Zotac launches a small form-factor (SFF) desktop gaming PC-- the Mek Mini, a machine packing a six-core Intel Core i7-8700 processor and an Nvidia GeForce RTX 2070 graphics card in a 260.8 x 136 x 258.8mm chassis.

The Mek Mini also includes 16GB DDR4 memory, a 240GB PCIe/NVMe M.2 SSD and a 2TB 2.5-inch HDD, and is powered by two 230W external power bricks. On the connectivity side, the PC offers a Rivet Networks Killer Wireless-AC 1550 802.11ac Wi-Fi + Bluetooth 5.0 controller, x2 GbE ports (one controlled by the Killer E2500 chip), x5 USB 3.0 Type-A ports, x1 USB 3.0 Type-C connector, SD card reader, and 3.5-mm audio jacks. Meanwhile the GPU has x2 Display Port 1.4, x1 DVI-D, x1 HDMI and x1 USB-C ports, allowing it to drive up to x4 monitors simultaneously.

EK Water Blocks announces a cooling solution for owners of the AMD Radeon VII graphics card-- the EK-Vector series, cooler replacements promising to allow for overclocking capabilities of 10-20%.

According to the company, the EK-Vector series allows the Radeon VII graphics card to "reach higher boost clocks, thus providing more overclocking headroom and more performance during gaming or other GPU intense tasks." The design integrates with an existing liquid cooling system, and channels coolant directly over the GPU, HGM2 memory and VRM (voltage regulation module), with a redesigned cooling engine offering a larger footprint compared to previous EK Full Cover water blocks.

Nvidia offers a small piece of hardware to power the AI projects of "developers, makers and enthusiasts"-- the Jetson Nano, a board promising to deliver 472 GFLOPS of processing power from a package measuring just 70 x 45mm.

The Nano is the latest offering in the Jetson line of embedded computing boards aimed at edge computing applications. What makes the Nano unique is the pricetag, since it costs all of $99 while still packing some fairly impressive specifications. For the curious, it carries a quad-core ARM A57 processor running at 1.43GHz, a 128-CUDA core Maxwell GPU, 16GB eMMC flash and 4GB DDR4 RAM, all within a 5W power envelope.

According to DigiTimes Research Intel CPU shortages are set to get worse in Q1 2019, as demand for Chromebooks equipped with entry-level Intel processors enters the "high period."

The analyst predicts the Intel CPU supply gap will shrink to 2-3% in Q1 2019, with Core i3 taking over Core i5 as the series hit hardest by shortages. The shortages started in April 2018, with major brands including HP, Dell and Lenovo experiencing supply gaps of over 5%. Analysts previously believed shortages would gradually ease after vendors completed inventory preparations for the holiday season, but the Q4 2018 supply gap remained at the same levels as Q3 2018. This is due to HP launching a second wave of CPU inventory buildup in Q4 2018, prompting other vendors to follow suit.