tech tech tech. How to take it out. What, what's that all about?
Well, I'm gonna tell you. NVIDIA GPUs could be getting
some imminent price hikes with one report citing claims from industry insiders
that some variants of the RTX 5090 could end up retailing for nearly $5,000
as soon as January 2026, a month in which many of you
are currently already living. Comment below with how your 2026 is going so far.
This alleged cost increase is almost certainly thanks
to skyrocketing DRAM costs. RAM makes up a huge chunk of a graphics card's price.
Now, I don't know if the 5,000 number is accurate,
but the RTX 5090 launched at a $2,000 MSRP,
and it's already hard to find anywhere under 3,000,
which is so, so sad for the people just trying to scrape enough together
to buy the most powerful gaming GPU on the planet. But it's becoming pretty clear
that price hikes on PC components outside of just RAM and SSDs are inbound.
For example, in a leaked letter to their partners, ASUS is saying they'll raise prices
on at least some products, starting on January 5th, 2026.
The letter indicates that memory and storage components are so expensive and scarce, scarce, scarce,
that ASUS can no longer absorb the cost.
They'd like to absorb some more of your money instead.
Wait a minute, January 5th, that's the first day of the Consumer Electronics Show
in Las Vegas, where this year, all the keynotes are just gonna be guys
walking on stage to be like,
welcome. Same shit, but more expensive. Woo, come on, please clap.
AI, but actually I take it back
because some companies are starting to pre-announce
some of the fun and wacky tech they'll show off at CES,
as is tradition. GameSir is teasing a wireless Swift Drive controller
with a tiny steering wheel built right into the pad
that provides force feedback effects for racing games, like the Namco JogCon PlayStation controller
from back in 1998. Finally, I can drive virtual cars in modern games,
just like I do real cars, with both my thumbs in the middle of the wheel.
Wait, whoa, watch out, you mess with the nerd, you get the horns.
GameSir also showed off a full-on wireless wheel
and pedal set with its own Turbine fan to simulate airflow and haptic effects
for total and complete immersion. Meanwhile, one netbook teased the new 1X Sugar Wallet,
an eight-inch gaming handheld with a folding OLED screen
powered by a Qualcomm Gaming Platform flagship processor,
my favorite type of Qualcomm Gaming Platform processor.
Price and launch details are still up in the air, but I'm into that thing.
It's like the handheld that could've been if Sony and Nintendo ended up working together after all
in the good timeline. Utopia.
Speaking of Nintendo, Epilogue has shown off the SN operator,
a USB connected dock that lets you plug your old Super Nintendo cartridges
straight into a PC, Mac, or Steam Deck,
and then play or archive them digitally with saved backups and emulator support built in.
It's 60 bucks US and supposedly ships in April, which is great news for cartridge owners
who don't wanna fiddle with the DIY archiving kits
out there. The not so great news, Nintendo may still find a way to sue your ass.
They are just not as cool as our sponsor. You might know the quick bits
for their contributions to tech news, but they're also amazing battle wrappers.
Hey, they have a show tonight. You should, oh, it's already over.
Cause they're so quick. Another RX 9070 XT has suffered a burn injury
on its 12 volt two by six power connector with Redditor Divine Threshold claiming it lasted a year
before joining the extremely exclusive
melted 12 volt connectors club. I'm jealous.
But at least he got a year of gaming out of it, unlike the guy who ordered a GPU and got rocks instead.
Some good news for him though. He finally got his RTX 5080 from Best Buy
after he figured out the shipping weight somehow mysteriously increased during transit.
To celebrate, he got a tattoo of the ASUS Tough logo
on a pile of rocks. Not sure why you'd want to commemorate a shipping snafu
in which someone stole an expensive item from you, but whatever sinks your boat.
Game Store GOG is officially breaking out on its own.
If that's what you call parent company CD Project Redd
selling GOG to Michael Kacinski,
the original co-founder of both GOG and CD Project Redd
who is now an independent entrepreneur despite still holding many CD Project Redd shares.
Anyway, the DRM free storefront says nothing is changing for users.
That's the important part. Your library is safe, but big changes are coming.
GOG is teasing more ambitious plans to revive classic PC games starting next year.
Basically, it's the same good old GOG old games
just readopted by its biological father who was only partially absent,
but is now giving this whole full-time parenting thing a shot, I call that character growth.
The US is giving Samsung and SK Hynex temporary permission to keep shipping chip making tools
into their Chinese factories through 2026
easing pressure after earlier export waivers were revoked.
The goal is to reportedly keep memory production running in the short term,
especially as AI demand pushes prices even higher.
But at the same time, China is pulling in the opposite direction.
Beijing is now requiring chip makers to use at least 50% domestically made equipment
when expanding their manufacturing capacity, forcing fabs to choose local tools
even when foreign options could offer a cheaper solution.
But are the chips still domestic if they're made by foreign machines?
Hey, remember solar freaking roadways? No, that's okay.
Because now we have charging freaking roadways.
Florida is building a highway that can wirelessly charge EVs while you drive.
Yes, charging freaking roadways. A stretch of state road 516
will have inductive charging coils underneath the asphalt
delivering up to 200 kilowatts to compatible cars
as they roll along. It's meant to extend range, not fully charged vehicles,
but it could definitely be a step in the right direction. Will it work?
Maybe. Will it be wildly expensive and only support a handful of cars at first?
I have so fricking lulely. Charging freaking roadways, man!
Researchers at Northwestern University have developed a tiny flexible under scalp implant
that could help restore lost senses by shining patterned light
directly through the skull into the brain, which is something you can do, apparently.
The wireless device avoids drilling into the brain and has already helped mice
relearn how to interpret sensory signals. It sounds fantastic,
as long as there's some sort of fail-safe to prevent a pickle-rick situation.
And Atlas Data Storage announced what it called
the world's first scalable DNA data storage offering
earlier this month. The system can pack up to 60 petabytes per liter
of gene-carrying juice and could last for thousands of years.
Sounds like something ChatGBD just came up with, but okay.
Unfortunately, encoding and decoding data using the four chemical bases in DNA
isn't really cheap or fast. Sequencing currently costs around $30
per roughly 250 gigabytes and takes significant time.
So it won't be replacing tape at scale for years.
Still, it's pretty cool. Soon we'll be living in less of a cyberpunk dystopia
and more of a bio-sci-fi, genetically engineered dystopia.
That's exciting. You know what else is exciting? That there's gonna be more tech news on Friday.
So you should come back then. Happy New Year, everyone. We'll see you in 2026.
Heck, depending on where you live, we might already be seeing you in 2026.
Have they solved the RAM crisis yet over there?
Let me know.