While you’d all be aware that celebrities, despite their wealth, are given expensive shit for free all the time, today we’re going to take a look at one gift in particular. Partly because it’s a gaming PC, but also because we kinda have the receipt for it as well.
Esports guy Jake Lucky tweeted this out earlier today, and it certainly provoked a reaction:
Responses in the replies generally ranged from “it looks like shit” to “that’s massively overpriced” to “lmao all that just to gamble” (more on that soon). That first sentiment might be a bit much. I think this looks great! It’s a gaming PC, what do you expect, and the white lighting in these photos is an infinitely classier look than the electronic clown car aesthetic you often see on these kind of systems. I’m particularly fond of the lighting around the fans, it’s a very “starship corridor” look.
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As for the price, well, there are some caveats here. The PC—which was put together by Paradox Customs—was actually bought for Drake as a gift by streamer Xposed (Paradox tells Kotaku they “hashed out” the component selection together), and in the time between the order first being placed and the PC actually arriving the market for a lot of expensive PC parts crashed for some reason. Throw in some Canadian taxes Xposed had to pay and Paradox say the actual cost in July 2022 is somewhere closer to $6500. Which, you know, is still ridiculously expensive for a PC, but it’s also not $8000.
How do we know that? Paradox tweeted this earlier today, which handily also gives us a chance to take a look at the kind of specs you can expect to see in a PC that cost more than my last three desktops combined.
As for who paid for the system and why, Xposed actually picked out this exact system for himself, then says he ordered a second for Drake because he had helped the rapper out with an earlier PC, but at the time had to skimp and get him a “prebuilt from Best Buy because it was short notice”:
In December 2021, Xposed signed a partnership deal with Stake, a shady and controversial online gambling site which Drake just happens to be continually streaming and promoting at the same time, and who shared this new PCs arrival on their socials.
We’re all aware of the chip shortage, but while you might have read about its impact on PC and cars, countless smaller industries are also struggling to operate due to ongoing supply issues. One of those is the printer business, and now a popular brand has been forced to take an aggressive action that’s bound to piss people off—and satisfy others.
Unable to procure enough chips, Canon is being forced to sell cartridges without a Digital Rights Management (DRM) chip, or the copy protection component that discourages you from using third-party printer ink.
Lacking a tag to identify as legitimate, official Canon ink is now being flagged as third-party components by the company’s own printers. Owners of the affected printers (here is a list of models) will see an error message from Canon explaining that the ink they installed can’t be recognized.
Canon doesn’t prevent you from using third-party inks, so you can bypass these annoying “use only our stuff” notices and continue printing without any loss in quality, but now you’ll have to do so even when using genuine Canon ink.
The error messages were first report by Twitter user @Mariowitte who wrote (translated from German): “thanks to the lack of semiconductors, Canon is now apparently producing toner cartridges without ‘copy protection’ and sending out emails to customers with instructions on how to workaround error messages about counterfeit cartridges.”
In an unconventional notice published to its German-language website, Canon gives customers instructions on how to bypass the same erroneous error messages consumers have long condemned as being anti-competitive. In what feels like an embarrassing self-own, Canon tells customers to simply close out of any messages that claim the ink their using can’t be identified, and in doing so, tells them the steps needed to use third-party ink.
Canon promises that despite the strange workaround to get printers to operate, the quality of the prints are unaffected if you’re using its ink. However, remaining toner levels won’t display properly, and might drop from 100% to 0% when they’re completely empty. It’s the equivalent of having a broken fuel gauge, and while you might not be left stranded on the side of the road, your printer may run out of ink without notice and lose functionality.
Giving customers the keys to using third-party ink might suggest a broader policy change, but Canon will return to using scare tactics to push away third-party ink cartridges once chip supply normalizes, meaning customers looking to save a penny will continue to see these error messages and should hope Canon doesn’t brick non-Canon cartridge options altogether as HP famously did in 2016.
WASHINGTON—One of the largest makers of voting machines in the U.S. on Monday sued a prominent supporter of former President Donald Trump, alleging that the businessman had defamed the company with false accusations that it had rigged the 2020 election for Joe Biden.
Dominion Voting Systems sued Mike Lindell, chief executive of Minnesota-based MyPillow Inc., and his company in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, seeking more than $1.3 billion in damages.
In its complaint, the company cites a number of statements made by Mr. Lindell, including in media appearances, social-media posts, and a two-hour film claiming to prove widespread election fraud. Mr. Lindell said he helped produce the film, which he released online in early February.
The complaint alleges that Mr. Lindell made false claims about the integrity of Dominion’s voting machines and that he knew no credible evidence supported his claims that the company had stolen the election from Mr. Trump—what Dominion has called the “Big Lie.”
“He is well aware of the independent audits and paper ballot recounts conclusively disproving the Big Lie,” the complaint states. “But Lindell…sells the lie to this day because the lie sells pillows.”
There are printers and then there are printers. We’re all familiar with the small cube-shaped laser printers that spit out a few bake sale flyers or a school book report that are designed to sit on a shelf near your desk at home. Then there are behemoths like Canon’s ImageClass MF743Cdw, a printer that hovers squarely between the average home laser printer and the massive office all-in-one machine.
While this printer won’t collate and staple your projects, it will do almost everything else. It has a built-in scanner—just lift the cover on top, drop your page, and use the built-in LCD screen to send the file to a mobile device, PC, or, if you’re in 1996, a fax machine—and a pair of paper trays, one for odd sizes and another for letter/legal.
This guy is big. It’s a heavy 64 pounds and is 43 inches high with a footprint of 21 x 29 inches. It takes up a lot of space. Be aware of this before you dedicate a spot on your desk for it.
The printer outputs in duplex color or black and white and supports wifi and Ethernet connectivity. You can also connect it to a computer via USB. A generous 5-inch screen lets you choose various functions and settings and you can also use the built-in NFC function to connect phones to the printer with a single tap. There is also a USB port on the front of the device for quick prints of documents and photos.
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Speed was above average in my testing with about three seconds per black-and-white print seven seconds for color prints. That latter number that was definitely affected by a system in which the printer spat out three color pages at a time and then warmed up the color toner for the next three pages. Canon estimates about 3,000 prints from the included black toner cartridge and about 2,000 for the color cartridge, although your mileage may vary.
As a standard printer, it works perfectly. It is one of the few printers I’ve tested recently that seamlessly connects to my home network and was available to every device in the house, including phones and laptops. This was surprisingly refreshing, because I’ve definitely experienced frustration trying to get various printers to connect to my local network. The MF743 found my network and stayed connected consistently.
Speed, as mentioned above, is about average and I was able to do some pretty hefty prints—50 pages or more—in a few minutes.
Color quality is excellentPhoto: John Biggs/Gizmodo
The on-device screen is plenty big enough to access the printer’s basic features. Setup is best performed in the remote admin system that essentially turns the printer into a web server, which then lets you enter address book entries for scanner emails and faxes, update user profiles, and change settings. Unless you are tasked with setting this printer up for a small office, you’ll be able to use it right out the box, and you can easily ignore the more complex settings.
Canon doesn’t recommend photo paper in this printer so I tested all of these prints on regular letter-sized printer paper. Black-and-white reproduction was perfect, and you’ll find no fault in this model for text documents. Color test prints were surprisingly bright and clear and I found the color accuracy to be acceptable. Again, this is not a photo printer, but photos sent from an iPhone directly to the printer came out bright and clear.
Prints of photos.Photo: John Biggs/Gizmodo
The copy feature was a bit of a letdown. I placed a print of a color test page I had printed earlier and ran it back through the copier. The result, as you can see, is pretty ragged. Every color had an orange tinge and there were many artifacts caused by the light shining through the print. I also tested the ID copier on a standard driver’s license and a few other cards. The copied results were sub-par but readable and, if you’re not picky, usable for record-keeping. The printer scans at 600 DPI, which should have been more than enough, but it looks like the onboard scanning and printing system doesn’t work as well as it could.
A copy vs. a scan.Photo: John Biggs/Gizmodo
Scanning was a different story altogether. The scanned images came out wonderfully on the computer, and Canon includes the MF Scan Utility for scanning on Windows or macOS. Because it is network-connected, you can initiate the scan from anywhere and the results are stellar. In fact, scanning and printing from a computer might be the only viable method for copying color documents using this printer.
But, look: The best place for this printer is in a small office. It’s too much firepower for home use—the paper tray holds 300 sheets, which is absolutely way more than even a family with kids needs. If you are, say, scanning paperwork at a doctor’s office or other professional situation, it’s the perfect printer. Because it costs $400, with black-and-white and color toner replacements coming in at just under $100 each, you’d spend less than you would on a more powerful copier/printer combo, and this does almost everything you’d need for a small office. The ID and passport scanning are nice add-ons (as long as you’re scanning and not copying) and the fax feature is, as they say, the icing on the 1990s Pudding Pop.
There are some features that standalone devices could probably do better. If, for example, you bought this for the ID scanner and plan to print the IDs immediately, a separate ID scanner might be the best solution. Or, if you’re planning on copying many color documents and images, there are definite limitations to this printer. But if you’re fine transferring scans to your computer and then storing them or printing them as needed, you’re definitely in good hands.
Canon makes great photo printers. This isn’t one of those. This is a heavy-duty, workhorse of a printer aimed at small- to medium-sized offices. The print quality is fast, economical, and solid, and a definite upgrade to other multi-function printers I’ve seen in this price range.