NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 Ti And RTX 3070 Ti Now Official; Both Arriving This Month

After months of speculation and rumours, NVIDIA has finally let the cat out of the bag on its new GeForce RTX 3080 Ti and RTX 3070 Ti graphics cards. Announced during its Computex 2021 keynote earlier, the two cards serve as a step-up to the currently existing RTX 3080 and RTX 3070 graphics cards.

Starting with the RTX 3080 Ti, as per the initial reports, the card comes with 12GB GDDR6X, 34 Shaders-TFLOPS, 67 RT-FLOPS, and 273 Tensor-TFLOPs. Additionally, the card also has 10240 CUDA Cores, a 19Gbps memory clock, as well as a 384-bit memory bus.

In terms of performance, NVIDIA says that the card is 1.5x more powerful and faster than its last generation RTX 2080 Ti. That power does come with a higher TGP consumption of 350W, which is 30W more than the RTX 3080. Elsewhere, the card has a boost clock of 1665MHz, 112 ROPs, and a memory bandwidth of 912GB/s.

The GeForce RTX 3080 Ti will be available from 3 June onwards, with an official SRP of US$1199 (~RM4946).

Next on the list is the RTX 3070 Ti. Aesthetically, the card’s cooler shroud definitely looks different from the RTX 3070; rather than use the same dual front-facing fan design, NVIDIA has opted to use the inverted dual-axis flow through design, originally introduced with the RTX 3080 and RTX 3090.

Specs-wise, there’s not a whole lot of detail about the RTX 3070 Ti besides what was showed on screen, but the card is definitely getting 8GB GDDR6X graphics memory, and not the standard GDDR6. Additionally, the card will have 22 Shader-TFLOPS, 42 RT-TFLOPS, and 174 Tensor-TFLOPs. In terms of performance, NVIDIA says the card is 1.5x more powerful than the RTX 2070 Super, and approximately 20% faster than the current RTX 3070.

As for availability, the GeForce RTX 3070 Ti is slated for 10 June and will have an SRP of US$599 (~RM2471).

Original Penang Kayu Nasi Kandar Outlets To Receive More Robot Waiters Later This Month

In a move to reduce physical contact during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, popular local franchise Original Penang Kayu Nasi Kandar has introduced robot waiters to help serve its customers. According to the restaurant’s owner and managing director Burhan Mohamed, the robots have been deployed at its SS2 and Citta Mall outlets, with more expected in the near future.

The robot waiter originally debuted at Original Penang Kayu Nasi Kandar’s Citta Mall restaurant earlier in March, he added. Due to positive reception from customers, the franchise had decided to order four more units – each costing around RM 43,000 per unit – from Secure Robotics which are expected to arrive in the middle of April this year. Burhan noted that the machines will not be used during peak hours as they could get in the way of customers and human waiters.

Based on the video uploaded on its official Facebook page, the franchise is utilising the popular PuduBot indoor delivery robot by Shenzhen-based Pudu Robotics, which is locally distributed by Secure Robotics. It is equipped with various advanced tech such as LIDAR and 3D vision sensors to help with positioning and obstacle avoidance. “PuduBot is a clever humanoid robot designed for restaurants, saving labor and increasing your efficiency,” wrote Secure Robotics on their official Facebook page.

On top of being programmable for table-to-table deliveries, the machine comes with a middle compartment for transporting large items and can also be customised to feature multiple levels of serving trays. The top portion of the robot is equipped with an LCD screen that displays different facial expressions, granting it a friendly personality.

If the Pudubot looks familiar, it is because the same model has been deployed by different restaurants in Malaysia as well. These include the KyoChon outlet at The Gardens Mall, JBorn Cafe & Bistro in Johor Bahru, Ah Kor Kopitiam in Melaka, and many others.

For your reference, the first ever Malaysian eatery to feature robot waiters belongs to CH Premier Restaurant in Kuching, Sarawak. Along with its initial opening back in October 2016, the premise debuted four robot waiters imported from Kunshan, China. These consisted of three Goddess models and one smaller robot known as Lolita, which are still in service to this day.