TUL Corporation, a leading manufacturer of AMD graphic cards, today announced a gaming graphics series designed for enthusiasts only: the PowerColor PCS+ Vortex II series. The latest patent cooling series released with HD7970 and HD7870; by taking advantage of the deluxe "Platinum Power Kit" design, allowing the best power efficiency and enhancing stability at overclocking mode.

The latest series armed with patent "Vortex" II cooling technology, featuring an adjustable and perforated fan design, gamers can manually adjust the fan and its physical attribute, optimizing the air flow and dissipating the excessive heat efficiently, providing no-compromise cooling effect with silent gaming environment.

ZOTAC International, a global innovator of graphics cards, mainboards and mini-PCs, today redefines the mini-PC form factor with the extra small ZBOX nano XS AD11 Plus mini-PC. The ZOTAC ZBOX nano XS AD11 Plus is the world's smallest PC capable of delivering a rich high-definition desktop computing experience.

An AMD E-450 APU with Radeon HD 6320 graphics processing sits at the heart of the ZOTAC ZBOX nano XS AD11 Plus to render beautiful Microsoft DirectX 11 graphics and playback stunning online and offline high-definition content. The completely new ZOTAC ZBOX nano XS chassis shrinks the ZBOX nano chassis by nearly 17-percent into a 106-milimeter box that is only 37-milimeters tall that can easily slip into a jacket pocket.

A report in the the latest issue of Xbox World print magazine suggests that developer kits (devkits) of Durango (next-generation Xbox console), were implementing a "state of the art" 16-core IBM PowerPC CPU, its companion graphics processor is AMD-made, spec'd equivalent to AMD Radeon HD 7000 series, as previously reported. The 16-core CPU is said to have been implemented with a far-sight on the platform's longevity. "It's a ridiculous amount of power for a games machine - too much power, even. But remember, Kinect 2 could chew up four whole cores tracking multiple players right down to their fingertips, so it'll need a lot of power," the Xbox World article commented.

We know from older reports that NVIDIA is working on GeForce GTX 690, a dual-GPU graphics card based on the 28 nm GK104 silicon, we also know that its launch will be strategically timed to follow that of AMD Radeon HD 7990. Expreview scored a few juicy details about this card. To begin with, it is reported that GeForce GTX 690 will draw power from two 8-pin PCIe power connectors.

The GeForce GTX 690 will use a PCI-Express 3.0-compliant bridge chip. Its display outputs will include three DVI and one DisplayPort. PSU with at least 650W capacity will be made a system requirement. The entire feature-set of GeForce GTX 680 will be carried over. The exact specifications, core configuration, and memory amount, remain at large.

AMD's upcoming "Trinity" family of desktop and mobile accelerated processing units (APUs) will use up to four x86-64 cores based on the company's newest CPU architecture, codenamed "Piledriver". AMD conservatively estimated performance/clock improvements over current-generation "Bulldozer" architecture, with Piledriver. Citavia put next-generation A10-5800K, and A8-4500M "Trinity" desktop and notebook APUs, and pitted them against several currently-launched processors, from both AMD and Intel.

It found integer and floating-point performance increases clock-for-clock, against Bulldozer-based FX-8150. The benchmark is not multi-threaded, and hence gives us a fair idea of the per core performance. On a rather disturbing note, the performance-per-GHz figures of Piledriver are trailing far behind K12 architecture (Llano, A8-3850), let alone competitive architectures from Intel.

DangerDen recently announced the worldwide availability of DD-7970, its performance water-block for AMD Radeon HD 7970 (reference design PCBs). The DD-7970 is designed to provide coverage to all hot components on the obverse side of the PCB, including the 28 nm "Tahiti" GPU, 12 GDDR5 memory chips, and the VRM. Its coolant channel passes through the portion of the VRM, the portion over the GPU is ridged to increase surface area of dissipation. Options for the top include clear polycarbonate, and satin-finished copper. The polycarbonate top variant weighs 3 lbs, while the satin-finished copper variant weighs 4 lbs. Both are priced at US $114.95, available through DangerDen's online store.

Taiwan's premier semiconductor foundry, TSMC, is reportedly facing an acute shortage in 28 nm manufacturing capacity. This shortage is expected to relax in Q3, 2012, according to sources. Qualcomm, AMD, and NVIDIA are the three biggest patrons of the 28 nm process, Qualcomm uses it to manufacture performance ARM application processors, while AMD and NVIDIA use it for their new generation GPUs. Although launched at the very end of Q4 2011, AMD's HD 7970 shipped a relatively small volume due to low manufacturing capacity. NVIDIA launched only two 28 nm GPUs, the GTX 680, and GT 640M, and has had to delay launch of more models, due to this reason, according to source. Qualcomm, meanwhile, shifted some of its orders to UMC.

Sony's next-generation PlayStation, reportedly codenamed "Orbis", is known to be powered by an AMD x86-64 CPU with graphics based on its Southern Islands architecture, from the older report. We're now hearing that Sony may implement a multi-GPU solution of its own. According to an IGN.com report, the CPU in question will be a custom-version of AMD's A8-3850 quad-core APU. This should serve as indication that the processor cores will be based on AMD's K10 Stars architecture, rather than K15 Bulldozer/Piledriver.

The GPU, on the other hand, will be based on the "Southern Islands" architecture, and the IGN.com report pin points it to resemble Radeon HD 7670. The HD 7670 is a re-branded HD 6670, which is based on the 40 nm "Turks" GPU. Turks uses neither Graphics CoreNext nor VLIW4, but the older VLIW5 number-crunching machinery. The most interesting piece of information here is talk of a multi-GPU configuration between this Turks-based GPU, and the GPU that's embedded into the "Llano" APU. We know that the graphics core embedded into AMD A8-3850, the Radeon HD 6550D, can work in tandem with Radeon HD 6670 to yield an AMD Hybrid CrossFireX configuration called "Radeon HD 6690D2". This could be end up being Sony's graphics weapon of choice.

A marketing slide by AMD for industry partners, which sums up what the company's 2012 Mainstream Platform led by "Trinity" APUs will offer, got leaked to the web. In it, AMD claims its next-generation APUs to offer up to 29 percent higher productivity performance (read: CPU performance), and up to 56 percent higher visual performance, compared to current-generation (Llano). At least the graphics performance figures seem to be consistent with early test results.

Apart from these, the slide claims Trinity to be optimized for Windows 8 (with AVX, AES-NI, SSE4.2, and DirectX 11.1 graphics, it could very well be). The processor is said to feature third-generation auto-overclocking technology, TurboCore 3.0. The mobile version of the chip will be designed to offer over 12 hours of resting battery-life. Lastly, there's mention of new media-acceleration features. AMD is expected to launch its new line of APUs in this quarter (before July).

AMD announced today that Darrell Ford, 47, will join the company as senior vice president and chief human resources officer. He will report to President and Chief Executive Officer Rory Read. Ford, who was most recently vice president, Human Resources - Retail for Shell Oil, will be responsible for leading all areas of the company's human resources function.

"Darrell brings a strong combination of deep human resources expertise, sound business acumen and a global perspective that will strengthen AMD's leadership team," Read said. "In addition to managing AMD's global HR function, he will also lead an ongoing effort to align our global employee population around a culture of commitment to help create enhanced value for our customers and shareholders."

MEN Micro Inc., a world-renowned provider of embedded computing and I/O solutions for mission-critical industrial, mobile and harsh environment applications, now offers the G214, a 3U CompactPCI Serial multi-display controller board based on the latest AMD Radeon processor architecture.

The new peripheral board is ideal for use for video surveillance in control rooms as well as in simulators, professional A/V equipment and digital signage applications and other embedded applications requiring compute-intensive GPGPUs (general purpose graphics processing units).

Microsoft's next-generation Xbox console, codenamed "Durango", will implement an "always-on" DRM, according to a VG 24/7 report. Always-on is a stringent anti-piracy measure that's already in use with some PC game titles published by Ubisoft, which requires the players to be connected to the Internet when playing. Even as its proponents (read: game publishers only), claim increased sales, it faces strong opposition from the gaming community. The Christmas 2013 (tentative) launch of Durango rides on the assumption that fast, always-on broadband Internet will have proliferated to every living room.

Next up, there's talk of Durango featuring a unique multi-GPU hardware design that doesn't resemble symmetric PC multi-GPU technologies such as NVIDIA SLI or AMD CrossFire, but instead, the two GPUs will be tasked with rendering the same object redundantly. Perhaps Durango features native flicker-free stereoscopic 3D capability, and the two GPUs are merely rendering the two planes? Once again, there's talk that these GPUs will be designed by AMD. The CPU of Durango will feature "four or six" cores. Lastly, Blu-ray disc is back as the storage medium, in these latest rumors.

Admittedly, this is a terrible day for news on unannounced GPUs, but we rushed it in anyway. Here are the first board shots of AMD's next-generation dual-GPU graphics card, the Radeon HD 7990 (codename: "New Zealand"). Sources told us that AMD working overtime to release this SKU, to restore performance-leadership of the Radeon HD 7900 series. The dual-GPU card, according to the specifications at hand, is bearing AMD's coveted "GHz Edition" badge, its core is clocked higher than that of the HD 7970.

But first, the board shot. Pictured below is the first picture of this beast. Right away you'll question its authenticity for using a 70 mm fan instead of a lateral-flow blower, but that design change serves a purpose. Despite its high performance, the previous-generation Radeon HD 6990 was plagued with user complaints of high noise. That's because a single, normal-sized lateral-flow blower was positioned in the center, blowing through two sets of aluminum channels, at a very high speed. With the HD 7990, AMD on the other hand, borrowed the ventilation design of NVIDIA's GeForce GTX 590, to a large extant. It reused the fan found on reference-design HD 7850 and HD 7770, and placed it in middle of two heatsinks.

Announced back in January, at CES 2012, the IdeaPad S206 11.6-inch laptop is moving closer to its release date so its maker, Lenovo, has made a nice little video for it to entice potential buyers. The S206 features a 20.7 mm thick metallic casing, an AccuType keyboard, an AMD dual-core APU, a 0.3-megapixel webcam, 802.11 b/g/n WiFi, the Quick Start 'instant on' function, and a battery allowing for up to 4 hours of operation.

Hightech Information System (HIS) today announced the launch of HIS 7850 Fan 2 GB. The card offers outstanding graphics quality and excellent cooling technology for enthusiastic users. With core and memory clocks at 860 MHz and 4800 MHz, the card ensures the highest graphics enjoyment during hardcore gaming. Equipped with HIS outstanding cooler, the card provides a quiet environment for daily tasks and movies.

The card also comes with the innovative overclocking software by HIS - iTurbo. User can control the temperature, speed and power in their hands!

As the month of March is drawing to a close, AMD has decided to release a fresh batch of Catalyst Application Profiles that should go great with the latest Catalyst release. The 12.3 CAP 1 package weights in 0.5 MB and includes the following profiles:

- FireFall: Resolve corruption when enabling Anti-Aliasing through the Catalyst Control Center on single GPU configurations
- Test Drive Unlimited 2: Improves CrossFire performance
- Ridge Racer Unbounded: Fixes full screen corruption for single GPU configurations
- Stacking: Resolved image quality issues when enabling Anti-Aliasing through the Catalyst Control Center on single GPU configurations
- Dirt 3: Fixes corruption found in particular scenes when CrossFire is enabled

The 12.3 CAP 1 can be downloaded from this page.

Sony may have codenamed PlayStation 4 "Orbis" (IPA: /ˈor.bis/), according to a Kotaku report. The next-generation game console is slated for "holiday season, 2013." This information was sourced by Kotaku, from a reliable source with a good track-record of accuracy. Orbis is derived from the Latin word for "circle", or "to circle/orbit". The term "Orbis Vita" or "Orbis Vitae" denotes "the circle of life." The specifications of Orbis known so far, include AMD-made x86-64 CPU, and an AMD-made GPU, built on the Southern Islands (Graphics CoreNext) architecture. In all probability, it could be a unified SoC, a highly scalar Fusion chip.

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 now made available this month's WHQL-certified set of Catalyst graphics drivers. The Catalyst 12.3 comes with support for the 28 nm-flavored Radeon HD 7900, HD 7800 and HD 7700 Series, as well as for the Radeon HD 6000, HD 5000, HD 4000, HD 3000 and HD 2000 models.

Download: Windows 7/Vista (32-bit) | Windows 7/Vista (64-bit) | Windows XP (32-bit) | Windows XP (64-bit)

Japanese cooling expert Scythe announcing a new revision of the Top-Flow CPU cooler Grand Kama Cross. New Rev. B of the x-shaped cooler comes with reliable quality and performance for the same price as prior version. Main improvement is the compatibility to the new enthusiast socket LGA2011 from Intel. Furthermore Socket compatibility list includes latest Intel socket LGA1155, LGA1156, LGA775, LGA1366 as well as AMD socket 754, 939, 940, AM2, AM2+, AM3, AM3+ and FM1.

Well-proven Top-Flow design of grand Kama Cross Rev. B utilizes the created airflow to additionally cool surrounding components on the motherboard. Curved aluminum fin structure deflects the airflow, which has a positive influence on temperatures of Voltage regulator modules, chipset and RAM. Efficient airflow is achieved by the pre-assembled 140 mm axial fan. Scythe Slip Stream 140 PWM fan comes with PWN support and allows stepless fan speed adjustments from 500 to 1.300 RPM.

While it's certainly dedicated to the ultrabook 'cause', ASUS is not ignoring AMD's own slim mobile PC offering and is in fact prepping a new ultra thin machine powered by the E-450 APU (dual Bobcat cores @ 1.65 GHz, Radeon HD 6320 graphics).

Named U82U, ASUS' new ultra thin has a 14-inch display, 2 GB of RAM (up to 8 GB are supported), a 500 GB hard drive, two USB 3.0 ports, a HDMI output, and an 8-cell battery. ASUS has yet to reveal the machine's release date or price tag.

AMD today announced a collaboration with Green Hills Software, the largest independent vendor of embedded software, that brings its industry-leading INTEGRITY real-time operating system (RTOS) to the AMD Embedded G-Series Accelerated Processing Unit (APU) platform. The combination of INTEGRITY RTOS with the AMD Embedded G-Series APU creates a high performance, reliable and secure embedded computing solution or use across a range of applications including industrial control systems, consumer, networking, military/aerospace and medical.

The INTEGRITY RTOS offers support for multi-core x86 CPUs in the AMD Embedded G-Series APU with its v10.0.2 SMP release. The AMD Embedded G-Series APU offers an advanced, low-power, multi-core x86 CPU and a discrete-class DirectX 11-capable GPU on a single chip. This specific family of APUs was created expressly for the requirements of embedded systems, many of which require the precise, deterministic timing of an RTOS.

FinalWire today released the latest version of AIDA64, version 2.30. This release is set around enhancing the desktop gadget, improving the UPS and smart-battery monitoring capabilities, and adding support for newly-released hardware, such as the latest GPUs from AMD and NVIDIA; and the latest Intel SSDs. AIDA64 is proprietary software, and is available through FinalWire's online store.DOWNLOAD: FinalWire AIDA64 2.30 EXE (installer), ZIP Package

The condensed change-log follows.

The Arctic team has now confirmed that a new Accelero Xtreme VGA cooler is in the works and will reach stores in late May. Known as Accelero Xtreme III, the incoming product has a cooling capacity up to 300 Watts, it measures 288 (L) x 103 (W) x 50 (H) mm, and has 84 aluminum fins, five 6 mm copper heatpipes, three 92 mm (Fluid Dynamic Bearing) fans working at 900 to 2000 RPM, and a copper base with pre-applied MX-4 thermal compound.

It's no news that Zalman is a graphics card vendor in its own might. The company is ready with its Radeon HD 7950 graphics card (model: ZALMAN HD7950-Z). The card uses a slightly customized AMD reference design PCB (customized with its color), augmented with Zalman's proven VF3000 VGA cooler. The VF3000 is a large aluminum fin heatsink to which heat is fed by copper heat pipes, ventilated by two large red LED-lit fans.

The cooler occupies three expansion slots, and is said to offer temperatures as low as 20°C below what the AMD reference cooler manages. This particular model sticks to AMD reference clock speeds, leaving it to end-users to take advantage of the cooler and overclock for themselves, although plans for an OC model are underway.