Memory Transcription Subject: Arthek, Governor of Venlil Prime, Hobbyist Archaeologist.
Date [Standardized Human Time]: Servers Unresponsive - Date Unknown. ——
The closer we came to the hangar, the more anticipation welled in my heart. I had been told that this ship was in almost perfect condition, having spent so long in the vacuum of space. For but a moment I wondered if it truly looked like that mysterious bauble I often gazed at in my office, or if that was merely a piece of a far larger world - and this was nothing alike with it? My paws moved autonomously as I fantasized of all the information we’d gather from this, imagining all that could be found in a terminal or maybe a footlocker of personal belongings. Maybe, just maybe, we could put a face to the name ‘Man’, for all they had been for so long to us were unfathomably beings whose legs were all we could recall.
Ourron remained quiet as we approached the hangar, a sign above the sealed door displaying that this was indeed one of many hangars for astroartifacts. I held my breath as the doors shot open with a cold, metallic ‘thunk’ - revealing another hangar of similar size to the previous one I had landed in, though the blast doors that allowed ships inside were tightly closed. But my eyes were trained on the single thing that mattered on this entire craft. A breathtaking sight, I regarded something ancient. Older than my species, than my world, then even the oldest uniceullar bacteria preserved on the dark side of Venlil Prime.
A man’s ship.
It looked similar to the toy, almost. This was no rocket ship, but a proper spaceship. It was small and elegant, with artistry clearly of high concern. It’s chassis was slender, sleek, and rounded - long bleached white by solar radiation and the freezing temperatures around it. It curiously lacked windows, though it had a singular door on its side, near the rounded beak of the craft. This, to me, was evidently not meant to transport hundreds like so many of our ships were. It was huge, sure, but it was compact - enough to fit a dozen Venlil, but if the Men were as tall as genetic memory dictated - then this wouldn’t fit but a scant few.
“Behold,” Ourron spoke to me with a sober tone, as if he was somehow facing how truly temporal we were before eternity for the first time in a career focusing on such topics, “A spaceship, built almost a a century before Talsk had bacteria.”
My ears flicked at that comment. The Farsul had always prided themselves on their wisdom and forward-thinking way of life. I couldn’t imagine how bitter it must be to know that you had been surpassed before you even had the chance to exist. The Farsul had always been recognized as the closest species to Men, being one of the first to exist and understand their genetic memories. The venerable species was one of the few that had always tried to step outside the shadow of our creators, and instead walk beside their immortal steps. I doubt this was the first time he reflected on the transience of our existence, but he always was quite the actor.
“Then it’s older than we thought.” I commented, “Talsk was terraformed fifteen million years ago-“
“ - I doubt this craft was present then.” Ourron interrupted, gazing up at it before his face momentarily went flush. “Oh! I apologize, I interrupted you-“
“No, no, please continue.”
“ - I won’t rule it out however. We don’t know how long they lived, or how long their ships lived. If anything, this could have had a hand in making Venlil Prime. We discovered it only a system or two away from your world.”
That thought found itself sticking in my head. Was I looking at something that helped carve out very mountains? What made our pastures green? The more I stared at the ship before me, the more I found myself seeing it not as a ship, but as the grave of an Angel. An angel of the great god named Man, who had given us life.
I averted my gaze in respect of it. We would soon enter its belly.
Ourron led me to the set of stairs set before the craft, leading us up to a doorway that I only stood half-way to the top of. Its builders must have been colluseses to reach the control pad, which my Farsul companion had just struggled to press. To both of our surprises, the door shot open and a short hiss of decompression sounded after it. Both of our eyes widened at the sound’s passing, knowing that could only mean one thing. It … still had power. This ship had been operational since an enlightened species such as the Farsul were still banging rocks together and running from predators.
Whatever was powering this, it promised more than just deepening our knowledge of our origins. If we could find out what energy this was using, this would revolutionize the present day! We both seemed to share the same thought as we shared an awe-struck expression. Not a word needed to be shared from there. We both stepped in on our own and took in our surroundings.
It was a small ship, despite our small stature. A modest one too. The lights remained on and everything seemed perfectly preserved. Mostly. Two seats laid discarded on the ground, dozens of strange objects discarded across the floors. The windowless beak of the ship was lined with various computers in fathomable to my comparatively primitive mind, at the center being a radar still active, picking up an almost perfect view of the room it was situated in. I brushed a paw against it, feeling the ancient metal with awe.
“How?” I whispered to myself, “How are you still active?”
Stepping back, I noticed something further. Amidst the debris, there was a symbol on the floor. Hesitantly with a paw, I brushed away as much as I could to behold what was here. It was a sigil of some sort, a blue circle painted on the floor. Within was a painting of a tree, tall and gnarled - casting a shadow upon a strange quadrupedal creature that almost resembled a Venlil, who seemed to be resting in its shade.
More runes circled it, this time sharp and linear compared to the circular ones upon the toy spaceship.
‘Crescite et multiplicamini, et replete aquas maris, et volatilia multiplicentur in terra.’
Again, I wondered what that possibly could mean. Perhaps more writing, like what I expected of the toy.
But my focus was stolen from the sigil as I heard Orroun speak from the back of the small craft.
“Arthek! Come see this!”
My thoughts were stolen from me by his words and I hurried over towards the back, where things got cramped and multiple cabinets and shelves built into the ship lay empty - its contents seemingly laid on the floor around us. The Farsul was knelt on the ground, his eyes wide in shock - his mouth agape as he flapped his muzzle a few times and looked back up at me, a lip quivering as he did.
“L .. loook! Bone fragments!”
I looked down to see what he was gawking at, only to gawk myself. A large item sat on the floor, fabric … maybe Rubber, crumbled in the Farsul’s hands. It was a deep and rich orangish-red color and was seemingly for a whole body. The same color we detected in our memories. The suit itself was the size of two Venlil, and had room for two arms and legs. A thick neck led up to a hood with a glass visor. A definitive shape for Man had been uncovered, and we would make history multiple times over now.
But what he was focused on was what little structure could be found in the crumpled mess, most bones long ground to dust. But as I crouched, he guided my hand to one of the arms. I squeezed my paw on it and felt bone. A long, thin bone where the arm was. Him and I shared another look, and I dipped my head in respect to the fallen man - wondering just what fate befell our precursors. It was a several-million year old death, and yet I mourned this unnamed man just the same as if he had died yesterday. The empathy they instilled in us made us do so.
“Tell me that you’ll give them a proper funeral, and won’t just stick them in a museum to be stared at forever.” I asked.
“Always.” The Farsul responded, his voice the same as mine.
We stared at the suit for a moment more, before we decided to continue our exploration. The shelves were of no concern, though beside us was a pair of two sleeping pads on similar shelves to what assumedly carried personal belongings. The sheets and pillows laid on the ground, draped over one of the consoles, but we could tell what it was.
All that remained was the final door at the end of the ship. There was no way that it contained much, but we had to see. With some time spent to find something to stand on in order to press the pad, the door again shot open and amazed us once again. A cool blue light emanated from the room, a pod found within. It was hooked up to multiple machines built into the walls, all beeping away and monitoring …
Monitoring …
Intact vitals?
I knew a heartbeat censor when I saw it.
We knew what we had to do! A silent agreement was made between a series of glances, and I would do the honor of opening the pod and saving a possibly living man! I found the emergency latch and pulled, the pod’s upper half swinging open at surprising speeds and unveiling a Man in the same suit as his comrade.
They laid there for a moment, their chest rising and falling to indicate how alive it truly was. I had made history today in so many ways, my knock-knees wobbling as the visor turned to face us. The both of us fell to our knees in deference - dipping our heads to one of our creators. We would have to find a way to talk to them, of course, but h-
“Come closer.”
The voice shook me to my core, their voice was translated immediately - akin to rumbling thunder, deep and able to shake the foundations of my soul. Their voice was pointed, a command given to me. And I obeyed, pushing myself to my shaky paws and approaching, my gaze averted to the deity before me.
“Look at me.”
I looked up at the Man, my jaw slack at the sight. I was one of the first since the first generation to gaze at our parents. And like a child lost and reunited with his mother, I felt tears well in my eyes. Their voice was deep, but laced with compassion. The very warmth my ancestors passed down unto me.
“My God … You’re so beautiful, little one.” They spoke, unwiring themself from the machine and stepping down - the room shaking from their weight. But I was frozen, feeling the warmth of tears running down my face. The Man towered over me, looking into my very soul.
But then they crouched at eye level, and stared at me. And I couldn’t hold it in anymore, my arms shot out and wrapped themselves around one of the Man’s arms, overwhelmed by the experience.
I felt the Man’s paw upon my head, and I also felt the incredulous stare of my comrade.
“Where are your shepherds?” The Man asked softly, though I had no idea what they meant, and simply sniffled - overwhelmed by my feelings. A powerful arm wrapped itself around my back and I was pulled into its chest. It was a feeling I had never experienced, yet I always had. In the memories left by my ancestors.

Just a bit of background. We have a hybrid AD setup at work (AD on-prem and Azure AD in cloud).
We have a bunch of workstations (custom built PCs) that we want to enrol in Intune. With staff laptops I understand the benefit of autopilot, as the devices arrive and are already registered in Azure AD/Intune. But I'm not sure the best practice for enrolling computers that weren't provisioned this way.
Should I be running the autopilot ps1 script on a workstation to get the hash CSV and then upload this to Intune to add it to the Autopilot devices list, and then login via 'Connect to work or school account' (with an admin account) on the computer in order to join it to Azure AD?
Or should I not be using Autopilot at all, and just join the computer through logging in via 'Connect to work or school account'?
How does Hybrid joining fit in with all this?

Dear Microsoft Executives,
I have been using Windows since Windows 3.0. I have installed and used just about every edition of Windows that has ever existed, and I have defended it in the face of naysayers for decades. However, you are following a worrying path with your OS and have been for quite some time, and I am extremely disappointed. My voice is but one voice, but I am sure that I am not alone.
We do not want nor need the following things in Windows; they do not make our experience easier nor do they make it safer or better in any way:

1. We do not want nor need Windows to spy on us, collect our telemetry and user data, and exploit it either internally or by selling it to other companies.
2. We do not want nor need Windows to advertise to us anywhere in the OS.
3. We do not want nor need Windows to decide for us what the "best" or "safest" default apps are.
4. We do not want nor need Windows to have "AI" built-in. See #1 for more information.
5. We do not want nor need Windows to run "on the cloud" as opposed to on our local hardware.

These just scratch the surface. All of these things should be OPT-IN, only installed and/or used if you consent to them. They should not be forced on us or OPT-OUT with hidden or obfuscated ways to do so.
AI is particularly egregious because the concept of having an AI assistant in our computers is one that many of us have dreamed about for DECADES. However, corporate America can't let it just be an optional component and can't let it be 100% local and private; they HAVE to be able to monetize the data it collects.
I worry for the future of technology of all breeds; will prosthetics and implants sell our usage data and force subscription fees and ads on us? Our cars already are allowed to prevent us from using features already installed unless we pay extra money.. corporations don't want us to own anything or have any rights whatsoever with the products and services we pay for. This dystopia is in many ways worse than the cyberpunk dystopias we grew up reading about.
Anyway, I know no one important will read this and it will just collect ephemeral dust on reddit servers, but it is important. I hope many more people will read this and add to this list, and that it somehow makes it to someone who needs to see it.
Thank you for your time,
TheRogueX
​

Chapter 4: a time to check out
Memory transcript: Abigail Nelson 2277 August 21st [human standard time]
Local time: currently unknown
Abigail and Somah lurked in the shadows of the ship's interior, where there relation to the ship was currently a significant problem as the two meandered around as they attempted to avoid patrols.
Somah scoffed, clutching the shock baton she looted from a guard, an irritated and fearlook was drawn over her face as two clung to the darker spots of the ship's many hallways.
“Where not getting anywhere in here, we might as well be turning in circles”
Somah hissed in clear irritation as Abigail turned to look behind them, trying to make sure they were not being followed by any security, a makeshift bag holding a collection of hopefully hazardous cleaning supplies laying on her back.
“Well I haven't seen a terminal anywhere or anything that looks like one, and I doubt they would have a map kiosk on what I'm guessing is the brig….” Abigail retorted as the two saw a break in the guards and rushed to take advantage of it moving into another room.
The room was dark, Abigail switching on her pipboys light as Somah closed the door behind them as suddenly the lights kicked on.
“Okay it all looks clear…” Abigail said looking around as Somah nodded with a sigh lowering her guard ever so slightly. “Yeah zone secure….”
Then a sudden third voice chimed in, this one sounding far younger than either of them, The two older women jumped at the sudden intrusion of a young, white skinned twelve year old girl wearing a near pristine sports jacket and a baseball cap, one of their own stark white jumpsuits, Somah looked at the little girl shocked as Abigail was astonished at how she had managed to sneak up on them.
Before Abigail could ask the little girl anything, Somah blurted out.
“How the hell did you sneak up on us?!” she asked incredulously as the young lady simply smiled “I came in through the pipes, there all over the ship and lead to lots of places” She says as Somah glared at the girl as Abigail attempted to de-escalate the situation by kneeling down to the young girl's level.
“I'm sorry if my friend here seems a bit aggravated, we're both a little frazzled from well….” Abigail said as the young lady nodded.
“I know, i've been watching you guys from the pipe and the Mutts are REALLY mad about you guys getting out, im sally by the way” The young girl said smiling at the two.
“Well it's nice to meet you sally, i'm Abigail and my friend here is Somah, were a little lost”
“Yeah i could tell” Sally said with a clear bit of smarm to her tone “You two have been going around in a circle for two hours, i'm surprised none of the guards managed to find you but i guess they were to busy chasing their own tails”
Somah couldn't help but crack a smile at Sallys rather direct words to them.
“Well sally we don't exactly know our way…wait did you say that you've been following us? How exactly” Somah asked incredulously as she smirked back.
“The dogs have tunnels and stuff that go all over, i can fit in pretty good but i dont think you could” She said as Abby seemed to get an idea.
“Do you think you could help us get out of here? We have a plan to-” Abigail was stopped by Sally
“You want to dump a bunch of cleaning junk into the air vents, I've tried that and the spaceship knows if the air is bad and cleans it '' she said matter of factly.
Somah crosses her arms incredulously “Allrighty then little miss smarty pants how do you suppose we flush out the space dogs?” The look of incredulity on Somahs face made Sallys cocky dimenor fade for a moment as she thought.
“Well i've seen some of the Mutts go outside the ship, i've seen them fixing stuff outside but we would need a space suit” Sally said as Abigail piped up
“Where are we going to get a space suit then?”
Somah nodded in agreement as Sally piped up once more with a sudden idea, “OH! OH! We can find an astronaut in the alien freezer room! It was where they put a lot of people!”
At that description Somah and Abigail stared at one another in a mix of Fear and incredulity.
Memory transcript: Farusl Archivist Tyka Date: 2277 August 21st
Tyka was sitting at his desk, his muzzle buried into his paws as reports of the two escaped humans flooded his computers inbox, the two had managed to escape by overpowering the guards and taking there weapons…such a thing should have been impossible, predators working together should be impossible, predatory sapients never worked together, rather they dominated one another for control, but these two not only managed to outwit the guards but coordinate plan to escape and avoid being recaptured, and there hasn't been any sign of them since.
“How could this be….this shouldn't be possible, humans are predators…but….but…” The implications of this event could not be understated, not remotely so.
“There has to be a reasonable, logical explanation to how they could have worked together, what would make them realize that by working together they could achieve a higher goal….” The archivist would rack his mind, combing through the data he had from there years of post annihilation humanity and would come to realize something, humans were no longer the apex predator of the world, the impossible mutations and truly abominable “Super predators” that stalked the fire blasted world had reduced humans to a sort of, “Predator Pseudo prey”
“As a Pseudo prey that would mean they must have some form of primitive empathy, yet brutal cunning, a prospect that would seem impossible….if i hadn't just seen it with my own eyes…..what will the council of elders even say if…no, when i present this information to them upon my next update…i will have to present it very carefully….”
The moment the thought left his muzzle the door to his office opened to reveal the familiar, and domineering frame of Officer Netly, her side arm now openly carried as two guards stood outside wearing the extermination gear Tyka feared, he had seen there work first hand shortly after they captured several local feral humans, said humans attacked the moment they were let out of the capture pods, they were dirty, covered in scars and a toxicology report from the one that wasn't immolated in the so called holy purifying flame the exterminators claimed to spread like the plague that they claimed predation to be, to be fair Tyka couldn't deny the fact that predation was a illness but it was one that could be cured, he knew that and humanity for its fault deserved to be cured.
Tyka let out a deep frustrated sigh. “Hello officer Netly….do we have any updates on the two escapes?” Netly was ramrod straight with a grim look on her muzzle,
“Unfortunately no….they have managed to elude recapture, all security on the processing deck, and on that note, storage reports subject HC-0152 has escaped…again” Tyka sighed “If she wasn't a predator i would commend her for her ability to escape a high security sector, how did she do it this time? Spit in the eye of a poor operator or did she go for the shins” Netly scrunched her nose “Neither, she assaulted a young male operator by striking his reproductive organs with a violent foot strike, she then escaped into the maintenance tunnels” The way Netly presented the information made it sound about as bad as someone stubbing there paw, Tyka on the other paw flinched, what kind of psychopath would attack someones delicates like that and the visible flinch made Netly scowl.
“I am sure the news is quite disturbing, if i am to be aloud to send the exterminators i'm sure the loss of two subjects won't be as bad as having two hell world hardened predators loose onboa-” Netly found herself cut off by Tyka
“Absolutely not! HC-2251 is by far and away too important to destroy, you saw her genetic structures stability and purity! Something impossible for anyone unsheltered from the atomic apocalypse that they subjected themselves to, and considering the complexity of the device on her wrist there must of been some outside influence, and remember the footage, she ATE VEGETATION without coaxing or any previous augmentation, clearly shes at least tame” Netly seemed puzzled, still attempting to keep her stern demeanor however ever so slightly bending to his words. “So your theory is the possibility that they've…somehow…cured themselves? How? We have limited records of Earth, the last time a Farsul vessel was here was nearly 250 years ago, during there world spanning conflict, one so brutal and seemingly pointless im sure even a GREY would find it pointless” she almost spat as Tyka shook his head
“I'm unfortunately more than aware of what i'm suggesting, but this kind of forethought and technical ability, let alone the ability to collaborate with another predator shows that humans may be more empathetic than we realize, maybe the apocalypse showed them, no matter how few, that there nature was wrong! Our ancestors reports did say they consumed both animals AND Vegetation.
Netly scoffed, “Perhaps you are right and instead of uplifting the Arxur we should have bombed them to the stone age and see if they would sit by the fire and sing communal songs” She said indignantly as Tyka produced a remote control for a screen in his office and turned to on, tuning to what was a live stream of the surface of a group of dirty wasteland survivors sitting around a camp fire, and they were…singing, one held a six stringed instrument of some kind and the entire group was singing some kind of song about old roads leading to home.
“And that is just one example our observation drones picked up while observing developing costumes post flame” he says, a slight smug tone enveloping his words as Netly scrutinized the footage.
Netly was stunned, her usual demeanor clearly cracked as Tyka stepped around his desk. “I hope you can see what im trying todo, i dont want to simply preserve humanity in a glass bottle, a footnote, we, THEY have an opportunity to move past there violent past, the universe has gifted them a second chance to repent and as such we must help them see it Netly! Imagine it! We could help these poor, sick predators become REAL PEOPLE!”
Tykas words stuck a cord inside of Netly, as much as she despised predators, predators didn't sit around a camp fire singing about there lost home, people did.
“Very well Archivist…you've convinced me, i will not deploy our ships compliment of exterminators….yet, especially for HC-2251, however anyone else is fair game, HC-0125, i don't care if she is a pup i she is sly and has shown she is more than able to escape into the ducts, it took us 9 cycles [4 months] to flush her out using Fire mist and we haven't been able to refuel it since, why you had so many archived humans requisitioned is beyond me”

PHEW chapter 4 is done! i hope everyone enjoys it and the prolonged chapter, im working on flushing out the dialogue, time for chapter 5!
Previous

Hi, I don't know if this is the best place to ask this, but I'm always going to. What is the best Remote managing software for a personal home server? I have a server I built for data storage and for some other capabilities. But I still need to set up a Remote managing software for it. I don't have the space for the computers to have their dedicated monitors and keyboard. and I can't use an HDMI splitter to have it able to be split to the monitor I currently use, So I want a remote managing software that allows me to use the computer for work, data storage, and be able to watch things off of it, as I also want to use it like my own personal Netflix as I have a whole bunch of movies and TV shows downloaded to it. Any advice would be greatly appreciated, and If you need me to clarify anything, feel free to ask. I want to understand better what I should use for this server.

Just saw this pre-built for sale, and I have to admit I am tempted by it but I am well aware of the downsides of getting a pre built PC. Educate me as to why I should pass this by so I can stop considering it.
The specs for those who don't want to take the link.
AMD Ryzen™ 9 7950X (80 MB total cache, 16 cores, 32 threads, up to 5.70 GHz Max Boost Clock)
laptop Windows 11 Home, English, French, Spanish (Dell Technologies recommends Windows 11 Pro for business)
videocard NVIDIA® GeForce RTX™ 4090, 24 GB GDDR6X
memory 32 GB: 2 x 16 GB, DDR5, 4800 MT/s
harddrive 2 TB, M.2, PCIe NVMe, SSD
Advertised for $2,655
https://www.dell.com/en-us/shop/desktop-computers/alienware-aurora-r15-gaming-desktop/spd/alienware-aurora-r15-amd-desktop/wdr15amd50h?cjdata=MXxOfDB8WXww&cjevent=f88aa58217e711ef818401390a1eba24&dgc=CJ&publisherid=1583972&publisher=&aff=Ziff+Davis%2C+LLC&affid=1583972&aff_webid=7060520&aff_user_id=036KllWNuh7haOZS6KrLh8H&gacd=9684992-28463632-5750457-345576786-177846717&dgc=af&VEN1=12578053-7060520-036KllWNuh7haOZS6KrLh8H-Ziff%20Davis,%20LLC&dclid=CjgKEAjwjLGyBhDc5Y7AzITVomoSJABoaMy_J0fNJTq6wf5iiqkAet4UihqSm0spSZK6gsmt8Buk0PD_BwE
Edited to add specs

 The necropolis was gorgeous, for what it was. Its white outer walls hiding the darker Victorian Gothic interior. The tech that was hidden in the walls though was able to move bodies in their caskets from a designated place in the necropolis to the "viewing area" as the necropolians called it. This was where I waited for my, for lack of a better term, escort to take me to the mortuary. Since science has grown surprisingly fast our abilities for forensic sciences have also grown, and that's to whom I was headed. (S)He was an, unusual (wo)man to say the least. An expert in their field and about as learned as a doctor, if not multi-doctorate. If you ever asked them why they never pursued an actual doctorate, they would get angry and act all prissy while saying that going to school would've slowed them down and all they needed were the basic certificates for their work. The reality though, revealed to me during a drunken bout, they just never liked school and believed that it ultimately stunted a person's growth and ability to question the reality around them, that everything that you need to learn is already in books and in some form or another in digital content online. They were brilliant, if a little wacky. About five minutes after I had arrived and was sitting down in the viewing area, a little box rolled up to me making a couple of beeps to let me know to follow it and immediately started rolling towards the wall opposite of where it came from. When it looked like it was about to hit the wall, a hidden door opened up by the casket viewer, inside was a set of stairs leading down into the darkness. Stepping through the doorway I became acutely aware of sounds seemingly coming from all around me suddenly. It really is impressive, as though I just stepped from a tomb to a busy workshop, the sounds of gas escaping pistons, whirring, and clanking chains flooded my ears. I continued down the stairs following my helpful little box, which despite its size and shape would suggest was actually quite nimble on the stairs. It seemed to have wheels that would extend down to the next step as the edge rolled over it and once the back of the box was clear of the step it would drop back into its squat position, hiding its wheels as quickly as possible. It continued to do so the entire way. The box seemed to notice me watching it and made a kinda shrill whistle and its undercarriage light went from a comfortable yellow to a, is that... Peach? Is it blushing? My god I think it is! I let out a small chuckle and my little blushing box stopped dead in its tracks mid-step, its light suddenly going white, almost blinding me from behind and lighting up the hallway for a split second. Luckily both of my feet were solidly on a step so I didn't take a tumble or anything, but I couldn't help doing anything but laughing harder. 

After a second the little box crept up behind me and continued down, its status light continuing to show pinkish. I followed it slowly, the chuckle slowly dying in my throat as we reached Ceriths office. Well "office" was being nice. Morgue, mortuary, both of these fit just as well. Cerith was, for the most part, a recluse. We reached the door and the little robot continued through a little hole in the wall. I waited a second and knocked. "Enter!" Came the voice on the other side. I opened the door and stepped through. Along one wall set doors that normally housed the dead waiting to be processed. One out of dozens were open, its occupant missing from its silver slab. The middle of the room was brightly lit from a single overhead light. In the middle of the circle of light stood a figure, long Raven colored hair bound in a single braided ponytail, the rest of them bound in medical examination garb. They seemed to be engrossed in the corpse in front of them. The little robot rolled up next to Ceriths feet and made a little chiming noise. "Thank you Tabitha. That'll be all," said a voice that was neither male nor female from beneath the mask. Just sort of in the middle. "Tabitha? Never knew you to be sentimental," I said gently, the chuckle in my voice making itself clear. "I see you still find even the darkest things funny," Cerith quipped back. "My line of work Cer, you take the laughs where you get them. Look who's talking anyway, you're usually elbows deep inside someone 25/8. Even you have a seriously fucked up sense of humor." That got Cerith laughing, sounding like thunder and the whip crack of lightning at the same time. "You've got me there Julius," Cerith said after his laughter subsided. I think he suits him today. Which is both a good and bad sign. When Cerith is acting like a man, it usually means some grim news, but they are going to try to make it seem like not a big deal and laugh a lot. Plus they almost never call me Julius. Something was wrong. Very seriously wrong. As this realization hit me I got this odd tingle in the small of my back. Like someone had put several freezing needles under the skin and into my spine, something I'm familiar with from the anima-games from the cyber sphere. Halos: Divine Retribution If I remember right. Those Angels were sadistic bastards. I shuddered at both the memories from the game and the shockingly similar feeling I was experiencing. Dread, that feeling is dread my friend, the quiet part of my mind whispered to me. "Cer, what's wrong bud," I asked. He didn't say anything. For a long time. After a few minutes I was about to ask again, but then he spoke. And what came out will haunt me, quite possibly till the day I die. "This ones temporal lobes are gray matter. Nothing even close to being coherent. Just. Dead neurons. And he's not the first." Gone was the jovialness of the past ten minutes. This was Cerith the whisperer. In an almost dead tone they continued, "the others didn't fare nearly as well as this one. Most of the brain is intact here, which means that if they didn't deliver a massive shock or something similar to fully kill him he would have possibly lived as a vegetable with memory issues, but that's not what I'm looking for in this one here now. Now I'm trying to figure out what else the others had in common with him, and so far that's brought up all but naught. Well this one has a bit of liver damage. But that's about it. So Mr John was a drinker. Not much there." When Cerith is "whispering" the best thing to do is just let him be. But I couldn't help but prick my ears up at mentions of others with similar wounds, and the fact that this one had liver issues.... "Cer. You said... CERITH," I finally snapped out and caught his attention mid ramble. "Thank you. You said liver problems. But nothing similar to the others? No drugs? Alcohol? Not even a synth brain-pattern? You checked Everything?" "Well let's see, John here was a drinker that's for sure," Cerith said his hands never ceasing their work as he started to put 'John' back together seemingly satisfied that he found nothing else, " Mr Lombardo in chest 3 had cocaine mostly, and Mr Lei in chest 9 had opium. Although to tell you where it came from for both I'd have to do a molecular analysis and see what it compares to. Other than that, no. Absolutely nothing connecting any of them. As far as I can tell they are all unique cases completely separate from each other except for the damages to the brain. And I only found this by accident. During a routine scan I happened to look at the screen as it passed through the brain and noticed an odd density in his temporal lobes. Just slightly higher than normal. Hell to be honest with you it had the density of a fresh cutie, you know those little oranges?" I nodded, and he continued, "Right of course you do, who hasn't? Anyways it's just super dense compared to the surrounding tissues, and I take a sliver probe and drop it in like you do. And when I turn the damn thing on to look at the neurons the area all I see are dead cells packed on top of one another. Not natural decay death, but forced to die. Most of the cell walls were torn open like they had blown up from the INSIDE. That's when I called you." He finished up with 'John' putting the final few perfect stitches in place and sealing him up for good. Once he seemed happy with his work he called out to his seemingly empty morgue, "Grom I'm done! Can you put Mr John Doe here back in his room? Number 11 if you please." He turned away from the body on the table and removed the giant rubber gloves that went to his elbows. He walked into the dark calling out over his shoulder, "I'll be back in a sec I gotta scrub out, want a drink? I have beer, whiskey, vodka, I might have some Cognac somewhere, and bourbon. Your choice, just call out what you want and Tabitha will be there with it. Also have a seat! We have much to discuss." With that he disappeared from both sight and sound in the dark. It was a neat trick I have to admit, and it had something to do with how he had his morgue set up. Even the giant war machine that was Grom was absolutely quiet unless you managed to catch him through the gloom. I thought for the longest time the reason why I could never catch him sneaking around was from some sort of stealth program put into place, but when he goes up and down those stairs he's as loud as can be. So it was definitely not his program but the way the morgue was built. I'm confident in saying that because when I turned back to look at the table, or rather where it was, there was now a chair that looked like it had just grown out of the floor and the body was gone. Also the thought of something as big as a fridge just sneaking up on some poor combatants and snapping their necks as quietly as he walks in the morgue just gives me the heebies. As I sat in the chair a thought occurred to me. Considering how advanced the morgue seemed to be it would make sense that it had some sort of AI or integrated computer. "Computer?" I had been here a million times but I'd never had a chance to think about it nor try anything. But not even a second after I had said anything a response came. "Yes Detective Julius. My name is DANNA. Or Dynamically Actualized Neural Net AI. How can I be of service?" The voice seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere, slightly feminine and breathy, all service but no sex. Honestly I was just surprised that it worked. "DANNA, I was just wondering if I could take a look at the files that Cerith had mentioned? If it is as bad as they claim I think I might need to know anyway. Also if you can get those blood works done for me I'd appreciate it. Also something with whiskey or rum would be amazing." "Of course Detective. I will have Tabitha bring it shortly. And how would you like the information to be displayed? Desktop or dynamic?" That piqued my interest. "Dynamic please." No sooner than I had said a series of screens blinked into existence in front of me. It was some sort of Holographic display. I reached out and touched the display and was surprised that I got stopped by something. It was hard but surprisingly I found that I could push into the screen with my finger if I pushed hard enough. It kinda felt like... Oobleck. I also found that by pinching the corner I could pull the screens closer or further from me. I even found that I could grab individual pages of the reports off the screen and hold it. It felt like a thin sheet of plastic and responded like both a tablet and a singular document. If I switched pages the old one would appear back onto the screen and the next would pop onto it. This was about as slick a set up as I had ever seen and whistled my appreciation under my breath, I'm definitely going to have to ask Cerith about where they got DANNA from. "See something you like, big boy?" A very DEFINITELY female voice said in my ear from behind, soft and throaty, screaming come hither. I felt small dainty hands gently caress the tops of my shoulders before slipping down the front of my chest, pulling me back into the chair that I didn't realize I had been slouching in. "You know better than that, Jules. Your back is important and slouching will destroy the muscles and cause some to atrophy." The voice left no room for argument, and left me more than a little bit flushed. I closed my eyes and dropped my head back as far as it would go, the back of my head hitting something soft and warm, stretching my neck and back out. "Damnit Cer I thought you were scrubbing out, not completely changing." I hadn't realized it, but at least an hour had passed from when I started playing with the computer and working with the files if the clock on the computer was to be believed. "You looked like you were pretty into it so I decided not to disturb you. Plus you know how much fun it is for me to tease you like this. Especially after, well these..." One hand waved at the screens in front of me. The small hands' nails were painted the darkest black and almost made them blend into the void that existed outside of the screens. "I do Cer, and that's part of the problem, we both know that it's never going to happen. Least of all for you." She laughed a little, a clear beautiful sound and the body beneath my head bounced slightly telling me I was against her stomach. "Still I know you enjoy these little moments," she said, the pressure on the back of my head disappearing and was replaced by the voice right by my ear again as she whispered, "especially when we both know that's not at all true." At the last words she nibbled my ear gently. I couldn't help but roll my eyes at her, in spite of my baser instinct rising to meet her VERY juicy insinuations. But for as long as I've known Cerith and as many times as we have both been VERY drunk, they have NEVER cashed in. I just assumed that it was a quirk of theirs. "Anyways," she said standing back up, "what are you thinking so far about the files? Spooky, right? Like I said, nothing that I can see connects them." Her hands gestured in front of me in an approximation of a shrug. She then clasped them together, wringing the knuckles and effectively trapping me in the chair and back against her abdomen. I scrubbed my eyes with my fingertips acutely aware of the growing headache that suddenly made itself known. "Your right from the medical side. I can't see everything you can, of course. I don't have near the knowledge that you have," which is true being that Cerith is at least 200 years old. I never asked directly, the old adage still holding about women and their age. Still though her answers to certain questions would lead one to believe her being her first adult car was a Bing Cherry 2201 Firebird GT with white walled hover trim and chrome accents. From pictures that I could find it looked like a slick piece. Looking back to the screens I couldn't help but feel that itch again. I couldn't explain it. That prickly feeling of ice needles again, this time in the back of my skull. As much as I'd hate to admit it. I think Cerith is right. I sighed heavily before saying "send me everything. I'll open a new case file and have the team start working on it first thing." She made a happy noise and bounced slightly, clearly satisfied with my decision to take it on. I reached out and to my left and a glass was placed gently into my hand by Tabitha. I hadn't even realized she had come over while I was working and was now ready for that drink. Room temperature rum and cola. The drink went down smoothly enough considering I drained the glass in one gulp, during which time I finally got a good eyeful of Ceriths current form. Or rather the underside of part of it. From what I could tell she was wearing a black T-shirt. That was it. I put the glass back down, it's job done without moving my head and said, "What a lovely view Cerith. I'm guessing you chose this to try to get a rise out of me?" I couldn't lie though it was affecting me, but I couldn't let her know that. Not when she's like this. Otherwise she'll continue to tease me till she leaves me with the absolute worst case of blue balls this side of the City. Her hands came up and cupped my chin almost lovingly, and her voice said "Of course Detective. Do you not approve? Or would you rather I change back to my medical examination form? Or something else?" Her words dripped with implied sex. I groaned, loudly, and said, "This is fine. Jesus Cer." Before we could continue our most scintillating of conversations there was a sudden PING! And DANNA said, "I'm sorry to interrupt, but there's a message for you Cerith. It says 'If you can get to the department Cerith, do so. We need you to explain your paperwork. And if Detective Julius is still with you have him come in too.' signed the Chief. Would you like to reply?" 'Shit, I forgot the morgue kills all signals,' I thought to myself as I stood up gently (regretfully) prying myself from Ceriths grasp with a, "duty calls. Need a lift?" I stretched gently, the scales in between my shoulders clicking appreciatively for the stretch, and turned around to notice she was indeed, just wearing a black T-shirt that hugged her voluptuous figure closely. The scales in my back clicked shut in surprise. Cerith let out a small cute chuckle, "I see after all this time I can still surprise you," she said blowing a kiss my way, reminding me of a little Gothic pixy. I rolled my eyes away from her and willed my scales to relax. I grabbed my jacket off the back of the chair, slinging it on and clicking the neck clasp shut under the cord that connected my scales to the unit in my head. I was awarded the cybernetics upon completing my training and getting all my licenses to have them. The force had allowed me to customize it, I had chosen top of the line. A dual unit with custom built AI. The individual scales were ceracoated titanium microprocessors all running in both series and parallel, and could move to expel heat or react. The main unit was the same except it was one solid unit that replaced a chunk of skull. Once that was done I zipped up the front of the leathers and ran the scales through the racer setting. They clicked and flattened against the outside of the jacket, securing it to my back. I shrugged making sure it was comfortable. "I'll take the fact that you're only in a t-shirt you'll be along shortly?" "Certainly detective." Her voice was filled with dismissive submission... And sadness? I looked back at her and noticed her makeup was gone. Or had she had any on in the first place? I gave myself a mental shake. There's no way. This was Cerith, veritable goddess of the necropolis. I put the last few minutes away for review later. Chief called. I have to go. On an instinct I thought long dead, I reached out and squeezed her hand. I felt a slight squeeze back. And then she let go with a, "Go on, be a good detective. I'll be along shortly." I left with Tabitha as my guide. Before Cerith disappeared into the darkness I thought I heard her whisper, "please don't leave." My scales raised in a saddened response. I couldn't be sure I heard her right though. If I heard her at all. I reached back and stroked them, knowing my ai probably heard her, and knowing it could feel me touch the scales. After a few seconds the scales settled down. 'I know buddy,' I thought to the AI. It couldn't respond like usual AI. The force thought that was too dangerous. What if it went rogue? What if it tried to kill the host and take over? The list went on and eventually they decided the basics were ok. When I got my unit one of the first things I did was jack it into a diagnostic to see what kind of hardware I was dealing with exactly because manufacturer specs from real use are sometimes different with AI if the bits and bobs are in place. When I did, all I got on the screen was 'Hello?'

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Okay, I finally got so mad about this to actually have the will to come here and type all of it.
First, my PC specs:

• AMD Ryzen 7 5700G
  
• AMD RX 6750 XT
  
• Galax B550M
  
• 32GB (2 x 16) RAM DDR4 3600MHz (capped at 3000MHz because of mobo)
  
• Corsair 650W PSU
  
• Windows 11 installed on an NVME SSD
  

Okay, so my PC does fine most of the time, I can for example run Forza Horizon 5 at 4K 60 fps HDR with no frame drops at all, beautiful experience. But then, there are SOME types of games like Alan Wake 2, Dead Space Remake (I know it has traversal stutters, but mine are definitely much worse and happen way more often, even while not walking at all), Hellblade 2 that just released today, Ready or Not, and some other games have the worst stutter I ever saw in my life.
I actually just recorded this because my friend didn't believe how much the game was stuttering for me. He has an RX 6600, which is supposed to be much worse than mine, but it turns out he was running the game with better graphical options than me and the game didn't stutter at all for him. Every time something like this happened, I just assumed that the game was poorly optimized or something like that, but in this case, I have a friend to compare with.
Initially I tried lowering Hellblade 2's graphics to the lowest resolution possible and lowest graphical options possible, but no matter what, it kept having these stutters (to be honest at this point it's not even stuttering anymore, it's just halting basically). And what I noticed is that these types of long stutters have been happening to me all this time of owning this PC, specially with Hellblade 2, Alan Wake 2, and Ready or Not. It feels like these 3 games are cursed on my PC tbh. I'd say it happens with most Unreal Engine titles on my PC, but then Alan Wake 2 is not made in Unreal and has the same weird behavior as those other titles. Also, Persona 3 Reload is made in UE4 and it does not have those weird stutters (apart from shader compilation stutters, that go away after 15 min of playing). I know this also happened with other games, but I can't remember from the top of my head at the moment, but yeah, the same exact type of long stutter happened with other games, independently of graphical options.
I built this PC myself, and I like to consider myself somewhat versed in computers. I've been building computers since 2013, and I always successfully solved problems like this myself. But after 2 years of having this rig, I honestly don't know what to do anymore. The funniest part is that I recently bought a gaming laptop that has an RTX 4060 in it, which I thought would have less performance than my PC. I got so mad today with this Hellblade 2 situation that I decided to install it on that laptop just to test it. I got literally zero stutters there, and the performance is remarkably better. I didn't even consider putting heavy games on it at first because I thought that my PC would naturally handle those much better. And tbh, it was a long time since I had a gameplay this smooth on a PC that I own on a recent good looking game like that.
Okay so...
What I have tried:

• Checked that my RAM is at 3000MHz (which is the fastest my Mobo can do).
  
• Updated my BIOS to the latest version (which btw is from 2022, if this info helps).
  
• Disabled fTPM on the BIOS.
  
• Updated GPU drivers to the latest version.
  
• Did a clean install of Windows 11.
  
• Enabled/disabled Free Sync on my monitor.
  
• Lowering the graphics to hell.
  
• Called Saul (no answer)
  

If anyone manages to solve this, I will honestly buy you two cookies. I figured this has passed my current knowledge limit, or it could also be that I'm ignoring a gigantic detail. I really don't know anymore. Thank you for reading through all of it!

So this is my newest machine, it is based on the MICRO 8088 project by Sergey Kiselev.
It is truly hard to call this a old computer and then again its not new, see there are some NOS chips in the build, Processor, Math Co-Processor, VGA Chip etc but most of it is New.
Specs:

• 8088 Main Board - NEC V20 Running at 9.4Mhz, Intel 8087-1 Math Co-Processor, 1Meg of RAM(only 640 available and 128k in UMB) new BIOS and PS/2 style keyboard connector.
• Monster Floppy Controller Card - controller can control 4 floppy drives, I have setup to only do 1 floppy right now. There is also a 9-pin serial port I use for a Mouse.
• 8-bit Ethernet Card - Yes that's right this PC XT has a network card! It is another of the projects for the MICRO 8088 by Sergey and well it is really only good for Telnet BBS, but just amazing for that. It only runs at 10mbits.
• ISA Super VGA - an 8bit VGA card using the Trident TVGA-9000 chip w/ 512k of memory.
• RTC or Real Time Clock board Ver 3.o - this is support directly in the custom BIOS by Sergey, neat to have a real clock in an early DOS machine.
• XT-IDE card - so I can use a Compact Flash Card (CF Card) as the hard drive, in my case a MASSIVE 128MB.
• SoundBlaster 1.5 - sound card by David Larsson. What do I say its a sound blaster, but NEW (mostly) still uses the NOS Yamaha OPL2 chip and CMS (SAA1099) Game Blaster chips

All those cards are plugged into a 7 slot backplane (again by Sergey) that uses a 20 Pin PICO power supply for the whole system. The case is 3D printed and has a space for one 3.5 inch drive (In me case a 3.5" 1.44 meg floppy)
So in the end this is a truly hand built PC as all 2 of these cards I built from the bare PCBs, the only reason I did not build the two (Soundblaster and XT-IDE) is, I wanted a joystick port on the sound card and all the project level cards do not support one and the XT-IDE I already had from my old PCjr project.
It is great to BBS and play a few of these old games again, the VGA makes all the difference in world as back in the day when I had a PC XT I had CGA and much later EGA and well CGA is terrible, but now I remember the other problem with original PCs IRQ and Address Space.
I hope you enjoyed reading about and seeing the project.
C0op3r

I've been using Apple computers for work for more than 10 years. All of our devices in the family are Apple. We also have two Xboxes in the house fwiw. Twenty years ago when I was in college, I bought and assembled desktop computer parts from NewEgg - but I feel pretty out of my depth now.
My son is 10 and on the spectrum. He's desperate to have a computer that will allow him to play BeamNG. Is there a laptop or desktop, ideally pre-built, that can run this software for under, say $500? I have an extra monitor on hand he can use. Would you be so kind as to share a link or two of some options you'd consider? I mean, I'd even be up for trying to build a new computer from parts if I had some kind of current guide to tell me what parts to get...
Thanks in advance for any advice you can offer.

What’s up everyone! I responded to a comment about this a few days back, but thought it would be good as its own post. I attended GoFest NYC last year and here is an updated list of what to bring. Keep in mind I left my air bnb in the morning and didn’t come back until the end of the day.
In my backpack:
Portable Chargers! - Yes, bring multiple! Can’t stress that enough. This obviously depends how powerful yours is, but I would go through 1.5-2 per day last year. I personally recommend anything by Anker.
Snacks / Water - Personally I just kept some granola / energy bars in my bag. I’d frequently stop at 7/11 and CVS to stock up on drinks and such. I found it annoying to fill up the bag with tons of waters before I left as it’s just adding unnecessary weight to your back the whole day. - BEFORE YOU GO TO RANDALL’S ISLAND: load up on snacks. The food trucks there were expensive and the lines were long! Eat a big meal before heading over there.
Small Umbrella - If you own a small and light umbrella, it definitely came in handy as there isn’t a whole lot of shade in certain parts of the city.
Go + + - DO NOT use the auto catching feature if the device is new to you. I lost many shinies last year because of it. Just use it to spin stops to keep items stocked!
Clothing
GOOD SUPPORTIVE SHOES - Also cannot stress this enough. I walked over 150 KM’s last year and my feet were blistered top to bottom. Highly recommend getting a good running or walking shoe (New Balance makes good ones). I’d also look into pairs of anti blister socks.
Bucket Hat - Keeps the sun out of your eyes. Perfect for long days in the sun!
Sun Glasses / Sun Screen - self explanatory 😎
Hope this helps!

So, my keyboard is a bit... Bizarre (lol). I can't play normally, I had to learn new controls for playing. While pressing space or enter works normally, trying to go up, down, side to side was a headache since i don't have up and down keys. I eventually was able to figure out that H/L for left and right, and J/K is for up and down. I just use the Windows key to exit the window.
Now the problem is saving the game... I tried using the ESC key but it just works the same as the Enter key. I clicked every key on that keyboard and yet... Nothing. I'm not sure what to do... Idk how to make it so the computer registers a key as a command. I'm not much of a 'gamer', this computer was built by my older brother during COVID, and eventually gave it to the family to use bc he has a new computer? Idk but we have that one now... The old keyboard that had all of the commands and stuff got replaced with the smaller one bc of reasons idk about. I'm just rambling here sorry.
Also, just a side note..., um any advice on not getting incapacitated? Even though I'm playing easy mode, I somehow keep getting myself incapacitated... The furthest run I've gotten is to when Holly gets sick. I had been exploring the place, being quite through and stuff in that run and um... Even though the girl told me not to touch the rock in the art class... I still did because I was curious...... I had gone back to my house after Holly got sick and saw the rock moving in the hallway... I touched it and... Sigh. I couldn't even be mad.
Im gonna try another run in a couple of days. I have finals tomorrow and the day after tomorrow so I can't really let myself play or be on social media either. Adieu... I'm not sure how to say goodbye

Hi all!
I hope you don’t mind me jumping ahead as my 2.5 year old is currently waiting for her formal assessment, but her SLP and myself/my husband are seeing all of the diagnostic criteria for autism and my family in particular is genetically very neurodivergent. But this question in particular is causing us a lot of stress.
For those who were diagnosed young, what did you personally find was your preference when it came to visible interventions that set you apart from other kids?
Our daughter is struggling most obviously with auditory processing and sensitivity. Headphones to dampen the sound around her will likely be very helpful in the future - but they are also very visible to other kids. When she is older she will be able to wear earplugs which are more hidden, but not for a while.
My brother (ADHD) was given accommodations as a child that were very successful for him academically (taking tests in a silent room alone, using a computer vs. pen and paper, etc.) but he says he wishes my parents didn’t implement them as they highlighted that he was different from other kids and he was bullied.
I of course have NO problem with her “standing out” and bought her the comfiest headphones I could find in her favourite colour to keep in her going out bag for noisy bathrooms with hand driers, loud music in stores, etc. that cause her a lot of distress. They are actually amazing and I kind of want a pair for myself! But I can be a bit intense and I don’t want to push stuff like this in school for more minor discomfort and single her out. Would love anyone’s thoughts.

Pc specs:
-16GB RAM -1tb SSD -RX 6600 6gb -ASUS Prime B450M-A II AMD AM4 (Ryzen 5000, 3rd/2nd/1st Gen Ryzen Micro ATX Motherboard -AMD Ryzen 5 5600 -MSI MAG A550BN Gaming Power Supply 80 Plus Bronze Certified 550W -GAMDIAS RGB Gaming ATX Mid Tower Computer PC Case with Side Tempered Glass Panel and Excellent Airflow Design & 3 Built-in 120mm ARGB Fans

Expedition Yeltomar
Frank, a human male in his middle ages, sits in the pilot seat of the small single occupant shuttle. It had been a rather challenging descent so he was taking this time to catch his breath and settle his nerves. The Zeno-biologist has been exploring planets for the past year, jumping from system too system, cataloging planets for the galactic federation. He has already cataloged 3 other life bearing planets in the last 17 systems but this one was by far the most challenging.
Star system 2B38A-22 is a fairly mundane system with a larger K-class orange dwarf star at its heart. It contains a single gas giant and a common ice giant in its outer system with the molten metallic core of another gas giant circling in a 15 day orbit of its parent star. Just farther out is the planet he is currently landed on, being a sizable heavy gravity terrestrial world of 2.8 galactic standard gravity and having an unusually dense atmosphere of 8.1 galactic standard.
Frank takes a deep breath and pulls himself out of the seat. The high gravity of this world was proving difficult to fight against after his time in deep space. 'I really need to get more exercise. I'm getting weak here.'; he says too himself. Being an Earth born human, this world is only 1.6 times the gravity of Earth, so should not be this hard to manage. Walking slowly over too the science station he starts taking readings on the atmosphere of the planet too see if he will need the bulky atmosphere isolation suit, or just the re-breather. 'Hmmm. 40% Oxygen, 30% Carbon dioxide, 22% Methane, trace amount of Nitrogen, Neon, Helium, other gasses too low to make out. That's a novelty. Gravity and atmospheric pressure high enough to hold onto Helium.'; he thinks, starting to get into his elements again.
'Dangerously low biodiversity, mostly grasses and a few types of larger shrub and tree analogs. The limited animal life seems to be almost entirely evolved to use some type of flight. Almost no ground based life. But seems to be a stable marine biodiversity. Signs of a recent mass extinction event, no more then 1000 stellar cycles ago. No signs of civilization detected. No ruins or any forms of technology detected. Anomaly? Hmmm. What type of anomaly? Electromagnetic/Radio-logical. Odd... Close by as well. I'll have to check that one out.'; he reads off in his head. The results read out by the sensors were a bit erratic, changing a bit randomly as he watched them. The thick atmosphere and the shifting magnetic field of the planet are having negative effects on the shuttles sensors, making them unreliable.
"The atmosphere should be breathable, even without the re-breather. That's a nice change. But that high methane level will probably stink. Not so sure about the density though. It's thick as soup out there. Might want the re-breather just in case. Temperature seems fine and there isn't anything dangerous in the atmosphere so won't need the suit at least. Thank goodness for that. Wasn't looking forward to trying to move around in that bulky thing in this gravity."; Frank was starting too think out loud again. Being out here in unexplored space was starting to get too him. "Did you get the info dump Bimni? Is the info matching up with your reading up there?"; Frank calls out, having pushed the comms button in the science lab.
BrightEyesAtSea is a female Adelie Astor-geologist who is unfortunately stuck in their "mother-ship" due too the Adelie being unable to handle high gravity planets. She was quite displeased to say the least. So many different interesting mineral combinations to study and she was stuck ship side. Bimni was a name the human, Frank, had said when trying to shorten her name and it just kind of stuck. Not that she minded, but why couldn't he just use her full name? "Reading different up here. Not seeing that anomaly reading either. Blasted electromagnetic interference."; she Warbles out. The translation software working well to convert her Adelie churrs into human guttural speech, and vise verse. "This one is your call. You've got the more accurate atmospheric readings. Not sure about the rest. Something is off on this world, the chemistry just does not add up."
That did not bode well. If Bimni was having bad feelings, then he needed to be careful. Her gut feelings had proven more accurate then any sensor. "Noted. I'll be careful when out and about. Just keep Rover warmed up and send him down if anything goes wrong."; Frank responds in turn. Rover was a military robotic mech that, despite many attempts at reprogramming, they were not able to tone down its brutishly aggressive responses to stimuli. So they never use it for anything but hazardous environments or when things go wrong. "Just be sure to grab as many mineral samples as you can fit onto the shuttle. It would be so much easier if I could just be down there.": Bimni responds with a huff. Frank can feel her telepathic annoyance even from this range, so she must be truly furious about being stuck ship side.
Finding no other reasons to postpone this, Frank grabs the re-breather and walks, still slowly, over too the airlock. "Alright Bimni. I'm heading out. I'll keep in touch with you using the shuttle as a relay. Hopefully the interference doesn't get too bad."; Frank says after after linking up the mobile comms earpiece to the shuttles antenna. It's not like he was going to go far from the shuttle anyways. Not in this gravity. Just far enough to reach that anomaly. Cycling the airlock, he steps inside. Deciding to wait on the re-breather for now, he clips it too his belt. He would see how bad the atmosphere was and decide from there. Pushing the cycle button, he waits for the airlock to balance atmospheres with the outside, getting a taste of the atmosphere in the process.
As the airlock finishes cycling and opens, Frank is hit with the thick humid atmosphere and the raw smell of methane. Huh. The smell was not as bad as he thought it would be. But the thick humid air was another matter. "It's like pea soup out here."; Frank comments. "I could almost swim in this stuff. But at least its not hard too breathe." Bimni quickly responds with; "Gee thanks. Now I want a bowl of pea soup, and you know we ran out 5 cycles ago." She didn't sound any happier after that comment. "Well sorry for making you hungry, with all the good food being on the mother ship and me only having excursion rations."; he jokes back at her hoping to at least lessen her bad mood. "The only solace I have for being stuck up here."; Bimni coos back, seeming to have lost at least some of her bad mood.
Frank takes his first steps out of the airlock onto this new world and... \*SPLAT\* feels something wet and soft hit his head and slide down his side. Lifting a hand up to wipe the side of his head, he is met with a slimy substance with bits of plant matter and something else. Tentatively, he takes a sniff; "Fraaack...."; Frank lets out with a sigh. Looking up he sees a 2 meter long gasbag creature with undulating manta ray like wings slowly swimming away high above him. "First steps out of the shuttle and I get crapped on by an alien."; he says with a bit of disgust. This is quickly answered with a trilling chuckle from Bimni though the comms. "Not a word."; he says too Bimni, who continues to chuckle even louder. Retracing his steps back up to the shuttles airlock, he reaches inside and grabs one of the rag towels and wipes off the droppings from his head and side. What a great start this is...
20 minutes later, Frank has already loaded several unique looking rocks into the shuttle for Bimni to examine later and has determined that there are in fact TWO types of grass in the surrounding area. Wow. And what is that? Another one of those elongated gasbag creatures high above. Both of the grasses are very similar too each other it seems, both being nearly black in color too absorb as much of the very dim light given off by the orange sun in the sky as possible. It is quite dim out despite it being close too mid day with the sky being completely clear. The thick atmosphere dispersing a lot of the light and giving everything a red orange tint with blues being quite faint. In the distance he can see a cluster of shrubs that look like thick orange coral with yellowish black balloon like gas bags growing out of the ends of each branch. And beyond that, in the general direction of the anomaly readings, there is an unusual rock formation overgrown with some type of plants.
"Still not much too see here Bimni, other then a few odd rocks here and there. I grabbed several samples for you already before you ask. The lack of diversity here is quite disconcerting."; Frank comments to Bimni through the comms. In response he only hears the faint crunching of whatever she had found to munch on while he did all the hard work down here. "Still making my way towards the anomaly. Hopefully there will be something interesting there. At least the bushes ahead are something different. Seem to be a thick stemmed Ficus analog with inflated leaf structures that look like balloons. Some type of adaptation to the high gravity I'm sure."; he continues the running dialog he's been trying to keep up since the gasbag poo incident. Though it has been hard too due with how little there has been to discuss.
Closing in on the bushes, they are in fact, just as he though. Similar to a ficus with thick stems, and the leaves are gas filled balloon like structures that hold up the stems. Really not much to look at other then being completely alien with a fascinating symbiosis with a few benign bacteria that seem to produce the gas that fills its leaves. A sudden sound diverts his attention. Frank looks up just in time to track an unusual 1 foot long bird like creature taking off from the ground in a hurry. The creature has 2 pairs of feathered wings attached too a bird like body, a long swan like neck with a bird like beaked head that hangs down below it's body, no legs, and 2 highly aerodynamic gasbags on it's back. This bird is already moving fast and accelerating even faster as it moves at a right angle too him. "That's a new one. A bird like life form. Has both 2 sets of feathered wings and a pair of gasbags for lift. It's fast too!"; he excitedly says too Bimni.
His excitement is short lived though, as a loud POP is heard and a 3 clawed tentacle is suddenly attached through the birds gasbag, holding onto the bird. This tentacle is in turn part of a large wing shaped creature with an open mouth, filled with sharp teeth, attached too the bottom of its wing shaped body. The bird is quickly dragged backwards towards the open mouth and swallowed hole. The whole time this flying wing creature is rippling with different colors like an earth cuddle fish. Before Frank can even exclaim about it, there is a soft booming sound as trails of faint smoke start to come out of a cylindrical shaped bulge on each side of the wing shaped creature before it shoots forwards at high speed, climbing up upwards again before it's body ripples with color one last time then seems to fade into the sky as its body color quickly matches the color of the sky.
"By all that's holy! Your not going to believe this one..."; Frank says in a hushed tone. His excitement replaced with caution and a bit of fear. "There's a flying predator here that can camouflage to match the sky. Damn thing appeared in the sky out of no where and then was gone from sight just as quickly. Wolfed down that bird like you do with those sardines you like so much."
"Are you safe?"; Bimni responds with honest concern in her squawking voice.
"I think so. Don't see that thing anywhere. But you better make sure Rover is ready too launch on a moments notice in case that thing comes back. The damn thing seemed to be jet powered as well."; Frank responds, still a bit shaken up. He was not expecting anything like that, he wasn't going to lie. Looking around him, there was no shelter nearby other then the rock formation ahead.
"Can you take shelter for a bit somewhere? Just in case it's still around?"; Bimni asks, sounding quite concerned as she preps Rover for immediate launch.
"There's no where too take shelter. Closest is that rock formation. Hopefully there is some place to shelter near there."; Frank responds, not feeling very confident. But it's that or make a break for the shuttle, a good 15 minutes away though the open grasses.
"Do it. And by the gods, keep your human senses open!"; Bimni blurts out.
Frank didn't even bother with a response. He went into a full jog, the fastest he could move in the high gravity of this world. Even with his crazy human endurance, he was all too quickly winded and forced too slow down as he neared the rock formation. Finding an overhang with a shallow but human sized indent under it he ducks into it. It might not be much, but at least he only need to worry about what's in front of him now. "I'm there... Found a... overhang. In shelter."; he panted out. "No sign... of danger." He hasn't felt this winded since he used to run marathons back on Earth.
Having taken a moment to catch his breath again, Frank places his hands on the sides of the indent he's tucked into and only now realizes something is off. Pulling his eyes away from looking for danger, he glances at the surfaces around him. Too smooth. He runs his hands along it again and can feel the seams of... construction? "Uh Bimni? This rock formation is not natural. It was constructed."; he says in a slow quiet voice.
"What? Someone carved it?"; she asked. Frank ran his hands along the underside of the overhang while watching for danger, feeling the framework and paneling that was used too construct it. Metal. "No. It's a structure of some type. It's made of metal."; he responds. No ruins or technology my arse! "Wish you were down here even more now, your better with this stuff."
"I'm sending down Rover. I'll put it on manual and pilot it remotely myself."; Bimni states with a sharp chirp, leaving no room for argument. "Yeah, that's a good idea."; Frank responds softly. "I'll wait until Rover touches down before I start exploring. Don't need that big flying wing to catch me off guard."; he replies back.
Frank remains under the ledge while he waits for Rover to drop in, but luckily it's only a matter of a few minutes and the mech descends too the ground, curled into a ball, and under parachute. The mech is ready to go, being able to survive entry without the shuttle thanks to it's built in heat shield. Rover unrolls and stands up, being half the height of Frank, walking on 4 legs, with a manipulate arm on its back. With Rover there to help guard, Frank is able to leave his impromptu shelter. "Nice aim there Bimni. Landed Rover within meters."; he says to Bimni, a bit impressed. "Are you detecting anything new with Rovers sensors?"; Frank asks.
"Only getting the same reading, anomaly."; Bimni's voice comes from the speaker built into Rovers frame. "Now where did you find the metal?"; she asks as Frank gestures Rover over too the underside of the overhang and the indent he was tucked into before. "Back here, and above us. These surfaces are unnatural and the underside of this overhang is metal."; Frank points out.
Bimni pilots Rover under the overhang and uses the manipulator arm, with its light, to examine the surfaces more closely. "hmmm. Fascinating. These surfaces are of an alloy I've never seen before."; she says with a chirp of interest. As she is maneuvering to look at different parts of the surface, she accidentally bumps Rover into a panel on the side of the indent. There is a groaning noise from the back wall before the wall just as suddenly slides sideways revealing an opening. A soft glow is comming from inside along with the sounds of running machinery.
Giving each other a quick glance, both Frank, and Bimni piloting Rover, step in through the open doorway too figure out what is inside. There is a short corridor that leads too a room filled with softly glowing lights and what can only be a computer control room of some sort. Everything is marked with an alien language that is completely undecipherable. "Now this is interesting. And it's still running. Can you make anything of this?"; Frank says too Bimni before going to oe of the control panels and trying to figure out what it says. He doesn't notice Bimni's lack of response as he touches one of the displays.
There is a quick flash of the dim lighting in the room before all the sounds in the room go quite and the light turn off. "Did I touch the wrong thing?"; Frank asks. "Bimni, any idea? Bimni?"; he asks before turning around too see Rover standing un-moving in the corridor. "Hello. Bimni, you there?" There is no response but suddenly there is a burst of of some form of energy that even Frank can feel and an alarm starts blaring. Think now is the time to leave, Frank turns to Rover and grabs the handle on its back, pushing on it to try and get Rover's tactile override to move it. He's a bit grateful when it starts to back up through the corridor as its supposed to.
Once back outside, in the open air, there is a beep, as Bimni is able to reconnect too Rover. "What happened? I suddenly lost signal with Rover and lost your signal as well frank."; Bimni keels out, sounding quite worried.
"Not sure. Rover just stopped moving in the corridor while I was inside the room on the other side. Maybe some kind of shielding or interference?"; Frank responds while the alarm can still be clearly heard in the background.
"What did you do?"; Bimni demands now that the alarm sound can be heard clearly by her as well. "Nothing. I was just trying to see what the panels were and touched one, then the whole thing shut down and the alarm started going off. A growl is heard through Rovers speakers; "You humans have no common sense! You touch everything without even thinking..."; Bimni grumbles out. Frank can only shrug his shoulders sheepishly, can't really fight ones nature.
Any further comments from either of them is cut short as a pair of dragon like creatures land heavily beside them and let out a roar. These creatures are close too 4 feet tall at the shoulders, standing on four thin legs with 4 toed clawed feet. They both are black in color with thin, spindly looking bodies that are covered in very short, dense fur. They have a pair of wings on their back that are larger then their bodies and shaped like the wings of an albatross, and a single row of wide scales running along their backs from the top of their head too half way down their tail. The larger of the two stands up on it's hind legs and starts making shooing motions with its front legs and wings as it takes steps towards them. It is making strange animal vocalizations while it is doing this, sounding like many different animals, most unknown, but some sounding strangely familiar.
Bimni readies to defend Frank using Rover, but a quick gesture by Frank delays her. "Lets back away slowly and see how they respond first."; Frank says as he starts to back away from the structure. Begrudgingly, Bimni follows suit, backing Rover away from the building as well. Their actions are rewarded by the larger creature moving to stand in front of the open passage and crossing its front legs, like it is standing guard. The smaller of the two slips behind the larger one and hurries into the structure, still moving on all four legs. As it slips past, and into the structure, a series of marking can be seen over its back legs and tail. They are green in color and resemble lightning or electricity.
A loud series of animal noises is heard coming out from inside the structure. The larger creature blocking the passageway leans down, without taking its eyes off Rover and Frank and barks a series of noises back into the structure in turn. As it does this, marking can be seen on the sides and back of this creature as well, this time a red flame like pattern can be seen. A quick series of flashes is seen from the corridor and the sound of the alarm is silenced followed by the sounds of machinery starting up again. The smaller creature exits the structure shortly after, using its tail to hit the panel too close the doorway as it exits. Both creatures are now standing there staring at Frank and Rover, not looking too happy.
The smaller of the two creatures standing in front of Frank and Bimni turns too the larger one and lets out a series of barks, pops, clicks, and whistles which the larger one turns its head slightly towards it and gives off a purr sound. The smaller one stands up on it's hind legs and stretches up to rub it's nose on the chin of the larger one before dropping down too all 4 legs again and slipping behind the other. It quickly moves away from everyone and launches its self into the air with some visible effort, flying away on it's long thin wings.
"So what do you think Bimni? They don't seem like animals too me. Their actions seem a bit too civilized."; Frank says too Bimni, with a strange echo. "You think they are the ones who built this structure?"; Bimni responds with no echo from Rovers speaker. "I'm not sure. They might also be another species that found the structures already here."; Frank says with that odd echo again, while turning towards Rover. "I'm not sure."; is repeated in Franks voice. Frank freezes, looking around. Bimni also hears that, and has Rover turn completely around too scan the area. The creature in front of the structure has uncrossed it's front legs and is now standing less defensively with its head cocked too the side.
"I'm not sure."; is said again in Franks voice. This time it is definitely coming from the creature in front of the structure, as it tips its head too the other side. "Did it just copy your voice?"; Bimni asks, having turned Rover to face the creature again. "I think it did."; Frank responds, with no echo. Raising one of his hands up he points at himself and says; "Frank", then points at Rover and says; "Rover". Finally giving an open handed gesture towards the creature, he waits for a response. The creature seems to think about it for a bit and is about to give a response but suddenly turns it's head too the side as three more of the creatures fly in and land nearby.
One of the three that lands is the smaller one with green markings from earlier. Another is only slightly larger with blue markings that look like lightning, while the third is much larger. The largest of the three is even larger then the one standing in front of the structure. It has bright yellow flame markings on it's sides and tail and is carrying some sort of device. All three of them stand up on their hind legs shortly after landing and start talking to each other and the one that was there already quite heatedly. An unusual combination of different animal noises, mixed with pops, whistles, and barks and exchanged before the one at the structure stops and points at Frank and says; "Frank", then at Rover and says; "Rover" in a perfect imitation of Franks voice.
"Well, that settles it. If there was any doubt about intelligence..."; Bimni says after the obvious display. As soon as Bimni speaks, the largest of the beings taps a few times on the device it has and a projection appears above the device like a video screen. On this projected screen is the world they are standing on, seen from high orbit. The projection begins playing a video of sorts that shows a world lush with life. None of which has been seen anywhere. The video changes view, showing different versions of the 4 beings on different parts of the world, with cities and lots of advanced technology around them. Then the view changes again too high orbit where a powerful solar flare is shown flashing over the planet with several chunks of metalic asteroids being swept along with it.
The view changes again so the beings running in terror and crowding into bunkers and sturdy structures as asteroids rain down in fireballs, exploding high in the thick atmosphere. The sky turns flames as the atmosphere is ignited by the asteroids. The view changes again to a few survivors making their way out of bunkers to find a world flattened and burned empty. The view changes to high orbit again, but the view is getting closer too the planet as if what is giving the view is falling towards the planet. The lush planet appears burned barren and brown as the view goes static as the view source starts to burn up as well. Finally the view shifts too the few survivors giving up everything they have to build structures like the one in front of them as plants start to grow around the structures in slowly increasing circles. The 4 beings all turn too look at Rover and Frank while the one in front of the structure points at it then sweeps it's hands around at the general area.
Several days go by with the beings on the planet, soon known to call themselves Yeltarians, surprisingly quickly learning how to use the human language. Their own language involving implied meaning, and the sounds produced expressing that meaning instead of words. With the language barrier broken, the Yeltarians were able to fully explain what happened too their world. A massive solar flare had shattered the dieing inner planet of their system, flinging chunks of the planet outwards with the flare its self. Between the flare and the following planetary chunks, they had set the atmosphere ablaze, catastrophically altering the atmospheric composition. Most non aquatic life was decimated in the initial inferno while much more of the remaining life on the planet slowly dieing off from the atmospheric changes.
When the Yeltarian survivors finally left their bunkers, they found a world leveled by fire and chocked off by a nearly un-breathable atmosphere. Using all their advanced knowledge, the survivors hatched a plan to save both themselves and their world. A massive terraforming project over their entire planet. They built hundreds of terraforming machines around the world using every available scrap and surviving piece of technology they could find. Then to give their planet a chance to heal, they turned to their own culture and shifted it from a materialistic high tech one, to a minimalist druidic society. All this, just to save as much as they could of what life remained.
But the remaining biodiversity of their world is too low, and they continue to loose species to disease and failed genetic alterations. Their world will not last much longer with how few living things remain. Even their terraforming equipment is starting to fail. So this leaves them with only one hope, to find suitable life outside of their own world to balance the failing ecosystems. But, they had torn apart their only remaining spacecraft to build the equipment that sustains their world. And they have no way to rebuild them with all their technology regressed to the state it is in now.
They were also willing to explain their race as well. What had once been several different Yeltarian races, had all become one race after the cataclysm. They are of two different sexs, male and female, with the females being larger and stronger in general. While the males tend to be smaller and much lighter, but also faster and more maneuverable in flight. They also explained the meaning of the markings on their bodies. The color doesn't mean as much, but the pattern shows which of the two divergent genetic traits are active in their bodies. All Yeltarians have the genetics to use an organic fire through the production of alcohol in their bodies, and bio-electrics generated by specialized cells in their bodies. But only one of the two genetic traits ever manifests due to a special gene that randomly activates one trait genetic while blocking the other trait genetics when they reach maturity.
"So, would you be willing to help us out? Take one of us with you to help search for compatible life in the depths of space? Too save our dieing world?"; The leader of the local Yeltarians asks Frank and Bimni. "This is our only chance since we are unwilling to give up our dieing world. Our, Yeltomar."

Timestamp: https://imgur.com/a/9lHNf91 Downsizing my keyboard stuff! All products include shipping; CONUS. Please comment before DM, and let me know for more pics! Open for offers or any questions. Thx!

1. Ikki68 Aurora Camping Barebones ($180) - Flex Cut Hotswap PCB - PC + POM Plate - WS Camping stabs built-in (except for the right shift one) - Silicone pads - Coiled cable - Included accessories, carrying bag, and box - Assembled once, essentially new
2. Cub65 Barebones ($150) - Cream case, Golden Weight, Dolphin Badge - Wired Non Flex Cut ANSI Hotswap PCB - POM Plate - All foams - Included accessories and carrying bag - Assembled once, essentially new
3. Monsgeek M1 Barebones - Purple ($90) - C3 Equalz V3 Stabs (Salmon Color) installed - Minor imperfections (small scratches - see timestamp for pictures) - All foams - Coiled cable - Tape for the tape mod not included
4. GMK Zen Pond Spacebar Kit ($45) - In ziplock bag - Barely used (only used the arrow keys and blue 6.25u spacebar for a little)
5. NicePBT Beach Day ($55) - Barely used, like new
6. Keynovo Coiled Cable - White + Blue ($25) - Opened and used - Will ship in ziplock bag; slight black markings on coil
7. Durock V2 Stabilizers - Smokey Black ($20) - Unused and unopened (bought from Amazon)

Been a php / web developer as a hobbyist and as a job for quite some time. I’ve built apps in objective c and on android with Java. However, I’m self taught and never really learned about how computers work (memory allocation, assembly, compilers, etc). I would really like to learn more low level information instead of just programming shit and hope it works. I heard I should learn C or C++. Is that a good idea? If so do you have book suggestions on C or other books to help me get a better grasp?

[English is not my primary language, I may use the wrong terms]
Hello, I have a file repertory on my computer with audiobooks in it, the size of the entire repertory is 91,1GB but the size on disk is only 18,5GB, it was my understanding that the size on disk was usually larger because of how the hard drive is formatted, and I read somewhere online that the size on disk being smaller could have something to do with built-in compression. First of all, is it the correct explanation(?) and if so, can someone tell me more about this built-in compression, direct me to a Youtube video explaining in more details or advise some online ressources to learn about this?
A little thank you to those who read me, and a big one to those who will take the time to answer ;)

I have an Inspiron 5676 mobo, Ryzen 7 2700, 650w psu, and an amd 6650xt in my computer rn. I just built this and everything else turns on just fine but my gpu just won’t turn on. I’ve tried changing the spots it’s connected in the psu but nothing changes. Anyone have any ideas?