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• Yeah, I'm going to stay right here in my insulated, double-glazed, air-conditioned bunker for a week.
  
  
  
• You can get an AMD Ryzen 9800X3D, an Asus X870 motherboard, and 32GB of RAM for $939 at Newegg right now - and even get a bonus mouse.  (Tom's Hardware)
  
  That's a $480 CPU, a $300 motherboard, and memory that did cost around $100 but  suddenly finds itself at $440.  And a $125 mouse that isn't worth $125 or it wouldn't be included for free.
  
  
  
• Just one small problem: Asus is currently reviewing - though not recalling - all of its 800-series motherboards over a string of failures specifically involving the 9800X3D CPU.  (Tom's Hardware)
  
  ASRock has been battling this for months.  It's rare, but seems to keep happening.
  
  
  
• Oh, and the faster 9850X3D is here.  (Notebook Check)
  
  It's only slightly faster, but it's only slightly more expensive.  If you were planning on a 9800X3D build - or upgrading an existing system that already has DDR5 RAM - it's not a compelling option but not an awful one either.

• Some perspective: Intel reported a loss for 2025, yes, but it was 98% smaller than the loss in 2024.  (Tom's Hardware)
  
  The $300 million loss for the year also has to be compared with the $20 billion in fresh investments.  I certainly wouldn't count them out yet.
  
  
  
• Intel also confirmed that its new Nova Lake CPUs will be showing up late this year.  (Tom's Hardware)
  
  These are expected to have twice the number of CPU cores of any recent consumer models - up to 16 performance cores and 32 efficiency cores, plus 4 low-power cores.  Which is rather a lot.
  
  
  
• Japanese toilet maker Toto is seeing its share price rise for an unexpected reason.  (Tom's Hardware)
  
  For nearly forty years, the company has also made electrostatic chucks used to hold silicon wafers in place during manufacturing - one of many afterthought components that has seen a sudden surge in demand:

  Interestingly, the source name checked a few other unlikely Japanese companies that are benefitting from the AI boom.  An MSG seasoning maker also makes chip-insulating films, for example.  Meanwhile, cosmetics brand Kao’s expertise in facial cleansers has an unexpected twin: the company also makes cleaning agents for semiconductor wafers.

  Find what you're good at, and keep doing it.
  
  
  
• AMD has prepared a chart showing why its laptop chips are still better than Intel's new Panther Lake CPUs.  (WCCFTech)
  
  They're not.
  
  
  
• If you were thinking of buying an Nvidia 5000-series graphics card, now might be a good time to think of buying an AMD graphics card, or to simply find a new hobby like gardening or making fun of people online.  (WCCFTech)
  
  Nvidia is cutting production and has abandoned its Open Price Program which tried to keep boards available at MSRP, meaning they soon won't be.
  
  Higher end cards already aren't.
  
  
  
• What TikTok's new ownership means for your feed.  (The Verge)  (archive site)
  
  It means you're still the same idiot you were yesterday.  Stop watching slop that is making you retarded.
  
  
  
• What TikTok's new privacy policy means for you.  (Tech Crunch)
  
  It means you're still the same idiot you were yesterday, because the policy has been in place since 2024.
  
  
  

Posted by: PatBuckman at Sunday, January 25 2026 02:20 AM (rcPLc)

Posted by: normal at Sunday, January 25 2026 04:18 AM (Sbqr6)

Posted by: Joe Redfield at Sunday, January 25 2026 04:38 AM (KOtXO)

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