It turns out that our older report suggesting that the most affordable of Intel's new Core i7 "Haswell-E" HEDT processors will feature a slimmer PCI-Express root complex, even if it gives you 6 cores at a [hopefully] sub-$400 price-point, holds true, after all. Intel's wacky approach to its latest HEDT processor lineup was confirmed by leaked manuals of Gigabyte's socket LGA2011-3 motherboards, based on the Intel X99 Express chipset. The manual confirms that while Intel's $500-$750 Core i7-5930K and >$1,000 Core i7-4960X offer bigger 40-lane PCI-Express Gen 3.0 root complexes; the Core i7-5820K features a narrower 28-lane one. This means that multi-GPU configurations on systems running the chip won't be too different from those on LGA1150 "Haswell" platforms.

On motherboards with, say, three PCI-Express 3.0 x16 slots, the i7-5930K and i7-5960X will let you run two slots at full x16 bandwidth, and a third slot at x8. On systems with the i7-5820K, the second slot won't go beyond x8, and the third one will cap out at x4. On boards with four slots, one of them will run out of bandwidth. The trade-off for this narrower PCI-Express interface is the fact that you're getting six "Haswell" cores, twelve logical CPUs enabled with HyperThreading, about 12 MB of L3 cache, and a quad-channel DDR4 memory interface, at a price-point not too far off from the Core i7-4790K. So for enthusiasts with no more than two high-end graphics cards, the i7-5820K could provide an attractive gateway option to Intel's new HEDT platform. You can find the leaked manuals in this thread.

Here are the first pictures a HIS branded Radeon R9 285, the third in a series of leaked press-shots of cards based on AMD's new performance-segment GPU, designed to take on NVIDIA's bestselling GeForce GTX 760 in not just performance, but also energy-efficiency. The card is based on a new ASIC, codenamed "Tonga," which is rumored to feature a stream processor count identical to one of the variants of "Tahiti," and a 256-bit wide GDDR5 memory interface, holding 2 GB of memory. HIS' card features a compact variant of the company's IceQ X² cooling solution. Its pictures also reveal that the R9 285 "Tonga" will feature XDMA CrossFire, much like the R9 290 series.

Intel Core i7 "Haswell-E" HEDT (high-end desktop) processors, along with compatible motherboards based on the Intel X99 Express chipset, are expected to launch on September 14, 2014, according to a leaked Intel supply chain document scored by VR-Zone. The Core i7 "Haswell-E" series succeeds current Core i7 "Ivy Bridge-E," and its compatible X79 Express chipset. The new chips will be built in the new LGA2011-3 package (incompatible with current LGA2011), and will be the first client desktop platform to support the new DDR4 system memory standard. The series will include three parts, the six-core Core i7-5820K and i7-4930K; and the eight-core i7-5960X. The three are detailed in our older article, here.

Here are some of the first pictures of an Inno3D branded GeForce GT 740 graphics card, the GT 740 iChill. Based on a custom-design PCB, the card features a strong VRM (by GK107 requirements), which draws power from a 6-pin PCIe power connector. It features 1 GB of GDDR5 memory, across a 128-bit wide memory interface. Confirming that the GT 740 is based on the GK107, the marketing poster leaked to the web reads its ASIC string to be "GK107-425." It's configured with 384 CUDA cores, 32 TMUs, and 16 ROPs. The GPU is clocked at 1100 MHz (a factory-overclock), while the memory runs at 5.20 GHz (GDDR5-effective).

Cooling the 65W TDP GPU is a similarly overkill iChill HerculeZ 2000 cooler, designed in-house by Inno3D, which uses a dense aluminium fin-stack, to which heat drawn from the GPU, is fed by a pair of 8 mm-thick copper heat pipes, and ventilated by a pair of 100 mm fans. The cooler shroud on which the fans are suspended, can be detached, by simply removing six thumb-screws, letting you clean the heatsink underneath, which has been a USP of Inno3D's cooling solutions. Inno3D also put out its own performance numbers for the card, in which it claims the GT 740 iChill to be faster than previous generation GTX 650 (they're both based on the same chip).Performance graphs follow.

Intel's upcoming Thunderbolt host controller, codenamed "Alpine Ridge," could allow you to play God with several uncompressed Ultra HD video streams during production, if its leaked specifications hold up. The controller leverages PCI-Express gen 3.0 to double bandwidth of the interface. It will launch around the same time as Intel's next-generation Core "Skylake" processors (some time in 2015), and in a typical implementation, will be wired to the CPU's root-complex, and not that of the PCH. With PCIe 3.0 x4 or PCIe 3.0 x2 links at its disposal, the controller can push data at a staggering 40 Gbps. The link can also ferry DisplayPort, HDMI 2.0, and USB 3.0 data through its link layer. That bandwidth should enable you to plug in up to two Ultra HD displays, apart from your storage array.

The Thunderbolt connector itself will undergo a change with the arrival of Alpine Ridge. It will be slimmer (shorter) than the current connector, at 3 mm (good for Ultrabooks), and there will be adapters for backwards compatibility with older-generation Thunderbolt devices. The connector will be designed to supply up to 100W of power, so Ultrabooks based on it will do away with round DC jacks, and charge up much like tablets and smartphones do. That amount of power should also enable single-cable HDD docks and RAID boxes. There will be two main variants of Alpine Ridge, one that supports two ports over daisy-chaining, and one that supports just a single port.

According to some newly-leaked slides, Intel is planning quite a solid state drive release spree for the second quarter of 2014, one that will see the introduction of three storage solutions - the SSD Pro 2500 Series (codename Temple Star), SSD DC P3500 Series (Pleasantdale) and SSD DC P3700 Series (Fultondale). All three SSD families are going to utilize 20 nm MLC NAND Flash memory, will be available in two form factors and will be backed by a five-year warranty.

MSRP (before taxes) pricing of AMD's upcoming Radeon R9 290 (non-X) being around $450 is looking increasingly likely. In a string of reports that Japanese publication Hermitage Akihabara published ahead of launches of the R9 290X and the R9 290, in which the publication talked about pricing in the country, a price difference of roughly 18 percent is emerging between the two. Applying that to the $549.99 MSRP of the R9 290X stateside, one can derive a $450 pricing for the R9 290. Granted, local taxation may greatly vary between Japan and other markets, affecting the end-user price, but pre-tax MSRPs can be consistent.

The Radeon R9 290 is expected to launch on the 5th of November, 2013. Based on the same "Hawaii" silicon as the Radeon R9 290X, it features 2,560 Graphics CoreNext stream processors, 160 TMUs, 64 ROPs, and a 512-bit wide GDDR5 memory interface, holding 4 GB of memory. Its core is clocked around 948 MHz, and memory at 5.00 GHz.

If these performance numbers posted by credible reviewers at OCUK hold up, then AMD could have a second, more affordable graphics card for you, which outperforms NVIDIA's GeForce GTX 780, at least in synthetic benchmarks. In a brief performance run that spans synthetic tests, which included Unigine Heaven 3.0 at 1080p and 1440p resolutions, with normal level of tessellation; 3DMark 11 (performance preset) and 3DMark Fire Strike (both Normal and Extreme); the card we believe to be R9 290 (name blurred out in the graphs) is consistently faster than the GeForce GTX 780 reference, in the same bench.

Based on the same 28 nm "Hawaii" silicon as the Radeon R9 290X, the R9 290 is its more affordable sibling, featuring 2,560 Graphics CoreNext stream processors, 160 TMUs, 64 ROPs, and a 512-bit wide GDDR5 memory interface, holding 4 GB of memory. It features clock speeds of 947 MHz (core), and 5.00 GHz (memory, GDDR5-effective). There's no word on pricing, but it could be available from the 31st of October, 2013.

Some time in late September, the 25th to be precise, AMD is flying the press at large over to Hawaii, to unveil its "Volcanic Islands" GPU family, with its flagship part, codenamed "Hawaii." This chip is expected to succeed "Tahiti," on which AMD's top-end Radeon HD 7900 series is based. An poster on ChipHell forums leaked these pictures of a press-package of AMD's flagship Hawaii-based graphics card, which has things going both for and against its credibility.

To begin with, the picture shows an audio CD-type jewel case holding Battlefield 4. Given that the game won't launch until late-October, we find it implausible that its release DVDs will be ready a month in advance. There's also a graphic printed on the box that shows the shore of a volcanic island (where magma meets the ocean) in the background, and an AMD logo in the foreground. The thread also contains a few alleged x-ray shots from a different poster, but we're pretty sure that they're of a motherboard. Nice try.

The information was sourced and publicized by the VideoCardz.com crew on Tuesday, confirming some previous leaks and refuting others. The new GeForce GTX 760 employs the same reference design NVIDIA used for its previous generation cards (GTX 670, GTX 660 Ti, GTX 660 and GTX 650 Ti) and is designed to replace the GTX 660 Ti in NVIDIA's current lineup. The card employs a cut down version of the GK 104 GPU, with 1152 CUDA Cores, 96 TMUs and 32 ROPs. With a base clock of 980 Mhz and a boost value of 53 MHz, for a maximum out of the box frequency of 1033 MHz, the new card supports GPU Boost 2.0 which is a temperature controlled feature (the cooler the chip the higher the clocks). Stock memory size will be 2 GB and reference memory clocks were set at 1502 MHz, for a slightly over 6 Ghz effective speed. A 256-bit wide memory bus is employed to offer 192 GB/s of memory bandwidth at stock clocks. TDP is set at 170W for the new card, requiring two 6-pin PCIe connectors

Also relevant to the topic is another piece of information unveiled along with the above mentioned specifications, the fact that the GeForce GTX 760 will complete NVIDIA's portfolio for the coming months. NVIDIA presumably awaiting AMD's move before launching any more GeForce products of its own. AMD, in turn, being expected to bring out the Radeon HD 8000 Sea Islands cards in September.

There are many theories doing rounds about the specifications of NVIDIA's upcoming performance-segment GPU, the GeForce GTX 760. One states that it's largely similar to the GeForce GTX 660 Ti from previous-generation, with higher clock speeds, possibly 7.00 GHz memory, and GPU Boost; while another suggests a completely new core-configuration. According to a GPU-Z screenshot leaked by a ChipHell community member, NVIDIA is attempting to give the GeForce GTX 660 a successor, rather than merely retrofitting the GTX 660 Ti.

According to leaks that surfaced on ChipHell, NVIDIA is configuring a GK104 GPU with just three out of four GPC (graphics processing clusters) enabled, while keeping the memory and raster operations untouched. This approach would give the chip 1,152 CUDA cores, 96 TMUs, 32 ROPs, and a 256-bit wide GDDR5 memory interface. The card in the GPU-Z screenshot features 1072 MHz core, 1111 MHz GPU Boost, and 7.00 GHz memory.

According to CPU World staff, who, by appealing to an unnamed secondary source, managed to confirm the validity of an earlier leak, we are now looking at Intel's desktop roadmap for the following twelve months. The slides reveal the Q3 launch of Intel's Ivy Bridge-E chips, the Core i7-4820K, i7-4930K and i7-4960X comprising the lineup. The new Extreme chips will make use of the existing X79 platform. Also in Q3 the Premium line will receive a new product, the Core i7-4771, which we do not know in what way differs from the currently available Core i7-4770, but a judicious appeal to wild speculation could point out an upgraded IGP.

The mid segments will get a platform upgrade in the form of a new H81 chipset, and six new processors, the Core i3-4130, i3-4330, i3-4340, as well as three new Ivy Bridge based Pentium chips, the G3220, G3420 and G3430. Celeron processors are in the pipelines for Q1 2014, while Q2 will follow with the Haswell refresh and the accompanying new platform based on the Z97 and H97 chipsets.

GPU buyers can breathe a huge sigh of relief that AMD isn't fixated with next-generation game consoles, and that its late-2013 launch of its next GPU generation is with good reason. The company is building a new GPU micro-architecture from the ground up. Codenamed "Volcanic Islands," with members codenamed after famous islands along the Pacific Ring of Fire, the new GPU family sees AMD rearranging component-hierarchy within the GPU, in a big way.

Over the past three GPU generations that used VLIW5, VLIW4, and Graphics CoreNext SIMD architectures, the component hierarchy was essentially untouched. According to an early block-diagram of one of the GPUs in the series, codenamed "Hawaii," AMD will designate parallel and serial computing units. Serial cores based on either of the two architectures AMD is licensed to use (x86 and ARM), could handle part of the graphics processing load. The stream processors of today make up the GPU's parallel processing machinery.

In addition to its latest flagship Obsidian 900D chassis, Corsair plans to launch a new premium micro-ATX gaming PC case this season, the Obsidian 350D (model: CC-9011029-WW). It posed for pictures at various retailers, and some of its press-shots were leaked to the web. Reportedly measuring 450 x 210 x 440 mm, the case will retain the solid matte steel construction with a brushed aluminium front, and a large side acrylic window. Its front-panel features two 5.25-inch drive bays, a pair of USB 3.0 ports, and HD audio jacks.

Internally, the Obsidian 350D doesn't feature any drive cages that can go on to obstruct long graphics cards. Instead, it features two 3.5-inch bays towards its bottom, and what appear to be three 2.5-inch bays towards the top portion, with a gap in between. Ventilation includes two 140 mm fan vents on the top, to which radiators can be latched on to (one 140 mm spinner included), and a rear 120 mm fan (included). The Obsidian 350D should be released some time towards late-April or early-May.

As confirmed by some freshly-leaked slides, 2014 will see Intel bring some new guns to the fight with ARM, including Bay Trail-T, the successor of Clover Trail and the first Atom platform to take advantage of the 22 nm manufacturing process.

The star of Bay Trail-T is the Valleyview SoC which will feature four (out-of-order) Silvermont cores clocked at up to 2.1 GHz (delivering up to 60% higher performance than the Clover Trail chip), a two-channel LPDDR3 memory controller, an upgraded video decoder, support for resolutions up to 2560 x 1600 pixels, and a new GPU boasting DirectX 11 capabilities and offering up to a 3x performance boost over Clover Trail.

Devices based on Bay Trail-T are expected to have a standby battery life of 20 days and would last for 11 hours of continuous video playback, before needing to be charged.

Going into 2013, Intel's tough balancing act between keeping a low power/thermal envelope, and advancing performance, all while staying on the 22 nm silicon fab process, will be care of its Core "Haswell-ULT" processor. The chip will feature some radical changes to traditional Intel processor design, which will help it achieve its design goals. According to a deck of leaked slides scored by Expreview, Intel plans to use additional C-states that drop the processor's base clock, and redesign the processor package to accommodate the PCH silicon, reducing the board footprint.

To begin with, Haswell-ULT will be designed to support 24 MHz base clock speed, which running in "deep" energy-saving idle states. Modern processors with FSB replacement interconnect technologies such as QuickPath Interconnect and HyperTransport need a base clock to time other components on the processor, and for low-level communications, while a bulk of the data is transported by the primary interconnect. Intel found a way to turn off the 100 MHz base clock signal (which is also used to time the PCI-Express root complex and integrated graphics core), and replace it with a 24 MHz clock, when the processor is idling. As the processor returns to lower (more active) C-states, the 100 MHz base clock is reapplied. The 24 MHz base clock is activated by three new power states, C8, C9, and C10, introduced by Haswell-ULT. The third slide below details what happens to the various components in the new C-states.

ASUS is working on a new graphics card based on the upcoming GeForce GTX 650 Ti GPU, augmented with a non-reference design cooling solution. ASUS refers to it as "dual-fan," stopping short of calling it "DirectCU II." One can infer that the cooler could look very similar to dual-slot DirectCU II featured on GTX 660 DirectCU II, with the exclusion of direct-contact heat pipes. The new cooler, according to leaked marketing material will be 11% quieter, and run the GPU 14% cooler than NVIDIA reference cooler. The new marketing materials confirm specifications revealed by an older leak. The GPU is clocked at 980 MHz, with 1350 MHz memory (5.40 GHz GDDR5-effective), with 576 CUDA cores, and 1 GB of memory across a 128-bit wide interface. The GeForce GTX 650 Ti is expected to be priced around US $149, and is slated for October 9.

A little later this month, NVIDIA plans to launch the GeForce GTX 660, its first desktop GPU based on the 28 nm GK106 silicon. The GTX 660 carries NVIDIA's ASIC codename GK106-400. An internal document detailing other SKUs based on the GK106 in the works, was leaked to the web. According to a 3DCenter.org report, the two ASIC codenames GK106-250 and GK106-200 described in the document could be new SKUs.

The GK106-250, carrying a working title GeForce GTX 655, could have one of the five SMX units of the GK106 disabled, resulting in a CUDA core count of 768. According to the document, it features a 192-bit wide GDDR5 memory interface, holding 2 GB of memory, much like the GTX 660. The GK106-200, on the other hand, with a working title GeForce GTX 650 Ti, could feature just three of the five SMX units on the GK106 silicon, making up 576 CUDA cores. According to the document, it features 2 GB of GDDR5 memory across a 128-bit wide memory interface, much like the GK107-based GTX 650. The two SKUs could help NVIDIA seal gaps in its mainstream desktop GPU lineup.

Here are some of the first pictures of NVIDIA's upcoming GK106 silicon, which goes into building the GeForce GTX 660 graphics card. The GK106, built on the 28 nm silicon fab process, is poised to be NVIDIA's newest mainstream-performance chip that succeeds the GF116. The pictures reveal the chip package to be almost as big as the GF116 but smaller than the GK104. This can be attributed to fewer memory I/O pins (192-bit maximum bus width).

The rectangular die of the GK106 appears to have roughly the same area as that of the GF116, but with the higher transistor density of the 28 nm process, one can expect a significantly higher transistor count for the chip. If some of the pictures we're seeing are any indication the GK106 will be extremely energy-efficient, as an unknown graphics card based on it draws power from just one 6-pin power connector.

A leaked AMD document for retail partners spelled out specifications of the first three FX "Vishera" processors by AMD. The new CPUs incorporate AMD's "Piledriver" architecture, and much like the first-generation "Zambezi" chips, will launch as one each of eight-core, six-core, and four-core chips. The eight-core FX-8350 is confirmed to ship with 4.00 GHz nominal clock speed, with 4.20 GHz TurboCore speed. The six-core FX-6300 ships with 3.50 GHz nominal, and 4.10 GHz TurboCore speed. The quad-core FX-4320, on the other hand, ships with the same clock speeds as the FX-8350. In addition, the document confirmed clock speeds of several socket FM2 A-series APUs, such as the A10-5700 and the A8-5500.

Intel's next high-end desktop (HEDT) platform, codenamed "Ivy Bridge-E," is slated for Q3-2013, according to the latest platform road-map slide sourced by VR-Zone. According to the leaked slide, launch of Ivy Bridge-E Core i7 processors follows that of Core "Haswell" socket LGA1150 processors (Q2-2013). What's more, the upcoming Ivy Bridge-E chips will be compatible with existing socket LGA2011 motherboards, based on Intel X79 Express chipset.

Intel's next-generation Ivy Bridge-E chips are up-scaled versions of today's Core "Ivy Bridge" chips, built on the same 22 nm process, with more processing cores, memory channels, cache, and PCI-Express 3.0 certified system interfaces. It remains to be seen if Intel launches a new chipset to go with the new processor, or retains the X79 chipset with a few minor updates in the form of steppings. The company retained its X58 Express chipset over the first two HEDT processor generations (45 nm Core i7 "Bloomfield" and 32 nm Core i7 "Westmere").

Streacom's newest duo of silent all-aluminum cases for HTPCs, the micro-ATX FC9, and the ATX FC10, inch closer to their Computex 2012 launch. Their specifications were leaked by the company's Chinese website. Both cases ensure the machines running in them stay quiet, and remain completely fanless, because their bodies double up as heatsinks for sensitive components, such as the processor. Both cases are made of brushed silver and black (sandblast finish) color options.

Measuring 348 x 289 x 100 mm (WxDxH), the Streacom FC9 supports motherboards in the micro-ATX and mini-ITX form-factors. It features one 2.5-inch drive bay, and a 3.5-inch bay, which supports 2.5-inch drives. It also has a bay for a slimline slot-loading optical drive. A CPU base makes contact with the processor (LGA775, LGA1155, LGA1156 supported), which conveys heat to a side panel via four copper heat pipes. All six panels of the case are made of thick aluminum sheets, some of which are ridged to increase surface area for heat dissipation. The case features three low-profile expansion slots.

According to a possible leak by a Rockstar North employee, Grand Theft Auto V (GTA V), could be headed for an October 2012 launch. The employee in question, Alex O'Dwyer, a character animation developer, listed out the projects he worked on, in his CV, which included a mention of "Grand Theft Auto V", with a date of "Oct 2012". The CV has since been pulled, with no comment from O'Dwyer or Rockstar.

It 'tis the season of rumors and assumptions for this years winter time blockbusters. According to Computer and Video Games, the following information, claiming to reveal the game's release date and a load of multiplayer features, was first posted on the official Black Ops forums in a thread that was later taken down, and its cached version is unavailable. It was then reposted in another thread on Activision's forums, which was also killed off by the publisher, but its cache remains available (via MP1st). None of this information is confirmed, but there's no reason it couldn't be genuine as it all sounds feasible. The list is full of new modes but makes no mention of a new game engine.

Thanks to some good understanding of geometry, and great Photoshop skills, the punters have estimated the die-size of NVIDIA's GeForce Kepler 104 (GK104) GPU, using a picture of the NVIDIA reference board that was leaked last week. Compared to the known die-size of an AMD "Tahiti"-based graphics card, the die-size of GK104 was estimated to be around 320 mm², about 45 mm² smaller than Tahiti. The relative transistor density of the chip, compared to AMD's 28 nm chips, were also estimated.