Moving to an upgraded workstation at home

Random Life tech update: Switching to a new PC

My PC journey recap:

I started my journey in personal computing with an custom built PC sometime in 2004 with an AMD Athlon 64 CPU, then graduated to new PC when I built one with an Intel i5 CPU some 7 years later in 2011 (quad core) , and now after 9 years it's finally time to get a new PC again. 

I moved back to AMD ryzen 9 3900X this time considering performance per dollar AMD is offering compared to Intel's offerings. (The ryzen 9 I got is a massive 12 cores)

Instead of building my own again, I decided to just order a pre built and save myself some time which I just don't have to sit and build a pc. below are the specs.

OLD PS SPECS

Intel i5 3560K 3.4 Ghz

NVIDIA GeForce 970 4GB

16 GB Memory DDR3 RAM

Primary storage 1 TB SSD

Secondary storage 6 TB 7200RPM Sata6 Hard Drive

NEW PC SPECS

CyberPowerPC SLC10488W

AMD Ryzen 9 3900X 3.8GHz

NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2080 Ti 11GB

32 GB Memory DDR4 RAM 3000Mhz 16-20-20

primary storage 1TB PCI-E NVMe SSD 

secondary storage 2TB HDD SSD

Windows 10 Home 64-bit

so in summary going 3 times cpu cores, more clock speed, twice memory at twice the speed, going 4 times as fast on primary ssd , it's a significant difference in games. Exciting times ahead benchmarking and pushing the hardware to its limit in search for higher fps and great looking graphics in the newest pc games.

ps. this was drafted a while ago when the Zen3 5900X wasn't out yet.

#newpc #prebuiltgamingpc #cyberpower #movingonfromintel #switchingtoteamred  #goingamd #amd #nomoreintelinside #amdinside #ryzen9 #pc

Why there is no god , reason #62138292

Here's reason #62138292 for why I am convinced there is no god.

TL DR: the poor and weak getting crushed and rich getting richer , no rational god will stay on the sidelines this long allowing this to happen.

long version: ~2 mins read

The year is 2020, a real estate tycoon and reality tv personality Donald J Trump has been President of the United States of America for almost 4 years. There is a global pandemic on going which is about to cause more than a million deaths (official records) from 195 countries. Malaria is still the number one disease based killer on the planet. Countless jobs were lost in the ensuing destruction caused by wildfires, floods, lockdowns etc, We are experiencing a great depression. To add to all that madness, we also have the killings of black people in the streets of America by police in various incidents across the country. Systemic racism is prevalent in here in America.

The rich meanwhile just got a whole lot richer, ultra high networth individuals actually saw their wealth grow in this time. Jeff Bezos the worlds richest man just crossed 200 Billion USD in networth and there are now 5 trillion dollar companies and Apple ( a company that makes iPhones and computers) is worth 2 Trillion and may even soon reach 3 Trillion. 

Where is this god ? what the fuck is he/she smoking ? how much injustice and suffering before he or she decides to intervene and fix things. Of course this all would make sense if there was no god and this is the mess humans have created with their own greed and their own selfish reckless behavior across borders, across cultures. We are such a cancer to the planet. No rational god would sit passively while we destroy ourselves and our surroundings this destructively and this alarmingly quickly.

I want to end on a positive note, WHO just declared Africa to be polio free, guess god was busy fixing that while all this was going on and he will get to it soon enough and all will be good. Lets just all agree 2020 is cancelled and we can move to 2021 already.

- conclusion, god does not exist and is a made up entity because clearly there is a problem of pain and suffering in this world where a real god would have been super helpful in helping out balance out the evil and bring some of the good in this world.

ps. Those who think god is testing us, or god has a plan for all of us, or its all part of gods plan or any other similar things, please refrain from my post, you will be mocked and made a fool of on this thread by an atheist like me or by other atheist who may happen to have the courage to do so.

pps. if you were an astute reader and noticed me use the lower case g instead of the typically used upper case G for god, its intentional :)

#atheism #thoughts #rant #PolioFreeAfrica #pandemic2020 #blacklivesmatter #ProblemofEvil

Stargazing Series Part 1: Zion National Park in Utah

Bridge Mountain and the East Temple views , Zion National Park, Utah, 2019

This is the first part of the multi blog series on stargazing that I want to publish over time, covering my visits to national parks, in my chase to capture the milky way (our home galaxy) in so much detail.

Every single time when I see the milky white patch of the sky I am filled with amazement, we are very lucky to get to live on this rocky planet orbiting a mid sized star near a relatively quiet part of the galaxy, where we get a chance every night (barring clouds) to get a peek at what's out there. Some planets out there, are either tidally locked to their stars (similar to how the moon is tidally locked to earth) or some planets are simply too far away from their suns to sustain liquid water which is believed to be a key ingredient for life to survive. The stars in our galaxy themselves provide a window to the past around us, light coming from some of these stars left those stars thousands of years ago and when you step out on a starry night and glance up at these twinkling stars, some of those photons finish their thousand year journey by hitting your retina and registering a tiny twinkly light. To those of you who have never truly experienced a really dark sky, I must admit, the photos exaggerate , the camera is able to bring out more colors while our eyes or only capable of showing us a faint grey cloudy white smudge, we can barely make out the dust lanes, but let me assure you, the sheer planetarium effect of these thousands of stars do make up for the paleness of the milky way as seen with a naked eye, so I urge you to try it. Stargazing is very underrated as a tourist activity.
repost from my instagram post (You can checkout my latest instagram feed on the photography tab of my webpage).

Not convinced, heres another short taken before dawn at one of the gates of the park.

Entry Gates, Zion National Park, Utah

some detail on the technique and specs of the images.
I spent only a few minutes to capture both images (its a single shot taken with an exposure set to 15 seconds) and perhaps took an hour to process it in photoshop to bring out the colors and contrast.
EXIF: Single Shot• Sony A7rii + Samyung 14 f/2.8• 15sec • 12800 ISO


#nature#zionnationalpark#nightphotography#landscapeastrophotography#milkywaychasers#milkyway#ourhomegalaxy#somanystars#sonya7rii

coming soon Part 2: Stargazing Series Part 2: Cherry Springs State Park, PA

Joining Facebook

So I haven't bothered posting on this blog for a while, a few posts lying in my drafts.
I figured the global pandemic and isolating with wife in our 2 bedroom apartment in what seems to be the current epicenter of the pandemic (next to New York City, New York), now would be a good time to pen down a few posts and publish.
Let me start with an announcement (as the title suggests) I will be joining Facebook as a software engineer in their New York Office.
After 9 years in the finance technology working on the investment banks front office trading and algorithmic trading systems for fixed income and equity products, I am taking a major shift to a new life working on a pure technology and internet services oriented company by joining Facebook.

My new office will be only a few blocks from my current downtown office, not that it matters as I don't think I would be stepping foot into the New York Office anytime soon due to the lockdown.

more to follow if you happen to be following this space..

cheers