Epic Games, the developer behind the battle royale game Fortnite, has been slapped with a hefty fine of €1.1 million for violating EU consumer laws and pressuring youngsters into making in-game purchases. This decision was made by the Dutch Authority for Consumers and Markets (ACM) following an investigation into the company's practices. The ACM found that Epic Games had failed to provide clear information about the nature of its in-game purchases, particularly to children. This lack of transparency led to many young players making unintended purchases, which was a clear violation of EU consumer protection laws. The authority also noted that Epic Games' practices were designed to encourage children to make frequent purchases, which further deepens the issue. Netherlands' ACM claims that these were "dark patterns" which are prohibited in the EU. More specifically, these were "Get it now" or "Buy now" phrases that pushed youngsters into making choices. One fine is for illegal aggressive commercial practice that created fear of missing out (FOMO), which is calculated at €562,500. Another €562,500 is fined on countdown timers, which were used in the Item Shop for items that were still available even after the timer had reached zero. This totals €1.125 million.

In response to the fine, Epic Games has announced its intention to appeal the decision. This fine serves as a significant reminder to game developers of the importance of transparency and consumer protection in the gaming industry. As the popularity of online gaming continues to grow, companies must prioritize the well-being and financial security of their young players. The ACM's decision sends a strong message that such practices will not be tolerated and that companies must take responsibility for their actions. The fine is significant, and it will be interesting to see how Epic Games responds to the decision. In a statement for GameIndustry.biz, Epic Games has noted that "The findings in the ACM's decision contain significant factual errors about how Fortnite and the Item Shop operate. The ACM is mandating changes that would result in a poor experience for players. We will appeal this decision. While our appeal is pending, players in the Netherlands that are under the age of 18 will not be able to see or purchase items that are in the shop for less than 48 hours, beginning May 24, 2024."

AMD formally launched the Ryzen 7 8700F and Ryzen 5 8400F Socket AM5 desktop processors. These are variants based on the Ryzen 8000-series desktop APUs, but with their integrated graphics disabled. The 8700F may lack integrated graphics, but includes the Ryzen AI NPU, with up to 16 AI TOPS performance. The 8400F lacks an NPU. Much like the 8700G, the 8700F packs an 8-core/16-thread CPU based on the current "Zen 4" architecture, but with a 100 MHz lower maximum boost frequency of 5.00 GHz. The TDP is the same, at 65 W, and the retail package includes a Wraith Stealth cooler.

The Ryzen 5 8400F is a 6-core/12-thread processor, but much like the 8500G, it is based on the "Phoenix 2" silicon, which has two "Zen 4" cores that can achieve the maximum 4.40 GHz boost frequency for this chip, and four "Zen 4c" that boost lower. Both kinds of cores feature an identical IPC and ISA, and so AMD Chipset Software uses UEFI CPPC preferred cores software flags to prioritize workload to the "Zen 4" cores. AMD in its launch presentation claims that the 8700F should offer competitive gaming and productivity performance to an Intel Core i5-14400F, and that the 8400F should offer gaming performance in the league of an i5-13400F. The company is pricing the 8700F at $269, or $60 cheaper than the 8700G; while the 8400F is priced at $169, or $10 less than the 8500G.

The rollout of SiPearl's much-anticipated Rhea processor for European supercomputers has been pushed back by a year to 2025, but the delay comes with a silver lining - a significant upgrade in core count and potential performance. Originally slated to arrive in 2024 with 72 cores, the homegrown high-performance chip will now pack 80 cores when it eventually launches. This decisive move by SiPearl and its partners is a strategic choice to ensure the utmost quality and capabilities for the flagship European processor. The additional 12 months will allow the engineering teams to further refine the chip's architecture, carry out extensive testing, and optimize software stacks to take full advantage of Rhea's computing power. Now called the Rhea1, the chip is a crucial component of the European Processor Initiative's mission to develop domestic high-performance computing technologies and reduce reliance on foreign processors. Supercomputer-scale simulations spanning climate science, drug discovery, energy research and more all require astonishing amounts of raw compute grunt.

By scaling up to 80 cores based on the latest Arm Neoverse V1, Rhea1 aims to go toe-to-toe with the world's most powerful processors optimized for supercomputing workloads. The SiPearl wants to utilize TSCM's N6 manufacturing process. The CPU will have 256-bit DDR5 memory connections, 104 PCIe 5.0 lanes, and four stacks of HBM2E memory. The roadmap shift also provides more time for the expansive European supercomputing ecosystem to prepare robust software stacks tailored for the upgraded Rhea silicon. Ensuring a smooth deployment with existing models and enabling future breakthroughs are top priorities. While the delay is a setback for SiPearl's launch schedule, the substantial upgrade could pay significant dividends for Europe's ambitions to join the elite ranks of worldwide supercomputer power. All eyes will be on Rhea's delivery in 2025, mainly from Europe's governments, which are funding the project.

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AVerMedia Technologies, a leader in digital audiovisual solutions, today announced a firmware update for its well-received HDMI 2.1 USB Capture Card, Live Gamer ULTRA 2.1. The update gives users three new features - including 5.1 multi-channel audio pass-through and capture - fulfilling some highly wished-for upgrades of the capture card, making it even more powerful.

"We're constantly listening to our customers to ensure that we're bringing nothing but the best to the table," said Michael Kuo, President and CEO of AVerMedia. "Now, with the three added features, creators can take their content creation and gaming experience to greater heights."

Patriot Memory, a renowned name in performance memory and storage solutions, has teamed up with MSI, an innovator in gaming hardware, to unleash the Viper Xtreme 5 RGB DDR5 MPOWER Series - an extreme-speed DDR5 memory kit crafted for gamers, overclockers, and power users. This cutting-edge collaboration between the two brands combines blistering data rates up to 8000MT/s with massive 32 GB (16 GB x2) or 48 GB (24 GB x2) capacities. The Viper Xtreme 5 RGB DDR5 MPOWER series unleashes a torrent of memory bandwidth, turbocharging gaming rigs, content creation workstations, and other high-intensity applications demanding extreme responsiveness and throughput.

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Intel today released the latest version of the Arc GPU Graphics Drivers. Version 101.5518 beta comes with optimization for "Ghost of Tsushima: Director's Cut" and "Homeworld 3." The drivers also fix a couple of issues with this release. To begin with, lower than expected performance with "Dragon's Dogma 2" has been fixed on Arc A-series discrete GPUs. A bug that caused "Dead Space" to experience lower than expected performance on Core Ultra processors with Arc Graphics has been fixed. Grab the latest version of Intel Arc GPU Graphics Drivers from the link below.

DOWNLOAD: Intel Arc GPU Graphics Drivers 101.5518 Beta

Formovie Technology, a leading player in the world of display technology, has announced the launch of Xming Episode One, its latest 1080p resolution projector with Google TV and Native Netflix support. As an independent brand of Formovie Technology, Xming offers quality LCD projectors with features such as auto keystone correction and autofocus included at an incredible price point.

Episode One seeks to be the top pick for Google TV users. It comes with native Netflix support and is available at an affordable price point of $/€299 at Formovie's website. This projector is unique for its Google TV and Native Netflix features, which make streaming easy and seamless without any additional devices. Its Google TV certification and integrated Google Assistant makes it versatile and convenient for everyday use.

We've had our eye on the ASUS ROG Ally X since last week. The Ally X started its life on the rumor mill as a design revision of the ROG Ally that corrects the location of its microSD slot away from a heat vent, before we learned that it's a whole new product positioned above the ROG Ally, which not just fixes the microSD slot, but also comes with a larger battery, and support for M.2-2280 NVMe SSDs to unlock the widest selection of aftermarket SSDs among any handheld console.

Mystery Lupin a source with ASUS leaks, suggests that the ASUS ROG Ally X could be priced at $799, which would be a $100 premium over the top-spec ROG Ally Extreme. For this premium, ASUS is dropping in a battery that's rumored to have a 40% higher capacity than the one the original ROG Ally Extreme comes with; and the sheer convenience of an M.2-2280 drive bay that has a 1 TB SSD. It's also rumored that ASUS may step up the memory size. The other hardware specs are unchanged—the processor is still an AMD Ryzen Z1 Extreme, the display is still that 7-inch 48-120 Hz VRR with 1080p resolution; and with an identical controller layout. ASUS is expected to launch the ROG Ally X on June 2.

ASUS today announced that it is bundling a Steam code for the role-playing video game Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth with select NVIDIA GeForce RTX 40 series and AMD Radeon RX 7000 series graphics cards purchased from May 13 to July 8, 2024. For gamers who have been waiting for their chance to explore Japan and Hawaii's criminal undersides with Kasuga Ichiban and the gang in the latest installment of the beloved Like a Dragon series, now is the chance to leverage new hardware in an adventure so vast that it spans the Pacific.

During this global promotion, any purchase of an ASUS NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 or above or any ASUS AMD Radeon RX 7600 XT or above will include a bundled Steam code for Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth. Gamers everywhere can take advantage of this opportunity to upgrade their system and redeem the game code by August 8. For complete promotion details and instructions on how to redeem this code, click here.

ASUS Republic of Gamers (ROG) today announced availability of the ROG Tessen Mobile Controller. The Tessen is the only foldable mobile controller currently available on the market, and it features programmable rear paddles, additional rubber support pads for phone-case compatibility, mechanical switches for the face buttons and D-pad, plus console-grade joysticks to provide gamers with a combination of ultimate portability and superb control. The ROG Tessen's unique construction and features have already been recognized at international level, achieving a top spot in the Gaming/VR/AR category at the prestigious 2024 iF Design Awards, as well as bagging a 2024 Red Dot Award for product design.

The ROG Tessen has a travel-friendly design that folds easily to enable users to slip it into any bag or even a pocket. The Tessen securely holds phones in landscape orientation, with the left side of the controller folding down to easily slot the phone to the controller's extended USB-C connector. Once connected, the left side of the controller can be flipped up and the telescopic aluminium bridges adjusted to lock the phone in place. Bundled rubber support pads and an extended USB-C connector allow the Tessen to be easily connected to a phone in a protective case.

SilverStone today introduced the Air Slimmer 140, a slimline 140 mm case fan. The fan comes with a thickness of just 15.5 mm, compared to the 25 mm that's typical of 140 mm fans. This should come in handy if you choose a thicker radiator, or are building an SFF machine. The fan features a copper fluid dynamic bearing, although the company didn't specify endurance numbers. The 9-blade impeller features what SilverStone brands as Shark Force patterns, which improve noise characteristics.

The fan takes in 4-pin PWM input, and supports ultra-low speeds. It turns at speeds ranging between 0 and 1,700 RPM, with a maximum airflow of 82 CFM, at 2 mm H₂O static pressure, and 33 dBA maximum noise. It includes cables for daisy-chaining. There are two key variants of the fan, the base variant comes with a black impeller and lacks any lighting, and then there's the Air Slimmer 140 ARGB, which has a white impeller and 9 LEDs studded in the hub. It takes in 3-pin ARGB input for the lighting. The company didn't reveal pricing.

A product roadmap leak at leading PC OEM Dell, disclosed the tentative launch dates of several future generations of processors by Intel, AMD, and Qualcomm. The slide was detailing hardware platforms for future revisions of the company's premium XPS notebooks. Given that Dell remains one of the largest PC OEMs, the dates revealed in the leaked slides are highly plausible.

In chronological order, Dell expects Intel's Core Ultra 200V series "Lunar Lake-MX" processor in September 2024, which should mean product unveilings at Computex. It's interesting to note that Intel is only designing "Lunar Lake" for the -MX memory-on-package segment. This chip squares off against Apple's M3, M4, and possibly even the M3 Pro. Intel also has its ambitious "Arrow Lake" architecture planned for the second half of 2024, hence the lack of product overlap—there won't be an "Arrow Lake-MX."

AMD is indeed bringing the Ryzen 7 8700F and Ryzen 5 8400F desktop processors to the retail PIB channel. Both these processors are based on the 4 nm "Hawk Point" or "Phoenix 2" silicon, but with their iGPU disabled, hence the "F" in the model name. Company slides related to the two were leaked to the web. The processors feature CPU cores based on the "Zen 4" microarchitecture, and are built in the Socket AM5 package.

The Ryzen 7 8700F features the 8-core/16-thread "Zen 4" CPU that the 8700G, but with lower CPU clock speeds of up to 5.00 GHz boost (compared to up to 5.10 GHz for the 8700G). Although its iGPU is disabled, its NPU isn't. The Ryzen AI NPU offers 16 AI TOPS performance. The processor retains the 65 W TDP of the 8700G. Moving on to the 8400G, and here we see the processor being based on the "Phoenix 2" silicon, with 6 CPU cores. Two of these are "Zen 4," and can reach the processor's 4.70 GHz maximum boost frequency; while the other four are "Zen 4c," and operate at lower clock speeds. The chip physically lacks an NPU, and its iGPU is disabled. It still has 65 W TDP to feed its CPU cores. In their retail packages, both processors include a Wraith Stealth cooling solution that's meant for 65 W TDP processors.

At OpenAI's spring update, a lot of eyes were fixed on the company, which spurred the AI boom with the ChatGPT application. Now being almost a must-have app for consumers and prosumers alike, ChatGPT is a de-facto application for the latest AI innovation, backed by researchers and scientists from OpenAI. Today, OpenAI announced a new model called GPT-4o (Omni), which hopes to bring advanced intelligence, improved overall capabilities, and real-time voice interaction with users. Now, the ChatGPT application wants to become like a personal assistant that actively communicates with users and provides much broader capabilities. OpenAI claims that it can respond to audio inputs as quickly as 232 milliseconds, with an average of 320 milliseconds, similar to human response time in conversations.

However, OpenAI states that it wants ChatGPT's latest GPT-4o model to be available to the free, Plus, and Team paid subscribers, where paid subscribers get 5x higher usage and early access to the model. Interestingly, the GPT-4o model is much improved across a variety of standard benchmarks like MMLU, Math, HumanEval, GPQA, and others, where it now surpasses almost all models except Claude 3 Opus in MGSM. It now understands more than 50 languages and can do real time translation. In addition to the new model, OpenAI announced that they are launching a desktop ChatGPT app, which can act as a personal assistant and see what is happening on the screen, but it is only allowed by user command. This is supposed to bring a much more refined user experience and enable users to use AI as a third person to help understand the screen's content. Initially only available on macOS, we are waiting for OpenAI to launch the Windows ChatGPT application so everyone can also experience the new technology.

The 63rd edition of the TOP500 reveals that Frontier has once again claimed the top spot, despite no longer being the only exascale machine on the list. Additionally, a new system has found its way into the Top 10.

The Frontier system at Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee, USA remains the most powerful system on the list with an HPL score of 1.206 EFlop/s. The system has a total of 8,699,904 combined CPU and GPU cores, an HPE Cray EX architecture that combines 3rd Gen AMD EPYC CPUs optimized for HPC and AI with AMD Instinct MI250X accelerators, and it relies on Cray's Slingshot 11 network for data transfer. On top of that, this machine has an impressive power efficiency rating of 52.93 GFlops/Watt - putting Frontier at the No. 13 spot on the GREEN500.

NEO Semiconductor, a leading developer of innovative technologies for 3D NAND flash and DRAM memory, today announced a performance boosting Floating Body Cell Mechanism for 3D X-DRAM. Andy Hsu, Founder & CEO presented groundbreaking Technology CAD (TCAD) simulation results for NEO's 3D X-DRAM during the 16th IEEE International Memory Workshop (IMW) 2024 in Seoul, Republic of Korea.

Neo Semiconductor reveals a unique performance boosting mechanism called Back-gate Channel-depth Modulation (BCM) for Floating Body Cell that can increase data retention by 40,000X and sensing window by 20X.

Kingston Digital, Inc., the flash memory affiliate of Kingston Technology Company, Inc., a world leader in memory products and technology solutions, today announced the reintroduction of the Workflow Dock and its accompanying Readers. The Workflow series now features more hub options separate from the dock, offering even more flexibility. This update caters to the diverse needs of content creators by supporting a broader range of content transfers.

The Workflow series is designed to streamline transferring video, photo, and audio from multiple sources simultaneously. This enables creators to streamline their post production process and establish a file offload system tailored to their requirements with ease. These hubs and card readers facilitate simultaneous file transfers to a Mac or PC at USB 3.2 speeds and can function independently as standalone devices when needed.

Intel Corporation today announced the appointment of Kevin O'Buckley as senior vice president and general manager of Foundry Services, the customer service and ecosystem operations division of Intel Foundry. O'Buckley starts today and becomes a member of Intel's executive leadership team reporting to CEO Pat Gelsinger. He succeeds Stuart Pann, who will retire from Intel after 35 years of service at the end of May and remain an adviser to support a seamless transition.

"Kevin brings a unique blend of expertise from across the semiconductor industry, having served as a senior leader and technologist in both foundry and fabless companies," said Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger. "As we continue building the world's first systems foundry for the AI era, Kevin will play a critical role in helping customers achieve their goals by leveraging Intel Foundry's unique ability to deliver process and packaging technology through a resilient and sustainable supply chain."

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At ISC High Performance 2024, Intel announced in collaboration with Argonne National Laboratory and Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) that the Aurora supercomputer has broken the exascale barrier at 1.012 exaflops and is the fastest AI system in the world dedicated to AI for open science, achieving 10.6 AI exaflops. Intel will also detail the crucial role of open ecosystems in driving AI-accelerated high performancehigh -performance computing (HPC). "The Aurora supercomputer surpassing exascale will allow it to pave the road to tomorrow's discoveries. From understanding climate patterns to unraveling the mysteries of the universe, supercomputers serve as a compass guiding us toward solving truly difficult scientific challenges that may improve humanity," said Ogi Brkic, Intel vice president and general manager of Data Center AI Solutions.

Designed as an AI-centric system from its inception, Aurora will allow researchers to harness generative AI models to accelerate scientific discovery. Significant progress has been made in Argonne's early AI-driven research. Success stories include mapping the human brain's 80 billion neurons, high-energy particle physics enhanced by deep learning, and drug design and discovery accelerated by machine learning, among others. The Aurora supercomputer is an expansive system with 166 racks, 10,624 compute blades, 21,248 Intel Xeon CPU Max Series processors, and 63,744 Intel Data Center GPU Max Series units, making it one of the world's largest GPU clusters.

Hi everyone. As patch 1.1.2f1 is rolling out on Steam and Microsoft Store, let's have a look at what it includes and what you can expect next. This patch removes the entitlement from all the Beach Properties assets, so they are now a part of the base game and available to everyone. Saves and custom maps using the assets should work without any extra steps, but as always, don't hesitate to make a bug report on the forum if you have any issues. Additionally, we have improvements to performance, support for Nvidia DLSS Super Resolution, and a long list of bug fixes for both the game and the Editor. You can find the full list below.

With this patch in your hands, we've started working towards the next one. It will take about a month as, along with bug fixes and improvements, this patch will include a large re-work of the Economy to address much of the feedback you have shared with us in the past months. We'll share more details on what has changed when the patch is ready. As modding is an important part of any Colossal Order game, one of our top priorities right now is to resolve the remaining issues with the asset import pipeline, so you can start to import and share your custom assets on Paradox Mods. This is proving more difficult than we hoped, so we don't have an exact timeline at this time at this point, but it will likely take several more months. Thank you for all the bug reports, feedback, and support. We really appreciate it as it helps us understand and improve your experience with Cities: Skylines II.

AMD's future RDNA 5 graphics architecture will bear a "clean sheet" design, and may probably not even have the RDNA branding, says WJM47196, a source of AMD leaks on ChipHell. Two generations ahead of the current RDNA 3 architecture powering the Radeon RX 7000 series discrete GPUs, RDNA 5 could see AMD reimagine the GPU and its key components, much in the same way RDNA did over the former "Vega" architecture, bringing in a significant performance/watt jump, which AMD could build upon with its successful RDNA 2 powered Radeon RX 6000 series.

Performance per Watt is the biggest metric on which a generation of GPUs can be assessed, and analysts believe that RDNA 3 missed the mark with generational gains in performance/watt despite the switch to the advanced 5 nm EUV process from the 7 nm DUV. AMD's decision to disaggregate the GPU, with some of its components being built on the older 6 nm node may have also impacted the performance/watt curve. The leaker also makes a sensational claim that "Navi 31" was originally supposed to feature 192 MB of Infinity Cache, which would have meant 32 MB segments of it per memory cache die (MCD). The company instead went with 16 MB per MCD, or just 96 MB per GPU, which only get reduced as AMD segmented the RX 7900 XT and RX 7900 GRE by disabling one or two MCDs.

MSI, a leading global server provider, brings its latest server platforms powered by AMD processors and 5th Gen Intel Xeon Scalable processors, optimized for HPC and AI markets at ISC 2024, booth #F39 in Hamburg, Germany from May 13-15. "As businesses increasingly adopt AI applications to improve customer experiences, the need for greater computing power and denser deployments has spurred significant shifts in IT infrastructure, driving a widespread adoption of liquid cooling," said Danny Hsu, General Manager of Enterprise Platform Solutions. "MSI's AI server platforms empower businesses to achieve efficiency gains while handling more compute-intensive workloads."

MSI G4201 is a 4U supercomputer designed for exceptional performance in compute-intensive tasks. It features up to eight double-wide PCIe 5.0 x16 slots optimized for high-performance GPU cards, alongside one single-wide PCIe 5.0 x16 expansion slot. Each GPU has a full PCIe 4.0 or 5.0 x16 link directly to the root port complex of a CPU socket without going through a PCIe switch, granting maximum CPU-to-GPU bandwidth. Powered by dual 5th Gen Intel Xeon Scalable Processors and equipped with 32 DDR5 DIMMs, the G4201 platform delivers outstanding heterogeneous computing capabilities for various GPU-based scientific high-performance computing, Generative AI, and inference applications. Additionally, the system includes twelve 3.5-inch drive bays for enhanced functionality.

Quantum computing. Drug discovery. Fusion energy. Scientific computing and physics-based simulations are poised to make giant steps across domains that benefit humanity as advances in accelerated computing and AI drive the world's next big breakthroughs. NVIDIA unveiled at GTC in March the NVIDIA Blackwell platform, which promises generative AI on trillion-parameter large language models (LLMs) at up to 25x less cost and energy consumption than the NVIDIA Hopper architecture.

Blackwell has powerful implications for AI workloads, and its technology capabilities can also help to deliver discoveries across all types of scientific computing applications, including traditional numerical simulation. By reducing energy costs, accelerated computing and AI drive sustainable computing. Many scientific computing applications already benefit. Weather can be simulated at 200x lower cost and with 300x less energy, while digital twin simulations have 65x lower cost and 58x less energy consumption versus traditional CPU-based systems and others.

QNAP Systems, Inc. is committed to enhancing the security of its products by engaging in international collaborations. Recently, the company participated in the Pwn2Own Toronto 2023 competition organized by Trend Micro's Zero Day Initiative (ZDI), resulting in valuable experiences and achievements. QNAP will continue to deepen its cooperation with international cybersecurity organizations to continuously improve product security, ensuring the best protection for users' data.

Pwn2Own is a global cybersecurity competition organized by ZDI aimed at challenging security vulnerabilities in various software and hardware. Participants utilize various techniques, including exploit and zero-day attacks, to breach target systems. This competition not only provides a platform for security experts to showcase their skills but also enables vendors to understand and address security vulnerabilities in their products, benefiting users worldwide.

Driving a fundamental shift in the high-performance computing industry toward AI-powered systems, NVIDIA today announced nine new supercomputers worldwide are using NVIDIA Grace Hopper Superchips to speed scientific research and discovery. Combined, the systems deliver 200 exaflops, or 200 quintillion calculations per second, of energy-efficient AI processing power.

New Grace Hopper-based supercomputers coming online include EXA1-HE, in France, from CEA and Eviden; Helios at Academic Computer Centre Cyfronet, in Poland, from Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE); Alps at the Swiss National Supercomputing Centre, from HPE; JUPITER at the Jülich Supercomputing Centre, in Germany; DeltaAI at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign; and Miyabi at Japan's Joint Center for Advanced High Performance Computing - established between the Center for Computational Sciences at the University of Tsukuba and the Information Technology Center at the University of Tokyo.

NVIDIA today announced that it will accelerate quantum computing efforts at national supercomputing centers around the world with the open-source NVIDIA CUDA-Q platform. Supercomputing sites in Germany, Japan and Poland will use the platform to power the quantum processing units (QPUs) inside their NVIDIA-accelerated high-performance computing systems.

QPUs are the brains of quantum computers that use the behavior of particles like electrons or photons to calculate differently than traditional processors, with the potential to make certain types of calculations faster. Germany's Jülich Supercomputing Centre (JSC) at Forschungszentrum Jülich is installing a QPU built by IQM Quantum Computers as a complement to its JUPITER supercomputer, supercharged by the NVIDIA GH200 Grace Hopper Superchip. The ABCI-Q supercomputer, located at the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST) in Japan, is designed to advance the nation's quantum computing initiative. Powered by the NVIDIA Hopper architecture, the system will add a QPU from QuEra. Poland's Poznan Supercomputing and Networking Center (PSNC) has recently installed two photonic QPUs, built by ORCA Computing, connected to a new supercomputer partition accelerated by NVIDIA Hopper.

To bring cutting-edge artificial intelligence capabilities to its flagship product, Apple is said to be finalizing a deal with OpenAI to integrate the ChatGPT technology into the upcoming iOS 18 for iPhones. According to Bloomberg, multiple sources report that after months of negotiations, the two tech giants are putting the finishing touches on a partnership that would be an important moment for consumer AI. However, OpenAI may not be Apple's only AI ally. The company has also reportedly been in talks with Google over licensing the Gemini chatbot, though no known agreement has been reached yet. The rare team-up between the fiercely competitive firms underscores the intense focus on AI integration across the industry.

Apple's strategic moves are a clear indication of its recognition of the transformative potential of advanced AI capabilities for the iPhone experience. The integration of OpenAI's language model could empower Siri to understand and respond to complex voice queries with deep contextual awareness. This could revolutionize the way Apple's customers interact with devices, offering hope for a more intuitive and advanced iPhone experience. Potential Gemini integration opens up another realm of possibilities around Google's image and multimodal AI capabilities. Future iPhones may be able to analyze and describe visual scenes, annotate images, generate custom imagery from natural language prompts, and even synthesize audio using AI vocals - all within a conversational interface. As the AI arms race intensifies, Apple wants to position itself at the forefront through these partnerships.

Welcome to the 20th week of 2024 and this week kicks off with a huge AAA space saga that some of you have been eagerly waiting for. However, we have a second AAA title this week, which is a few years old Playstation game that, despite the title, doesn't have anything to do with ghosts. The rest of this week's releases involve aliens, rhythms, world wars and pirates.

Homeworld 3 / This week's first AAA title / Monday 13 May
Tactical, beautiful, and wholly unique, the GOTY-winning sci-fi RTS returns with Homeworld 3. Assume control and battle through fleet combat in dazzling, fully 3D space while the award-winning story unfolds on a galactic scale. Strategic freedom is yours. Hulking space derelicts called megaliths bring 3D terrain into the classic Homeworld battlespace. Use the crumbling remains of an ancient civilization to funnel foes into a brilliant ambush or hide your fleet from powerful enemies. Fortresses teem with menacing turrets and invite your strike craft into dangerous trench runs deep behind enemy lines. But not everything is in your control. Dangerous space phenomena like particle storms and asteroid fields will test even senior commanders. Steam Link

AMD has reached a significant milestone, capturing a record-high share of the X86 CPU market in the first quarter of 2024, according to the latest report from Mercury Research. This achievement marks a significant step forward for the chipmaker in its long battle against rival Intel's dominance in the crucial computer processor space. The surge was fueled by strong demand for AMD's Ryzen and EPYC processors across consumer and enterprise markets. The Ryzen lineup's compelling price-to-performance ratio has struck a chord with gamers, content creators, and businesses seeking cost-effective computing power without sacrificing capabilities. It secured AMD's 23.9% share, an increase from the previous Q4 of 2023, which has seen a 19.8% market share.

The company has also made major inroads on the data center front with its EPYC server CPUs. AMD's ability to supply capable yet affordable processors has enabled cloud providers and enterprises to scale operations on AMD's platform. Several leading tech giants have embraced EPYC, contributing to AMD's surging server market footprint. Now, it is at 23.6%, a significant increase over the past few years, whereas AMD was just above 10% four years ago in 2020. AMD lost some share to Intel on the mobile PC front due to the Meteor Lake ramp, but it managed to gain a small percentage of the market share of client PCs. As AMD rides the momentum into the second half of 2024, all eyes will be on whether the chipmaker can sustain this trajectory and potentially claim an even larger slice of the x86 CPU pie from Intel in the coming quarters.Below, you can see additional graphs of mobile PC and client PC market share.

Building on the foundation of its award-winning Super X-Fi Headphone Holography, Creative Technology will be unveiling the all-new Super X-Fi Gen 4 audio profile. This latest release boasts significant enhancements in dynamic range, clarity, and spatial awareness. The Super X-Fi Gen 4 isn't just raising the bar; it's redefining the standard for immersive audio experiences. With this latest update, users can enjoy an expanded dynamic range, delivering richer, more detailed audio reproduction. Coupled with improved clarity, users can indulge in crystal-clear sound that captures every subtle nuance, while the refined sense of space offers a more expansive and lifelike soundstage.

Super X-Fi technology elevates the audio experience for users by recreating the immersive soundstage of high-end surround speaker systems within headphones, further personalized by the power of Artificial Intelligence (AI) for a remarkably natural listening experience. Since its debut at CES 2019, users and critics have been impressed by the realism of personalized audio, which is tailored according to their anthropometric profiles. From immersing in the heart-pounding action of a blockbuster movie to feeling the raw energy of a live concert or delving into the captivating world of gaming, Super X-Fi can bring it all to life with breath-taking detail and precision.

Thermaltake, a leading PC DIY brand for premium hardware solutions, is proud to announce that the GR500 Racing Simulator Cockpit and the Triple Racing Monitor Stand are now ready for purchase. Moving beyond the conventional PC gaming setup, racing simulators redefine the gaming environment allowing you to feel like you are driving a racing car on a real racetrack in an indoor entertainment space easily. Create your simulators with the Thermaltake racing ecosystem, or take it one step further and match them with a VR headset like the Meta Quest 3, fully immersing the thrill of fast and furious racing!

GR500 Racing Simulator Cockpit
Thermaltake GR500 Racing Simulator Cockpit is designed for racing enthusiasts to experience authentic feel of racing. It comes with a racing-like bucket design and is made with a fiberglass seat, ensuring a premium seating experience. The adjustable seat allows you to glide forward & back, and recline, providing an ideal driving position for long gaming hours. The GR500 is crafted with a sturdy aluminium profile, steel structure, and anti-tip bracket, guaranteeing stability and safety. To make your racing simulator sleek, the base of the GR500 features RGB Lighting Strips including 20 lighting effects. If you switch to Rhythm Pickup mode, the lighting can even dynamically change with music. Additionally, Thermaltake GR500 has universal hardware compatibility that supports mainstream wheels, gear shifters, and pedals from Logitech, Fanatec, Thrustmaster, and more, allowing you to build an ideal racing simulator with high customization.

Gear up, Trailblazers - Honkai: Star Rail lands on GeForce NOW this week, along with an in-game reward for members to celebrate the title's launch in the cloud. Stream it today, along with five new games joining the GeForce NOW library of more than 1,900 titles this week.

Five Stars
Take a galactic journey in the cloud with Honkai: Star Rail, a new Cosmic Adventure Strategy role-playing game from HoYoverse, the company behind Genshin Impact. The title seamlessly blends intricate storytelling with immersive gameplay mechanics for an epic journey through the cosmos. Meet a cast of unique characters and explore diverse planets, each with its own mysteries to uncover. Assemble formidable teams, strategically deploying skills and resources to overcome mighty adversaries and unravel the mysteries of the Honkai phenomenon. Encounter new civilizations and face off against threats that endanger the Astral Express, overcome the struggles caused by Stellaron together, powerful artifacts that hold the keys to the universe's fate. Begin the trailblazing journey without needing to wait for downloads or game updates with GeForce NOW. Members who've opted into GeForce NOW's Rewards program will receive an email with a code for a Honkai: Star Rail starter kit, containing 30,000 credits, three Refined Aethers and three Traveler's Guides. All aboard the Astral Express for adventures and thrills!

Leading global motherboard manufacturer, ASRock, has successively released its AI QuickSet software tool based on Microsoft Windows 10/11 and Canonical Ubuntu Linux platforms since the end of last year, which can help users quickly download, install and set up many artificial intelligence (AI) applications. It can also be accelerated by ASRock's custom AMD graphics cards, and has received widespread response from the market. Today ASRock continues its efforts and launch the AI QuickSet software tool that supports ASRock's custom Intel Arc A-Series graphics cards, including Intel Arc A770, A750, A580, A380, and A310 models, allowing users to enjoy the fun brought by generative artificial intelligence (AI) applications at their fingertips!

ASRock AI QuickSet software tool v1.0.3i supports Microsoft Windows 10/11 64-bit operating system, allowing users to easily install Stable Diffusion web UI OpenVINO without delving into complex configuration settings. This Stable Diffusion Web UI artificial intelligence (AI) image generation tool optimized through the Intel OpenVINO tool suite can be used with ASRock's own Intel Arc A series graphics cards (including Intel Arc A770, A750, A580, A380, A310 model)'s powerful computing capabilities provide excellent operational performance. This once again demonstrates ASRock's strong software and hardware R&D capabilities and its spirit of considering users. It also makes ASRock's AI QuickSet software tool once again a premium choice for consumers to quickly experience the fun of generative artificial intelligence (AI) applications!

Sabrent introduced the Rocket 2242 M.2 Gen 4 NVMe SSD. The drive is built in the M.2-2242 form-factor (42 mm long), which should make it suitable for certain kinds of handheld game consoles, such as the Legion Go. The Rocket 2242 comes in just one capacity for now, 1 TB. The drive combines a Phison E27T series DRAMless controller with Kioxia 162-layer 3D TLC NAND flash, and takes advantage of the PCI-Express 4.0 x4 host interface to offer sequential transfer speeds of up to 5000 MB/s. The company put out no other performance or endurance related specs. Sabrent is pricing the Rocket 2242 1 TB at USD $99.99, it is available now, and backed by a 5-year warranty.

Team Group Inc., the global leader in premium storage solutions, continues its commitment to providing consumers with cutting-edge storage solutions that meet today's technological trends. To support the growing demand for electric vehicles as an eco-friendly option, Team Group is proud to announce the launch of the Model T USB 3.2 Gen 1 Flash Drive. Specifically designed to support USB dashcams in electric vehicles, this compact USB drive exemplifies the company's innovative approach to addressing emerging lifestyle trends. The Model T USB 3.2 Gen 1 Flash Drive provides users with innovative functionality for a stress-free driving experience.

The Model T USB 3.2 Gen 1 Flash Drive is designed for storing driving footage in electric vehicles and is specifically compatible with the Tesla Model 3/Y/S/X. Featuring a USB 3.2 Gen 1 interface, it boasts up to 512 GB of storage capacity. Engineered for Sentry Mode and dashcam footage storage, ensuring a stable performance that allows continuous recording even post-formatting. With ample storage, users can confidently activate Sentry Mode. Coupled with dashcam footage, the Model T USB 3.2 Gen 1 provides peace of mind by capturing and storing critical moments for up to 10 minutes. The Model T USB 3.2 Gen 1 Flash Drive features a sleek nickel-black finish, compact size, and ergonomic design that optimizes aesthetics and space utilization. With its Type-A connector, recording footage and storing multimedia files has never been easier. The stylish design of the zinc alloy body blends seamlessly with the sleek interior of electric vehicles, providing a durable and advanced storage solution.

ASRock today introduced the W790 WS R2.0 motherboard for workstations powered by 4th Gen Intel Xeon W-3400 and W-2400 series processors in the Socket LGA4677 package. Although its model name suggests that it is a revision of the W790 WS, the new W790 WS R2.0 appears to be a lite version of the original, which removes several I/O features. To begin with, the fancy I/O shroud makes way for bare connectors, where you can see several of the connectors stripped away. While the CPU VRM appears unchanged, the VRM heatsinks used on the R2.0 are of a simpler design. The design effort behind both these changes appears to be to make the board friendly to certain kinds of rackmount chassis.

Besides the design changes, the ASRock W790 WS R2.0 loses out on Thunderbolt 4, Wi-Fi 6E, and only has a single 10 GbE interface instead of dual-10 GbE on the original W790 WS. These aside, the W790 WS R2.0 is still a very capable workstation motherboard for the platform it's based on. It draws power from a combination of 24-pin ATX, two 8-pin EPS, and a 6-pin PCIe power; and uses a 22-phase CPU VRM. The board features four PCI-Express 5.0 x16 slots (x16/NC/x16/NC or x16/NC/x8/x8 or x8/x8/x8/x8), and one PCI-Express 4.0 x16 (electrical x4). The CPU socket is wired to eight memory slots, supporting quad-channel DDR5 memory, with support for DDR5 RDIMM-3DS, a total memory capacity of 2 TB, and a maximum overclocked memory speed of DDR5-6800.

Earlier this week, we got news of ASUS working on a design revision for its ROG Ally handheld game console to fix the positioning of its microSD card slot that was causing card and card-reader failures due to its location close to a thermal vent. It turns out that this revision is a whole different product, and ASUS is naming it the ROG Ally X. There's more to this console than simply a relocated microSD slot that won't fry your memory cards.

Apparently, ASUS has used the opportunity to give it a larger battery, and a larger M.2-2280 SSD bay, compared to the M.2-2242 slot on the original ROG Ally. This would open up end-users to the widest possible array of SSD choices. As a final bit of product differentiation, the ROG Ally X comes with a new black chassis trim. The larger battery makes the ROG Ally X heavier than the original. Besides these three hardware changes, the new ROG Ally X features the same kit as the original, and is hence expected to offer the same performance, albeit with improved battery life. ASUS is expected to formally launch the ROG Ally X on June 2, 2024.