| 11:42 |
asciilifeform |
!q uptime |
| 11:42 |
snsabot |
asciilifeform: time since my last reconnect : 35d 1h 18m |
| |
~ 9 hours 11 minutes ~ |
| 20:54 |
asciilifeform |
ohai dllud |
| 20:54 |
asciilifeform |
dllud: answr'd comment. |
| 20:55 |
dllud |
asciilifeform, damn quick! |
| 21:00 |
asciilifeform |
dllud: btw do you actually have a 'talos' ? lotsa folx seem to like to bring it up, but ~no one has |
| 21:00 |
dllud |
ahhah I fit in that category, I don't have one |
| 21:01 |
asciilifeform |
i've yet to run into anyone who'd admit to having bought it. |
| 21:01 |
asciilifeform |
( or for that matter who could explain the appeal. ibm is ~at least~ as much a tentacle of the octopus as intel..) |
| 21:03 |
dllud |
I think I know just one person that bought it, by the nick of Jeremy_Rand_Talo, hangs around on some IRC channels. |
| 21:04 |
dllud |
Indeed. Although for Intel we are sure the ME is there and we need to feed it with blobs. |
| 21:04 |
asciilifeform |
who's to say what blobs are baked straight into the iron in the ibm box. |
| 21:05 |
dllud |
Yes. But I can argue the same about the old Opterons, can't I? |
| 21:05 |
asciilifeform |
but unlike e.g. the opteron -- given the cost, nobody's likely to ever pull ibm's apart. |
| 21:06 |
dllud |
Did someone do it for the Opterons? |
| 21:07 |
asciilifeform |
here for instance is some dissection of the newer, plainly-boobytrapped opteron. |
| 21:07 |
snsabot |
Logged on 2016-10-04 14:41:09 kmalkki: note that RtmPubSigned.key[0x14..0x23] == AmdPubKey.bin[0x04..0x13] |
| 21:08 |
asciilifeform |
the older one, someone recently made progress in reversing the microcode (which loads w/out any cryptotrap), but i haven't the link handy |
| 21:09 |
asciilifeform |
the classic opterons included 0 oddball on-die periphs (nics, remote managers, etc) unlike the newer, and have published init code. so hard to picture of what would consist an effective mine in'em |
| 21:10 |
asciilifeform |
could, i suppose, contain a 'magic instruction' that goes from ring3 to 0, but all cpu are 'guilty until proven innocent' of containing this, and besides, process isolation on linux is rubbish anyway |
| 21:11 |
dllud |
Thanks for the links! Have you seen similar research for the POWER chips? Any idea of the peripherals baked into them? |
| 21:12 |
asciilifeform |
dllud: that's the thing, nobody seems to have any idea , given as they cost weight in gold |
| 21:12 |
asciilifeform |
vivisection required supply of reasonably-inexpensive burnable units, unless yer truly loaded |
| 21:12 |
asciilifeform |
( and if yer loaded, for coupla 10 k $ you can have own cpu baked ) |
| 21:12 |
dllud |
As for the passive cooling. Your requirements are just too high (8 SSDs, 2nd CPU, etc.), ahahha. |
| 21:12 |
dllud |
Damn, have you ever thought about doing it the other way around? |
| 21:12 |
dllud |
I.e. grabbing an old power transformer from the scrapyard, strip it's guts out, and machine some copper blocks to connect the CPUs to the transformer's outer layers? |
| 21:13 |
asciilifeform |
dllud: experimented with similar. problem with oil submersion is that no pc mobo is designed for it -- track impedance changes, and capacitors dissolve |
| 21:14 |
asciilifeform |
not to mention that yer fucked if you ever want to swap a part |
| 21:15 |
asciilifeform |
... whereas if you don't submerge, but run heat pipes, box will die under load, all kinds of parts (e.g. voltage regulators) presume ~some~ airflow |
| 21:16 |
dllud |
ohhh, that's what I was thinking about, solid copper blocks as heat pipe connecting to the ex-transformer shell. |
| 21:16 |
dllud |
Didn't think about all those tiny components besides the CPU. |
| 21:17 |
asciilifeform |
dllud: consider this photo . |
| 21:17 |
dllud |
If it was just the CPU I bet you could get a custom heat conductor for a decent price. |
| 21:17 |
asciilifeform |
notice, north/south bridge, and the voltage regs (right/center of pic) are quite warm. |
| 21:17 |
dllud |
CNC machines are pretty common nowadays. I've seen lots of SMEs with them. Shouldn't cost that much to have your custom copper thing machined. |
| 21:18 |
asciilifeform |
dllud: i have cnc mill right here. |
| 21:18 |
dllud |
ahahhaah ohh well, x-ray, CNC. Do you also happen to have a laser cutter? xD |
| 21:18 |
asciilifeform |
problem is that one can't easily cool the vregs / inductors / all the little pieces of shit, that way |
| 21:19 |
asciilifeform |
dllud: laser cutter (tho dun see what good it does for this problem) |
| 21:19 |
dllud |
Taking that into account, I wonder how those guys from Compulab get away with it. |
| 21:20 |
dllud |
https://fit-iot.com/web/ |
| 21:20 |
dllud |
Hmm.. it has "some" airflow. |
| 21:20 |
asciilifeform |
i've yet to see 1 of those w/out any air holes, aha |
| 21:20 |
dllud |
It doesn't seem to be sealed. |
| 21:21 |
dllud |
Yup, this one isn't. |
| 21:21 |
asciilifeform |
and, again, much easier when everything is soldered down, single cpu, et |
| 21:21 |
asciilifeform |
c |
| 21:22 |
asciilifeform |
sorta academic from my pov, tho, i won't be buying intel cpu (and esp. not intel nics) |
| 21:22 |
dllud |
asciilifeform, but do those tiny holes pose any problem to you? I bet it takes years before they accumulate too much dust. |
| 21:23 |
asciilifeform |
well, say i want radio-shielded box. |
| 21:24 |
dllud |
ahhh hahha, better start small then. I bet that finding a way to get rid of the vacuum cleaner you have nowadays (i.e. fans) would be a good first step. Then onto the sealed thing. |
| 21:25 |
asciilifeform |
or, say, to run it in a packed rack, with buncha hot boxen. |
| 21:25 |
asciilifeform |
i noticed that all sorts of 'consumer' rubbish in fact overheats if placed in a reasonably warm confined space, rather than ideal room temperature desk. |
| 21:26 |
dllud |
yup, it does. Tried that while fitting stuff into a small video/audio rack. |
| 21:27 |
asciilifeform |
at any rate, currently 'workstation' to me means at least 2 pre-2013 opterons. and swappable nics , as cards. and expandable ecc ram. |
| 21:28 |
asciilifeform |
so, not much interest in the various bricks. tho i've used, in various applications, small single-board arms and the like. |
| 21:28 |
asciilifeform |
they simply aint workstation replacements. |
| 21:32 |
dllud |
Yup. And now I can see why you are into a dead end about the cooling. But couldn't you ditch the "radio shielded" requirement, and build a box with some holes that give you enough airflow for the voltage regulator, plus heatpipes for CPU, GPU (and RAM?) |
| 21:33 |
asciilifeform |
hypothetically, a pc mobo designed for classic opterons, w/ a heavy aluminum ground layer , designed to be sat down on top of a 1x1metre hedgehog, would do the job. but of course dun exist presently. |
| 21:33 |
asciilifeform |
dllud: the 'heatpipes for x,y,z, some airflow' box is actually pictured in the article we're discussing. |
| 21:33 |
asciilifeform |
i was speaking of actual solution. |
| 21:34 |
asciilifeform |
the 'here's how to solve your problem, why dontcha give up and settle for half' is uninteresting , imho |
| 21:35 |
dllud |
hahah, indeed, got me |
| 21:36 |
dllud |
BTW, since I am wasting your time, I'll take the chance to ask about this: http://www.loper-os.org/?p=2433 |
| 21:36 |
dllud |
Did you meanwhile found any better candidate for a laptop? |
| 21:36 |
asciilifeform |
what about it ? |
| 21:36 |
asciilifeform |
dllud: nope. |
| 21:36 |
asciilifeform |
not found. |
| 21:36 |
dllud |
Bahh :(, sad. But that's the answer I was expecting. |
| 21:38 |
asciilifeform |
someone earlier linked to a self-assemble-kit arm lappy, but turned out to be blob-booting chinese thing. |
| 21:38 |
asciilifeform |
(and with rubbish lcd.) |
| 21:39 |
asciilifeform |
state of the lappy market, even in 'price no object' category, is pretty sad these days -- keyboards that wouldn't look out of place in a toy store, etc (not even to mention intelism) |
| 21:41 |
asciilifeform |
i'd happily buy a lappy that consists of ips lcd + ice40 fpga + some dram sockets. but, of course, no one makes. |
| 21:43 |
asciilifeform |
would even buy a 'rockchip' lappy, if could be had w/out any googlisms in it. |
| 21:43 |
dllud |
asciilifeform, Well, there are some attempts. Like this: https://www.crowdsupply.com/mnt/reform |
| 21:44 |
dllud |
Basically the same SoC and in the Purism Librem phones. |
| 21:44 |
asciilifeform |
ugh brick |
| 21:44 |
dllud |
But still a promise. Not something you can buy. |
| 21:44 |
asciilifeform |
1990s want their chassis back |
| 21:46 |
asciilifeform |
imho '3d printed' plastics feel like shit to the touch, btw |
| 21:47 |
asciilifeform |
proper lappy oughta be milled, or at least stamped, aluminums |
| 21:47 |
dllud |
yup, good for prototyping and nothing else. Then make a mould out of it and inject with proper plastic. |
| 21:47 |
asciilifeform |
or even that |
| 21:47 |
asciilifeform |
the products of starvation-budget 'kickstarters' etc tend to be horrifying from simple mechanical pov |
| 21:49 |
dllud |
Yup, you will be in for a sad ride in the next few years. The laptops that may come out without Fritz chips will be those kinds of community projects with bulky shitty chassis. |
| 21:49 |
asciilifeform |
if they simply made e.g. replacement mobo for c101pa chassis/screen -- would be potentially interesting. |
| 21:50 |
asciilifeform |
could cost even less than the clunker in the linked www. |
| 21:51 |
asciilifeform |
there's nothing wrong with the c101pa's chassis/screen, why not use it. |
| 21:51 |
dllud |
There is stuff like that for Thinkpad chassis: http://www.cnmod.cn/x210/ |
| 21:51 |
dllud |
albeit with Intel Inside. |
| 21:52 |
asciilifeform |
imho x86 in lappy is lunacy to begin with. why the fuck put 100 watt clothes iron in lappy when arm etc. exist. |
| 21:54 |
asciilifeform |
e.g. rk3328 draws <3watt (entire machine) . |
| 21:55 |
* |
asciilifeform bbl. |
| 21:56 |
dllud |
Because people like me hop too frequently from place to place during the work day to ever consider buying a desktop. A laptop with okish performance is a blessing. You can compile lots of stuff in situ, and only leave the really heavy duty jobs for your server (whenever you can sit in a place a good enough/cheap enough internet connection). |
| 22:01 |
dllud |
With an ARM-based laptop I would need an always on, low latency, large bandwidth connection. That's something that does not exist yet. (Perhaps 5G or Starlink?) |
| |
~ 1 hours 30 minutes ~ |
| 23:32 |
asciilifeform |
dllud: the rk3328 actually performs very (by my standards) decently. (e.g. gcc compiles at roughly 1/2 the speed of my desktop) |
| 23:32 |
asciilifeform |
the lack of expandable ram is annoying tho |
| 23:36 |
asciilifeform |
if it were available in a usable laptop form factor, i'd buy it (already have a proper linux port for it, etc) |
| 23:37 |
asciilifeform |
( 'usable' here means, something ~other~ than 3kg of 'glue gun' printed plastic w/ camcorder batteries rattling around inside ) |