In what is turning out to be a massive QA oversight by AMD, people who bought retail Radeon VII graphics cards report that their cards don't support UEFI, and that installing the card in their machines causes their motherboard to engage CSM (compatibility support module), a key component of UEFI firmware that's needed to boot the machine with UEFI-unaware hardware (such as old storage devices, graphics cards, NICs, etc.,).

To verify this claim, we put the stock video BIOS of our Radeon VII sample in a hex editor, and what we found out startled us. The BIOS completely lacks UEFI support, including a GOP (graphics output protocol) driver. A GOP driver is a wafer-thin display driver that runs basic display functions on your GPU during the pre-boot environment. Without UEFI support for the graphics card (i.e. with CSM running), Windows 10 cannot engage Secure Boot. Since UEFI Secure Boot is a requirement for Microsoft Windows 10 Logo certification, we are having doubts whether AMD can really claim "Windows 10 compatible" for Radeon VII, at least until a BIOS update is available.

To add value and give it a feature-set edge over the GeForce RTX 2080, AMD is reportedly preparing to unlock several professional graphics features for the Radeon VII that are otherwise exclusive to Radeon Pro series graphics cards. These features will be released by simply adding Radeon VII support to the upcoming Radeon Pro 19.Q1 software suite. You uninstall your Radeon Adrenalin 2019 Edition drivers and replace them with the Radeon Pro 19.Q1 drivers to access pro features.

These include access to ProRender, certifications for various 3D, CAD, and CGI suites, SecureMI security, enterprise virtualization, and more. Over 320 professional applications are certified for the Radeon Pro 19.Q1 drivers, all of which will seamlessly run on the Radeon VII. AMD will also introduce a feature that lets you switch between the Radeon Pro and Radeon Adrenalin drivers on-the-fly (without needing reboots), so you don't lose your ability to play the latest games with day-one optimizations from AMD. These drivers will make the Radeon VII an incredible value in the enterprise space, as the GPU offers performance rivaling professional graphics cards priced well north of $3,000. It also blunts the feature-set edge the RTX 2080 holds over the Radeon VII.

In our own testing of the Radeon VII, we found that adding washers to the GPU retention bracket to increase mounting pressure reduces temperatures by up to 10°C. You can learn more about what we did in the Overclocking section of our Radeon VII review. Replacing the thermal pad between the Radeon VII GPU and its cooler with liquid metal TIM was found to lower the GPU's maximum junction temperature by 5 °C, and a 24 MHz gain in minimum sustained engine clock speed was observed, by German professional overclocker Roman "der8auer" Hartung. AMD uses a strip of highly conductive Hitachi Chemical TC-HM03 thermal pad as the interface material between its reference Radeon VII cooling solution and the "Vega 20" MCM. Based on vertically-oriented graphite strands, the TC-HM03 is rated to offer 25-45 W/m·K of thermal conductivity, which beats most aftermarket fluid TIMs on paper, including those based on diamond. The conductivity and longer lifespan compared to fluid TIMs is probably why AMD chose it.

Liquid metal is the best possible DIY thermal interface material currently available in the retail market, however it requires careful application because it is electrically conductive and can short open vias or SMDs. der8auer used nail polish to insulate the SMD electrical components surrounding the GPU die on the fiberglass substrate. After drying it, a generous amount of liquid-metal was spread over the uniform MCM cluster. To prevent any air-gaps between the cooler and the TIM layer that's bound to be thinner than the thermal pad, a layer of liquid metal was also coated on the base of the cooler. The retention module was fastened a little on the tighter side. The maximum junction temperature of the GPU lowered from 106 °C to 101 °C, and the minimum GPU clock sustained increased from 1709 MHz to 1733 MHz. The boost frequency, however, remained around 1780 MHz. You can watch the full video presentation by der8auer here.

AMD "Navi" is the company's next-generation graphics architecture succeeding "Vega" and will leverage the 7 nm silicon fabrication process. It was originally slated to launch mid-2019, with probable unveiling on the sidelines of Computex (early-June). Cowcotland reports that AMD has delayed its plans to launch "Navi" all the way to October (Q4-2019). The delay probably has something to do with AMD's 7 nm foundry allocation for the year.

AMD is now fully reliant on TSMC to execute its 7 nm product roadmap, which includes its entire 2nd generation EPYC and 3rd generation Ryzen processors based on the "Zen 2" architecture, and to a smaller extent, GPUs based on its 2nd generation "Vega" architecture, such as the recently launched Radeon VII. We expect the first "Navi" discrete GPU to be a lean, fast-moving product that succeeds "Polaris 30." In addition to 7 nm, it could incorporate faster SIMD units, higher clock-speeds, and a relatively cost-effective memory solution, such as GDDR6.

GIGABYTE, the world's leading premium gaming hardware manufacturer, today announced the launch of Radeon VII HBM2 16G, the latest Radeon VII graphics cards built upon the world's first 7nm gaming GPU. Based on the enhanced second-generation AMD 'Vega' architecture, Radeon VII is equipped with 3840 stream processors and 16GB of ultra-fast HBM2 memory (second-generation High-Bandwidth Memory). It is designed to deliver exceptional performance and amazing experiences for the latest AAA, e-sports and Virtual Reality (VR) titles, demanding 3D rendering and video editing applications, and next-generation compute workloads.

According to the AMD official website, the Radeon VII graphics card enables high-performance gaming and ultra-high quality visuals. Ground-breaking 1 TB/s memory bandwidth and a 4,096-bit memory interface paves the way for ultra-high resolution textures, hyper-realistic settings and life-like characters. With the high speeds of today's graphics cards, framerates often exceed the monitor refresh rate, causing stuttering and tearing.

MSI is proud to officially announce AMD Radeon VII, the world's first 7nm gaming graphics card. The all-new Radeon VII is designed to provide exceptional performance and amazing experiences for the latest AAA, esports and VR titles, demanding 3D rendering and video editing applications, and next-generation compute workloads.

"AMD Radeon VII is the highest-performance gaming graphics card we have ever created," said Scott Herkelman, corporate vice president and general manager, Radeon Technologies Group at AMD. "It is designed for gamers, creators and enthusiasts who demand ultra-high quality visuals, uncompromising performance and immersive gaming experiences."

Hot on the heels of our earlier report of there being just 100 Radeon VII graphics cards in stock to sell in the UK, we're hearing from French tech publication Cowcotland of an even worse situation in the Old Continent. Apparently, there are only 20 cards allocated to France and Spain, each. The price Cowcotland reports for the card is 739€ (including VAT), although paucity of cards could allow retailers to price the card just about anything, if there is demand for them. AMD has not given retailers in Europe inventory replenishment dates. Factories in China are down for the Lunar New Year holiday there, and depending on demand, another production run could be underway only by mid-thru-Late February, with fresh stocks reaching Europe only a month after.

Update February 6, 2019: Our colleagues at Kitguru were able to talk more recently with Gibbo from OcUK, who now clarified there may be anywhere between 100-200 Radeon VII available in the UK at launch, and possibly more coming after that. Take all statements with a grain of salt accordingly. The original story is below.

In what could add credibility to reports of AMD's initial production batch of the Radeon VII being no more than 5,000 pieces, a representative of British PC hardware retailer Overclockers UK posted on the OCUK forums that the inventory for the UK is no more than 100 pieces. From this, OCUK has stocked up 44 cards, and a few more are on the way. In a forum post, "Gibbo" mentions that OCUK will have more than half the Radeon VII graphics cards allocated to the UK market. Sales of the card go live at14:00 BST, on the 7th of February. AMD is probably playing the Radeon VII launch close to the chest, and future production batches will be greenlit looking at how quick these 5,000-odd cards fly off the shelves.

AMD today posted the latest version of Radeon Software Adrenalin 2019 Edition. Version 19.2.1 beta ships with optimization for "APEX Legends" and "The Division 2 private beta." It also improves performance of "Assassin's Creed: Odyssey" by up to 5 percent, when tested on a Radeon RX Vega 64 graphics card. The company also fixed a number of issues.

To begin with, a bug affecting "Battlefield V" in which character outlines remain on the screen after revive has been fixed. Radeon Settings not automatically installing when updating Radeon Software on machines with hybrid graphics has been fixed. Also fixed is a Radeon Settings application crash noticed when switching tabs too quickly with long game lists. Some displays experiencing a loss in video when maximizing to fullscreen any software with FreeSync enabled, also has been fixed. A white-screen bug affecting "Anthem" has been fixed. HDMI Underscan settings not restoring after reboot has been fixed. An inverted color bug with ReLive has been fixed.DOWNLOAD: AMD Radeon Software Adrenalin 19.2.1 beta

The change-log follows.

This should be old news by now, but it actually isn't: MSI is just now releasing their iteration of the AMD Radeon RX 590 SKU. Perhaps the company decided that the product wasn't too differentiated from the previous RX 480 and RX 580 graphics cards so as to justify all the resources they'd have to pour through to its development; or they wanted to first sell through their RX 580 inventory, and have now struck a good balance with stocks of the old and the new.

Whatever the reason, the fact is that MSI's first RX 590, launched in the Armor series - it isn't even in the gaming X department - has been released, three months later, in two variants: Armor and Armor OC (the latter is running a paltry 20 MHz higher than the non-OC version, so). The 12 nm, Polaris 30 XT graphics card draws power from an 8-pin connector, and video outputs include 2x DisplayPort, 2x HDMI, and 1x DVI. It's a dual-slot affair, like almost all MSI graphics cards, and all Armor ones. No word as of yet on availability nor pricing.

AMD (NASDAQ:AMD) today announced revenue for fiscal year 2018 of $6.48 billion, operating income of $451 million, net income of $337 million and diluted earnings per share of $0.32. On a non-GAAP basis, operating income was $633 million, net income was $514 million and diluted earnings per share was $0.46.

For the fourth quarter of 2018, the Company reported revenue of $1.42 billion, operating income of $28 million, net income of $38 million and diluted earnings per share of $0.04. On a non-GAAP basis, operating income was $109 million, net income was $87 million and diluted earnings per share was $0.08.

AMD in its Q4-2018 Earnings Report disclosed that it has amended its Wafer Supply Agreement (WSA) with GlobalFoundries that frees it from paying a "7 nanometer tax." Under the older version of WSA, AMD would have had to pay a penalty to GlobalFoundries if it sourced processors from any other semiconductor foundry. The company got preferential pricing in return for the exclusivity. With GlobalFoundries discontinuing development of cutting-edge processes such as 7 nm and 5 nm, it makes sense for AMD to seek out other foundry partners, such as TSMC, and an amendment to the WSA was needed. With this amendment in place, AMD can go ahead and source 7 nm dies from TSMC without paying penalties to GlobalFoundries (GloFo).

With its "Zen 2" microarchitecture, AMD is going big on multi-chip modules, in which only those components that can tangibly benefit from the switch to the 7 nm node, namely the CPU cores, would be built on 7 nm dies, called "CPU chiplets," while components that don't need the miniaturization just yet, such as the processor's memory controller, PCIe root-complex, etc., will be built on separate dies called "I/O controllers." These dies will continue to be 14 nm, and likely supplied by GloFo. Final packaging of 7 nm CPU chiplets from TSMC, and 14 nm I/O controllers from GloFo, will happen at GloFo's facilities in China or Malaysia. AMD in its amendment committed to purchasing 14 nm and 12 nm chips from GloFo between 2019 and 2021, which means the MCM approach to processors is here to stay.

Amidst breaking news about PowerColor designing what could be the first custom-design Radeon VII graphics card, the company also unveiled its reference-design Radeon VII card, the AXVII 16GBHBM2-3DH. This card sticks to AMD's reference design clock speeds of up to 1750 MHz boost, and up to 1800 MHz "peak" clock speeds, with the memory ticking at 1000 MHz. It implements the slick, solid-aluminium triple-fan stock cooling solution AMD designed for this card. Drawing power from a pair of 8-pin PCIe power connectors, the card puts out three DisplayPort 1.4 and an HDMI 2.0b. Based on the 7 nm "Vega 20" silicon, the Radeon VII packs 3,840 stream processors, 240 TMUs, 64 ROPs, and a 4096-bit wide HBM2 memory interface, holding 16 GB of memory. It's likely that PowerColor will sell this card close to AMD's MSRP for this card, USD $699.

PowerColor, one of AMD's foremost AIB (Add-in-Board) partners, is preparing at least as many as five different SKUs based on the latest, upcoming AMD graphics chip. While AMD did say that initial availability of the new, shrunk-down Vega graphics card would be limited to base design models, it's clear that at least PowerColor wants to bring its years of R&D on cooling solutions to bear.

The product codes for PowerColor's in-development SKUs stand as AXVII 16GBHBM2-3DH (reference model), AXVII 16GBHBM2-2D2H (RedDragon Triple Fan), AXVII 16GBHBM2-2D2HD (RedDevil Triple Fan), AXVII 16GBHBM2-2D2H/OC (RedDragon Triple Fan OC, and AXVII 16GBHBM2-2D2HD/OC (RedDevil Triple Fan OC). Whether PowerColor is moving the fastest, has the best relations with AMD, or is just the one company whose beans have been spilled is uncertain for now, but you can expect other brands to join in on the SKU development, if they aren't doing so already (highly, highly doubtful at that).Update (30/01): A PowerColor representative on Reddit stated that the company is not planning to launch any custom-design Radeon VII in the immediate future. "We did clarify to the media, that at this moment we will only carry AMD reference design and at the moment we do not have custom model planned in the immediate future," they said. PowerColor didn't completely shut off the possibility of a "Red Devil" branded Radeon VII. "Obviously there's quite of you guys out there wanting our Red Devil series on the Vega VII and we will always consider the option. Just not at this point," the statement read.

Benchmarks of AMD's upcoming Radeon VII graphics card have surfaced, courtesy of the one and only, graphics card info and results leaker extraordinaire Tum Apisak. In these scores, and looking purely at the graphics portion of the benchmarks, AMD's solution really does seem to bring the fight to NVIDIA's RTX 2080 - no small feat, considering that it's mostly a shrunk-down version of AMD's previous-gen Vega with overcharged memory and core clocks.

The Radeon VII scores, according to Tum Apisak (take it with a grain of salt), 27400 on the FireStrike test; 13400 on the FIreStrike Extreme bench; 6800 on the FireStrike Ultra test; and finally, 8700 points on Time Spy. Consulting 3D Mark's database, it seems that factory-overclocked RTX 2080 graphics cards usually score around 27000 points on the FIreStrike base and 6400 points on the FireStrike Ultra tests, which means that at least in this synthetic scenario, AMD's graphics card ekes out a win.

Sometime mid-2019, AMD will launch its 3rd generation Ryzen "Zen 2" processors with core counts of up to 16 cores in the AM4 package. These processors will launch alongside the new AMD 500-series desktop chipset family, led by the X570. AMD assures backwards compatibility of these processors with older chipsets provided motherboard vendors support their customers with BIOS updates. You'll probably need a 500-series chipset motherboard to use PCI-Express gen 4.0 connectivity, while older chipsets will limit connectivity to gen 3.0 (not that there are any GPUs that use gen 4.0).

ASRock is developing as many as nine motherboard models based on the AMD X570, according to a list scored by VideoCardz. These include the X570 Phantom Gaming X and X570 Taichi leading the top-end; X570 Phantom Gaming 6, X570 Phantom Gaming 4, and X570 Extreme4 covering the mid-range, and the entry-level of the lineup consisting of the X570 Pro4/R2.0 and X570M Pro4/R2.0.

The leading global motherboard and graphics card manufacturer, ASRock, pleasure to announce the world's first AMD based Mini STX Platform - DeskMini A300 at CES 2019. It adopts with AMD A300 chipset, not only supports AMD AM4 65W APU, but also provides up to 32GB DDR4-2933MHz high-speed memory, which leads to outstanding computing power and 3D performance. DeskMini A300 offers up to 4 storage interfaces, supports three display outputs simultaneously, M.2 Wi-Fi module and various accessories within 1.9 Liter compact size. DeskMini A300 is an ideal choice to build a home entertainment PC and mini data center.

DeskMini A300 features the brand new A300M-STX motherboard. Continuing the design of the ASRock DeskMini series, the AMD AM4 socket is able to support the Bristol Ridge and Raven Ridge's 65W APU, as well as two DDR4 SO-DIMM slots, which can support up to 32GB of capacity. With overclocking memory module, it will power up 20% of 3D gaming performance even more . Moreover, the DeskMini A300 supports three display outputs simultaneously, greatly improves the user experience.

The leading global motherboard manufacturer, ASRock, is proud to introduce the new ASRock Steel Legend motherboard series. ASRock Steel Legend motherboards are built around the most demanding specs and features to provide a wide array of materials, components, and features that ensure stable and reliable performance. Steel Legend motherboards stand out from the crowd through its massive and luscious XXL Aluminum Alloy Heatsinks, I/O Armor, PCI-E Steel Slot, Polychrome Sync (Addressable RGB LED) support, and detailed PCB print on Sapphire Black PCB for mainstream users, gamers, and professionals that choose to work and play in style. With support for the latest AMD Ryzen processors, as well as high-quality audio featuring the highest quality Nichicon golden audio caps and signal shielding integrated into the PCB.

ASRock has gone to great lengths to ensure optimum stability and protection. With ASRock Full Spike Protection on all USB, Audio and LAN ports, users are always protected from Lightning/ESD damage, which is a comforting thought when using Steel Legend motherboards in challenging environments. Use of Premium 60A Power Chokes and Nichicon 12K Black Caps means not only that the B450 Steel Legend and B450M Steel Legend will remain rock solid no matter the task, but it also keeps your system stable when overclocking, for extra performance, whether you're gaming or rendering professional content.

Let me be the first to say that the two may not be directly related, but it is an awfully strong coincidence that both pieces of news come out on the same day. Indeed, earlier in the day AMD put out a press release (full release past the break) announcing "multiple organizational changes focused on strengthening the company's senior leadership team and accelerating growth." Several familiar names have been promoted within the company to be in charge of more products and visions across their CPU and GPU business units. Mark Papermaster, for example, is now an executive VP as well as CTO of AMD, and the company has also hired in new talent, including industry veteran Sandeep Chennakeshu, as executive VP of "Computing and Graphics responsible for the company's high-performance PC, gaming and semi-custom businesses".

Perhaps all this re-structuring and new hiring comes in handy, at a time when we have seen several people leave AMD for Intel or otherwise. Indeed, shortly after that press release went out, word got to us that James Prior, Senior Product Manager for AMD, and an ardent employee for nearly 6 years, is no longer working for the company. We have no word yet on what is next for James, but it was more than a small surprise to know that the person you just spoke with at CES, and had a long conversation of AMD's desktop processors, is gone just like that. We have known James for many years now, and can attest to his work ethics as well as being a great guy all-round. We wish him the best in his future ventures, and look forward to also seeing how AMD's re-structuring turns out.

AMD yesterday released the latest version of their Radeon Adrenalin Graphics Drivers. Version 19.1.2 adds support for the remaster of Resident Evil 2, a long-awaited title, as well as for Tropico 6 and Anthem's Early Access build. Anthem support brings with it an additional 7% performance uplift at 1080p resolution with AMD's RX 580 graphics card. Some issues such as black screens on reboot and flickering issues in rocket League with FreeSync have also been fixed. Follow the link below to download the drivers, and check after the break for additional fixes and known bugs in this release.DOWNLOAD: AMD Radeon Software Adrenalin 19.1.2 Beta

ASRock is a relatively new entry into the graphics card market with its Phantom gaming brand, but has already delivered on AMD's previous-generation hardware with interesting solutions. The company, alongside Sapphire, has been one of the first to showcase their take on AMD's upcoming Radeon VII high-performance graphics card, which will slot in above the company's RX 580 graphics cards in terms of performance.

This is a reference design through and through, so it's more of a question of whether or not you like AsRock's stickers better than their competitors', though some changes to the backplate could have been made as well, in order to expand on ASRock's branding. The Asrock version of AMD's Radeon VII should be available come launch, on February 7h (see what they did there?) for $699.

A new development could shake up our expectations on AMD's new Ryzen 2 CPUs, which if true, could mean that previous rumors of much increased core-counts at the top of AMD's offerings were true. User TUM Apisak, who has been involved in multiple information leaks and scouting for the hardware world, has digged enough to find a submitted UserBenchmark that screams of a 12-core, 24-thread AMD Matisse part (an engineering sample at that, so keep your hats on for the presented clock speeds).

The benchmark list the used CPU via product code 2D3212BGMCWH2_37 / 34_N (H2 is indicative of a Matisse CPU The benchmark is listing a base clock speed of 3.4 GHz and an average boost clock speed of 3.6 GHz. The rest of the system specs are very, very basic, with 4 GB of 1333 MHz DDR4 memory being used on a new AMD platform, based on the Myrtle-MTS based chipset. The processor is listed having a 105 watts TDP and 32 MB of L3 cache.

Sapphire is among the first AMD add-in-board (AIB) partners to launch a Radeon VII graphics card. The card sticks to AMD reference board design, which the company unveiled at its CES 2019 keynote. Interestingly, its GPU engine boost frequency is set at 1750 MHz, which is less than the 1800 MHz boost frequency figure that was mentioned by the company earlier. Could it be that AMD is reserving 1800 MHz for cards directly sold on AMD.com? The memory frequency is unchanged at 1000 MHz, which works out to an HBM2 memory bandwidth of 1 TB/s. Sapphire's box for this card lists out key specifications upfront, and also features the Vega II logo. It's likely that the card will be sold at the baseline price of $699, given that there are no other variants of this card, not even custom-design.

BIOSTAR, a leading manufacturer of motherboards, graphics cards, and storage devices, introduces a solution for edge computing, the BIOSTAR A10N-8800E system-on-chip (SoC) mini-ITX motherboard, for faster data access and computing over traditional cloud solutions. The BIOSTAR A10N-8800E integrates the AMD FX-8800P processor, typically found in AMD mobile computing, for superb processing performance and power efficiency. Even with a mini-ITX form factor, it includes features such as dual channel DDR 4 2133 support, USB3.1 Gen. 1, PCI-e M.2 16Gb/s and HDMI output. The BIOSTAR A10N-8800E is an excellent motherboard for edge computing applications for home, office or online gaming.

AMD in 2012 launched the FX-8150, the "world's first 8-core desktop processor," or so it says on the literal tin. AMD achieved its core-count of 8 with an unconventional CPU core design. Its 8 cores are arranged in four sets of two cores each, called "modules." Each core has its own independent integer unit and L1 data cache, while the two cores share a majority of their components - the core's front-end, a branch-predictor, a 64 KB L1 code cache, a 2 MB L2 cache, but most importantly, an FPU. There was much debate across tech forums on what constitutes a CPU core.

Multiprocessor-aware operating systems had to be tweaked on how to properly address a "Bulldozer" processor. Their schedulers would initially treat "Bulldozer" cores as fully independent (as conventional logic would dictate), until AMD noticed multi-threaded application performance bottlenecks. Eventually, Windows and various *nix kernels received updates to their schedulers to treat each module as a core, and each core as an SMT unit (a logical processor). The FX-8350 is a 4-core/8-thread processor in the eyes of Windows 10, for example. These updates improved the processors' performance but not before consumers started noticing that their operating systems weren't reporting the correct core-count. In 2015, a class-action lawsuit was filed against AMD for false marketing of FX-series processors. The wheels of that lawsuit are finally moving, after a 12-member Jury is set up to examine what constitutes a CPU core, and whether an AMD FX-8000 or FX-9000 series processor can qualify as an 8-core chip.