During yesterday's Microsoft Event, in addition to the new AI features and Surface devices, the company also announced its new Surface Pro Flex wireless keyboard, compatible with the Surface Pro 8, 9, 10, and 11 models. Officially called "Surface Pro Flex Keyboard with Slim Pen," the wireless keyboard is a $449.98 add-on keyboard that doesn't include Microsoft's Surface Slim Pen 2, only an indentation at the top of the keyboard to charge it. So, without a pen, what does the keyboard offer? According to Microsoft, up to 41 hours of continuous typing while detached, a dedicated Copilot key, and a touchpad with a vibration function for haptic feedback. The touchpad can have varying pressure levels, and applications can use it to build different functionalities.

Its thin and light design measures 289x221x5.25 mm with a weight of 340 g. The dedicated Copilot key summons the AI assistant and all the functionality Microsoft plans for its Windows 11 integration, which has been completely revamped for AI. The material choice is a Alcantara polyester-blend, which can be difficult for maintenance, and the keyboard is sold in either black or bright sapphire colors, becoming available on June 18th. Interestingly, given the name "Surface Pro Flex Keyboard with Slim Pen" and a price tag of $449.98, it is intriguing as to why Microsoft doesn't bundle the Surface Slim Pen 2 with the keyboard, as it is designed with a dedicated wireless charging indentation for the pen.

We're thrilled to announce the addition of Crossplay, a highly anticipated feature in Remnant 2! Now, players can unite against the Root, irrespective of their chosen platform. Team up with friends or discover open games across platforms and embark on your journey together. Dev Note: For console players, Crossplay is set to on by default. This setting will affect your ability to see other games (including friend's games) within the game if their Crossplay setting is set to "off." If you can't see a friend's game in-game, then confirm that you have matching Crossplay settings. The "off" setting will prevent you from joining another game that have Crossplay enabled. Additional Dev Note: Settings on PC that use frame generation currently blocks the Epic Online Services Overlay, which is required for Crossplay functionality of joining friends in game. You can still accept invites using the Epic launcher prior to starting the game and join that way if you wish to use frame generation in game.

Aberration Domination Event
The Root have seized yet another opportunity to unleash a horde of menacing Aberrations across all worlds! From February 29th to March 5th, gear up and face this challenge head-on. Defeat these sinister foes and collect the elusive Corrupted Shards, a rare material with untold potential. Head over to the enigmatic Dwell in Ward 13, where you can trade these Corrupted Shards to craft corrupted versions of some NEW special weapons. Show the Root that even in the darkest of times, our resolve shines brighter than ever! Dev Note: This is our second big aberration event; we figured why not celebrate the addition of Crossplay with another Aberration event! We've added even more corrupted weapons to acquire, so group up and take on the Root!

LIAN LI Industrial Co. Ltd., a leading chassis and PC accessories manufacturer, premieres the LIAN LI 2024 DIGITAL EXPO at 9 am EST on YouTube. In this 2-part video, LIAN LI shares updates on prototype cases, a standing desk, and unveils new concepts for an all-in-one cooler and power supply. The prototypes include the SUP-01, the case that experiments with a front GPU layout, the DAN Cases A3 M-ATX case, and the O11 VISION BACK CONNECT. LIAN LI also unveils the GALAHAD II LCD SHIFT, an AIO that minimizes the tubing, the EDGE Series PSU, a new form factor power supply that solves cable access in dual chamber cases, and the DK-07, a new standing desk with new features. The LIAN LI 2024 DIGITAL EXPO will be followed by a roundtable discussion hosted by Jameson Chen, CEO at LIAN LI, with YouTube influencers Stuart Tonks from GGF Events, Justin Robey from Robytech, and PCMR's founder Pedro Valadas.

The SUP-01, a compact 45-liter case, reimagines the PC layout with a front-positioned graphics card and innovative cooling. Equipped with airflow-optimized mesh panels, it surpasses the LANCOOL 216 in cooling performance. The GPU's unique placement optimizes cooling without sacrificing aesthetics and is supported by adjustable brackets. The airflow configuration strategically utilizes GPU fans and rear fans as intakes, and right-side fans as exhausts, ensuring optimal GPU and CPU cooling. The main chamber accommodates motherboard sizes up to ATX, pre-mounted PCIe 4.0 riser cable, and features clearance for 280 to 360 mm AIOs. Storage options include two SSDs or 3.5" HDDs, a removable drive cage, and magnetic dust filters to maintain system cleanliness. The price is set to be $149.99.

You're about to get an exciting look at some of the incredible games ahead with Xbox, as we present a new edition of Developer_Direct. On Thursday, January 18 at 12pm PT / 3pm ET / 8pm UK, fans will get an inside look at a selection of highly anticipated games coming to Xbox Series X|S, PC, and Game Pass. Shortly after, ZeniMax Online Studios will host The Elder Scrolls Online 2024 Global Reveal at 1pm PT / 4pm ET / 9pm UK to preview 2024's biggest update.

Presented by the game creators themselves, Developer_Direct offers an in-depth look at upcoming titles, how they're being created, and who's creating them. We'll visit MachineGames in Sweden to check in on their Indiana Jones game, swing by Obsidian's Irvine offices to see more from Avowed, head to Oxide Games' Maryland home to learn about Ara: History Untold, and take a trip to Cambridge, England to see Senua's Saga: Hellblade II from Ninja Theory. Please note that while this show won't have updates on games from Activision Blizzard, you can look forward to news from those teams later this year.

A screaming goat once told me that October is the BEST month. Not just because it's full of pumpkins (yum!) or because all the skeletons in my save file finally fit in (aww!), but because Minecraft Live is back on October 15, and this year it's bigger and blockier than ever! If you've never watched our epic, once-a-year livestream before, then you are in for a treat. Not only do we spend an hour talking about Minecraft (our favorite topic), but we dive into news from Minecraft and Minecraft: Legends; share snippets of what you can expect in the future, and reveal the winner of the hotly anticipated mob vote!

Minecraft Live returns on October 15! Tune in at 1pm EDT for news, sneak peeks, the mob vote, and more! Once the mobs have been revealed, you'll be able to cast your vote via the Minecraft Launcher, Minecraft.net, or the special event server on Minecraft: Bedrock Edition from October 13. You can even challenge yourself to mob-tastic mini-games while you're there!

Join Intel Chief Executive Officer Pat Gelsinger, Chief Technology Officer Greg Lavender and other Intel leaders at Intel Innovation 2023, a premier event for global developer communities. In an age fueled by artificial intelligence, developers will engage with their peers and learn from the brightest minds in the industry to use breakthroughs in hardware, software, services and advanced technologies to speed development, drive innovation and help hone every competitive edge.

The two-day event is a technical conference designed to benefit global developers, architects, business leaders, creators and students. Intel Innovation brings this valued community up to speed with the latest Intel technologies and tools during keynote addresses, breakout sessions, hands-on labs and tutorials, networking and community-building events, and interactions with top Intel and industry experts.

The LTX Event has returned in its annual two-day form in beautiful Vancouver after the COVID break. With blistering temperatures outside, it was great to see the turnout and having it come out of the four-year pause that the pandemic demanded. Compared to 2019, where there was a handful of brands, and the 2023 location has moved slightly, from the older Canada Place convention center, to its newer, adjacent building. At roughly USD $40 for a visitor's day pass, one could argue that it isn't even that cheap, but even so upon arriving there on Saturday, there was a line running along the entire length of the building for visitors to enter with a pre-purchased pass in hand.Just like in 2019, the event is propped up around several core pillars. There are interactive events like a case toss competition, live stage shows with various topics, a LAN party section, as well as an ever greater mix of brands to allow excited end-users to get an up close look at featured products and even try them out. The entire event also provides brands the ability to sponsor various sections, while others have focused on booth space for exposure and interactivity.

Today, Apple unveiled the lineup for its annual Worldwide Developers Conference, including the timing of the keynote and Platforms State of the Union presentations, and shared more information with developers about what they'll learn and experience. Free for all developers, WWDC23 will take place in an online format from June 5 through 9, with an opportunity for developers and students to celebrate in person at a special experience at Apple Park on opening day.

The packed week of events and activities will help developers learn about the latest technologies, tools, and frameworks coming to iOS, iPadOS, macOS, tvOS, and watchOS. Throughout the week, developers will be able to connect directly with Apple engineers and experts through one-on-one labs and activities in Slack for guidance on building innovative and platform-differentiating apps and games.

Welcome, adventurer. On June 2, the fiery pits of Hell will rejoice - Diablo Immortal turns one! This milestone could not have been achieved without your continuous support, and to honor you, we have a bloody wave of new additions hitting the shores of Sanctuary over the next two months. It's time to gaze into the flames and provide a bird's-eye view of the upcoming Diablo IV Launch Celebration x Diablo Immortal event and Lilith-themed Cosmetics, new Zone, and new Class.

DIABLO IV LAUNCH CELEBRATION X DIABLO IMMORTAL
The creation of Sanctuary by Inarius and Lilith is a storied tale; its impact can still be felt today. The Merciless Monstrosity event, Children of Lilith Battle Pass, and Hatred's Heritage Phantom Market will be experienceable expressions of Sanctuary's matriarch. Your opportunity to let sin flow freely will arrive in early June.

The Newegg PC Building Contest finals were held in Taipei, on April 22nd. This isn't a typical e-sports event, or even an overclocking/benchmarking contest, but one with a very simple premise—build an operable PC using the parts of your choice, within a time-limit. The finals saw the top-5 contestants from a pool of 50 make their way to Taipei, and for the final event, the time set was just 1 hour. That seems like an eternity for someone used to building PCs, but this isn't a mom-and-pop Dell you're building—a fully fledged high-end gaming desktop with certain mandatory components to have (although the choice of make of the components is up to you). You're supposed to assemble the desktop and bring it up to an operable state.

Neo Forza became the DDR5 memory and SSD manufacturer of choice for most of the finalists. Three out of five finalists chose Neo Forza Trinity DDR5-7200 memory, and all five of them chose Neo Forza NFP455 NVMe Gen 4 SSD. While the winner put together the build in 37 minutes, the slowest of the five made it in just under the hour. They stated that the build was "stressful" and they never thought it could get so nerve-racking to put together a simple PC. Meanwhile, Neo Forza celebrated its unexpected claim to fame for being the memory vendor of choice among the finalists. "We were humbly overwhelmed as the event, inadvertently, showed Neo Forza as a preferred choice by experienced pro-users for DRAM and SSD in PC builds suitable for gaming, content-creation, streaming and 3D rendering," the company commented.

The Sky UK news network has gathered intel from industry and government sources about an industry event that is due to take place next week at a very famous location - 10 Downing Street - the residence of the UK's Prime Minister. Sky News has been informed that Microsoft has been invited to attend the showcase by the UK Interactive Entertainment (UKIE) industry organization - best described as the main trade body for the nation's games and interactive entertainment sector. The American technology behemoth is expected to display and demonstrate their Xbox gaming product range in front of top politicians and key entertainment industry figures. There is no mention of representatives from Sony Interactive Entertainment (SIE) being invited to attend in a similar capacity. The timing of this UKIE organized event (to take place on April 26) is highly controversial as it will coincide with the UK's Competition and Markets Authority's statutory deadline to deliver a Phase-2 verdict on Microsoft's proposed acquisition of Activision Blizzard.

The UK Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) regulatory body has already delivered a provisional approval of the aforementioned deal, but stated that it required more time to investigate the potential for irregularities in competition within the cloud gaming sector. The Phase-2 verdict, due to be delivered next week, is anticipated to include the antitrust watchdog's finalized judgement on cloud gaming market affairs. Sky's insider sources in the city of London have speculated that Microsoft could face a humiliating situation at the 10 Downing-hosted party, if by coincidence the CMA changes its opinion on the Activision Blizzard takeover bid. If the competition regulator stays consistent with its (earlier) provisional decision, Microsoft could be criticized for its extensive courting of government organizations - not only in the UK, but around the world.

Microsoft's Window Defender engineering team has finally found the time to address a long term bug within its anti-malware software - relating to performance issues with Mozilla's Firefox web browser. User feedback stretching back to five years ago indicates extremely sluggish web surfing experiences, caused by a Windows "Anti-malware Service Executable" occupying significant chunks of CPU utilization (more than 30%). The combination of Firefox and Windows Defender running in parallel would guarantee a butting of (software) heads - up until last week's bug fix. A Microsoft issued update has reduced the "MsMpEng.exe" Defender component's CPU usage by a maximum of 75%.

Microsoft and Mozilla developers have collaborated on addressing the disharmonious relationship between Defender and Firefox. A plucky member of the latter's softwareengineering team has been very transparent about the sluggish browser experience. Yannis Juglaret has provided a string of project updates via Mozilla's Bugzilla tracking system - one of his latest entries provide details about the fix: "You may read online that Defender was making too many calls to VirtualProtect, and that global CPU usage will now go down by 75% when browsing with Firefox. This is absolutely wrong! The impact of this fix is that on all computers that rely on Microsoft Defender's Real-time Protection feature (which is enabled by default in Windows), MsMpEng.exe will consume much less CPU than before when monitoring the dynamic behavior of any program through Event Tracing for Windows (ETW). Nothing less, nothing more."

Overwatch 2 Season 4 launches April 11! Blossom onto the battlefield with our newest Support Hero Lifeweaver, progress through the Battle Pass to earn rewards including Mythic Galactic Emperor Sigma, and fight for your faction when The Watchers and The Infinite Empire clash in the Starwatch event! Explore Talantis, the first-ever map made in collaboration with the community. Enjoy major quality-of-life updates with a revamped Competitive experience.

Watch the trailer to see what to expect with this upcoming season, which brings the new Support Hero Lifeweaver, a new Battle Pass, the community-made map called Talantis, and more. Progress through the Battle Pass to earn rewards including Mythic Galactic Emperor Sigma, and fight for your faction when The Watchers and The Infinite Empire clash in the Starwatch event.

Client SSDs constituted a major driver of demand bit growth in the NAND Flash market for the past two years as the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic were spurring procurement activities related to working and studying from home. TrendForce currently projects that the attach rate of client SSDs among notebook computers will reach 92% in 2022 and around 96% in 2023. However, the demand surge related to the pandemic is subsiding, and the recent headwinds in the global economy have caused a demand freeze in the wider consumer electronics market. Hence, among the major application segments of the NAND Flash market, client SSDs are going to experience the most significant demand slowdown. This, in turn, will constrain demand bit growth as well. TrendForce projects that for the period from 2022 to 2025, the YoY growth rate of NAND Flash demand bits will remain below 30%.

The average NAND Flash content of client SSDs has already surpassed 500 GB this year. Quotes for 512 GB SSDs have fallen sharply and come to a level that is roughly comparable to the quotes that were given for 256 GB SSDs half-a-year ago. In fact, quotes for 512 GB SSDs are also near the level for HDDs with the same capacity. On the other hand, upgrading to 1 TB or higher for notebook SSDs could be challenging for PC OEMs mainly because the licensing fee for the Windows OS has a positive correlation with device specifications. Therefore, an increase in SSD capacity will raise the cost of a whole notebook computer. With PC OEMs being less keen on adopting SSDs that are 1 TB or higher, growth in the average NAND Flash content of client SSDs will also be more limited in the future.

Today, AMD (NASDAQ: AMD) announced "together we advance_PCs," a livestream premiere to unveil next generation AMD PC products. Chair and CEO Dr. Lisa Su, CTO and EVP Mark Papermaster, and other AMD executives will present details on the latest "Zen 4" architecture that powers upcoming AMD Ryzen processors and the all new AM5 platform built around the latest technologies including DDR5 and PCIe 5.0, all designed to drive a new era of performance desktop PCs.

The show will premiere at 7 p.m. ET on Monday, August 29, on the AMD YouTube channel. A replay can be accessed a few hours after the conclusion of the event at AMD.com/Ryzen.

In-person events are slowly getting back together, and Intel is one of the first to grab tech media's attention with the Intel Vision 2022 conference announcement. Schedule for two days in a row, May 10th and May 11th, Intel's 2022 Vision conference looks like a teaser for some exciting news. The company is expected to present some business insights, hold keynotes, breakout sessions, technology showcases, demos, and exhibitions from sponsors and partners. It requires registration, which is a paid fee of $899 until April 11th, and $1499 after that for in-person seats; however, it is free for digital visitors.

Earlier today, we reported about Intel's plans to release Arc Alchemist discrete graphics card lineup sometime between May and June, so this could be one of the days the company selects for official product launch. We are still not sure about that, so please take those thoughts with a grain of salt. Be sure to tune in and see what Intel plans to do in the future.

Due to the growth of confirmed Omicron cases in the United States, the global leading gaming brand, MSI, officially announced that its on-site CES physical presence in Las Vegas will be canceled for the safety of all employees, customers and fans. The new products for 2022 will be showcased through online events virtually.

"Since December, the rapidly spreading Omicron variant has brought the USA a surge of COVID-19 cases. The health and well-being of our employees, customers and fans are our top priority. Hence, we have decided not to participate in-person at CES 2022 and will join the show virtually with our online product launch," said Sam Chern, MSI Marketing Vice President.

The launch of Intel's Alder Lake processsors has opened an exciting chapter for team blue and motherboard makers who are finally transitioning to new technologies like DDR5 and PCIe Gen5 standards. Today, GIGABYTE AORUS has prepared a complete lineup of motherboards designed to satisfy all kinds of workloads powered by Alder Lake processors as these AORUS Z690 motherboards are about to hit the market. These new boards include an upgraded feature set like 16+ phases power delivery on all boards, upgraded heatsinks to keep VRM temperatures under control, and built-in DDR5 overclocking features.

The event will be live-streamed on YouTube, so tune in to the First Look Event as the AORUS team gives an in-depth overview and cover the performance increase you can experience with Intel 12th gen CPU and DDR5 memory on the AORUS Z690 platform. They will be going over the new platform's entire lineup and feature set, so make sure you get to the event on time. It will start at 18:00 UTC zone, and you can tune in to watch here: AORUS Z690 First Look Event.

Microsoft is today holding a virtual Windows Event to showcase what is next for Windows. As we have made reports earlier in the past few weeks, the Redmond giant has shown-off the next-generation Windows 11 operating system, which will make a major improvement compared to Windows 10 both internally and as far as looks are concerned. We were live-blogging all of that, and at exactly, 11 am Eastern Time. You can find the whole live blog below, and check out the new Windows 11 OS features.

14:43 UTC: The event is about to start...

When Microsoft announced its Windows 10 operating system, the company set it to be a platform that would last for many years. Instead of the regular releases like we have seen in the past years with Windows XP, Vista, 7, and 8, Windows 10 is a bit different. Microsoft designed the OS to be a product that receives plenty of updates over the years, however, it is still the same project. We are, of course, wondering if we are going to get something different and will Microsoft develop a new OS that is a successor to the 10. It seems like we are about to find out what the Redmond company plans to do with its OS offerings in the upcoming Microsoft Event scheduled for June 24th.

Starting at 11 a.m. Eastern Time, you can tune in to watch the event and find out what the company plans to do. The event website says "Join us to see what's next for Windows". By saying this, we are sure to see some advancements coming to the OS, however, we are still guessing what that may be. You can watch the live stream on Microsoft's website on June 24th, which you can check out here.

Anticipation for next year's Consumer Electronics Show is building up, and companies are starting to tease their events. Today, NVIDIA has decided to surprise us and give us a "heads up" about its upcoming event. Called "GeForce RTX: Game On", the company is going to host it as a virtual event (due to the pandemic concerns) and present new technologies. As the goal of the show, NVIDIA states that it will "unveil the latest innovations in gaming and graphics". That means only one thing - new graphics cards are incoming. With the current industry rumors pointing towards a high-end GeForce RTX 3080 Ti GPU, we can only speculate that it will be presented at the show. This launch date would contradict previous reports that this specific GPU is landing in February due to the supposed postponing. We have to wait and see what the event is about, so stay tuned on January 12th at 09:00 am PST for our coverage of the event.

Intel's chief architect and senior vice president of discrete graphics division, Mr. Raja Koduri, is said to be scheduled to present at Samsung Electronics Event day. With a presentation titled "1000X More Compute for AI by 2025", the event is called Samsung Foundry SAFE Forum. It is a global virtual conference designed to be available to everyone. So you might be wondering what is Mr. Koduri doing there. Unless you have been living under a rock, you know about Intel's struggles with node manufacturing. Specifically, the 10 nm node delays that show the company's efforts to deliver a node on time. The same is happening with the 7 nm node that also experienced significant delays.

Intel has a contract to develop an exascale supercomputer at Argonne National Laboratory, called Aurora. That supercomputer is using Intel's CPUs and the company's upcoming Xe GPUs. Since the company has problems with manufacturing and has to deliver the products (it is bound by several contracts) to its contractors and customers, it decided to look at external manufacturers for its products, specifically Xe graphics. Being that Mr. Koduri tweeted an image of him visiting Samsung Giheung Fab in Korea, and now presenting at the Samsung Foundry event, it is possible that Intel will tap Samsung's semiconductor manufacturing process for its Xe GPU efforts and that Samsung will be the contractor in charge.

After Sony has showcased Unreal Engine 5 capabilities on the new PlayStation 5 console, there was a counterpart event missing from Microsoft. However, Microsoft has announced today that the company will host a live stream event on July 23rd. That is the date when Microsoft will host the event on YouTube and Twitch. Starting at 9 am PT time, the company will showcase the capabilities of the new Xbox Series X console. Possibly, Microsoft will show ray tracing and all the latest technology advancements with AMD's RDNA2 graphics card found inside the new console. What we can expect in terms of games is Halo Infinite and maybe new Forza and Gears of War games. Either way, we have to wait and find out on July 23rd.

Every year, Oculus Connect brings together developers, content creators, marketers, and more to celebrate the VR industry's momentum and growth. In light of the evolving public health risks related to COVID-19, we've decided to shift Oculus Connect 7 to a digital format later this year.

This was a tough decision to make, but we need to prioritize the health and safety of our developer partners, employees, and everyone involved in OC7. Oculus Connect gives us an unprecedented opportunity to connect with our global developer community. OC7 will be no exception, and we look forward to sharing more details about the digital event in the coming months.

NVIDIA today announced that their yearly GPU Technology Conference (GTC) will be held online, instead of locally at the San Jose Convention Center as previously planned. The company cites Covid-19 (colloquially called Coronavirus) concerns as the root cause - the health of both its professionals and attendees is paramount for the company, and as such, an online event seems more inline with the state of the world.

In the press note, NVIDIA also said that NVIDIA founder and CEO Jensen Huang will still deliver a keynote address, which will be available exclusively by livestream. All those who registered for a GTC pass will receive a full refund. This is yet another event that has been impacted by the recent virus outbreak that has the world's economies teetering, but for the more cynical among us, it could be the beginning of a new way of doing this sorts of events: online, rather than locally, thus reducing the required investment and logistics usually associated with such.