• humanamerican@lemmy.zip
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    131
    arrow-down
    4
    ·
    20 hours ago

    Most programmers I know wouldn’t understand what they’re looking at here.

    This is sysadmin humor maybe?

    • 1984@lemmy.today
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      3
      ·
      edit-2
      5 hours ago

      Writing code but never seen the thing the code runs inside of…

      I guess they are not very curious.

      • humanamerican@lemmy.zip
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        3
        ·
        5 hours ago

        I’m sure there are great screenwriters who don’t know the first thing about cameras or projectors. They can still write good screenplays.

    • AnarchistArtificer@slrpnk.net
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      20
      ·
      edit-2
      14 hours ago

      The CPU is the silver squarish shape towards the right. It generates a lot of heat when in use, so having good cooling for it is important. So important that CPUs come with a fan in the box. This involves a heat sink to help draw heat away from the CPU. This screws on mounting points around the CPU, but thermal paste is also used to help heat transfer up. Then there’s a fan that attaches to that heat sink, so that the hot air from the CPU can be blown away from the CPU.

      People spend a heckton of money on cooling for their CPU and GPU, because when things overheat, they throttle themselves and performance becomes super slow. Longevity of components can also be harmed by higher temperatures. If it gets too bad, then it will crash entirely.

      This PC has put the CPU heatsink on the case fan on the left. I don’t think this is especially harmful in and of itself — the big problem is that the CPU is entirely “naked” and has no cooling whatsoever. This means the CPU begins overheating basically as soon as the PC is turned on.

      Edit: you can actually see where the heat sink should match up to the CPU here

      • MonkderVierte@lemmy.zip
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        3
        ·
        edit-2
        2 hours ago

        Ah btw, the thermal paste is only supposed to fill the microscopic surface gaps, so please add only a tiny bit and don’t spread it around, it creates air bubbles while adding the sink. A rice grain worth in size and form in the center is enough.

          • MonkderVierte@lemmy.zip
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            3
            ·
            2 hours ago

            Sorry, i meant “rice grain”. It’s Reiskorn in german, the Korn being the grain. One of the same word, different meaning pitfalls. Corrected it.

    • Korne127@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      79
      ·
      20 hours ago

      Yep. This is hardware related. To be fair, many programmers I know are also into self-building and more hardware-related stuff, but that’s something I personally just don’t know my way around well (instead I like more theoretical computer science more). So I genuinely don’t know the problem here, and I think that’s fine.

      • humanamerican@lemmy.zip
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        61
        arrow-down
        1
        ·
        20 hours ago

        You get no shade from me. My only beef is with programmers who act like they are experts in all things computer when they aren’t.

        BTW, the issue in the picture is that the CPU cooler is attached to the wall of the case instead of the CPU. It shuts down because modern hardware will usually turn itself off when it overheats to mitigate the risk of permanent damage.

      • AnarchistArtificer@slrpnk.net
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        7
        ·
        edit-2
        14 hours ago

        The big silver heat sink that’s on the left is meant to be on the CPU, which is the Silver squarish shape towards the right. Keeping the CPU cool is a big deal — CPUs come with a smaller fan which is sufficient for many people, but people who use their PC more intensively, or want to extend the life of their CPU typically buy an additional cooler. Here’s an example of a stock cooler, and here’s a motherboard that’s using the fairly basic aftermarket CPU cooler that I have. It was only $30, but when I was new to PC building, it was strongly recommended, because if your CPU gets too hot, it’ll throttle itself and slow down. People who over clock their CPU (running it at a higher voltage for better performance) have to get even beefier cooling, such as water cooling. You can completely fry your CPU if you do something wrong when overclocking, and even if it doesn’t get that bad, minor mistakes can cause crashes due to CPU overheating.

        So TL;DR: keeping your CPU cool is super important for both performance and longevity of the CPU.

        The PC in the top photo has zero cooling for the CPU. Not even the stock fan that comes with the CPU. That heatsink that’s attached to the case fan is almost certainly intended for the CPU — you don’t even need a heatsink in that location.

        This means that this person’s CPU will rapidly overheat soon after it is turned on.

        Edit: you can actually see where the heat sink should match up to the CPU here

        • AndyMFK@lemmy.dbzer0.com
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          14
          arrow-down
          2
          ·
          19 hours ago

          So interesting. I’m a programmer, I know a lot of programmers, and I’d hate to think that any of them wouldn’t immediately recognise the issue.

          Not sure if you’re the outlier or I am.

          • humanamerican@lemmy.zip
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            12
            ·
            18 hours ago

            I’ve taught upper level comp sci at a STEM school and I think a majority of my students wouldn’t know what they were looking at in this picture.

            People who’ve written doctoral theses on machine learning and and natural language processing have asked me for help building their gaming rig.

            Not to say its universal, but the Venn Diagram of programmers and hardware nerds is far from a circle.

            • LeninsOvaries@lemmy.cafe
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              5
              arrow-down
              1
              ·
              12 hours ago

              I’m definitely not a hardware nerd. I don’t know what the current generation graphics cards are called, I have no opinions on liquid cooling, and I haven’t bought RAM in a decade. I can still tell that CPU has no cooling at a glance.

        • Scrubbles@poptalk.scrubbles.tech
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          6
          arrow-down
          1
          ·
          edit-2
          20 hours ago

          As someone who has done both, programmer most recently, and has respect for both, you’re being very judgy. Both are difficult enough jobs without other tech fields bringing each other down.

          • humanamerican@lemmy.zip
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            7
            arrow-down
            2
            ·
            19 hours ago

            I’m not judging. Just observing that a lot of programmers I know wouldn’t understand what’s happening in this picture so maybe it isn’t really programmer humor.

      • mcv@lemmy.zip
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        6
        ·
        19 hours ago

        We’re looking at a hardware issue. What would a programmer care?