Dell Technologies (NYSE:DELL) unveiled new products and software that reimagine work so anyone can perform at their best. With a new portfolio of intelligent, collaborative and sustainable devices, Dell is transforming work experiences to give people greater flexibility to work from anywhere.

"People's expectations of their technology continue to evolve. It's why we push beyond barriers to create devices that offer better experiences and are more integrated into our lives," said Ed Ward, senior vice president, Client Product Group, Dell Technologies. "Our new intelligent PCs make it possible for us to work smarter and collaborate easier, so we can give our best selves in all that we do. Secure, sustainable and smart: that's the way forward for PCs."

Intel's first discrete gaming graphics card based on the Xe-HPG graphics architecture, will be built on a TSMC 7 nanometer silicon fabrication node, according to a Reuters report citing sources "familiar with the matter." The first such discrete GPU is being referred to internally by Intel as the DG2. Recent reports suggest that Intel will give the DG2 formidable specs, such as 4,096 unified shaders across 512 execution units, and 8 GB of GDDR6 video memory. Back in 2020, the company launched the DG1 under the Intel Iris Xe MAX marketing name, targeting only the mobile discrete GPU market. The DG1 has entry-level specs, with which Intel is eyeing the same pie as NVIDIA's fast-moving GeForce MX series mobile GPUs. Interestingly, the other major client of TSMC-N7 following Apple's transition to N5, is Intel's rival AMD.

Intel highlighted the company's focus on execution of core products and showcased the company's broader portfolio, in addition to sharing more on what's coming in the year ahead. As part of its disclosures, Intel announced the recent production of its 3rd Gen Intel Xeon Scalable processors (code-named "Ice Lake") with volume ramp taking place during the first quarter of 2021. Intel's 10 nm Xeon Scalable processors feature architectural and platform innovations that boost performance, security and operational efficiency within data centers.

"Today marks a significant milestone for Intel as we continue to accelerate the delivery of our 10 nm products and maintain an intense focus on delivering a predictable cadence of leadership products for our customers," said Navin Shenoy, executive vice president and general manager of the Data Platforms Group at Intel. "Our 3rd Gen Intel Xeon Scalable platform represents a strategic part of our data center strategy and one that we've created alongside some of our biggest customers to enable the data center of tomorrow."

Semiconductor manufacturing is not an easy feat to achieve. Especially if you are constantly chasing the smaller and smaller node. Intel knows this the best. The company has had a smooth transition from other nodes to the smaller ones until the 10 nm node came up. It has brought Intel years of additional delay and tons of cost improving the yields of a node that was seeming broken. Yesterday the company announced the new Tiger Lake-H processors for laptops that are built using the 10 nm process, however, we are questioning whatever Intel can keep up with the semiconductor industry and deliver the newest nodes on time, and with ease. During an interview with Intel's CEO Bob Swan, we can get a glimpse of Intel's plans for the future of semiconductors at the company.

In the interview, Mr. Swan has spoken about the technical side of Intel and how the company plans to utilize its Fabs. The first question everyone was wondering was about the state of 10 nm. The node is doing well as three Fabs are ramping up capacity every day, and more products are expected to arrive on that node. Mr. Swan has also talked about outsourcing chip production, to which he responded by outlining the advantage Intel has with its Fabs. He said that outsourcing is what is giving us shortages like AMD and NVIDIA experience, and Intel had much less problems. Additionally, Mr. Swan was asked about the feasibility of new node development. To that, he responded that there is a possibility that Intel could license its competitor's node and produce it in their Fabs.

Intel at a January 11, 2021 online media event (which we live-blogged here) revealed more information about its 11th Generation Core "Rocket Lake-S" desktop processor family. These chips succeed the 10th Gen Core "Comet Lake-S," and are built on the same Socket LGA1200 package, retaining backwards compatibility with Intel 400-series chipset motherboards with firmware updates; and native support with the upcoming Intel 500-series chipset motherboards. Intel in its media event confirmed that the top Core i9-11900K is an 8-core/16-thread processor, which will deliver the highest PC gaming performance possible when it comes out.

In its media event, Intel revealed a side-by-side comparison of the i9-11900K with a machine powered by the AMD Ryzen 9 5900X 12-core processor, where it's shown offering a mostly mid-single-digit-percentage performance lead over the AMD chip. In the "Metro Exodus" benchmark prominently highlighted in the Intel event, the i9-11900K is shown offering an average frame-rate of 156.54 FPS compared to 147.43 FPS of the 5900X (a 6.17% gain). VideoCardz tweeted a leaked Intel presentation slide with many more game test results where Intel compared the two chips. Intel's play with marketing "Rocket Lake-S" to gamers and PC enthusiasts will hence ride on the back of gaming performance leadership, and future-proofing against the new wave of productivity apps that leverage AI deep-learning, as "Rocket Lake-S" features DLBoost VNNI extensions that accelerate deep-learning neural-net building, training, and AI inference performance.

Hey, we're live from Intel's Event at CES. We expect to hear about Rocket Lake, and possibly get a glimpse into the future beyond that.

Intel has apparently taken the CES opportunity to showcase its upcoming Rocket Lake-S CPU in gaming against one of AMD's best mainstream CPUs, packing 12 cores - although the specific model remains undisclosed. Geeknetics shared screen-grabs from the demo, done inside Metro Exodus, where the undisclosed Intel 8-core Rocket Lake-S is shown achieving higher average frame-rates compared to the AMD solution (an average of 156.54 FPS for Intel, against 147.43 FPS for AMD). The CPUs were paired with an NVIDIA RTX 3080 graphics card - and in case you're wondering whether NVIDIA's Resizable BAR capabilities have been activated for this Rocket Lake-S system, no information on that was available at time of writing (the question is raised since Intel has already announced support for the feature with NVIDIA GPUs on Tiger Lake-H).

More and more people continue to turn to gaming for entertainment, escape, and socializing with friends & family. This has lead to unprecedented demand for enthusiast level gaming laptops. This growing demographic demands a design language that addresses their need for a sleek lifestyle device for work, school, everyday tasks AND gaming. The 11th Gen Intel Core H Series Processors for Ultraportable Gaming builds on the best of what our 11th Gen Intel Core U-series processors have already delivered, adds more performance to enable this new class of Ultraportable Gaming systems.

As the launch of Intel's 500 series chipsets is getting near, we are starting to see more motherboards appear and get leaked. Today, thanks to the folks over VideoCardz, we have the first pictures of MSI's upcoming Z590 motherboards, with the latest designs and ideas from the company. Pictured below are MSI's trio of motherboards including MSI MEG Z590 GODLIKE, MPG Z590 Gaming Carbon WiFi, and MAG Z590 Tomahawk WiFi boards. The first in line is the MEG Z590 GODLIKE motherboard, a top tier, flagship design made with E-ATX standard in mind. It is supposed to bring all of the platform features to the table while being the best for overclocking due to its 20 (18+1+1) VRM phases.

Next up are the MPG Z590 Gaming Carbon WiFi and MAG Z590 Tomahawk WiFi designs, which should represent a bit cut-down GODLIKE variants. We don't have the exact specifications, so we need to wait for the official announcement.

The PC has never been more essential, so this year at CES 2021, HP Inc. is launching computing innovations essential to how and where people experience work and life. HP today unveiled new devices and solutions designed to power hybrid work environments and growing personal creative studios.

With half of the global workforce still working remotely due to the COVID-19 pandemic, new use cases for the PC are emerging for both consumers and employees remaining at home. Since COVID, there has been a seven hour increase in time spent on personal PCs. In some cases, this has resulted in an increase in everyday creativity - with photography, writing stories or articles, and live streaming being the top three activities among consumers. But working and staying at home isn't always simple, with only 30% of people having a space where they can shut the door. Yet 72% of knowledge workers want a hybrid remote-office model moving forward and 48% of Gen Z are considering an expansion of their freelance business in the future, requiring solutions with enhanced collaboration and micro-mobility features.

An Intel Rocket Lake-S CPU with 8 cores and 16 threads has recently surfaced in an overclocking video, being pushed to 6.923 GHz operating frequency, as showcased via a CPU-Z screen-grabbed from the video. Neither author of the video or the overclocker that pulled this feat are currently known. However, it can be seen from the CPU-Z that the overclocked CPU at 6.9 GHz supports instruction sets not available to Intel's current lineup of desktop CPUs, but that will be supported by Rocket Lake-S: namely, SHA and AVX512F. Likewise, the cache sizes correspond to the expected changes for Intel's Rocket Lake-S.

The overclocked CPU was paired with overclocked DDR4 memory as well, which was brought up to 6,666 MHz, buoyed by a crispy 1.830 V. Motherboard information is scarce, but it's speculated that it's a Gigabyte-branded Z590 motherboard. Perhaps this video is part of an Intel-pushed marketing attempt to increase desirability of its Rocket Lake-S CPUs to overclockers and enthusiasts. Expect the official Rocket Lake-S unveiling to occur during CES, with market availability around March.

AMD is expected to announce its upcoming EPYC lineup of processors for server applications based on the new Zen 3 architecture. Codenamed "Milan", AMD is continuing the use of Italian cities as codenames for its processors. Being based on the new Zen 3 core, Milan is expected to bring big improvements over the existing EPYC "Rome" design. Bringing a refined 7 nm+ process, the new EPYC Milan CPUs are going to feature better frequencies, which are getting paired with high core counts. If you are wondering how Zen 3 would look like in server configuration, look no further because we have the upcoming AMD EPYC 7543 32-core processor benchmarked in Geekbench 4 benchmark.

The new EPYC 7543 CPU is a 32 core, 64 thread design with a base clock of 2.8 GHz, and a boost frequency of 3.7 GHz. The caches on this CPU are big, and there is a total of 2048 KB (32 times 32 KB for instruction cache and 32 times 32 KB for data cache) of L1 cache, 16 MB of L2 cache, and as much as 256 MB of L3. In the GB4 test, a single-core test produced 6065 points, while the multi-core run resulted in 111379 points. If you are wondering how that fairs against something like top-end Intel Xeon Platinum 8280 Cascade Lake 28-core CPU, the new EPYC Milan 7543 CPU is capable of fighting two of them at the same time. In a single-core test, the Intel Xeon configuration scores 5048 points, showing that the new Milan CPU has 20% higher single-core performance, while the multi-core score of the dual Xeon setup is 117171 points, which is 5% faster than AMD CPU. The reason for the higher multi-core score is the sheer number of cores that a dual-CPU configuration offers (32 cores vs 56 cores).

Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. today introduced Galaxy Chromebook 2, the newest member of the Galaxy Computing family. Since 2011, Samsung has been a leader in the Chromebook market, finding new ways to elevate the Chrome OS experience—and the ultra-premium Galaxy Chromebook represented a path-breaking leap forward. The 2-in-1 Galaxy Chromebook 2 builds on that legacy, offering the leading features from its predecessor at a more accessible price. Boasting the first-ever QLED display on a Chromebook, reliable hardware, and seamless integration into the Galaxy and Google ecosystems, Galaxy Chromebook 2 represents yet another high-performance option for users who love the flexibility of Chrome OS.

"Many kids grew up using Chromebooks in school, and as they enter the workforce, their needs evolve, they're looking for premium, powerful hardware that can elevate that intuitive Google experience," said Shoneel Kolhatkar, General Manager, Head of New Computing, Samsung Electronics America. "We designed the Galaxy Chromebook 2 with these users in mind, taking the popular features from Galaxy Chromebook—incredible visuals, great specs, and gorgeous design and color—and bringing them to a wider base of customers."

Today, Intel introduced Intel RealSense ID, an on-device solution that combines an active depth sensor with a specialized neural network designed to deliver secure, accurate and user-aware facial authentication. Intel RealSense ID works with smart locks, access control, point-of-sale, ATMs, kiosks and more. "Intel RealSense ID combines purpose-built hardware and software with a dedicated neural network designed to deliver a secure facial authentication platform that users can trust," said Sagi Ben Moshe, Intel corporate vice president and general manager of Emerging Growth and Incubation.

With an easy enrollment process and no network setup needed, Intel RealSense ID brings a highly accurate, natural solution that simplifies secure entry. Using only a glance, users are able to quickly unlock what's important to them. Intel RealSense ID combines active depth with a specialized neural network, a dedicated system-on-chip and embedded secure element to encrypt and process user data quickly and safely. To ensure continued ease of use, Intel RealSense ID also adapts to users over time as they change physical features, such as facial hair and glasses. The system works in various lighting conditions for people with a wide range of heights or complexions.

GIGABYTE TECHNOLOGY Co. Ltd, a leading manufacturer of motherboards, graphics cards, and hardware solutions, today announced that all Z490 motherboards featuring PCIe 4.0 hardware design can support the 11th Gen. Intel Core processors perfectly by update to the latest F20 BIOS, and provide the extreme bandwidth and performance for PCIe 4.0 graphics cards and SSDs. With a snap update of the latest BIOS from GIGBAYTE's official site, users can enjoy the full pack of advantages and unlock the Resizable BAR function on GIGABYTE Z490 and H470 motherboards.

The latest 11th Gen. Intel Core processors will be launched on March 2021. The new processors keep the same architecture as the previous generation but they enable the PCIe 4.0 support, which meet a range of needs for users who expect broad bandwidth and super high transfer speed of PCIe 4.0 on the Intel platform. For those who own one of the current generation motherboards, it would be a great deal to enjoy the performance uplift on Z490 motherboards with PCIe 4.0 function and 11th Gen. Intel Core processors support.

PC benchmarking software company PassMark has recorded the market share of AMD and Intel processors based on their testing data. This data dates back to Q1 2014 and shows Intel dominating the desktop market. AMD has been gradually making ground on Intel since they launched their Ryzen processors in 2017 which have quickly become some of the best processors available. Thanks to the success of Ryzen the market share of AMD desktop processors recently overtook Intel reaching 50.8%, this number has now fallen to 49.8% as the data continues to be updated with new tests but the trend is clear. While AMD has made tremendous gains in the desktop market they still fall far behind in the laptop and server segments with 17% and 1.1% market shares respectively. This puts AMD's total market share across all segments at 38.2% according to PassMark data.

Intel's return to discrete gaming GPUs may have had a modest beginning with the Iris Xe MAX, but the company is looking to take a real stab at the gaming market. Driver code from the latest 100.9126 graphics driver, and OEM data-sheets pieced together by VideoCardz, reveal that its next attempt will be substantially bigger. Called "DG2," and based on the Xe-HPG graphics architecture, a derivative of Xe targeting gaming graphics, the new GPU allegedly features 512 Xe execution units. To put this number into perspective, the Iris Xe MAX features 96, as does the Iris Xe iGPU found in Intel's "Tiger Lake" mobile processors. The upcoming 11th Gen Core "Rocket Lake-S" is rumored to have a Xe-based iGPU with 48. Subject to comparable clock speeds, this alone amounts to a roughly 5x compute power uplift over DG1, 10x over the "Rocket Lake-S" iGPU. 512 EUs convert to 4,096 programmable shaders.

A leaked OEM data-sheet referencing the DG2 also mentions a rather contemporary video memory setup, with 8 GB of GDDR6 memory. While the Iris Xe MAX is built on Intel's homebrew 10 nm SuperFin node, Intel announced that its Xe-HPG chips will use third-party foundries. With these specs, Intel potentially has a GPU to target competitive e-sports gaming (where the money is). Sponsorship of major e-sports clans could help with the popularity of Intel Graphics. With enough beans on the pole, Intel could finally invest in scaling up the architecture to even higher client graphics market segments. As for availability, VideoCardz predicts a launch roughly coinciding with that of Intel's "Tiger Lake-H" mobile processor series, possibly slated for mid-2021.

BIOSTAR has started teasing a new motherboard lineup to accompany the launch of Intel's Z500 series chipsets, which will offer support for the company's upcoming 11th gen Rocket Lake-S CPUs. So far, BIOSTAR has confirmed that two motherboards are being built around this new series, in the form of the Z590 Valkyrie (ATX) and Z590I Valkyrie (Mini-ITX). The tease showcases the motherboard series' logo, based of Valkyries' wings in what appears to be a black and white color philosophy, which might extend to the motherboards themselves. This could mean that BIOSTAR is now offering a slightly more toned-down design compared to their usual RACING motherboard series.

Linus Torvalds, the inventor of the Linux kernel and version-control system called git, has posted another one of his famous rants, addressing his views about the lack of ECC memory in consumer devices. Mr. Torvalds has posted his views on the Linux kernel mailing list, where he usually comments about the development of the kernel. The ECC or Error Correcting Code memory is a special kind of DRAM that fixes the problems that occur inside the memory itself, where a bit can get corrupted and change the data stored, thus offering false results. ECC aims to fix those mistakes by implementing a system that fixes these small errors and avoids bigger problems. According to Mr. Torvalds, it is a technology that we need to be implemented everywhere, not just server space like Intel imagines.

Linus TorvaldsIntel has been instrumental in killing the whole ECC industry with it's horribly bad market segmentation... Intel has been detrimental to the whole industry and to users because of their bad and misguided policies wrt ECC. Seriously...The arguments against ECC were always complete and utter garbage... Now even the memory manufacturers are starting do do ECC internally because they finally owned up to the fact that they absolutely have to. And the memory manufacturers claim it's because of economics and lower power. And they are lying bastards - let me once again point to row-hammer about how those problems have existed for several generations already, but these f***** happily sold broken hardware to consumers and claimed it was an "attack", when it always was "we're cutting corners".

Hot on the heels of its Geekbench score leak, we have PassMark numbers for the upcoming Core i7-11700K "Rocket Lake-S" desktop processor, leaked to the web. The PassMark online score database lists performance obtained from a single i7-11700K sample, where it's shown to be trading blows with the Ryzen 7 5800X (score averaged from over 600 samples). The Intel chip scores 3548 points single-thread rating, compared to 3509 (average) of the 5800X, while its multi-threaded score of 54255 points falls short of the 54458 points of the 5800X (average). Both these chips are 8-core/16-thread.

The Core i7-11700K has the same core configuration as the top i9-11900K part, but with lower rumored clock speeds. The Core i7 ticks at 3.60 GHz base, with up to 5.00 GHz boost, and the same 125 W TDP rating as its 10th Gen predecessor. The "Rocket Lake-S" desktop processor family sees Intel's first IPC uplift to the client-desktop platform in 5 years, on the backs of new "Cypress Cove" CPU cores. While we haven't seen evidence of core-counts above 8 for these processors, Intel's play will be to restore gaming performance leadership that it lost to AMD's Ryzen 5000 "Zen 3" processors. Plagued by scalping and limited availability to genuine customers, AMD stares at its performance leadership not translating into brand equity before Intel's next-gen parts flood the market.

In the run-up to its mid-January unveil of its 11th Gen Core "Rocket Lake-S" desktop processors and companion Intel 500-series chipsets, we get our first look at the three 500-series chipset models from Intel's stable for the DIY client market. This includes the top-tier Intel Z590, the mid-range B560, and the entry-level H510. Intel even made logos for the three chipsets, which could appear on the retail packaging and marketing materials of motherboards. While 11th Gen Core "Rocket Lake-S" processors are expected to be backwards-compatible with existing 400-series chipset Socket LGA1200 motherboards; there are major advantages to choosing a 500-series motherboard.

To begin with, motherboards based on the Z590 chipset feature a fatter 8-lane DMI 3.0 chipset bus between the processor and the PCH, which doubles the chipset bus bandwidth to 64 Gbps per direction. 500-series chipset motherboards also feature one CPU-attached M.2 NVMe slot, which works with "Rocket Lake-S," as the processor puts out 28 PCIe lanes. 16 of these go toward the PEG interface, 8 toward the chipset bus, and four toward this dedicated NVMe slot. In related news, Chinese tech publication MyDrivers reports that Intel is staring at a motherboard chipset shortage going into Q1-2021, with availability of the entry-mid 400-series chipsets such as the H410 and B460 being scarce. This could impact motherboard pricing.

Intel has just released its "Architecture Instruction Set Extensions and Future Features Programming Reference" manual, which serves the purpose of providing the developers' information about Intel's upcoming hardware additions which developers can utilize later on. Today, thanks to the @InstLatX64 on Twitter we have information that Intel is bringing on-package High Bandwidth Memory (HBM) solution to its next-generation Sapphire Rapids Xeon processors. Specifically, there are two instructions mentioned: 0220H - HBM command/address parity error and 0221H - HBM data parity error. Both instructions are there to address data errors in HBM so the CPU operates with correct data.

The addition of HBM is just one of the many new technologies Sapphire Rapids brings. The platform is supposedly going to bring many new technologies like an eight-channel DDR5 memory controller enriched with Intel's Data Streaming Accelerator (DSA). To connect to all of the external accelerators, the platform uses PCIe 5.0 protocol paired with CXL 1.1 standard to enable cache coherency in the system. And as a reminder, this would not be the first time we see a server CPU use HBM. Fujitsu has developed an A64FX processor with 48 cores and HBM memory, and it is powering today's most powerful supercomputer - Fugaku. That is showing how much can a processor get improved by adding a faster memory on-board. We are waiting to see how Intel manages to play it out and what we end up seeing on the market when Sapphire Rapids is delivered.

Intel is familiar with chip manufacturing problems since the company started the development of a 10 nm silicon semiconductor node. The latest node is coming years late with many IPs getting held back thanks to the inability of the company to produce it. All of Intel's chip production was historically happening at Intel's facilities, however, given the fact that the demand for 14 nm products is exceeding production capability, the company was forced to turn to external foundries like TSMC to compensate for its lack of capacity. TSMC has a contract with Intel to produce silicon for things like chipsets, which is offloading a lot of capacity for the company. Today, thanks to the exclusive information obtained by Reuters, we have information that a certain New York hedge fund, Third Point LLC, is advising the company about the future of its manufacturing.

The hedge fund is reportedly accounting for about one billion USD worth of assets in Intel, thus making it a huge and one influencing shareholder. The Third Point Chief Executive Daniel Loeb wrote a letter to Intel Chairman Omar Ishrak to take immediate action to boost the company's state as a major provider of processors for PCs and data centers. The company has noted that Intel needs to outsource more of its chip production to satisfy the market needs, so it can stay competitive with the industry. The poor performance of Intel has reflected on the company shares, which have declined about 21% this year. This has awoken the shareholders and now we see that they are demanding more aggressiveness from the company and a plan to outsource more of the chip production to partner foundries like TSMC and Samsung. It remains to be seen how Intel responds and what changes are to take place.

Intel's Rocket Lake-S platform is scheduled to arrive at the beginning of the following year, which is just a few days away. The Rocket Lake lineup of processors is going to be Intel's 11th generation of Core desktop CPUs and the platform is expected to make a debut with Intel's newest Cypress Cove core design. Thanks to the Geekbench 5 submission, we have the latest information about the performance of the upcoming Intel Core i7-11700K 8C/16T processor. Based on the Cypress Cove core, the CPU is allegedly bringing a double-digit IPC increase, according to Intel.

In the single-core result, the CPU has managed to score 1807 points, while the multi-core score is 10673 points. The CPU ran at the base clock of 3.6 GHz, while the boost frequency is fixed at 5.0 GHz. Compared to the previous, 10th generation, Intel Core i7-10700K which scores 1349 single-core score and 8973 points multi-core score, the Rocket Lake CPU has managed to put out 34% higher single-core and 19% higher multi-core score. When it comes to the comparison to AMD offerings, the highest-end Ryzen 9 5950X is about 7.5% slower in single-core result, and of course much faster in multi-core result thanks to double the number of cores.

In response to incredible customer demand, Intel has doubled its combined 14 nm and 10 nm manufacturing capacity over the past few years. To do this, the company found innovative ways to deliver more output within existing capacity through yield improvement projects and significant investments in capacity expansion. This video recounts that journey, which even included re-purposing existing lab and office space for manufacturing.

"Over the last three years, we have doubled our wafer volume capacity, and that was a significant investment. Moving forward, we're not stopping… We are continuing to invest into factory capacity to ensure we can keep up with the growing needs of our customers," says Keyvan Esfarjani, senior vice president and general manager of Manufacturing and Operations at Intel. The company also ramped its new 10 nm process this year. Intel currently manufactures 10 nm products in high volumes at its Oregon and Arizona sites in the U.S. and its site in Israel.