22 thoughts on “Commonsense Computer Control Laws

  1. Well really, why not?

    One would rather have the peasants spend their time behind the plow and oxen. I mean, it’s organic.

  2. How many of these computers exist or could potentially exist in California?
    How much energy could they use?
    How many data centers exist in California?
    How much energy do they use?
    How do they compare?

    It’s the focus on non-solutions that makes Climate Change Cultists so awful.

  3. Its a safe bet that CA is already pressuring Microsoft to include Smart Meter™ functionality in upcoming releases of Win 11. Couple that with mandatory implementation of the already existent GeoFencing™ functionality and MicroSoft/CA will be better able to manage their persistent rolling brownouts by throttling back power hungry gaming and home entertainment systems (welcome to 20 FPS gameplay kids). It will provide CA the ability to power down systems completely to prevent the blackouts that are more and more common.
    If you think Walz won’t immediately jump on this bandwagon, think again.

  4. It is all about the Bitcoin. That’s what all these high-powered computers are used for – crypto-farms. Feds are scared shitless of cryptos. Just look at their attempts to tax and regulate them.

  5. It does occur to me that a snowbird resident of Nevada or Arizona could do straw purchases of Alienware computers and schlep them across the border to CA for a nominal fee. Of course the cartels will want to get their beaks wet so they’ll strap an Alienware onto the back of every illegal immigrant crossing over from Mexico.

    Once again CA is the land of opportunity!

  6. It does occur to me that a snowbird resident of Nevada or Arizona could do straw purchases of Alienware computers and schlep them across the border to CA for a nominal fee.

    Got my black Trans-Am all tuned up and ready to keep the smokies away from the Snowman, but damn if that Sheriff Buford T. Justice might be working for CHIPs.

    But…….uh…..if Californians want to really control the evil emissions of CO2, maybe they ought to quit buying sh*t from the world’s #1 coal-fired polluter….China.

  7. Greg

    yep fill up the trailer(80,000lbs of Alienware) in TX at Dell plant and its I-10 all the way to LA then up I-5 to SF.
    You can have Sally Field I’ll take the dog.

  8. I have often said that a vice is nothing more than a virtue taken too far.

    Nourishment become gluttony,
    Procreation becomes porn.
    Compassion become indulgence.

    The same with the environmental movement. It once was about stewardship, taking care of our air, our earth and our water, but that was then, this is now.

    The movement has metastasized into a hysteria whereby useless billionaires and divorced wives of useless billionaires shower money upon organizations whose only purpose is to come up with some caused to be showered with money for.

    Of course, then there is shake-down artists like Tom Steyer and Warren Buffet who employ environmentalists to force the nation to ship hydro-carbons by rail rather than by pipeline and to preach the benefits of carpet bombing the countryside with spinning crucifixes of their eco-cult.

  9. The next step will be computer registration and background checks to keep computer owners from driving over the border into Los Vegas and buying their computers there.

  10. Crap like this is why I haven’t purchased a whole computer (aside from a laptop) in over 25 years. I started building my own PCs and install Linux to get around the “Microsoft tax”. Should this law get widespread adoption, we’ll see a burgeoning black market for CPUs, followed by a black market for power supplies when the nanny-state catches on.

    Meanwhile, there are many more appliances in the average home that draw much more current: Refrigerators, A/C, washers, dishwashers, etc. Attacking the “problem”, as they perceive it, head-on will result in these little energy fascists finding themselves out of a job, so they’ll go after the niche first, get the camel’s nose under the tent, and use that law to justify further restrictions. Silver lining: Unemployment will drop when we have to hire personal attendants to hand-wash our clothes and dishes and fan us. You want to keep your food cool? Just store it with the government-run refrigeration facilities keeping banker’s hours.

  11. You don’t need that kind of computing power; it’s a computer of war, plain and simple. Think of the children!

  12. Dear old Rush had it right back in the 80’s: Greenie weenies were just green on the outside, red on the inside.

    Just another road on the way to total control.

  13. These restrictions do not apply to DIY computers. Nerd gamers for the win!

    In practical systems you get enough relaxation for specs that for any reasonable system (i.e. not an Alienware Dell) you can pass the full power specs due to the way the limits are calculated for expansion slots and the like — with even 4 expansion slots it’s virtually impossible to fail these specs. There is all sorts of relief in the full power specs based on memory & memory bandwidth, number of PCIe slots, graphics card speed/memory/memory bandwidth, etc. It’s people like Dell that do some pretty strange stuff in their Alienware designs that will get hit by this.

    Most of the requirements are for idle mode power. And if you can’t meet those 4W idle power specs, you’ve designed a terrible system and deserve to be banned.

    Another fun fact: most GSync monitors will be banned by these regulations. For some extremely stupid reasons those draw 14W in standby mode. That’s 4 LED lightbulbs! And all because Nvidia didn’t care about vampire power when they did their hardware. Nearly all FreeSync monitors pass these specs.

  14. Here’s a vid that pretty much covers this. As far as PCs go, the regulations aren’t insane. I won’t comment on the other appliances as I am not familiar with them, but I do agree with the overall conclusion: it takes a particularly bad design to fail these considerations, and it is irresponsible to fail these specs. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jOHKLyjVSuE

  15. geez people… it is not about gamers or computes per se… you are all missing the boat and the point of this insanity. It is all about crypto-mining. Have you seen those rigs? It is not about CPU’s but how many video cards (which are faster) you can jam in. Hence the slot limit. Those rigs must idle at 100W if not 10x that – because idling is all they do. I cannot believe you do not see this for it it is – an attack on crypto-mining first an foremost and energy consumption is just a pretense. For crying out loud, people using the power pay for it! You guys can be so obtuse sometime. But then you probably get it and just trolling me with your ignorance.

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