Basically title. I’m a digital artist in the USA and not rich by any stretch. In fact, somewhat in debt. (Aren’t we all.)

I also try really hard to not be a mindless consumer. I use old equipment as long as I can, repair, refurbish, etc…

All this talk of upcoming tariffs has me worried that, rather than being able to get a day-job at newly opened US manufacturing for electronics or something, I’ll instead be paying +60% more on like everything.

I know tech is a depreciating asset, but should I try to upgrade now to hold out for the next ~5 years or so?

I was considering hunting down a motherboard/cpu/RAM combo for instance.

Are worries about tariffs overblown? Trying to figure out how to prepare as best I can with my meager resources before everything just…keeps getting worse.

I am getting paid for my digital art, it’s not living money though. My spouse has a more stable income that enables me to keep trying.

Thanks in advance. <3

EDIT: Thanks a ton for all the helpful replies! I’m glad I’m not being overly paranoid.

Some of you have asked for system specs so here they are for the curious:

System Specs:
  • OS: OpenSUSE Tumbleweed
  • Mobo: Z590 Aorus Elite AX
  • CPU: i7-10700k @ 5.1 Ghz
  • GPU: Nvidia RTX 3090
  • Mem: 32GB DDR4 (forget the speed…3000?)

I want to be clear: I don’t mean to sound too panicked and I’m more than happy to be content with what I have and see my blessings for what they are.

However, as I’m trying to break into being a 3D Blender artist and gamedev professionally, I’m trying to strategize whether standards will significantly increase and leave me behind in the next 5 years or so. (Game industry, not trying to do Hollywood VFX models on my home rig or anything lol)

I don’t game so much these days unfortunately. And if I do, like 5% of my library is particularly demanding. 😂

  • MonkeMischief@lemmy.todayOP
    1·
    4 days ago

    There’s an effort called Monado that’s making strides, but we hope there’s a sustained interest and a breakthrough of some sort. The controllers are no-go at the moment.

    Is microsoft actually bricking their WMD headsets or just not supporting them anymore? Could you still treat it as a retro gaming console?

    So they’re not literally “bricking them”, but effectively doing so. They require “Windows Mixed Reality” to run, all the drivers are proprietary, and M$ is “deprecating WMR”, at which point it will no longer be offered, and will be taken down from the Microsoft Store.

    So basically you’d require an un-updated Windows 10 machine that previously had it installed, or else the device is a paperweight.

    They can’t even pretend to have any kind of “environmental responsibility” when they’re actively just creating tons of e-waste as a matter of policy.