Tech Tho(ugh)ts

HDR, a term that’s been thrown around a lot regarding things like TVs, monitors, and your smartphone! It has something to do with lighting, but what- and how- does it even work?

Sources:

HDR Definition:

• TechRadar, 20 May 2021, “HDR TV: what is HDR, and what does High Dynamic Range mean for your TV?“

Types of HDR:

• PCMag, Updated: 1 February 2021, Accessed: 31 May 2021, “What Is HDR (High Dynamic Range)?“
• Videomaker.com, Accessed: 31 May 2021, “What is HDR video?”

Local Dimming:

• CNET, 26 March 2017, “LED local dimming explained”

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Displays are everywhere! You likely use them every day, whether it’s by watching TV, using your computer, or interacting with your phone- you can’t really get away from them these days. There are so many kinds of displays, though- so there must be some different, right?

EPISODE NOTES/MISTAKES: We had incorrectly (jokingly) said that ultrawide displays had a display resolution of “21×16”, they are generally 21:9.

Sources:

Screen Display Covering/Matte & Glossy Finishes:

• Review Geek, Updated: 1 September 2020,Accessed: 31 May 2021, “Quick Tip: The Nintendo Switch Screen Is Plastic, so Buy a Screen Protector”
• How-To Geek.com, Updated: 11 July 2017, Accessed: 31 May 2021, “Glossy vs. Matte LCDs: Which Should You Choose When Buying a Display?”

CRTs:

• HowStuffWorks.com, Accessed: 31 May 2021, “How Television Works”
• ECStuff4u.com, April 2018, Accessed: 31 May 2021, “CRT advantages and disadvantages”

Plasma:

• The National Interest, 19 March 2020, “HDTV Question: Where Have All the Plasma TVs Gone?“
• BBC Future, 18 October 2013, “How does a plasma TV work?”
• DigitalTrends,13 April 2013, “LCD vs Plasma TVs“

LCDs:

• HowStuffWorks.com, Accessed: 31 May 2021, “How LCDs Work”
• Tom’s Hardware, 4 August 2020, “What Is an IPS Monitor? A Basic Definition“

OLED:

• TechRadar, 27 May 2021,”What is OLED? Black levels, burn-in, and contrast ratios explained“
• OLED-Info.com, Updated: 23 December 2018, “What is the OLED technology all about?”

Mini-LED:

• Android Authority, 14 February 2021, “What is Mini-LED and why is Apple adopting it?“
• Linus Tech Tips @ Youtube.com, “I REALLY Wanted to Try Mini LED… and it’s GREAT!”

Micro-LED:

• Android Central, 25 May 2021, “Royole shows off a stretchable micro-LED display for next-gen wearables“

E-Ink:

• Eink.com, Accessed: 31 May 2021, “Benefits”
• Eink.com, Accessed: 6 July 2021, “Color”
• PC Mag, 20 December 2019, “E Ink Develops New Color E-Paper Display“
• MakeUseOf.com, 1 April 2016, “What Is E-Ink? How It Works & Why Every Ebook Fan Needs It”

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We’ve talked about GPUs being a little.. overpriced at the moment, in our episode on them. Whether or not it’s post-2021 when you listen to this and the GPU shortage problem is over, you may still be curious: why are things like this right now?

Sources:

COVID-19 Pandemic Slowing Manufacturing:

• Intrado GlobalNewswire, 6 July 2020, “Graphic Processing Unit (GPU) Market to Grow $200.85 Billion by 2027: at 33.6% CAGR“
• PCMag, 14 February 2020, “Nvidia Faces $100 Million Coronavirus Hit“
• Tom’s Hardware, 9 March 2021, “2020 GPU Sales Failed to Impress, Despite Record Demand“

NVIDIA 30 Series:

• Tom’s Guide, 7 September 2020,”Nvidia RTX 3080 vs. RTX 2080 Ti: How much better is it?“
• NVIDIA.com Newsroom, 1 September 2020, “Introducingi GeForce RTX 30 Series GPUs”
• TechRadar, 16 March 2021, “Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 review”

AMD RX 6000 Series:

• Tom’s Guide, 28 October 2020,”AMD Big Navi release date, price, specs and performance“
• Tom’s Hardware, 23 November 2020, “AMD Radeon RX 6800 XT and RX 6800 Review: Nipping at Ampere’s Heels“

TSMC Manufacturing:

• ExtremeTech, 7 January 2021, “Report: Packaging Issues, PS5 Demand May Be Hurting TSMC Production“
• GamingBolt, 24 September 2020, “Tech Analysis: How Are Xbox Series X And PS5 SoCs Manufactured?“
• Wccftech, 23 April 2020, “NVIDIA And AMD Just Bought Up All Excess Capacity At TSMC For Next Generation GPUs And CPUs“

NVIDIA Mining Lock and Mining GPUs:

• Tom’s Hardware, 15 March 2021,”Nvidia Hacks Its Own GeForce RTX 3060 Anti-Mining Lock (Updated)“
• ZDNet, 18 February 2021, “Nvidia launches CMP, cryptocurrency mining processor, may alleviate gaming chip shortages“

Supply Issues and Mitigation:

• NotebookCheck.net, 29 April 2021, “AMD determined to ramp up Radeon RX 6000 GPU production throughout 2021“
• Screen Rant, 15 April 2021, “Nvidia Says GPU Shortage May Last Until 2022“
• PCMag, 12 April 2021, “Nvidia: Demand for Graphics Cards to Outstrip Supply for Much of 2021“

Overpriced GPUs:

• Wccftech, 13 February 2021, “Over 14,000 NVIDIA GPUs Have Been Sold On eBay This Year Alone And The Resale Price Is Going Up As Time Goes On“
• eBay on 5 April 2021, “RTX 2060” Search Query

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In our GPU episode, we’ve talked about DisplayPort and HDMI- the current “main” connectors out there (the ones people actually use, or at least often). However, there are still other connectors that have somehow withstood the test of time. We’ll tell you about a few of them.

Sources:

DVI:

• How-To Geek, Updated: 3 July 2017, Accessed: 25 May 2021, “What’s the Difference Between HDMI and DVI? Which is Better?”
• Monoprice Support, Accessed: 25 May 2021, “What is the difference between DVI, HDMI, and VGA?”

VGA:

• TechRepublic, 4 September 2008,”Looking back at the IBM PS/2″
• HP Tech Takes (HP.com), 19 July 2019, “Top Advantages of DVI vs VGA for Computer Monitors”

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Alright, so Ray Tracing! NVIDIA’s supporting it with their RTX lineup, and AMD is getting in on the action starting with the RX 6000 series! Heck, even the new consoles seem to have…. it…. but, really, who is Ray? And why are we Tracing him?

Sources:

Definition:

• Tom’s Guide, 14 June 2020, “PS5 and Xbox Series X ray tracing: Here’s why it’s a big deal“
• TechRadar, 20 August 2019, “What is ray tracing? The games, the graphics cards and everything else you need to know“

Ray-Tracing vs Rasterizing:

• ChaosGroup.com, 16 September 2019, “Real-time, ray-traced and rasterized rendering explained”
• Linus Tech Tips @ Youtube.com, “Is RTX a Total Waste of Money??”

Ray Tracing in Media:

• Pixar’s paper on Ray Tracing in the movie Cars (2006)

RT Cores and Ray Accelerators:

• Appauls.com, 8 March 2021, “Nvidia RT Cores vs. AMD Ray Accelerators – Explained”
• Vortez, 18 November 2020, “AMD Radeon RX 6800 Review“
• AnandTech, 14 September 2018, “The NVIDIA Turing GPU Architecture Deep Dive: Prelude to GeForce RTX”

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So here we are, throwing letters at you like no tomorrow- first CPUs, and now… GPUs. But what is this…. G? Graphs? Geography? …Grains? …How about… graphics! That’s right, this is an episode on Graphics Processing Units (or as they’re sometimes referred to, Video Cards!)

Sources:

GPU Definition:

• Intel.com, Accessed: 5 May 2021, “What Is a GPU?”
• NVIDIA Blog, 16 December 2009, “What’s the Difference Between a CPU and a GPU?”

Frame buffer / VRAM:

• PCMag.com Encyclopedia, Accessed: 5 May 2021, “frame buffer”
• TeamtechGB @ Youtube.com, “What is VRAM and why is it different from RAM?”
• Techguided.com, Accessed: 5 May 2021, Updated: 27 July 2019, “How Much VRAM Do I Need for Gaming (at 1080P, 1440P, 4K)”

GPGPU Programming:

• NVIDIA.com, Accessed: 5 May 2021, CUDA Zone
• Khronos.org, Accessed: 5 May 2021, Khronos Group’s OpenCL (Open Computing Language)

What Graphics Cards can be used for:

• Lifewire.com, Accessed: 5 May 2021, Updated: 28 September 2020, “Using Graphics Cards for More Than Just 3D Graphics”
• ZDNET, 13 August 2018, “How the GPU became the heart of AI and machine learning“
• Analytics Vidhya Blog, Accessed: 5 May 2021, Updated: 9 September 2020, “Why GPUs are more suited for Deep Learning?”

Major Connector Types:

• HDMI.org, Accessed: 5 May 2021, “HDMI Specifications and Programs”
• DisplayPort.org, Accessed: 5 May 2021, General FAQs

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We seem to be finally going along the whole ‘computers have lots of parts and we should talk about them’ track. Considering Apple has released their “M1” CPU powered iDevices…. maybe you should know what exactly that means? If you aren’t a fan of Apple, maybe you just want to know why Intel keeps releasing a new geographic feature every year or so.

Sources:

CPU Definition + RISC/CISC:

• ComputerHope.com, Accessed: 11 May 2021, “CPU”
• GeeksforGeeks.org, Accessed: 11 May 2021, “Microarchitecture and Instruction Set Architecture”
• Medium, 27 July 2020, “What Does RISC and CISC Mean in 2020?”

Architectures (ARM & x86):

• ITIGIC, 13 November 2020, “ARM vs x86, Why is One More Energy Efficient than the Other?“

Hyperthreading/Simultaneous Multi-threading:

• Intel.com, Accessed: 11 May 2021, “What Is Hyper-Threading?”
• TechSpot, 29 July 2019, “Testing Ryzen 9 with SMT On vs. SMT Off”
• HP.com, 14 August 2018, Accessed: 11 May 2021, “Hyper-Threading and Everything You Need to Know”

PCIe Lanes:

• Guru 3D, 5 November 2020, “AMD Ryzen 5 5600X review – PCI-Express 4.0 and the X570 Chipset“
• CotsComputers.com, Accessed: 11 May 2021, PCIe Lanes explained

APUs (Accelerated Processing Unit) & SoCs (System on a Chip):

• Tom’s Hardware, 11 September 2019, “What Is an APU? A Basic Definition”
• Tom’s Hardware, 11 September 2019, “What Is an SoC? A Basic Definition”

(Mention) Intel Last Gen i9’s (10th/9th Gen) Run Hot:

• Wccftech, 11 May 2020, “Intel Core i9-10900K 10 Core Flagship CPU Runs Very Hot & Consumes 235W Power at 4.8 GHz – Over 90C Temps With a 240mm AIO Cooler”
• Vice, 19 July 2018, “Apple’s New i9 MacBook Pro Runs so Hot It Has to Slow Down“

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‘Enhanced’ Reality Arc [2/2]

So, you’ve decided you want to get into this VR thing after all! There’s so many options- do you go console, PC, or standalone headset?

Sources:

Oculus Quest 2:

• Oculus.com, Accessed: 24 April 2021, Quest 2 Page
• Oculus.com Blog, 13 April 2021, Introducing Oculus Air Link, a Wireless Way to Play PC VR Games on Oculus Quest 2, Plus Infinite Office Updates, Support for 120 Hz on Quest 2, and More

Oculus Facebook Account Concerns:

• UploadVR, 31 January 2021, “Everything You Need To Know: Facebook Login, User Data And Privacy On Oculus Headsets“
• RoadToVR, 20 August 2020, “Here’s Where Facebook “Guaranteed” Users Would Never Need a Facebook Account to Use Oculus Headsets”
• RoadToVR, 14 September 2020, “Facebook Accounts Using Fake Names, Among Other Violations, Risk Losing Access to Oculus Content“

Oculus Quest Facebook Account Workaround:

• basti564 @ github.com, Oculess Repository

Oculus Rift S:

• Oculus.com, Accessed: 24 April 2021, Rift S Page
• The Verge, 6 April 2021, “Facebook says it’s no longer replenishing Oculus Rift S supplies“
• WIRED, 18 March 2020, “Review: Oculus Rift S”

Playstation VR (PSVR):

• PlayStation.com, Accessed: 24 April 2021, Playstation VR Page
• Jobsimulatorgame.com, Accessed: 24 April 2021, Playstation VR Tracking Guide

Vive Cosmos/Tracking Accuracy:

• Vive.com, Accessed: 24 April 2021, Vive Cosmos Page
• Vive.com, Accessed: 24 April 2021, VIVE Wireless Adapter
• RoadToVr, 6 August 2020, “Vive Cosmos Rated Least Accurate Among Top Headsets in Controller Tracking Test“

Valve Index:

• ValveSoftware.com, Accessed: 24 April 2021, Valve Index Page

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Alternatively, ‘(AR)gh, Acronyms are Hard‘

‘Enhanced’ Reality Arc [1/2]

VR, or Virtual Reality, has become more accessible over the years. But what is it, really? Is Augmented Reality the same thing? Why are there so many versions of “reality” out there? …You might need a philosopher for that last one, but we’ll do our best to explain the rest.

EPISODE MISTAKES: We explained the Original Oculus Rift’s tracking method, the Rift S actually uses a similar inside-out camera tracking method to the Quest.

Sources:

Augmented Reality/VR Definitions:

• PCMag, 31 March 2021, “Augmented Reality (AR) vs. Virtual Reality (VR): What’s the Difference?“
• WIRED, 8 March 2021, “The WIRED Guide to Virtual Reality“
• Augmented Reality Uses:
  • Interesting Engineering, 15 November 2020, “9 Powerful Real-World Applications of Augmented Reality“
  • Google’s website for Glass
  • Architect Magazine, 21 September 2017, “IKEA Launches Augmented Reality Application“
  • F-35 Sidenotes
    • Defense News, 5 March 2021, “Ripping F-35 costs, House Armed Services chairman looks to ‘cut our losses’”
    • AVweb, 5 April 2021, “Is The F-35 Irrelevant?”

VR Tracking in General:

• Mechatech.co.uk, Accessed: 14 April 2021, “How do common virtual reality tracking systems work?”

Oculus Tracking:

• SlashGear, 2 October 2019, “Oculus Quest update finally makes the VR headset worth its salt“
• TechCrunch, 22 August 2019, “How Oculus squeezed sophisticated tracking into pipsqueak hardware“

VIVE Trackers for Lighthouse-Based Devices

Mixed Reality:

• Intel.com, Accessed: 14 April 2021, “Virtual Reality vs. Augmented Reality vs. Mixed Reality”
• Microsoft Docs, 26 August 2020, Accessed: 14 April 2021, “What is Mixed Reality?”

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Is it that time again? You bet’cha! Google and Facebook have been announcing some new projects lately- all of which you should avoid. Why is that? Well, simple- nothing’s changed, and neither of them have your best interests in mind.

Check if you’re affected by FLoC here: https://amifloced.org/

Sources:

Facebook Data Leaks:

• Business Insider, 3 April 2021, “533 million Facebook users’ phone numbers and personal data have been leaked online“
• TechCrunch, 4 September 2019, “A huge database of Facebook users’ phone numbers found online“

Mark Zuckerberg on Section 230 Reform:

• TheHill, 24 March 2021, “Facebook’s Zuckerberg proposes conditional Section 230 reforms“
• The Week, 24 March 2021, “Zuckerberg calls for Section 230 reforms — but they may help Facebook“

Android sending more data than iOS:

• Ars Technica, 30 March 2021, “Android sends 20x more data to Google than iOS sends to Apple, study says“

Google’s killing the third-party cookie & FLoC (Federated Learning of Cohorts):

• Statista.com, Accessed 14 April 2021, “Revenue of Google from 1st quarter 2008 to 4th quarter 2020”
• CNBC, 14 January 2020, “Google plans to kill support for third-party cookies that track you all over the internet”
• Electronic Frontier Foundation, 3 March 2021, “Google’s FLoC Is a Terrible Idea“
• Electronic Frontier Foundation, 30 March 2021, “Google Is Testing Its Controversial New Ad Targeting Tech in Millions of Browsers. Here’s What We Know.“

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