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A computer generated pile of cash. At least our governments would never just make up money like that…
If you can't laugh at yourself - ask me and I will do it for you.
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Our governments, unless you live in a banana republic where the government just prints money, don't make up money like that. Our central banks do it, but usually indirectly. It's actually our banks that create money when they originate loans. Every currency unit on deposit generates, say, 10 to 20 currency units in loans. It's a question of how leveraged they dare to be. It used to be Swiss law that the principals of a bank were liable, to the full extent of their personal wealth, if the bank went under. Today, banks have little risk. They'll get bailed out by the central bank. And in the last decade, most countries have made it legal for banks to keep your money if they become insolvent and need to be recapitalized. Once your deposit your money, you're an unsecured creditor of the bank.
For many years now, banks have been furiously creating money to buy government bonds, which finance deficit spending. In fact, primary dealers (the term used in the US, but equivalents exist elsewhere) must bid at government bond auctions. It's quid pro quo: if we give you a license to run a top-tier bank, you must buy our debt. This ties in with quantitative easing, where the central bank then buys the government bonds from the primary dealers, who get cash in return, propping up their balance sheets. In the US, the central bank (Fed) isn't allowed to buy government bonds directly. But this intermediate step, of primary dealers buying the bonds and flipping them to the Fed, makes it non-banana republic finance. The whole process was elegantly captured in a cartoon of a bull elephant blowing itself, along the lines of an ouroboros. A magical perpetual motion machine.
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You might wanna review your schtick and learn a bit. 
Bastard Programmer from Hell 
"If you just follow the bacon Eddy, wherever it leads you, then you won't have to think about politics." -- Some Bell.
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Quote: If you are happy with our work: tell our management. If not: tell us
"It is easy to decipher extraterrestrial signals after deciphering Javascript and VB6 themselves.", ISanti[ ^]
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Debate when the throwing event is back on? (10)
"I have no idea what I did, but I'm taking full credit for it." - ThisOldTony
"Common sense is so rare these days, it should be classified as a super power" - Random T-shirt
AntiTwitter: @DalekDave is now a follower!
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DISCUSSION
Throwing event - DISCUS
is back - SI
ON
Software rusts. Simon Stephenson, ca 1994. So does this signature. me, 2012
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And you are up tomorrow. 
"I have no idea what I did, but I'm taking full credit for it." - ThisOldTony
"Common sense is so rare these days, it should be classified as a super power" - Random T-shirt
AntiTwitter: @DalekDave is now a follower!
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For months I've been having trouble starting my 10 - 12 year old PC. It goes through the POST test nicely, displays the Windows logo, then shuts down. That sounds like a video system problem to me, so I updated my video card to something a little more current. When I opened the system, I saw for the first time the true resolution of my monitor, and it was lovely. Then I opened Microsoft Solitaire! LOL!!!!
It tries (and fails) to work with the full screen, but the poor cards just can't keep up with the cursor! BTW, there are 618 levels that I know about... Further exploration shows that other functions are having problems, as well. Scrolling web pages is erratic now, since the upgrade. I suspect that the older spec PCiE bus can't keep up with the demands of modern video cards. It appears that I've finally worn out this 2010 - 2012 PC that was state-of-the-art back then. They just don't make them like they used to...
Back then I dealt with TigerDirect and Newegg. Are they still good sources, or are there newbies I should know about?
<edit> Re: the title, when I tried Solitaire with the new configuration, my first thought was of Lucy, in the Christmas movie, telling Charlie Brown, "You killed it, you blockhead!!!!"
Will Rogers never met me.
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Oh, hey, we passed through your way yesterday. Thought of you and locked the doors. 
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Good choice!
Will Rogers never met me.
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I always think of Lucy pulling the football away just as Charlie Brown is about to kick it. The poor sap never learns!
Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four. If that is granted, all else follows.
-- 6079 Smith W.
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I use Newegg for all my PC builds, great company.
The most expensive tool is a cheap tool. Gareth Branwyn
JaxCoder.com
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Newegg *was* a great company. A few years ago the founders cashed out and the new management are soulless bean counters. Gone are the better than normal RMA terms, and policy of never settling with patent trolls. Instead you get things like them selling obviously defective returns and when you ask for a refund on the garbage you just unboxed they blame you and refuse[^].
Today, Newegg is a great search engine if you need specific features on a mobo or the like; but you might as well save the $5 afterwards and buy it on Amazon instead.
Did you ever see history portrayed as an old man with a wise brow and pulseless heart, weighing all things in the balance of reason?
Is not rather the genius of history like an eternal, imploring maiden, full of fire, with a burning heart and flaming soul, humanly warm and humanly beautiful?
--Zachris Topelius
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What a shame. I didn't know they had sold out as I haven't had any problems in my last couple of builds or upgrades.
Thanks for the heads up!
The most expensive tool is a cheap tool. Gareth Branwyn
JaxCoder.com
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https://www.bhphotovideo.com/[^] is an under the radar place out of NY with pretty decent prices.*
* FGS1963 is in no way affiliated with B&H. No warranty expressed or implied. Your mileage may vary. Objects in mirror are closer than they appear. Keep away from children under 5 years old.
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Are you talking about building a new system from components or buying a pre-built one?
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Components. I haven't purchased a complete desktop since 1994. 
Will Rogers never met me.
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I've been using pcpartpicker.com to configure the system and, mostly been buying on Amazon because the prices are as good as or better than anywhere else (plus I have Prime). Surprisingly, BestBuy sometimes has better prices. I've used NewEgg a couple of times. I also look at microcenter.com (especially if you have a store in your town). Their prices can be kind of high but there's nothing like walking into a store with a cart and filling it up with the components you are looking for. Like a grocery store for computer parts.
If you haven't built a system in a while, the CPU coolers for the latest CPUs are HUGE. Make sure you have room in your case and a couple of extra case fans to move air through it. You can use a fan-only cooler or one called an "AIO" (for "all-in-one") which is a closed-loop water cooler with a radiator, kind of like an automobile. I haven't gone the water-cooled route yet.
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Thanks for those suggestions! Even though they call these things 'desktops' I prefer oversized cases with lots of fans. In fact, I replaced one that was getting noisy when I did the video card with a Cooler Master Sickleflow 120. I can barely hear it at all!
Will Rogers never met me.
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I built my PC last year using BeQuiet! case, CPU cooler tower and fans and I can tell, it is really quiet.
In the most exigent moments, the CPU coolers can be heard but the rest... nothing.
M.D.V. 
If something has a solution... Why do we have to worry about?. If it has no solution... For what reason do we have to worry about?
Help me to understand what I'm saying, and I'll explain it better to you
Rating helpful answers is nice, but saying thanks can be even nicer.
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I continue to be amazed at the flattening rate of replacement for PC hardware over the last 12 years. I am currently running a server that was built from TigerDirect components and a locally sourced case/psu around the same time as your system, originally running Server 2008 on the first SSD I ever bought, a massive 64GB beast! Since then, the OS has been replaced 2x (currently on Server 2016) and drives swapped for newer SSDs. When I built that thing over a dozen years ago, I never dreamed that it would be around this long...and most importantly that it still performs adequately for my needs.
IMO, starting a dozen years or so back, we have entered a sort of 'hardware plateau' where decent hardware coupled with SSDs, and faster broadband internet has been good enough for most. Combine that with the extremely low failure rate for SSDs and people find that their 10-12 y/o systems still get the job done.
There are an awful lot of consumers with PCs in this condition which is a problem if you want to sell people new stuff...give them a compelling reason to upgrade or introduce some tougher hardware restrictions in a new O/S.
That said, I believe that 12 years of continuous operation is pushing my luck and am in the planning phase to take the vintage server (mentioned above) out of service and relocate the services.
"Go forth into the source" - Neal Morse
"Hope is contagious"
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kmoorevs wrote: IMO, starting a dozen years or so back, we have entered a sort of 'hardware plateau' where decent hardware coupled with SSDs, and faster broadband internet has been good enough for most. Combine that with the extremely low failure rate for SSDs and people find that their 10-12 y/o systems still get the job done.
The plateau ended a few years ago when mainstream desktop core counts stopped being capped at 4. The only reason I haven't replaced my 2014 CPU/mobo yet is that I'm waiting for AMDs next generation platform later this year. (For Intel I wouldn't bother, they cycle sockets every 2 years so there's no point; but AMD's 4ish year lifecycle is long enough to offer compatible parts that are worthwhile upgrades.
Did you ever see history portrayed as an old man with a wise brow and pulseless heart, weighing all things in the balance of reason?
Is not rather the genius of history like an eternal, imploring maiden, full of fire, with a burning heart and flaming soul, humanly warm and humanly beautiful?
--Zachris Topelius
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Wordle 373 4/6
⬜⬜⬜🟨⬜
🟨⬜⬜⬜🟨
🟨🟩⬜⬜⬜
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩
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Wordle 373 5/6
⬜⬜⬜⬜🟨
⬜🟨🟨🟨⬜
⬜⬜⬜⬜⬜
🟨⬜🟩🟨🟨
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩
Waaay too many choices with those 4 letters...
Software rusts. Simon Stephenson, ca 1994. So does this signature. me, 2012
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Wordle 373 5/6
⬛🟨⬛⬛🟨
🟩⬛⬛🟨🟨
🟩🟩🟨⬛⬛
🟩🟩⬛🟩⬛
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩
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