and it is OK. At least Microsoft, Dell, HP, Lenovo and Realtek are guilty of that.

How can you audit what you do not understand?

buccalon Show HN: I've spent nearly 5y on a web app that creates 3D apartments

I believe this would also fit the bill: https://planner5d.com/

buccalon NirSoft web site provides a unique collection of small and useful freeware

Current PowerToys are really bloated in comparison. SVG thumbnailer gets stuck sometimes and Explorer stops responding, even when installed from MS Store it nags for updates when it should autoupdate and so on. It is not like old Win32 PowerToys where I haven't seen side effects just improvements to Windows behaviour.

buccalon Second factor SMS: Worse than its reputation

NFC/RFID in many mobile devices allows for interfacing smart cards very similarly to wired connection.

buccalon Making a Linux-managed network switch

Interesting project.

For simpler use you can get an OpenWRT capable router which in most cases uses a managed switch chip. OpenWRT provides a nice interface to configure VLANs and other options.

buccalon Show HN: Open-Source Video Editor Web App

Avidemux without reencoding.

buccalon StarTech Unveils 15-in-1 Thunderbolt 4/USB4 Dock with Quad Display Support

Why this type of Active DP > HDMI adapter without external power for 15€ does not suffice?

https://de.assmann.shop/en/Cables-and-Adapters/Video-Cables-...

buccalon Court of Appeal ruling will prevent UK museums from charging reproduction fees

If anyone is interested in copyright law I would recommend a free CopyrightX course from Harvard ( https://cyber.harvard.edu/teaching/copyrightx ). During the course you gain insight into the legislative side of copyright matters.

buccalon Custom firmware for MI fitness band

Transflective LCD, e-paper or similar always visible low-power display technology is mandatory for infrequently charged compact wearables.

I tried I like Amazfit Bip (older, more contrast, low refresh frequency) and Amazfit Bip S (newer, less contrast, higher refresh frequency, music playback control) devices that work for more than a month on one charge. For Android synchronization one can use excellent FOSS Gadgetbridge app.

buccalon Organic Maps: An open-source maps app that doesn't suck

It depends on the region. In Lithuania address data is automatically updated in OSM from official sources while Google Maps may not show current addresses which were added or changed for years. Overall, we should look why every country on earth does not provide constantly updated map data publicly for free. I doubt that fees collected from sale of map data come near the cost of missed deliveries, burned energy and time to wander around in order to find locate desired destination.

buccalon What happened with ASUS routers this morning?

If you plan on using third party firmware you should look at compatibility with OpenWRT BEFORE buying the device. Router manufacturers are unwilling and unable to provide a future-proof software.

Latest proof of that in my case was with a new Wi-Fi 6 router Netgear WAX206. After indeterminate time clients would just stop receiving packets and would require reconnecting. WAX206 latest factory firmware is based on OpenWRT from 2016 (Netgear still refuses to open source parts of it). After flashing current OpenWRT the connection is rock solid.