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rasz_pl

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what air ducts? this is a mac we are talking about, not a thinkpad. There are thin inadequate slits in the case, they are the reason any cpu load results in 80'C, and every discrete GPU mac dies to be eventually grudgingly covered by some small time window "we care enough to not get sued" recall program.

Those prices match Intel promotions and bonus gifts Intel ordinarily offers to big distributors for pushing hi-end product (CPU and Chipsets). There is nothing suggesting Microcenter is running a loss on this, they might have a very thin margin, or even sell at 0 and only count Intel gifts as a potential profits (Intel will give distributors gifts like "free" SSDs for selling X number of expensive parts). Its all in the spirit of tactics that were killing AMD in ~2002 and lead to Intels monopoly trial, just made a little more subtle this time.

Recruiter A to recruiter B: Well, I hoped this one would be sharp enough, guess we need to search harder for people that wont be careless with our company sensitive stuff laying around simply because someone told them to leave laptop behind and take a walk ...

You cant restore SSDs. I would assume Googlers are rolling SATA SSDs, if not M.2 PCIE ones.

What Google could be doing is remote logging on the laptops - logs uploaded to ze cloud every time you connect to the mothership. Plugging in USB drive leaves trace with USB ID, volume information etc. Windows also logs this and more http://www.forensicswiki.org/wiki/USB_History_Viewing

Protip: to exfiltrate data with minimal trace your best bet is taking out the drive and reading it in another computer (using write blocker for best effect), this can still be traced if someone is logging SMART written/read data (I am, but Im paranoid), not all HDD/SSD vendors provide this info. Second best is booting from USB drive so the original OS never sees the plug/unplug event in the first place, I have no idea about current state of UEFI/AMT logging going on tho.

Disclaimer: I used to do forensics.

AMD has a history of having dysfunctional R&D:

386DX - copied Intel design verbatim (1:1 microcode). Got sued, won only because Intel had multiple source agreements with IBM.

K6 - purchased NexGen. Designed 100% by outsiders.

K7 - once again hired somebody else's engineers. This time almost whole DEC Alpha design team.

K8 - DEC people had some more steam left in them.

K9-Zen period - no more companies to take over and claim credit for their designs, add terrible management bleeding engineering talent while burning money on stupid ideas like Seamicro = in house garbage with 50% Intel IPC.

Zen - finally managed to rehire competent ex DEC engineer Jim Keller after his successful career at Apple.

They might play dirty games instead (again). Intel loves incentivising its distributors with bonuses and deal combos. Sell top Intel CPU + expensive motherboard with top Intel chipset = receive free Intel SSD etc. Of course distributors are free to do what they like with those rewards, consumers almost never even know about it = bigger hidden margins for pushing hiend models.