TSMC, a Taiwanese semiconductor giant, is reportedly talking to its partners to develop an $11 billion (€10 billion) factory in Germany with the help of a few European partners. Currently assessing the plant location for Saxony in Germany, the fab wouldn't only be exclusively made by TSMC but will bring in NXP, Bosch, and Infineon that, will create a budget of around 7 billion Euros, including state subsidies, while the total budget is leaning closer to 10 billion Euros in total. However, it is essential to note that TSMC is still assessing the possibility of a Europe-based plant altogether.

Asking for as much as 40% of the total investment to be European-backed subsidies, TSMC wants to create a European facility that will be focused on a growing sector--automotive. If approved in August, the TSMC plant will become the company's first European facility and will first focus on manufacturing 28 nm chips. As one of the first significant EU Chips Act €43 billion investment, it will heavily boost European semiconductor manufacturing.

The most popular cryptocurrency by market-cap, Bitcoin, has dropped in value to below the USD $40,000-mark, to $38,429 as of this writing. This amounts to a whopping 43% drop in value from its November 2021 peak of roughly $67,600. Ethereum has also seen an 8% fall over the past 24 hours, as has the value of several other cryptocurrencies. While we won't get into the nuts and bolts of Bitcoin volatility or hand out any financial advice, this could have an impact on graphics card availability owing to a multitude of reasons.

As of this writing, we see the GeForce RTX 3080 commanding a scalper price of roughly $1,500 (brand new), for the LHR variant (lower crypto-mining performance), while non-LHR cards that are used, start around $1,900. If the fall in cryptocurrencies continues, we could see increased availability of used graphics cards from crypto miners, as gamers would be willing to buy a used RTX 30-series or RX 6000 series graphics card that's still within its warranty period (of 2 years).

Due to material shortages caused by insufficient semiconductor supply, to date, power management IC (PMIC) prices remain on an upward trend, according to TrendForce's latest investigations. Average selling price (ASP) for 1H22 is forecast to increase by nearly 10%, reaching a record six year high.

In terms of the global supply chain, in addition to the production capacity of major IDM manufacturers including TI, Infineon, ADI, STMicroelectronics, NXP, ON Semiconductor, Renesas, Microchip, ROHM (Maxim has been acquired by ADI and Dialog by Renesas), IC design houses such as Qualcomm and MediaTek (MTK) have obtained a certain level of production capacity from foundries. Of these, TI is in a leadership position and the aforementioned companies possess a combined market share of over 80%.

Thermaltake, the leading PC DIY premium brand for Cooling, Gaming Gear, and Enthusiast Memory solutions, is thrilled to announce the launch of Thermaltake's first multi-colored series of products including, Chassis, Memory, Power Supplies, and Gaming Chairs at the 2021 Thermaltake Expo June Virtual Exhibition. "As we enter a new season, Thermaltake is ready to introduce some bold new colors. We are launching several fan-favorite iconic products in different color-washes. We want to offer our audience—the gamers, modders, and PC DIY enthusiasts more customization options. Choose your color and design, and make "Your MOD, Your Way." Said Kenny Lin, the CEO of Thermaltake.

The concept is to provide more colored and tailored products to the audience allowing them to have more building options and to be able to select the colors that best reflect their moods and personality. The first of the lineup is the turquoise series which includes the Tower 100 Turquoise and TOUGHRAM RGB Turquoise 3600 MHz. The launch of the special color models gives users more options and flexibility to choose from modding their PC and matching the decorating tone of their own space. Thermaltake is ready to present to all PC enthusiasts a feast for the eyes.

Genesis Rhod 250 is a practical and durable gaming keyboard. The manufacturer included laser engraved symbols, resistance to splashes, as well as 19-key antighosting. All of this is available for a shockingly low price. The black and red design of the Rhod 250 is based on membranes with high durability. Its antighosting mechanism efficiently handles combinations of up to 19 keys pressed, enabling playing in duos on the same keyboard. The keys have laser engraved symbols, so that they do not vanish after long-term, intensive use.

The Genesis Rhod 250 allows for the swapping of arrows and W, A, S, D keys. The device also includes multimedia control keys, and some of the keys are enriched with symbols of video game equipment. The whole set is resistant to splashes, which enhances the practical value of the device. There are also standard features such as Windows block key or anti-slip, foldable feet.

Microsoft posted a technical brief of the new Hardware-Accelerated GPU Scheduling feature introduced with Windows 10 May 2020 Update, and its latest Windows Display Driver Model (WDDM) version. In a blog post by Steve Pronovost, a tech lead with Microsoft DirectX, Microsoft finally set out to explain what WDDM GPU Scheduling is. Introduced with Windows Vista, WDDM 1.0 introduced GPU scheduling, a software component that allocates workload from multiple sources onto a GPU, prior to which all applications that needed GPU-acceleration would send as much traffic as they could to the GPU driver. With growing complexity in the modern 3D rendering pipeline, the need for a scheduler, not unlike the OS thread scheduler, was needed.

In the following section (which matters), Microsoft went on to detail what Hardware-Accelerated GPU Scheduling is. Apparently, some of the newer generations of GPUs (by NVIDIA, AMD, and Intel), have a hardware component in-built to perform scheduling. When this component is combined with Windows 10 May 2020 Update and a WDDM 2.7-compliant graphics driver, Windows offloads GPU scheduling onto it, freeing up some CPU resources and potentially reducing latencies at various stages of the graphics rendering pipeline. Windows continues to exhibit control over scheduling, but by talking to this scheduling component instead of a CPU-executed software stack.

Intel and Micron have signed a new agreement for the production of 3D XPoint memory. As currently the only source of 3D XPoint memory solutions, Micron will get a significant increase in cash flow coming from Intel for the memory production. While Intel and Micron ended their partnership on 3D XPoint memory, they have signed a new contract for the production and supply of new 3D XPoint wafers to Intel. This shows that the demand for 3D XPoint memory is strong, so Intel needs production capacity to deliver the memory, and Micron is the obvious choice.

Previously, Intel sold its ownership of Lehi fab based in Utah, which was manufacturing the 3D XPoint memory solutions, so it was left to Micron to use. However, they signed a new deal and now Micron is in charge of manufacturing and addressing the supply issues for Intel's future Optane products. The new agreement comes with changed pricing and forecast of the sales, so Intel is likely paying more cash to Micron this time.

ADATA Technology, a leading manufacturer of high-performance DRAM modules and NAND Flash products, today announced the launch of two new gaming accessories, the XPG INFAREX K10 keyboard, and M20 mouse. Designed to enhance gaming experiences, the K10 keyboard sports nine LED lighting modes, anti-ghosting keys, and ergonomic keycaps, while the M20 mouse features durable OMRON switches, five-setting adjustable DPI, and RGB lighting.

The XPG K10 adds a new dimension to gaming with nine stunning LED lighting modes to choose from, allowing gamers to select the hue that best suits the games they are playing. The modes include - Flowing Light, Multicolor Breathing, Seven-Color Cycle Flickering, Switchable Static, Six-Color Cycle Breathing, Red and White Breathing Cycle, Red and White Cycle Flickering, White Static, and White Breathing. What's more, the K10 helps gamers up their game with some great features including 26 anti-ghosting keys to prevent missed or accidental keypresses, because in the heat of the moment a missed keypress could spell defeat. In combination with its ergonomically curved keycaps, the K10 improves accuracy, while also offering a comfortable keypress experience. Convenient Media Keys allow for quick adjustments of music, sound, or other effects in the middle of a battle without having to open other programs or app.

All-in-one PCs with a touchscreen are clever: They take up a minimum of space, avoid cable clutter, are quick to set up and, as a result, are comparatively mobile. The 15.6" fanless "X50" models have proven this for many years. Shuttle's range of models is now being expanded to include another fanless, but considerably smaller, 11.6" (29.5 cm) version.

Wherever larger all-in-one PCs are out of place, the XPC all-in-one P20U is right at home. Its external dimensions are just 29.9 x 27.1 x 5.0 cm (D x W x H). If tidied cable routing can be dispensed with, the height can be reduced by an additional 6.8 cm by removing the cable collector box on the bottom of the unit which is new with this model.

Bungie's Destiny 2 was one of the hottest PC releases of the year - and in most regards, it has delivered a tight, rewarding FPS experience. It has brought to the PC space the same satisfying FPS experience its developers have been honing ever since Halo. However, if there's one facet Bungie still has a lot to work on is its relationship to its player base, the way it chooses to communicate, and basically, how not to do things in order to increase attractiveness of its microtransactions, as some players have been putting it.

Case in point: the Destiny community has erupted over the past few days in regards to a (visually and mathematically proven) reduction in received XP as reward for some in-game actions (such as shooting bad moon wizards, completing public events, and so on). It was proven by users that earned XP during activities could be reduced by up to 95% (through activity repetition) over the base experience for that action. Yet nothing in the game ever pointed toward reduced experience in these scenarios. In fact, the XP numbers added to the XP bar with each action really didn't change at all - the XP scaler was working behind the scenes and oblivious to the player. Bungie confirmed the findings, saying it was "not performing the way we'd like it to" since the games' inception, and were "working on a fix".

Blizzard, best known for their Starcraft, Warcraft, and Diablo series (who are also responsible for that phenomenon World of Warcraft), has recently announced they are going to cut back support for older Windows-based operating systems. Resource allocation is a real problem; the opportunity cost of having engineers working on ensuring that their most recent updates and recent remasters aren't breaking support for older operating systems always comes at the cost of work on newer OSes.

As such, in a blog post on their forums, Blizzard has announced that starting in October of this year, "we will begin the process of ending support for Windows XP and Windows Vista in World of Warcraft, StarCraft II, Diablo III, Hearthstone, and Heroes of the Storm." They went on to explain this decision, in that "Microsoft ceased mainstream support for these versions of Windows in 2009 and 2012, respectively, but since a decent portion of our audience was still using them at the time, we continued supporting them. However, there have been three major Windows releases since Vista, and at this point, the vast majority of our audience has upgraded to one of the newer versions." And if you're thinking that this isn't true end of life for these systems when it comes to Blizzard game support, think again: "The games will not run on these older operating systems once they are no longer supported, so we encourage any players who are still using one of the older OSes to upgrade to a newer version. We'll be rolling out this change on a staggered schedule, and will post further notices as we get closer to making the change for each game."

AeroCool is working on as many as four new gaming PC cases for launch in fall-2012, two of which are part of its premier XPreadator X3 line, the Devil Red Edition, and White Edition. The Devil Red scheme is an even combination of black with blood-red, which could go well with a ton of hardware (such as motherboards, graphics cards, sound cards, SSDs, and PSUs that are using this scheme. The White Edition scheme, on the other hand is mostly white with a dash of black.

Built with 0.7 mm-thick sheets of SPCC steel, the new XPreadator X3 cases are bound to be sturdy (and heavy). The ATX full-tower cases will measure 533 mm (D) x 223 mm (W) x 527 mm (H), and be spacious enough for CPU coolers as tall as 186 mm, will feature eight expansion slots (to support double-slot graphics cards using the bottommost expansion slot on the motherboard), graphics cards as long as 31 cm, and eight 3.5-inch and 2.5-inch drive bays. The cases will support as many as nine fans to ventilate it from various points. The XPreadator X3 Devil Red and White Editions from AeroCool will be generally available by the end of September, 2012.

Giada, a brand of Shenzhen Jiehe Technology Development, Co., Ltd, today announces the i53 Mini PC. With full HD 1080P video, high connectivity, support, and an attractive design, Giada's new book-sized i53 Mini PC is an ideal choice for home entertainment, web browsing, and document writing.

The i53 is based around Intel's Mobile HM76 Express chipset and Ivy Bridge technology platform. Even while offering great performance, this environmentally friendly PC only uses 35W.

Extreme Engineering Solutions, Inc. (X-ES) is supporting the 3rd generation Intel Core i7 processor across eight industry-standard form factors -- COM Express, 3U VPX, 6U VPX, 3U CompactPCI, 6U CompactPCI, VME, air-cooled PrPMC/XMC, and conduction-cooled PrPMC/XMC. The XPedite7470 3U VPX Single Board Computer (SBC) and XCalibur4401 6U CompactPCI SBC are the first products available from X-ES to support the 3rd generation Intel Core i7 processor.

3rd generation Intel Core i7 processors provide higher performance and lower power compared to 2nd generation Intel Core i7 processors. 3rd generation Intel Core i7 processors also include Intel HD Graphics with DirectX 11, supporting OpenGL 3.1 and OpenCL 1.1.

MSC Vertriebs GmbH presents the first COM Express modules based on the 3rd generation Intel Core processor family (formerly codenamed 'Ivy Bridge'). The 3rd generation Intel Core processor family utilizes Intel's advanced 22nm process technology with three-dimensional transistors for higher performance at lower power. The new COM Express modules feature a further leap forward in computing power, graphics and video performance in comparison to modules based on the previous generation Intel platform. Important innovations of this new product generation are lower power consumption at higher clock frequencies and improved graphics and video performance. For the first time, the new Intel platform supports DirectX 11.

Microsoft Windows Vista is out of its "mainstream support" from today. Users will continue to have free access to security updates, but those without a commercial support contract will have to pay for bug fixes or other patches. This phase between end of mainstream support and end of support is called "extended support", and for Vista, it will last till 2017. The decade-old Windows XP, on the other hand, will see Microsoft pull the plug on its support no later than in 2014.

ROCSTOR, a leading provider of fast, high-capacity data storage and encryption solutions, announces the launch of Amphibious, an International CES Innovations 2012 Design and Engineering Awards Honoree. The Amphibious is a secure, ruggedized portable hard drive with real time hardware encryption and offers advanced two-factor authentication, USB 2 and Firewire 800. In addition, the crypto module is FIPS 140-2 certified.

The Amphibious is considered as one of the most secure and user-friendly devices in the world for size, strength of encryption, and method of authentication. It offers users the option of using the device in a cross platform and Operating System independent fashion, and no GUI or software installations required. The Amphibious is the result of several years of intensive R & D effort and collaboration. For the user it offers the value of data security by using an original concept of two-factor authentication with Smart Card and Keypad, real time hardware encryption, and futuristic design sense. The Amphibious is appropriate for consumers, SOHO's, enterprises, institutions, military and government applications who want to store data in a secure manner.

The latest beta drivers and the first in the 290 series have been released by NVIDIA today, supporting all graphics cards since the venerable 6-series. Their main new feature are official support for enabling ambient occlusion settings in the control panel separately for specific games and enabling NVIDIA Surround on the new X79 SLI-certified motherboards. Ambient occlusion (AO) is settable for uber-popular games The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3. So, what does AO do? We'll let Andrew Burns of NVIDIA explain:

If you're unfamiliar with Ambient Occlusion, it is most easily described as a way to make in-game shadowing more realistic, and therefore better.

What he doesn't say of course, is how it kills your frame rate, especially on lower end hardware. Anyway, there's all the usual goodies in this release: 3D Vision game profiles for games such as MW3, Diablo 3 & LEGO Harry Potter: Years 5-7 (yes really). There's a HD audio update and nine fixes too, including one for random flickering of the Windows boot logo as it's loading or fading away and a fix for the mouse cursor flickering and shaking in games such as Crysis 2 & Deus Ex when SLI is enabled when using 3DTV Play. The NVIDIA product release page is here and they have a snazzy-looking driver selector here. The release notes follow.

We have brought you the potential perils of the upcoming UEFI Forum-implemented - www.uefi.org - Windows 8 secure boot feature here, here and here. However, it appears that it may not be so 'secure' after all, since there appears to be a surefire way to circumvent it, at least for the moment, while it's in development.

Softpedia has scored an exclusive interview with security researcher Peter Kleissner, who has created various Windows (XP, Server 2003 etc) "bootkits", which allow OS infection at the highest privilege level, giving unrestricted access to the whole of the PC. His latest one, called Stoned Lite, shows how the Windows 8 secure boot process, still in development, can be subverted, as it stands. He is planning to release details of how the code works at the upcoming International Malware Conference (MalCon) - malcon.org - that will take place in India on November 25th. It appears that the real vulnerability exists in the legacy BIOS boot procedure, not in Microsoft's implementation of secure boot, as Kleissner said:

The problem with the legacy startup is that no one verifies the MBR, which makes it the vulnerable point. With UEFI and secure boot, all the boot applications and drivers have to be signed (otherwise they won't be loaded). You can compare it to TPM, although Arie van der Hoeven from Microsoft announced that the secure boot feature is mandatory for OEMs who want to be UEFI certified. It is a good message that security is not an option.

Yes, that's right the maker of notoriously vulnerable software is now blaming you, the user, should you get a virus, trojan or other malware infection on your Windows computer. However, it does look like they have some justification for saying this. For those with long attention spans, Microsoft have just released their 168 page Microsoft Security Intelligence Report 6MB PDF, with the stated aim of providing:

An in-depth perspective on software vulnerabilities and exploits, malicious code threats, and potentially unwanted software in the first half of 2011

The first thing to note about the report is that it is limited to its Malicious Software Removal Tool and Microsoft's other anti-malware products. Zero-day attacks that it can't detect are not included in the findings. So, surely it can't all be the user's fault then? It also means that the security angles from third party security vendors such as Kaspersky, Norton and McAfee aren't represented here.

PC enthusiast customers and companies running corporate datacentres looking to buy into the new Sandy Bridge-E platform may want to wait a little while before handing over their hard-earned money to Intel. The initial batch of C1 revision Sandy Bridge-E processors have a bug - "errata" in Intel terminology - in them with VT-d, which means that hardware accelerated virtualization doesn't work properly with them (software only mode is unaffected). The feature when working properly, allows all hardware acceleration to work on the hosted operating system (virtual machine). This would allow things such as hard drive controllers to work, plus applications such as high-powered 3D games, typically First Person Shooters, to run at nearly full speed and the full Windows Aero desktop to be displayed on the hosted OS, as the hardware features of the graphics card can be used. Therefore, working VT-d is a critical feature for these kinds of applications.

Microsoft's first attempt at replacing XP with Vista failed miserably, since Vista had many initial issues and was so poorly received, that the brand was irrevocably tarnished. However, Microsoft's second attempt with Windows 7 has been very successful, since it has always worked very well, even during its development phase and is well liked. Now, if figures from Stat Counter are to be believed, then Windows 7's share of the market has climbed to 41.64%, while Windows XP has dropped to 37.20% - still a hefty percentage and one that Microsoft will be keen to see drop to zero as soon as possible. This means that Windows 7 is now finally the most popular Windows version after almost two years since the retail version was released on October 22nd 2009, with Windows 8 due out likely in summer 2012.

Shuttle Computer Handels GmbH, European subsidiary of Shuttle Inc., one of the leading developers and manufacturers of compact PC solutions such as the world-renowned XPC Mini PC Barebones today announces the sales launch of Version 2 of its XS35 product line.

Just as its predecessor, the new generation of XS35 models is built around energy-saving components and runs virtually silently. The new XS35 series does away with any fans and remains nearly inaudible at any time which predestines such space-saving PCs use in the living room at home, in the office, classrooms and even in libraries. The energy-efficient Intel Atom D525 processor provides sufficient power for all daily computing applications. While the basic version, XS35V2, comes with integrated Intel GMA 3150 graphics, the XS35GTV2 barebone is equipped with NVIDIA's Next-Generation ION graphics solution that even allows for playback of full HD content at 1080p.

Rovi Corporation today unveiled Roxio Game Capture and Roxio PC Game Capture, two affordably priced products that offer a straightforward way for gamers to quickly and easily capture and share PC and console game play videos.

In-product tutorials help everyone get set up quickly and immediately begin to capture and showcase their latest campaigns, adventures, ball skills, and race sequences. Gamers may use the products to post their high scores, tips & tricks, game reviews, or even a feature-length movie, or Machinima, based on game play footage. See the products in action here.

NVIDIA today released version 197.13 of its GeForce system software. The suite includes drivers for all NVIDIA GeForce GPUs and IGPs since GeForce 6 series, NVIDIA ION platform, as well as system software for NVIDIA PhysX, NVIDIA 3D Vision technology, and drivers for the on-chip HDMI audio which the latest GeForce GPUs are shipping with. The WHQL-signed driver includes PhysX 9.10.0129 system software, updated HDMI audio driver to version 1.0.9.1, application-specific performance increments for several games, notably the following:

• Up to 13% performance increase in Crysis: Warhead with a single GPU, up to 30% performance increase in Crysis: Warhead with SLI technology
• Up to 13% performance increase in H.A.W.X with single GPU, up to 15% performance increase in H.A.W.X with SLI technology
• Up to 30% performance increase in Left 4 Dead with single GPU, up to 28% performance increase in Left 4 Dead with SLI technology

SLI profiles are added for the following applications: Assassin Creed II, Battlefield: Bad Company 2, Command and Conquer 4: Tiberium Twilight, Grand Theft Auto IV: Episodes from Liberty City, Mass Effect 2, Napoleon: Total War, and Zombie Driver. SLI support is improved for: Metro 2033, Supreme Commander 2, Unigine, and World of Warcraft
- Ambient Occlusion support for Call of Juarez: Bound in Blood, Need for Speed: Shift, Resident Evil 5, RUSE, and Street Fighter IV. Anti Aliasing can now be overridden for Mass Effect 2. As always, a number of new and existing bugs were fixed. For more information, refer to the Release Notes documents for Windows 7/Vista, Windows XP.

DOWNLOAD: NVIDIA GeForce 197.13 WHQL