Lenovo and AMD seem to be developing an exclusive partnership with client/workstation products. Following exclusivity for Lenovo to sell workstations powered by the Ryzen Threadripper PRO processors, the two appear to be collaborating on graphics cards. Pictures surfaced on Chinese social media of the new Lenovo Radeon RX 6800 XT and RX 6900 XT LEGION Edition graphics cards. At this point it's unclear whether Lenovo designed these cards, or if the designers of AMD's reference MBA (made by AMD) graphics cards lent a hand.

Looking at the red-illuminated "R" cornerstone design element, the possibility of the card being designed and made by the same OEM as reference-design MBA cards, cannot be ruled out. Use of the "R" cornerstone dates back to the Radeon RX Vega series. The typeface of the "R" has since been updated to match with the latest Radeon logo. Elsewhere across the card, we see a large "Radeon RX 6x00 XT" logo along the top of the card, which is RGB illuminated. The butch triple-slot card appears to be slightly larger than the RX 6800 XT / RX 6900 XT reference-design, pulling power from a pair of 8-pin PCIe power connectors. Along the metal back-plate we see a large, illuminated logo of LEGION, Lenovo's gaming PC marquee. Below are screengrabs from the animation, watch the animated GIF in the source link below. At this point we don't know if this card is China-exclusive, and exactly how it's marketed, whether it's sold standalone like any AIB retail card, or whether it's pre-installed on LEGION PCs, such as the 2021 LEGION 7000P desktops.

PowerColor has begun teasing another entry to their graphics card brands: Hellhound is fated to meet the Red Dragon and Red Devil products branding in either physical or virtual store shelves. The tease comes a mere week before AMD is expected to launch their mainstream RX 6700 graphics cards (powered by the Navi22 GPU with 2560 Stream Processors and 12 GB of GDDR6 memory), and thus, it seems legitimate to assume that the new series will debut with that particular AMD SKU. The color scheme for the new brand logo seems to tease a black, silver and teal design language.

This is what PowerColor had to say in describing their new series: "Hellhound is born, sharp of fang and razor-like claws, covered with fur that is tough like armour. Its eyes burn in the darkness, allowing it to precisely track and stalk its prey. It used to be a battle hound kept by a warrior brave, Yet, its bravery not unnoticed by the Red Devil, saw a chance to make this hound the keeper of his gates of hell… This Hellhound is silent, not a sound it makes as it guards the gates ready to strike in the darkness with a killer grace… Once prey is found, Hellhound will take it down, it strikes with stealth at one stroke!"

It appears that Intel's DG2 refers to a number of HPG (High Performance Graphics) products within the same family, with rumors surfacing around a possible total of six different graphics products based on the company's latest high performance graphics architecture - and its debut on the high performance discrete market. It's been confirmed that Intel's DG2 products will not be manufactured in-house, via Intel's 10 nm SuperFin technology, but with recourse to foundry partner TSMC's 6 nm fabrication technology.

It seems that DG2 is currently slated for launch based on three different chip configurations: the first is the DG2 512EU, which will power the highest-performance, 4096 shading unit, 8 GB / 16 GB GDDR6 and 192-bit bus graphics card. Another chip is the DG12 384EU, estimated to come in at ~190 mm², available in three different shading unit configurations: 3072 shading units, with an accompanying 6/12 GB of GDDR6 memory and 192-bit bus; 2048 shading units, which reduces allotted memory to 4/8 GB configurations and a 128-bit memory bus; and finally, the further cut-down 1536 shading unit configuration, with a maximum of 4 GB of GDDR6 memory over the same 128-bit bus. The final (current) chip in the DG2 family is the DG2 128EU, with both 128EU and 96EU configurations (1024 and 768 shading units, respectively) carrying 4 GB VRAM over a pretty tight 64-bit bus. We'll see if these leaks actually materialize into final Intel products, and if these design choices are the possible best, considering Intel's technology, so as to assail the two-player party that is the discrete, high performance graphics market.

SiPearl has this week announced their collaboration with Open-Silicon Research, the India-based entity of OpenFive, to produce the next-generation SoC designed for HPC purposes. SiPearl is a part of the European Processor Initiative (EPI) team and is responsible for designing the SoC itself that is supposed to be a base for the European exascale supercomputer. In the partnership with Open-Silicon Research, SiPearl expects to get a service that will integrate all the IP blocks and help with the tape out of the chip once it is done. There is a deadline set for the year 2023, however, both companies expect the chip to get shipped by Q4 of 2022.

When it comes to details of the SoC, it is called Rhea and it will be a 72-core Arm ISA based processor with Neoverse Zeus cores interconnected by a mesh. There are going to be 68 mesh network L3 cache slices in between all of the cores. All of that will be manufactured using TSMC's 6 nm extreme ultraviolet lithography (EUV) technology for silicon manufacturing. The Rhea SoC design will utilize 2.5D packaging with many IP blocks stitched together and HBM2E memory present on the die. It is unknown exactly what configuration of HBM2E is going to be present. The system will also see support for DDR5 memory and thus enable two-level system memory by combining HBM and DDR. We are excited to see how the final product looks like and now we wait for more updates on the project.

Apple and Epic Games have had quite a turbulent history of legal issues in the past year. Fortnite, the world's biggest battle royale game, got removed from the Apple store because its developer, Epic Games, had refused to comply to store rules. If a developer is listing a game on the Apple store, all in-game payments must be processed through Apple, with the company taking a 30% tax cut for it. Epic Games didn't like that idea too much, so the company just used an external system that gave players the option to pay for in-game goods using different ways. However, that represented non-compliance to Apple store guidelines, and Apple took the Fortnite game down.


Update February 26th 07:50 UTC: In the court hearing on Wednesday, U.S. Magistrate Judge Thomas S. Hixson ordered that Apple's subpoena was considered valid. Valve's lawyers urged the judge to not force the company to produce the requested data, however, Apple's lawyers have said that the request is doable and the company is only requesting data on a few hundred games, and it could have been worse by requesting data on over 30000 games instead.

Demand in the global foundry market remains strong in 1Q21, according to TrendForce's latest investigations. As various end-products continue to generate high demand for chips, clients of foundries in turn stepped up their procurement activities, which subsequently led to a persistent shortage of production capacities across the foundry industry. TrendForce therefore expects foundries to continue posting strong financial performances in 1Q21, with a 20% YoY growth in the combined revenues of the top 10 foundries, while TSMC, Samsung, and UMC rank as the top three in terms of market share. However, the future reallocation of foundry capacities still remains to be seen, since the industry-wide effort to accelerate the production of automotive chips may indirectly impair the production and lead times of chips for consumer electronics and industrial applications.

TSMC has been maintaining a steady volume of wafer inputs at its 5 nm node, and these wafer inputs are projected to account for 20% of the company's revenue. On the other hand, owing to chip orders from AMD, Nvidia, Qualcomm, and MediaTek, demand for TSMC's 7 nm node is likewise strong and likely to account for 30% of TSMC's revenue, a slight increase from the previous quarter. On the whole, TSMC's revenue is expected to undergo a 25% increase YoY in 1Q21 and set a new high on the back of surging demand for 5G, HPC, and automotive applications.

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The upcoming Intel Core i7-11700K "Rocket Lake-S" desktop processor showed up on European Retailer Mindfactory.de as a pre-order, listed at 469€ (including VAT). This is a huge step up from the retailer's current selling price of the i7-10700K "Comet Lake-S" of 317.50€, although roughly in line with its launch price. The i7-11700K is an 8-core/16-thread processor, which steps up performance over the previous-gen using the updated "Cypress Cove" CPU cores that come with increased IPC. The processor features a maximum Turbo Boost Max 3.0 frequency of 5.00 GHz, and 16 MB of shared L3 cache. The chip is differentiated from the top-dog Core i9-11900K only by frequency, with the flagship chip featuring max boost frequency of 5.10 GHz, along with the Thermal Velocity Boost feature. The Core i7-11700K comes in a simple paperboard box that lacks an included cooling solution.

NVIDIA's recently published Q4-2020 + Fiscal Year 2021 results show that the alleged "GPU shortage" has had no bearing on the company's financials, with the company raking in $5 billion in revenue, in the quarter ending on January 31, 2021. In its outlook for the following quarter (Q1 FY 2022), the company expects to make another $5.30 billion (± 2%). To its credit, NVIDIA has been maintaining that the shortage of graphics cards in the retail market are a result of demand vastly outstripping supply; than a problem with the supply in and of itself (such as yields of the new 8 nm "Ampere" GPUs). The numbers show that NVIDIA's output of GPUs is fairly normal, and the problem lies with the retail supply-chain.

Crypto-currency mining and scalping are the two biggest problems affecting the availability of graphics cards in the retail market. Surging prices of crypto-currencies, coupled with the latest generation "Ampere" and RDNA2 graphics architectures having sufficient performance/Watt to mine crypto-currencies at viable scale, mean that crypto-miners are able to pick up inventory of graphics cards at wholesale; with very little making it down to retailers. Scalping is another major factor. Those with sophisticated online shopping tools are able to buy large quantities of graphics cards the moment they're available online, so they could re-sell or auction them at highly marked up prices, for profit. NVIDIA started to address the problem of miners by introducing measures that make their upcoming graphics cards artificially slower at mining, affecting the economics of using GPUs; while the problem of scalping remains at large.

GIGABYTE today introduced the GeForce RTX 3060 VISION graphics card targeted at creators. This is the company's fourth such card based on an "Ampere" series GPU. When paired with NVIDIA's GeForce Studio drivers, the card provides a formidable feature-set and optimization for content creation suites, making this a quasi-ProVis graphics card.

The design of the card is similar to most other RTX 30-series VISION cards—a large white cooler shroud hides an aluminium fin-stack heatsink. This shroud is topped off with a brushed aluminium plate. The cooler is optimized for low-noise, and idle fan-stop, and features fans with graphene-lubricated double ball-bearing fans. Airflow from the third fan flows through the card, and out from a cutout on the back-plate. The card pulls power from a single 8-pin PCIe power connector. You also get a handy factory-overclock of 1837 MHz boost (vs. 1777 MHz reference). Display outputs include two each of HDMI 2.1 and DisplayPort 1.4a connectors. The card is expected to be priced around $400.

We have recently discovered that NVIDIA's newly announced 30HX and 40HX Crypto Mining Processors are based on the last-generation Turing architecture. This news will come as a pleasant surprise to gamers as the release shouldn't affect the availability of Ampere RTX 30 Series GPUs. The decision to stick with Turing for these new devices is reportedly due to the more favorable power-management of the architecture which is vital for profitable cryptocurrency mining operations. The NVIDIA CMP 40HX will feature a custom TU106 processor while the 30HX will include a custom TU116. This information was discovered in the latest GeForce 461.72 WHQL drivers which added support for the two devices.

Our initial support for "Resizable BAR" is available now for GeForce RTX 3060 desktop graphics cards and GeForce RTX 30 Series laptops. Utilizing an advanced feature of PCI Express, Resizable BAR can increase performance in certain games. Support for other desktop GPUs will follow in late March. Resizable BAR is an optional PCI Express interface technology. As you move through a world in a game, GPU memory (VRAM) constantly transfers textures, shaders and geometry via many small CPU to GPU transfers. With the ever-growing size of modern game assets, this results in a lot of transfers. Using Resizable BAR, assets can instead be requested as-needed and sent in full, so the CPU can efficiently access the entire frame buffer. And if multiple requests are made, transfers can occur concurrently, rather than queuing.

GeForce RTX 30 Series laptops with Resizable BAR-capable Intel and AMD CPUs are available now. Check with each laptop manufacturer to discover if Resizable BAR is supported on a particular model. For desktops, you will need a compatible CPU, compatible motherboard, motherboard SBIOS update, GPU VBIOS update (the GeForce RTX 3060 already ships with the necessary BIOS) and new GeForce Game Ready driver to enable Resizable BAR.

It's getting frosty: With the addition of the new Alpine 23 CPU cooler, ARCTIC's diverse product range is expanding with new fan variants. Compact, solid, affordable - that's ARCTIC's Alpine series. The series expands with the Alpine 23, the further improved successor Alpine AM4. This new AMD cooler boasts a revised assembly system and long life span.

The Alpine 23 can simply be plugged into the existing AMD retention modules and screwed tightly; robust metal clips guarantee stability and safety. High-performance MX-2 thermal compound is pre-applied, making it easy to get started right out of the box. Thanks to radial heat sinks and a broad, PWM-controlled speed range, the compact CPU cooler offers sufficient performance as well as low noise levels at a very low price.

Display specialist AOC extends its portfolio of P2 series professional displays with three new models: the 31.5" (80 cm) U32P2 with 4K UHD (3840 x 2160 pixels), the 31.5" Q32P2 with QHD (2560 x 1440 pixels) and the 28" (71.1 cm) U28P2A, also with 4K UHD resolution. For increased productivity when working at home or in the office, these monitors offer sizeable screen real estate, a height-adjustable stand with portrait orientation option, and a built-in USB hub to easily connect peripherals. Thanks to the Adaptive-Sync support to match the graphic card's framerate with the monitor's refresh rate, stuttering and tearing is eliminated. AOC's new 31.5" P2 displays are available in Europe starting February 2021, while the 28" model will be available from April.

AOC's P2 series represents the brand's offer for professional business users seeking to increase productivity in their workflow. Whether used for working remotely or in an office, these displays' features cover all of the essential requirements and much more. Offered in 22", 24", 27", 28", 32" and 34" display sizes, the majority of P2 series monitors are equipped with IPS panels, which are color accurate and support wide viewing angles. The displays also feature ergonomic stands and flexible connectivity, with some models accepting USB-C input.

At Framework, we believe the time has come for consumer electronics products that are designed to last. Founded in San Francisco in 2019, our mission is to empower you with great products you can easily customize, upgrade, and repair, increasing longevity and reducing e-waste in the process. Today, we are excited to unveil our first product: the Framework Laptop, a thin, lightweight, high-performance 13.5" productivity notebook that can be upgraded, customized, and repaired in ways that no other notebook can. We're here to prove that designing products to last doesn't require sacrificing performance, quality, or style.

CORSAIR, a world leader in PC gaming peripherals and enthusiast components, today launched a new ultra-light gaming mouse, the KATAR PRO XT. At a weight of just 73g and equipped with a drag-reducing paracord cable, the KATAR PRO XT is extremely agile and well-suited for fast-paced FPS and MOBA gameplay. The KATAR PRO XT is also the first CORSAIR mouse to implement new CORSAIR QUICKSTRIKE buttons, pre-tensioned to reduce button travel to a minimum, meaning every click from the KATAR PRO XT registers faster than ever.

Sporting a compact symmetrical shape, the KATAR PRO XT is great for claw and fingertip grip styles. With a weight of 73g, the KATAR PRO XT is one of the lightest in the entire CORSAIR gaming mouse lineup, aided by a lightweight paracord cable that reduces drag to enable faster and more precise movements. Debuting in the KATAR PRO XT, CORSAIR QUICKSTRIKE buttons feature a spring-loaded pre-tensioned design with zero gap between the primary mouse buttons and their switches, so that all your shots and spells register immediately with virtually no travel distance.

NVIDIA today released the latest version of GeForce drivers. Version 461.72 WHQL introduces support for the new GeForce RTX 3060 graphics card, and adds optimization for "Outriders" demo. In addition DLSS support is added for "Nioh 2 - The Complete Edition" and "Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord." NVIDIA Reflex support is added for "Rainbow Six Siege." Among the issues fixed are stuttering noticed with "Hitman 2" and "Edge of Eternity" with G-SYNC enabled and in windowed mode; a performance drop noticed in Vulkan apps when switching between windowed and fullscreen modes with G-SYNC enabled; an application crash for "X4: Foundations" with Windows 10 1803; a legacy bug with Blu-ray playback flickering with HDMI display output; Chrome and Edge experiencing random TDR on "Ampere" graphics cards; and LG CX OLED TVs not being recognized as being G-SYNC capable.

DOWNLOAD: NVIDIA GeForce 461.72 WHQL

NVIDIA today reported record revenue for the fourth quarter ended January 31, 2021, of $5.00 billion, up 61 percent from $3.11 billion a year earlier, and up 6 percent from $4.73 billion in the previous quarter. The company's Gaming and Data Center platforms achieved record revenue for the quarter and year.

GAAP earnings per diluted share for the quarter were a record $2.31, up 51 percent from $1.53 a year ago, and up 9 percent from $2.12 in the previous quarter. Non-GAAP earnings per diluted share were $3.10, up 64 percent from $1.89 a year earlier, and up 7 percent from $2.91 in the previous quarter. For fiscal 2021, revenue was a record $16.68 billion, up 53 percent from $10.92 billion a year earlier. GAAP earnings per diluted share were a record $6.90, up 53 percent from $4.52 a year earlier. Non-GAAP earnings per diluted share were $10.00, up 73 percent from $5.79 a year earlier.

In 2019, AMD and Samsung have announced that they will be joining forces to develop a new class of mobile SoCs, carrying the Exynos name and having a Radeon GPU inside. These Exynos SoCs could be used for almost everything that needs a low-power processor. While the original plan was to have these processors run inside Samsung's mobile phone offerings, it seems like there is another application for them. If the rumors coming from ZDNet Korea are correct, we are in for a surprise. According to the source, Samsung is preparing to use the Exynos SoC with Radeon graphics in the company's next-generation laptops lineup.

While there is little to no information regarding the specifications of the said system, we can expect it to be a fully Samsung-made laptop. That means that Samsung will provide display, RAM, storage, battery, and other components manufactured by the company or its divisions. This laptop is expected to replace Samsung's Galaxy Book S, which currently uses Qualcomm Snapdragon 8cx SoC. The new PC is going to be Windows 10 based system. For more details, we have to wait for the announcement.

Manufacturing silicon is no easy task. You need to have all the right supplies available all the time. One of the most used ingredients in silicon manufacturing is water. Almost every process needs it and it needs to be constantly available to the manufacturer. According to the report coming from Reuters, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) and United Microelectronics Corporation (UMC) are experiencing water shortages. The Taiwan island is in trouble, as the typhoon season has been rather mild and water supplies are at the historic lows. Water restrictions are in place all across the island and the reservoirs in the center and southern regions are at only 20% capacity.

The lack of water is a big problem for TSMC and UMC, as both companies rely on the constant income of it. With water restrictions in place, TSMC has to keep its facilities running and needs to solve the problem. That is why Taiwan's biggest silicon manufacturer is now making small orders of waters, delivered by a truckload. TSMC expects to compensate for the lack of water coming from its regular sources with truckloads of it. While we do not know the numbers of it, we can expect the water use to be very high if we take into account the number of wafers TSMC produces at its facilities.

AAEON, an industry leader in Edge Computing solutions, announces the SRG-3352C Compact Edge IoT Gateway System. The SRG-3352C brings reliable, cost effective gateway operations with expandability and wireless communication support designed to quickly deploy edge networks in a variety of environments.
The SRG-3352C builds upon the features, durability and reliability of the SRG-3352 Edge IoT Gateway System with expanded support for more connections and wireless communications. All of this is packed into a compact form factor that makes deploying the SRG-3352C even easier, powering more flexible edge network deployments.

The SRG-3352C is powered by the Arm Cortex-A8 800 MHz RISC processor. This innovative processor reduces the energy requirements of the system, allowing for a more efficient system to help save electricity costs. While powerful enough to connect edge networks together, the low energy usage can help cities with achieving green energy goals, and even allow the system to operate on solar power or batteries. It also eliminates the need for dedicated heatsinks, allowing the system to operate in wider temperatures, from 0°C up to 60°C without loss in performance.

In the spirit of transparency and closure we wanted to share that we've made the difficult decision to stop our new development work on Anthem (aka Anthem NEXT). We will, however, continue to keep the Anthem live service running as it exists today. Since Anthem's launch, the team has been working hard to continually improve the game, releasing multiple updates that brought with them a variety of improvements and introduced new content to play. Towards the end of 2019 we expanded on that effort and started working on a more fundamental restructure of the game.

During the development we've provided updates revealing some of the team's work through blog posts and conversations with you on social media and it's been inspiring for us to see the positive reactions and feedback. I've been incredibly proud of the work the team has been doing, and excited to see and play each new build of the experience.

AMD has recently announced their third "When Gaming Begins" event to announce the latest addition to the Radeon RX 6000 Series. AMD unveiled the first of their Ryzen 5000 Series processors during the first When Gaming Begins event and announced the RX 6800, RX 6800 XT, and RX 6900 XT graphics cards during the second event. This third event will almost certainly be to officially unveil the Radeon RX 6700 XT and/or RX 6700 graphics cards which we have received various leaks and rumors about.

We expect the RX 6700 XT to come with 40 compute units, 2560 cores, and 12 GB 192-bit GDDR6 memory and to compete with the NVIDIA RTX 3060 Ti. The card is rumored to retail for under 250 USD however it is unknown if the card will actually be available to purchase at this price. The RX 6700 features the same 12 GB 192-bit GDDR6 memory but only includes 36 compute units and 2304 cores. AMD will likely also talk about their laptop plans and software features during the event. The third When Gaming Begins event will be live-streamed by AMD on March 3rd at 11 am ET.

GIGABYTE TECHNOLOGY Co. Ltd, a leading manufacturer of motherboards and graphics cards, today announced the new AIO liquid cooler AORUS WATERFORCE X SERIES. Beyond the success of the AORUS LIQUID COOLER, AORUS WATERFORCE X SERIES deliver 3 radiator sizes of 240/280/360 mm which cater to various needs from users for a robust support to the high performance multicore CPUs on Intel and AMD platforms. Besides the compatibility for a multitude of builds, AORUS WATERFORCE X SERIES improve every aspect functions and designs. The 7.8 mm Tube Diameter improves the flow by 37% and it is engineered with ceramic axis pump to optimize durability and heat dissipation.

The leading Graphene Nano lubricant fan structure also reduces the rate of wear on bearing and carbon deposit by its low coefficient of friction and high lubrication, which extends the life 2.1 times by sleeve bearing fan and avoid the noise from ball bearing on low fan speed to create quieter operation. The renowned LCD display design further integrates more innovative modes and customized settings, including the exclusive Chibi Time, and the support of MP4\GIF\JPG format. Through the newly integrated Micro SD port, users are more free to load preferred materials for display, and paired with multiple lighting modes of RGB FUSION, AORUS WATERFORCE X is the AIO liquid cooler more than you could ever imagined.

PC case designer Fractal today announced the release of the Meshify 2 Compact. Building on the Meshify history of intelligent space utilization and smooth airflow pathing, Fractal's design team has introduced a host of new features in the Meshify 2 series such as a front USB 3.1 Type-C port, a bolt-free tempered glass panel, a fully removable top panel that grants excellent interior access, and a front nylon filter that can be removed from the mesh for increased airflow. Meshify 2 Compact continues the legacy of its predecessors with a sharp angular asymmetry, high-performance standards and a filtered airflow path from front intake directly through key components to exhaust. The result is a keenly anticipated update to one of Fractals most popular cases.

You can find our review for the Fractal Design Meshify 2 here.

Unity, the world's leading platform for creating and operating real-time 3D (RT3D) content, today released the 2021 Gaming Report: Unity Insights from 2020 and Predicted Trends for 2021, which provides a comprehensive look at how gaming changed for both players and creators one year into the pandemic. With more than 2.8 billion monthly active consumers of content created or operated with Unity solutions, this report represents the largest dataset on COVID-19's impact on gaming. For a free copy of Unity's 2021 Gaming Report, please visit this page.

"It's still too early to tell if changed habits will become the new norm once the pandemic is over, but given our understanding of past player behavior changes, it would be surprising to see many players revert," said Ingrid Lestiyo, Senior VP and General Manager, Operate Solutions, Unity. "In a year where online entertainment content - more than ever - became the cornerstone of social connections for so many when seeking a semblance of normalcy, Unity Operate Solutions was there to provide reliable, scalable solutions that helped keep the experiences connected and players engaged. Our amazing creators are here for that reason, and our mission is to enable them to focus on, and produce more, content with the technology we provide. While the nature of work may have changed for many game studios over the last year, the tools that help to power their success continued to deliver results that kept players happy, and revenue for developers of all sizes growing."

Seagate Technology plc, a world leader in data storage and management solutions, today introduced LyveTM Cloud storage-as-a-service platform, an S3-compatible storage-only cloud. Lyve Cloud enables always-on mass capacity data storage and activation. It is designed as a simple, trusted, and efficient service allowing enterprises to unlock the value of their massive unstructured datasets. Seagate is collaborating with Equinix, the world's digital infrastructure company, to make Lyve Cloud accessible to more customers. This collaboration will provide extensive interconnect opportunities for additional cloud services and geographical expansion.

Lyve Cloud is a natural extension of Seagate's leadership in mass data solutions, combining our mass capacity HDD innovation with deep storage industry knowledge to help customers activate more of their valuable data," said Ravi Naik, executive vice president, storage services, and chief information officer at Seagate. "According to Seagate's Rethink Data report, as much as 68% of data available to enterprises goes unused. By providing a reliable and cost-efficient cloud storage solution at the metro edge, closer to where their data is generated, Lyve Cloud lets enterprises store and activate their data at scale, securely and efficiently."

The transition to PCIe 4.0 is in full swing, and Kioxia Corporation, a world leader in memory solutions, is leading the way forward. Today, the company announced that its lineup of KIOXIA CM6 and CD6 Series PCIe 4.0 NVM Express (NVMe ) enterprise and data center solid state drives (SSDs) have gained compatibility approval with Super Micro Computer, Inc. (Supermicro)'s PCIe 4.0-based platforms, including a wide range of enterprise-ready rackmount systems encompassing Ultra, WIO, BigTwin, FatTwin, SuperBlade, 1U/2U NVMe all flash arrays, GPU accelerated systems and SuperWorkstations.

Users are moving to NVMe SSDs to address the demands of enterprise performance requirements, cloud-based data center architectures, and performance-centric and latency-sensitive applications. At the center of this movement is heightened demand for NVMe -based storage where PCIe 4.0 is the latest performance upgrade, and Kioxia's CM6 and CD6 Series SSDs are delivering these enhanced capabilities.

In 2011, computers were clogged with too many input/output (I/O) ports. There were USB ports for data; Ethernet ports for internet; and DisplayPort, HDMI and VGA ports for video. Despite being large enough to accommodate multiple ports, the computers still couldn't keep up with users' needs.

The solution? Intel launched Thunderbolt technology, which consolidated data, video and power on a single, small connector. Thunderbolt allowed users to move data quickly and confidently among connected smart devices - like PCs, docks, monitors, solid state drives, external hard drives and cameras - using that single connector. At the time, Thunderbolt boasted the ability to transfer a full-length, high-definition movie in less than 30 seconds and back up a full year of continuous MP3 music playback in just over 10 minutes.

EK, the leading computer cooling solutions provider, is ready to offer its premium high-performance GPU water block for EVGA FTW3 editions of NVIDIA GeForce RTX 30 Series graphics cards. This new water block is named EK-Quantum Vector FTW3 RTX 3070 D-RGB and is exclusively engineered for EVGA FTW3 RTX 3070 GPUs.

This water block is 314mm wide and 155mm long and cools all key components on the GPU's printed circuit board. The EK-Quantum Vector FTW3 RTX 3070 is compatible with EVGA FTW3 RTX 3070 graphics cards. This Vector water block actively cools the GPU, top-facing VRAM, power stages, and chokes in the VRM section. The newly developed FTW3 water blocks feature clean, symmetrically-shaped, optimized flow paths that reduce hydrodynamic instabilities and vortexing (dead spots) inside of them.

Oh the irony! Hacking was a very viable way to develop your character and play Cyberpunk 2077, but CD Projekt RED did not think their 2021 would be made worse due to an IRL hack. Not only did they lose out invaluable source code to hackers, but said hackers also sold the codes in a move that jeopardizes the structural integrity of a video game developer. You could make jokes about the 90's meme letter the hackers sent to the company, however they clearly don't see the humor in this situation as this has taken up resources which otherwise were meant to go towards patching Cyberpunk 2077- especially on older gen consoles.

CD Projekt RED took to twitter earlier today to inform us that the patch is delayed, as many speculated, but also that the additional time will also contribute towards increasing the scope of the patch beyond earlier updates. Indeed, in a situation where they simply can't seem to catch a break, perhaps transparency and downplaying expectations would have been the way to go. As it stands, the public feedback to this news is a gentle reminder to the sane TPU reader to keep social media and public comments at arm's length to maintain said sanity. We sympathize with CD Projekt RED and hope that they come out better to do better by their paying customers alike.

Fry's Electronics, Inc. (or simply Fry's as is more popularly referred to) ripped off the band-aid from its ailing operations in the USA today. The 36-year old company was a Silicon Valley original, and went full-time into the PC market as a retailer shortly after giving up its grocery business dreams. The company had been struggling for a while now, with yours truly having never once bought from any of their stores despite having lived in a city that housed so many, and clearly too many, of them. The brand had quickly become associated with outdated and overly expensive hardware, and unfortunately today's news was due to happen sooner than later. We wish all employees a quick rebound, and look out for wind-down sales from the company as it attempts to satisfy creditors and stakeholders.

"Neonpunk style emanates in the darkness from the glimmer of high quality metals, showcasing futuristic aesthetics in the darkness of the night. The new era of esports has arrived." This is how Gigabyte describes their latest RTX 3060 AORUS ELITE design. Apart from the apparent attempt at coining a new nomenclature for RGB lighting and dark materials, Gigabyte have announced that their to-be-launched graphics card features the company's well-known Windforce 3X cooling system.

The card features a 1x 8-pin and 1x 6-pin power delivery subsystem, a black metal backplate, dual-BIOS capabilities with a (default) OC and a Silent mode, and LED power indicators to easily troubleshoot power delivery issues. No word on pricing or clockspeeds were available at time of writing.

Industry specialists with various analysis groups have stated that they expect the world's current chip supply shortages to not only fail to be mitigated in the first half of 2021, but that they might actually last well into 2022. It's not just a matter of existing chip supply being diverted by scalpers, miners, or other secondary-market funnels; it's a matter of fundamental lack of resources and production capacity to meet demand throughout various quadrants of the semiconductor industry. With the increased demand due to COVID-19 and the overall increasingly complex design of modern chips - and increased abundance of individual chips within the same products - foundries aren't being able to scale their capacity to meet growing demand.

As we know, the timeframe between start and finish of a given semiconductor chip can sometimes take months. And foundries have had to extend their lead times (the time between a client placing an order and that order being fulfilled) already. This happens as a way to better plan out their capacity allocation, and due to the increased complexity of installing, testing, and putting to production increasingly complex chip designs and fabrication technologies. And analysts with J.P. Morgan and Susquehanna that are in touch with the pulse of the semiconductor industry say that current demand levels are 10% to 30% higher than those that can be satisfied by the fabrication and supply subsystems for fulfilling that demand.

HP Inc. today announced a definitive agreement to acquire HyperX, the gaming division of Kingston Technology Company. The acquisition supports HP's strategy to drive growth in its Personal Systems business, where gaming and peripherals are attractive segments. HyperX's award-winning product portfolio spans a range of gaming peripherals, including headsets, keyboards, mice, mouse pads, USB microphones, and console accessories.

"HyperX is a leader in peripherals whose technology is trusted by gamers around the world and we're thrilled to welcome their outstanding team to the HP family," said Enrique Lores, President and CEO, HP Inc. "We continue to advance our leadership in Personal Systems by modernizing compute experiences and expanding into valuable adjacencies. We see significant opportunities in the large and growing peripherals market, and the addition of HyperX to our portfolio will drive new sources of innovation and growth for our business."

PC gaming continues to be one of the most popular forms of video gaming, with the PC hardware industry anticipated to be worth $70 billion by 2023.1 The global peripherals market is expected to grow to $12.2 billion by 2024, with gaming peripherals representing a disproportionate share of this growth.

Cincoze, a professional manufacturer of embedded systems, has announced its new flagship GPU edge computing system, the GP-3000. Its crowning feature is an exclusive GPU Expansion Box that provides expansion for up to two high-end GPU graphics cards and creating a high-performance industrial-grade GPU computer. Brandon Chien, General Manager of Cincoze, stated that "We already know AI will drive innovation and expansion for industrial applications. The GP-3000 is Cincoze's answer for intensive image processing and complex calculations, such as deep machine learning, autonomous driving, automated visual inspection, and mobile monitoring. As our latest flagship model, the GP-3000 multiplies edge computing efficiency, amplifies productivity and reliability, and accelerates AIoT automation."

The GP-3000's extreme computing power starts with an 8th or 9th generation Intel Xeon or Core i3/i5/i7 (Coffee Lake and Coffee Lake-R) CPU, Intel C246 chipset, and supports two sets of DDR4-2666 ECC/non-ECC SO-DIMM up to 64 GB and can support up to two 250 W high-end GPU graphics cards. With a total system power consumption of 720 W, it's easy to meet and exceed high-efficiency application requirements. A precision heat dissipation and cooling design quickly wick away heat, keeping the focus squarely on the breathtaking performance of the GP-3000.

For professional photographers, videographers, and cinematographers, a reliable memory card is just as important as using high-end cameras and recorders. In addition, since the advent of 5G, the demand for high quality has become even more prevalent. SP Industrial's "Cinema Series" line of CF memory cards meet the latest CFast 2.0 specifications for outstanding performance, making them ideal solutions for shooting high-resolution Full HD, 4K. Hoping to further support professionals in this field, SP industrial has set in motion the development of a CFexpress Type B card, the Cinema Ex. The card will join the "Cinema Series" family, and promises to meet all requirements of the most demanding users by fully equipping them with the tools to shoot videos in 8K.

When it comes to memory cards, CF cards are the superior choice for professionals as they are faster and more durable than SD/microSD cards. Their ability to reach incredible read and write speeds are ideal for shooting extreme sports and action shots as well as capturing wildlife and fast-paced motion. Their greater durability allows them to be used in situations that cater to the environments of this type of footage, including the rugged outdoors and the forces of nature.

Intel "Alder Lake" is the first processor generation coming from the company to feature the hybrid big.LITTLE type core arrangement and we are wondering how the configurations look like and just how powerful the next-generation processors are going to be. Today, a Geekbench submission has appeared that gave us a little more information about one out of twelve Alder Lake-S configurations. This time, we are getting an 8-core, 16-threaded design with all big cores and no smaller cores present. Such design with no little cores in place is exclusive to the Alder Lake-S desktop platform, and will not come to the Alder Lake-P processors designed for mobile platforms.

Based on the socket LGA1700, the processor was spotted running all of its eight cores at 2.99 GHz frequency. Please note that this is only an engineering sample and the clock speeds of the final product should be higher. It was paired with the latest DDR5 memory and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2080 GPU. The OpenCL score this CPU ran has shown that it has provided the GPU with more than enough performance. Typically, the RTX 2080 GPU scores about 106101 points in Geekbench OpenCL tests. Paired with the Alder Lake-S CPU, the GPU has managed to score as much as 108068 points, showing the power of the new generation of cores. While there is still a lot of mystery surrounding the Alder Lake-S series, we have come to know that the big cores used are supposed to be very powerful.

Addressing the demands of the modern data center, Xilinx, Inc. (NASDAQ: XLNX) today announced a range of new data center products and solutions, including a new family of Alveo SmartNICs, smart world AI video analytics applications, an accelerated algorithmic trading reference design for sub-microsecond trading, and the Xilinx App Store.

Today's most demanding and complex applications, from networking and AI analytics to financial trading, require low-latency and real-time performance. Achieving this level of performance has been limited to expensive and lengthy hardware development. With these new products and solutions, Xilinx is eliminating the barriers for software developers to quickly create and deploy software-defined, hardware accelerated applications on Alveo accelerator cards.

Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd., the world leader in advanced memory technology, today announced that it has begun mass producing its most advanced line of data center SSDs, the PM9A3 E1.S.

The new PM9A3 fully complies with the Open Compute Project (OCP) NVMe Cloud SSD Specification to satisfy the rigorous demands of enterprise workloads. Defined by leading data center providers including Facebook, the OCP Specification is a set of unified interoperable standards, enabling SSD vendors to work toward next-generation storage designs with much more effectiveness.

Intel claims that its upcoming 11th Gen Core "Rocket Lake-S" desktop processors offer up to 11% higher storage performance than competing AMD Ryzen 5000 processors, when using the CPU-attached M.2 NVMe slot. A performance slide released by Intel's Ryan Shrout shows a Samsung 980 PRO 1 TB PCI-Express 4.0 x4 M.2 NVMe SSD performance on a machine powered by a Core i9-11900K processor, compared to one powered by an AMD Ryzen 9 5950X. PCMark 10 Quick System Drive Benchmark is used to evaluate storage performance on both machines. On both machines a separate drive is used as the OS/boot drive, and the Samsung 980 PRO is used as a test drive, free from any OS role.

The backup page for the slide provides details of the system configurations used for both machines. What it doesn't mention, however, is whether on the AMD machine, the 980 PRO was installed on the CPU-attached M.2 NVMe slot, or one that's attached to the AMD X570 chipset. Unlike the Intel Z590, the AMD X570 puts out downstream PCI-Express 4.0, which motherboard designers can use to put out additional NVMe Gen 4 slots. On the Intel Z590 motherboard, the M.2 NVMe Gen 4 slot the drive was tested on is guaranteed to be the CPU-attached one, as the Z590 PCH puts out PCIe Gen 3 downstream lanes. A PCI-Express 4.0 x4 link is used as chipset bus on the AMD X570, offering comparable bandwidth to the DMI 3.0 x8 (PCI-Express 3.0 x8) employed on the Intel Z590. A drive capable of attaining 7 GB/s sequential transfers should be in a sub-optimal situation on a chipset-attached M.2 slot. It would be nice if Intel clears this up in an update to its backup.

Update 02:51 UTC: In response to a specific question on Twitter, on whether the drives were tested on CPU-attached M.2 slots on both platforms, Ryan Shrout stated that a PCI-Express AIC riser card was used on both platforms to ensure that the drives are CPU-attached. 11% is a significant storage performance uplift on offer.

Sony has restarted their "Play At Home initiative" to provide a "series of free games and entertainment offers for our PlayStation community to make the next few months a little more fun and enjoyable". The Play At Home initiative was launched by Sony in April 2020 and offered PlayStation users a free copy of Uncharted: The Nathan Drake Collection, and Journey for PS4. Sony will now be offering a free copy of Ratchet & Clank PS4 from Insomniac Games between March 1st and March 31st. Once you redeem the game, it will be yours to keep as was the case previously. All the games offered via the Play At Home initiative are playable on the PS5 with backward compatibility mode. Sony has also partnered with Funimation to offer an extended trial for new customers of the anime streaming service. Sony will announce additional free games and services in the coming months.

Sony has officially announced that they are working on a next-generation PlayStation VR headset for the PS5. Sony has only provided limited details of the upcoming headset but they include upgrades to resolution, field of view, tracking, and input. The new headset will also connect to PS5 with a single cord to simplify setup. The new VR controllers will incorporate various improvements from the latest generation DualSense wireless controller along with general ergonomic improvements. While this new PSVR system is still under development and will not launch until at least 2022 Sony has reaffirmed their commitment to the existing PSVR platform confirming the launch of several new titles including After The Fall, Sniper Elite VR, and Humanity. You can read the full release from Sony below.

Akasa, a global leader in fanless technology, has extended their Turing fanless chassis design series by releasing the new Turing A50. The Turing A50 has been designed specifically to support the mainboards found inside the ASUS Mini PC PN50 series, which features the latest AMD Ryzen 4000 notebook PC mobile processors in conjunction with Radeon graphics. The Turing A50 is a product at the forefront of fanless technology and combines innovative style with solid functionality in order to create a contemporary Ryzen fanless system.

The ASUS Mini PC PN50 series can feature some of the latest AMD mobile processors: the Ryzen 3, 5 and 7. Whichever you choose, the Turing A50 will be able to keep the APU cool under all working conditions to optimize performance in complete silence. The case utilizes fanless technology, where the solid aluminium core that showcases hi-performance AK-TC5026 thermal compound and gap fillers, efficiently transfers heat from the APU. With the chassis itself working as a heatsink, the excess heat from the APU is then transferred to the external fins via the aluminium core and into the surroundings, keeping the APU cool without the need of a noisy fan. Built with deep cooling fins to maximize the surface area and an aluminium casing, the system functions optimally whilst also existing as a completely silent component.

Cherry Americas, part of the global leader in computer input devices, today announced that the CHERRY KC 4500 ERGO ergonomic keyboard has been added to its portfolio. Through its unique design, the CHERRY KC 4500 Ergo is specifically built to allow hands, arms and shoulders to adopt a natural posture and provides hours of comfortable working.

The CHERRY KC 4500 ERGO is designed to be equally well suited for use in the office or home. As with all its products, CHERRY has placed great emphasis on maximizing ease of use, including three stand-up feet on the front side of the keyboard to enable users to change the angle of operation whether the user is sitting or standing. The inclusion of rubber feet on the keyboard prevents any slipping in all positions. The keyboard also comes with a soft palm rest that provides optimal positioning to allow users to rest their hands comfortably and prevent straining pressure points.

A class action settlement with Epic Games, Inc. ("Epic") has received preliminary approval from the Superior Court of North Carolina, Tenth Judicial District. Under the settlement, all U.S. players of Fortnite: Save the World and Rocket League who bought a random item loot box in either game before Epic Games discontinued them will receive certain benefits immediately and automatically. The settlement also provides up to $26.5 million in cash and other benefits to U.S.-based Fortnite and Rocket League players to resolve claims arising from players' purchases of Fortnite and Rocket League in-game items.

Beginning today, Epic will deposit 1,000 V-Bucks, the Fortnite virtual currency, or 1,000 Rocket League Credits, into the accounts of U.S. players who bought a random item loot box. These deposits will be automatic and players do not need to do anything to claim them, though it may take a few days for all eligible players to receive them.

Additionally, players who believe they were harmed or damaged by virtue of their in-game Fortnite or Rocket League purchases and meet certain criteria can file a claim for a cash payment of up to $50 or a virtual currency deposit of up to 13,500 V-Bucks (in Fortnite) or 13,000 Credits (in Rocket League). Legal guardians of players who are minors that made in-game purchases without parental permission can seek partial refunds of up to $50, but must agree to the closure of their child's Epic Games accounts.

Intel and Google Cloud today announced a collaboration to develop telco cloud reference architectures and integrated solutions for communication service providers to accelerate 5G deployment across multiple network and edge locations.

"Communications service providers can adopt cloud-native technologies to harness the potential of 5G both as a connectivity solution and as a business services platform to deliver applications to the network edge," said Shailesh Shukla, vice president and general manager of networking at Google Cloud. "Expanding on our work with the telecommunications industry, we are excited to work with Intel to help customers plan, test and deploy the technology and infrastructure needed to accelerate the delivery of cloud-native 5G for consumer and enterprise use cases."

be quiet!, market leader for PC power supplies in Germany since 2007, introduces the Dark Power 12 series. This high-end power supply series consists of three models with 750, 850, and 1000 watts. They are positioned directly beneath the award-winning Dark Power Pro 12 series, starting at 1200 watts. Dark Power 12 features an extraordinary 80 PLUS Titanium certification, an advanced topology, and a proven cooling concept for the perfect balance between efficiency, performance, and silence. An Overclocking Key lets users combine the four 12 V rails into one with high power output, ideal for overclocked processors or graphics cards. be quiet! has combined these high-end technical specifications with fully modular black sleeved cables.

Dark Power 12 features 80 PLUS Titanium certification. be quiet! has achieved this high-efficiency factor by implementing the advanced "Active Rectifier + Full Bridge LLC + SR + DC-DC" topology and a wire-free interior design on the DC side. Unlike the Pro models, Dark Power 12 does not rely on digital regulation: the active rectifier helps its topology achieve a high efficiency rating on Titanium level. For maximum reliability and signal quality from the four 12 V rails, Dark Power 12 relies exclusively on premium components such as long-lasting Japanese 105°C capacitors.

Driven by such factors as the continued development of autonomous driving technologies and the build-out of 5G infrastructure, the demand for automotive memories will undergo a rapid growth going forward, according to TrendForce's latest investigations. Take Tesla, which is the automotive industry leader in the application of autonomous vehicle technologies, as an example. Tesla has adopted GDDR5 DRAM products from the Model S and X onward because it has also adopted Nvidia's solutions for CPU and GPU. The GDDR5 series had the highest bandwidth at the time to complement these processors. The DRAM content has therefore reached at least 8 GB for vehicles across all model series under Tesla. The Model 3 is further equipped with 14 GB of DRAM, and the next-generation of Tesla vehicles will have 20 GB. If content per box is used as a reference for comparison, then Tesla far surpasses manufacturers of PCs and smartphones in DRAM consumption. TrendForce forecasts that the average DRAM content of cars will continue to grow in the next three years, with a CAGR of more than 30% for the period.

Global sales of smartphones to end users declined 5.4% in the fourth quarter of 2020, according to Gartner, Inc. Smartphone sales declined 12.5% in full year 2020.

"The sales of more 5G smartphones and lower-to-mid-tier smartphones minimized the market decline in the fourth quarter of 2020," said Anshul Gupta, senior research director at Gartner. "Even as consumers remained cautious in their spending and held off on some discretionary purchases, 5G smartphones and pro-camera features encouraged some end users to purchase new smartphones or upgrade their current smartphones in the quarter."

Passmark Software have recently announced the significant expansion of their cross-platform benchmarking with the latest releases of PerformanceTest. For the first time this cornerstone benchmarking software is now available for Windows ARM, included with every PerformanceTest for Windows license. All CPU, 2D, Memory and Disk Tests have been natively compiled to run on Windows ARM, partial 3D support is also available.

PerformanceTest has also been released as free command line versions for Linux x86 64-bit, Linux ARM 32-bit, Linux ARM 64-bit and for MacOS (CPU Test Suite Only). The Android and IOS Mobile versions have also received updates, with all available versions of PerformanceTest now running the same CPU Test Suite found in V10 for Windows. These releases allow for directly comparable cross-platform CPU results, an apparent necessity as the number of ARM based processors such as Apple's M1 and Qualcomm's Snapdragon enter consumer hardware.

Odd Tech Reviews published a performance review of an Intel Core i7-11700 (non-K) "employee beta sample." This review comes on the heels of a Lab501.ro review of an unlocked i7-11700K engineering sample; and yet springs a different set of results in relation to the AMD Ryzen 7 5800X. The i7-11700 is shown having a slight edge over the 5800X in both the single- and multi-threaded tests of the CPU-Z Bench, where it's shown posting a 3.59% higher single-threaded score.

The Ryzen 7 5800X retakes the lead over the Core i7-11700 sample in Cinebench R15 and R20, posting higher scores in both the single- and multi-threaded tests. The 5800X also maintains lead with 7-Zip. Blender sees the i7-11700 once again run past the 5800X, but the AMD chip claws back with V-Ray and Handbrake video-encoding tests. There's a pitched battle between the 5800X and the i7-11700 with gaming, with each chip having an upper hand over the other, depending on the test. Find all these results and more in the Odd Tech Reviews presentation.

GLOBALFOUNDRIES (GF), the world's leading specialty foundry, today announced a strategic partnership with the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) to provide a secure and reliable supply of semiconductor solutions manufactured at GF's Fab 8 in Malta, New York—the company's most advanced semiconductor manufacturing facility. These semiconductor chips will be used in some of the DoD's most sensitive applications for land, air, sea, and space systems.

Under the agreement, GF will provide a supply of chips built at Fab 8 on its differentiated 45 nm SOI platform. The agreement is made possible by Fab 8's compliance with U.S. International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) and highly restrictive Export Control Classification Numbers under the Export Administration Regulations (EAR).

The new supply agreement builds upon the longstanding partnership between the DoD and GF to provide chips for defense, aerospace, and other sensitive applications. GF currently supplies the DoD with chips manufactured at GF's other on-shore facilities, Fab 10 in East Fishkill, New York, and Fab 9 in Burlington, Vermont.

Beyond the Dark Portal in the shattered realm of Outland, the armies of the demonic Burning Legion prepare for an invasion that threatens the entire world of Azeroth. Later this year, World of Warcraft players will return to the fel-scarred ruin of Hellfire Peninsula to stop the incursion at its source; rediscover what lurks below the fungal forests of Zangarmarsh; and face down Illidan the Betrayer once again in Burning Crusade Classic, Blizzard Entertainment's authentic recreation of the acclaimed first World of Warcraft expansion.

"The World of Warcraft community made it clear that they wanted WoW Classic, and now they're eager to continue their journey into The Burning Crusade," said J. Allen Brack, president of Blizzard Entertainment. "Since the launch of WoW Classic and as we rolled out content updates, we've learned a lot about what players want from an experience like this in 2021. We're building on that to ensure players' new adventures in Outland are as epic as ever, whether they're taking a return trip through the Dark Portal or joining us for the very first time."

Diablo II, one of the most acclaimed titles in PC gaming history, returns... and Hell has never looked better. Blizzard Entertainment today revealed Diablo II: Resurrected, the definitive remastering of Diablo II and its Lord of Destruction expansion—two hallmark entries in the company's genre-defining action role-playing series.

Diablo II was hailed by Time magazine as "arguably the best role-playing game of all time, the best dungeon-crawler of all time and the best PC game of all time." Diablo II: Resurrected welcomes back veteran heroes and invites a new generation of players to experience the game's sinfully dark storyline, thrilling loot chase, and visceral hack-and-slash gameplay with modernized visuals that take advantage of the latest gaming hardware.

The epidemic in 2020 made people once again realize that computers are indispensable for study, entertainment, and work. In situations where frequent computer use is required, high-performance laptops are of vital importance. In September 2020, Intel launched the Evo platform, bringing improvements for laptops in terms of components, technology, and appearance. The platform makes laptops capable of delivering a remarkable experience, including: higher responsiveness, longer battery life, and improved appearance.

Under this context, the Evo platform puts forward higher requirements on laptop hardware. In addition to PCIe/NVMe SSDs with 256 GB or higher capacity, a near-instantaneous wake up time of 1 second or less is required. This outperforms many high-performance laptops on the market. The "1-second wake" function must be certified by Intel Modern Standby and Microsoft IHV (Tiger Lake requires SSD power to be less than 1.5 mW in the D3 cold state).

AMD today released the latest version of Radeon Software Adrenalin drivers. Version 21.2.3 beta adds optimization for "DIRT 5 Energy Content Pack." Among the handful of issued fixed with these drivers include HDMI audio device (such as home-theater receivers) failing to install on Radeon RX 400 series and RX 500 series "Polaris" graphics cards; hot-plugging TVs and displays in multi-monitor configurations causing a system hang; "Substance Painter" experiencing a crash with Radeon RX 6000 series; HP Reverb G2 VR HMD causing a system crash when plugging into RX 6900 XT, and the Radeon Software application sometimes failing to look up the latest version of the software. Grab it from the link below.

DOWNLOAD: AMD Radeon Software Adrenalin 21.2.3 betaThe change-log follows.

Users have recently been reporting various intermittent USB connectivity errors on AMD 500 series motherboards. AMD has acknowledged these issues in a recent Reddit post where they have asked affected users for more information to help them resolve the issues. The issues appear to be most commonly found when using VR headsets on X570 motherboards where intermittent connectivity issues are most noticeable. Some of the affected users report that the issues are most common when using a PCIe 4.0 GPU and that switching to PCIe 3.0 can sometimes resolve the issue. AMD is asking affected users to submit reports through their Online Service Request platform and will also contact users directly on Reddit to request detailed information.

EK, the leading computer cooling solutions provider, is ready to offer its Classic design GPU water block for ASUS ROG Strix edition of NVIDIA GeForce RTX 30 Series graphics cards. Minimalistic design with fewer details makes this EK-Classic Line water block more affordable while still offering all the qualities of an EK product, such as high performance, excellent customer support, and a comprehensive installation manual.

The EK-Classic GPU Water Block Strix RTX 3080/3090 D-RGB has a big purpose-designed 126 mm wide and 237 mm long copper base to cover and cool all key components on the GPU printed circuit board. This gives it an advantage on the market of having a clean design, showing off all the cooling liquid, and cooling all the necessary components.