At The National Association of Broadcasters Show (NAB Show) today, Intel and Netflix announced a new high-performance video codec that is available as open source and royalty-free to content creators, developers and service providers. Scalable Video Technology for AV1 (SVT-AV1) offers performance and scalability in video processing.

"The SVT-AV1 codec offers both high performance and efficiency. And compared to today's most popular codec (H.264 AVC), SVT-AV1 can help service providers save up to half their bandwidth, delivering leading-edge user experiences that can be quickly and cost-effectively delivered at a global scale. This codec makes it possible for services ranging from video on demand to live broadcast of 4Kp60/10-bit content on Intel Xeon Scalable processors, including the recently launched 2nd-Generation Intel Xeon Scalable processor," said Lynn Comp, Intel vice president of the Network Platforms Group and general manager of the Visual Cloud Division.

Optane Persistent Memory is being touted by Intel as the "hottest" storage medium between DRAM and NVMe SSDs in the short-term, and a successor to DRAM-based memory in the long-term, aided by its ability to hold data even in the absence of power. The company's latest Xeon Scalable "Cascade Lake" processors support Optane Persistent Memory, allowing data-centers to cram larger amounts of data accessible at DRAM-like speeds, even if at much higher latencies. It remains significantly faster than NVMe SSDs. Component retails began listing 512 GB modules of the Optane Persistent Memory, and its prices are nothing like your 512 GB NVMe SSD. CompSource lists the 512 GB module (model: NMA1XXD512GPSU4) for a whopping USD $7,816, although the product is out of stock.

Response from motherboard manufacturers to the Intel B365 Express mid-range socket LGA1151 chipset has been rather lukewarm, with very few product launches. The B365 Express is a rebadged H270 Express with 8th and 9th generation Core CPU support replacing 6th and 7th gen. ASUS launched one of its first ATX form-factor boards based on this chipset, with the Prime B365-Plus. The board draws power from a combination of 24-pin ATX and 8-pin EPS power connectors, conditioning it for the CPU with a 4+3 phase VRM. The CPU socket is wired to four DDR4 DIMM slots, and a PCI-Express 3.0 x16 slot. The board supports 9th generation Core processors out of the box.

Besides the main x16 slot, the board's expansion slots loadout is designed to benefit from the increased 20-lane PCIe budget of the B365 Express. You get a PCI-Express 3.0 x16 (electrical gen 3.0 x4) slot, and four PCI-Express 3.0 x1 slots. There are two M.2 slots on offer. The bottom slot has PCI-Expres 3.0 x4 wiring only, and supports M.2-22110 drives, while the top M.2 slot has PCI-Express 3.0 x2 and SATA 6 Gbps wiring. There are six SATA 6 Gbps ports. Display connectivity includes one each of D-Sub, DVI, and HDMI. USB connectivity includes eight USB 3.0 ports, four on the rear panel, four by headers. The board's sole 1 GbE network interface is controlled by a Realtek 8111H PHY. The onboard audio solution is driven by an entry-level Realtek ALC887 CODEC. Expect this board to be priced around $90.

Kingston Technology Company, Inc., a world leader in memory products and technology solutions, today announced its 32GB, 16GB and 8GB Server Premier DDR4-2933 Registered DIMMs have received validation on the Intel Purley Platform, featuring the Intel Xeon Scalable processor family (formerly known as "Cascade Lake-SP"). A link to the validation page can be found here.

Kingston's Purley-validated Server Premier modules are specifically engineered to unleash the power of Intel's six-channel server microarchitecture. At 2933MT/s - the next-generation memory frequency supported in the latest Intel Xeon Scalable processor family - each DIMM provides peak bandwidth of 23.46 GB/s. When grouped for multi-channel performance, this provides a significant boost in performance for today's memory intensive server applications.

Intel announced today a brand-new product family, the Intel Agilex FPGA. This new family of field programmable gate arrays (FPGA) will provide customized solutions to address the unique data-centric business challenges across embedded, network and data center markets. "The race to solve data-centric problems requires agile and flexible solutions that can move, store and process data efficiently. Intel Agilex FPGAs deliver customized connectivity and acceleration while delivering much needed improvements in performance and power for diverse workloads," said Dan McNamara, Intel senior vice president, Programmable Solutions Group.

Customers need solutions that can aggregate and process increasing amounts of data traffic to enable transformative applications in emerging, data-driven industries like edge computing, networking and cloud. Whether it's through edge analytics for low-latency processing, virtualized network functions to improve performance, or data center acceleration for greater efficiency, Intel Agilex FPGAs are built to deliver customized solutions for applications from the edge to the cloud. Advances in artificial intelligence (AI) analytics at the edge, network and the cloud are compelling hardware systems to cope with evolving standards, support varying AI workloads, and integrate multiple functions. Intel Agilex FPGAs provide the flexibility and agility required to meet these challenges and deliver gains in performance and power.

Intel formally launched the Wi-Fi 6 AX200 client-segment WLAN card for notebooks and PC motherboards in the M.2-2230 and M.2-1216 form-factors, based on the "Cyclone Peak" PHY powering the Wireless AX-22260 NIC family. The card interfaces with its host over PCI-Express 3.0 x1 and USB 2.0, for the Wi-Fi and integrated Bluetooth interfaces, respectively. As a Wi-Fi 6 adapter, it supports 802.11ax over 2x2 MU-MIMO antennae, and peak bandwidth of 2.4 Gbps, with support for both the 5 GHz and 2.4 GHz bands. The Bluetooth interface is version 5.0.

Intel late Tuesday made a boat-load of enterprise-relevant product announcements, including the all important update to its Xeon Scalable enterprise processor product-stack, with the addition of the new 56-core Xeon Scalable "Cascade Lake" processor. This chip is believed to be Intel's first response to the upcoming AMD 7 nm EPYC "Rome" processor with 64 cores and a monolithic memory interface. The 56-core "Cascade Lake" is a multi-chip module (MCM) of two 28-core dies, each with a 6-channel DDR4 memory interface, totaling 12-channel for the package. Each of the two 28-core dies are built on the existing 14 nm++ silicon fabrication process, and the IPC of each of the 56 cores are largely unchanged since "Skylake." Intel however, has added several HPC and AI-relevant instruction-sets.

To begin with, Intel introduced DL Boost, which could be a fixed-function hardware matrix multiplier that accelerates building and training of AI deep-learning neural networks. Next up, are hardware mitigation against several speculative execution CPU security vulnerabilities that haunted the computing world since early-2018, including certain variants of "Spectre" and "Meltdown." A hardware fix presents lesser performance impact compared to a software fix in the form of a firmware patch. Intel has added support for Optane Persistent Memory, which is the company's grand vision for what succeeds volatile primary memory such as DRAM. Currently slower than DRAM but faster than SSDs, Optane Persistent Memory is non-volatile, and its contents can be made to survive power-outages. This allows sysadmins to power-down entire servers to scale down with workloads, without worrying about long wait times to restore uptime when waking up those servers. Among the CPU instruction-sets added include AVX-512 and AES-NI.

Intel Tuesday unveiled a new portfolio of data-centric solutions consisting of 2nd-Generation Intel Xeon Scalable processors, Intel Optane DC memory and storage solutions, and software and platform technologies optimized to help its customers extract more value from their data. Intel's latest data center solutions target a wide range of use cases within cloud computing, network infrastructure and intelligent edge applications, and support high-growth workloads, including AI and 5G.

Building on more than 20 years of world-class data center platforms and deep customer collaboration, Intel's data center solutions target server, network, storage, internet of things (IoT) applications and workstations. The portfolio of products advances Intel's data-centric strategy to pursue a massive $300 billion data-driven market opportunity.

GIGABYTE TECHNOLOGY Co. Ltd, a leading manufacturer of motherboards and graphics cards, today released the newest 300 series motherboards BIOS to fully support the newest Intel 9th Gen. Core processors with new stepping. The updates prevent the inability to boot the system during installation of the CPUs, providing full support for the next generation CPUs and ensuring that users can upgrade their processors without compatibility issues.

In Q2, Intel is set to launch new 9th Gen. Core processors with new stepping and motherboard manufacturers will upgrade their BIOS to improve the compatibility of their motherboards with these new processors. GIGABYTE has already upgraded all BIOS at first notice and uploaded the newest updates and all related information to its official website so that users can conveniently and successfully upgrade the BIOS for their GIGABYTE 300 series motherboards. With professional validation and testing carried forth by GIGABYTE engineers, the newest BIOS updates enhance compatibility with these new processors so that users can maximize performance with excellent system stability.DOWNLOAD: GIGABYTE Intel 300-series Motherboard BIOS Updates.

Anyone remotely familiar with NVIDIA knows of their now erstwhile distinguished engineer Thomas A. Petersen, better known simply as Tom Petersen or TAP. He was a delight to work with as far as the tech media is concerned, including TechPowerUp, and was a source of technical information on NVIDIA microarchitectures as well as features targeting the general consumer and prosumer alike. The last few keynote presentations have had a visible lack of Tom on screen, and even in person to where we were discussing internally whether he had taken on a more "behind the scenes" approach at the company. As it turns out, Tom is the latest in line to have attracted the eyes of Intel as the latter gears up to the challenge of gaining marketing share in the discrete GPU business in the years to come.

Tom confirmed on his Facebook page this past Friday that he was indeed leaving NVIDIA, with March 29 being his last working day there. He was quick to note his unemployment status on his LinkedIn profile in a humorous manner as well, and this was surely not for long given news broke shortly from Hothardware, and then Gamers Nexus, who both independently verified from their contacts at Intel that Tom Petersen was headed to the blue team sooner than later. Aside from being a media liaison for technical marketing, he has been at the forefront for the development of tools to help benchmark render response and effectiveness (FCAT), contributed to NVIDIA's GPU BOOST technology directly, and no doubt will be an important contributor at Intel to complement the vast number of PR and media personnel joining their ranks in the recent few months. We are excited to see what Tom helps bring to the table, and wish him the best to help create a more open and competing dGPU market for us.

ASRock has released BIOS updates for all Z390/H370/Q370/B365/B360/H310 series motherboards to support the soon to be released new stepping 9th Generation Intel Core processors. The latest BIOS updates are available for download now from our website or simply update through ASRock APP Shop. New processors are scheduled to launch in Q2, 2019, the latest BIOS for each motherboard are listed as below. BIOS updates for more models will be added soon.

EK Water Blocks, the leading premium computer liquid cooling gear manufacturer, is releasing the EK-Velocity WS, a robust premium grade water block for narrow ILM LGA 3647 (Socket P) Intel processors, and the EK-VRM ASUS ROG Dominus Extreme, a VRM water block tailor-made for the ROG Dominus Extreme motherboard. Both are all metal water blocks with nickel plated copper cold plates and nickel plated brass tops. No compromise on quality, durability, and performance!

Intel and Micron Technology have parted ways from the IMFlash Technology joint-venture that set out to win the emerging non-volatile memory market with limited success. The two are now locked in numerous legal skirmishes arising from the disjointing of a major high-technology alliance, as employees migrate to either company. One such former Intel engineering-manager is in the middle of a legal spat, named Doyle Rivers. Rivers jumped ship from Intel to Micron Technology, allegedly carrying with him a large amount of trade-secrets and IP related to Intel's 3D XPoint memory and Optane products.

Intel Tuesday secured a preliminary injunction from the US District Court for the Eastern District of California, Sacramento Division, which tells Rivers to not possess, use, or disclose any confidential Intel information related to the company's 3D XPoint or Optane products, including personnel working on those products; and to return any such possessions to Intel. Rivers' defense claims Intel gets nothing from this injunction. In a telephonic interview with The Register, Daniel Sakaguchi, a partner at Alto Litigation in San Francisco, representing Rivers, stated "Mr. Rivers doesn't have anything to return," adding "We continue to take the position that Intel's claims are greatly exaggerated."

Intel is readying a new stepping of 9th generation Core processors, which could require motherboard BIOS updates. ASUS released a statement in which it mentions that Intel is preparing to launch processors based on the new stepping of "Coffee Lake Refresh" silicon from Q2-2019. It goes on to say that BIOS updates have been released for its entire line of Intel 300-series chipset motherboards for supporting the new stepping. The company doesn't mention what the stepping ID is, or what's different.

The statement reads: "ASUS has released BIOS updates for all 300 series motherboards, adding support for the forthcoming 9th Generation Intel Core processors based on new stepping. These processors are scheduled for launch in Q2, 2019. The latest BIOS updates are available for download now from the ASUS website." You can find these updated BIOS ROMs on the product page of your motherboard on ASUS website.

Intel Corporation today announced that its board of directors had unanimously decided to extend Andy Bryant's term as Intel chairman for one additional year, to help support Intel's leadership transition. If Bryant is re-elected at Intel's 2019 annual stockholders' meeting, his term as chairman would continue through the conclusion of Intel's 2020 annual stockholders' meeting. Bryant has informed the board that he does not expect to stand for re-election again in 2020.

"I am honored to be nominated to serve as a director and Intel's chairman for another year," Bryant said. "If re-elected by the stockholders at our annual meeting in May, I look forward to continuing to work with Bob, the board and the entire executive team to continue Intel's historic transformation to a data-centric company. I expect this would be my last year of service as a member of Intel's board."

"I am ecstatic that the board has extended Andy's term for another year," Intel CEO Bob Swan said. "He has been a great sounding board for me since I joined the company, and has been especially invaluable to me while I have served in the interim and now permanent CEO roles."

The latest version of Intel Graphics drivers which introduce the company's latest UWP-based Graphics Command Center app, hide another secret in their INF. The file has pointers to dozens of variants and implementations of the company's next-generation Gen11 integrated graphics architecture, which we detailed in a recent article. Intel will implement Gen11 on two key processor microarchitectures, "Ice Lake" and "Lakefield," although later down the line, the graphics technology could trickle down to low-power Pentium Silver and Celeron SoC lines, too, with chips based on the "Elkhart Lake" silicon.

There are 13 variants of Gen11 on "Ice Lake," carved using execution unit (EU) count, and LP (low-power) aggressive power management. The mainstream desktop processors based on "Ice Lake," which are least restrained in power-management, get the most powerful variants of Gen11 under the Iris Plus brand. Iris Plus Graphics 950 is the most powerful implementation, with all 64 EUs enabled, and the highest GPU clock speeds. This variant could feature on Core i7 and Core i9 brands derived from "Ice Lake." Next up, is the Iris Plus Graphics 940, with the same EU count, but likely lower clock speeds, which could feature across the vast lineup of Core i5 SKUs. The Iris Plus 930 comes in two trims based on EU count, of 64 and 48, and could likely be spread across the Core i3 lineup. Lastly, there's the Iris Plus 920 with 32 EUs, which could be found in Pentium Gold SKUs. There are various SKUs branded "UHD Graphics Gen11 LP," with EU counts ranging from 32 to 64.

Intel has revealed the layout and overall look (as well as functionality, though that one is always changing) of their new Graphics Command Center app, which showcases the company's vision for a graphics control hub. The design is thematically coherent (read: it's blue), and is, for now, of a simple layout. Enthusiast options are expectedly going to be added closer to or upon release of the company's discrete-level graphics architecture with Intel Xe, but the Command Center as it is showcases Intel's overall spirit to their graphics push. For now, features keep the minimalist approach of Intel's integrated graphics - this is more of a new coat of paint than a new enthusiast-grade Command Center.

Intel made a video available on its Twitter account, and announced an early access program for users that want to partake i the feature and usability development of the new Command Center. The new app is available through Microsoft's App Store on Windows.

This here is an interesting piece of tech news for sure, in that Intel has already scored a pretty massive design win for not one, but two upcoming products. Intel's "Future Xeon Scalable Processors" and the company's "Xe Compute Architecture" have been tapped by the U.S. Department of Energy for incorporation into the new AURORA Supercomputer - one that will deliver exascale performance. AURORA is to be developed in a partnership between Intel and Cray, using the later's Shasta systems and its "Slingshot" networking fabric. But these are not the only Intel elements in the supercomputer design: Intel's DC Optane persistent memory will also be employed (in an as-of-yet-unavailable version of it as well), making this a full win across the prow for Intel.

Kyle Bennett, owner of tech publication HardOCP that ruled the web for over two decades, has joined Intel in the position of Director of Enthusiast Engagement. Following his departure, HardOCP will "mothballed," in that it will not generate new content, its IP and existing content will be owned by Bennett. HardForum.com, on the other hand, will be sold to a company Bennett is familiar with, demonetized, and run by volunteers and funded by Patreons. At Intel, Bennett will work under Technology Leadership Marketing, and will lead the company's efforts to "reconnect with the top of the high-performance consumer pyramid which contains hardware enthusiasts, overclockers, gamers, and content creators."

Kyle Benett is among a handful superstar tech journalists Intel soaked up in recent times as Raja Koduri and Chris Hook build Intel's Infinity Gauntlet with them. These include Ryan Shrout from PC Perspective, and Damien Triolet from Hardware.fr (albeit via AMD). Anand Lal Shimpi probably was one of the first and most prominent tech press leaders who left his publication for the industry. AMD's arsenal includes Scott Wasson from The TechReport and the famous overclocker Sammi Maekinen. Lars Weinand from RivaStation works for NVIDIA (also via AMD). Kyle Bennett is famous for a mountain of work in the DIY PC sphere, but in recent times is most recently credited for exposing and leading an awareness campaign against NVIDIA's poorly conceived GeForce Partner Program (GPP). We wish Kyle Bennett all the very best in his new endeavor and pray that he doesn't allow DIY PC and overclocking to become as expensive a hobby as fast cars (which unfortunately is the direction in which it's headed).

Apple today updated its iMac line with up to 8-core Intel 9th-generation processors for the first time and powerful Vega graphics options, delivering dramatic increases in both compute and graphics performance. From consumers to pros alike, users will notice their iMac is faster for everyday tasks all the way up to the most demanding pro workloads. This boost in performance, combined with its gorgeous Retina display, sleek all-in-one design, quiet operation, fast storage and memory, modern connectivity and macOS Mojave, makes iMac the world's best desktop.

"Customers are going to love the huge boost in iMac performance. With up to 8-core processors and powerful Vega graphics, the iMac lineup is stronger than ever," said Tom Boger, Apple's senior director of Mac Product Marketing. "With its stunning Retina display, amazing design, twice the performance, and macOS Mojave that our customers love, iMac is by far the best desktop in the world."

SPOILER, short for Speculative Load Hazards Boost Rowhammer and Cache Attacks (not sure how that abbreviates), is the latest in the long line of security vulnerabilities preying on imperfections in speculative-execution capabilities of modern processors, which surfaced early March, and affects all Intel processors. The vulnerability exploits the speculative nature of loading data from main memory to a CPU register. Intel has yet to assign a CVE to SPOILER, and hasn't yet released its own documentation on possible mitigation.

Meanwhile, rival AMD put out a statement that its processors are inherently immune to SPOILER due to a fundamentally different memory management design. "We are aware of the report of a new security exploit called SPOILER which can gain access to partial address information during load operations. We believe that our products are not susceptible to this issue because of our unique processor architecture. The SPOILER exploit can gain access to partial address information above address bit 11 during load operations. We believe that our products are not susceptible to this issue because AMD processors do not use partial address matches above address bit 11 when resolving load conflicts," the company writes in its statement.

ASUS today announced ZenBook 14 (UX431). It balances value and performance to deliver a sleek, sophisticated ultraportable that doesn't compromise on power. This premium laptop is packed full of the latest technology that includes 8th Generation Intel Core processors, NVIDIA GeForce MX150 graphics, up to 16GB of RAM, ample SSD storage space and the latest connectivity options. The ZenBook 14 is available now, in two configurations, starting at $799.99.

ZenBook 14 exudes sophistication without screaming for attention. Its Utopia Blue color and spun-metal finish are decidedly chic while still being distinctly Zen. Lifting the lid reveals a 14-inch FHD (1920x1080) IPS NanoEdge display that offers great viewing angles and uniform color, whether the user is sitting square in front of it at work, or lounging to one side watching Netflix.

Intel Graphics switched gears from being integrated graphics solutions for basic 2D desktop and video, to something that could appeal to gamers. The change appears to have been brought about by hiring of Raja Koduri, who led graphics teams at AMD and Apple. Intel discovered that its iGPUs can play many e-Sports games such as PUBG, World of Tanks, Warhammer: Vermitide 2, etc., and so, the company decided to do more for this segment of PC gamers that still games on iGPUs, beginning with regular driver updates that pack game-optimizations, the switch to the new DCH driver model for Windows 10, and apparently, a new Control Panel app designed for gamers.

Teased in a YouTube presentation by Intel Graphics, the Control Panel appears to show a game launcher and settings optimization tool modeled along the lines of GeForce Experience. Intel has also made big changes to the functional bits of the Control Panel, which deal with global display settings, monitor setup, etc. The new Control Panel gives us a direction of where Intel Graphics is headed: it doesn't want to leave behind gamers. The Gen11 iGPU which will be part of the company's 10 nm "Ice Lake" processors already spark rumors of massive 3D performance improvements over current Gen9.5, and reportedly have over 1 TFLOP/s of raw compute power. The company is also working on a discrete GPU lineup under the Xe brand, targeting a variety of market segments, including gamers.The video presentation by Intel Graphics follows.

Intel is rumored to refresh its high-end desktop (HEDT) platforms this Summer with new products based on the "Cascade Lake" microarchitecture. Intel now has two HEDT platforms, LGA2066 and LGA3647. The new "Cascade Lake-X" silicon will target the LGA2066 platform, and could see the light of the day by June, on the sidelines of Computex 2019. A higher core-count model with 6-channel memory, will be launched for the LGA3647 socket as early as April. So if you've very recently fronted $3,000 on a Xeon W-3175X, here's a bucket of remorse. Both chips will be built on existing 14 nm process, and will bring innovations such as Optane Persistent Memory support, Intel Deep Learning Boost (DLBOOST) extensions with VNNI instruction-set, and hardware mitigation against more variants of "Meltdown" and "Spectre."

Elsewhere in the industry, and sticking with Intel, we've known since November 2018 of the existence of "Comet Lake," which is a 10-core silicon for the LGA1151 platform, and which is yet another "Skylake" derivative built on existing 14 nm process. This chip is real, and will be Intel's last line of defense against AMD's first 7 nm "Zen 2" socket AM4 processors, with core-counts of 12-16.

Supplies of Intel processors will worsen in the second quarter of 2019 according to Taiwan-based industry observer DigiTimes. In a research-based report covering not just the DIY channel, but also the OEM channel focusing on notebook manufacturer, DigiTimes notes that heading into Q2, growth in demand for entry-level portables such as Chromebooks based on entry-level Intel processors, and mainstream notebooks powered by Core i3 processors, which make up the largest demographic of PC consumers in the market.

A pertinent concept to this report is supply-gap, the percentage difference between demand and supply. A positive supply-gap indicates demand exceeding supply and shortages. Leading notebook vendors HP, Dell, and Lenovo, reported supply-gaps of 5% going into Q3-2018, which severely impacted their bottom-lines. The companies waded through Q4 with 4-5%. DigiTimes reports that even Apple wasn't spared from shortages in "Amber Lake" processors. "In the first quarter of 2019, the Core i5 processors featuring Coffee Lake architecture are now having the worst supply shortfall. Some of the demand for Intel's entry-level Atom processors has turned to AMD, while some others have opted for Core i3 processors," the report reads. AMD's market-share among OEMs increased from 9.8% in Q1-2018 to 15.8% in Q1-2019.