Maybe they should switch to Optocouplers and ditch the Pots(Potentiometers). Optocouplers were used in PC mice for tracking before moving to laser.

My guess is the Pots are getting dirty. Some non-conductive contact cleaner might be worth a go.

@SkiBumMSP:

I do remember having to set Master/Slave jumpers on hard drives...and some IRQ conflicts I think trying to setup a Joystick and Sound Card, this was on the Dell.

I stuck with internal modems, but I do remember Win Modems being slow, particularly those that used software decoding instead of hardware decoding.

I remember returning a PCI modem in favor of an older ISA slot modem because the ISA slot modems were still using hardware decoding.

That change made a massive difference in online gaming (Unreal). My ping dropped from well north of 2000ms down to 499ms or so, which was decent for dial-up.

@SkiBumMSP:

I rebuilt an old Dell 486 33MHz I think as my first rig, I believe that dealt with interrupts. My first ground up build was an AMD K6-2 350, ASUS P5A MoBo running two 3DFX Voodoo 2s, was so exciting. I still have those cards, I'll never sell them.

I also miss the computer shows, but lucky for me I'm close to a Microcenter, so it's the next best thing...Cambridge/M.I.T

I think the oldest motherboard I have is "Super Socket 7" based. Oldest working PC is AMD "Socket 939", 2004-ish.

As long as console manufactures are getting paid and retailers are selling, I don't think anyone will really care. That said, it shouldn't be that hard to detect a simple-bot purchasing an item.

These are scripts and they are designed to be fast.

If you monitor the time it takes from stock to be available to the completed sale, then it should be obvious the transaction was completed faster than humanly possible (milliseconds), hence a bot.

I'm sure these times are captured in a database or transaction log.

Bots could also-likely be broken on a daily basis by slightly changing the transaction flow, causing the script to fail.

@santinegrete:

One fan started surging/rumbling and when I looked (Glass Panels) it was the only one spinning. I found the other was seized, and failing to save them I pulled them from the card.

I looked up the part number in a Google search and found replacements on eBay.

The upside is I've been building rigs for decades, so I'm never really down to just one box or GPU. I'll be keeping all my spare GPUs and CPUs incase this price hike lasts longer than we'd all hope.

GPU scalping is far more painful than console scalping...at least to me personally. As primarily a PC gamer, I still have a fairly decent rig that can run 1440p @ 60fps, so a PS5 is something I can wait for.

On the PC side, I had both fans on my GTX 1080 die. I had no choice but to track down new fans and replace them because new GPU prices are pure insanity. Without the fans, my entire rig was down, at least for gaming.

Even the used GPU market is a mess. GPU's that sold for $150~$200 used two years ago, people are asking for $400~$500 for the same cards.

You can see why when cards like the RTX 2060 is selling for $650+ new.

I guess I can always grab a DualSense and pretend I have a PS5 playing on PC; Control looks like fun.

@rolento25:

I happily take my fights when they come to me, I don't go looking for them.

When Covid is over I'll give you a big hug, you seem bitter.