That first part sounds like software/firmware stuff like mine, but the second part almost sounds like an antenna design issue.

Used to use Red Hat. This theme is for people who have nostalgia for back when Red Hat wasn’t a puppet of the blue monster - not the one that likes cookies.

Thunderbird’s not bad, but I usually use web stuff.

I have an existing iCloud e-mail that I haven’t had the time to switch off of. I then use G-Mail for school stuff - since I’ve signed away my soul to Google anyway, might as well use what they have to offer.

Maybe one day, I’ll start my own personal e-mail utopia, nut that day is not today.

Maybe Fedora?

Personally, though, I’m a Debian guy - Testing on my desktop and stable with Flatpaks and a few backports on my laptop.

Who would have thought? I’ve hardly touched Windows in over 2 years (mostly other people’s computers and the occasional app in my GPU-accelerated VM) so I haven’t kept up much.

According to the repair manual, my Wi-Fi card is actually replaceable, at least physically. I don’t know if Lenovo still does BIOS whitelists of cards like they used to (I think they did remove it a few years back.), but their OEM parts website has a diverse selection if this fix were ever to break.

I’d say other than the bottom being a bother to remove (and the keyboard not being designed to be replaced, though after some research, it seems possible), this is a surprisingly repairable laptop for how recent it it.

I totally agree with you on the Linux side. However, I first got into Linux by using it in Virtualbox on Windows. In the Windows world, as far as I know, it’s the easiest-to-use free-as-in-beer¹ hypervisor, so long as UEFI support has improved since I last used it.

1: I say this because of the non-libre extension pack.

As I have learned the hard way, it truly is.

I agree with Mint. I think Ubuntu has kind of devolved though, and PopOS is the better way to go. Fedora’s good too these days.

My recommendation is to try out a few distros in VirtualBox before switching - this was my process, and it can be very gradual.

I don’t use Mint, but I would guess that you could change your repos in /etc/apt/sources.list, run sudo apt update, and then sudo apt full-upgrade. Just make sure the full upgrade isn’t doing really dumb stuff like deleting a bunch of programs.

I could be completely wrong and this could be terrible advice, but this has become the wisdom for me when I use Debian Testing. Of course, I just did straight sudo apt update after Bookworm was released and the upgrade to Trixie went mostly fine. I have never upgraded between stable versions, so I may not be one to say.

As a younger fan, for the longest time, I avoided Lower Decks as I’m not usually into the adult animation comedy genre. I first watched it late last year and have rewatched the whole thing 3 or 4 times total since (though I often start around “Terminal Provocations” as I don’t enjoy earlier episodes as much.).

Me and my siblings would often watch whatever Trek my mom was watching before eventually doing our own watch throughs.

We can always hope Prodigy will pull off a season 3.

I installed Pop in a VM (I use Debian usually) and was surprised how usable it was sans-graphical acceleration. Ubuntu is pretty much unusable these days in a VM - it can literally sometimes take 30 seconds for a button press to register where it works instantly in VM Pop or Fedora.

I found the crossover kind of neutral. I don’t think it made the film much better or worse. I think a nice thing could have been some sort of Nimoy cameo at the end.

Well, under it, anyhow.

USS TITAN - INT - DAY RIKER and TROI are walking out of the holodeck. The final screams of Bradward Boimler stop.

RIKER (Chuckling) It’s a shame that both Boimlers are dead now. I actually kind of liked those ensigns.

TROI Did you not see that extra pip in that holorecording?

Riker Ah, that’s right. Proud of the guy… even though he’s dead.

Riker and Troi laugh as they walk off screen.

On another random note, I just remembered that I put a Fontaine quote as my senior quote in my high school yearbook.

I feel like that’s the Trek films in a nutshell - from a critic’s standpoint, they’re not necessarily all great, but they almost feel like long Star Trek episodes that you enjoy anyway.

Here’s my thoughts on each film:

• Generations: Honestly, I think pretty good with a solid overall plot. I loved Data’s arc - I feel like they did a great job not taking the comic relief too far. The fight scene was delightfully campy, and the “Time is a predator” stuff is so memorable to me.
• First Contact: I think it was a fun film. It’s almost the Wrath of Khan of the TNG films - a lot more action, with some Trek - which is probably why it’s considered the best. Personally, I prefer Generations, but this is still a good watch.
• Insurrection: There were a lot of fun moments, but the overall plot wasn’t that great - Picard’s new love interest that we never hear about again, the weird theme about “being in the moment” that I feel didn’t integrate into the plot all that well, etc.
• Nemesis: I think Nemesis had a lot of great things that didn’t quite land at the end. I think Shinzon did a great acting job, but could have been written better. They made him more irrational than I think he should have been, and the whole plot with “blowing up the earth” and “conquering the galaxy” felt way out of line for someone who is the product of and survived imperialism. As for B4, I feel they didn’t address the ethical concerns of throwing Data’s mind in him. At the end, blowing up Data didn’t help, but if the rest of the movie had been written better, I might have been fine with this choice, Chances are, whether through B4 or a Search for Spock-esque plot, we would have gotten another film where we got Data back.

I’ve often envisioned what a Lower Decks film might entail. I think one of the side plots would be Rutherford suddenly realizes he forgot his entire family existed and tries to get reacquainted with them. He quickly finds out that with his implant, he has become everything they ever wanted him to be, and that scares him as he realizes they don’t accept who he used to be and don’t have enough grief for the Rutherford that was.

Sorry to be pedantic, but how much latinum are you betting?