Intel's next-generation Xe2 "Battlemage" graphics architecture is expected to introduce a significant update to the display engine over the current Xe "Alchemist." The display engine handles the various display I/O of the GPU. For most users with a single display that's running at or under 4K @ 60 Hz, this is irrelevant, however, as your resolution, refresh-rates, color bit-depth, and dynamic-range go up, some of the newer display connector formats become relevant. Intel beat both NVIDIA and AMD to be the first GPU maker to implement DisplayPort 2.1 albeit with a UHBR10 link layer (which is needed for DP 2.1). The DP 2.1 spec prescribes certain optional higher link layer bit-rates, such as UHBR13.5 and UHBR20. AMD was the first to implement UHBR13.5 and UHBR20 with the Radiance display engine in its RDNA 3 GPUs, and we're learning that Intel wants to catch up.

Driver patch notes unearthed by Phoronix find references to Arc "Battlemage" GPUs supporting UHBR13.5. These drivers are believed to have previously supported UHBR20, but support for the higher bit-rate was removed from the current version of drivers. It indicates that Intel is still evaluating the higher bit-rates on its unreleased GPUs, and production-ready versions could implement at least UHBR13.5. DisplayPort 2.1 with UHBR13.5 (13.5 Gbps per lane), over a DP80-ready DisplayPort cable yields a maximum resolution of uncompressed 8K @ 60 Hz with HDR, or 4K @ 240 Hz with HDR. Intel is expected to debut "Battlemage" with its Core Ultra 200-series "Lunar Lake" mobile processors, later this year.

ASUS today announced its participation in the upcoming NAB Show 2024, themed "A Glimpse into Tomorrow's Tech." Visitors to the ASUS booth (C2934, LVCC Central Hall, Exhibition Time: April 14-17, 2024) will have the opportunity to explore the future of content creation with hands-on experiences and demonstrations of groundbreaking innovations. The ASUS showcase will highlight a range of cutting-edge technology ideal for the challenges of XR and virtual production, including the ProArt Display PA32KCX, the world's first 8K Mini LED professional monitor, in addition to AI-powered workstations and color management solutions.

Shooting in 8K gives creators at the cutting-edge of XR and virtual production exceptionally high-resolution footage, affording them wide flexibility in post-production without sacrificing the ability to produce final products in a full 4K resolution. To allow these creators to work with raw 8K footage in full detail, ASUS today announced the ProArt Display PA32KCX, the world's first 8K Mini LED professional monitor. This 32-inch 8K (7680 x 4320) offers an average ΔE value of less than one for world-leading color accuracy, and it covers 97% of the cinema-grade DCI-P3 color gamut for beautifully saturated color reproduction. With its 4096-zone Mini LED backlight capable of 1200 nits peak brightness and industry-leading 1000 nits full-screen sustained brightness, the ProArt Display PA32KCX is an ideal candidate for HDR workflows. It supports multiple HDR metadata formats, including HLG and HDR10, allowing creators to check how content will appear for a wide range of target displays before it is sent off for final delivery.

Intel Core Ultra "Lunar Lake-MX" will be the company's bulwark against Apple's M-series Pro and Max chips, designed to power the next crop of performance ultraportables. The MX codename extension denotes MoP (memory-on-package), which sees stacked LPDDR5X memory chips share the package's fiberglass substrate with the chip, to conserve PCB footprint, and give Intel greater control over the right kind of memory speed, timings, and power-management features suited to its microarchitecture. This is essentially what Apple does with its M-series SoCs powering its MacBooks and iPad Pros. Igor's Lab scored the motherlode on the way Intel has restructured the various components across its chiplets, and the various I/O wired to the package.

When compared to "Meteor Lake," the "Lunar Lake" microarchitecture sees a small amount of "re-aggregation" of the various logic-heavy components of the processor. On "Meteor Lake," the CPU cores and the iGPU sat on separate tiles—Compute tile and Graphics tile, respectively, with a large SoC tile sitting between them, and a smaller I/O tile that serves as an extension of the SoC tile. All four tiles sat on top of a Foveros base tile, which is essentially an interposer—a silicon die that facilitates high-density microscopic wiring between the various tiles that are placed on top of it. With "Lunar Lake," there are only two tiles—the Compute tile, and the SoC tile.

ASUS today announced the official release of ASUS NUC 14 Pro, one of several mini PCs unveiled at CES 2024. ASUS NUC 14 Pro delivers best-in-class performance thanks to its Intel Core Ultra 7 or 5 processor powered by three AI engines—a Graphics Processing Unit (GPU), a Neural Processing Unit (NPU), and a Central Processing Unit (CPU). Offering high throughput, low power consumption, and fast response, ASUS NUC 14 Pro delivers robust computing capabilities. It also features WiFi sensing for intelligent energy efficiency, along with exceptional security, manageability and stability enabled by Intel vPro Enterprise.

Featuring a 4 x 4 matte black textured chassis constructed of recycled plastic, a replaceable lid, and a VESA mounting plate, this ultra-small-form-factor (uSFF) desktop PC integrates into any workspace, offering maximum functionality without compromising style. Each device comes individually packaged and includes a three-year limited warranty.

For those of you that have been waiting patiently for the first DisplayPort 2.1 monitors to start arriving, we have good news as Gigabyte has revealed details of its first display equipped with DP 2.1. The monitor in question is the AORUS FO32U2P which also sports a 4K QD-OLED panel with a 240 Hz refresh rate. The 31.5-inch QD-OLED panel does follow the standard feature set with a 10-bit panel, 250 cd/m² brightness, 1.5 million to one contrast ratio, 0.03 ms GTG response time and a DisplayHDR True Black 400 certification. Gigabyte has gone for an anti-reflective coating as well, which might not appeal to everyone.

As for the inputs, the DP2.1 ports support the full UHBR20 spec, which is 80 Gbps of total bandwidth over four 20 Gbps DisplayPort lanes, which means Gigabyte hasn't skimped on anything here. Yes, you read that correctly as well, the monitor has two DP 2.1 inputs, one full size and one mini DP input and there's also a USB Type-C input that supports DP-Alt mode, in addition to 65 W USB Power Delivery and USB data, although it's not clear if this port also supports DP 2.1. Furthermore, there are two HDMI 2.1 ports, one upstreams and two downstreams USB 3.2 ports, as well as a headphone and microphone jack. Gigabyte has also equipped the AORUS FO32U2P with a pair of 5 W speakers and a stand that offers tilt, swivel, pivot and height adjustments. The maximum power usage is said to be 78 W, but this shouldn't include the USB PD part. Other features include KVM support, daisy-chaining via a DP output, picture in picture and picture by picture support and various gaming features such as crosshairs, night vision, black equalizer etc. Gigabyte has as yet to announce official pricing on a release date.

Update Mar 5th: We've received additional details on the DisplayPorts of the AORUS FO32U2P from Gigabyte and only the DP inputs supports DP 2.1, whereas the USB Type-C input and the DP daisy-chain ports are limited to DP 1.4. The MSRP of the AORUS FO32U2P will be US$1399.99 with the AORUS FO32U2 which is a DP 1.4 version will have an MSRP of US$1199.99.

Back in December, details of HP's OMEN Transcend 32 leaked and one of the big reveals was that this upcoming OLED display was going to feature DisplayPort 2.1 support. Now details have emerged via TFTCentral that the Transcend 32 might not be all it was expected to be, as its DP 2.1 port is what can only be referred to as severely limited, since it only supports UHBR10 which equals 40 Gbps worth of bandwidth. Comparing this with the upcoming Gigabyte AORUS FO32U2P which supports UHBR20, you're looking at twice the bandwidth at 80 Gbps. To put this into real world terms, this means that the OMEN Transcend 32 will still require DIsplay Stream Compression enabled to hit its maximum refresh rate of 240 Hz at 4K resolution, as this requires close to 69 Gbps of bandwidth. That said, it's still capable of 144 Hz without DSC, which is a small consolation prize, but it's hardly going to win over potential customers.

The OMEN Transcend 32 does have a few extras though, such as support for VESA AdaptiveSync 240 and ClearMR in addition to AMD's FreeSync Premium Pro. Other niceties include a USB Type-C port with DP Alt mode as well as 140 W USB Power Delivery, a USB Type-C output and KVM functionality. It's also said to feature "OMEN Gear Switch technology" which makes the display act as a network switch and enables files to be dragged and dropped between devices connected to the monitor. HP has as yet to announce pricing and a launch date for the OMEN Transcend 32.

XFX today launched its Radeon RX 7900 GRE graphics card. Although the custom-design card sticks with the company's RX 7000 series Speedster MERC board design, XFX did not assign a brand extension to this card. The card's styling appears identical to the RX 7800 XT Speedster QICK 319 Core Edition, a card it very likely shares most of its board design with. The RX 7900 GRE is based on a compact "Navi 31" package that's rumored to be pin-compatible with the "Navi 32," which is why most custom RX 7900 GRE cards appear to have board designs closer to their RX 7800 XT counterparts, than to custom RX 7900 XT cards.

The XFX RX 7900 GRE is 33.5 cm long, 13 cm tall, and is 3 slots thick. It features an aluminium fin-stack heatsink that appears identical to that of the RX 7800 XT QICK 319, ventilated by a trio of fans. XFX has given the RX 7900 GRE factory overclocked speeds of 2052 MHz Game clocks, compared to 1880 MHz reference Game clocks; while leaving the memory untouched at 18 Gbps. The card draws power from a pair of 8-pin PCIe power connectors. Display outputs include three DisplayPort 2.1 and one HDMI 2.1. The company didn't reveal pricing.

ASRock, the leading global motherboard, graphics card and mini PC manufacturer, today launched the new Steel Legend and Challenger series graphics cards based on the AMD Radeon RX 7900 GRE GPU. The new ASRock AMD Radeon RX 7900 GRE Series graphics cards are built on the groundbreaking AMD RDNA 3 architecture, featuring redesigned compute units, second-generation AMD Infinity Cache and ray tracing technologies, and increased AI throughput. They also feature the AMD Radiance Display Engine with support for DisplayPort 2.1, full AV1 encoding and are optimized for high-performance, high-resolution 4K/1440p gaming, streaming and content creation applications.

The new ASRock AMD Radeon RX 7900 GRE Series graphics cards are equipped with high-speed 16 GB GDDR6 memory at 18 Gbps, and are pre-overclocked to deliver higher levels of performance. In addition, the AMD Radiance Display Engine provides 12 bit-per-channel color for up to 68 billion colors for incredible color accuracy. ASRock AMD Radeon RX 7900 GRE Series graphics cards also support various ASRock exclusive features, including the Striped Ring/Axial Fan, Air Deflecting Fin, Ultra-fit Heatpipe, Metal Backplate, and Polychrome SYNC technology to provide great cooling efficiency, solid construction and fancy ARGB lighting effects. With these exclusive features, ASRock AMD Radeon RX 7900 GRE Series graphics cards are premium choices for 4K/2K gamers and creators.

BenQ is giving finishing touches to the new MOBIUZ EX321UX planar gaming monitor. This 31.5-inch monitor features mini-LED backlighting with 1,152 local dimming zones. The display features an IPS panel offering 4K Ultra HD (3840 x 2160 pixels) at 144 Hz refresh rate, and 1 ms GTG response time. The panel features 10 bits per cell color (1.07 billion colors), with 99% coverage of Adobe RGB and DCI-P3. Besides the 1,152 local dimming zones, the panel features a maximum brightness of 1,000 cd/m². Display inputs include one DisplayPort 2.1, three HDMI 2.1, and USB 3.2 type-C. The USB port isn't used for display, but rather just a USB hub. The monitor features HDMI eARC (enhanced audio-return channel) on one of its three HDMI 2.1 ports, with support for 7.1-channel audio output that supports Dolby Atmos and DTS:X. BenQ is expected to formally launch the display some time in May.

AMD Radeon RX 7600 XT went on sale today, at a starting price of $330. Designed for maxed out AAA gameplay at 1080p, this card can try its hands with 1440p gaming, at mid-thru-high settings; you can use features such as FSR 2, FSR 3 Frame Generation, the AMD Fluid Motion Frames feature that extends frame generation to any DirectX 11/12 game; as well as the HyperRX one-click performance enhancement that's part of the AMD Software control panel app. AMD had already maxed out all available shaders on the 6 nm "Navi 33" monolithic silicon, but has opted not to rope in the larger "Navi 32" chiplet GPU for the RX 7600 XT. Instead, it attempted to squeeze out the most performance possible from the "Navi 33," by dialing up clock speeds, power limits, and doubling the memory size.

You still get 32 compute units on the RX 7600 XT, which are worth 2,048 stream processors, 64 AI accelerators, 32 Ray accelerators, 128 TMUs, and 64 ROPs, but the 128-bit GDDR6 memory bus now drives 16 GB of memory running at the same 18 Gbps speed, yielding 288 GB/s of bandwidth. The GPU game clock has been increased to 2.47 GHz, up from 2.25 GHz on the RX 7600. The power limit has been increased from 165 W to 190 W on the RX 7600 XT; and implementing DisplayPort 2.1 has been made mandatory for board partners (they can't opt for the DisplayPort 1.4a like they could on the RX 7600). AMD claims that the 16 GB of video memory should come in handy for content creators, and those dabbling with generative AI.

We have three reviews of the Radeon RX 7600 XT for you today, so be sure to check them all out.

Sapphire Radeon RX 7600 XT Pulse | XFX Radeon RX 7600 XT Speedster QICK 309 | ASRock Radeon RX 7600 XT Steel Legend

erial leaker @yuuki_ans on X/Twitter has released details on Intel's upcoming Barlow Rridge Thunderbolt 5 controller which will be known as the JHL9580 or JHL9540 depending on the SKU. The good news is that Intel has finally moved to PCIe 4.0 for the bus interface, which was expected due to the increased bandwidth on offer by Thunderbolt 5 over Thunderbolt 3 and 4. Barlow Ridge will use a PCIe 4.0 x4 interface to connect to the host and it appears that the earlier leak that suggested native Thunderbolt support in Arrow Lake-S might be incorrect, as there are diagrams showing Barlow Ridge connected to Arrow Lake-S CPUs.

Besides the faster bus, Thunderbolt 5 brings asymmetrical data transmission support which means that for display applications there will be a 120/40 Gbps mode, whereas for data only applications Thunderbolt 5 will deliver a symmetrical 80 Gbps mode. We should point out that this only appears to apply to the JHL9580 SKU, which also supports 40 Gbps USB4 speeds, whereas the JHL9540 for some reason remains a Thunderbolt 4 controller. That said, both of the Barlow Ridge SKUs get support for 20 Gbps USB 3.2 Gen 2x2, something that was lacking in previous Thunderbolt implementations. There will also be support for DisplayPort 2.1 via DP Alt Mode with full UHBR20 support when used with a DP80 certified cable. Actual data transfers are limited to the 64 Gbps PCIe 4.0 interface to the host system, just like USB4, but this does at least give Thunderbolt 5 extra head room for display data even in symmetrical mode. The Barlow Ridge controllers appear to be connected directly to the Arrow Lake-S CPUs via the PCIe 4.0 x4 interface, much in the same way USB4 host controllers connect to AMD's Ryzen 7000-series CPUS.

AMD has revealed the full specs of its upcoming Ryzen 8000G APUs and it turns out that the Zen 4c cores aren't clocking as high as the Zen 4 cores in the Ryzen 5 8500G and Ryzen 3 8300G. We should point out that the 8300G has a singular Zen 4 core and three Zen 4c Cores here, so there's no confusion. The Zen 4 cores in the 8500G have a base clock of 4.1 GHz, while the 8300G comes in at 4.0 GHz, with both of the APU's Zen 4c cores having a base clock of 3.2 GHz. Oddly enough, AMD lists the overall base clock of the 8500G as 3.5 GHz and the 8300G as 3.4 GHz with a notice that reads "Represents the average effective base frequency of all cores." AMD is in other words averaging the clock speeds of the two different cores to come up with an approximate base clock.

The Zen 4 cores in the 8500G boost up to 5 GHz, with the 8300G boosting to 4.9 GHz, whereas the Zen 4c cores in the 8500G boost up to 3.7 GHz and in the 8300G to 3.6 GHz. Here AMD doesn't provide an estimated frequency equivalent. Despite being budget models in the Ryzen 8000G-series of APUs, both SKUs get two USB4 ports with full 40 Gbps capabilities, plus a pair of USB 3.2 Gen 2 (10 Gbps) ports. Furthermore the Radeon 740M GPU will be clocked at 2.8 GHz in both APUs, but both SKUs are limited to a mere four graphics cores, whereas the Ryzen 5 8600G gets eight at the same clock speed and the Ryzen 7 8700G gets 12 at 2.9 GHz. All four APUs also support DisplayPort 2.1.

GIGABYTE certainly came to the CES 2024 show in force and big part of its showcase were existing and new monitors, including the 48-inch OLED AORUS FO48U and the 49-inch OLED AORUS CO49DQ gaming monitors. During the show, GIGABYTE revealed a bit more information about its current monitor lineups, including gaming oriented AORUS, as well as multimedia, and standard G- and GS-series gaming monitors.

The flagship offer and the star of the monitor show at GIGABYTE's CES 2024 event was certainly the AORUS OLED monitor lineup, including the CO49DQ, MO34WQC2, FO32U2P, and the FO48U. The big 34-inch AORUS MO34WQC2 OLED monitor with 3440x1440 WQHD resolution and 240 Hz refresh rate is certainly a sight to behold. It is AMD FreeSync Premium certified, has 0.03 ms GTG response time, has integrated KVM switch, and offers two DisplayPort 1.4 and two HDMI 2.1 inputs. The CO49DQ is also another one that peaked our interest, and although it does not include the KVM switch, this 49-inch 10-bit OLED monitor with 5120x1440 resolution offers impressive picture quality with 99% DCI-P3 but sticks with 144 Hz refresh rate. It is also AMD FreeSync Premium certified and has two DisplayPort 1.4 and two HDMI 2.1 inputs, but lacks integrated KVM switch.

The Video Electronics Standards Association (VESA) today announced that it has published the latest update to DisplayPort, version 2.1a. This update replaces the VESA certified DP40 ultra-high-bit-rate (UHBR) cable specification with a new VESA certified DP54 UHBR cable spec to enable up to four-lane UHBR13.5 link rate support (a maximum throughput of 54 Gbps) over a two-meter passive cable. As a result, the DisplayPort 2.1a update effectively doubles the passive cable length for UHBR13.5 GPU-to-display connections—which previously could only be supported through a DP80 UHBR cable—providing consumers with greater flexibility in their gaming or workstation setup.

VESA also announces it has published a new Automotive Extension Services protocol specification for both DisplayPort 2.1a and the latest version of VESA's Embedded DisplayPort (eDP) specification, version 1.5a. This new protocol extension provides support for automotive display functional safety as well as secure integrity and authentication for up to 16 display regions of interest. With the VESA Automotive Extension Services protocol, VESA has for the first time established a standard for vehicle displays that can enable display safety engineers to achieve ISO 26262 ASIL-D* - the holy grail of electronic safety integrity. Silicon manufacturers are already adopting VESA's Automotive Extension Services protocol today for chipsets that will be integrated in future vehicles.

AMD announced the new Radeon RX 7600 XT graphics card, bolstering its mid-range of 1080p class GPUs. The RX 7600 XT is designed for maxed out AAA gaming at 1080p, although it is very much possibly to play many of the titles at 1440p with fairly high settings. You can also take advantage of technologies such as FSR 3 frame generation in games that support it, AMD Fluid Motion Frames on nearly all DirectX 12 and DirectX 11 games; as well as the new expanded AMD HyperRX performance enhancement that engages a host of AMD innovations such as Radeon Super Resolution, Anti-Lag, and Radeon Boost, to achieve a target frame rate.

The Radeon RX 7600 XT is based on the same 6 nm "Navi 33" silicon, and the latest RDNA 3 graphics architecture, as the Radeon RX 7600. If you recall, the RX 7600 had maxed out all 32 CU on the silicon. To design the RX 7600 XT, AMD retained the "Navi 33," but doubled the memory size to 16 GB, and increased the clock speeds. The 16 GB of memory is deployed across the same 128-bit wide memory bus as the 8 GB is on the RX 7600. The memory speed is unchanged, too, at 18 Gbps GDDR6-effective; as is the resulting memory bandwidth, of 288 GB/s. There are two key changes—the GPU clock speeds and power limits.

Hot on the heels of LG's UltraGear 4K OLED monitor with Dual-Hz feature, specifications and pictures of the upcoming HP OMEN Transcend 4K OLED monitor have leaked online. It will come with 32-inch 4K OLED panel with 240 Hz refresh rate and peak brightness of 1000 nits in HDR mode. The monitor will feature HP's Omen Tempest Cooling Tech to mitigate the risk of burn-in problems, as well as support for AMD FreeSync and Dolby Vision.

The rest of the known specifications, reported by Windows Report, include KVM switch, a feature that is quite popular in monitors these days, as well as HDMI 2.1 and DisplayPort 2.1 support. It also includes several other USB Type-C and Type-A ports. The monitor is expected to be the star of HP's OMEN CES 2024 lineup.

AMD continues to release new Ryzen 5000 series processor models for the Socket AM4 platform to this day, with new processors expected to launch next month. That's over 6 years of longevity for the platform, considering that AMD has extended official Ryzen 5000 series support all the way back to its first line of AM4 motherboards based on the 300-series chipset. The company plans a similar longevity for Socket AM5. In an interview with Overclockers UK, AMD's client channel business head David McAfee said "I think that we certainly recognized that the longevity of the AM4 platforms was one of the biggest reasons that led to the success of Ryzen and as we think and as we think about the future, 2025 and beyond, that decision to move to a next-generation of socket is one that's going to be really thought through really really carefully. We know the impact that moving to a new socket brings and we want to stay on AM5 for as long as we possibly can. We are firmly committed to 2025 and beyond and we will see how long that promise lasts beyond 2025."

AMD Socket AM5 is designed to deliver up to 230 W of package power, and has a contemporary I/O that includes a dual-channel DDR5 memory interface (4x 40-bit sub-channels); and 28 PCIe Gen 5 lanes (x16 PEG, two x4 NVMe, and x4 chipset bus), besides the usual SoC connectivity. With the upcoming Ryzen 8000G "Phoenix" APUs, we could expect to see that the socket even wires out modern display I/O such as DisplayPort 2.1 with USB type-C, and the bandwidth for 12-bit HDR up to 68 billion colors. AMD debuted Socket AM5 with the "Zen 4" microarchitecture, with "Zen 5" expected to launch in 2024. It's conceivable that the company's 2025 client architecture, "Zen 6," could also see its desktop presence on AM5, given that DDR5 memory and PCIe Gen 5 will remain relevant till at least that time.

BIOSTAR, a leading manufacturer of motherboards, graphics cards, and storage devices today, is excited to introduce the mid-range gaming combo with AMD AAA solution, the BIOSTAR AMD Radeon RX 7700 XT graphics card, and B650MT motherboard, the perfect solution for casual and mid-range gamers and individuals who relish a premium home entertainment experience.

Built around the AMD B650 single-chip architecture with support for the AMD AM5 socket, the B650MT motherboard is an ideal choice to run the latest AMD Ryzen 7000 series processors with its innate ability to extract maximum performance at any instance. The B650MT motherboard is BIOSTAR's latest offering for gaming and home entertainment, meticulously crafted to meet the demands of both casual and mid-range gaming enthusiasts. This motherboard epitomizes efficiency and stability, boasting top-shelf BIOSTAR technology such as Super Hyper PWM for reliable, steady power delivery and innovative A.I Fan, with an automatic detection system designed to ensure optimum cooling performance while intelligently conserving energy.

Today, Intel announced Thunderbolt 5 - the next generation of Thunderbolt - and demonstrated a prototype laptop and dock. Thunderbolt 5 promises to deliver significant improvements in connectivity speed and bandwidth benefits for computer users.

"Thunderbolt 5 will provide industry-leading performance and capability for connecting computers to monitors, docks, storage and more. Intel is excited to continue our tradition of leadership for wired connectivity solutions. Thunderbolt is now the mainstream port for connectivity on mobile PCs, and delivering the next generation of performance with Thunderbolt 5 will provide even more capability for the most demanding users," said Jason Ziller, general manager of the Client Connectivity Division at Intel.

Samsung Electronics, a global leader in the visual display industry, today announced the future of gaming monitors with the newest entries in its Odyssey monitor series: the Odyssey Neo G9 57" (G95NC model) and the Odyssey Ark 55" (G97NC model). The gaming monitors are on display at Gamescom 2023—the world's largest event for computer and video games, held from August 23 to 27 in Cologne, Germany—and the Odyssey Neo G9 57" can now be pre-ordered globally.

"The world of gaming is constantly evolving, and our latest monitor technology is crucial for gamers to open new doors to adventure and perform their best. Samsung's monitor leadership is further boosted by our newest Odyssey monitors, which unlock the ultimate level of immersion and create new experiences for gamers worldwide," said Hoon Chung, EVP of Visual Display Business at Samsung Electronics. "Gamescom is where the future of gaming is built. We can't imagine a better place to showcase the future of monitors."

AMD today announced the Radeon PRO W7600 and W7500 graphics cards for the professional-visualization (pro-vis) market segment. These cards target the mid-range of the pro-vis segment, with segment price-band ranging between $350-950. The two are hence positioned below the W7800 and W7900 that the company launched in April. The W7600 and W7500 are based on the same RDNA3 graphics architecture as those two, and the client-segment RX 7000 series. AMD is pricing the the two new cards aggressively compared to NVIDIA. Both the W7500 and W7600 are based on the 6 nm "Navi 33" silicon.

The Radeon PRO W7600 leads today's launch, maxing out the silicon it is based on—you get 32 RDNA3 compute units, or 2,048 stream processors; 64 AI Accelerators, 32 Ray Accelerators; 128 TMUs, and 64 ROPs. The card comes with 8 GB of 18 Gbps GDDR6 memory across a 128-bit wide memory bus. The memory does not feature ECC. The card comes with a 130 W typical power draw, with a single 6-pin PCIe power connector. It uses a slick single-slot lateral-airflow cooling solution. AMD claims 20 TFLOPs peak FP32 performance.

Teledyne LeCroy, the worldwide leader in protocol test solutions, announced that it has received Video Electronics Standards Association (VESA) approval for testing DisplayPort 2.1 Link Training Tunable PHY Repeater (LTTPR) and Display Stream Compression (DSC) compliance with the quantumdata M42de Video Analyzer and Generator. These tests underwent extensive testing during industry workshops to ensure their accuracy and reliability and are now considered mandatory for compliance certification of DisplayPort 2.1 Ultra High Bit Rate (UHBR) capable devices.

The DisplayPort specification was updated to version 2.1 in October of 2022 and brought significant changes to link training and LTTPR operation. Design and test engineers are faced with incrementally more testing as DisplayPort chipsets add support for the new link training and other advanced features. "The need to drive higher video resolutions and frame rates raises the bar for vendors seeking VESA logo approval. Compliance testing is a key factor in delivering a robust DisplayPort technology ecosystem and outstanding customer experiences," said Bill Lempesis, executive director of VESA, which develops and administers the DisplayPort standard and compliance logo program. "Reaching this level of comprehensive test coverage so quickly after the DisplayPort 2.1 specification was released is only possible due to the close collaboration between test vendors like Teledyne LeCroy and our VESA member companies."

So far it has been very quiet on the market when it comes to USB4 hubs, with most products being based on Intel Thunderbolt hardware costing Thunderbolt money. Realtek was demoing its RTS5490 "hub router controller" at Computex and it's as far as we're aware, the first USB4 hub IC that has been announced. The RTS5490 supports speeds of up to 40 Gbps and it has one upstreams and four downstreams ports. It's also backwards compatible with Thunderbolt 3 and USB 3.2 Gen 2x2 (20 Gbps), as well as slower USB standards. It also supports the USB PD 3.1 standard and should as such be suitable for docking stations that can deliver up to 240 W to a connected laptop.

It also has native support for DisplayPort 2.1 Alt mode and UHBR20 up to 80 Gbps for DisplayPort signals. The demo board only had an older MST controller, so it would be limited to DP 1.4, but hopefully some company is working on a DP 2.1 MST controller, as this is required to split off the DP signal to the physical ports from USB-C. We were not given any details on when the RTS5490 will be available in the market and pricing will obviously depend on what kind of extra features are being added by the device makers, as it's unlikely that the first products based on it will be simple hubs.

Possible specifications of the upcoming AMD Radeon RX 7600 graphics card leaked to the web. At this point we don't know if the RX 7600 maxes out the silicon it is based on (with room for a faster RX 7600 XT). The leak appears to be from marketing materials of the RX 7600. It speaks of 32 Compute Units. This works out to the same 2,048 stream processors as the previous-generation RX 6600 XT, but an increase from the 1,792 of the RX 6600. The mention of AI accelerators confirms that this GPU is based on the latest RDNA3 graphics architecture.

The other RDNA3 feature referenced is the Radiance Display Engine, which supports the latest DisplayPort 2.1 and HDMI 2.1a outputs, along with 12 bpc color, and support for resolutions as high as 4K 180 Hz with a single cable. Apparently, the GPU that the RX 7600 is based on has 32 MB of Infinity Cache memory, which is the same amount as the previous-generation "Navi 23" silicon powering the RX 6600 series. For the flagship "Navi 31," the Infinity Cache memory size is generationally reduced to 96 MB (from 128 MB on "Navi 21,") because the memory bus width has generationally increased to 384-bit (from 256-bit). This could mean that the RX 7600 has a 128-bit wide memory bus, given that its Infinity Cache size is unchanged from that of the RX 6600 series.

Intel cut the baseline prices of its Arc A750 performance-segment graphics card. The card now starts at USD $249, down from its launch price of $289 for the first-party reference-design card. Among the handful custom-design board partners for the A750 are Acer, Gunnir, and ASRock. The A750 targets maxed-out AAA gaming at 1080p, although the card is capable of higher resolutions with the Intel XeSS performance enhancement.

Based on the 6 nm ACM-G10 silicon, the A750 is endowed with 3,584 unified shaders across 28 Xe Cores or 448 EUs, 224 TMUs, 112 ROPs, and 8 GB of 16 Gbps GDDR6 memory across the chip's full 256-bit wide memory interface (512 GB/s memory bandwidth). The card has a typical board power of 225 W, draws it from a combination of 8-pin and 6-pin PCIe power connectors; and has modern display outputs that include HDMI 2.0 and DisplayPort 2.1. The Arc "Alchemist" family of GPUs meets the full DirectX 12 Ultimate feature-set, including real-time ray tracing. They also have regular driver updates with day-zero optimization for big game releases.Many Thanks to TumbleGeorge for the tip.