AMD EPYC Server Performance Up ~8% Geo Mean For 2026 With Linux Kernel Improvements
With the in-development Linux 7.3 kernel showing some nice performance improvements over Linux 7.2 in different areas, Linux 7.2 also having brought some nice gains especially for I/O, and the preceding kernels also having seen some nice performance optimizations this year, I wanted to measure how far the Linux kernel performance has evolved so far in 2026. Today’s article is looking at that with how the Linux kernel performance ha … ⌘ Read more
Just some light Sunday afternoon entertainment: Printing from NetBSD on the dotmatrix printer by dumping data to /dev/ulpt0. The netbook doesn’t have a parallel port, so this must be done over USB. NetBSD.escp was created by a little custom ESC/P converter written in C. 🥳
https://movq.de/v/14b09c47a5/print-small.mp4
Video description:
Video begins with a view of the netbook’s screen: 3 windows are open, one of them showing the typical NetBSD logo to print, the other one shows the commands I ran in preparation:
magick /usr/X11R7/include/X11/pixmaps/NetBSD.xpm -depth 8 -alpha set /tmp/NetBSD.pam ./pam2escp /tmp/NetBSD.pam /tmp/NetBSD.escpThe other terminal shows a root shell with this command:
cat /tmp/NetBSD.escp >/dev/ulpt0I hit Enter, the printer starts printing.
Camera pans to show the printer, an Oki ML 3390. Continuous paper. Once finished, I manually feed the paper a little bit to better show the result.
(If you turn up the volume enough, you can hear “Leaving” by “Chill Carrier” from 2008.)
KDE Plasma 6.8 Seeing More Polishing & Fixes, Plasma 6.9 Begins Seeing More Activity
Following last week’s Plasma 6.8 beta release, KDE desktop developers have spent this week mostly working on bug fixes as well as some early changes toward Plasma 6.9… ⌘ Read more
Steam Frame Making Use Of Zink For OpenGL On Vulkan
Valve’s Steam Frame VR headset that makes use of a Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 SoC with Adreno graphics is using the open-source “Turnip” Vulkan driver from Mesa as reported last year. For OpenGL it turns out that the Mesa Zink driver is being used on the Steam Frame for OpenGL atop the Vulkan API… ⌘ Read more
DXVK 3.1.1 brings fixes for Adobe software, Call of Duty: Ghosts, Rayman 3, Skyrim SE
DXVK is a Vulkan-based translation layer for Direct3D 8/9/10/11 to run lots of games nicely on Linux with Wine / Proton.
Read the full article on [GamingOnLinux](https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2026/09/dxvk-3-1-1-brings-fixes-for-adobe-software-call-of-duty-ghosts-rayman-3 … ⌘ Read more
Scientists Discover Mysterious New X-Ray Objects ‘Unlike Any They Have Seen Before’
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Space.com: NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory has found a brand new type of an otherwise familiar object – compact binary systems that steal gas from other stars, but which do so while emitting very low-energy X-rays but copious amounts of ultraviolet. Chandra spotted 8 … ⌘ Read more
SteamOS 3.8.27 Beta and SteamOS 3.9.1 Preview released - Valve continue working on NVIDIA support
Valve released two new testing builds with SteamOS 3.8.27 Beta and the much bigger SteamOS 3.9.1 Preview.
Read the full article on [GamingOnLinux](https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2026/09/steamos-3-8-27-beta-and-steamos-3-9-1-preview … ⌘ Read more
KDE Plasma 6.8 Remote Desktop To Enjoy Lower Latency Performance
Along with KDE Plasma 6.8 beta releasing this week, there were some other interesting Plasma changes this week worthy of a shout-out… ⌘ Read more
KDE Plasma 6.8 Beta released for testing
The next main release of the KDE Plasma desktop is coming soon, and a first Beta is available for you to check it out and go hunting for bugs.
Read the full article on GamingOnLinux. ⌘ Read more
KDE Plasma 6.8 Beta Released With Many Great Improvements, Kup Backup Scheduler
Ahead of the stable release of Plasma 6.8 due out on 14 October that also marks the 30th anniversary of the KDE project, out today is the much anticipated beta release… ⌘ Read more
COSMIC Epoch 1.8 Provides Latest Fixes & Minor Improvements For This Rust Desktop
Released overnight was the newest version of the Rust-based COSMIC desktop environment developed by System76 as part of the effort on their Pop!_OS Linux distribution… ⌘ Read more
Star Trek Turns 60
“Star Trek” marks its 60th anniversary today, September 8, six decades after the original series premiered in 1966 and went on to become one of the most successful science-fiction franchises in television history. Outlets across the web are commemorating the milestone with full health reports, hot takes, behind-the-scenes retrospectives, and reflections on the franchise’s influence and what may lie ahead. The New York Times rep … ⌘ Read more
KDE Plasma 6.8 gets a Windows-like Autoscroll feature
KDE Plasma 6.8 is due out in mid-October and it’s coming with all sorts of new features, and one I’m particularly happy to see with autoscrolling.
Read the full article on GamingOnLinux. ⌘ Read more
KDE Plasma 6.8 Lands Windows-Like Auto-Scrolling, Lower vRAM Usage For Breeze Theme
It’s been an exciting start to the month of September for KDE Plasma developers with continuing to land last minute improvements for Plasma 6.8 ahead of its official release in mid-October… ⌘ Read more
FINAL FANTASY VII REVELATION arrives April 8, 2027 - will be getting two DLC expansions
Square Enix just revealed that FINAL FANTASY VII REVELATION will release April 8th, 2027 and they’ve also said it will get two DLC expansions.
Read the full article on [GamingOnLinux](https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2026/09/final-fantasy-vii-revelation-arrives-april-8 … ⌘ Read more
Google Releases Gemini 3.8 Flash, Its Third Flash Model In Six Weeks
Google released Gemini 3.8 Flash, its third Flash model in six weeks, claiming it’s their best reasoning and coding model yet (topping the DeepSWE leaderboard). Ars Technica reports: Gemini 3.8 Flash comes in two variations. There’s the standard Flash, which Google describes as a “workhorse” model that’s good for anything from agentic tasks … ⌘ Read more
KDE Plasma 6.8 Lands Dwell Clicker Support To Improve Accessibility On Wayland
In preparations for Plasma 6.8 going Wayland-exclusive in abandoning the X11 session, another feature gap compared to X11 has been addressed… ⌘ Read more
SteamVR Beta 2.17.8 released to ready up for the Steam Frame - added support for USB streaming
Valve are clearly making preparations for the Steam Frame to finally get a proper release this month - with a new Release Candidate Beta build of SteamVR.
Read the full article on [GamingOnLinux](https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2026/09/steamvr-beta-2-17-8-released-to-read … ⌘ Read more
Anthropic Signs $35 Billion Cloud Deal With Nvidia-Backed Lambda
Anthropic has reportedly signed a $35 billion cloud-computing deal with Nvidia-backed Lambda for a roughly 350-megawatt Texas data center being developed by Hut 8. “Lambda will install Nvidia chips at the Hut 8 facility, with the arrangement designed to expand the pool of Nvidia computing resources available to power Anthropic’s Claude AI products,” rep … ⌘ Read more
🎶 “Aneurysm” - Nirvana https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AE3ynTXTm_8
FreeBSD 14.5-RC1 Released With Several Security Fixes
Ahead of FreeBSD 14.5-RELEASE hopefully debuting on 8 September, FreeBSD 14.5-RC1 is out today as the final scheduled development release… ⌘ Read more
KDE Plasma 6.8 Improving Performance & Efficiency For Some Full Screen Content
In addition to the Union QtWidgets initial release happening this week, a number of other improvements also landed in the past few days in making Plasma 6.8 all the more exciting… ⌘ Read more
SteamOS 3.9.0 Preview brings major updates to desktop mode, Linux kernel, WiFi and more
Hot on the heels of the SteamOS 3.8.26 Beta, Valve released SteamOS 3.9.0 Preview bringing some really massive changes to the system.
Read the full article on [GamingOnLinux](https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2026/08/steamos-3-9-0-preview-brings-major-updates-to-desktop- … ⌘ Read more
Stripe and Advent Ditch $50 Billion PayPal Takeover Bid
Stripe and private equity firm Advent International have ditched their $53 billion pursuit of PayPal, ending a deal that would have been the largest fintech acquisition ever. “Stripe last week agreed to pay $8 billion for AI model marketplace OpenRouter, but a source said that the OpenRouter and PayPal deals were operating on independent tracks,” reports Axios.
[! … ⌘ Read more
DXVK 3.1 Released With DXGI Incremental Presentation, D3D11 Buffer Render Targets
DXVK 3.1 is out today as the newest feature release for this Direct3D 8 / 9 / 10 / 11 implementation built atop the Vulkan API as a key component to Valve’s Steam Play (Proton)… ⌘ Read more
SteamOS 3.8.26 Beta brings a performance fix and various other improvements
Valve released SteamOS 3.8.26 Beta that finally fixes a performance issue that has been present in the Beta builds for a while, along with other bug fixes.
Read the full article on [GamingOnLinux](https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2026/08/steamos-3-8-26-beta-brings-a-performance-fix-and-various-o … ⌘ Read more
Lemonade 11.8 Makes It Easy To Run DeepSeek V4 Flash On AMD Strix Halo
For those interested in making use of the recently released DeepSeek V4 Flash model, AMD developers have released Lemonade 11.8 that now makes it rather trivial to get DeepSeek V4 Flash up and running on AMD Ryzen AI+ Max “Strix Halo” systems… ⌘ Read more
LibreOffice 26.8 Released With Many Nice Improvements
LibreOffice 26.8 is now available as the latest half-year feature update to this leading open-source alternative to Microsoft Office… ⌘ Read more
KDE Remote Desktop Experience Improving For Closing The X11 vs. Wayland Gap
KDE developer David Edmundson is out today with a blog post around improvements that have been ongoing for the Plasma 6.8 release in improving the KDE remote desktop experience. As part of ensuring a good Wayland experience and hitting all the needs fulfilled by X11, Plasma 6.8 is seeing improvements for its remote desktop functionality… ⌘ Read more
Had no clue @prologic@twtxt.net has his own computer mouse brand now, straight up giving them away, for under $3 a piece.
I got one and well pleasantly surprised, especially for the price. It fits perfectly in the hand, decent rubber, weighs nothing, clicks very silently. The scroll wheel is where you can feel some of the cost cutting, it’s pretty wonky, but good enough.
Classic cheap thin long cable, you better like 1600 DPI, cause there’s no button to change that. Sensor is the usual red light, but works on all surfaces, bedsheets included. Gliders are small and not around the sensor, but at this weight, that makes next to no difference.
Decent 8/10 option
Had no clue @prologic@twtxt.net has his own computer mouse brand now, straight up giving them away, for under $3 a piece.
I got one and well pleasantly surprised, especially for the price. It fits perfectly in my hand, decent rubber, weighs nothing, clicks very silently. The scroll wheel is where you can feel some of the cost cutting, it’s pretty wonky, but good enough.
Classic cheap thin long cable, you better like 1600 DPI, cause there’s no button to change that. Sensor is the usual red light, but works on all surfaces, bedsheets included. Gliders are small and not around the sensor, but at this weight, that makes next to no difference.
Decent 8/10 option
At 8 o’clock, we had chilly 10°C. My mate and I dashed up our backyard mountain in just a tad under an hour. And that wasn’t the direct way. Our jumpers came off quick. It was really nice, because the sun was already warming and lighting up the landscape and everbody else still asleep. We had everything to our own.
Shortly after we were atop, the first two yoga women showed up with their mats. When we decended, a bunch more were on the way up. And then came the families with dogs and kids. Very glad to have missed all this hustle and bustle.
Now, I’m really tired. But it’s a great feeling of exhaustion. Two and a half hours later, we’re at 17°C. It’s supposed to hit an acceptable 23°C later on.
Unfortunately, no pics. I learned that charging via the docking station when the computer is turned off doesn’t do shit at all. Oh well.
KDE Plasma 6.8 Lands Some Enticing Performance Optimizations This Week
This Week in Plasma is out with its latest issue to highlight interesting developments in the trek towards Plasma 6.8… ⌘ Read more
@movq@www.uninformativ.de Regarding https://movq.de/blog/postings/2026-08-16/0/POSTING-en.html, how often do you edit the first commit? A good mate does the same for at least a whole decade, probably more. I never found myself in this situation. Even though I mess with commits on a daily basis. Just never the first one so far. 8-)
PHP 7.4 To PHP 8.6 Benchmarks, PHP 8.6 JIT Performance
A Phoronix Premium supporter recently relayed a request to see some fresh PHP performance benchmarks. So here are some fresh numbers of PHP 7.4 through the latest PHP 8.5 code plus the current Git state of PHP 8.6 ahead of the official PHP 8.6.0 release later in the year. With PHP 8.6 is also a fresh look at the JIT performance enabled too… ⌘ Read more
Intel Enables Buffer Compression For Better Gaming Performance With DXVK
Merged today to Mesa 26.3-devel is a nice performance boost for Intel graphics with Valve’s Steam Play when using DXVK for Direct3D 8 / 9 / 10 / 11 over the Vulkan API. The open-source Intel ANV driver is seeing up to 5% better performance with DXVK… ⌘ Read more
OpenAI Announces Massive Data Center In Ohio With $105 Billion Nvidia Guarantee
OpenAI has signed a 10-year lease for an enormous Ohio data center that will eventually provide 8 gigawatts of computing capacity and require at least 10 gigawatts of new power generation. According to OpenAI, Nvidia will be supplying the chips and guaranteeing up to $105 billion in lease and power obligations. From t … ⌘ Read more
Warcraft 2-inspired incremental auto-battler ‘Orc Incremental’ arrives September 8
I foresee a great many hours being lost to this one - inspired in part by Warcraft 2, Orc Incremental is an incremental auto-battler with RPG elements.
Read the full article on [GamingOnLinux](https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2026/08/warcraft-2-inspired-incremental-auto-battler … ⌘ Read more
How Larry Ellison Dropped From World’s 2nd-Richest To No. 8 In Just 2 Months
Less than a year ago he was the #1 richest man in the world. 10 weeks ago he was #2. But yesterday Larry Ellison dropped to #8, Forbes reports, falling behind Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang.
Ellison’s net worth is now estimated at just $192.6 billion — after a $104 billion decline:
Shares of Oracle plunged roughly 54% betwe … ⌘ Read more
KDE Plasma 6.8 To Allow Fine-Tuning Mouse/Touchpad Speeds
KDE developers continue to be quite busy this summer baking improvements for the upcoming Plasma 6.8 desktop release. This Week in Plasna is out with its newest issue to outline all of these interesting enhancements… ⌘ Read more
It is such a nice feeling that Mu is such a capable little language 😅 And I decided to write code code in Mu by hand 🤚 haha 🤣 and start solving Project Euler problems, like Problem 8 which works out to be a nice elegant solution in Mu:
#!/usr/bin/env mu
// Largest Product in a Series
import "fp"
import "sys"
fn usage() {
print("Usage: cat |", args()[0], "<n>")
}
fn products(xs) {
return fp.reduce(xs, 1, fn(x, y) {
if y == nil {
return x
}
return x * y
})
}
fn main() {
if len(args()) < 2 {
usage()
exit(1)
}
s := must(sys.read_all(0))
if len(s) == 0 {
usage()
exit(1)
}
n := must(int(args()[1]))
r := fp.max(fp.map(fp.sliding(fp.map(s, int), n), products))
print(r)
}
main()
D7VK 2.1 Brings Faster Load Times, More Performance Tweaks
D7VK as the open-source implementation of the Direct3D 7 / 6 / 5/ 3 APIs atop the Vulkan API for Linux/Wine usage is out with another feature update. D7VK continues to mature quite well for further enhancing these older Direct3D API versions that cover the span prior to DXVK’s focus of Direct3D 8 to Direct3D 11 or VKD3D-Proton’s Direct3D 12… ⌘ Read more
Valve Slowly Expands SteamOS Support On Non-Valve Hardware
Valve is continuing to broaden SteamOS support beyond its own hardware, with the latest beta adding “initial gamepad support” for a few recent gaming handhelds and improving compatibility for a few others. Ars Technica reports: Those newly supported handhelds include MSI’s Claw 8 EX AI+, the extremely expensive, extremely powerful handheld built around I … ⌘ Read more
Polychromatic 0.9.8 Released With Razer Blade 16 2023 Support
For those looking to manage the RGB lighting and other features of their Razer devices on Linux, Polychromatic 0.9.8 is now available for that UI front-end that interacts with the OpenRazer kernel drivers for providing a decent albeit unofficial Linux configuration experience… ⌘ Read more
SteamOS 3.8.25 Beta has firmware updates for Steam Machine, wider handheld support, Steam Frame Wireless Adapter support
SteamOS 3.8.25 Beta is a bit of a bigger one with a decent list of improvements for Steam Machine, more handhelds and even the Steam Frame Wireless Adapter.
Read the full article on [GamingOnLinux](https:/ … ⌘ Read more
KDE Plasma 6.8 Improvements For UI, Built-In Remote Desktop Server
It’s been another busy summertime week of KDE developers working toward a great Plasma 6.8 desktop release in October… ⌘ Read more
Linux 7.2-rc7 Addresses A “Nasty” Race Condition Leading To Use-After-Free After 8 Years
The Linux kernel Git activity continues being quite heavy this week on fixes. It’s looking like the Linux 7.2-rc7 kernel release on Sunday will be another big one with the changes continuing to flow in from both developers and AI bots… ⌘ Read more
NASA’s Curiosity Mars Rover Discovers a Field of Honeycomb Textures
NASA’s Curiosity rover has sent back images of honeycomb-like textures called polygonal fractures, each one about 1.5 to 3 inches (4 to 8 centimeters) across. NASA reports:
The mission has spotted small patches of these geometric shapes several times before, but nothing at the scale discovered in Valle Grande. In a 360-degree panorama th … ⌘ Read more
KDE Plasma 6.8 To Enjoy Huge Performance Gains For Multi-GPU/eGPU Performance
It’s been a very exciting week in the KDE Plasma 6.8 development space particularly thanks to performance work on bettering KWin’s multi-GPU / external GPU handling… ⌘ Read more
Picolibc 1.8.12 Brings Latest Improvements To This Embedded-Focused C Library
If the recent release of the GNU C Library glibc 2.44 is too big for your embedded use-cases, Keith Packard continues hacking on Picolibc as his embedded-focused C library. Released overnight was Picolibc 1.8.12 with a variety of improvements for this embedded libc… ⌘ Read more