The latest patch for Halo Infinite has introduced an undesired side effect for a select portion of its PC platform playerbase. Changes to minimum system specification requirements were not clarified by 343 Industries in their patch notes, but it appears that the game now refuses to launch for owners of older GPU hardware. A limit of 4 GB of VRAM has been listed as the bare minimum since Halo Infinite's launch in late 2021, with the AMD Radeon RX 570 and Nvidia GTX GeForce 1050 Ti cards representing the entry level GPU tier, basic versions of both were fitted with 4 GB of VRAM as standard.

Apparently users running the GTX 1060 3 GB model were able to launch and play the game just fine prior to the latest patch, due to it being more powerful than the entry level cards, but now it seems that the advertised hard VRAM limit has finally gone into full effect. The weaker RX 570 and GTX 1050 Ti cards are still capable of running Halo Infinite after the introduction of season 3 content, but a technically superior piece of hardware cannot, which is unfortunate for owners of the GTX 1060 3 GB model who want to play Halo Infinite in its current state.

AMD's ROCm compute programming platform—a competitor to NVIDIA's CUDA, dropped support for the "Polaris" graphics architecture, with the latest version 4.5 update. Users on the official ROCm git raised this as an issue assuming it was a bug, to which an official AMD support handle confirmed that the Radeon RX 480 graphics card of the original poster is no longer supported. Another user tested his "Polaris 20" based RX 570, and it isn't supported, either. It's conceivable that the "Polaris 30" based RX 590, a GPU launched in November 2018, isn't supported either. Cutting out a 3-year old graphics architecture from the compute platform sends the wrong message, especially to CUDA users who AMD wants to win over with ROCm. With contemporary GPUs priced out of reach, IT students are left with used older-generation graphics cards, such as those based on "Polaris." NVIDIA CUDA supports GPUs as far back as "Maxwell" (September 2014).

Capcom, the Japanese video game maker, has today announced specification requirements for its upcoming Resident Evil Village PC game, needed to play the game at certain resolutions/graphics presets. Starting with the minimum settings, Capcom is thinking of 1080p 60 FPS gaming. To achieve that you need at least an Intel Core i5-7500 or AMD Ryzen 3 1200 processor paired with 8 GB of RAM. The minimum specification also requires a DirectX 12 capable GPU, with 4 GB of VRAM, just like NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 Ti or AMD Radeon RX 560. The company notes that using this configuration, framerate may drop below 60 FPS during heavy loads. If you want to use raytracing, which is now also present in the game engine, you must switch to at least NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 or AMD Radeon RX 6700 XT.

The recommended specification of course requires much beefier hardware compared to the minimum specification. If you want to have a steady 1080p 60 FPS experience without frame drops, Capcom recommends an Intel Core i7 8700 or AMD Ryzen 5 3600 processor, paired with 16 GB of RAM, and a GPU like an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1070 or AMD Radeon RX 5700. However, if you want the raytracing feature you need a better GPU. To achieve a 4K resolution with 60 FPS and raytracing turned on, the GPU needs a bump to at least an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 or AMD Radeon RX 6900 XT graphics card. You can check out the game requirements in greater detail below.

Microsoft's flight simulator, an upcoming game designed to bring real-life scenarios of flying an airplane, just got a list of system requirements needed to run a game. To play with Flight Simulator, you would at least need to have a quad-core CPU like AMD Ryzen 3 1200 or Intel Core i5-4460 equipped system, along with 8 GB of RAM. For graphics, you would need a GPU with at least 2 GB of VRAM, where the requirement is either AMD Radeon RX 570 or NVIDIA GeForce GTX 770 GPU. Another interesting observation is the requirement of 150 GB of drive space, meaning that this game will be pretty big. Internet connection needs to be 5 Mbps at minimum, and as you up the resolution and graphics, you would need a faster connection. You can check out the entire table below.

The need for incrementally faster connection comes out of one reason - adaptive streaming. The game looks stunning, and if you wish to play at the highest quality, parts of the game will be rendered in the cloud. Microsoft is using its Azure infrastructure to help and render parts of the game and stream it down to your PC. This ensures that your PC is capable of playing the game and Microsoft is showing how they can tap the power of cloud for uses like this.

It's been a very busy May-June for AMD as the company pushes out its major client-segment product lines spread across Computex 2019, and E3 2019. At Computex, the company focused on its 3rd generation Ryzen "Zen 2" desktop processors, and led its partners to show us a galaxy of new motherboards based on the AMD X570 chipset. It turns out that the company was saving a handful processor SKUs focused on gamers for E3.

The second important product launch of course is Radeon RX 5700 series, based on AMD's new "Navi 10" silicon on which its new RDNA graphics architecture debuts. With its AIB (add-in board) partners expected to be allowed to make custom-design cards, and based on what little nuggets of information AMD put out, "Navi" promises to stir up a key performance-segment price-band that's currently held by NVIDIA's GeForce RTX 2070 and RTX 2060. The AMD keynote will see the company CEO Dr. Lisa Su and her top execs take centerstage to make some big announcements. With E3 being a purely entertainment / client-segment forum, the AMD keynote promises not bore with tiresome topics such as AI, self-driving cars, etc.2:30 PM PDT: Ahead of its keynote, AMD posted a teaser video of its new RDNA graphics architecture on YouTube.

NVIDIA today rolled out the GeForce GTX 1650 graphics card at USD $149.99. Like its other GeForce GTX 16-series siblings, the GTX 1650 is derived from the "Turing" architecture, but without RTX real-time raytracing hardware, such as RT cores or tensor cores. The GTX 1650 is based on the 12 nm "TU117" silicon, which is the smallest implementation of "Turing." Measuring 200 mm² (die area), the TU117 crams 4.7 billion transistors. It is equipped with 896 CUDA cores, 56 TMUs, 32 ROPs, and a 128-bit wide GDDR5 memory interface, holding 4 GB of memory clocked at 8 Gbps (128 GB/s bandwidth). The GPU is clocked at 1485 MHz, and the GPU Boost at 1665 MHz.

The GeForce GTX 1650 at its given price is positioned competitively with the Radeon RX 570 4 GB from AMD. NVIDIA has been surprisingly low-key about this launch, by not just leaving it up to the partners to drive the launch, but also sample reviewers. There are no pre-launch Reviewer drivers provided by NVIDIA, and hence we don't have a launch-day review for you yet. We do have GTX 1650 graphics cards, namely the Palit GTX 1650 StormX, MSI GTX 1650 Gaming X, and ASUS ROG GTX 1650 Strix OC.

Update: Catch our reviews of the ASUS ROG Strix GTX 1650 OC and MSI GTX 1650 Gaming X

The GeForce GTX 1650 will be NVIDIA's smallest "Turing" based graphics card, and is slated for a late-April launch as NVIDIA waits on inventories of sub-$200 "Pascal" based graphics cards, such as the GTX 1050 series, to be digested by the retail channel. A Eurasian Economic Commission filing revealed many more details of this card, as an MSI Gaming X custom-design board was finding its way through the regulator. The filing confirms that the GTX 1650 will pack 4 GB of memory. The GPU will be based on the new 12 nm "TU117" silicon, which will be NVIDIA's smallest based on the "Turing" architecture. This card will likely target e-Sports gamers, giving them the ability to max out their online battle royale titles at 1080p. It will probably compete with AMD's Radeon RX 570.

Back in the glory days of ATI Radeon, the XT brand extension denoted the better-endowed variant among two or more graphics card models based on the same silicon, such as the Radeon HD 2900 XT. After AMD's takeover, the XT, Pro, XL, and other lesser used extensions such as XTX and All-in-Wonder were retired in favor of numerical variant numbers, beginning with the HD 3870. The company continued to use "XT" and "Pro" internally to differentiate ASIC variants, although those monikers were seldom if not never used in marketing materials. That's about to change. AMD launched its first overtly XT brand-extended product in close to 15 years, with the China-specific Radeon RX 560 XT, but alas, it's a lousy re-brand.

The RX 560 XT is positioned between the RX 560 4 GB and RX 570 4 GB, and is based on the "Polaris 20" or "Polaris 30" silicon (we don't know which). AMD enabled 28 out of 36 NGCUs on this silicon, resulting in 1,792 stream processors, 112 TMUs, and 32 ROPs. The memory is 4 GB across a 256-bit wide memory interface, although the memory clock-speed is dialed down to 6.6 Gbps (211.2 GB/s). What makes the RX 560 XT a re-brand is that AMD launched an SKU with the same exact specifications, called Radeon Pro 570, and there are several odd-ball RX 570-branded cards in the wild with this core-config. There's no reference-design board of the RX 560 XT, and the SKU is entirely in the hands of board partners to come up with custom-designs of their own.

Update: AMD has informed us that the RX 560 XT is based on the 14 nm "Polaris 10" silicon, and not "Polaris 20" or "Polaris 30." Polaris 10 is the first implementation of the "Polaris" architecture.

Sapphire has reportedly developed an odd-ball Radeon RX 570 graphics card, equipped with 16 GB of GDDR5 memory, double the memory amount the SKU is possibly capable of. The card is based on the company's NITRO+ board design common to RX 570 thru RX 590 SKUs, and uses sixteen 8 Gbit GDDR5 memory chips that are piggybacked (i.e. chips on both sides of the PCB). When Chinese tech publication MyDrivers reached out to Sapphire for an explanation behind such a bizarre contraption, the Hong Kong-based AIB partner's response was fascinating.

Sapphire in its response said that they wanted to bolster the card's crypto-currency mining power, and giving the "Polaris 20" GPU additional memory would improve its performance compared to ASIC miners using the Cuckoo Cycle algorithm. This can load up the video memory anywhere between 5.5 GB to 11 GB, and giving the RX 570 16 GB of it was Sapphire's logical next step. Of course Cuckoo Cycle is being defeated time and again by currency curators. This card will be a stopgap for miners until ASIC mining machines with expanded memory come out, or the proof-of-work systems are significantly changed.

While at CES 2019 we had the opportunity to visit with PowerColor who were showing off their latest external GPU enclosures including the TBX-180/240FU, and the TBX-750FA. Starting with the TBX-750FA this external GPU enclosure uses a Thunderbolt 3 (40Gbps) connection and has a 750-watt internal power supply. Due to the size of not only the enclosure but the power supply as well, graphics cards measuring up to 335 x 170 x 58 mm (13.18 x 6.69 x 2.28 inches). When you factor in maximum GPU power is rated at 500-watts pretty much any GPU on the market should work with this enclosure like a cat with a box if it fits it sits. Connectivity options consist of the 1x Thunderbolt 3 port for connection to the host system, 1x Gigabit Ethernet, 5x USB 3.0 (3 up front, 2 in back), 1x SD 4.0, and finally 1x SATA. Overall the enclosure measures in at 359 x 179 x 198 mm and supports Windows 10 and MacOS 10.13.4 or later.

It's no news that AMD's Radeon RX 570 graphics card is carved out of the same "Polaris 20" silicon as the RX 580, by disabling 4 out of 36 GCN compute units. AMD kicked a controversy recently, when it launched a China-specific Radeon RX 580-branded SKU with the core-configuration of the cheaper RX 570, confusing Chinese consumers. It turns out that this RX 580 2,048 SP SKU is based on the same exact ASIC variant of the "Polaris 20" silicon as the RX 570, with the only difference being device ID.

We watch a lot of GamersNexus content. Our GPU Database curator noticed something interesting in their recent teardown of a Dataland Radeon RX 580 (2,048 SP) graphics card directly imported from China. The unique ASIC sub-variant code etched on the GPU's aluminium reinforcement brace matches that of the RX 570. AMD internally refers to the RX 570 as "Polaris 20 XL," and its ASIC code etched is supposed to be "215-0910052." For the RX 580, the real one, aka "Polaris 20 XTX," the code etched is "215-0910038." Thanks to GamersNexus' high-resolution filming, our curator was able to spot the ASIC code for "Polaris 20 XL" on the Dataland card's GPU. This confirms that AMD merely took an RX 570 and gave it a different device ID to create the RX 580 2,048 SP, leaving consumers to wade through the confusion.

With AMD's announcement of the new Radeon RX 590 graphics card we've learned something interesting: any user who buys a Radeon RX graphics card or a Radeon RX powered PC will get up to three games for free. "Tom Clancy's The Division 2", "Resident Evil 2" and "Devil May Cry 5", with a retail value of up to $180, will be the titles available for those users.

As mentioned on the press release, "gamers who purchase an AMD Radeon RX Vega or RX 590, or an eligible Radeon RX Vega or RX 590 powered PC, will receive free copies of all three games. Gamers who purchase an AMD Radeon RX 580 or RX 570 graphics card, or an eligible Radeon RX 580 or RX 570 powered PC, can choose two of these games for free".

AMD late Monday updated its Radeon Software Adrenalin 18.10.1 beta drivers, without changing version numbers, to support some of the new regional SKUs the company launched over the weekend, including a variant of the Radeon RX 580 with only 2,048 stream processors instead of the normal 2,304; and the RX 580G and RX 570G. Besides this, the driver is unchanged from the original 18.10.1 drivers AMD released late last week. We have uploaded these latest drivers to our Downloads section.DOWNLOAD: AMD Radeon Software Adrenalin 18.10.1

In a silent event that occurred earlier today, AMD's Chinese product page for the Radeon RX 580 graphics card now shows a new addition- the RX 580 2048SP. Contrary to every other RX 580 on the website, including OEM and system integrator solutions, this new SKU has 256 fewer stream processors (2304 vs 2048, respectively). As it turns out, this appears to be a China-only graphics solution that launched on October 15, 2018 and TechPowerUp can confirm this is a Polaris 20-based Radeon product as well.

Looking purely at the specifications, this appears to be an RX 570 with a higher boost frequency (up to 1284 MHz vs 1244 MHz), so this is a confusing strategy by AMD to call it an RX 580 instead. The tinfoil hat nearby suggests that this may well be taking advantage of consumers who go simply by the name scheme and do not look up what a stream processor is, and indeed this is similar to what AMD did last year with the downgraded Radeon RX 560 that started out to be a Chinese-region product and then found its way elsewhere as well. Retailers have started listing this as a product available for consumer purchase already, and a search for RX 580 brings up both these and the other versions together. Not cool, AMD, not cool.

AMD announced the "Raise the Game" bundle. The company is giving away three AAA games with its Radeon RX Vega 64, RX Vega 56, RX 580, and RX 570 graphics cards (you get all three games when you purchase any of those graphics cards). Assassin's Creed Odyssey is the star attraction here. The latest addition to the Assassin's Creed franchise adds a straight $59.99 value to your graphics card purchase. You also get "Strange Brigade," a $39.99 upcoming co-op adventure shooter set in a Tomb Raider-esque setting. Lastly, there's Star Control: Origins, the upcoming space RTS by Stardock.

This is probably the first time that a GPU vendor is bundling only upcoming games, which at launch-prices add tremendous value to your graphics card, especially some of the cheaper RX 570 ones. Assassin's Creed Origins releases this October, while Strange Brigade lands late-August, and Star Control: Origins this September. The bundle is limited to participating retailers, and applicable to graphics cards sold between August 7, 2018 and ends November 3, 2018 (or until stocks last). You get a master coupon that must be redeemed on AMD website before 31st December, which puts out the UPlay and Steam keys for the games.

At the XFastest Network event in Japan, ASRock shared some slides detailing its overall graphics card strategy up to February 2019. There are some interesting bits of information that can be gleaned/extrapolated from it. One bit of information that seems to be set in stone is the introduction, come August, of revised versions of some graphics cards (namely, the RX 570 and RX 580 models) under the MK2 marketing - likely revised in their cooling apparatus. That the RX Vega versions of ASRock graphics cards won't be receiving such a revision seems clear as well: there's no reason for the company to withhold information on that. The others, however, are more prone to speculation.

First of, the fact that ASRock still only lists AMD graphics cards likely means the company will remain an exclusively AMD-aligned AIB. Secondly, the absence of any new AMD graphics cards in the ASRock lineup, while noteworthy and prone to speculation, doesn't really say much. AMD certainly wouldn't look lovingly towards ASRock should they out information on a new RX600 series or other AMD products ahead of time. Likewise, ASRock wouldn't want publicity on a new deal with NVIDIA to hit the roads ahead of time. As such, let's just stay with the MK2 graphics cards and ASRock's lineup - and codification for its products, which they kindly shared during the event.

In what looks like a move to get rid of ASUS-branded AMD Radeon graphics cards, the company announced a massive game-bundle promotion in the UK. The company is giving away Steam keys to four fairly old games with its Radeon RX Vega, RX 580, and RX 570 based graphics cards, that include not just ROG Strix models, but also Dual Fan, and Expedition sub-branded ones. Among the games are "The Surge" (2017), "Blood Bowl" Legendary Edition (2010), "Sprintires: MudRunner" (2017), and "Farming Simulator 17" (2017). Participating retailers include Aria, OCUK, Scan, Box, CCL, E-Buyer, and Novatech.

MSI is proud to present a brand new series based on AMD's "Polaris" chipsets, the Radeon graphics-based MECH series. Equipped with the new thermal design, the Radeon RX MECH series doesn't just allow for higher core and memory speeds but also provide increased performance in games. The outstanding shapes of the eye-catching MECH series cooler are intensified by a fiery red glow piercing through the cover, while the MSI dragon RGB LED on the top can be set to any of 16.7 million colors to match your mood or build. A completely custom PCB design featuring enhanced power design with Military Class 4 components enables higher stable performance to push your graphics card to the max. A classy matte black metal backplate shows the MECH 2 cards more structural strength and provides a nice finishing touch.

"AMD Radeon has always been committed to the best interest of gamers: a dedication to open innovation such as our contributions to the DirectX and Vulkan APIs, a commitment to true transparency through industry standards like Radeon FreeSync technology, and a desire to expand the PC gaming ecosystem by enabling developers everywhere. It is these values that result in a thriving PC gaming community, and explain why so many gamers continue to rally behind the AMD Radeon brand," said Scott Herkelman, vice president and general manager, AMD Radeon Technologies Group.

ASRock's Phantom series of graphics cards have been rumored and officially launched for a while now, but actual availability thresholds have been elusive. Now, a hard date has come out of the woodwork: ASRoc's first foray into the graphics card market with materialize with custom designs of AMD's RX 580 and RX 570 graphics cards on April 19th.

The Phantom series of graphics cards are ASRock's own takes on AMD's Polaris silicon. The graphics cards will apparently ship with three distinct operating modes: a "Silent" mode, an "OC" mode, and standard clocks. The Phantom Gaming X Radeon RX 580 8 G will ship with 1,324 MHz clocks on silent mode; 1,435 MHz on OC mode; and 1380 MHz in the standard mode. The second card to be on offer on April 19th will be the Phantom Gaming X Radeon RX 570 8G, with clocks at 1,228 MHz on silent mode; 1,331 MHz on OC mode; and 1380 MHz in the standard mode. Connectivity options for both graphics cards is set at 3x DisplayPort, 1x HDMI, and 1x DVI ports. No pricing information is available at time of writing.

AMD is giving final touches to the new Radeon RX 500X-series graphics cards. Product page placeholders for RX 580X, RX 570X, RX 560X, and RX 550X surfaced on AMD website. The specifications tabs on these pages are blank, so there's no official information on what the "X" denotes. It's curious to see AMD give the extension to even lower-end SKUs such as the RX 560 and RX 550.

The company has, in the past, come up with extensions such as "D" to denote OEM-specific SKUs with different specifications than the retail-channel (AIB) products. Going by the convention of "X" denoting higher performance on certain AMD Ryzen processor SKUs, the RX 500X series could have one of several improvements - a new silicon fabrication process facilitating a clock-speed bump, or faster memory, or even some speed boosting feature similar to Ryzen XFR (extended frequency range). We'll know soon enough.

ASUS today introduced the Radeon RX 570 Expedition graphics card (model: EX-RX570-O8G). The card is part of the company's Expedition family of graphics cards and motherboards designed for the rigors of gaming i-cafes, and is built with slightly more durable electrical components, and IP5X-certified dust-proof fans. The card features an engine clock (GPU clock) of up to 1256 MHz out of the box (against 1240 MHz reference), while its memory clock is untouched at 7.00 GHz (GDDR5-effective). It features 8 GB of memory.

The card is cooled by a custom-design aluminium fin-stack cooler to which heat drawn by a pair of 8 mm-thick nickel-plated copper heat-pipes is vented out by a pair of IP5X-certified 80 mm dual ball-bearing fans that are programmed to stay off when the GPU temperature is under 55 °C. The card is put through 144 hours of extreme stress-testing before being packaged. Power is drawn from a single 8-pin PCIe power connector. Display outputs include one each of DisplayPort 1.4, HDMI 2.0b, and dual-link DVI-D. The company didn't reveal pricing.

TechPowerUp today released GPU-Z v2.8.0, with important stability and feature updates. To begin with, we've addressed driver-crash issues seen on AMD "Raven Ridge" APU iGPU enabled systems, when using GPU-Z. The new DXVA 2.0 Features page in the "Advanced" tab is a ready-reckoner for all the video formats your GPUs provide hardware-acceleration for. We've made improvements to the accuracy of video memory usage readings on AMD Radeon GPUs, rendering performance of NVIDIA PerfCap sensor; and AMD power-limit readings in the "Advanced" tab.

Among the new GPUs supported are Radeon RX 460 Mobile, RX 560 Mobile, RX 570 Mobile, RX 580 Mobile, RX 550 based on Baffin LE. Minor bug-fixes include NVIDIA PerfCap sensor drawing outside its area; accuracy of temperature reading on AMD "Vega," a "BIOS reading not supported" error popping up on certain motherboards, and the driver digital signature reading getting truncated on high-DPI displays. Grab GPU-Z v2.8.0 from the link below.

DOWNLOAD: TechPowerUp GPU-Z v2.8.0The change-log follows.

MSI is apparently working on a revised version of its dual-fan Armor design for AMD's cards, dropping the white and black color scheme and opting for a more AMD-basic black and red one. The new versions, tentatively dubbed the Armor MK2 graphics cards, are expected to trickle through MSI's AMD graphics card lineup slowly, starting with the RX 570 and RX 560 graphics cards in their OC versions. The new color scheme, even if used to exhaustion already, does a little more than the previous Armor iteration in conveying the image of an AMD graphics card (black and red, anyone?), and the Armor MK2 models should feature an additional color and design upgrade to the existing backplate.

SAPPHIRE Technology is unveiling brand new products at Computex 2017. The SAPPHIRE NITRO Gear Series will provide SAPPHIRE users with more customization options than ever, with LED fans as well as new backplate & shroud sets. After the enthusiastic reception of the SAPPHIRE NITRO+ Radeon RX 580 Limited Edition, SAPPHIRE will offer a Special Edition version with blue shroud and backplate, and high factory overclock as part of its regular offer. For ultrabook owners, SAPPHIRE is bringing new Thunderbolt 3 dongles with 2x DisplayPort or 2x HDMI outputs.

Accessories for NITRO-charged gamers
Demand for personalization in PC gaming hardware is increasing. To meet it, SAPPHIRE is introducing a brand-new NITRO Gear Series of accessories. To begin with, the company will offer extra LED fans (with dual-ball bearing) in 3 backlight colors - white, red and blue. SAPPHIRE users can easily swap their stock fans with the SAPPHIRE Quick Connect system. Packs with one 95 mm fan in selected colors will be available to buy. The fans are compatible with all SAPPHIRE NITRO+ and Pulse RX 580 / 570 models as well as NITRO/NITRO+ RX 480 / 470 models.

PowerColor announced market availability of its Radeon RX 570 4 GB Red Devil graphics card. The company had announced the card at the RX 570 SKU launch. It is Positioned above the RX 570 Red Dragon, and is characterized by a high-end looking product design, featuring a long custom-design PCB, mated with an equally long 2-slot, triple-fan cooling solution, which features an aluminium dual-fin-stack heatsink ventilated by a trio of 70 mm fans, which stay off when the GPU is idling. PowerColor also included a back-plate to add to its premium appeal.

The Radeon RX 570 4 GB Red Devil features factory-overclocked speeds of up to 1320 MHz GPU (boost), compared to reference frequencies of 1275 MHz; and its memory is left untouched at 7.00 GHz (GDDR5-effective). Based on the 14 nm "Lexa" silicon, the Radeon RX 570 features 2,048 stream processors across 32 GCN compute units, 128 TMUs, 32 ROPs, and a 256-bit wide GDDR5 memory interface. The RX 570 Red Devil draws power from a single 8-pin PCIe power connector; display outputs include three DisplayPort 1.4, and one each of HDMI 2.0 and dual-link DVI.