Intel's Core i3-7350K, the little dual-core that could, is going to be absent from the company's launch line-up, multiple sources have reported. Considering Intel's other expected, already pretty well-known parts and respective pricing which will be making up its Kaby Lake market launch, the absence of Intel's only "innovative" product (if you can really call an unlocked multiplier an innovation) surely presents itself as sad news for the extreme value-conscious consumer - at least if non-K overclocking of Intel's processors is, this time around, properly shut-down by the company as intended.

Expected to be priced at $175, the Core i3-7350K is expected to carry a base clock of 4 GHz, with 5 GHz on air being the expected OC potential of the chips. Apparently, Intel is delaying the launch of this part (as well as its entry-level Celeron and Pentium families of processors) by several weeks. This could be a way for Intel to prevent early cannibalization of its i5 7400 processors by a small chip that could, in the right scenario, provide much higher performance due to its 1 GHz extra base core clock speed (also being the only Core i3 desktop SKU to feature Turbo Boost, with a frequency of up to 4.2 GHz).

In a realm of ever-expanding storage needs, and increasingly constrained time slices, being able to quickly transfer or back-up your files and carry them with you is still an important metric. Even in an increasingly cloud-powered world, sometimes, simply being able to care about a piece of hardware, and not losing a password or having your cloud account hacked, still pulls its weight in some users' considerations. Sharkoon is looking to address those users' needs with the release of the Rapid-Case 2.5" USB 3.1 Type-C, a DIY enclosure which is sure to give your old HDDs (or even SSDs) a new lease of life.

ZOTAC International, a global manufacturer of innovation, is pleased to bring 10 years of design excellence to CES 2017 and showcase innovative VR and
commercial solutions. A strong lineup including ZOTAC's first Thunderbolt 3 Mini PC, External VGA box, and what's being touted as "the world's smallest GeForce GTX 1080" will be on show at One-Story Sky Villa, Palms Casino Resort.

"We believe the future of computing should be flexible," says Tony Wong, CEO, ZOTAC International. "Our next generation of computing products enables users to get the best of mobile and stationary experience."

German PC enthusiast "Crashtest" clinched a sweet combo of an AMD A12-9800 "Bristol Ridge" socket AM4 APU with an ASUS A320M-C entry-level micro-ATX motherboard, for 200€. Pairing it with 8 GB of dual-channel DDR4-2133 memory, the platform was put through the AIDA64 test-suite. In the memory front, the platform performs on-par with older platforms at comparable DDR3 bandwidth. The K15.6 integrated memory controller isn't producing the kind of memory bandwidth as the Core i7-6700K with dual-channel DDR4-2133 memory from AIDA64's internal reference bench table.

In the CPU-related tests, the APU has about the same performance as its predecessors, such as the A10-7850K. The chip features two "Excavator" x86-64 CPU modules, making up four cores, and is clocked at 4.20 GHz. There are performance upticks seen in tests such as Hash and VP8, where the chip likely benefits from new instruction sets.More results follow.

Regret not taking advantage of the free upgrade offer to Windows 10? A loophole in the Windows 10 Free Upgrade offer lets you freely upgrade your Windows 8.1 and Windows 7 installations to the latest Windows 10, five months after the free upgrade offer expired. Apparently, Microsoft is keeping the free upgrade offer open to people who use assistive technologies. These could include people who use screen narrators or magnifiers. You can now simply head over to Microsoft Accessibility website, and on checking an undertaking that you do use assistive technologies, avail the free Windows 10 upgrade. Microsoft reportedly isn't checking if you actually use these features.

Cherry GmbH, the German-American computer peripheral-device maker best known for its mechanical keyboard switches, has announced a new addition to their Silent line of switches. The new Silent Black switches join the company's Silent line-up of Silent Red, Silent RGB Red, and Silent RGB Black. Cherry MX Silent switches are not particularly new, but until now, they were limited to linear Red switches, and were used exclusively on Corsair products (such as the STRAFE RGB Keyboard). Now, though, Corsair's exclusivity has come to an end, leaving other companies free to implement the Silent switches onto their own keyboards.

The "silent" operation is achieved via a rubber pad which dampens the sound of both the switch bottoming out and the rebound noise. Otherwise, the switches' specifications are identical to those of their non-silent counterparts. It's also worth noting that both Red and Black switches are linear, meaning there's no extra click within the key travel. The Silent Black switches are specified for 60 cN +/- 20 cN actuation force (against the 40 cN of their Silent Red counterparts), 2mm +/-0.6 pretravel, 4mm /-0.4 actuator travel, <5 ms bounce time, and are rated at 50 million key presses.

French hardware magazine "CANARD PC HARDWARE" has apparently confirmed that AMD's upcoming Ryzen chips will be able to achieve overclocks of at least 5 GHz on air, if an easter egg hidden on the magazine's Ryzen feature. On page 10 of the digital magazine (which you can look at on the provided link) as well as the physical version, a cryptic string of binary code can be found on top of the page (for reference, the string is as follows: 010110100110010101101110010011110100001101000000010000010110100101110010001111010011010101000111). When you paste this string of binary code on any online binary to plain text converter, you get a revelation that's sure to put a little more coal on the hype train's furnace: ZenOC@Air=5G.

An upcoming build of Windows 10 operating system, build 14997, reportedly features a component ominously named "gamemode.dll." This sparked off speculation of the operating system featuring a special runlevel that's optimized for PC gaming. It's likely that in game mode, the operating system prioritizes CPU, memory, and GPU allocation to games being run, and sheds unwanted processes to free up memory.

Sources tell "Windows Central" that the game mode could allocate hardware resources to a game with the efficiency of an Xbox One console, which means only the bare minimum services needed to correctly play the game will be enabled. At this point it's unclear if the Game Mode will benefit only games built on the UWP, or even the vast Win32 ecosystem of games distributed by Steam, Origin, and UPlay.

The picture of a bare PCB of an upcoming GIGABYTE AX370-Gaming series socket AM4 motherboard is doing rounds on the web. The picture reveals the bare PCB of the motherboard with all its traces and printed markings, but at a stage before surface-mount components can be soldered onto it. One can still make out quite a bit about the board. AMD X370 is the company's upcoming high-end desktop chipset, which will be launched alongside the company's Ryzen 8-core processor, some time in February, 2017.

To begin with, the AX370-Gaming K3 is built in the ATX form-factor. Its AM4 socket supports both Ryzen "Summit Ridge" CPUs and 7th generation A-series "Bristol Ridge" APUs. The board draws power from 24-pin ATX and 8-pin EPS power connectors, and conditions it for the CPU with a 7-phase VRM. The AM4 socket is wired to four DDR4 DIMM slots. Expansion slots include one PCI-Express 3.0 x16, a second gen 3.0 x16 slot that's electrical x4, and three other gen 3.0 x1 slots. Storage connectivity appears to include at least eight SATA 6 Gb/s ports, and one 32 Gb/s M.2 slot. 8-channel HD audio, gigabit Ethernet, USB 3.1 (including type-C) ports, appear to make for the rest of the connectivity. GIGABYTE's signature Dual-UEFI is featured.Many Thanks to TheLostSwede and Tomas H. for the tips!

Das Keyboard, maker of award-winning mechanical keyboards, today announced it will demo the 5Q at CES 2017. The 5Q is the world's first cloud-connected keyboard and the only keyboard of its kind that increases productivity by streaming information from the Internet directly to the keyboard. After a successful Kickstarter campaign that exceeded the company's fundraising goal by over 580%, Das Keyboard is now ready to demo the 5Q with its connected software suite called Q, allowing information like email activity, project status, stock quotes, and sports updates to be color-coded and displayed on the keyboard keys.

At CES 2017, Samsung Electronics plans to demonstrate how it has stepped up its game in the entertainment monitor space with the unveiling of its new CH711 Quantum Dot Curved monitor. Additionally, Samsung will also showcase its recently launched CFG70 and CF791 Quantum Dot displays at the Las Vegas Convention Center, Booth #15006, Central Hall.

"Today's multimedia consumers have heightened expectations; they demand an immersive experience that makes them feel like they're part of the games they play and the content they view," said Andrew Sivori, Vice President, CE-IT Product Marketing at Samsung Electronics America. "Our new Quantum Dot Curved monitors offer brilliant design, richer color, and even deeper contrast than ever before."

Lenovo has recently released the specifications for their 2017 Thinkpad series line-up, with several models (T470p, L470, L570, T470, T570, X270 and Yoga 370) featuring the usual, evolutionary hardware improvements, such as being equipped with Intel's latest generation Kaby Lake processors and increased screen resolutions. However, one of the hardware announcements for the new Thinkpad series goes a little further than your usual, run-of-the-mill updates: these solutions will feature what is expected to be the first consumer-level adaptations of Intel's Optane technology.

PNY announced the CS2030 line of high-performance SSDs in the M.2-2280 form-factor. The drives take advantage of PCI-Express 3.0 x4 (32 Gb/s M.2 slots), and the NVMe protocol, and are available in two capacities - 240 GB and 480 GB. Combining a Phison PS5007 controller with MLC NAND flash memory, the drives offer sequential transfer-rates of up to 2,750 MB/s reads, with up to 1,500 MB/s sequential writes. 4K random access performance is rated by the manufacturer at up to 210,000 IOPS reads, and up to 215,000 IOPS writes. Backed by 3-year warranties, the 240 GB variant is priced at US $179.99, and the 480 GB variant at $329.99.

AMD Ryzen, the high performance processor based on the company's "Zen" micro-architecture, will increase the company's market-share of the desktop CPU market in Q2-2017, according to sources from motherboard manufacturers, in a report by Taiwan-based industry observer DigiTimes. The report states that motherboard manufacturers are "optimistic about [Ryzen's] high price/performance ratio," prompting them to ramp up orders of motherboards for the new platform, from their suppliers.

According to the report, the new platform built around the AMD Ryzen processor will be officially released by the end of February 2017, and will enter global mass-shipments in March. It will help increase AMD's desktop processor market share in the following quarter. The sources point out that motherboard vendors are sourcing high-end X370, mid-range B350, and entry-level A320 chipsets from AMD, and their new product designs are now in the final stage of related testing. The B350 and A320 chipsets are already launched, to support the 7th generation A-Series "Bristol Ridge" APUs.

ViewSonic Corp., a leading global provider of visual solution products, launches the VP2771, a 27-inch WQHD monitor that offers superior color accuracy and uniformity for color-critical applications. The VP2771 is built with an edge-to-edge SuperClear IPS panel, and features professional-level color precision. With one of the world's thinnest bezels for a frameless viewing experience, the VP2771 monitor is ideal for multi-monitor configurations for graphic designers, video editors and other professional content creators.

For consistent color, each VP2771 monitor is factory calibrated to deliver a precise Delta E≤2 value for outstanding color precision of all the included color spaces, including sRGB, EBU, SMPTE-C, REC709 and DICOM-SIM. Uniformity of color across the screen is a critical feature in achieving the most accurate viewing experience in color-critical applications. The integrated color uniformity function ensures consistent chromaticity across the screen, while a 14-bit 3D look-up table generates a palette of 4.39 trillion colors. With a 6-axis color adjustment feature, users can individually adjust six primary colors: red, green, blue, cyan, magenta and yellow, providing the ultimate in color processing.

GIGABYTE introduced a new line of compact desktops designed for serious gaming, the BRIX Gaming GT series. Measuring 276 mm x 384 mm x 128 mm (DxHxW), this desktop has the chops for gaming at 1440p or even 4K Ultra HD, although GIGABYTE is marketing this as the ideal desktop for VR gaming in the living room. Its case features a chimney-type common air channel that pushes hot air from top-vents. A 400W custom-design PSU powers the machine.

Under the hood is an Intel Core i7-6700K quad-core processor, NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080 graphics, 32 GB of dual-channel DDR4-2133 SO-DIMM memory, a 240 GB M.2 SSD, an additional 1 TB 2.5-inch HDD, and a vacant 2.5-inch drive bay. Audio is care of a Realtek ALC1150 HDA codec, backed by TI Burr Brown OPA2134 AMP circuit over the headphones jack. Networking includes an Intel 3165NGW dual-band 802.11ac WLAN with dual Bluetooth 4.0 interfaces, and Killer E2400 gigabit Ethernet. Other connectivity includes two USB 3.1 ports (of which one is type-C), four USB 3.0 ports (of which one is type-C, total two type-C ports), and 6-channel audio. Windows 10 comes pre-installed. GIGABYTE didn't reveal pricing.

Raijintek introduced the Metis Plus cube-type mini-ITX aluminium chassis. A successor to the original Metis launched in 2014, the Metis Plus comes with an updated brushed aluminium finish with diamond-cut edges, a 120 mm top fan mount, an extra 2.5-inch drive mount along the base, and an updated 3.5-inch/2.5-inch (1x 3.5-inch convertible to 2x 7 mm-thick 2.5-inch) drive tray design. The rest of its specifications are unchanged from the original Metis.

Measuring 190 mm x 277 mm x 254 mm (WxDxH), and weighing in at 2.12 kg, the Metis Plus features an "upside-down" (left-side) oriented mini-ITX motherboard tray, with clearance for graphics cards as long as 17 cm, and CPU coolers as tall as 16 cm. It features a concealed standard ATX PSU bay, with an AC receptacle and internal cord conveying power to the PSU. The case can either hold four 2.5-inch + one 3.5-inch drives at a time, or two each of 2.5-inch and 3.5-inch drives. The case comes with a pre-installed front 120 mm intake fan with LED lighting to match the case color. The case comes in 7 color options. The company didn't reveal pricing.

It may have practically no IPC gains over its predecessor, but Intel's 7th generation Core "Kaby Lake" unlocked processors are shaping up to be an overclocker's delight. A Core i7-7700K sample tested by professional overclocker Allen "Splave" Golibersuch was able to breach the 7 GHz barrier. To achieve this feat however, HyperThreading was disabled, and two of the four CPU cores were also disabled.

Paired with an ASRock Z170 OC Formula motherboard, the i7-7700K was bench-stable at 7022.96 MHz, at the chip's maximum base clock multiplier of 69x, and a base-clock of 101.78 MHz. The Vcore voltage was set at a scorching 2.00V. The chip crunched PiFast in 9.02 seconds, SuperPi 32M in 4 minutes 20.25 seconds, wPrime 32M in 2.953 seconds, and wPrime 1024M in 1 minute 33.171 seconds. Paired with an ASUS GeForce GTX 1080 STRIX OC graphics card, it scored 643,316 points in Aquamark, and 86,798 points in 3DMark 05.

SK Hynix Inc. announced it will construct a new memory semiconductor FAB in Cheongju, Chungcheongbuk-do to meet increasing NAND Flash demand. This is a part of a mid/long-term investment plan that SK Hynix declared at M14 completion ceremony in August 2015. At that time, the Company said it could spend 46 trillion won to set up 3 new FABs in Icheon and Cheongju including the M14.

The new FAB will be located in a Cheongju Technopolis site. SK Hynix starts a design within next month then begins construction of the shell and the cleanroom in August 2017 to be completed in June 2019 with total investment of 2.2 trillion won. Equipment installation into the FAB shall be decided considering market conditions as well as the Company's migration plans.

Bykski introduced its FOUR series CPU water blocks named FR-CU-RA, the FOUR series products were positioning at higher level in BYKSKI's product lines, and usually designed for the high end products. FR-CU-RA was supported for modern Intel CPUs, such as LGA2011 , LGA115x, but unfortunately it was not supported for AMD series CPUs.

The FR-CU-RA is available in three color options based on the appearance of the metal which is set on the acrylic - silver, blue and red; it provides different choices for user to make different appearances of the water cooling PC. The base of the water block is made of red copper, but you could not see the original color because of the anti-oxidation treatment.

French tech print magazine "Canard PC" is ready with early benchmarks of an AMD Ryzen 8-core processor. The scan of a page from its Ryzen performance review article got leaked to the web, revealing three key performance takeaways. In the first selection of tests, Canard PC put Ryzen through synthetic CPU-intensive tests that take advantage of as many CPU cores/threads as you can throw at them. These include the likes of H.264 and H.265 video encoding, WPrime, Blender, 3DSMax 2015, and Corona. Ryzen was found to be faster than the quad-core Core i7-6700K, and the six-core i7-6800K, but somewhere between the i7-6800K and the eight-core i7-6900K.

The next selection of tests focused on PC gaming, with a list of contemporary AAA titles, including "Far Cry 4," "Battlefield 4," "The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt," "Anno 2070," "GRID: Autosport," and "ARMA III." Here, the Ryzen sample was found to be underwhelming - it was slower than the Core i5-6600 quad-core chip clocked at 3.30-3.90 GHz; but faster than the i5-6500, clocked at 3.20-3.60 GHz. The fastest chip in the table is the i7-6700K (4.00-4.20 GHz). The reviewer still notes that Ryzen has a decent IPC gain unseen from the AMD stable in a while.

X2 today announced the Harada gaming mouse. This right-oriented mouse is suitable for both claw- and palm-grips, and combines a rubberized plastic body, with a stainless steel base and polymer glide feet. The mouse features 7 programmable buttons with Omron switches for the main two buttons. The top surface features RGB multi-color LED lighting through lighting accents under the buttons, and the X2 logo.

Under the hood, the X2 Harada features an Avago 9800 optical sensor, with a resolution of up to 8,200 dpi, with steps of 7,400 dpi, 6,200 dpi, 4,800 dpi, 2,400 dpi, and 1,200 dpi. The sensor has a refresh-rate of 380 cm/s, 1 ms response time, and 30G acceleration. You can set the resolution and polling rate on-the-fly. The controller polls the USB interface at 1,000 Hz. An in-built 64 KB memory stores macros and lighting settings. The mouse is backed by a 2-year warranty, the company didn't reveal pricing.

MSI in cooperation with PHANTEKS, a global leader in computer chassis, introduce new products featuring new industry standard front panel USB 3.1 Gen2 Type-C connectivity. Introducing a new ultimate high tower chassis soon, the PHANTEKS Enthoo Elite, USB connectivity has never been faster and more convenient. Featuring the latest USB 3.1 Gen2 technology with Type-C connector on its front panel, it is sure to satisfy any pc enthusiast.

"Matching perfectly with our new high-end chassis products is MSI's new GAMING M7 motherboard, which fully supports our new Front Type-C solution by including a USB 3.1 Gen2 Front Panel Header for Type-C. Powered by MSI's Lightning USB, this allows you to reach speeds up to 10 Gb/s and fast charging for devices from the front Type-C connector," said Boon Tuoh Khor, PHANTEKS Lead Product Designer.

TechPowerUp wishes you and your loved ones a Merry Christmas, and a prosperous 2017! Another year draws to a close in the tech world, and 2017 promises to be an even bigger year, right from the get go, with the 2017 International CES in early January, and a slew of major tech launches throughout the year. We'd like to thank all our readers and users of our software for all the love and support. Don't forget to tell us what you got under your tree!

Colorful Technology Company Limited, professional manufacturer of graphics cards and motherboards, is thrilled to reveal its preview of features for its upcoming iGame200 motherboard product line. The new motherboards from Colorful will support both existing and upcoming processors for the LGA1151 socket including the 7th-gen Core series processors from Intel. The new processors will bring several improvements over its predecessor including performance and efficiency enhancements and Colorful is ready to bring the best that these CPUs can offer and deliver the needs of gamers with outstanding features.

In Win today introduced the second generation X-Frame open-air chassis. The X-Frame 2.0 was first unveiled at the 2016 Computex expo. It features a tray-type main platform, attached to a swivel base with three feet, and a pivot, along which you can rotate the main platform along two axes, orienting it tall as a tower, or flat, giving you easy access to your hardware. A 1065W In Win SI-1065 PSU comes included. This full-modular PSU has cables for a rig with up to three high-end graphics cards, a triple +12V rail design (75A + 25A + 25A), 92% claimed efficiency, lighting, and a USB power port.

The motherboard tray has room for a standard ATX motherboard, with room for graphics cards and CPU coolers of practically limitless lengths and heights. The tray has two 2.5-inch drive mounts. The compartment below the motherboard tray has additional storage areas, with four 3.5-inch drive bays, and a 5.25-inch bay. The top compartment has a 3x 120 mm radiator mount. Front panel connectivity includes four USB 3.1 ports, of which one is type-C, and HDA audio jacks. The In Win X-Frame 2.0, with the included SI-1065 PSU, is priced at 1,499€ (incl. taxes).

Sharkoon expands their popular Rapid-Case series with their fastest one yet, which thanks to its USB 3.1 interface offers a data transfer rate of up to 10 gigabits per second. The Sharkoon Rapid-Case 2.5" USB 3.1 Type C is an external housing which can accommodate 2.5" SATA hard drives or 2.5" SSDs with a maximum height of 9.5 mm.

Thanks to its USB 3.1 interface, the Rapid-Case offers a data transfer rate of up to 10 gigabits per second as well as up to 70% increase read and 40% increase write speeds on UASP capable host controllers. The internal SATA interface of the Rapid-Case supports SATA Revision 3.0 and is also backwards compatible to previous Revisions. The Rapid-Case connects via its included cable with future-proof, two-way Type C plug to every PC, laptop and MacBook with corresponding Type C port. A discreet status LED next to the USB 3.1 interface indicates operation and data transfer.

A massive leak of marketing material gives us a peak into MSI's upcoming socket LGA1151 motherboard lineup based on Intel Z270 Express chipset, which will be launched alongside the 7th generation Core "Kaby Lake" processor family. The lineup begins with the Z270 PC Mate. This is likely the cheapest motherboard in the lineup, and gets you started on a cost-effective build. The board covers all the essentials, even if it's not designed for multi-GPU builds. Notice the 2x DVI connectors. This board could be priced closest to the $100 mark.

Next up, is the Z270 SLI Plus. This board could likely be priced in the neighborhood of $120-150, and is the cheapest board from the lineup that has NVIDIA SLI support. You get most of the features of the Z270 PC Mate, plus a stronger CPU VRM reinforced slots, a rear I/O shroud, 8-channel audio, and additional USB 3.1 ports. The Z270 Krait Gaming is a variant of this exact board, with a white+black color scheme, which could be sold at a $10-15 premium over the Z270 SLI Plus.

ZADAK Lab is thrilled to achieve the honor of being the only brand with the distinction of having overcame the challenges of developing RGB LED illuminated SSDs and memory modules. LED lighting memory module with single color? An external LED SSD with low capacity? It was really different before the ZADAK511 SHILED RGB Series. The ZADAK team is comfortably over those limits. SHIELD RGB DDR4 and SHILED RGB Dual Interface SSD are pretty groundbreaking products. They really set the standard for the design and functionality of memory modules and SSD for next one to two years. It is a revolution.

The patented SHIELD RGB Dual Interface SSD is one of the most beautiful designs you have ever seen. Distinguished from other SSD, ZADAK team employs various metal materials and exquisite workmanship to create multi-level design on the upper cover, making the look of SHIELD SSD from 2D to 3D. Not merely the sense of vision but the tactile amazes those PC enthusiasts which makes this SSD a legend. Besides the high speed SATAIII and USB3.1 TYPE-C Gen2, the high performance SHIELD SSD adopts MLC NAND Flash with a rigorous testing process so that the important documents can be stored safely. The sequential read and write speed on both connectors are 550MB/s and 480MB/s.

BIOSTAR is proud to announce its latest addition to its line of gaming products with its new VGA for gamers looking for the perfect balance of price and performance with the new BIOSTAR GeForce GTX 1050 Ti. With an MSRP of $159, this card will be the perfect upgrade gift for yourself or a gamer friend. Enjoy gaming to the next level with its new dual-fan cooling for the best performance the GTX 1050 Ti can bring.

Thermaltake, as the pioneer incorporating RGB lights into PSU, releases the New Toughpower Grand RGB Gold Series (650W/750W/850W) Fully Modular with 80 PLUS Gold Certified Power Supply Unit. Integrated with various high-quality components, Toughpower Grand RGB Gold Series is equipped with the patented 256 colors Riing 14 RGB fan, featuring five lighting modes (256 Color RGB Cycle, Solid Red, Green, Blue, White, and a LED Off mode) by pressing the RGB Lighting button and built-in memory function, covering all market segments with a wattage range from 650W to 850W for 10 years warranty. The New Toughpower Grand RGB Gold Series is now available for online ordering at Amazon USA, Newegg, Amazon Euro, Scan UK and Alternate in Germany.

The Toughpower Grand RGB Gold Series delivers excellent cooling performance thanks to the concentrated compression fan blade design of Riing 14 RGB fan; with the hydraulic bearing, silent and stable operation is provided. This fully modular line-up also adopts Smart Zero Fan to minimize undesired noise, <30mV low ripple noise design and 100% Japanese made capacitors to ensure reliability. The voltage regulation of the PSU is set to no more than ±2% for major rails to demonstrate the best performance. When it comes to the cable, its low-profile flat cable provides easier cable management to reduce clutter and increase airflow inside the chassis. All in all, the Toughpower Grand RGB Gold Series guarantees aesthetic appeal and unbeatable yet mute operation for all kinds of cases.

Futuremark is working on new game-tests for its 3DMark benchmark suite. One of these is a game test that takes advantage of DirectX 12, but isn't as taxing on the hardware as "Time Spy." Its target hardware is notebook graphics and entry-mainstream graphics cards. It will be to "Time Spy" what "Sky Diver" is to "Fire Strike."

The next, more interesting move by Futuremark is a benchmark that takes advantage of the Vulkan 3D graphics API. The company will release this Vulkan-based benchmark for both Windows and Android platforms. Lastly we've learned that development of the company's VR benchmarks are coming along nicely, and the company hopes to release new VR benchmarks for PC and mobile platforms soon. Futuremark is expected to reveal these new game-tests and benchmarks at its 2017 International CES booth, early January.

Thermaltake's drive to make variants of its cases with tempered glass side panels reached the Suppressor F31, the noise-suppressing full-tower chassis. The Suppressor F31 Tempered Glass Edition features a large, clear, 4 mm-thick tempered glass window on its left side panel letting you revel on your creation.

Measuring 497 x 250 x 515 mm (HxWxD), the case serves up room for graphics cards as long as 42 cm (27.8 cm with a detachable drive-cage in place); and CPU coolers as tall as 18 cm. Storage areas include a 3x 3.5-inch/2.5-inch drive cage that's detachable, and two 2.5-inch internal drive bays. Cooling features include two 140 mm (convertible to 1x 200 mm or 3x 120 mm) front intakes, three 120 mm (convertible to 2x 140 mm) top exhausts, a 140 mm rear exhaust, and a 140 mm bottom intake. The company didn't reveal pricing, but looking at the prices of currently released Tempered Glass Edition cases by Thermaltake, this case could ship at a 10% premium.

Genius, a leading global brand in personal peripheral devices for the digital world, is proud to announce its ultimate gaming peripheral offer combining its most-dependable gaming mouse, keyboard and headset into one package. Quickly get into battle without compromise with the Genius KMH-200 gaming combo: everything you need to dominate the battlefield.

The Genius KMH-200 will have an MSRP of $27.90. This is by far the most comprehensive package any gamer can have at such a low with all other combos out right now only including both keyboard and mouse, Genius rounds out the entire gaming experience and brings you both keyboard and mouse as well as a gaming headset all in one bundle.

Intel's 7th generation Core "Kaby Lake" processors are slated for a January 2017 launch, beginning with the flagship Core i7-7700K processor. Ahead of their launch, here are pictures of the retail boxes of Core i7, Core i5, and Core i3 "Kaby Lake" processors. As you can see, they're nearly identical to those of the 6th generation Core "Skylake" boxes, except for the "7th Generation" marking on the box, Intel HD Graphics 630 markings, and an interesting-looking "For a Great VR Experience" marking on the box. The processor model number sticker will be pasted right where you'd expect it. Intel Core "Kaby Lake" processors will run on motherboards with Intel 200-series chipset out of the box, and on 100-series chipset motherboards with BIOS updates.

Here are some of the first pictures of ASRock Z270 Extreme4, the company's mid-range socket LGA1151 motherboard based on Intel's upcoming Z270 Express chipset, with out of the box support for 7th generation Core "Kaby Lake" processors, and support for Intel Optane 3D X-point solid-state storage. Built in the ATX form-factor, the Z270 Extreme4 draws power from a combination of 24-pin ATX and 8-pin EPS connectors, and conditions it for the CPU with a 12-phase VRM.

The CPU socket is wired to four DDR4 DIMM slots, supporting up to 64 GB of dual-channel DDR4 memory; and two PCI-Express 3.0 x16 slots (electrical x8/x8 when both are populated). The third PCIe 3.0 x16 slot is electrical x4 and wired to the PCH. Three open-ended PCIe 3.0 x1 slots make for the rest of the expansion area. Storage connectivity includes eight SATA 6 Gb/s ports, and two 32 Gb/s M.2 slots. Display connectivity includes one each of D-Sub, DVI, and HDMI. You get a total of eight USB 3.0 ports (four on the rear panel four by headers), and two USB 3.1 ports (one each of type-A and type-C, both on the rear panel). Eight channel HD audio and gigabit Ethernet make for the rest of the connectivity.

AMD today released the very first driver update after their milestone "Crimson ReLive" driver release. Version 16.2.2 of AMD's drivers are basically focused on bug fixing and end-user updates, as you can see from the fixed issues, and known, still prevalent issues, right after the break. Also interesting is the addition of a whole new category of "Known Issues", specifically focused on issues around the Crimson ReLive application.

As always, you can grab the drivers right here on TechPowerUp. Just follow the links below.Download: AMD Radeon Software Crimson ReLive Edition 16.12.2 for Windows 10 64-bit | Windows 10 32-bit | Windows 8.1 64-bit | Windows 8.1 32-bit | Windows 7 64-bit | Windows 7 32-bit

Apparently AMD is working on a third GPU based on its "Polaris" (4th generation Graphics CoreNext) architecture, dubbed "Polaris 12." Snooping into the code of AMDGPU DRM kernel driver, PCI-IDs 0x6980, 0x6981, 0x6985, 0x6986, 0x6987, and 0x699F, were pointing to a descriptor "Polaris 12." There are no other known specifications of this chip.

Going by convention of Polaris 11 (Radeon RX 460) being a smaller chip than Polaris 10 (RX 470, RX 480), it's likely that Polaris 12 could be an even smaller chip. On the other hand, a chip slower than Polaris 10 makes very little sense, because it would compete with "free" integrated graphics. Another possibility is that Polaris 12 is a Polaris 10 refresh on an improved process, or even made at TSMC, in which case the higher number would mean that it's a newer chip.

GIGABYTE today introduced the GeForce GTX 1080 Rock Edition G1.Gaming graphics card (model: GV-N1080G1 ROCK-8GD). Put simply, this is a GTX 1080 WindForce OC (GV-N1080WF3OC-8GD) graphics card with an older generation WindForce 3X cooling solution, which the company deployed on some of its GeForce GTX 900 series products, such as the GTX 980 Ti G1.Gaming.

The underlying PCB is identical to that of the WindForce OC, and it also features an identical factory OC of 1632 MHz core, 1771 MHz GPU Boost, and 10 GHz (GDDR5X-effective) memory, out of the box. The card draws power from a single 8-pin PCIe power connector. Display outputs include three DisplayPort 1.4, and one each of HDMI 2.0b and dual-link DVI. The company didn't reveal pricing.

G.SKILL International Enterprise Co., Ltd., the world's leading manufacturer of extreme performance memory and gaming peripherals, is thrilled to announce the Trident Z RGB Series - the world's most revolutionary RGB lighting DDR4 memory kit. Requiring no additional power connections, this incredible feat of engineering bares pure RGB lighting across an uncovered full-length light bar on the award-winning Trident Z series heatspreader design.

By default, the Trident Z RGB will display a rainbow of colors in a wave-style lighting effect, illuminating any system with a myriad of hues. Further lighting effects and color customizations can be controlled and chosen through software, scheduled for a February 2017 release.

ID-Cooling introduced the SE-214C line of tower-type CPU coolers. Available in three color options based on the fan lighting - blue (SE-214C-B), red (SE-214C-R), and white (SE-214C-W), the coolers consist of an aluminium fin-stack with an offset that creates clearance near the motherboard's memory area, by reducing the fan's intrusion. It also features narrower fins at the base, for clearance around the CPU socket (helps with elaborate VRM heatsinks).

The aluminium fin-stack heatsink of the SE-214C uses four 6 mm-thick copper heat pipes, which make direct contact with the CPU at the base, and which convey heat to the fin-stack. The fin-stack is capped off with a matte-black ABS plate. The included 120 mm fans take 4-pin PWM input, spin between 600-1,600 RPM, pushing up to 50 CFM of air, with noise output ranging between 16.2-30.5 dBA. All modern CPU sockets are supported, including LGA2011 (TDP up to 130W), LGA115x, AM3(+), and FM2(+). The company didn't reveal pricing.

Zotac today unveiled its shorter-length GeForce GTX 1070 Mini graphics card (model: ZT-P10700G-10M). While this may not be the SFF-friendly 15 cm-ish card such as this one, it features a more compact PCB, and its overall length is 21 cm, down from the 30 cm of the dual-fan AMP! GTX 1070 card from the company. The card uses a new custom-design PCB that's about 17 cm in length, strapped onto a cooling solution longer than itself. This dual fan cooler is the same one featured on the company's GTX 1060 AMP! graphics card.

The cooling solution features a dense aluminium fin stack, to which heat drawn from the GPU is fed by a pair of 8 mm-thick copper heat pipes, which make direct contact with it; and which is ventilated by a pair of 80 mm fans. Unlike the other GTX 1070 cards from Zotac's lineup, this one draws power from a single 8-pin PCIe power connector. It sticks to NVIDIA-reference clock speeds of 1518 MHz core, 1708 MHz GPU Boost, and 8.00 GHz (GDDR5-effective) memory. Display outputs include three DisplayPort 1.4, and one each of HDMI 2.0b and dual-link DVI. This card is expected to be priced at $389.

GALAX, at its GEC 2016 special event, unveiled a host of new graphics cards. While it's likely that all of these are designed for the Chinese market, one of the cards piqued our interest - the world's first single-slot GeForce GTX 1070 graphics card (as captioned by Chinese tech publication XFastest). This could even be a GTX 1060, looking at the visual similarities the PCB of the card shares with GTX 1060 Founders Edition. Given the 150W TDP of the GTX 1070, a single-slot card can certainly not be ruled out. The card appears to feature a dense copper fin-channel heatsink through which air is guided by a lateral-flow fan, covered by a metal cooler shroud with an industrial design. GALAX could launch this card some time in 2017.

QNAP Systems, Inc. today announced the TS-831X - a new cost-effective 8-bay business NAS with a quad-core 1.70 GHz CPU to provide users with enhanced system performance for daily business operations. Alongside the standard models with 8 GB or 16 GB RAM, there is also a model with 4 GB RAM (TS-831X-4G) to provide an affordable option for budget-conscious users.

"The TS-831X features a highly-competitive specification, including built-in 10GbE ports, containerized apps, and SSD caching, making it a favorable choice for small and medium-sized organizations," said Jason Hsu, Product Manager of QNAP, adding "The TS-831X-4G option provides an accessible choice for budget-constrained organizations to benefit from the TS-831X's amazing functionalities without breaking the bank."

Over the weekend, gamers began testing the new DirectX 12 renderer of Tom Clancy's "The Division," released through a game patch. Testing by GameGPU (Russian media site) shows that AMD Radeon RX 480 is about 16 percent faster than NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 6GB, with the game running in the new DirectX 12 mode. "The Division" was tested with its new DirectX 12 renderer, on an ASUS Radeon RX 480 STRIX graphics card driven by Crimson ReLive 16.12.1 drivers, and compared with an ASUS GeForce GTX 1060 6GB STRIX, driven by GeForce 376.19 drivers. Independent testing by German tech-site ComputerBase.de supports these findings.

Dobot M1 is a crowd-funded robotic 3D printing arm project that aims to make a cost-effective consumer 3D printer, which does not just 3D printing, but also laser-engraving, PCB soldering (!), drawing (with ink, on paper/canvas), and packaging of delicate objects. The developers have two working prototypes, which meet all the functions its designers set out to give it. As an appreciation of the USD $285,000 fundraising for the project, its makers have announced a giveaway.

Up for grabs is a Dobot M1 multi-function robotic arm with 5 interchangeable heads: 3d print, laser engrave, 4th axis, suction cup, gripper. To participate, click on the giveaway link below, fill up the giveaway form on the company's Facebook page, and share the giveaway page with the hashtag #dobotm1 . A winner will be picked randomly. The company plans to sell the Dobot M1 at a launch price of $3,099, and will be available to Kickstarter donors for $1,799.Dobot M1 Robotic Arm Fundraising Appreciation Giveaway

Today, video game is the first cultural industry in the world, with 2 billion of gamers. 34% are playing on a gaming console, 33% on a computer, and the number of mobile gamers is increasing quickly. In 2016, the video game worldwide market weights 100 billion dollars, increasing of 8% in the last year. But, till ANKORRO, there was no video game device able to integrate the emotional factor. Emotion stays at the door of the game, and can't enter in.

ANKKORO, the gamotion manager » is a brand new technology created by Ironova. It can catch the gamer's emotions, analyse them and influence them. This way, the gamer may make his character's profile more realistic, more human, and also work on his own reactions and emotions, facing stress or fear. With ANKKORO, heroes are no more virtual, the gamer and his emotions are integrated in the core of the game.

Used to game in the 2000s, through your college, and then "life happened"? Want to turn your 4-year old Dell into a gaming PC, but its 350W generic OEM power supply is holding you back? For these things and other, NVIDIA is selling a "PC Gaming Revival Kit," a package consisting of a graphics card, an SSD, a PSU, and a game, to help you bring PC gaming back into your lives. The kit includes hardware to turn just about any desktop with a SATA port and PCI-Express slot, into a 1080p gaming machine (provided it meets some basic requirements of the graphics card).

Available in the EU, priced at 399€, the kit includes an MSI GeForce GTX 1060 3GT OC graphics card, a factory-overclocked GTX 1060 3GB card with a dual-fan cooling solution; a Corsair Force LE 240GB solid-state drive, a Corsair CX450M partially modular 450W power supply, an NVIDIA GeForce t-shirt, and a copy of "Gears of War 4." Bought separately, the graphics card goes for 229€, and PSU for 51€, the SSD for 77€, and the game for 45€, total: 402€, so it's not that big a value, but could point a lot of people in the right direction. It could also make for a decent X'mas gift.

AMD has definitely been on the upswing in recent times, with CEO Lisa Su having seemingly conducted a frail, collapsing company through the muddiest waters in its history. The general sentiment towards the company seems to now be leaning towards the "bullish" side of the equation, which translated into a cool $10.66 per stock at Friday's closing time (having increased, after hours, towards the $10.80 mark. This is great news for a company which has essentially increased their stock value by a factor of four in the last year alone.

Shares of AMD's rival Nvidia, however, have risen 60% in the past three months and nearly 200% in the past year. NVIDIA's share value closed last Friday at a historic $100.41 (having since declined towards $99.55), over a strong bullish sentiment towards the company, which has recently signed a Warrant Termination Agreement with Goldman Sachs for a $63 million value. This basically shows investors that the company has sufficient cash so as not to allow them to see their share value diluted by the sudden entry in circulation of $63 million of shares, should Goldman Sachs exercise their (now terminated) warrant.

The same job post that brought us confirmation about an eventual GeForce GTX 1080 Ti release, as well as the likely introduction of a step-up program for GTX 980 Ti owners, also brought to light the most recent monetization effort from the green company: a subscription-based service for their elite supporters. This subscription service will, for a mere $10 monthly deduction on their bank account, grant subscriptors an "Elite" status amongst their NVIDIA peers, as well as access to a "rotating bundle of free games from our GFE app store (4x games per quarter)", a "Free GeForce PC in the cloud subscription", as well as "exclusive skins, in-game items, and GeForce Gear".

In a lInkedIn job post for Senior Marketing Manager, NVIDIA has seemingly confirmed the launch of a Ti version of their GTX 1080 graphics card. The relevant line is a simple one: "980 Ti users get first spot in line for 1080 Ti pre-orders, or Step Up offer".

If true, this is an interesting way for NVIDIA to go on about with their newest generation graphics card releases, and would be a good way to essentially "corner" their current user base into future hardware upgrade paths by increasing the value of staying within the GeForce family. Considering NVIDIA's current product stack, we wouldn't be surprised to see GTX 1080 Ti retail at about $999, so a value of $200 for your used 980 Ti seems reasonable in such a trade-in program (from a purely corporate perspective, naturally).

The MMX 300 premium headset has enjoyed an excellent reputation among gamers and reviewers for years. Whether listening or speaking, the headset is seen as a reference when it comes to crystal¬clear sound and maximum speech intelligibility. Could there be anything left to improve on with this successful model? Well actually yes or so the beyerdynamic engineers decided as they launched into the details with their customary diligence. The result: a 2nd generation MMX 300 that again sets new standards, and they too will be presented at CES.

When you see the word CUSTOM you can be sure of finding the most versatile and interactive headphones from beyerdynamic. This is also true of the new CUSTOM GAME. As the first gaming headset of the successful product series, it takes the advantages of the CUSTOM ONE PRO, CUSTOM STREET and CUSTOM STUDIO and transfers them to the world of gaming.

ASUS today announced the Republic of Gamers (ROG) XG Station 2 external graphics enclosure. A successor to the pioneering XG Station by the company, which launched way back in 2007, this box has the connectivity to drive high-end graphics cards, and expand connectivity of your machine. The enclosure features a PCI-Express 3.0 x16 slot, and two 6+2 pin PCIe power connectors, with which it can supply the card with up to 500W of power. Its power supply can further provide up to 100W of power to recharge your notebook. The internal power supply meets 80 Plus Gold efficiency rating.

The ROG XG Station 2 connects to your notebook or desktop using Thunderbolt 3 (40 Gbps). It uses this bandwidth to drive not just the graphics card, but also a gigabit Ethernet controller, and a 4-port USB 3.0 hub. You can supplement the main Thunderbolt connection's bandwidth with an additional USB 3.0 (5 Gbps) connection to your host machine. This isn't necessary, but ASUS claims it will improve performance. The enclosure opens up at a vertical seam like an oyster, letting you easily install your graphics card. The walls of the enclosure are perforated, but a trio of 70 mm fans actively ventilate it. The enclosure also features RGB LED lighting, which can be managed using ASUS Aura software. ASUS plans to sell the ROG XG Station 2 from Q1-2017.

Colorful Technology Company Limited, professional manufacturer of graphics cards and motherboards, announces its latest entry in the iGame family of graphics cards with its latest rendition of the GTX 1070 with the introduction of the powerful iGameGTX1070 X-TOP-8G Advanced Limited. This new card features a new Silver Shark cooler sporting 90mm fans and a specially designed i-Ring central fan.

The new Colorful iGameGTX1070 X-TOP-8G Advanced Limited features a 1657 MHz base frequency with a boost frequency of 1860Mhz. iGame signature features highlight this release with an 8+2 phase digital power supply via iGame Pure Power (IPP). Improved build quality with Colorful's Silver Plating Technology ensure high-level of performance even with extreme loads.

If you're one of those people who doesn't regularly update their graphics card drivers, and you're rocking an NVIDIA graphics card, you really should update your drivers to the latest WHQL version, 376.33. The release notes and a security bulletin issued by the company point towards the fixing of multiple detected kernel layer (nvlddmkm.sys) vulnerabilities in NVIDIA's previous driver releases, which could "Lead to a Denial of Service, Escalation of Privileges, or Both".

In total, there are seven reported vulnerabilities as having been fixed, with NVIDIA acknowledging contributions in the issues' detection from engineers with Google Project Zero and Cisco Talos.

BIOSTAR is pleased to announce the introduction of its latest gaming peripheral and also the latest addition to the BIOSTAR RACING series family of performance products: the BIOSTAR RACING AM3 gaming mouse. With gamers looking for performance and features nowadays, gaming mice have become an expensive tool to fully enjoy games and the price to have one is sometimes a barrier in getting what you need to game. BIOSTAR changes that and addresses the needs of gamers at a reasonable price without sacrificing quality nor feature set. Built around a high-precision PMW 3320 sensor, the RACING AM3 gaming mouse comes with enhanced precision up to 5000DPI resolution to satisfy your gaming needs. The BIOSTAR RACING AM3 will have an MSRP of $15.99.

A step-up from your traditional gaming mouse, the BIOSTAR RACING AM3 gaming mouse is designed to aid gamers who are looking for a precision, high-performance mouse that can meet their needs. With BIOSTAR's experience, they have come up with the BIOSTAR RACING AM3 to offer their flagship mouse for the gaming masses, taking feedback from gamers as well as years of experience when designing the RACING AM3 gaming mouse. The result is an incredibly precise, high-performing and high-quality gaming mouse with the perfect balance of price and features.

Want SLI to work right on your GeForce GTX 1080, GTX 1070, or TITAN X Pascal without having to spend $50 on a fancy SLI bridge with an LED light-show you don't need? Look no further than the "no-frills" NVIDIA SLI HB bridge by ASUS. The bridge is just a fiberglass PCB with SLI slots where you'd want them, and simple ASUS ROG branding printed on the PCB, nothing too fancy. The bridge comes with 60 mm or 2-slot spacing (1 slot between two dual-slot thick graphics cards). The bridge will be sold separately for a fraction of the price of the company's LED-lit bridges; as well as being part of some of the company's upcoming motherboards' accessory packages.

Heatpipe cooling expert Calyos unveiled a passive-cooling kit for the Thermaltake Core P3 chassis. The kit mounts on to the panel bolts of the Core P3, and is an elaborate passive cooling heatsink, from which two sets of heat pipes make their way out. One of these mount on to the CPU (supports all modern socket types), and the other to a graphics card. The kit can handle thermal loads of up to 100W TDP for the CPU, and up to 180W TDP for the graphics card. That's enough cooling for a machine with a Core i7-6700K processor, and a GeForce GTX 1080 graphics card. Calyos will unveil this kit at its 2017 International CES booth.

NVIDIA today released the GeForce 376.33 WHQL drivers. These drivers come with a number of bug-fixes covering the previous GeForce 376.19 drivers, particularly with its Oculus Touch VR game title-specific optimizations. According to the release notes, these drivers seem to disable SLI support for "Titanfall 2," probably because it's too unstable at the moment. Grab the drivers from the links below.DOWNLOAD: NVIDIA GeForce 376.33 WHQL for Windows 10 64-bit | Windows 10 32-bit | Windows 8/7/Vista 64-bit | Windows 8/7/Vista 32-bit

ASUS today announced Xonar U7 MKII, a high-quality USB sound card and headphone amplifier. The compact Xonar U7 MKII is an upgraded version of the acclaimed Xonar U7 and features true 7.1-channel,192kHz/24-bit high-definition (HD) surround-sound output for incredible audio performance. Xonar U7 MKII comes with ASUS Sonic Studio, a software utility with an intuitive single-screen interface that provides complete control over a wide range of audio features, and Sonic Radar Pro, a feature for gamers that visually maps in-game sounds in first-person shooter (FPS) games to provide a competitive advantage.

ASUS Xonar U7 MKII retains the compact USB-powered design that was a highlight of the original Xonar U7 and delivers true 7.1-channel, 192kHz/24-bit HD audio, outperforming most available USB-powered audio devices. With a high-quality Cirrus Logic CS4398 digital-to-analog converter (DAC) and exclusive ASUS Hyper Grounding technology, Xonar U7 MKII has a 114dB signal-to-noise ratio (SNR), ensuring ultra-pure sound for the best listening experiences. The small size of Xonar U7 MKII takes up minimal room on a desk, and makes it easily portable, so laptop users can enjoy great-sounding audio anywhere.

ASUS today announced BRT-AC828, an ultra-fast AC2600-class dual-band 802.11ac wireless router with a four-transmit, four-receive (4x4) antenna configuration. BRT-AC828 is packed with all the networking features that are vital to growing companies, whether they are new start-ups or longer-established enterprises.

ASUS AiRadar combines beamforming with the four external antennas to ensure reliable, powerful and ultra-fast Wi-Fi - with combined speeds of up to 2534 Mbps - throughout the workplace, allowing users to concentrate on growing their business. For fast and resilient internet connectivity, BRT-AC828 features dual Gigabit WAN ports that offer up to 2 Gbps aggregated bandwidth, with automatic failover in the case of interruption to one of the internet connections. Other business-focused features include an easy-to-configure secure Wi-Fi portal for customers, simplified device management using Device Grouping, and a RADIUS server for secure authentication and easy user administration.

Already an industry leader renowned for integrating cutting-edge technology into its premium, high-resolution monitors, LG Electronics (LG) is pushing the industry to the next level with plans to introduce a HDR-compatible 32-inch UHD 4K monitor at the 2017 Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas next month.

The availability of HDR content continues to expand, covering a wide range of fields from movie to games. The enhanced picture quality offered by HDR technology is instantly recognizable to even the most casual user and manufacturers are already pushing this promising technology to its fullest potential. With professional-grade picture quality and exceptionally vibrant colors, HDR compatible monitors will appeal to creative professionals, gamers, and anyone else that takes image quality seriously.

Renowned games studio Crytek hasn't left the ropes yet - and the situation is again looking dire for the company. After a rough 2014 that saw multiple upcoming games being canceled (with a sequel to the graphical masterpiece Ryse being canned at this time) and employees not getting paid for months at a time, only the sale of franchises and assets (Homefront's IP to Deep Silver, for one), as well as a licensing deal with Amazon for their Crytek engine (worth $70 million), managed to save the company. At the time, employees put the blame on less than solid management decisions towards pushing the company as a free-to-play powerhouse, blaming the management for poor handling of the studio's transition towards that form of monetization. However, efforts to stay afloat seem to have been little more than a small lifeboat for the company.

Calyos, makers of compact workstations, unveiled the NGS Cube, a passively-cooled gaming desktop with performance-segment hardware. The star-attraction here is the case itself, which is made of aluminium, and encloses a network of heatsinks, heat pipes, and bases; and is capable of handling thermal loads of up to 200W. That gives it just enough muscle to cool the ZOTAC GeForce GTX 1060 Mini graphics card it includes (up to 120W TDP), and a quad-core CPU with TDP of up to 65W. Driving it all together is an ASUS Z170I Pro Gaming motherboard. The company is expected to showcase the NGS Cube at the 2017 International CES, with sales starting soon after.

DeepCool introduced the DA series of mainstream power supplies (PSUs). Available in 500W (DA500), 600W (DA600), and 700W (DA700) variants, these PSUs cover the essentials of providing clean and safe power to your gaming hardware. The three feature fixed, sleeved cabling, with the 500W model having connectors of a machine with a single high-end graphics card; and the 600W and 700W variants featuring cabling for machines with up to two high-end graphics cards.

Under the hood, the DA series feature a single +12V rail design with 80 Plus Bronze switching efficiency, active PFC, DC-to-DC switching, protection mechanisms against over/under voltage, overload, and short-circuit. The units use a 120 mm temperature-controlled fan to stay cool. The PSUs are backed by a 3-year warranty. The company didn't reveal pricing.

Cooltek announced the TG-01 midi tower chassis. With the TG-01 we present a fine Midi-Tower with "tempered glass" elements at a particularly attractive price-performance ratio. The main feature of the TG-01 is without doubt the use of tempered glass as a design element0. Both the front and the left side panels are made of the hardened glass and give the case a unique classic character. The I/O panel with 2 x USB 3.0, 1 x USB 2.0 and the HD audio connectors can be found above the glass cover. The power button is located at the front of the top cover, as is the HDD- and Power-LED.

To maximize the benefits of a glass front, three LED fans are pre-installed on the inside of the front panel. We offer four different variants: each with three blue, red and green illuminated fans, as well as a version with RGB fans. The RGB version offers an RGB controller next to the power-button, which allows the user to switch between different colors and multiple light effects.

ZADAK Lab announces its state-of-the-art RGB gaming memory modules, SHIELD RGB DDR4. The patented SHIELD fully supports the latest high-end motherboards, Intel 100 and 200 series. It starts at a clock speed of 2400MHz, going up beyond 3000MHz. SHIELD RGB DDR4 comes with single channel packaging as well as kit of dual-channel one, and along with the highest capacity of 64GB.

It is overwhelming to know that with the software ZArsenal, you can regulate the preferable colors and manage the LED flashing patterns, including color cycle, rainbow, dash, etc. Full compatibility with the most recent Intel platforms, it works superbly with all types of 100 and 200 series gaming motherboards.

At their Austin, Texas "New Horizon" Event, AMD introduced us to live "ZEN" chips working full-tilt, showing us what AMD's passion and ingenuity managed to achieve. The "New Horizon" event was a celebration to what AMD sees as another one of those special, breakthrough moments for a company: after starting work on "ZEN" 4 years ago in 2012 as a complete new design. The focus: building a great machine, whilst increasing IPC by 40% over their previous architecture, at the same power constraints; and to create a smart machine, which could sense and adapt to environment and applications so it improves over time. The company's verdicts: "ZEN" met or exceeded their goals, with the desktop PC market being home to the very first "ZEN" product.

According to AMD's CEO Dr. Lisa Su, AMD's event was named "New Horizon" as a reference to AMD's vision in the computing space: that they're on a journey to bring a new generation of processor technology, and customers towards a new horizon of computing. Their intention? To directly connect with fans who love PC gaming, whilst doing what AMD does best - pushing the envelope on performance, power, frame-rates and technology. AMD also flaunted their renewed faith in gaming, with it being on the company's DNA and passion, whilst revisiting the old memory lane, reminiscing on the Athlon Thunderbird, the world's first chip to break the 1 GHz barrier; the launch of their first 64-bit processor; and breaking the 1 TFLOP barrier in computing power with their HD 4850 and 4870 gaming GPUs.

Crucial, a leading global brand of memory and storage upgrades, today announced the availability of its latest DDR4 server DIMMs. With speeds of 2666 MT/s, new Crucial DDR4 server memory modules allow for increased performance and bandwidth within data centres and hyperscale environments. They are also available in a variety of server module types and densities ranging from 8GB to 64GB.

New Crucial 2666 MT/s 8Gb-based server memory modules are approximately 11 percent faster than the previously released 2400 MT/s DIMMs. Additionally, the newly expanded portfolio of Crucial server memory will support cloud and enterprise environments that are migrating to next-generation Intel server platforms.

CORSAIR, a world leader in enthusiast memory, high-performance gaming hardware and PC components today announced the immediate availability of the CORSAIR Force MP500 range of M.2 solid state drives, the fastest SSDs yet produced by CORSAIR. Available in 120GB, 240GB and 480GB capacities, the MP500 range delivers blistering performance up to five times faster than traditional SATA 6Gbps SSDs, offering users the next step in high-performance storage in an ultra-compact form factor.

Equipped with a Phison PS5007-E7 NVMe controller and high-bandwidth PCIe Gen. 3 x4 M.2 2280 interface, the MP500 range of drives put your data in the fast lane. Delivering phenomenal data performance including read speeds of up to 3,000 MB/s and write speeds of up 2,400 MB/s, the MP500 range of SSD accelerate system boots, game load times and file transfers beyond anything possible over a single SATA 6Gbps connection.

AMD VEGA Cube (working name), is an unannounced product by the company, which could see the light of the day as a Radeon Instinct deep-learning GPGPU solution. This [grande] coffee mug-sized contraption is four GPU subunit boards making up four sides of a cube (well, cuboid), with two sides making up the air channel, likely with space for a compound heatsink or liquid-cooling block, drawing heat from the GPUs lining the inner walls of the cube. The combined compute power of the VEGA Cube, hence, is 100 TFLOP/s (FP16), or 50 TFLOP/s (FP32, single-precision).

Each GPU board is similar in function to NVIDIA's Tesla P100 NVLink board. It has the GPU, VRM, and a high-speed interconnect. The GPUs here in question could be VEGA 10, a multi-chip module with a 25 TFLOP/s (FP16, 12.5 TFLOP/s FP32) GPU die, and 8 GB of HBM2 memory. There are four such GPU boards facing each other. AMD could deploy its much talked about NVLink-alternative, the GMI Coherent Data Fabric, which enables a 100 GB/s data path between neighboring GPUs. It remains to be seen if AMD makes an actual Radeon Instinct product out of this, or of it will remain a really groovy proof of concept.

ADATA Technology, a leading manufacturer of highperformance DRAM modules, NAND Flash products, and mobile accessories today launchedthe Ultimate SU900 2.5" SATA 6Gb/s SSD, which signals further expansion in 3D NAND Flash storage. The SU900 delivers high-grade 3D MLC NAND and uses the SMI 2258 controller. Most importantly, it offers up to 2TB capacity, reinforced by performance-boosting SLC Cache Buffer and DRAM Cache. For data integrity, the SU900 offers LDPC error correction, data shaping, wear leveling, and RAID Engine. It reaches 560MB/s read and 525MB/s write, and includes a 2.5mm spacer and 3.5" bracket in the box. ADATA provides a 5-year warranty with the drive.

The time has come for 3D NAND SSDs to realize their higher density potential, and so the SU900 lineup includes a 2TB model. However, consumers can choose 256GB, 512GB, and 1TB variants based on needs and budgets. Flash on the SU900 is high-grade 3D MLC (multi-level cell), ensuring improved reliability, longevity, and performance. The SSD employs an SMI 2258 controller, pushing 560MB/s read, 525MB/s write, and 85K/90K IOPS. Thanks to ADATA sorting and quality assurance, the SU900 has a TBW (total bytes written) of up to 800TB and an MTBF (mean time before failure) of 2,000,000 hours.

Cooler Master, a leader in design and manufacturing computer components and peripherals, today announced the launch of the MasterMouse S, a small and elegant gaming mouse with intelligent RGB illumination, four DPI levels up to 7200 DPI, and ergonomics that aim to provide a secure and satisfying claw grip.

The MasterMouse S and MasterMouse Lite S thus join their larger sibling, the MasterMouse Pro L, released earlier this year, adding the size S to Cooler Master's MasterMouse family (MasterMouse Pro L is a modular mouse that includes both M and L sizes). The naming of these three mice also reflects their positioning in Cooler Master's portfolio, with MasterMouse S in the middle, "Pro" standing for an advanced model, and "Lite" indicating more affordable features.

AMD has apparently chosen RYZEN (pronounced "risen") as the marketing name for the first consumer enthusiast processors based on the "ZEN" micro-architecture. Slated for market availability in Q1-2017, the first RYZEN part will feature 8 cores, 16 threads, 20 MB of total cache (8x 512 KB L2 + 2x 8 MB L3), and a clock speed of over 3.40 GHz. The chips will be built in the socket AM4 package, and will be launched alongside a new wave of motherboards with AMD X370 chipset.

Given the relatively modest clock speeds by AMD's standards, it's safe to say that AMD has made big IPC gains, and is now tapping into those gains. Intel, on the other hand, is clocking its upcoming Core i7-7700K at 4.00-4.40 GHz. AMD is also introducing enthusiast-segment features with RYZEN, including XFR (eXtended frequency range), Smart Prefetch, a tightly tuned power-management system built from the ground up, called AMD Pure Power, and its related feature, AMD Precision Boost.More slides follow.

XIGMATEK today unveiled the EDEN, an ATX mid-tower chassis featuring a prominent RGB multi-color LED lighting element along its front panel. The case features a horizontally partitioned internal layout that's contemporary, with the top compartment holding the motherboard tray, with room for graphics cards as long as 35 cm, and CPU coolers as tall as 16 cm; and the bottom compartment housing a 3x 3.5-inch/2.5-inch drive cage, and the PSU bay. Two additional 2.5-inch drives can be mounted behind the motherboard tray. Cooling features include two 120 mm front intakes, a 120 mm top exhaust, and a 120 mm rear exhaust. The company didn't reveal pricing.

AMD's next-generation high-end graphics card, based on the "Vega" architecture, was showcased at an event in Sonoma CA, earlier this week. While the architecture is being debuted with the Radeon Instinct MI25 deep-learning accelerator, a prototype graphics card based on the silicon was exhibited by the company, showing Vulkan API gaming.

AMD was pretty tight-lipped about the specifications of this prototype, but two details appear to have slipped out. Apparently, the chip has a floating point performance of 25 TFLOP/s (FP16), and 12.5 TFLOP/s (FP32, single-precision). On paper, this is higher than the 11 TFLOP/s (FP32) of NVIDIA TITAN X Pascal. The other important specification that emerged is that the card features 8 GB of HBM2 memory, with a memory bandwidth of 512 GB/s. This, too, is higher than the 480 GB/s of the TITAN X Pascal. It remains to be seen which market-segment AMD targets with this card.

This article was updated on Dec 15 to accommodate AMD's request to remove all info regarding the demo system, the shown game and its performance, which has been put under NDA retroactively.

TechPowerUp today released its latest version of TechPowerUp GPU-Z, the lightweight graphics sub-system information and diagnostic utility that no enthusiast can leave home without. Version 1.16.0 comes with an improved GPU Lookup mechanism, which can catch cards that use the same GPU and PCB, but different clocks, like some Sapphire RX 470 and RX 480 cards. Also, it can now properly tell DDR3 from DDR4 memory type on machines with Intel "Skylake" integrated graphics. Memory clock reading on AMD Radeon R9 Fury, R9 Fury X, R9 Nano, and Pro Duo, running Radeon Crimson ReLive drivers, is fixed.DOWNLOAD: TechPowerUp GPU-Z 1.16.0 | GPU-Z 1.16.0 ASUS ROG Themed

The change-log follows.

Cooler Master, a leader in design and manufacturing computer components and peripherals, today announced the launch of the MasterBox 5t. This model is based on the high end MasterCase Maker 5t serie and is designed specifically for gamers at a more budget friendly price. This case's straightforward design comes with conveniently placed cut-outs, making component installation, interior expansion, and multiple interior layouts simple and easy. It can also support large, high-end components, several fans and DIY liquid cooling. Keep your system looking clean with numerous routing holes and a cover for your PSU.

AMD (NASDAQ: AMD) today unveiled its strategy to accelerate the machine intelligence era in server computing through a new suite of hardware
and open-source software offerings designed to dramatically increase performance, efficiency, and ease of implementation of deep learning workloads. New Radeon Instinct accelerators will offer organizations powerful GPU-based solutions for deep learning inference and training. Along with the new hardware offerings, AMD announced MIOpen, a free, open-source library for GPU accelerators intended to enable high-performance machine intelligence implementations, and new, optimized deep learning frameworks on AMD's ROCm software to build the foundation of the next evolution of machine intelligence workloads.

Inexpensive high-capacity storage, an abundance of sensor driven data, and the exponential growth of user-generated content are driving exabytes of data globally. Recent advances in machine intelligence algorithms mapped to high-performance GPUs are enabling orders of magnitude acceleration of the processing and understanding of that data, producing insights in near real time. Radeon Instinct is a blueprint for an open software ecosystem for machine intelligence, helping to speed inference insights and algorithm training.

The team at Videocardz has published a story with some interesting slides regarding AMD's push towards the highly-lucrative deep learning market with their INSTINCT line-up of graphics cards - and VEGA being announced as a full-fledged solution means we are perhaps (hopefully) closer to seeing a solution based on it for the consumer market as well.

Alongside the VEGA-based MI25, AMD also announced the MI6 (5.7 TFLOPS in FP32 operations, with 224 GB/s of memory bandwidth and <150 W of board power), looking suspiciously like a Polaris 10 card in disguise; and the MI8 (which appropriately delivers 8.2 TFLOPS in FP32 computations, as well as 512 GB/s memory bandwidth and <175 W typical board power), with the memory bandwidth numbers being the most telling, and putting the MI8 closely along a Fiji architecture-based solution.

AeroCool today unveiled the LS-5200 mid-tower chassis. Measuring 220 mm x 376.5 mm x 460 mm (WxDxH), this tall case is made mostly of SECC steel, and comes in two color options - all-black, and silver+black. It's characterized by a perforated front intake that runs the entire height of the case. With no 5.25-inch drive bays to conceal, this intake convers a 360 mm x 120 mm or 280 mm x 140 mm radiator slot. The case features a simple 2-zone fan controller accessible from the front-panel.

Under the hood, the LS-5200 features a horizontally-partitioned layout, the the bottom compartment completely enclosed. The motherboard tray has room for graphics cards as long as 34.6 cm (up to 37.1 cm with no front fans installed). Cooling includes three 120 mm (or two 140 mm) front intakes, two 120 mm top exhausts, and one 140 mm rear exhaust. Storage features include a 3x 3.5-inch/2.5-inch drive cage in the lower compartment, and mounts for four additional 2.5-inch SSDs behind the motherboard tray. The company didn't reveal pricing.

Thermaltake today announced the Core X71 Tempered Glass Edition, a variant of the Core X71 featuring prominent 4 mm-thick tempered glass side-panels, which differentiate it from the original's slightly smaller clear acrylic windows. The window covers almost the entire accessible area of the top compartment of the dual-compartment full-tower. The panel covering the bottom compartment is still made of perforated metal, with dust-filters. The full-tower case serves up room for large HPTX/XL-ATX/EATX motherboards, graphics cards with lengths in excess of 350 mm; multiple 5.25-inch/3.5-inch/2.5-inch drive bays, and room for at least four long (3x 120 mm / 2x 140 mm) radiators. The company didn't reveal pricing.

SilverStone today announced availability of its 800W SFX-L form-factor power supply (model: LTI-SX800). This PSU was first unveiled at the 2016 Computex expo. Measuring 125 mm x 130 mm x 63.5 mm (WxDxH), this PSU is built for SFX-L ready cases such as the Fortress-Z (FTZ01B). It features full modular cabling, with enough wiring for a high-end gaming PC with up to two graphics cards.

Under the hood, the LTI-SX800 features a single +12V rail design with 80 Plus Titanium switching efficiency, active PFC, and most common electrical protection mechanisms, against over/under voltage, over/under current, overload, overheat, and short-circuit protection. The unit is cooled by a 120 mm temperature-controlled fan. The company didn't reveal pricing.

SP/ Silicon Power, a leading provider of memory storage solutions, launches its new High Endurance microSDHC/microSDXC cards especially designed for car video recorders, security cameras and surveillance systems. These write-intensive applications crucially depend on the highest level of reliability to provide trustworthy proof in the most decisive moments. Equipped with high-quality MLC NAND flash chips, SP's new high Endurance micro SDHC/microSDXC card meets this special requirement by achieving up to 12,000 hours of 64 GB Full HD video recording.

Additional key features for reliable and speedy performance are the card's built- in error correction code (ECC) function technology for high data transmission safety and full support of Ultra High Speed Class 3 (U3) specification.

Overclocking.guide's der8auer has recently posted a story regarding the recently discovered ability to "liberate" AMD's RX 460's shaders - from the Polaris 11 architecture's stock 896 shaders / 56 TMUs to a grand total of 1024 stream processors and 64 TMUs. We did some quick testing and found the mod to be working as promised.

The process is straightforward enough. First, make sure to grab TechPowerUp's own GPU-Z, and save a copy of your original BIOS by clicking the arrow next to the "BIOS Version" field, so you have a fallback in case things go wrong. Then, follow the source link towards overclocking.guide's RX 460 tested BIOSes (currently only for the ASUS STRIX O4G and the Sapphire Nitro 4G), and download the appropriate one. Then run "flash unlocked bios.bat" to flash the BIOS, and in about 15 seconds, the process should be complete, granting you about 10% of extra performance. In our own testing, using the power testing setup we use in graphics cards reviews, we saw a 4 W increase in peak power consumption.

TSMC (Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co.), one of the foremost semiconductor producers in the world - which controls a leading 55% share of the global market - said on Wednesday it plans to build a new, $15.7 billion facility in Taiwan that would churn out 5 nm and 3 nm chips. If TSMC were to achieve these production nodes in a timely fashion (with "timely" meaning "before their competitors"), that would prove a huge boon for the company, as everyone - and especially deep-pocketed smartphone chip designers such as Apple and Qualcomm - is looking towards evolution in process nodes, which allows for improvements in power consumption, performance, size and cost of chips per wafer.

"We're asking the government to help us find a plot that is large enough (123 to 197 acres) and has convenient access so we can build an advanced chip plant to manufacture 5 nm and 3 nm chips," TSMC spokesperson Elizabeth Sun said. The spokesperson declined to provide details about the timing of the construction and production, though it's seemingly still a few years away (yet close enough for it to merit an official request). TSMC co-CEO Mark Liu had already mentioned that the company was working on 5 nm chips, and had assigned the task of developing 3 nm technology and conducting research on 2 nm technology to upwards of 300 engineers. Delays on EUV (Extreme Ultraviolet) lithography have slowed expected advancements in further miniaturization of the process nodes. It remains to be seen which technology TSMC is counting on towards aiding them in their goals for 5 nm, 3 nm and the mentioned 2 nm chip production, especially since at those sizes, we start leaving the usual realm of plane old physics, crossing the threshold towards their exotic cousins, quantum physics.

If you are using a modded BIOS on your AMD Polaris card, and try to install AMD's excellent Crimson ReLive drivers, you might be in for a surprise. This is because AMD re-enabled their BIOS signature enforcement with these latest drivers. Basically, if you modded your card's BIOS in search of higher overclocking, more voltage or customized fan settings, the hash in your BIOS is no longer recognized by AMD the driver, since it differs from the factory values.

On detecting such a modded BIOS with an invalid checksum, the Crimson ReLive driver won't load, meaning that the system will run with the VGA fallback driver only, without 3D acceleration and Radeon Settings will not start. However, you can force your modded BIOS to load on Crimson ReLive if you're willing to jump through some hoops.

BIOSTAR is excited to announce the feature set for its 2nd-generation RACING series of motherboards that will support the 7th-generation of processors from Intel. BIOSTAR steps up its game for gamers and enthusiasts by introducing new features and upgrading existing ones for a more powerful experience like never before seen from the RACING series.

BIOSTAR introduces new features to further enhance the degree of performance and style that the BIOSTAR RACING series is known for. Some of these features include the brand-new M.2 Cooling Protection, 10GbE LAN, Lightning Charger and the improved ones for LED lighting, such as VIVID LED Armor and 5050 LED Fun Zone, for DIY lovers and lighting enthusiasts. From excellent power delivery for a more stable operation all the way to new ways of improving the visual appeal and style of your system to make it stand out and pop for your next theme. Combined, these new features will bring a new level of experience for gamers and enthusiasts.

TechPowerUp today released the latest version of TechPowerUp GPU-Z. Version 1.14.0 introduces new features, addresses various bugs, improves the user-interface, and adds support for new graphics cards. To begin with, GPU-Z can detect clocks set by AMD Radeon WattMan on older Graphics CoreNext graphics cards, as enabled by the latest Crimson ReLive drivers.

GPU-Z 1.14.0 fixes a memory leak noticed when GPU-Z is running for extended periods on machines with NVIDIA "Pascal" graphics cards. The driver WHQL status detection has been improved. The way GPU-Z reports bus interface has been improved. GPU-Z can now properly tell between DDR3 and DDR4 memory types on AMD "Kaveri" integrated graphics. GPU-Z 1.14.0 adds support for AMD Radeon Pro Duo, Radeon Pro WX7100, WX5100, WX4100, and early support for AMD "Stoney." We've also added support for various VIA graphics solutions.DOWNLOAD: TechPowerUp GPU-Z 1.14.0 | GPU-Z 1.14.0 ASUS ROG Themed

The change-log follows.

BitFenix announces the Shogun Chassis. During Computex 2016 we showcased four of our brand new chassis, which also included Cape. With the input from some of the world's renowned enthusiasts, we have developed and tweaked the Cape to be an extremely desirable chassis with many novel features. Strength, Power and Absolute Control makes you a champion. Carrying on the theme of simplicity from our famous Shinobi Chassis, Shogun is the newest flagship design model from BitFenix. The all new BitFenix Shogun is the most capable command station that gives you the edge in the battle for victory. May it be performance or looks, Shogun is the best of both worlds. With the top level aesthetics, novel features and extreme compatibility BitFenix Shogun is one of the most advance and user friendly chassis in the market.

AMD has just announced their 2016 major software update release (following Catalyst Omega in 2014 and Crimson Edition in 2015). It's dubbed the "Crimson ReLive" release (numbered 12.6.1), and is purported to bring a lot of features and performance improvements across the board for AMD products, as has been historically achieved by AMD with these annual driver releases. This time, there's just one other thing: game recording and streaming through the built-in ReLive app. It serves as a streaming app that works for both professional, developer and consumer use cases. It supports major streaming giants (such as Twitch and YouTube), includes an in-app toolbar and custom overlay, and is apparently going to feature its own tab inside AMD's updated driver suite, with minimal reported impact on performance.

As always, you can grab the drivers right here on TPU: just follow the links below. And for more information, benchmarks, and a run-through of the new driver and its features, check out TPU's review of the driver suite, right here.Download: AMD Radeon Software Crimson ReLive Edition 16.12.1 for Windows 10 64-bit | Windows 10 32-bit | Windows 8.1 64-bit | Windows 8.1 32-bit | Windows 7 64-bit | Windows 7 32-bit

Back in early November it was reported that GIGABYTE is planning to open a new front against rivals ASUS Republic of Gamers and MSI Gaming, with Aorus-branded motherboards and graphics cards, in 2017. The company appears to be ready with the motherboards. A teaser pic posted on its Facebook page reveals at least one enthusiast-segment socket LGA1151 motherboard, which is likely based on the Intel Z270 Express chipset. The few features that stand out are four PCI-Express x16 slots (of which two could be wired to the Z270 chipset and electrical x4, given the chipset's 4 additional PCIe downstream lanes); a smattering of RGB LEDs all over the board, and premium overclocking features.

Update (09/12): Here are some of the first press-shots, courtesy of VideoCardz. Apparently GIGABYTE decided to keep its conventional naming scheme.Many Thanks to Chaitanya for the tip.

Tis the season of 'leaks.' A marketing image of an upcoming socket LGA1151 Z270 chipset based motherboard by MSI bearing its Gaming Series Tomahawk branding was teased on Facebook. It appears to be feature-rich given that MSI positions its "Tomahawk" branded motherboards in the mid-tier of its lineup. One of the features that caught our attention is MSI's claim to have achieved true 1000 MB/s bandwidth for USB 3.1 (gen 2.0) using a custom software feature. MSI is calling this the X-Boost. The company is also guaranteeing full 8 Gb/s bandwidth per port, since it's using ASMedia AS2142 controllers to drive its USB 3.1 ports.Many Thanks to TheLostSwede for the tip.

ADATA Technology, a leading manufacturer of highperformance DRAM modules, NAND Flash products, and mobile accessories today launchedthe updated Premier SC660H and Premier SV620H external SSDs. Based on previous designs, the new models are part of the ADATA move to 3D NAND Flash in all new SSDs and in refreshes of existing models. The SC660H and SV620H feature 3D TLC NAND instead of traditional 2D NAND to provide increased reliability, durability, and efficiency. The drives connect to host PCs via USB 3.1 Gen 1, and are presented in two distinct enclosure styles. Thanks to 3D NAND, the updated SSDs are available in 256GB and 512GB as opposed to 240GB and 480GB in the original SC660/SV620. Performance is 440 MB/s read and 430MB/s write in both models.

Micron Technology, Inc. today introduced the Micron Enterprise 5100 Series SATA solid state drive (SSD) family, enabling future-focused data storage platforms to meet the combined demands of performance, capacity and enterprise-class reliability. Micron's 5100 Series Enterprise SATA SSDs provide IT with an easy migration to bridge the infrastructure divide to tomorrow's all flash data center. With an industry-leading 8-terabyte (TB) capacity, the 5100 Series helps you manage the data deluge created by today's diverse digital universe with performance characteristics perfectly tailored to manage the data tsunami.

"Micron is uniquely positioned to help IT embrace modernization and agility, and leading enterprise and cloud data centers look to Micron for breadth and depth in solid state storage solutions to tame a diverse digital universe," Darren Thomas, vice president of storage at Micron. "Our Micron 5100 Series SATA SSDs featuring FlexPro architecture offer a seamless migration path with enterprise class reliability and proven ROI, ensuring flexibility, continuity and agility for data management today and tomorrow."

In addition to the Xtreme Gaming XK700 gaming keyboard, GIGABYTE also unveiled the Xtreme Gaming XTC700, a tower-type CPU cooler. Built to handle thermal loads of ">200W," and with support for LGA2011v3, AM4, LGA115x, AM3(+), FM2(+), and LGA1366; the cooler features an aluminium fin-stack with molded fins to maximize surface area for heat-dissipation; ventilated by a pair of 120 mm fans in push-pull configuration, capped off by a top-plate with an RGB LED-lit GIGABYTE Xtreme Gaming logo ornament that supports GIGABYTE RGB Spectrum software control.

Heat to the aluminium fin-stack is conveyed by three 10 mm-thick copper heat pipes, which make direct contact with the CPU at the base. The included fans each spin at speeds ranging from 500-1,700 RPM, pushing 14-53 CFM of air, and with a noise output of 12-31 dBA. The fans feature 4-pin (PWM) power input, while the LED ornament plugs into one of your motherboard's USB 2.0/1.1 headers. Measuring 139 mm x 109 mm x 169 mm, the cooler weighs 1015 g. The company didn't reveal pricing.

GIGABYTE introduced the Xtreme Gaming XK700 mechanical keyboard. Featuring a brushed aluminium top, and a standard 104-keyset (with 22 hotkeys enabled using the Function key), the XK700 combines Cherry MX RGB mechanical switches with advanced electronics by GIGABYTE the offer full-NKRO over USB, anti-ghosting, and 512 KB of onboard memory to locally store hotkey sets and lighting profiles. The lighting can be managed using GIGABYTE's RGB Spectrum software, letting you set any of 16.7 million colors to individual keys, sets of keys, or even set groovy lighting effects. They keyboard also offers finely tuned front elevation adjustments, a set of orange keycaps to highlight your favorite keys, and a set of wrist bands. The company didn't reveal pricing.

Thermaltake today announced the Core X31 Tempered Glass Edition (model: CA-1E9-00M1WN-03), a variant of the Core X31 mid-tower chassis featuring a tempered-glass side-panel, replacing the acrylic panel on the original. The clear panel covers the entire area of the side panel, letting you show off your gear. Measuring 250 mm x 511 mm x 497 mm (WxDxH), this is one of the wider mid-towers you'll come across, with the extra width being distributed between more "crawl-space" behind the motherboard tray for better cable management, support for larger 200 mm-wide fans along the top and front panels; and additional height clearance for the motherboard tray, letting you accommodate tall CPU air coolers, or an additional graphics card along the plane of the motherboard, using an included PCIe riser.

The Core X31 Tempered Glass Edition features a flexible design, with detachable drive cages and support braces, letting you accommodate heavy liquid-cooling gear, such as pumps, reservoirs, and tubing. Storage areas include two 5.25-inch drive bays, and three 3.5-inch/2.5-inch drive bays. Cooling includes support for one rear 140 mm fan, two top 200 mm (or 3x 140 mm or 3x 120 mm) fans; one 200 mm front (or 2x 140 mm or 2x 120 mm) fans; and two 140 mm (or 2x 120 mm) bottom fans. Each of these fan slots can hold radiators of the corresponding size. The company didn't reveal pricing, but we expect it to be a small premium over the original's $130 price.

when looking up at an hex file taken from macOS Sierra drivers, Anandtech forum user Glo found what could very well possibly amount to upcoming graphics chips from AMD: Polaris 10 XT2 and Polaris 12. We could very well be looking here into an as-of-yet unknown revision of AMD's Polaris 10 architecture, as well as a totally different chip from the already released Polaris 11 and Polaris 10. Maybe Polaris 12 is the mysterious 687F:C1 chip previously benchmarked in AOtS?

Also of note is the referral to Vega 10, lending further credence to reports of an early 2017 release. Given the fact that all three different architectures are referenced in the same hex dump, this could mean that AMD is working on a new 500 line of GPUs for 2017 - possibly to complete a given ZEN platform and giving customers the chance to go all-in on an AMD system, while simultaneously capitalizing on AMD's apparent confidence in ZEN's market reception. In this scenario, AMD's Vega10 would serve as the successor to the Fury series, with Polaris 12 and Polaris 10 XT2 replacing Polaris 11 and Polaris 10 from the product stack. Another scenario is that Polaris 10 XT2 corresponds to a dual-gpu solution, whose rumors have been making the rounds for some time now.

The Bluetooth Special Interest Group (SIG) officially adopted Bluetooth 5 as the latest version of the Bluetooth core specification this week. Key updates to Bluetooth 5 include longer range, faster speed, and larger broadcast message capacity, as well as improved interoperability and coexistence with other wireless technologies. Bluetooth 5 continues to advance the Internet of Things (IoT) experience by enabling simple and effortless interactions across the vast range of connected devices.

"Bluetooth is revolutionizing how people experience the IoT. Bluetooth 5 continues to drive this revolution by delivering reliable IoT connections and mobilizing the adoption of beacons, which in turn will decrease connection barriers and enable a seamless IoT experience," said Mark Powell, executive director of the Bluetooth SIG. "This means whole-home and building coverage, as well as new use cases for outdoor, industrial, and commercial applications will be a reality. With the launch of Bluetooth 5, we continue to evolve to meet the needs of IoT developers and consumers while staying true to what Bluetooth is at its core: the global wireless standard for simple, secure, connectivity."

After putting in work in the OpenGL, WebGL, and most recently, Vulkan APIs, the technology industry consortium Khronos Group is setting its sights on the VR industry and ecosystems. Their aim: to create a "cross-vendor, royalty-free, open standard" for the VR development community. This move is an effort to prevent the VR system from fragmenting itself towards an eventual collapse, considering the multiple engines to create content, platforms to sell that content through, and a few different hardware options with casuistically different requirements and tool-sets. As a result, for a developer to support SteamVR (OpenVR), Oculus (OVR), and OSVR, it has a lot of work to do, since each platform (with its unique runtime) interfaces with the game engine in a different way. Developers must account for the intricacies of each platform during the development process.

Japanese cooling expert Scythe presents the fifth version of the Mugen CPU Cooler, which has been fitted with significant improvements. The Mugen has been one of the most popular CPU coolers on the market for a long time. Scythe was able to ramp up the performance even further with Mugen 5 and at the same time equip the heatsink with a unique new fan. Supplied Kaze Flex 120 PWM fan features noise reduction rubber-insulators in the corners, dynamic fan speed range from 300 to 1.200 rpm as well as a brand-new Sealed Precision FDB bearing, allowing smooth and silent operation at all times.

Scythe's engineering team took the user feedback and applied it on the revamped design of Mugen 5! The heatsink of the Mugen 5 is based on 6 high-quality all-copper heatpipes and a solid aluminum fin stack. Great compatibility to tall memory modules is achieved thanks to the new asymmetrical design of Mugen 5. The solid copper base-plate has been placed slightly shifted for this purpose, instead of centered. In addition to that, several layers of the fin stack on the back of Mugen 5 have been shortened, to further increase RAM compatibility. Mugen 5 can easily fit into most PC chassis on the market, thanks to the total height of only 154.5 mm. In order to avoid corrosion and to improve the quality, all copper-heatpipes and the copper-baseplate are nickel-plated.

Intel and AMD's cross-licensing arrangements could get more equitable in the future, with reports hinting at the possibility of Intel licensing AMD Radeon intellectual property to be used as Intel processors' integrated GPUs. Rumors of such a deal were first reported by HardOCP this Spring, where it stated that the two companies were negotiating a licensing agreement. Earlier this week, HardOCP editor Kyle Bennett commented on the site's forums that a licensing agreement has been reached between the two, even though Intel does not want this to be public.

Such an agreement could see AMD sharing designs of its Radeon integrated graphics processors with Intel, which will integrate it into its processor designs, and manufacture them. Whether the amalgamated graphics solution will continue to be branded "AMD Radeon" or whether it will be marketed under the Intel graphics brands, remains to be seen.

Western Digital Corporation, a world leader in storage technologies and solutions, today announced that it has signed a definitive royalty-bearing agreement with Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. to renew the cross-license of the two companies' semiconductor patent portfolios. The terms of the renewed agreement are retroactive to the end date of the prior agreement, which expired on August 14, 2016. The renewed agreement will run through December 31, 2024.

The agreement includes rights to each party's patents broadly covering multi-level cell flash memory and flash storage systems. The original agreement, which dates back to 1997 and had been renewed twice before, had permitted Samsung to use patented flash memory technologies invented by SanDisk, which Western Digital acquired in May 2016.

Raidmax today announced the Alpha, an ATX mid-tower chassis characterized by a large perforated-metal front panel, with RGB LED lighting. The lighting is handled by LED strips, and can be controlled using an included infrared remote control, which lets you set not just color, but also any of 22 multi-color lighting modes. The side panel features a large clear acrylic window. Internally, the case features a contemporary horizontally partitioned layout.

The Raidmax Alpha has room for graphics cards as long as 33 cm, and 16 cm tall CPU coolers. Storage areas include one exposed 5.25-inch drive bay, three internal 3.5-inch (of which two can convert to 2.5-inch), and two additional 2.5-inch. The cooling features include 3x 120 mm or 2x 140 mm front intakes, two 140 mm top exhaust, and 120 mm rear exhaust. The company didn't reveal pricing.

Western Digital Corp. today further expanded its data center SSD and HDD portfolio with the introduction of next-generation storage solutions designed to help IT managers address the intensive data and extreme performance demands of today's enterprise, cloud and hyperscale workloads.

The new solutions include the blazingly fast HGST-branded Ultrastar SN200 NVMe-compatible PCIe solid-state drive (SSD) series, which offers class-leading random read performance of up to 1.2 million IOPS in key workloads, and the company's fastest and highest capacity SAS SSD to date, the HGST-branded Ultrastar SS200 Series SSD. The company also introduced its fourth-generation helium-based HelioSeal enterprise-class hard disk drive (HDD), the 12TB HGST-branded Ultrastar He12 drive. Additionally, the company announced it will extend the He12 platform to 14TB, leveraging Shingled Magnetic Recording (SMR).

NVIDIA today announced the "Choose your Adventure" bundle. Buyers of new GeForce GTX 1050, GTX 1050 Ti, and GTX 1060 graphics cards will get to choose from one of three available VR indie games. The giveaway also extends to notebooks with mobile variants of the GPUs. The selection includes "Maize," "Redout," and "Raw Data." The offer is applicable to a large selection of markets and participating retailers. Invoices of new applicable products from these retailers will include coupon codes which can be exchanged on NVIDIA's redemption page for game keys.

The name speaks for itself - the keyboard offers a true retro-look to its owner. Circular, detached keys ensure that the Ncore Retro has the distinctive look of a classical typewriter. The chrome finished surface in combination with the silver enclosed key caps underlines the high-quality design of the keyboard. Don't let the deliberate "retro-look" fool you though: underneath is a true mechanical keyboard with all the advantages that brings. This includes Anti-Ghosting technology and the possibility to switch between 6-Key and N-Key Rollover. A variety of function keys can be enabled through use of the FN-Key.

A total of 12 multimedia keys are included, in addition to the possibility to lock the Windows key, switch the functionality of the WASD and arrow-keys and change between 6-key and N-key rollover. As such, the keyboard is not only aimed at fans of old typewriters, but also at enthusiastic gamers and dedicated design buffs, who are looking for a classic keyboard for their office.

Other information to surface from WCCFTech's leak on the upcoming Radeon Software Crimson ReLive drivers, is its dual nature, for both consumers and professionals. The Radeon Technologies Group is seemingly on a crusade to bolster AMD's software support recognition with customers, and that naturally extends towards the professional side of the equation as well.

As such, the first immediate feature to be introduced is AMD's Pro Renderer, a physically-based rendering engine that enables production of photorealistic images, with both plugin and native integration support from the big names in professional workflows, such as Autodesk's 3DS Max, Autodesk Maya, and Blender (just to name a few), along with game-engine integration and support through the Unity Engine and Stingray. LiquidVR support is also headed for professionals, enabling professional VR workflows in design, engineering, animation, filmmaking, and VR game engines.

The crew at WCCFTech have just leaked AMD's now annual major software update release (with Catalyst Omega in 2014 and Crimson Edition in 2015). The new 2016 release is apparently dubbed the "Crimson ReLive" release, and these are purported to bring a lot of features and performance improvements across the board for AMD products, as has been historically achieved by AMD with these annual driver releases. This time, there's just one other thing: game recording and streaming through a built-in app.

Since its inception, the Radeon Software division has released 29 drivers of which 8 were WHQL releases, with support and optimizations for over 28 gaming titles, having been downloaded over 85 million times. AMD seems to put newfound interest in consumer satisfaction with their driver releases, considering how a leaked slide mentions that they have achieved a 4.5/5 rating in customer satisfaction in recent times (AMD had already given us at TPU a glimpse of that at the Computex event in Macau, pre-Polaris days, and this seems to be it). AMD is putting much stock in their DX12 performance thanks to features such as asynchronous compute, and the staples of supported platforms and projects. AMD also seems to have a new-found claim towards it being one of the most important players in the graphics industry, chalking up their market dominance by including gaming consoles in their portfolio.

AMD allegedly disabled asynchronous-compute technology support on older generations of Graphics CoreNext (GCN) architecture, since Radeon Software 16.9.2. With the newer drivers, "Ashes of the Singularity" no longer supports asynchronous-compute, a feature that improves performance in the game, on GPUs based on the first-generation GCN architecture, such as the Radeon R9 280X.

"Ashes of the Singularity" benchmarks run by Beyond3D forum members on GCN 1.0 hardware, comparing older drivers to version 16.9.2 shows that the game supports async-compute on the older drivers, and returns improved performance. AMD, on its part, is pointing users to a patch change-list from the developers of "Ashes..." which reads that the game supports DirectX 12 async-compute only on GCN 1.1 (eg: Radeon R9 290) and above.

be quiet!, the market leader in PC power supplies in Germany for ten consecutive years, now offers a high-quality side panel window for all Dark Base 900 cases, which was previously reserved for the Pro version only. This elegant glass side panel significantly enhances the appearance and gives you a perfect view inside your PC case.

As of today be quiet! will sell this high-quality side panel window, which was already factory-installed in the Pro model, separately, for all Dark Base 900 cases. Owners of the standard version can upgrade to this elegant side panel of 4mm tinted and tempered glass at a low cost. In addition, the side panel is decoupled from the case with rubber elements to inhibit the transfer of vibrations. The fully-windowed side panel gives you a perfect view of the top-end components inside your PC case and significantly enhances the aesthetics of the system.

The tempered glass side panel will be immediately available for an MSRP of €39 / £39 / $39.

Remember Geil'sEVO X? If you wanted some lighting phenomena going on inside your case with those DDR4 RAM modules, you'd also have to make do with unsightly cables, adding to the clutter of your chosen component holder. ZADAK511 has done away with those additional power cables, and now allows you to "pimp" your rig without them.

These two products were designed by the ZADAK Lab team, and ZADAK has developed a piece of software they named "ZArsenal" which allows the user to regulate the colors and lighting effects of both the memory modules and SSD, with a claimed nil performance impact on either. Details on the SSD refer only to its dual interfaces (SATAIII and USB 3.1, TYPE-C Gen2, updated from their Shield [sans RGB] series), while the memory kit's details are a little more scarce - we expect them to be on par with the companies' previously announced Shield line (sans RGB), which would mean at least DDR4-3000 speeds at timings of 16-18-18-38 (with 4 GB density modules) or the companies' top-of-the-line DDR4-4266 kit. No details on pricing for either of the products were given.

On their Facebook page, MSI have given a little tease regarding their upcoming next generation Intel Z270 boards. Details are scarce at the moment, but these motherboards are to be marketed under MSI's PRO series, with the Z270 SLI Plus featuring a clean, high-contrast black and white color scheme, while the Z270 SLI opts for an almost totally black design.

The Z270 SLI Plus is the higher-end product of the two. It sports a 10-Phase PWM circuitry, cooled with the aid of two heatsinks in the ATX form-factor. As usual, it has four DIMM slots which leverage MSI's DDR4 Boost feature, and support for XMP profiles. All of these four DIMM slots are protected by metal shielding, and expansion slots include three PCIe 3.0 x16 (x16/x8/x8 electrical), three PCIe 3.0 x1 and two Turbo M.2 NVMe slots. Storage options include 6 SATA III ports and a dual USB 3.0 front panel header. It also features MSI's latest Audio Boost panel for premium audio quality, with what they call a "Mystic Light" RGB solution, and the I/O panel is covered by a black and white shroud.

Cooler Master, a leader in design and manufacturing computer components and peripherals, today announced the launch of there latest model designed specifically for gamers. If you wonder where the "t" stands for? Yes there is no doubt…It stands for turbo edition. The little mark now appears at the end of the component company's flagship MasterCase Maker 5. The original version of this mid-tower case was launched last year around Taipei's Computex trade show and is now debuting in their gaming version.

"We wanted to go for a sharper, bolder look, like a sports car," said Mark Severin, head of Case Product Marketing. "In the case of the MasterCase Maker 5t, we added in a few extras that cater specifically to gamers." In line with the color combination that shows up on many gaming-focused motherboards and components, the MasterCase Maker 5t case is lined in red and we are not using just normal red, but we have developed a special red paint with sparkling flakes. This results in an amazing color combination.

BenQ, internationally renowned provider of digital lifestyle devices, today announced the SW320 photographer monitor, a 31.5-inch 4K display with class-leading color performance and High Dynamic Range (HDR) capability. Spanning a wide color gamut covering 99% of Adobe RGB and 100% of sRGB, Rec. 709, and the digital cinema industry's DCI-P3 color space, SW320's true 10-bit IPS panel and advanced 14-bit lookup table (LUT) deliver spectacular color quality with precise ≤2 Delta E values.

"SW320 represents the pinnacle of BenQ color-critical display technology," said Conway Lee, President of BenQ Corporation. "This wide color gamut HDR monitor takes professional imaging to new heights, fulfilling the demanding and exacting requirements of photography enthusiasts."

SilverStone introduced the NT08-115XP, an ultra-low profile CPU cooler designed for media PC builds, and replacement for stock coolers. This top-flow cooler measures 101 mm x 101 mm x 33 mm (LxWxH), and is made of a copper-cored aluminium heatsink with forked, spirally-projecting fins, ventilated by a 10 mm-thick 80 mm fan that spins between 1,200-3,400 RPM, pushing up to 5.64-15.98 CFM of air, with a noise output of 16.5-28.98 dBA. The cooler is designed specifically for Intel LGA115x series CPU sockets (LGA1156, LGA1155, LGA1150, LGA1151), and can handle thermal loads of up to 65W. It features a push-pin type retention mechanism similar to those found on Intel's stock coolers. The cooler is expected to go on sale on the 8th of December.

OWC, a leading zero-emissions Mac and PC technology company, today introduced the OWC Mercury Elite Pro Dual with Thunderbolt 2 Technology. The new Mercury Elite Pro Dual - designed in Austin, TX by the OWC new product development team - offers speeds up to 474 MB/s, capacities up to 20TB, and RAID modes 0 and 1. A newly engineered aluminum enclosure features a larger, quieter fan and an advanced airflow design for drive health and longevity. For professionals who need the additional performance of RAID 0 (two disks working together to create one very fast volume), or the peace of mind provided by RAID 1 (two disks mirrored to create instant redundancy), Mercury Elite Pro Dual with Thunderbolt 2 Technology packs serious connectivity in a versatile package.

"The Mercury Elite Pro Dual has long been a go-to solution for creative professionals who need flexibility without sacrificing performance," said Larry O'Connor, CEO, OWC. "With the addition of Thunderbolt 2 Technology and a new, cooler, quieter design, the Mercury Elite Pro Dual is built to handle demanding workflows, providing peace of mind so you can focus on creating your next masterpiece."

AMD (NASDAQ: AMD) today announced that it has received a perfect score on the Human Rights Campaign Foundation's 2017 Corporate Equality Index (CEI), naming it a "Best Place to Work for LGBT Equality". The CEI is a benchmarking tool that rates corporate equality policies and practices for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) employees including equal employment opportunity policies, non-discrimination protections, and benefits.

"At AMD we believe that creating an inclusive environment where every employee is empowered to bring their diverse set of perspectives to the table each day is the key to bringing out the best, most innovative ideas," said Ruth Cotter, chief human resources officer and senior vice president of Corporate Communications and Investor Relations at AMD. "We are proud of the progress we have made to achieve our CEI score and to be named alongside other leading companies as we collectively pursue equality for everyone in the workplace."

Synology Inc. today launched DiskStation DS3617xs, a 12-bay NAS server scalable up to 36 drives. It delivers high performance at over 2,358 MB/s reading and fast deployments to support large-scale businesses. Equipped with a quad-core Intel Xeon-D 2.2 GHz CPU that bursts up to 2.7 GHz, DS3617xs delivers stunning performance at over 2,358 MB/s sequential throughput reading and 406,760 IOPS reading under a RAID 5 configuration with 10GbE Link Aggregation enabled. DS3617xs comes with one PCIe 3.0 slot that supports a high-speed Network Interface Card (NIC).

"We've seen strong interest and demand from our customers in this business-ready desktop NAS model for its painless deployment and flexible scalability." said Michael Wang, Product Manager at Synology Inc. "This time we've doubled the default RAM capacity of DS3617xs to 16GB and enable upgradability up to 48GB in total for businesses to utilize."

Jonsbo announces the QT03A, VR2 and FR-101 fan series. With the QT03A and the VR2 we present two particularly classy PC cases. The combination of high-quality materials, an exemplary processing and an eye for detail emphasize our products from the gray mass of the case market. In addition to this, we present our first series of fans, the FR-101.

The QT03A is a based on the popular QT01 "Antiphon". It is not a replacement, but expands the portfolio by another Midi tower. Like the QT01, the QT03A uses an anodized aluminum front. The two sides made of 5 mm thick "tempered glass" further refine the case and allow for an almost unimpeded view into the interior.

New reports have surfaced that indicate NVIDIA is all set to launch a new mid range mobile graphics solution, the GTX 1050 M at CES 2017 in Las Vegas. While NVIDIA has already released mobile variants of the GTX 1080, GTX 1070 and GTX 1060, people not willing to spend big on higher tier products from the green camp are limited to "Maxwell" based GTX 960 M or GTX 950 M offerings. Reports also indicate there has been somewhat of a surge in demand for GTX 1060 M equipped laptops, where the new GTX 1050 M could be nicely positioned to further augment consumer appetite.

As we reported in November, we can expect that in line with the existing "Pascal" based mobile solutions, the new GTX 1050 M to sport the same (or better) core-configuration as its desktop counterpart, but with significantly higher clock speeds. This should make the GTX 1050 M an attractive option as it would endow the laptop with graphical horsepower exceeding the very capable GTX 970 M. All in all with new Intel "Kaby Lake" processors set to take the stage at CES 2017 too, we could see quite an array of new or reconfigured laptops scattered throughout the show.

NVIDIA has today released their latest GeForce Game Ready drivers, in the form of the 376.19 WHQL release. The new drivers boast support for Oculus Touch launch titles, such as Crytek's "The Climb", Oculus Studios' "Oculus First Contact", Insomniac's "The Unspoken", The Stork Burnt Down's "Home Improvisation: Furniture Sandbox" for all your furbishing-related needs and IKEA doctorate, as well as Escalation Studios' "Please, Don't Touch Anything", along with an estimated 345 other Oculus Touch launch games (in reality, closer to 49 others;I admit, I picked some of the most interesting names). Also, remember that article about the VR bubble bursting?)

Lacking are any additional SLI profiles, though there are some resolved issues specifically on Windows 10: an issue where No Man's Sky with the Foundation Update (1.10) would display severe texture corruption with SLI enabled, G-SYNC flickering issues on notebooks, as well as a notebook G-SYNC pendulum demo issue. For those of you using 3D Vision, there are some updates on that field as well, with four new profiles for Dead Rising 4, Mars 2030, Serious Sam and SuperHot. You can grab the drivers from the NVIDIA page, right here on TPU. Just check the links below the images.DOWNLOAD: NVIDIA GeForce 376.19 WHQL for Windows 10 64-bit | Windows 10 32-bit | Windows 8/7/Vista 64-bit | Windows 8/7/Vista 32-bit

Benchmarks of an as-of-yet-unknown GPU have surfaced in the Ashes of the Singularity benchmark database - one that could point towards performance levels on an upcoming AMD GPU (the RX 490?). With new cards based on Vega expected to arrive in early 2017 sporting a brand new architecture, hope is they will fill in AMD's utterly lacking (as in, equal to zero) enthusiast-class performance graphics solutions. The new GPU appears to be within spitting distance of the already established GTX 1080, with only a few percentage points separating the two (with the unknown graphics card having an 85.1 average frame-rate in all batches at 1080p standard settings, against 93.4 on a GTX 1080 - with both values potentially varying with particular overclocking characteristics and so on, so please don't take them at face value.

Many research firms' numbers have shown that VR product sales in 2016 have been weaker than originally expected due to both high product costs and lack of content. No-one has yet seen VR's killer app, after all, and I know I'd love to see another Halo-like product to drive awareness on the VR platforms like it did on the original Xbox.

All of the above lead towards Google's Daydream View, HTC's Vive, Oculus Rift and Samsung Electronics' Gear VR having all achieved sales that are not even close to previously-set market expectations, with even the current mainstream poster-boy for VR, Sony's PSVR, showing adoption numbers that are as lowly as low can be. Even in their home-field, Japan, a country known for being filled with tech-savvy and tech-crazed customers, only 0.7% of the existing PS4 and PS4 Pro user-base has made the jump for a VR headset.

AMD's December 13th "New Horizon" event is supposedly (and expectedly) a pivotal moment for the company - a celebration of sorts for the impending launch of their ZEN-based microprocessors. The event, which will be presented mainly by Gametrailers TV-based journalist Geoff Keighley, is now turning up to be a Summit Ridge celebration of sorts as well.

According to recent reports, a small number of motherboard manufacturers should also be in attendance at the event, showing-off their AM4-compatible motherboards based on the top-of-the-line X370 chipset. The X370 is the most advanced version of the Zen-compatible chipsets and is expected to provide extensive overclocking features and up to two third-generation PCIe x16 lanes for multi-GPU systems. Below the X370, the B350 and A320 take over the role of the mid-range and entry-level chipsets respectively. The new chipsets are expected to bring native M.2 NVMe & SATA Express connectivity, PCIe gen 3, DDR4 memory compatibility and USB 3.1 Gen2 to the company's high-end desktop platform for the very first time.

Realtek have recently updated their High Definition Audio drivers. Version 2.80 of the drivers brings some overdue improvements to the table, at least when it comes to the time frame of their release: Windows 10 is now supported, and there are some mysterious "customizations" added. Codecs ALC255, ALC235 and ALC867 where also added, and support for Windows 8.1 was improved.

You can grab the drivers from Realtek's own site, right here.

We've earlier reported about the implementation of EasyAntiCheat on Watch Dogs 2 - and how the Ubisoft game installs a driver in kernel mode and a service that monitors your systems' operating files (when Watch Dogs 2 is running). In that piece, we said that "This mechanism is also running even when you're in single-player-only - and even offline - modes, meaning that you're not getting out of its crosshairs no matter how you are playing the game". Now, there seems to be a way to bypass the system monitoring altogether and enjoy the game in single-player. The way to do so, however, varies whether you're running the game on Steam or on Uplay.

Remember ASRock's Beebox? The original Mini PC was originally reviewed here on TechPowerUp to a glowing score and wholehearted recommendation, and now, the company has announced an upgrade to its innards that is sure to give a new lease of life to the device's appeal. The upgraded systems are powered by either Intel's Core i5-7100U (2C/4T, 2.5 GHz base and 3.1 GHz Boost clocks) or i3-7200U (2C/4T, 2.4 GHz base clock) CPUs, featuring the Kaby Lake micro-architecture, but are, apart from that, identical to their predecessors. The system can also be equipped with up to 32 GB of DDR4-2133 memory (two SO-DIMM slots), an M.2-2280 NVMe SSD and a 2.5" SSD/HDD depending on your particular demands. Meanwhile, Intel's 802.11ac Wi-Fi + BT 4.0 wireless module is pre-installed.

Seagate has announced that the company is launching its Duet external hard drive, which would be, in all regards, a run-of-the-mill external hard drive (based on the company's Backup Plus Portable Drive), were it not for the fact that it runs tailored software that syncs its contents with the Amazon Drive service. The drive automatically downloads and uploads content from (and to) Amazon Drive to enable instant and offline access to data stored in the cloud - allowing you to not only store your data on the Cloud, but also keep a physical copy of it with you.

Business. Business never changes. Whether you're for Keynes or Hayek, some truths just can't be escaped: and the one based on the market tending to equilibrium between the forces of supply and demand is oft times almost akin to a law of physics - other times, not so much. This time, it appears as if the market forces are steering NAND prices through the roof. The causes? Varied, though you probably carry one of them in your pocket most of the time. We earlier reported surging prices in the DRAM market, spurred by the Note 7 fiasco and increased production of that smartphone's competitors (and Samsung's own products) to fill the gaping hole left by its forcible market removal. But not only by DRAM are smartphones powered - they also make use of NAND flash.

Due to the usual metrics and happenstances with foundry yields and wafer production, some chips contained in the production wafers are defective, with inoperative sections. This is always taken into account by companies, such as NVIDIA, while designing their product stacks (with the GTX 1070/1080 sharing the same silicon, and GTX 1070 samples being, mostly, defective versions of the fully-enabled Pascal GP104-140 chip). Other times, when supply of defective chips that can guarantee sufficient numbers of lower-tiered products, such as the GTX 1070, is insufficient to guarantee market demands (basically, things go better than expected at production), some sections of fully-operational chips are deactivated, so that it has the same working resources as the (otherwise defective) chips. Sometimes, like it happened with the Radeon HD 6950, these chips' resources can even be unlocked by simple BIOS flashing. According to recent reports, NVIDIA is bound to do something akin to that, by reusing GP104-140 chips on their GTX 1060 3 GB variants.

Gainward introduced the GameSoul line of premium graphics cards for the Greater China region. The series is led by the GeForce GTX 1080 GameSoul, followed by the GTX 1070 GameSoul. Both cards are based on a nearly identical board design, but differ with the PCB, with the GTX 1070 card featuring GDDR5 memory in place of GDDR5X. Both cards feature a large, triple-slot cooling solution with split aluminium fin-stacks, ventilated by a trio of 100 mm spinners.

The GTX 1080 GameSoul comes with factory-overclocked speeds of 1733 MHz core, 1873 MHz GPU Boost, against reference clock speeds of 1607/1733 MHz; while the GTX 1070 GameSoul comes with speeds of 1620/1822 MHz, against 1506/1683 MHz reference clocks. Both cards feature ref LED lighting, dual-BIOS, draw power from a pair of 8-pin PCIe power connectors, and feature display outputs of three DisplayPorts 1.4 and one each of HDMI 2.0b and dual-link DVI.

After announcing earlier this week the impending release of their VR Go backpack, ZOTAC has now made pricing details available: $1999 will net you the ability to strap a PC to your body so you can freely engage with enemies or friends alike in VR environments.

The ZOTAC VR GO can work autonomously for up to two hours, feeding on two Li-ion batteries rated at 95Wh (6600mAh). The batteries can be hot-swapped and charged separately, featuring a DC12V-out for powering the HTC Vive or Oculus Rift. When not in use as a backpack to play virtual reality games, the VR GO can be used like a normal desktop computer: its form-factor allows it to be placed on a desk either vertically or horizontally and all the ports will remain accessible. It isn't very heavy, either, though at 4.95 kilograms, your mileage may vary.

MSI announced retail availability of the Core Frozr L CPU cooler. This tower-type air cooler features an aluminium fin stack that projects upwards from the base at a slightly offset position. This is to clear up room south of the CPU socket in a typical motherboard, and also to clear up room near the memory slots. The cooler measures 140 mm x 155 mm x 84 mm, and weighs 960 g.

The cooler features four 8 mm thick nickel-plated copper heat pipes that draw heat from the base, and convey them along eight points in the fin-stack. The topmost fin features a groovy MSI Gaming die-cast metal plate. The included 140 mm Torq-X fan spins between 500-1,800 RPM, pushing between 19.79 - 71.27 CFM of air, with a noise output of 17.2 - 33.6 dBA. The cooler can handle thermal loads of up to 200W. It supports most modern CPU socket types, including AM4, LGA2011v3, LGA115x, LGA1366, AM3(+), and FM2(+).

In a bid to help you remove at least one of those pesky charging cables from your life, AOC has revealed a 27-inch PLS monitor which includes a Qi base station on its stand, enabling you to charge compatible smartphones. In doing this, AOC joins the likes of Samsung in offering monitors with wireless charging capabilities.

The P2779VC features a 1920x1080 resolution PLS panel, one VGA input, and two HDMI 1.3 inputs. The panel boasts a 178-degree viewing angle, true 8-bit color depth, and a 20,000,000:1 contrast ratio, pointing it more towards color accuracy than other metrics. When it comes to gaming, it's certainly not at the top of screen responsiveness with a quoted response time of around 5ms, but it certainly isn't impossible to game on.

The P2779VC will debut in the US in December, with AOC saying it will be stocked by Amazon, Best Buy, and Newegg, with an MSRP of $250.