[Editor’s Note: The Tom’s Hardware staff first published a version of this poem in 2014 on Christmas Eve. We updated it a little bit and ran it again each year at the same time. The poem was given a complete overhaul in 2018 and has been rewritten with new stories and references every year since. The 2021 version is below.
Thank you all for the support and participation you offered in 2021, and we wish you Happy Holidays and a Happy New Year.]
'Twas mid-December and the North Pole was hopping,
As Santa was doing some holiday shopping.
But he soon found out that he couldn't get squat;
Everything that he wanted was scalped by a bot.
He couldn't get a PS5 despite his best,
He couldn't get an Xbox Series X.
He couldn't get GPUs at MSRP,
He couldn't get anything under the tree!
Santa couldn't wait, not even a bit,
Unlike Pat Gelsinger, he's too old for this s**t.
So he went to the workshop to pull out some tricks:
His elves would build exploding USB sticks.
Then Rudolph and Cupid and Dasher and Prancer
Would blow up the scalper PCs as the answer!
While he knew that property destruction's no bueno,
He'd still blow their tops like a crypto volcano.
On a Surface Laptop Studio with Windows 11
He planned how he'd blast the scalpers from heaven.
So that he could get gifts for children with glee,
He made the detonator a big 'F' key.
The planning used P-cores that Alder Lake packs,
And the graphics power in the M1 Max.
Then Santa followed where he thought Tesla led
And put AMD processors into his sled.
He set up the sled as an operations center,
Then had the elves and reindeer all break and enter,
And the scalping rigs blew up like bad PSUs,
When Santa hit the button that started the fuse.
Now that the Grinches had lost all their power,
Santa knew it was the gift-buying hour.
He bought Razer Zephyrs as soon as they dropped,
And onto each console queue, he happily hopped.
Even though he could get some gifts as intended,
The component shortage still hasn't ended.
But he couldn't give up, he couldn't stop.
So his elves would fab what they could in the shop.
(Before you call us liars and start giving us coal,
Know that Santa has fabs at the North Pole!
With tons of silicon on a cutting-edge node
That he oversees from his humble abode.)
And when that work was water under the bridge,
He grabbed a drink from his Xbox-shaped fridge.
He knew how much more beer he needed to buy,
It had come from a keg with a Raspberry Pi.
Santa woke up energized the next day,
Glad that he kept the Grinchbots at bay.
Then he shut down his rig, he closed all his tabs,
And flew his PC sleigh right over our labs.
No matter what you’re celebrating this year,
Hanukkah, Kwanzaa or Christmas with cheer;
We at Tom’s Hardware wish you the best,
And we’ll be at our benches, running our tests.
