2 Fast 2 Furious Nissan Skyline GT-R R34 Receives LEGO Speed Champions Treatment

 Hate it or love it but the Fast & Furious movie franchise has had a huge impact on both pop and automotive culture. It even made its way into the LEGO universe as the company is preparing to release the iconic Nissan Skyline GT-R R34 from the 2003’s 2 Fast 2 Furious very soon.

Even though 2 Fast 2 Furious was panned by critics and many audiences alike but if you love cars, then it is hard to forget the R34 although its role as the hero’s car was taken over by Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution VII in the latter part of the movie. In case you have never seen it before, here is a preview:

If you are a purist, then you might be irritated to see that none of the aftermarket brands that were on the car’s hood and bumpers made their way to the LEGO replica. Then again, this is a Lego Speed Champions release after all which is meant for kids aged above 8 years old and accuracy is not exactly the main objective.

Nevertheless, LEGO has fairly recreated the car’s paint job and blue stripes for the replica as well as making it a right-hand drive vehicle just like in the movie. Furthermore, the company has included a Brian O’Conner (played by the late Paul Walker) minifigure with it.

Expected to be available worldwide this coming January, the new 2 Fast 2 Furious’s R34 LEGO Speed Champions replica has already appeared on LEGO Malaysia’s website. However, its actual availability date and pricing in our market are not yet known at the moment though.

For those who are wondering, this is not the first vehicle F&F features by LEGO though. Earlier this year, the company unveiled the 1970 Dodge Charger R/T from the original Fast & Furious movie which comes complete with a minifigure iteration of its driver, Dominic Toretto that was played by Vin Diesel.

In case you want to get your hands on it right now in anticipation of the Nissan Skyline GT-R R34 release, the LEGO Speed Champion replica of Dom’s Charger can be obtained for RM119.90 from LEGO Certifies Stores all over the country including Brick Magic and Box Of Bricks.

Man Orders RTX 3090 Ti From Amazon, Receives Sand

Ah, scammers. As much as many of us hate these degenerate sub-species of the human race, they are, unfortunately, a difficult bunch to properly be rid of. Recently, a man in Brazil recently fell victim to a scam when he made an order on Amazon and got a whole load of sand, literally.

The Brazillian man, whose name is Mauricio Takeda, had posted his plight on the social media platform, TikTok. Here’s the story: Takeda had pulled the trigger and decided to purchase an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 Ti graphics card from Amazon Brazil. What makes this purchase extra special, though, is that the multinational brand was also having its Prime Days sale period, which in turn meant that products were being sold at a discount.

In Takeda’s case, his Palit GeForce RTX 3090 Ti GameRock graphics card was purchased for 14500 Brazillian Real (~RM12179). If we’re being honest here, that’s still a little on the high side, and that is despite the fact that the prices of graphics cards have been on a steady decline or if you’re in China, crashing hard.

 Upon receiving his newly purchased “GPU” in the mail from Amazon, red flags began to rise for Takeda when he picked up the package and realised something was very clearly off with its weight. With his suspicions already at a heightened state, he then proceeded to ask his wife to record him opening the package and, upon doing so, discovered that he was not, in fact, an owner of a new RTX 3090 Ti, but multiple jars and pots filled with sand.

But Takeda’s story doesn’t even end there. Realising that he was a victim of a very expensive scam, he attempted, attempted, to liase with Amazon, asking them for a resolution, but to no avail. Then, after repeatedly receiving calls from the centre over a course of several days, they finally sent him an email containing a link that would permanently remove the affected Amazon account.

Takeda ultimately got restitution, though, after he filed a lawsuit in the Brazillian Small Claims Court and his issue actually became a national headline. At that point, even Amazon couldn’t take the issue lightly and began to fix the problem.

Apple Watch Series 7 Receives General Release Date: Malaysia’s Status Still Unknown

Of all devices that were launched during the California Streaming event last month which also include iPhone 13 Series, iPhone 13 Pro Series, 6th generation iPad mini, and 9th generation iPad, there are still some mysterious elements regarding Apple Watch Series 7. For example, its actual rollout date was not revealed by Apple during the event but that has just changed this evening.

The company has announced that Series 7 will be made available in selected markets starting from 15 October onwards. Interesting enough, more than 50 countries and regions are part of the first-wave markets for the new smartwatch including the usual suspects such as the United States, United Kingdom, Japan, and China.

Despite the large group of first-wave markets, it seems that Malaysia is not part of it though as Apple Malaysia’s website still listed the Series 7’s availability as “later this year” at the time this article is published. As a comparison, Apple websites for Singapore and Thailand have noted that customers will be able to order Series 7 through them starting from 8 October.

On another hand, Series 7 is not listed on Apple’s websites for Indonesia and Vietnam. We are now reaching out to Apple to find out more about the watch’s availability in Malaysia and will keep you posted once we receive further updates.

Apple iPhone 12 And iPhone 12 mini Receives New Purple Colour Option

Last night’s Spring Loaded event saw the launch of several new products from Apple; including the brand new iPad Pro, iMac computers, AirTags and more. Much to our surprise, the Cupertino-based company also managed to slip in an iPhone announcement, but not in the major kind of way that most would have hoped for. 

Months after their initial debut back in late October last year, Apple has revealed that the standard and mini variants of its iPhone 12 smartphone series will receive a new addition to its current colour selection. Slated to arrive soon, fans can now own these models in the newly announced Purple colour. Yeah, that’s pretty much it.

Usually we’d expect phone brands to provide some sort of explanation as to why a new option has suddenly emerged, often with some fancy copywriting to go along with it. Instead, Apple senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing Greg Joswiak simply said, “The new purple finish, just in time for spring, adds another bright and fun option to the lineup, and we think customers are going to love it.” 

Aside from the new colour addition, everything else remains unchanged. Both the standard and mini variants of the iPhone 12 retain the same 5G-enabled A14 Bionic chip, RAM and storage configurations, MagSafe capabilities, so on and so forth. The company did note that the newer batch will ship with the recently announced iOS 14.5 firmware update, which is also slated to roll out to users sometime next week.

Apple says that the aforementioned Purple cladded iPhone 12 models will be available in the US starting 30 April, with pre-orders opening soon on 23 April. At this current time, the new colour selection is listed to be “coming soon” on Apple Malaysia’s website and despite featuring a newer colour, both models are offered at the same price as their original release. Specifically, the standard iPhone 12 is offered at a starting price of RM 3,899, while the mini variant starts at RM 3,399.