Logitech today introduced its first TAA-compliant products - a keyboard, two mice and a keyboard/mouse combo - for U.S. federal agencies covered by the Trade Agreements Act. The Trade Agreements Act of 1979 (TAA) requires federal agencies to purchase products, including computer peripherals, that are made in the United States or other designated countries.

Logitech, a world leader in computer peripherals, is now meeting the needs of federal IT buyers with four TAA-compliant products manufactured in Taiwan: The Logitech Keyboard K120-TAA, with a spill-resistant corded USB design, for $19.99; The Logitech Mouse B100-TAA, with high-definition optical tracking and a corded USB connector, for $14.99;The Logitech Mouse B120-TAA, which adds a corded PS/2 connector in addition to USB, for $19.99; and The Logitech Desktop MK120-TAA, a combo of the Logitech Keyboard K120-TAA and the Logitech Mouse B100-TAA, for $34.99.

ASUSTek plans to release its holdings in of a 24.5% stake Pegatron Technology, according to a report by Taiwanese business daily Commercial Times. This release is said to occur some time in May, according to the report. ASUS will generate an income of NT$2.8-3.8 billion (US$94.69-128.51 million), or NT$3.7-5 EPS, according to the report. This release will grant Pegatron more autonomy, which holds a sizable share of the notebook contract-manufacturing business, and channel brands such as ASRock.

Even as Elpida has filed for bankruptcy protection and is dealing with restructuring, its disposal of a subsidiary Taiwan-based DRAM foundry Rexchip will impact DRAM supply and pricing, sources told DigiTimes. Rexchip has a monthly foundry capacity of 800,000 12-inch wafers and uses 65,000 wafers currently. Elpida has just finished development of 25 nm DRAM technology, which gives it competitiveness over other DRAM majors, Samsung Electronics and SK-Hynix.

As analyzed in an older report, should Elpida's restructuring take a turn for the worse, leading to an exit from the DRAM industry, it could have huge consequences on the competitive environment of the industry. DigiTimes currently reports that DRAM prices are slowly, but surely creeping back up. DRAM contract prices for March have risen 5.7% on average, the prices of 4 GB DDR3 modules have gone as high as US $18.75, with average prices of $18.50.

With the new Ultrabook specification being governed by Intel, and compatible Ivy Bridge Core processors facing delays, Taiwan-based notebook vendors are finding incentives in launching "Ultrabook-like" PCs, notebooks that are about as compact as Ultrabooks, but with vendors' own hardware specifications. Such PCs are also said to be designed keeping in mind lower price-points, such as $600. These notebooks will do away with expensive metal unibody chassis, hollow hinges, and SSDs, and replace them with more cost-effective ones. For example, 7 mm-thick HDDs are already announced. Those could make viable alternatives for SSDs. Such Ultrabook-alternatives could be launched as early as in Q2-2012, sources note.

Taiwan's premier chip foundry, TSMC, is reportedly seeing strong demand for sub-40 nm chip manufacturing. It's easy to manufacture smaller, simpler chips on new foundry nodes than complex devices such as GPUs. Hence, the source notes that it's wireless communication device chip manufactures that have sub-40 nm nodes at TSMC fully booked up. The foundly also scored orders from local and foreign fabless audio IC firms. "In fact, TSMC's 6-inch fab dedicated to process analog and LCD driver ICs has been running at full capacity since late February, with shipment delivery times to customers being extended to more than 12 weeks, the sources pointed out," notes DigiTimes.

Shipments of tablet PCs is bound to go down by 30% in Q1 2012, according to market research carried out by DigiTimes. The various vendors will ship 14.97 million tablet PCs in the first quarter of 2012, dropping 30.6% on quarter but rising 77.6% on year. This figure can be broken down to 11 million iPad 2 and iPad 3 units, and some 3.97 tablets comprising of various other models than iPads. Shipments of these non-iPad tablets will decrease by 50.8% on quarter and include 1.5 million Kindle Fires and 300,000 Nook Tablets, DigiTimes Research said.

Of all the tablets shipped in Q1 2012, 26.3% will run Android, and 13.3% will be running Texas Intruments' processors, the research said. Taiwan-based ODMs alone will comprise a huge 90.25% of all tablet shipments in Q1, of which Foxconn will account for 83%, followed by Quanta Computer with 9.6%, DigiTimes Research indicated.

Idaho-based Micron Technology is reportedly going to spend at least US $500 million in purchasing a stake in its Japanese rival, Elpida, according to a Economic Daily News report. This development closely follows reports of an equity tie-up between the two companies, with a decision emerging in February.

Taiwanese Nanya Technology and Inotera Memories stated in recent reports that DRAM makers should consider uniting their operations as such moves could contribute to the industry's sustainable development. Elpida refused to comment on this latest report. What does this mean to the consumer? The year 2011 has been a bloodbath for DRAM makers as overproduction led to drastic drops in PC memory prices, and a watershed for PC consumers as a result. These latest developments could contribute to the inevitable rebound of DRAM prices in 2012.

Cavium, Inc. (NASDAQ: CAVM), a leading provider of semiconductor products that enable intelligent processing for networking, communications, and digital home applications, today announced a technology and marketing collaboration with Intel (NASDAQ: INTC) to offer Intel(R) WiDi-based products designed to enable superior wireless display consumer experience. The resulting end-to-end solution will combine Intel(R) WiDi's ease-of-use and innovation with Cavium's super low latency technology and advanced video processing techniques to further enhance Intel(R) WiDi's interactivity and broaden its target applications. As a part of the marketing collaboration, Intel and Cavium will work together to expand and grow the market for wireless display products. A range of OEMs will soon be offering Intel(R) WiDi compatible receivers with Cavium's PureVu(TM) media SoC. Live demonstrations of Cavium's new Intel(R) WiDi receivers are available at Cavium's suite at the 2012 International Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, between Jan 10th and 13th.

AMD has been slapped with a lawsuit by Quanta for allegedly selling faulty CPUs & GPUs that were unfit for purpose, since they didn't meet specified heat tolerances and subsequently failed. Taiwan-based Quanta may not have a name that the general public immediately recognizes, however they are actually the world's largest contract manufacturer of notebooks, so this lawsuit is a big deal. They claim that the faulty parts were used in notebooks made for NEC. The lawsuit was filed in a district court in San Jose, California and in the filing, Quanta claims they have "suffered significant injury to prospective revenue and profits". As Bloomberg reports, "the lawsuit also claims breach of warranty, negligent misrepresentation, civil fraud and interference with a contract."

The Taiwan Criminal Investigation Bureau has been doing a bit of investigating and has arrested four engineers working for Intel's OEM partners (names not disclosed) for flogging Engineering Sample (ES) processors on eBay. ES processors are intended strictly for qualification testing purposes for development of new products by OEM's and are only loaned to them under strict non-disclosure agreements, hence putting these on eBay is illegal. The Bureau searched the suspects houses last month and found 178 ES CPU's, worth around $800,000. Note that this value seems to be somewhat high, as it would make each CPU worth around $4,500. We will update this article if new values come to light. Also, this is not a new operation that has been busted, since the suspects had admitted to selling around 500 ES CPU's since 2009. For their efforts, the fab four now face five years in prison.

It should be noted for anyone contemplating the purchase of such dodgy CPU's on eBay or similar places, that they may be overstressed and contain faults, due to the intensive and sometimes destructive testing they go through.

Team Group Inc. has overcome the economic stagnation to make another success through slow and steady strategies. iSuppli, the leading research institution, released the latest market statistics of Q2 2011, indicating that the firm ranks no.8 in Flash category in the top 3 Taiwan manufacturers; ranks no. 7 in USB category, moving one place up from the previous quarter; and maintains position as the 12th largest DRAM manufacturer.

According to the President of Team Group, Danny Hsia says that "Team Group Inc. has dedicated itself to Taiwan as well as overseas markets for a long time, and the branding operation has matured. A survey of iSuppli showed our excellent performance, while winning the 10th Deloitte Technology Fast 500 Asia Pacific award is also recognition of Team's potential and competitiveness."

ASUS unveiled a designer variant of its N45SF entertainment notebook, dubbed N45J Mystic Edition. The N45J is ASUS' tribute to its homeboy, singer-songwriter Jay Chou. He starred in the action flick The Green Hornet. The notebook aesthetically has a big transition from its black+silver color scheme in its N45SF avatar. It's decked in white overall, with a dash of blue (the right shade, that misses being dubbed baby-blue by a whisker). On its lid is some urban art, which could have been adopted by the album-art of Jay Chou's label. There are also his autographs on the lid and the palm-rest.

That aside, this 14-incher packs a 1600x900 pixel display, is driven by 2nd generation Core processors (options include Core i7-2670QM/2630QM, Core i5-2430M/2410M, and Core i3-2330M/2310M), up to 8 GB of dual DDR3-1333 memory, NVIDIA GeForce GT 555M graphics with 1 or 2 GB VRAM, and a variety of storage options, including SSDs, high-capacity slow HDDs, or lower-capacity faster (7200 rpm) ones. DVD SuperMulti, BD-ROM, or BD-RW can be opted for. The audio is backed by punchy Bang & Olufsen ICEpower speakers. 720p web-camera, WiFi b/g/n, Bluetooth 3.0, and 3 -in-1 card reader, make for the rest. We don't have the pricing info. It will most likely only be launched in Taiwan and Greater China region, where Jay Chou is likely to have a big following.

Taiwan foundries are going to be cutting prices by 10 to 15% for wafers built on mature node processes. Since these wafers have lower production costs the foundries are passing on the savings. This move is to boost consumer confidence in building their inventory after a year of shaky ground in the U.S. and European markets. This according to DigiTimes.

Also DigiTimes is reporting despite slow demand for mature process manufacturing, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) continues to see orders heat up for advanced 28nm technology, according to sources at non Taiwan-based chip suppliers.

This news could mean that these same vendors that are getting a cut in overhead thanks to the foundries could pass on the savings to the end customer to boost revenue.

Taiwan-based tablet PC developer BungBungame unveiled Photon 100, a Windows 7 Home Premium-driven tablet PC with a highly-customized user-interface that makes it ideal for use by businesses, in the healthcare industry, restaurants, hotels and insurance, according to the company. The 10.1-inch tablet PC is driven by AMD Z01 accelerated processing unit (APU), with 4 GB of DDR3 memory, and 64 GB SSD. It weighs 820 grams. It is priced at NT $20,000 (US $662), and will be available in February 2012. BungBungame will demo the Photon 100 at the upcoming CES event.

AMD CEO Rory Read, speaking at the IT Supply Chain conference organized by Raymond James this Tuesday, said that his company had begun shipping 28 nm GPUs for revenue (meaning, in volumes big enough to fetch revenue). With it, AMD fulfilled its promise to be the first to the market with GPUs built on the 28 nm silicon fab process. AMD's foundry partner for these chips is TSMC. "We are ramping 28nm [products] with TSMC in Taiwan and shipping the products here and now. We are very excited about the products," said Read.

At the upcoming CES event, AMD will formally unveil a range of products that will use its 28 nm GPUs. CES will give AMD a good opportunity to bag design wins with large volume manufacturers of notebooks and PCs. What this means for the enthusiast community is that whenever AMD does launch its Radeon HD 7900 series, it won't be a "paper-launch".

Windows (PC) will make its first transition to a machine architecture other than x86 in decades with Windows 8 Windows on ARM (WOA), and Microsoft wants to make absolutely sure that it has a well-oiled ecosystem in place to propel its growth. Currently, Microsoft picked three potent players among ARM processor vendors, Qualcomm and Texas Instruments (that have experience and can ship in Zerg volumes), and NVIDIA (which has demonstrated a lot of engineering potential with its latest Tegra products).

Microsoft reportedly asked the three ARM players to pick two notebook vendors each (one major, and one minor) with which they will work to develop some of the first WOA portable computing devices. Qualcomm selected Samsung and Sony, Texas Instruments chose Toshiba and Samsung, while NVIDIA chose Acer and Lenovo. Among these, Samsung, Toshiba, and Lenovo are the major partners. Surprisingly, Taiwan-based companies have an insignificant role in this ecosystem. ASUS, which has thus far been the largest client of NVIDIA for Tegra processors, has been left out. Now that downstream partners are selected, upstream ODMs such as Quanta Computer, Compal Electronics, Wistron and Pegatron Technology, which manufacture for those companies, are getting their R&D teams in shape to compete for the next-generation platform. The finishing line of ARM's marathon run to get into PCs is in sight.

It looks like there's a subtle but relentless push to get ARM CPUs into desktop PCs. Morgan Stanley recently surveyed 30 PC makers (names not revealed) and discovered that 40% of them are interested in trying out ARM-based PCs within the next two years. As we reported previously that the Wintel alliance appears to be crumbling, this finding appears to add weight to that assertion. Of course, there's a huge mountain to climb before ARM processors can compete head to head with high performance x86, as explained in our article, not least because Microsoft won't begin supporting ARM until Windows 8 is released late next year and the fact that the vast majority of existing software won't run on ARM. A real catch-22 if ever there was one. Just as crucially, the many high performance enhancements and interface standards that currently go into making a modern x86 chip fly will also have to go into an ARM - and developing that isn't going to be cheap, although it may not take that long, since these are tried and trusted technologies that need to be applied. Still, the interest is there and Morgan Stanley expect that 10% (39 million) PCs, excluding tablets, will have an ARM processor at their heart. If true, it will make for interesting times.

Intel started the trend of improving integrated graphics with their second generation LGA1155 socket Core i3, i5 & i7 line of processors. Depending on the model, these processors sport integrated HD2000 or HD3000 graphics right on the processor die, which nowadays give acceptable performance for low-end gaming and can play Full HD 1080p video perfectly. This trend is increasing with the upcoming Ivy Bridge processors, which will be able to support a massive 4096 x 4096 pixel display, as we reported here. AMD now also have equivalent products with their Llano-based A-series processors. So, where does this leave discrete graphics cards? Well, the low end market is certainly seeing reduced sales, as there really isn't enough of a performance difference nowadays to always warrant an upgrade from an IGP. As integrated graphics improve further, one can see how this will hurt sales of higher end graphics cards too. The problem is that the bulk of the profit comes not from the top-end powerhouse graphics cards, but from the low to mid-end cards which allow these companies to remain in business, so cannibalizing sales of these products to integrated graphics could make high-end graphics cards a much more niche product and crucially, much more expensive with to boot.

Well, this is good news for PC enthusiasts. PC overclocking has become a competitive sport in recent years with various brands hosting the competitions and others also chipping in with sponsorship money. This year's event was the fourth annual MSI Master Overclocking Arena competition held in Taipei, Taiwan, with sponsorship money coming from the likes of Intel and Kingston among others. Basic competition info: sixteen teams worldwide; benchmarks used were Super PI 32M, 3DMark 11 and surprisingly, the ancient 3DMark 2001SE but it's not clear why such an old benchmark is being used; the components used are given to contestants based on a lottery system, the team picking a number corresponding to either a CPU or a complete rig. This prevents contestants from having an unfair advantage by bringing in their own heavily modified kit to press home an advantage. Imagine how much more potent a modded motherboard with beefed up voltage regulators could be? Turned out that the favourites, previous winners Romania, won the competition. The prize money was only $3000, which is paltry compared to mainstream sports, but remember that this overclocking "sport" is still very new and is very niche in nature, so isn't so unreasonable when viewed in that light. Head on over to VR-Zone for more competition details and photos.

And you thought 128 GB was too much data to put on a flash drive - even USB 3.0 at that? Wait till you see Transcend's latest flash drive developed in collaboration with Taiwan's Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI), that claims to be able to hold no less than 2 terabytes (TB) of data! Called the Transcend Thin Card, the drive is about as long and broad as most USB 3.0 flash drives, but is just a little thicker than a Penny. Thin Card models will start at 16 GB in capacity, and will go all the way up to 2 TB. A Transcend representative told Tom's Hardware that an international standard for USB 3.0 thumb sticks has yet to be set, and so it's not been sold so far. Thumb sticks are flash drives that are thinner than the standard USB connector, and slide into common USB ports.

Created to meet the needs of graphic designers and other professionals, the IPS-paneled ASUS PA238Q joins the ProArt Series of displays as a 23", LED-backlit model with native 1920 x 1080 resolution. It reproduces 100% of the sRGB color space, with every individual monitor precision calibrated at the factory to ensure unmatched color accuracy. The PA238Q ships with ASUS-exclusive QuickFit Virtual Scale software to display photos and documents in their true size on screen. In terms of ergonomics, a fully adjustable and sturdy stand complements a wide I/O range, which includes HDMI, DisplayPort, DVI-D, D-sub, and multiple USB ports.

This Friday, ASUS will launch what it is touting to be a revolutionary new ultra-portable computing device, the Eee Pad Transformer (EP101), at a high-profile launch event in Taipei. The EP101 is a slate-type 10.1-inch tablet that can attach to a bottom-half that includes a keyboard and trackpad, and transform into a netbook. Two of its biggest features include NVIDIA Tegra 2 processor that make it both fast and its UI visually intensive; and Google's Android Honeycomb operating system largely customized by ASUS, that is optimized for larger touch devices such as tablets.

Notable components include Tegra 2 processor, 1 GB LPDDR2 memory, 16/32/64 GB eMMC storage with unlimited cloud storage, IPS display with capacitive touch and resolution of 1280 x 800, 1.2 MP front and 5 MP rear cameras, Tegra 2 graphics that can play back 1080p video, and a load of connectivity feature including WiFi b/g/n, Bluetooth 2.1 EDR, 3G (optional). Other human interface devices include g-sensor, compass, gyro, light sensor, and GPS. The Eee Pad Transformer is expected to be priced in Taiwan at 19,596 NTD (around US $663).More pictures follow.

With the entire PC motherboard industry concentrated in Taiwan and China, it is valid to say that PC prices are pretty-much pegged to Taiwan's economy. Following a wave of labor-reforms in China and Taiwan coupled with deficit of skilled labor, and inflation added to the mix; key motherboard manufacturers are finding it difficult to cope with competitive motherboard pricing. A much smaller contributor to this is Intel's decision to phase out cheap G31 chipsets, making manufacturers buy slightly costlier G41 ones for the most common motherboard models.

Industry sources told Digitimes that the big three in the motherboard industry - ASUS, Gigabyte and MSI, will be hiking prices of their motherboards shortly, to cope with increasing raw-material, labor, and component costs. The price-hike is likely to increase prices by 10% on average in the next three months. Some higher-end models could increase by as much as 20%, if labor costs in China continue to rise. Another factor here is bulk manufacturers of printed circuit boards (PCBs), who have hiked their prices following increase in price of high-grade copper by a whopping 50% (from US $6000 /ton to $9000 /ton).

Motherboard giant Gigabyte contributed to a nerdtastic art piece put in place by authorities of the Taoyuan International Airport in Taiwan, Gigabyte's home country. A hall inside gate B7 of terminal 1 at the airport sports a wall-hung art-piece made entirely of Gigabyte motherboards, consisting of two lines, and a circle. The circle, made of identical motherboards, looks like a silicon wafer, and from a distance, each motherboard looks like a chip die on that wafer. A map of the island is also carved out of a motherboard on that circle.

Next to it is a large "Made in Taiwan" sign, also made by Gigabyte motherboards. This art piece is said to be using more than 1,200 motherboards, which of course are dead, returned for replacement pieces. After years of war and poverty, Taiwan has emerged as a major hub of semiconductor and electronics industries, there are ongoing efforts such as this one to propagate Taiwan as a stable investment destination, and in a pretty geeky way, we might add.

Intel Capital, Intel Corporation's global investment organization, reaffirmed its dedication to foster worldwide innovation with the announcement of 18 new investments. The new deals total approximately $77 million and were announced today at the 11th annual Intel Capital CEO Summit, Intel Capital's gathering of portfolio company CEOs, corporate technology decision makers from Global 1000 companies and thought leaders from around the world. The new Intel Capital investments span 11 countries including Brazil, China, Germany, India, Israel, Malaysia, the Netherlands, Russia, Taiwan, Ukraine and the United States.

The new investments align with Intel's strategic focus on fostering innovation in core PC and server market segments including cloud computing, mobility solutions and access to broadband wireless in geographies around the world. Additionally, these investments will help enable advancements in adjacent computing areas including smart TV, tablets and smartphones.