There’s nothing like starting off the new year by looking at CES 2025! From Mirumi the fuzzy mascot robot that clips onto your bag by Yukai, to cutting-edge tech from Lenovo, Sony and Nvidia  here are a couple of things that piqued my interest—one absolutely hilarious and the other big news for tech.

ENRON

Enron Is Back and They Have A Nuclear Reactor Egg?

You remember that small little company called Enron? Well, guess what—they have made a comeback 20 years in the making! Although not at CES physically, they released an online announcement last week for The EGG: an at-home nuclear reactor that can power your home for 10 years! Out of this announcement, you heard some crazy claims like, “When you put a nuclear reactor in your home, it's gotta be safe for the whole family” - Enron, CEO.

Now, obviously, this is satire. But there is an entire Enron website  with the original trademark and all. If you take a look at the patent records for Enron it belongs to THE COLLEGE COMPANY LLC. This is also the company that owns the trademark “Birds Aren’t Real,” a satirical conspiracy that says birds are actually drones operated by the US government. The Birds Aren’t Real movement was originally created to mock crazy conspiracy theories, and it grew into a cultural phenomenon amongst Gen Z in 2020.

I’m not sure how long this Enron stunt will go for, but I am here for it! In a world where we are bombarded with AI and new tech, it’s refreshing to see a satirical approach that pokes fun at the over-the-top nature of product launches and announcements. It’s a reminder not to take everything so seriously and to step back and laugh at the absurdity that sometimes comes with innovation. It reminds us to question the spectacle of it all. If you’re interested, you can buy some Enron merch on their online store and hopefully they keep making more content. 

NVIDIA

Nvidia- RTX Blackwell & Real Time Cinema Quality Assets

In an event almost entirely focused on AI, we have to talk about Nvidia! You may have seen the release of their new 50 series graphics cards. These Blackwell architecture cards are absolute beasts! RTX Blackwell has up to 92 Billion Transistors, 380 RT TFLOPS, 125 Shader TFLOPS and 4,000 AI TOPS. With the 5090 coming just below these numbers, it is going to be able to handle whatever you throw at it. Now, what does this mean? It means that we now have the ability to intermix AI workloads with graphics workloads.

An example of seeing AI and graphics processing together can be seen with the texturing of 3D objects. The new 50 series cards now have programmable shaders with the ability to process neural networks. As a result, you get neural texture compression and neural material shading, allowing AI to learn the texture and the compression algorithm, reducing the memory needed by up to 7X. This allows developers to produce cinema-quality assets in real-time graphics.

With the 5090 coming in at a price of $1,999, the question for me is: should I buy that beat-up Ford Ranger from Johnny down the street that's in “mint condition,” or the new 5090? They are both the same price! For me personally, it's going to be neither. Johnny's truck is definitely not mint condition! And the 5090, although making stunning innovations, is something that most people don't need. Unless you're doing intensive local AI workloads, are on the cutting edge with rendering techniques, or are a serious gamer looking to play games at 8K 165 Hz, it just doesn't make sense for the casual person.

Why the RTX 5070 Is Turning Heads

The 5070, Nvidia announced, is priced at $549! The crazy thing about this card is that, according to Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, it has “4090 performance at $549.” For reference, the 4090 is currently the crème de la crème, the crown jewel, the frickin' bee’s knees of graphics cards right now! Now, this statement is a bit of a marketing spin, but it is not a lie! With the use of AI in the new cards, the 5070 can match the performance of the 4090, although none of the hardware specs of the 5070 even come close to matching the 4090. This is done through a new innovation from Nvidia called DLSS 4 (Deep Learning Super Sampling). This basically means that there are three AI-generated frames for every one frame actually made by the graphics card. So, at 60 FPS, only 15 of those are ‘non-AI-generated frames.’

The Takeaway?

Introducing NVIDIA RTX Kit: Transforming Rendering with AI and Path Tracing

Part of the magic of modern creative work is the balance between beauty and practicality. Nvidia’s merging of AI and traditional graphics processing could close that gap even further. Real-time rendering, high-quality interactive experiences, and dynamic 3D content are about to become faster, cheaper, and easier to produce and consume. Only time will tell if these techniques stick around, but it's huge news for every visual industry.