Testing - Karmi's Musings & Tech

Are AI Subscriptions Worth Their Cost?

August 9, 2025August 8, 2025 by Karmi

AI subscription cost comparison chart: Claude Pro AI at $20/month for everyday productivity vs SuperGrok AI subscriptions at $30/month vs X Premium $8/month, displaying AI costs and pricing options

I have an X premium subscription at $84 a year – LOVE it and what Elon Musk has brought to X after basically stealing it from the Progressives (they still can’t forgive him for that). I have a self-hosted blog at Hostinger that’s about $336 every 4 years (works out to about $84 a year). That’s it for my subscriptions (other than two monthly AI subscriptions to test for this post), since I live on less than the US Poverty Guidelines.

I’ve basically merged the two. X premium has an excellent AI in with that package—Grok 3. Blog posts get copied over to X composer – though I’ve started making that post more of a brief teaser rather than being copied entirely. Some of the most interesting X posts get added to the blog’s sidebar using X/Publish. Even the poor in America can have expensive hobbies – IF they manage the money right.

Grok: My co-Writer, co-Coder, and AMAZING Sidekick

October 16, 2025July 15, 2025 by Karmi

Grok AI assistant busy at work. — Grok, my AI sidekick, co-writing & co-coding my WordPress blog & X posts!

Grok AI assistant is now my go-to for writing blog posts and coding projects, making tough tasks easy. As a coding novice, tackling the customization of my WordPress blog—powered by the premium Multipurpose Blog Pro theme with its Child theme active—felt like climbing a mountain blindfolded. Enter Grok, the AI assistant from xAI, who became my co-writer, co-coder, and downright *AMAZING* sidekick over two days of intense work. From tweaking the logo bar color to styling the homepage post sections, Grok guided me through the chaos of the “Inspect” tool with patience and precision.

Here’s how it went down.

Windows 11 24H2 – Laptops

August 12, 2025November 24, 2024 by Karmi

See Windows 11 24H2 – and Recall post for more info on the 24H2 Update.

This 24H2 update was on my Dell XPS 13 9310 – purchased in October of 2021. Specs are:

Windows 11 24H2 – and Recall

August 12, 2025October 20, 2024 by Karmi

Windows 11 24H2 installed on my ‘Rose’ test computer yesterday (10/19/2024). Specs are: Intel® i9-10900K CPU, ASUS Prime Z490M-PLUS MoBo, MSI GeForce GTX 1660 SUPER™ VENTUS XS OC GPU, and 32GB of memory.

Didn’t time it, but it is a *MAJOR* update and took time to download (Fiber internet) & install. Restart was required, and that also took time with several restarts during that process. Am seeing reports of an hour or more for the update – depending on computer’s age and your internet connection. Mine didn’t take an hour, but total time was over 30 minutes…maybe 40-45 minutes? It is a “full OS swap..”

What’s new in Windows 11, version 24H2:

Media Library – Digitizing your DVDs & Blu-rays (Part 3)

August 12, 2025May 23, 2024 by Karmi

Part 1 and Part 2. This is Part 3 and looks to be the last part unless I go with a Media server at a later date. I might be doing something wrong because the intro page that lists what’s on a DVD or Blu-ray isn’t being cloned in the MP4’s (??). Nor are the normal advertising and warnings being transferred, which is great. 👍😉👌 Other than those issues, I am getting what seems to be the same quality as on the original DVDs and Blu-rays.