MSI is preparing to launch its MPG 321URX QD-OLED monitor this month—we first spotted this model during an official expansion of the company's QD-OLED gaming monitor lineup—utilizing Samsung Display Gen 3 panels. The announcement outlined an initial MSRP of $1199 for MSI's MPG 321URX gaming monitor, although a time-limited special introductory offer of $949 was later advertised. ASUS Republic of Gamers (ROG) released its Swift OLED PG32UCDM gaming monitor (in USA and UK markets) late last week—competing at a $1299 price point with MSI's 321URX model. The two companies are attempting to outdo each other—earlier this month MSI pledged a 3-year warranty on its OLED panel products, semi-forcing ASUS into matching that generous offer—they previously advertised a two-year period for ROG Swift OLED monitors.

Monitors Unboxed has investigated alleged permanent MSI MSRP price cuts—affecting the MPG 321URX, as well the 49-inch 491CQP and 27-inch 271QRX QD-OLED models. The manufacturer appears prepped to undercut its competition to the tune of $350 (MPG 321URX vs. PG32UCDM): "I've gotten a second update from MSI regarding the MSRP of their QD-OLEDs. They have decided to change their mind and offer their previously lowered pricing permanently, instead of just as an introductory price. That means the official MSRPs of their products are as follows (read more after the jump)." At the time of writing, MSI's MPG 321URX QD-OLED is available to pre-order at a few North American and UK e-tailers, although a couple of listings state the item is "coming soon," or due in stock by early April.

AMD Ryzen 9 7900X3D is the often-ignored middle child of the 7000X3D series that's flanked by the reigning gaming CPU champion, the Ryzen 7 7800X3D; and the company's flagship Ryzen 9 7950X3D, which performs within 5% of the 7800X3D in gaming, but with the added 8 cores shoring up its productivity performance against the Core i9-14900K. Pricing of the 7900X3D dropped to $409 on Amazon, which is a huge departure from its $600 launch price. At this price, the 7900X3D is set up for a direct clash with the Intel Core i7-14700K, which is going for $400, with its iGPU-disabled sibling, the i7-14700KF listed at $392.

The Ryzen 9 7900X3D is is a 12-core/24-thread dual-CCD processor, with its 12 cores spread among two CCDs in a 6+6 configuration. The first of the two CCDs has the 96 MB L3 cache thanks to the 3D Vertical Cache (3D V-cache) technology, while the second is a regular CCD with just the 32 MB on-die L3 cache, but which can sustain higher clock speeds than the 3D V-cache CCD. The similar 16 core 7950X3D flagship can be had for $600, or about $50 higher than the i9-14900K, while the 7800X3D is going for $370.

A series of price cuts on Best Buy for the GeForce RTX 4060 Ti (8 GB) sees the card now drop to $344, down from its $399 MSRP, reports VideoCardz. This new low price puts it within just $15 of the recently launched AMD Radeon RX 7600 XT. For the vast majority of gamers playing at 1080p, this is great news. In our testing, the RTX 4060 Ti 8 GB is on average 18% faster than the RX 7600 XT in gaming without ray tracing; and a staggering 45% faster with ray tracing enabled. Both the RTX 4060 Ti and the RX 7600 XT are recommended by their makers for maxed out gaming at 1080p, including with ray tracing. Best Buy has the cheapest RTX 4060 Ti in the market right now, with the Gigabyte RTX 4060 Ti Gaming OC listed at $344.

Both the RTX 4060 Ti and the RTX 4060 appear to be designed to withstand a great degree of price cuts, to compete against the RX 7600 XT and RX 7600. The RTX 4060 Ti, much like the RX 7600 XT, features a small ASIC, and just four GDDR6 memory chips for its 128-bit memory bus, a simpler 8-lane PCIe interface; and in our opinion, a simpler VRM design than the RX 7600 XT. The bill of materials would boil down to the ASIC costs; while the RTX 4060 Ti uses a 188 mm² silicon built on the newer 5 nm node; the RX 7600 XT uses a larger 204 mm² albeit based on the older 6 nm node.

ITHome has picked up on interesting retail activity in China, where AMD Radeon RX 6650 XT graphics cards are deeply discounted. This seems to correspond to a possible discontinuation of Team Red's Navi 23 XT GPU—a Board Channel source stated: "AMD factory has stopped production of a certain GPU. At the present time, shipments from all AIB brands have stopped with inventory being cleared. AMD has stopped production for the Radeon RX 6650 XT, and nearly all brands will have their inventory cleared by the end of September." Board partners in China appear to running sales promotions, with cards reduced from an original MSRP of 3099 RMB ($425) down to as low as 1739 RMB (~$240), although these adjusted prices are mostly hovering around the 2000 RMB (~$275) mark.

AMD recently declared that its Radeon RX 7000 desktop lineup is now complete, following the unveiling of mid-range RX 7800 XT and RX 7700 XT cards at last week's Gamescom trade fair in Cologne, Germany. Their low-to-mid tier Radeon RX 7600 card, based on the Navi 33 XL GPU, is the sole successor to multiple RDNA 2 predecessors (RX 6600, 6600 XT & 6650 XT). AMD and its board partners are likely prioritizing larger scale RDNA 3 production, so the latest batch of GPU industry insider information is not all that surprising. Tom's Hardware points out that: "there is hardly any point for AMD to continue production of Navi 23. The company's RDNA 3-based Navi 33 GPU integrates 13.3 billion transistors, has 2048 SPs, and performs better than its direct predecessor. Meanwhile, it has a smaller die size (204 mm² vs 237 mm²) and is made on TSMC's N6 process technology (as opposed to N7 in the case of Navi 23), so it may well be cheaper to produce."

A recent report published by BoardChannels points to Galax possibly implementing a broad set of price cuts across its range of NVIDIA GeForce RTX 40 and 30-series custom graphics card models. Insider information originating from sources within a pool of NVIDIA and AMD board partners suggests that Galax could be shaving off up to 1000 RMB (around $140) from certain Ampere and Ada Lovelace products - effective later this month in its native Hong Kong market as well as mainland China.

The article posits that GeForce RTX 4080 cards could end up becoming 1000 RMB cheaper, and popular RTX 3060 models receiving cuts of around 250 RMB (≈$35). Galax is reported to have already offered entry-level desktop GeForce RTX 3050 cards at lower prices in the latter half of May - with 140 RMB (≈$19.50) reductions. The RTX 4070 series is supposedly set to receive a measly discount of around 150 to 200 RMB (≈$21 to $28), which is likely not doing it many favors given slow worldwide uptake since the product range's launch in mid-April. Galax could be making adjustments to fall in line with rivals (in the region) who have already reduced asking prices for NVIDIA gaming hardware.

Gunnir unveiled its top-end Intel Alchemist card closer to the start of this year - and this week the Chinese company has started selling a white edition of the Arc A770 Photon 16G OC graphics card. It has been reported that this is a world first - no other Alchemist card on the market features a custom cooler finished in white. Gunnir's standard Photon OC model - fitted with a dark gray-ish triple-fan design - has been available for a few months, and a snazzy blue Flux OC model also exists but is restricted to 8 GB VRAM.

Regardless of color choices, Gunnir's range topping Photon OC cards feature the best mainstream graphics hardware that Team Blue has to offer - namely an Alchemist SKU as seen in the (reference design) Arc A770 Limited Edition 16 GB model. Intel's board partners are having a tough time shifting their Arc lineup of graphics cards - discerning customers are wary of relatively immature architectures - and Gunnir has chosen to introduce a seasonal price cut across the Alchemist range. The promotion offers Chinese customers (via Gunnir's JD.com store) discounts on A380 (max. 33%), and A770 (max. 13%) GPUs.

Prices of the AMD Radeon RX 7900 XT RDNA3 graphics card continue on a downward trend, with the cheapest street price now touching $762. This is $137 below the AMD MSRP for the RX 7900 XT of $899, or a 15.23% reduction. At this price, the RX 7900 XT is priced already below several custom-design GeForce RTX 4070 Ti models. At stock frequency, the RX 7900 XT beats the RTX 4070 Ti by around 6% in conventional raster 3D graphics that makes up the majority of the gaming graphics workload, while its ray tracing performance is closer to that of the previous-generation RTX 3080 Ti or RTX 3090. The specific model in question is the XFX Speedster MERC 310 Radeon RX 7900 XT, with the $762 price surfacing on Amazon for $771.09 with a $10 checkbox coupon that's visible to buyers in the U.S.

Intel in February launched a couple of China-exclusive 13th Gen Core SKUs to highly optimize their price-performance for the PC gaming crowd there. These included the Core i5-13490F (6P+4E but with 24 MB L3 cache), and Core i7-13790F (8P+8E but with 33 MB L3 cache). In the wake of increased competition from AMD with its non-X Ryzen 5 7600, Ryzen 7 7700, and price-adjustments for its 7600X and 7700X, Intel is giving these SKUs slight price cuts. The i5-13490F launched at ¥1,599 (roughly $230), but is now retailing for ¥1,499 (roughly $200). There's no word on if these SKUs will launch outside China. The idea behind them is to increase the L3 cache sizes without touching the core-counts or clock-speeds, to improve cache-sensitive gaming performance. These chips are packaged in special "dark" retail boxes as shown below.

AMD Ryzen 7000-series "Zen 4" desktop processors got their first round of price-cuts on leading retailer Newegg, as the company has a hard time justifying their launch-prices in the wake of Intel's 13th Gen Core "Raptor Lake" and declining demand in the PC components market. The new pricing sees the top Ryzen 9 7950X 16-core/32-thread chip priced at USD $574, down from $700 (an 18% price-cut). The 12-core/24-thread Ryzen 9 7900X sees its price go down from $550 to $474 (down 14%).

The 8-core/16-thread Ryzen 7 7700X gets a $50 price-cut sending its price down from $400 to roughly $350. The 6-core/12-thread Ryzen 5 7600X gets a similar $50 cut, which means the chip can now be had for roughly $250, down from its $300 launch price. All four SKUs face stiff competition from the aggressively priced 13th Gen Core SKUs, which include the i9-13900K, the i7-13700K, and the i5-13600K. Prices of Socket AM5 motherboards are another big put-off as they're a major contributor to platform costs, which is restricted to DDR5 memory. The Intel platform currently includes entry-level chipset options, as well as motherboards with DDR4 support.

NVIDIA is working with its board partners to introduce price-cuts for the higher-end of its GeForce RTX 30-series "Ampere" graphics cards, in addition to game bundles. This would see the flagship GeForce RTX 3090 Ti drop in price from $1,999 to $1,499, a 25% price-cut. The RTX 3090 (non-Ti) sees its price cut from $1,499 down to $1,299, or a 13.3% cut. The RTX 3080 Ti slides from $1,199 down to $1,099, an 8.3% cut. The RTX 3080 12 GB will finally be available at or below its MSRP of $799, while remaining inventories of the original RTX 3080 10 GB sticks to $699.

In addition to these price-cuts, NVIDIA is bundling "Ghostwire Tokyo" and "DOOM Eternal" Year One Pass (base game + two DLCs), with these cards as part of a game bundle. NVIDIA is competing with not just a sudden drop in demand stemming from the crypto-currency mining crash; but also crypto miners flooding the market with used cards.

Pricing of AMD's Ryzen 9 5950X 16-core/32-thread "Zen 3" processor dropped to a surprising all-time-low of $600 on Newegg, down from its original $800, a 25% drop in price. This puts the 5950X more or less on par with the pricing of the Intel Core i9-12900K (±$20 variance). The 12-core/24-thread 5900X is going for $450, which is still significantly higher than the $380 that the Core i7-12700K commands.

The 5950X continues to lead the i9-12900K in various heavily multi-threaded productivity tasks, although it has lost the gaming performance edge to the new Intel chip. AMD is attempting to remedy this with the Ryzen 7 5800X3D processor that the company claims offers gaming performance parity, but will fall behind in multi-threaded productivity on account of fewer cores. If you're planning to pick a 5950X from Newegg for a build-from-scratch, don't forget to check out combo deals with motherboards, where you get to save a further $30-odd.

AMD cut prices of its Radeon R9 290 series and R9 280 series graphics cards further down from last month's price-cuts. The cuts see the company's flagship single-GPU product, the Radeon R9 290X, drop from $449, down to $399, an $150 overall drop, from its launch price of $549. The Radeon R9 290, on the other hand, has its price cut to $299, from its launch price of $399. The drop in price of the R9 290 is squeezing AMD's sub-$300 lineup like never before. The R9 280X is down to $270, just $30 less than the R9 290. The R9 285, which launched barely two months ago, has its price squeezed to $229, just $10 more than NVIDIA's GTX 760. If you're in the market for a graphics card with about $250 in hand, you're now open to a ton of options, including ramen for a week, in exchange for the $329 GeForce GTX 970.

AMD is apparently working with its add-in board manufacturers and retailers to bring down prices of its flagship single-GPU graphics card, the Radeon R9 290X. The card can now be had for as low as $449, non-reference design, factory-overclocked cards starting at a $50 premium. Prices could settle down somewhere between $450 and $500. This closely follows AMD's move to bring down price of its dual-GPU flagship Radeon R9 295X2 by a whopping 34 percent, down to $999, offering performance competitive to the $2999 GeForce GTX TITAN-Z. NVIDIA is preparing two new graphics cards competitive in performance to the Radeon R9 290 series, the GeForce GTX 970 and GTX 980. The two are based on the company's new 28 nm "GM204" silicon, implementing the "Maxwell" GPU architecture.

With NVIDIA's GeForce GTX 660 and GTX 650 threatening to make things messy in the sub-$250 market, and competitive pricing between NVIDIA partners with high-end SKUs, AMD is preparing yet another round of price cuts to its Radeon HD 7000 GPU series. Its last round followed the launch of GeForce GTX 660 Ti. According to the source, this is what AMD's lineup could look like, when it's done resetting prices:

• Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition - starts at $430
• Radeon HD 7970 standard - starts at $410
• Radeon HD 7950 Boost - starts at $300
• Radeon HD 7950 standard - starts at $290
• Radeon HD 7870 GHz Edition - starts at $240
• Radeon HD 7850 2 GB - starts at $200

AMD is working on a new set of price-cuts for its performance-thru-enthusiast lines of GPUs, following the launch of NVIDIA's GeForce GTX 660 Ti. The new pricing will take effect by the end of this week. The $299 GeForce GTX 660 Ti, as reviews show, offers higher performance per Dollar than Radeon HD 7870 GHz Edition, and punches above its weight, at the $349 Radeon HD 7950, prompting AMD to change its specifications by increasing core clock speed, and augmenting it with PowerTune with Boost. The resulting HD 7950 with Boost is bound to replace the older HD 7950.

When AMD's new pricing scheme takes effect, this is how the performance-enthusiast segment will shape up:

• Prices of Radeon HD 7950 Boost will go down from US $349 to $319,
• Prices of Radeon HD 7870 GHz Edition will go down from $299 to $249,
• Prices of Radeon HD 7850 2GB will go down to $209, and HD 7850 1GB to $189.

Intel is planning a series of price cuts for its three current consumer SSD lines, the SSD 320, SSD 330, and SSD 520. The new prices could take effect from August, and will render several models with price per GB under $1. While prices of most lower-capacity SSD 320 series products are left untouched (partly because they are being phased out of the market), those of the 300 GB and 600 GB are cut significantly. The 300 GB SSD 320 could get a price cut from US $519 to $464, while that of the 600 GB SSD 320 could go down from $1,059 down to $879.

Intel's current mainstream SSD line, the SSD 330, could face price cuts on some of its best selling models. The 60 GB model could see its price go down from $94 to $69, the 120 GB from $149 to $104, and the 180 GB from $234 to $154. Intel's performance SSD line, the SSD 520 series, sees prices cut for nearly every model. The 60 GB model is down from $109 to $99, 120 GB from $189 to $139, 180 GB from $279 to $199, 240 GB from $349 to $259, and 480 GB $809 to $594. The new prices restore competitiveness of Intel's consumer SSD lines against competitors' offerings, as SSD prices continue on their free-fall.

AMD reportedly finalized the adjusted prices. The price cuts were first reported in a little earlier this month. The price of Radeon HD 7970 was slashed by as much as US $70, sending it down to $479, $20 behind that of the GeForce GTX 680. That of the Radeon HD 7950 was cut by $50, which will send its price down to $399. Lastly, the price of Radeon HD 7770 went down by $20, it is priced at $139. Although not formally part of these price cuts, the Radeon HD 7870 is now available for as low as $330.

Despite losing its competitive edge to NVIDIA's GeForce GTX 680, for various reasons AMD was rather slow in adjusting prices of its Radeon HD 7900 series SKUs, the HD 7970 and HD 7950. We are now learning that AMD is preparing the first round of price cuts for its flagship graphics card lineup, since the advent of NVIDIA's Kepler architecture. A Kitguru report pits price cuts of Radeon HD 7970 as much as by US $60 (from $549 to "as low as" $489). The price of HD 7950, on the other hand, is expected to go down by as much as US $55 (that's from $449 to $394). There's also a small price cut in store for Radeon HD 7770, which according to the report, could go down by $15.

A lot of prospective buyers of new generation GPUs were counting on the US $499 launch price of NVIDIA GeForce GTX 680 to result in reactionary price-cuts in the red camp, particularly with the $549 Radeon HD 7970. NVIDIA's GPU is faster, more efficient, and under normal circumstances, should leave AMD with no other option, but to cut prices of HD 7970 to stay competitive. However, that hasn't happened, and according to a HardwareCanucks report, will not happen any time soon.

NVIDIA's GeForce GTX 680 launch wasn't just on paper, there was market-availability on launch-day, although like every other new GPU launch, stocks have been quite limited. Before this launch, AMD and its partners managed to replenish inventories of Radeon HD 7970, making it generally available, while not budging from its ~$549 price. Sources told HardwareCanucks and this situation won't change unless NVIDIA has a more full-fledged lineup of new-generation GPUs against AMD's, or unless the availability of GeForce GTX 680 drastically improves.

AMD has implemented price-cuts for its desktop CPUs under the Athlon X2, Phenom and Phenom II series. The price cuts affect Athlon X2 model 7750, Phenom X3 models 8750, 8650 and 8450, and the company's current flagship product Phenom II X4 940. The Phenom X3 8750 in particular, is pushed into the $100 mark with its 26% reduction in price.

With the revised price-table, AMD looks to make space for three upcoming products that include the much awaited Phenom II X4 955 Black Edition. Expected to have reached retail in the US on April 20, the chip has been pushed to a later date, when the company plans four launches in all: Phenom II X4 955, Phenom II X4 945, Athlon X2 7850, and AMD Overdrive 3 software.

Phenom II X4 945 is a 3.0 GHz quad-core processor with its multiplier locked at 16x, while the Athlon X2 7850 takes over as the company's flagship dual-core chip spec'd at 2.80 GHz, 3 MB of total cache, and a TDP of 95W. The chip is based on the 65 nm Kuma core. Phenom II X4 955 has already received listings in Europe, where it is priced at €229.90 including taxes.

On Monday we informed you here that Intel intends to cut the prices on some of its processors. Well, it looks that HKEPC's information wasn't exactly precise as some of our readers pointed out. Now thanks to The Tech Report we have some new info, the new prices will hit on Monday, January 19 and primarily affect Intel's 45nm quad-core processors:

• Core 2 Quad Q9650 3.00GHz 12MB 1333MHz $530 -> ~$322
• Core 2 Quad Q9550 2.83GHz 12MB 1333MHz $316 -> ~$267
• Core 2 Quad Q9400 2.66GHz 6MB 1333MHz $266 -> ~$217
• Core 2 Quad Q8300 2.50GHz 4MB 1333MHz $224 -> ~$194
• Core 2 Quad Q8200 2.33GHz 4MB 1333MHz $193 -> ~$163

Again, this is information from "an anonymous tipster", so these prices may vary.

If the Chinese HKEPC is to be believed, Intel is planning on slashing the prices of six Core 2 Duo processors, including the Core 2 Quad Q8200 (down from $193 to $183), the Core 2 Duo E7400 (down from $133 to $113), E5300 (down from $86 to $74), E5200 (down from $84 to $64), E2220 (down from $74 to $64) and E1400 (down from $53 to $43). On January 18th, Intel will also come out with two low-cost dual-core processors - the Core 2 Duo E7500 (2.93GHz@1066MHz FSB, 3MB L2 cache, 65W TDP) and E5400 (2.70GHz@1066MHz FSB, 2MB L2 cache, 65W TDP). This month will see the release of several energy efficient Intel Core 2 Quads as well. Here are their models and specs:

• Core 2 Quad Q9550s - 2.83GHz@1333MHz FSB, 12MB L2 cache, 65W TDP, $369
• Core 2 Quad Q9400s - 2.66GHz@1333MHz FSB, 6MB L2 cache, 65W TDP, $320
• Core 2 Quad Q8200s - 2.33GHz@1333MHz FSB, 4MB L2 cache, 65W TDP, $245

Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) has sent a newsletter to its channel partners today, informing them for yet another price cut that affects the company's desktop processor line-up. Several Phenom X4, Phenom X3 and Athlon X2 processors will be 10 to 20 percent cheeper starting next month. The prices below are not the usual prices "in 1000-unit tray quantities", but approximate street prices.

AMD has added weight to its CPU lineup by bringing in new CPUs and cutting prices for some older ones. New CPUs aside, the price cuts by AMD are rather dramatic to say the least. To begin with, it's known that the Phenom X4 9950 has a rated TDP of 140W, and that only a chosen few motherboards support it, perhaps leading to cold market response. AMD has revised the processor with a lower rated TDP of 125W. This isn't new, AMD did the same with the 125W B3 stepping model X4 9750 months ago, releasing a revised 95W B3 part. What's more, the Phenom X4 9950 Black Edition could sport a surprising price of US $186. Perhaps it's AMD paving the way for its 45nm parts. At its new TDP and price the X4 9950 is a much better buy.

The Phenom X3 8750 would sell for $139, making it very competitive with Intel's offerings at that price-band. Additionally, AMD added new dual-core processors based on the Brisbane core, the Athlon X2 6500 Black Edition priced at $105 and an Athlon X2 5050e 45W low-power part at $90.

Today's report from DigiTimes, comes to inform us that Intel is planning to cut the prices of its desktop processors in the third quarter of this year.

The performance-level Core 2 Quad Q9650 with a core frequency of 3GHz will launch priced at US$530 in thousand-unit tray quantities, while the Core 2 Quad Q9550 will drop around 40% from its original price of US$530 to US$316. The Core 2 Quad 9450, currently priced at US$316, will be phased out of the market to be replaced by the Core 2 Quad 9400 at 2.66GHz and a price of US$266. The Core 2 Quad Q9300 and Q6700 will both be phased out at the same time too, leaving the Q6600 as the only 65nm quad-core CPU left in Intel's lineup, and which will drop from US$224 to US$203. For dual-core CPUs, Intel will launch the Core 2 Duo E8600 at 3.33GHz and US$266, and will phase out the Core 2 Duo E8300. The company will also drop pricing for the Core 2 Duo E8500 and E8400 from US$266 and US$183 to US$183 and US$163, respectively. Intel will also add the Core 2 Duo E7300 at 2.66GHz and US$133 to its entry-level line and to drop the price of its Core 2 Duo E7200 from US$133 to US$113.