I mean… to be fair, you can’t even get a non-EV car that’s $30k and the quality that you got for $30k 10 years ago.

But yeah, it would be nice if there were budget options out there. PHEV’s are a fantastic option for people looking to dip their feet, but they’re just not cheap. The Prius Prime is on paper but you can’t find anyone selling them for less than $5k over MSRP.

Hopefully we’ll get there soon. Been waiting for that cheap EV for ages. But if you can’t actually make huge numbers of them because you’re constrained by battery parts, it doesn’t make sense to build cheap cars.

Thanks, I’ll look into it. For some reason I didn’t think you could still get Xiaomi phones in the US.

Interesting, thanks! I’ve already installed a custom keyboard on my phone called “TypeWise”. It helps me type faster for sure, but boy is its autocorrect terrible. Might be better in the paid version but they only offer a subscription option and I don’t think they have a sane concept of how pricing for apps works.

Having a real keyboard that I can use with my phone would allow me to use a software keyboard with better autocorrect and get best of both worlds. In theory. Gonna have to research this, but I really appreciate the suggestion.

Thx for the recommendation, I’ll look into that one. I haven’t had a Samsung phone since the Galaxy S2; I know people like them but they’ve always felt really overpriced to me. But given my kinda specific requirements, might be worth the premium.

For text to speech, I’m just using the Android built-in accessibility screen reader. It puts a little button on the bottom by the tile button and I can use it to read anything on the screen. Kinda sucks that I can’t change the voice to a male one, but I’m used to it at this point.

Thanks. I was aware of the ridiculous “gaming” one on the ROG phone, but I didn’t realize there were more mundane cooling cases. I’ll look into those, thanks.

(No offense taken, though I admit my pain-killer-addled brain took a second to realize WTF you were talking about! 🤣 )

Thanks, that’s actually a good point I hadn’t considered. I do enjoy fast charging my phone, never considered the advantages of charging slower. Worth noting, however, that the Pixel seems to run noticeably hotter even when it’s not charging. I realize I’m particularly sensitive to it, but yeah, not even related to charging, just a hot processor.

Thanks for the help.

“Grave of the Fireflies” “Fist of the Northstar”

Was gonna add “Ninja Scroll” and “Ghost in the Shell” but they were 90s, it turns out.

Garuda. It feels like being inside a gaming rig full of blinking RGB lights. Way over the top with the “gamer aesthetic”.

Last I heard, it would be ready “this week”. Since the game won’t be out for a few weeks yet, I think you can be patient and wait for the preload. No matter how slow you internet is, you will still be ready in time.

Making a big deal out of the free trial going from a month to 2 weeks? Cry me a river.

So I swapped to linux again about a month ago and I’m frankly shocked at how much better it is now, especially for gaming. While I don’t have first hand experience with the games you listed (in linux), based on the games I have played, I have no doubt those games will all work just fine.

Honestly, I don’t see myself going back to Windows at all at this point.

(For the record, I’m on Pop!_OS.)

The real trick is figuring out how to install the HD executable into the same prefix after that. From what I gather, vanilla Freelancer doesn’t work in linux well because of dx8.

Thanks for the advice. Unfortunately, when I double click setup.exe, it opens ProtonTricks, rather than install anything. I tried running it through the terminal window directly and it looked like it installed but when I tried to run it afterwards I got errors like it couldn’t find the files.

I dunno, I will probably just end up dual booting. This is EXACTLY the kind of experience that kept me from linux for the last couple decades. I am positive with enough effort I could get it working. I just don’t want to put in that kind of effort; I don’t want a new hobby.

Fortunately, when I’m not trying to install a 20-year old game made for the wrong operating system, things DO just work. :-D

It’s by the GloriousEggroll guys, and I really liked it a lot. I would still be using it if it worked better with my laptop’s hybrid Nvidia graphics setup. When I get around to swapping my desktop to linux, I’ll almost certainly go with Nobara first.

FWIW, Pop!_OS is where I landed for great hybrid graphics support.

I am using it specifically because of the hybrid Nvidia graphics on my laptop. Because they sell laptops with this setup, their OS supports it flawlessly. I’ll be honest, I’d rather be using something like Nobara, but there were games that weren’t working and I don’t have the patience to figure out how to get them working. Pop just works. That’s what I need.

Count me as one of those new Linux users. I’ve been trying to switch since the 90’s and Linux gaming is finally viable. I know this is in large part thanks to Valve, so thanks, Valve!

Ford is focusing on high-demand trims, such as the XLT, which accounts for over 50% of new orders. The Lightning Pro trim is also now available for retail customers but in very limited numbers. These units will be sent to reservation holders who have been waiting since the launch.

So annoying. Announce it at a reasonable price, then raise the price to unreasonable levels, then lower the price back down to reasonable levels but DON’T MAKE OR SELL THEM??? Yeah, of course the XLT is the most popular trim. You can’t get the cheaper one!

Call it what you will, Tesla’s charging network is far superior to anything else in the US right now. Getting more cars access to that network is a win.

On top of that, standardizing the plug is a HUGE win for consumers no matter which standard gets chosen.

I really do love my Model X but I just can’t in any way condone owning a Tesla at this point. It’s just not viable with how bad the service is.

It’s fantastic that other mfrs are going to the Tesla plug now. Now we can get the best of both worlds: Tesla’s charging network with reliable cars.

As much as I love my Model X, I would recommend nobody go near Tesla until they get their supply chain shit together. Mine has been in the shop since NOVEMBER waiting for parts from Tesla. That’s beyond absurd.

I can’t imagine established manufacturers like Ford making that kind of mistake.