This reminds me of the crypto/NFT days where everyone and their brother added a special "blockchain" feature in their product, even when it didn't make sense or was completely unnecessary.
At least that can be turned off in updates.
All these hardware additions, the AI buttons, even Windows taking away the right CTRL key for Copilot, are ugly appendages that, in 20 years, when were clearing out the equipment closest, we'll see some of these and go "oh yeah remember when that bullshit was as a thing for a few years?"
Microsoft is asking for it. https://www.theverge.com/2024/3/26/24112500/microsoft-ai-pc-intel-windows-copilot-key-requirements
It's just like ten years ago when everything was about "the cloud". I can't wait for the industry to move on to another gimmick to force down the consumer's throat.
The cloud at least made a bit of sense. Offload the requirements of hosting an app or colocating a server to other folks, and you just use it. It's somebody else's computer, and it's their problem if something goes wrong.
The problem is that the MBAs making the decision didn't understand what was going on in the first place, so "the cloud" because a catch-all buzzword for anything they didn't want to think too hard about.
I mean... having a chokehold on cloud computing is still very much a source of the dominance US and Chinese companies have to shape world markets these days...
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Silicon Valley is honestly worthless.
We have an entire industry based on innovations that are 30-50 years old.
How long until Wall street finds a new investment vehicle and San Francisco is the next Detroit?
Don't forget the part where Logitech now requires you to use a web app (that only works on Chromium) to adjust settings or pair dongles now.
Just find a new peripheral manufacturer.
I'm not defending them here but I use a company-provided Logitech keyboard and mouse and there is dedicated software (called Logi Options+)
I don't think it needs Internet access and it definitely doesn't run in a browser. I downloaded it with Firefox
Sounds like a latency add. I get pissed off when my sensor has angle snapping, prediction, smoothing, or the z-axis bug. I'm the guy who gets in the gmmk customer service and goes full Karen because their very nice spec sheet still doesn't tell me what I want to know and it took some trying to get them to ask their dev team.
I'm not making this up. I don't wanna ever have the convenient excuse of blaming the controls. https://www.esreality.com/post/2677965/re-mice-using-flawless-sensors-v2/
At first you wonder if this is real or fake, then you look it up.
Not that I would ever buy it, but I can totally picture myself accidentally pressing that button all the fucking time.
I just got an MX Master 3S and it's a wonderful mouse, but the Logi Options+ software is fucking TERRIBLE. God it's bad. They are definitely pushing this AI prompt builder nonsense, but the mouse itself just stops working for long periods of time and the the Options+ interface says that the mouse is "unavailable", even though it's right there and I can physically see it with my eyes and move it around with my hands. My computer says it's still connected via Bluetooth, but no, this thing that wants me to create a mouse account and use an additional AI prompt builder says the mouse doesn't work. I ran across a 3rd party program that lets me map the additional buttons on the mouse to the functions I like and am able to get by just fine without any Logitech software at all, and the mouse always works now. This mouse feels like they just accidentally made good hardware in spite of themselves.
I had to use third party software to assign the buttons on my Logitech trackball because their own software didn't recognize it.
Haven't had as bad of a time with Options+ but it still sucks. It somehow acts like it's connecting to some piece of complex and archaic industrial test equipment as opposed to a brand new mouse. It often takes longer than a Windows update and restarting the computer. It also causes way more cpu load while idle than could ever be considered reasonable.
Options was ok, it still had issue and still wanted an account, but it would at least just connect, update, close etc.
https://www.theregister.com/2024/06/14/bofh_2024_episode_11/ "the boss wants an AI pc. This wouldn't rankle as much if the boss had any "I" of his own to work with"
Simon has been doing this for 30ish years and that one is still spot on. I dig the purple light, too.
I'm waiting for my combination AI/blockchain/cordless blender, so I can't even use it because it had a brainfart while trying to make an NFT of my smoothie, dropped its' internet connection and now it won't even charge.