2020 is almost over, thankfully, in what turned out to be a rough year controlled in the majority by the Covid-19 virus, we saw many things come to a halt, sports, esports, cinema, tech production and more, but with some areas of the world recovering and others seemingly no longer bothered by how serious the virus is, we still manage to have a few small stories to talk about. So let’s get into it!
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KFC Console
Are you, like me, hungry for tech news? Could you also be hungry for the Colonels signature recipe fried chicken? Well then this could be the collaboration for you, earlier this year KFC showed off a console concept that many thought to be an April Fools joke, well it turns out the craziness of 2020 wasn’t quite finished yet. It seems as if this console wasn’t actually an April fools joke at all! KFC showed off a new trailer and showed that Cooler Master would in fact be the ones behind it’s manufacturing process. They used a Cooler Master NC100 chassis with an Intel Nuc 9 being the brains. The Nuc 9 features a 9th Gen Intel mobile chip but houses most of the guts such as the memory etc. While the exact GPU being used is unknown, it is confirmed at least to be an ASUS RTX supported graphics card, in an easy to access GPU slot with it being upgradable used as a selling point. In terms of storage you’re talking TWO Seagate Barracuda 1TB SSDs. They are claiming “240fps with 240Hz output” and “4k quality gaming.”
The main gimmick here however is the… *checks notes* chicken drawer, yes you read that right. It features a heated drawer that serves the purpose of keeping the Colonels crispy chicken at a perfect temperature. Such an obscure selling point so you can understand why people would think this was an elaborate ruse! Although an exact price and release date is unknown, we believe it’s going to run somewhere in the $2000-2500 range and don’t think it’s going to be available by the millions that’s for sure! I’d be surprised if this was anything more than a VERY limited collectors item, but it looks *ahem* finger licking good!
Android Security Updates
As per usual Android is dishing out it’s regular security updates, making sure you’re protected and you can be pleased that all your favourite apps are not at risk, such as my favourites in the back end of the year, AFK Arena, Pokémon Masters and with all the sport that happens over the holidays, the OddsTrader App, most phones have received an update including but not limited to devices from Nokia, OnePlus and Motorola but the reason I actually decided to include a small write up on this… Huawei have received an android security update, yes that’s right. A Huawei device from 2017 has received a security update, I personally hope this is a good sign for Huawei being able to move back to proper Android software. Huawei phones have had some of the best price to performance ratios of all flagships over the last few years but they were massively stumped when Trump ordered American companies to halt trading with China, meaning they had to develop their own operating system. With a bit of luck that may be behind us, but I won’t be getting my hopes up just yet.
Massive Haul of RTX 30xx GPU’s Found (Rumour)
There has been a story floating around this week of an unaccounted for shipping container being found in a port South Korea holding, get this, 500,000 RTX 3080 graphics cards, we can’t confirm or deny this story however, but what I will say is that a shipping container surely isn’t big enough to hold 500,000 full size graphics cards, so my only thought would be that it was just the actual GPU chips themselves, ready to be shipped out to be turned into full fledged graphics cards. I for one hope it is true though as I have been trying to get hold of an RTX 3080 for weeks at this point and I constantly miss out by what seems like seconds!
That’s about it honestly, with it being the holiday period there isn’t a whole lot to talk about, all the big guns are enjoying some well earned time off and come the start of 2021 we’ll be looking forward to swathes of tech news. Hopefully you folks have enjoyed your holidays so far and from me and mine, I wish you all the best for 2021.
Written by Stuart ‘Stubat’ Hannon