EK by LM TEK is proud to introduce the EK-Quantum Reflection³ Uni Distro Plate 300 D5, our first universal ATX distribution plate to feature an integrated bypass valve. The EK-Quantum Reflection³ Uni Distro combines a 300ml reservoir and D5 PWM pump on standard 120 mm fan mount, universally compatible with a large number of modern ATX PC cases, including the Lian Li O11D series and ASUS ROG Hyperion GR701.

The EK-Quantum Reflection³ features our latest innovation, the EK bypass valve for fast, efficient draining, flushing and refilling. No disconnected fittings, no mess, no lifting or tilting your case—simply drain your loop, close the bypass valve to pressurize, then attach an air blower to clear any residual coolant. Loop maintenance, solved. The hardest part is picking your next coolant color.

ViewSonic introduced a new 23.8-inch gaming monitor, the VX24G26J-4K with a 3840 x 2160 (4K) resolution. The monitor uses a Fast IPS panel with a native 160 Hz refresh rate, 1 ms GtG, 1,000:1 contrast ratio, and up to 400 nits brightness. The combination of UHD resolution with a pixel density of 185 PPI is something not often found on typical 24-inch 1080p or 1440p displays. The panel is treated with ViewSonic's Nano Obsidian Screen technology that provides a matte, anti-reflective finish. The monitor supports Adaptive-Sync alongside AMD FreeSync and NVIDIA G-Sync compatibility. It also sports HDR10, VESA DisplayHDR 400 certification, 8-bit color depth, 100% sRGB and 95% DCI-P3/Adobe RGB color gamuts coverage.

The ViewSonic VX24G26J-4K gaming monitor has a three-sided narrow-bezel design with the stand offering height, tilt, swivel and pivot adjustments. Additional features include Flicker-Free backlighting, Low Blue Light mode, Black Stabilization, and on-screen crosshair overlays. On the connectivity side, it has one DisplayPort 1.4 input, two HDMI 2.1 ports, a 3.5 mm audio jack and a built-in power supply. The monitor has so far appeared only in the Chinese market, ViewSonic not disclosing yet its pricing or global availability.

Epic Games has been working on enhancing its Epic Games Store (EGS) to better compete with Steam, and the upcoming Epic Games Launcher version 2 will bring significant performance improvements to the desktop application. According to the latest rumors, EGS Launcher v2 will be 5 to 6.5 times faster than the current launcher. This aims to attract more users with a substantial redesign of the storefront, both architecturally and visually. It should open about five times faster on a cold start, while returning from the system tray to the library could be roughly 6.5 times quicker on average. For players who have grown accustomed to waiting on menus and slow page loads, this may be the most meaningful change.

Epic also seems to be redefining what the store aims to represent, as engaging players is one of the best ways to keep them returning to the platform. The new storefront layout is built around a more personalized home page, with quick-access categories and a scrollable hero section designed to help players find relevant games faster. Product pages are also being reworked to do more than just display a title, price, and rating. Epic wants them to highlight story elements, community activity, and even a player's own progression where relevant. With this, EGS hopes to counter earlier claims by two former Epic Games employees that the EGS saw only an initial spike in active users during free game promotions, with gamers eventually returning to Steam.

Compared to their non-pro variants, Duronaut Pro and Hydronaut Pro offer increased thermal conductivity while otherwise meeting the specific requirements of their predecessors. Duronaut Pro was developed for particularly high long-term stability, while Hydronaut Pro can be used as a thermal paste in industrial systems thanks to its silicone-free carrier structure.

At first glance, the temperature differences measured under laboratory conditions between the Pro pastes and the non-pro variants appear marginal. However, when considering how little room for improvement still exists in thermal paste development with regard to temperature, these improvements in thermal conductivity must be considered significant.

Colorful Technology Company Limited, a leading brand in gaming PC components, gaming laptops, and Hi-fi audio products, proudly announces the launch of the limited-edition Chitu MAG-60 Magnetic Switch Keyboard, inspired by the Chinese zodiac sign of 2026-the Year of the Horse. Chitu (赤兔) is the famous warhorse in the Chinese legend Red Hare. The Chitu MAG-60 is a collector-grade mechanical keyboard that combines traditional Chinese artistry with cutting-edge magnetic switch technology, delivering a premium typing and gaming experience.

Limited to just 300 units worldwide, the Chitu MAG-60 Magnetic Keyboard represents a fusion of cultural heritage, luxury craftsmanship, and next-generation performance. From its handcrafted Alcantara and leather exterior to its exclusive TTC magnetic switches and advanced TMR sensing technology, every aspect of the keyboard has been meticulously designed for enthusiasts, collectors, and competitive gamers alike.

Play favorite titles from popular game libraries, keep progress synced and jump back into gaming sessions on virtually any device. That's the power of GeForce NOW cloud gaming. From providing access to members' favorite game libraries to offering some of the season's best membership pricing, GeForce NOW is making it easier than ever to get more from the cloud this summer. Plus, check out the seven new games arriving in the GeForce NOW library this week.

Hit Play Across Top Game Stores
Whether it's blockbuster franchises, competitive shooters, sprawling role-playing games (RPGs) or indie gems, GeForce NOW supports thousands of games from leading PC game stores, making it easy to bring existing game libraries to the cloud. Connect supported game store accounts and stream titles with GeForce RTX power. Games that include cloud-save functionality help keep progress intact across devices. Start a game on one screen, pick up where playtime left off on another and spend less time managing installs and storage space.

Intel Corporation today announced the appointment of Seok-Hee Lee as executive vice president of Intel Foundry, reporting directly to CEO Lip-Bu Tan. In this role, Lee will lead all advanced packaging, system integration, back-end technology development, and back-end manufacturing, strengthening Intel's ability to deliver differentiated, system-level innovation for customers.

Seok-Hee Lee Appointed to Lead Advanced Packaging
As part of the continued evolution of the Intel Foundry strategy, the company is establishing advanced packaging as a focused business with dedicated leadership. This reflects the growing importance and complexity of packaging as a key enabler of performance, power efficiency, and heterogeneous integration across AI systems.

It was recently rumored that the development of Persona 6 had been concluded, indicating that the game would likely be launching somewhat soon, and that previous rumor has been somewhat substantiated by the recent announcement and publication of the store pages for Persona 6 on Steam, PS5, and Xbox Series consoles. Notably, there is no Nintendo Switch 2 store page just yet, and it's unclear if Persona 6 will release on the Switch 2. An official release date has not been set, but Atlus West has strongly suggested in a post on X that Persona 6 will launch after Persona 4 Revival, which is slated to launch on February 18, 2027. Current rumors claim a September 2027 launch for Persona 6.

The store pages provide some clues as to the game's themes and aesthetic, with screenshots hinting that Persona 6 will take on a somewhat darker tone than Persona 5 Royal. According to the Steam Store page, Persona 6 will feature "a completely fresh, standalone story and new cast of characters," and players will be confronted with "strange rumors, unsettling urban legends, and occult incidents." Of course, Persona 6 will still follow the party-based, turn-based JRPG combat format combined with relationship simulation and slice of life elements. Atlus is also careful to note that Persona 6 requires no prior Persona experience and is a self-contained story, much like the other numbered entries in the franchise.

There has been much commotion when it comes to console vs. PC game release strategies from both Sony's PlayStation and Microsoft Xbox Game Studios, with recent commentary by PlayStation CEO, Hideaki Nishino, to Famitsu magazine expanding on previous rumors of PlayStation all but moving away from PC ports for its single-player games. According to the Nishino, the release platforms of PlayStation games will be determined by the characteristics of the game, and games will only be released on PC if the platform can "maximize" the gaming experience of the game. He went on to explain that this effectively boils down to the same thing being repeated by prior rumors: live-service multiplayer games will release to PC, while single-player narrative experiences will be kept on PlayStation in order to deliver value on the platform, however, the CEO did not exclusively rule out PC ports.

Commentary by Bloomberg games journalist, Jason Schreier, on the ResetEra forums, however, argues that the line is much more black and white than that, with the reporter stating that two sources told him that a town hall meeting two weeks ago saw Hermen Hulst, CEO of Sony Interactive Entertainment, confirm that single-player narrative games will be PlayStation exclusive, with the console maker wanting to "keep their IP aligned to their own platform." The justification for the return to PS-exclusives was that first-party PlayStation games just haven't made enough money as PC ports to justify the work, which is much the same as what was hinted at in previous rumors, as well. As for multi-player games, Sony wants to reach as wide an audience as possible, since those games depend on having a large player-base, so having as many players as possible enhances the gameplay for all platforms.

Gearbox and 2K Games have officially debuted new content for Borderlands 4, including an upcoming new vault hunter, new free endgame content, and a number of paid DLCs with new bosses, missions, vehicles, and other activities. As per the announcement, the first round of upcoming new features and content will drop on June 26 with version 1.8, and one of the major new features in update 1.8 is cross-platform save. Cross-platform saves will depend on players' SHiFT accounts, and players can manually sync save files via the in-game SHiFT interface in order to continue on another platform. Notably, Golden Keys will not transfer between platforms and will only be available for the platform the keys were redeemed on. June 26 will also herald the arrival of the Takedown at Hadron Abyss, which is a new free endgame challenge that will be available to all Borderlands 4 players, as well as a new raid boss, a new mini-boss, nine new legendary items, a new pearlescent item, and new challenge-based cosmetics. The Takedown at Hadron Abyss reveal trailer gives players an idea of what to expect from the new challenge, which takes place in an undersea research station and sees players face off against the Child of Terramorphous. The new content comes alongside claimed performance improvements, general balance updates, bug fixes, and vault hunter balance updates.

Borderlands 4 will also receive four new paid DLCs: Bounty Pack 3: A Zane to Kill For, landing on June 25, Bounty Pack 4: Murders & Acquisitions, landing on July 30, Story Pack 2, and Bounty Pack 5, both of which land in early September. A Zane to Kill For adds a new mission, a new boss, and two new mini-bosses, as well as new pearlescent and legendary gear, a new vehicle, a vault hunter skill, and an Echo-4 drone skin. A Zane to Kill For will hurl players into an investigation into who killed Zane's clone. Bounty Pack 4 will again introduce a new mission, a new boss, and three new mini-bosses, as well as a new vehicle and cosmetics. Most excitingly for many, the early September Story Pack 2 paid DLC will introduce the next playable vault hunter, Loveless, an ex-Anshin hacker who relies on cybernetic enhancements and shares her mind with a digital virus that can manifest in physical form via digistruct tech to enact her will. Not much has been revealed about Loveless's abilities, other than what was shown in a short character teaser and a character sheet in an X post, and that isn't much to go on. These DLCs will be available in both bundles and individually, with Bounty Pack 3's narrative content and gear available for $5.99 and the Vault Card 3 portion (new cosmetics and related gear) costing another $5.99. Loveless and her cosmetics will cost $9.99, while the narrative content for Story Pack 2 will cost $19.99.The trailer for Loveless, the Hacker, follows.

The overwhelming demand for the Steam Controller led Valve earlier this year to set up a reservation system by which buyers could sign up and get priority access when the new gaming peripheral was available to purchase. Reservations opened on May 8, and while it promised availability the week following the announcement, Valve didn't provide an estimated date for following batches of the Steam Controller.

Now, the gaming giant has updated its reservation system based on current demand and production capabilities, giving players an estimate for when the Steam Controller will be available for shipping based on when a reservation was made. At the time of writing, Valve is providing three estimated order windows, letting players know that they will be able to order by September 2026, December 2026, or at some point in 2027. Buyers who already have a Steam Controller reservation will already have an estimated order window assigned to their Steam account when they log in and navigate to the Steam Controller page. The 72-hour order window remains in place, and Valve has advised in the notice that current reservations "indicate a 2027 date for shipping."

An MSI online store listing recently revealed the pricing on the new Intel Arc G3 Extreme-powered Claw 8 EX AI+, which will apparently retail at a whopping $1,799.99, but, in a recent interview with FRVR, MSI product marketing lead, Andy Chu, explained that things are likely to get worse as the ongoing AI-driven DRAM and component shortage worsens. Chu, who said that even he, as an insider, is "unsure of where the market will go," also says that "there's much room for another price hike, at least from my own observation."

According to the executive, handheld sales are stable, and MSI is "confident with the new handheld, not just the new platform," referring to Intel's new handheld-specific G3 CPUs. He also championed the idea of releasing handhelds with expanded capabilities, stating that "it's good timing to take a look at what kind of true potential or the capability of this new handheld can provide us." His argument appears to be that, since handheld prices are high, it stands to reason that they should be more performant and more capable—to his credit, this is a topic that has been discussed online in social media posts and YouTube videos asking whether something like a Lenovo Legion Go or Steam Deck can be used as a desktop PC with an external monitor and a dock, for example.

There have already been several strong reactions from developers to generative AI in video games and their development—and many large studios advocating for the new tech—and Pocketpair, the developer behind Palworld, has once again clarified its stance on generative AI in a new interview with GamesRadar+ after the studio had to previously defend Palworld against accusations of AI.

In the interview, John Buckley, Pocketpair's publishing and communications head, once again reiterated that the studio behind the ever-expanding Palworld universe does not use generative AI and has no plans to adopt the tech in the future. He commented that "Gamers don't want it, and if the gamers don't want it, I guess that's it, right? Not much of a conversation to be had." He goes on to acknowledge that there are many big game developers using AI to save time on their projects, but that Pocketpair has a large team of in-house artists who "like doing stuff themselves," and that it "seems pointless" to replace them in favor of AI art.

AMD has fixed a couple of threading bottlenecks in HandBrake that were holding back transcoding performance on high-core-count systems, and the fixes have been included in HandBrake 1.11.0. AMD found that the issues came down to two things. HandBrake wasn't built to efficiently manage systems with more than 64 logical processors, so on chips like Threadripper, available compute was sitting idle instead of being put to work. Separately, some workloads were chopped into jobs that were too small, creating scheduling overhead that affected the actual transcoding time, particularly noticeable at 720p. AMD found cases where performance actually dropped by up to 60% rather than scaling as more cores were assigned. The fix improves thread management and job scheduling so HandBrake can split work more effectively across high core counts, keeping more cores busy with actual transcoding instead of coordination overhead.

According to an AMD blog post, a Threadripper 7980X (64 cores, 128 threads) CPU with 128 GB of DDR5-5600 paired with a Radeon RX 9070 XT measured gains up to 215% in Perfume H.264 720p, 203% in LG_8K HEVC 8-bit 4320p and 105% in LG 8K 60 FPS HEVC 10-bit 4320p. Across all the tested workloads, improvements ranged from 16% to 215%. In HEVC, a Threadripper PRO 9995WX (96 cores, 192 threads) with the same RX 9070 XT achieved gains of up to 181%, depending on the workload. The biggest gains were up to 181% in Perfume H.264 720p, 151% in Perfume HEVC 10-bit 2160p and 149% in LG_8K HEVC 8-bit 4320p.

Following Epic Games's recent announcement of a slew of new generative AI features coming to Unreal Engine 5.8 and the upcoming Unreal Engine 6, as well as its video demonstrating how it uses AI in daily game development and asset creation, the developer of Vampire Survivors, Poncle, announced in a comment on Reddit that it was reviewing its Fortnite x Vampire Survivors collaboration. Details about the collaboration had not been revealed, but Epic Games mentioned Vampire Survivors as a headline collaboration in its Unreal Fest on June 17. At the time of writing, it's unclear what action Poncle will take regarding the Vampire Survivors x Fortnite collaboration, but it seems as though there is a growing divide in the gaming industry, specifically between developers and studios open to using generative AI and those who oppose it. While Poncle has not explicitly stated its reasons for concerns over generative AI, common concerns range from IP an art direction issues to environmental concerns and even more esoteric issues surrounding the validity of AI art.

Poncle Official on RedditFollowing today's news about gen AI usage by Epic to create all sort of game assets, including Fortnite characters, we're currently "reviewing" our collaboration with Fortnite. We'll let you know if anything moves forward.

Witchfire, the single-player, dark fantasy RPG shooter from The Astronauts, has released Revelations, a major update introducing a wealth of new content, localization for 15 languages, and a dialogue system. Players can now engage in multithreaded conversations with Fallen Preyers, making pivotal choices that impact both gameplay and story. This system establishes the narrative baseline for the game's upcoming 1.0 release, providing fleshed-out storylines that unveil the tragic history of the Preyers.

Revelations introduces the Marshland, a hostile wetland map crawling with new abominations. This grim region hides the secrets of the Cathedral of Saint Aurelian, shedding light on historical Vatican failures and the mystery of a forgotten Fallen Preyer.

Despite the Valve Steam Machine being right around the corner, there has been a lot of interest from gamers who want to run SteamOS on custom gaming desktops or DIY Steam Machine console builds, while others may be looking to extract as much of the Steam Deck experience out of something like a used Lenovo Legion Go after the recent Steam Deck price increases. Fortunately, the latest SteamOS release, version 3.8, has officially landed in the stable release channel with a host of compatibility, performance, and usability upgrades. First and foremost, SteamOS 3.8 brings initial support for the upcoming Steam Machine and improvements to the desktop mode for those who want to use the Steam Machine as a PC-console hybrid. This is aside from a host of bug fixes for both the OS and certain game bugs and general improvements to the overall level of polish of the OS.

SteamOS 3.8 updates both the Arch Linux base and the KDE Plasma desktop mode to KDE 6.4.3 and switches to the Wayland display protocol by default. The update also improves VRR frame pacing and adds support for HDMI Variable Refresh Rate thanks to AMD's recent efforts to bring HDMI 2.1 support to Linux. The OS now also supports the LAVD CPU scheduler if manually enabled via the command "steamosctl set-cpu-scheduler lavd". SteamOS 3.8 also updates the graphics driver and fixes performance discrepancies between game mode and desktop mode, specifically addressing performance regressions in desktop mode. It also re-enables Bluetooth wake from sleep on Steam Deck LCD models. There are also improvements to game capture in game mode, as well as support for HDR, VRR, and per-display scale factor on external displays in desktop mode. Critically for desktop builds, SteamOS 3.8 also significantly improves video memory management on systems with discrete GPUs and support for recent Intel and AMD platforms.

GMKtec today announces that early access registration for the upcoming EVO-X3 will officially open on June 22, giving users the first opportunity to secure early access benefits ahead of global launch. EVO-X3 is a next-generation compact AI workstation designed for local AI computing, professional content creation, and enterprise edge workloads.

As AI computing continues to shift from cloud-based processing to local deployment, EVO-X3 represents a new category of desktop AI workstation built to deliver high-performance computing in a compact form factor comparable to a PS4-sized footprint. Powered by the AMD Ryzen AI Max+ 395 flagship APU, EVO-X3 integrates CPU, GPU, and AI acceleration into a unified architecture, enabling users to run local AI models, perform real-time inference, and handle demanding creative workloads without relying on cloud infrastructure.

Zyxel Networks, a leader in delivering secure and AI-powered cloud networking solutions, has unveiled three new additions to its range of ruggedized, outdoor wireless access points, to help managed service provider (MSP) partners meet the growing demand for fast, reliable bandwidth in challenging environments.

The trio of devices is designed for use in large, industrial or semi-industrial locations, smaller businesses and homes, and where wireless connectivity needs to reach places a significant distance away from the main coverage area. All three can be managed using Zyxel Networks' Nebula cloud platform, making them easy for MSP partners to deploy them and to subsequently monitor and optimize Wi-Fi performance for customers.

Grand Theft Auto fans, rejoice! The latest sequel in the GTA franchise—GTA VI—is opening up for pre-orders on June 25, allowing fans to gear up for one of the most anticipated AAA releases this year. Although the game officially launches on November 19, 2026, fans will be able to place pre-orders in about a week from now. This means that PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S players can add GTA VI to their pre-order list. Interestingly, the website doesn't mention any pricing for the game, so we might have to wait a few more days for that information. Additionally, no editions are listed, so it's still a mystery which GTA VI editions will be available on day one and how they will be priced compared to other AAA releases. We don't expect the game to be priced below the industry standard, and a slight premium compared to existing AAA titles is anticipated.

Chinese companies like Gloway and KingBank, which provide DDR5 memory kits for consumer platforms, have started integrating domestically produced CXMT DDR5 memory into their RAM kits, effectively ending their reliance on DRAM from Micron, SK hynix, and Samsung after years of external dependence. It has been reported that Gloway and KingBank have begun incorporating CXMT's 24 Gb DDR5 modules, which are being shipped as part of 48 GB RAM kits. With 3 GB per module, this results in eight modules per DDR5 DIMM for a total of 24 GB of capacity. In the regular dual DIMM configuration, Gloway and KingBank are offering consumers 48 GB of capacity.

Gloway has prepared the Longwuyi Yi Special Edition kit, which operates at 6,000 MT/s with latencies of CL36-38-38-80. This kit runs at a voltage of 1.2 V and is specialized for AMD CPUs. Reportedly, it features custom heat spreaders to maintain cooling and control heat dissipation, with 5 W/mK thermal pads included. Meanwhile, KingBank DIMMs use 2 mm heat spreaders and have a custom thermal interface material applied over the PMIC, along with dual-side RGB LED lighting that can be controlled via software.

AEWIN is glad to launch our new member of AEWIN Network Expansion Module, the NCT802. Built upon Intel Ethernet Controller E610-XAT2, it provides 8-port 10GbE RJ45 with four pairs of AEWIN Gen 4 Bypass. The module is with AEWIN standard Expansion Module form factor of PCIe Gen 4 x8 connection. The front-access design ensures effortless maintenance and servicing while its modular compatibility with various existing AEWIN platforms offers exceptional flexibility for tailored, high-performance solutions.

Intel Ethernet Controller E610-XAT2 features over 50% lower power consumption compared to previous generation controller (X710-AT2) which helps to reduce operational costs in the meantime. In addition, Intel committed over 10-year full support lifecycle which makes it perfect to build new projects that are expected to have long-term support. For enhanced Ethernet security, Intel E610-XAT2 features a hardware Root of Trust (RoT) for firmware resiliency.

AceMagic on Wednesday launched the Kron Mini K5, a compact mini PC powered by Intel Core 5 320 "Wildcat Lake" mobile processor. This chip features a 2P+4LPE core configuration, with a 4.60 GHz maximum P-core boost frequency, and 6 MB of L3 cache. AceMagic maxed out its cTDP to offer 15 W base power and 35 W maximum turbo power. The chip is paired with 16 GB of LPDDR5-6400 memory, and a 512 GB M.2 Gen 3 x4 NVMe SSD.

Networking options include 802.11ax (Wi-Fi 6) + Bluetooth 5.2; along with a 2.5 GbE wired LAN. Display outputs include one each of HDMI 2.0, DisplayPort 1.4, and USB-C with DisplayPort 1.4 passthrough. Among the USB connections are four 5 Gbps USB 3.2 Gen 1 type-A, two 10 Gbps USB 3.2 Gen 2 type-A, and one 20 Gbps USB 3.2 Gen 2x2, which doubles up as a 100 W power input, although there is also a separate 2-pin DC input jack. The USB-C provides single-cable convenience if you want to pair it with docking stations that also put out USB-PD power to their upstream USB sources.

AMD, through its official documentation portal, has confirmed the arrival of the next-generation Ryzen Threadripper TR6 "Mustang Peak" platform, along with some intriguing details about the upcoming CPU lineup. Based on the "Zen 6" CPU architecture, AMD is incorporating the latest I/O standards for these workstation powerhouses, including PCIe 6.0 and DDR5. As the "Zen 6" CPU cores are manufactured on TSMC's 2 nm semiconductor node, we expect AMD to increase the core count over its previous "Zen 5" Ryzen Threadripper workstation platform and deliver a significant performance boost due to advancements in node and microarchitecture. While specific details like TDP, clock speed, core counts, and segmentation are still lacking, we have learned that AMD is retiring its TR5 socket in favor of the new TR6 socket that will accommodate the platform.

With the introduction of PCIe 6.0, which doubles the bandwidth of PCIe 5.0 per lane configuration, AMD needs to add more pins to handle the increased bandwidth. Additionally, with varying core counts and clock speeds, the CPU socket likely requires more electrical capacity to support the new platform, necessitating an overhaul. If readers recall, the previous TR5 socket used 4,844 pins. For the TR6 update, it is possible that the pin count could exceed that number.

According to an investigation by Ars Technica, AMD has quietly removed a memory encryption feature from its consumer-focused Ryzen processors after years of inclusion. This feature, known as Transparent Secure Memory Encryption (TSME), is used to encrypt a system's memory content and prevent possible physical exploits that unencrypted memory data could be vulnerable to. Reportedly, AMD introduced TSME about a decade ago and began shipping it across all of its processors, including regular Ryzen, professional Ryzen Pro, Threadripper, and EPYC solutions. However, a random test on a Ryzen 7 9700X CPU, which uses "Zen 5" IP, has highlighted the absence of TSME support in consumer chips. In various exchanges between AMD engineers and some security professionals, the investigation led to a single response from AMD stating that "TSME is a security feature only applied to PRO CPUs as part of AMD PRO Technologies."

AMD has reportedly removed the feature quietly without prior notice. Discovering that the feature is missing is incredibly difficult on Windows-based machines, but still possible on Linux-based OS installations. Under a Linux-based OS, checking for firmware security revealed a missing encrypted RAM flag, despite TSME being enabled in the BIOS previously. It turns out that starting with the AGESA 1.2.7.0 build and in future AGESA versions, AMD has systematically removed the feature from its consumer Ryzen processors. After further investigation and inquiries to AMD, there is no information on whether the AGESA firmware is disabling this feature or if newer CPUs will ship with TSME disabled at the silicon level. All we know so far is that the feature is no longer present after years of being included on the consumer side.

SK hynix Inc. announced today that it has shipped samples of HBM4E, a next-generation DRAM for AI, to major customers. "The company was able to deliver samples of the 12-stack HBM4E on schedule thanks to its advanced HBM development and production expertise for HBM," said SK hynix, adding that "We will work closely with partners for mass production in a timely manner." The 12-layer HBM4E shows improvements in both performance and power efficiency. The product features a maximum data processing speed of 16 Gbps per pin and power efficiency that is up more than 20 percent from previous models. These enhancements improve data processing capabilities for AI training and inference.

The HBM4E reduces data transfer latency through its latest interface and design optimization while maintaining stable operation in high-bandwidth environments. This enables customers to increase efficiency in processing data for AI datacenters and large-scale computing systems. SK hynix utilizes Advanced MR-MUF technology for HBM4E products to achieve a 48 GB capacity in a 12-layer stack while ensuring structural stability. In particular, the company has also improved heat resistance by 17 percent, compared to the preceding HBM4, enabling stable operation of memory chips in high-performance computing environments.

The Stop Killing Games movement and the resulting Stop Destroying Videogames European Citizens' Initiative came to a head recently with a hearing in front of the European Commission, after a petition in support of the initiative garnered over 1.3 million signatures. Following the hearing, the European Commission published a press release detailing its response to the arguments presented by the Stop Destroying Games Initiative, and, while the Commission seemingly recognizes many of the issues with modern video game preservation and the consumer rights issues surrounding game licensing, the Commission has declined to put any laws in place to regulate the video games industry. It says that "The Commission considers that at this stage it cannot propose a legal obligation to keep video games playable after they stop being provided commercially." Instead, the European Commission will publish a code of conduct for the video games industry "on managing video games' end of life."

The European Commission justifies this course of action by stating that intellectual copyright concerns, which give copyright holders exclusive rights over their creations, and other IP rights "may also be relevant as they protect different visual and technological aspects of a video game." The Commission leans on existing EU law, which it says "provides for important safeguards protecting the economic interests of consumers," in that "video game providers must inform consumers about the duration and the conditions for terminating the contract before the consumers signs up for the video game." It goes on to point out that any consumer that is affected by a video game developer or publisher shutting down a game before the stated date may be eligible for a proportionate refund. The response by the Commission has largely been negatively received, with many gamers expressing their frustration at the lack of action in a follow-up post by the Commission on Instagram. Many of those commenting on the post say that they are disappointed that the democratic process seemed ineffectual, and many others said that a non-binding code of conduct is not what people asked for, blaming industry lobbying and monetary power for the lack of change. The full statement by the European Commission follows.

Unreal Engine 5.8 has just been announced by Epic Games as the last major update to Unreal Engine 5 before the launch of Unreal Engine 6. While there are a number of changes present in UE 5.8, including streamlined texturing and landscape creation, and sandboxes for isolated experimentation, to name but a few, two new headline features are coming to the real-time rendering pipeline with UE 5.8. The first is Lumen Lite, a new version of Lumen dynamic global illumination specifically designed to offer as many of the features and as much of the artistic quality as full-scale Lumen with much lower GPU compute costs. According to the update notes, Lumen Lite can be as much as twice as fast as Lumen High Quality, and it is lightweight enough to run on the Nintendo Switch 2 at 60 FPS.

The other new tool available to developers is MegaLights, which is now production-ready and allows artists and developers to place dynamic and shadowed area lights into scenes to improve quality and reduce noise. Epic cites a performance target of 60 FPS on current consoles and has included dedicated debugging tools to make game optimization easier with MegaLights. Unreal Engine 5 has been the scapegoat of many complaints by PC gamers about poor game performance—even if there are examples of visually striking games built on UE5 that are well optimized—and Lumen global illumination is one of the features that tends to take at least some of that blame. Both of the new features are supported on PC, along with many of the other new rendering tools, like Fog Screen Space Scattering, which improves volumetric fog and dust rendering, and a new toon shader for stylized games.

There has been a lot of talk in recent months about AI-powered teammates in video games of late, with everyone from NVIDIA to Ubisoft and Take-Two expressing interest in the feature. That same Ace AI tech that NVIDIA demonstrated over a year ago has now made its way into PUBG: Battlegrounds as a time-limited game mode called Ally Duo. Announced for the PUBG: Battlegrounds update 42.1, PUBG will be introducing the new Ally Duo game mode, which will pair players with an AI-powered companion in a new arcade mode in the Sanhok jungle map.

In a demo shown off previously by NVIDIA, Ella, the player's AI companion powered by NVIDIA Ace, responds to spoken instructions with natural language, guides players with in-game info and advice, and can be controlled by the player with those same spoken instructions—for instance, helping players look for resources and vehicles, delivering those vehicles, spotting and engaging enemies, and helping set up strategic attacks. Ella and the Ally Duo game mode are currently in beta and will only be available in PUBG: Battlegrounds from June 17 to July 1. The new mode strictly requires an NVIDIA RTX GPU for AI processing, with the RTX 2080 Ti and RTX 3060 8 GB cards and 16 GB of system memory being the minimum spec, while the RTX 4070 paired with 24 GB of system RAM is recommended. Players must also enable hardware-accelerated GPU scheduling if not enabled already. The NVIDIA Ace AI PUBG demo follows.

By now, the whole gaming industry has more or less mourned the loss of Destiny 2 in some way or another, with the game receiving its final content update on June 9 and mass layoffs expected at Bungie in the coming weeks. Destiny fans, however, seem to have not received the message or simply not cared. Following the Monument of Triumph content update, Destiny 2's performance has skyrocketed, both in terms of finances and player retention. It's hardly surprising to see Destiny still have a loyal fan base, given the recent outcry from Destiny fans for a Destiny 3 from Sony and Bungie.

According to SteamDB, Destiny 2 reached a two-year-high peak concurrent player count, at 167,867 concurrent players on the day of the update's release. While that's impressive enough on its own, Destiny 2 has also floated to the top ranks of the Steam Top Seller chart, which ranks games based on financial performance. Simultaneously, Destiny 2 climbed to third place in the Top Sellers chart for week 25 of 2026 (June 9-16), falling just short of the evergreen Counter-Strike 2 and the hot new Mecca Chameleon. While Bungie has so far decided to keep Destiny 2 online, the next step with these sorts of sunsetting operations is to shut down game servers, making the game unplayable.

We recently reported that Xbox Game Studios is apparently looking to shutter or sell off a handful of its in-house game studios, with Ninja Theory, the studio behind the Hellblade/Senua game franchise being one of the impacted studios. With the news of the potential shuttering, there were questions about the Ninja Theory's new Senua game, which was revealed at an Xbox Showcase less than two weeks ahead of the studio closure rumors.

Ostensibly, the new Senua game was meant to be a sequel to Hellblade 2, but according to a recent report by The Game File, Xbox Game Studios already knew about the split with Ninja Theory ahead of the game's reveal in early June 2026. The prevailing theory behind the strategy to continue with the unveiling of Senua is that it would attract buyers when it was eventually revealed that Ninja Theory was being sold off, theoretically increasing the value of the company to a potential buyer, thereby allowing Xbox to recoup its investment in the studio, and making a buyout quicker. When reports surfaced about the upcoming closure or sale of Ninja Theory, it was revealed that the studio received word of its fate on Monday, June 15, 2026, and it is unclear if the machinations behind the Senua announcement were Microsoft's doing or if the leadership at Ninja Theory were also involved.

Despite prior harsh criticism from the company's CEO, Tim Sweeney, it seems as though Epic Games may finally be changing its tone on Linux gaming. According to a recent job posting on the Epic Games site, the game studio is currently looking to hire a security engineer with "deep knowledge of Linux and Windows OS internals." The engineer will work on Epic Online Services, more specifically, Epic is looking for a Senior Game Security Engineer for its anti-cheat systems to work on "not only our titles but a wide variety of games from around the world" and to "champion Linux anti-cheat capabilities for Epic." All of this is to say that Epic Games is looking to expand Linux support for Easy Anti-Cheat, and the job description includes mentions of reverse engineering common cheats and malicious software and working with external game developers on EAC implementations based on data analysis.

It's worth noting that EAC already has a Linux compatibility mode, although it appears to simply deactivate the kernel-level anti-cheat capabilities, since that's the main component of EAC that is incompatible with Linux. Previously, the head of Epic Games, Tim Sweeney, has been skeptical about supporting Linux in EAC, despite eventually implementing a Linux mode after the launch of the Steam Deck. Notably, however, Epic's flagship game, Fortnite, still does not support Linux, despite the user-space EAC implementation other games use. Recently, there appear to also have been changes in Fortnite's player base and playing habits that resulted in a round of layoffs that have affected over 1,000 workers at the company, so it would not be a surprise to see Epic Games switch up its strategy surrounding Fortnite and EAC in response to the Fortnite downturn.

ALOGIC, the global professional AV and connectivity brand announces the launch of five new products at InfoComm 2026: The FOKUS wall-mounted touchscreen range in 43", 55" and 65" sizes; the Folio portable single & dual touchscreens for Mac and Windows; the Aspekt Touch 27" docking monitor; and a wireless-charging Active Stylus; and IRIS 2.4K autofocus webcam.

FOKUS is ALOGIC's new line of wall-mounted 4K touchscreens for meeting rooms and collaboration spaces, in 43", 55" and 65" sizes. FOKUS instantly connects with the Mac or Windows laptop and lets you present, annotate or sketch right on the screen, with full multitouch and 4096 levels of pressure-sensitive ALOGIC Active Stylus. The daisy-chain function lets Fokus work smoothly with Windows devices supporting a laptop, desktop or a mini PC running Windows. Underneath sits the same docking smarts as ALOGIC's Aspekt monitors—90 W USB-C charging, USB-C and USB-A ports, a top port for a webcam, Gigabit Ethernet and daisy-chaining, behind a 500-nit, 100% sRGB matt panel that keeps glare down. An included slim bracket sets it almost flush to the wall (or onto any 400 × 400 VESA mount), and it comes in Space Black. FOKUS screens include a remote control, allowing users to switch them on and off, toggle the touchscreen functionality, and conveniently switch between different video inputs.

Qualcomm Technologies Inc. today announced at Augmented World Expo the Snapdragon Reality Elite Platform, designed to power immersive spatial computing experiences with stunning visual fidelity and deeply integrated on‑device AI across a spectrum of form factors. It will power high-performance all‑in‑one video-see-through (VST) headsets and lightweight tethered optical-see-through (OST).

"XR adoption continues to expand, with more than 60 million devices already in market and growing momentum across industries." said Ziad Asghar, Senior Vice President and General Manager of XR, Wearables and Personal AI. "As more advanced and integrated XR platforms are developed, demand is increasing for XR technologies that deliver higher performance, greater intelligence, and improved power efficiency. Snapdragon Reality Elite is designed to meet those demands with powerful on‑device AI, enabling faster, longer‑lasting, and more immersive experiences, and reinforcing our leadership in VR and MR as we build purpose‑built XR chipsets from the ground up."

MSI, a world leader in gaming hardware, today introduced the MAG Infinite Z, an AMD-powered gaming desktop built for players who want strong performance, smart cooling, and easy upgradability in a compact tower design. Featuring up to an AMD Ryzen 7 9700X processor and up to NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Ti graphics, the MAG Infinite Z delivers powerful gaming performance in a space-saving 25L chassis.

Designed for modern gamers, the MAG Infinite Z combines high-performance hardware, intelligent thermal optimization, and practical upgrade features in one refined gaming desktop. Whether for competitive gaming, AAA titles, streaming, or daily multitasking, the system gives players the speed, stability, and flexibility they need without the oversized footprint of a traditional gaming tower.

BIOSTAR, a leading manufacturer of motherboards, edge computing solutions, industrial motherboards, graphics cards, and storage devices, today is excited to introduce the B850MS-E motherboard, a modern AMD B850 platform engineered for efficient productivity, immersive home entertainment, and reliable system integration.

Built to bring current-generation features to mainstream AMD Socket AM5 PC builds, the B850MS-E combines DDR5 memory support, PCIe 5.0 M.2 storage, and Wi-Fi 7 readiness in a versatile Micro ATX platform designed for everyday productivity, home entertainment, and business deployment. Supporting AMD Ryzen 9000 / 8000 / 7000 series processors, with readiness for future AMD Ryzen processors via BIOS update, the B850MS-E delivers a strong foundation for users seeking dependable performance across office workloads, multimedia streaming, and customer-facing applications.

MSI today announces the launch of the Maestro 500 Wireless, a versatile headset designed for users who move fluidly between work, entertainment, calls, and daily listening. Featuring Active Noise Cancellation with Transparency mode, high-resolution 40 mm drivers, beamforming and ENC-assisted voice pickup, multi-mode connectivity, and exceptional battery life, the Maestro 500 Wireless helps users hear clearly, communicate with confidence, and stay focused throughout the day.

The Maestro 500 Wireless delivers clear, immersive audio across everyday scenarios—from online meetings and music to video streaming and gaming. Its 40 mm drivers support a wide frequency response of up to 40 kHz, while Active Noise Cancellation reduces background distractions for improved focus. Transparency mode lets users stay aware of their surroundings without removing the headset.

AI runs at the speed of light. More and more, that light is made in Texas. Coherent broke ground today on an expanded manufacturing building in Sherman, Texas. The company makes the lasers, optical components and compound semiconductors that wire AI systems together—and runs what it calls the world's first 6-inch indium phosphide fab.

NVIDIA founder and CEO Jensen Huang and Coherent CEO Jim Anderson were on hand for the ceremony, joined by Sherman Mayor Shawn Temann and Adriana Cruz, executive director of Texas Economic Development and Tourism, who delivered remarks. The expanded building will scale production of the same InP wafers that carry data between chips, servers and data centers at the speed of light—the optical backbone of modern AI infrastructure.

As the 2026 PC DIY market undergoes a dramatic structural shift driven by volatile memory pricing, global hardware enthusiasts are entering a new era of "precise investment and smart building." To help consumers seamlessly balance core system performance with stunning external aesthetics, XPG proudly introduces the INFINITY F360/F120/R120 infinity mirror fan series and the MAESTRO 42SA/62DA CPU air coolers. These highly calculated, high-value cooling solutions allow users to optimize every single penny of their hardware budgets and build elite, high-performance gaming setups without making sacrifices on powerful thermal control or striking visual impact.

According to recent market data from IDC and arXiv, booming AI infrastructure development is aggressively competing for vital DRAM and NAND flash capacity, triggering widespread hardware inflation that will reshape the global PC market landscape well through 2027[1][2]. Under these fixed total budgets, players are forced to compress PC components investments like chassis and cooling, which unfortunately compromises overall system stability and visual appeal. Addressing this critical market pain point, XPG actively embraces the "Smart Building" trend by launching the INFINITY fan lineup and MAESTRO series coolers. Shattering the outdated myth that accessible pricing dictates performance compromise, XPG delivers premium, value-driven cooling solutions that provide elite gaming power and striking aesthetics to budget-conscious creators worldwide.

NVIDIA has published its latest update for the RTX Remix framework, with version 1.5 bringing impressive improvements. As some may recall, NVIDIA's RTX Remix is a tool for remastering older games to enable the game engine to support modern visual enhancements like full ray tracing, neural rendering with DLSS 4, and multi-frame generation. It also automatically enhances materials with generative AI. NVIDIA has been updating classic games like Half-Life 2 and Portal. According to the company blog post, RTX Remix 1.5 now includes new visual enhancements and a more efficient storage system that can reduce file sizes by roughly one-third, depending on the specific game.

The first major feature update is Smooth Normals. This feature, highly requested by the RTX Remix modding community, adds automatic smooth-normal generation to the legacy geometry in the game. This prevents older in-game assets from appearing blocky or faceted when path-tracing lighting is applied. Interestingly, NVIDIA has prepared a demonstration in a concrete tunnel within the game, which now looks like a uniform piece instead of the multi-piece rendering it once was. The company also added lighting control from various viewpoints, meaning that remixes and modding community will get to play with more lighting controls.

Since the news broke that the Valve Steam Machine would be delayed, there have been countless conversations online about how the Steam Machine would be dead on arrival because of its expected pricing and aging internals—a six-core Zen 4 CPU and a RDNA 3 Radeon Navi 33 GPU with 8 GB of VRAM—but a recent set of leaked Geekbench 6 benchmarks, labelled "Valve Fremont," have reignited these concerns. The Geekbench 6 result, shared by @Olrak29_ on X, show the Steam Machine scoring 7,316 points in the multicore test and 2,334 in the single-core test.

As a point of comparison, the Intel Core Ultra X7 358H in the ASUS VivoBook S16 managed to score a multicore score of 16,104 points and a single-core score of 2,868 points. There are no GPU test results available on Geekbench yet at the time of writing, although estimates based on the hardware of the Steam Machine's GPU put expected performance around the level of an AMD Radeon RX 7600, which is, based on Geekbench's GPU tests, around 50% faster than the iGPU in the Core Ultra X7 358H. For its part, Valve expects the Steam Machine to handle upscaled 4K gaming at 60 FPS with ray tracing and FSR support, to boot. What's perhaps more important to glean from these Geekbench scores is that the Steam Machine now appears to be in the hands of at least one hardware reviewer, suggesting that the Steam Machine may be launching sooner rather than later.

We previously covered the announcement of the GPD Box, a new Panther Lake mini PC that features an MCIO 8i port and dual USB4 v2.0 ports for expanded connectivity with eGPUs and other high-bandwidth applications. Now, the GPD Box has finally launched on Indiegogo with a starting price of HK$11,377 ($1,452.25 converted). The base configuration is powered by an Intel Core Ultra 7 356H with 32 GB LPDDR5-8533 RAM and a 1 TB M.2 2280 NVMe SSD. The next level up upgrades the CPU to the Core Ultra X7 358H for HK$12,020 ($1,534 converted), and the bundles with the Box mini PC and the G2 MCIO eGPU Dock come in at HK$14,394 ($1,837 converted) for the Core Ultra 7 356H version and HK$15,036 ($1,919 converted) for the X7 358H variant. The biggest difference between the Core Ultra X7 358H and the Ultra 7 356H is the significantly more powerful Arc B390 iGPU in the former—importantly, there is no MCIO connection on the Core Ultra X7 358H version of the Box, leaving it with only USB4 for eGPU connections.

Despite its compact chassis, at just 175 × 134 × 39.5 mm, the GPD Box has decent I/O capabilities, with the highlight of the show being the MCIO 8i port that allows for eGPU expansion with minimal bandwidth loss compared to USB4 and Thunderbolt connections. According to GPD, the maximum bidirectional bandwidth of the GPD Box's MCIO port is 512 Gbps, which effectively matches a native PCIe 5.0 x8 cable connection. Notably, while the G2 eGPU dock does include a PSU with an 800 W ATX 3.1 PSU with two GPU power cables, you will need to bring your own GPU if you buy the bundle with the dock. The G2 dock can also be purchased separately via Indiegogo at a starting price of $385. The GPD Box itself also features dual 2.5 GbE RJ45 ports with link aggregation support. For wireless support, there is Bluetooth 5.3 and Wi-Fi 6E, while the physical I/O includes 2× USB4 V2 Type-C ports, 2× USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-A, and a 3.5 mm audio combo jack on the front. The rear I/O has a DP 2.1 UHBR20 port, 1× HDMI 2.1 FRL ports, 2× RJ45 ports with 2.5 Gbps speeds, 2× USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-A ports, and the MCIO 8i port.

CTL, an EdTech lifecycle products and services provider, today announced an expansion of its product ecosystem with the introduction of the CTL MTIP24OPS 24" Open Pluggable Specification (OPS)-Ready Monitor, alongside two new CTL OPS All-in-Ones with ChromeOS, powered by Intel Core i3 and i7 processors. These new products provide flexible, upgradeable, and easily managed desktop computing solutions for schools and businesses where fleets of flexible desktop computers are needed, such as libraries, labs, test-taking centers, call centers, healthcare facilities, and more.

"CTL has a rich history of delivering reliable desktop monitors and innovative 2-in-1 computing solutions, dating back to our previous generations of Chromebox-powered workstations," said Jeremy Burnett, Vice President of Technology at CTL. "We are pleased to continue serving our customers with this next-generation set of modular desktop computing solutions, which can incorporate the inherently cybersecure, easily managed platform of ChromeOS."

Just on time, following the recent beta launch, which saw the addition of the new KDE Plasma Bigscreen view, KDE Plasma 6.7 has officially launched for public download and is now available from the KDE site. Unlike many previous versions, version 6.7 of the Plasma desktop environment for Linux doesn't have any real ground-breaking features, instead delivering a host of small changes that elevate the desktop environment to new heights and enable more versatile use cases. One such example is improved support for simultaneous HDR and ICC color profiles, making managing a desktop that pulls double duty as a media creation and consumption machine simpler. It also has expanded support for the Wayland protocol and its portals, and the new per-screen virtual desktop switching system has also been implemented. There are also performance improvements at hand across the board, with a focus on power usage and systems with Intel iGPUs.

Perhaps the only major change is the new Union theming system, which is still in its infancy but allows for easier theming of Plasma, QtQuick apps and QtWidget theming via CSS document editing. A much-awaited update to the Oxygen theme also makes its debut in KDE Plasma 6.7. On the UI side, Plasma 6.7 now has a toggle to switch the global theme to and from night mode from the control panel. The Application Menu, Dashboard, and Launcher widgets now also feature drag and drop to add apps to favorites; a system tray update now shows how many jobs are in the print queue on hover, and there is now support for more apps in the Background Apps system tray entry; the built-in calendar widget shows the time difference between the different time zones configured in the widget. For a full list of the tweaks and changes, check out the full changelog on the KDE site or the KDE Wiki.

At the VLSI Symposium held in Hawaii, Intel unveiled the new Intel 18A-P foundry node, a significant refinement of the Intel 18A node that carves out room for a 9% increase in performance at iso-power. The company announced that it commenced risk-production on this new node, and has earmarked it for its next-generation Xeon "Diamond Rapids" server processor. Besides 9% increase in performance at iso-power, Intel 18A-P is claimed to offer an 18% power reduction at iso-performance, a 20-40% improvement in die-level thermal resistance, and a 10-30% improvement in Via resistance in performance-critical layers.

The company detailed the physical changes to the Intel 18A node made to achieve these gains. Intel added new cell options across its 180HP and 160HD libraries to support a wider range of products. For low-power designs, it introduced W1 and W1.5 cells. For high-performance needs, it added the W3P cell, which utilizes a "dual contact" design to boost performance without exceeding the footprint of the existing W3 cell. The company significantly lowered thermal resistance by integrating a new heat-conducting material on the front side of the die. Intel also updated its EDA tools to support thermally-aware layouts, allowing designers to better manage heat dissipation at the structural level.

Sandisk today introduced the Optimus GX PRO 850P, an M.2 NVMe Gen 4 SSD tailor-made for the Sony PlayStation 5 and PlayStation 5 Pro consoles. The drive is an officially-licensed PlayStation accessory, and comes with performance and thermal optimization for the consoles. It comes in capacity variants of up to 8 TB. The drive is a variant of the Optimus GX PRO 850X that Sandisk targets at PC gamers and enthusiasts.

Given the way Sandisk is differentiating the 850P from the 850X, this new drive might have a different performance profile from its PC-targeted sibling, and perhaps even a different combination of controller and NAND flash. The company hasn't put out a detailed specs sheet, yet. We know that the 850X comes with WDC's in-house Black G2 PCIe Gen 4, 8-channel controller that uses a DRAM cache, paired with Kioxia 112-layer 3D TLC NAND flash. The company also hasn't put out pricing. For reference, the top 8 TB 850X is going for an eye-watering $2,700.

Today, at InfoComm 2026, HP Inc. introduced AI-powered communication and collaboration solutions designed to transform how work gets done. As organizations operate across increasingly distributed environments, HP is advancing its collaboration ecosystem—powered by the HP Workforce Experience Platform (WXP)—to deliver better experiences focused on connecting people, workspaces, and solutions.

"Organizations don't want more tools. They want to adopt intelligent collaboration solutions that not only deliver reliable meeting experiences, but that are easier to deploy, manage, and scale," said Carles Farre, Division President, HP Collaboration Solutions. "With innovations across HP devices, meeting room solutions, and platform capabilities, we're helping organizations create more seamless, engaging collaboration experiences for employees."

According to the latest research from Morgan Stanley, one of the leading investment banks, we have learned that the defect rate for Intel's 14A node is currently reported at D0=0.5. This means that defects in Intel's 14A node production are occurring at a rate of only 0.5, indicating a limited amount of purely non-functional silicon produced during the long and challenging semiconductor manufacturing process. For Intel, this suggests that the 14A node is still in the early stages of ramping up. However, the previous claims that this node is currently surpassing the 18A node at a similar development and ramp time are indeed accurate. For example, Intel plans to target a defect rate of only 0.1 to 0.2 by the first quarter of 2027, when the company intends to start running internal test chips and initiate a slight ramp-up for its own products. This will be followed by risk production in 2028 and high-volume production in 2029.

Looking at Intel's current "Panther Lake" SoC, which integrates multiple smaller dies into a unified package, we observe that Intel has utilized its 18A node for the compute tile's production. This tile measures approximately 8.004 x 14.288 mm, resulting in a silicon area of 114.304 mm². If we take this die size and apply the current parameters of the 14A node, we can estimate that a similar die, with the same surface area but increased density and manufactured on the 14A node, would achieve a yield of 56.45% for designs of that scale. Naturally, the current 18A node is providing better yields due to high-volume manufacturing, but the initial statistics for 14A appear promising. This assumption is based on a die of that specific size, with that particular defect rate, using High-NA EUV half-field exposures in the production process. We believe this is the stage Intel's 14A node is currently at, with room for many improvements. While Morgan Stanley notes in their report that the yield is about 40% for a test chip, its size must be significantly larger than the assumed size of the "Panther Lake" compute tile.

It was recently revealed by Xbox CEO, Asha Sharma, after many rumors and hints that it would be going in that direction, that Xbox would be reinvesting in exclusives going forward. However, there have been alleged insider reports and some skepticism from the community, who have been vocal about the need for Xbox console exclusives, that this move by Xbox was simply an appeal to that vocal player base. However, in response to a recent post on X by Jez Cordon, Xbox Chief Strategy Officer, Matthew Ball, has shot down those claims, stating that there is no plan to backtrack on currently planned Xbox exclusives, and that there are other exclusives in the works. Ball's full statement reads:

Matthew BallThese rumors are false. Gears of War: E-Day and Clockwork Revolution will stay exclusive. There are no conversations and have been no conversations to "reverse course." And as we said last week, players can continue to expect signature exclusives from us every year.

Lexar has been exploring various technologies to help consumers achieve faster data throughput and more reliable storage. The company now envisions a shift as the PC evolves from a traditional personal computer to a local AI-enhanced experience. We interviewed Lexar's Chief Technical Officer, Daniel Guo, about the technology Lexar is developing to help reduce some DRAM demand and shift the balance towards integrated hardware-software AI storage solution with NAND Flash. According to Guo, DRAM is about six times more expensive to manufacture than NAND Flash, and AI SSDs present opportunities to reduce DRAM requirements for running AI models on local hardware. This is where the Lexar AI Storage Solution comes into play, as the company is creating new storage solutions to support local AI deployments in constrained DRAM capacity by offloading some parts of large language models to SSDs. This approach allows larger and more powerful LLMs to fit into a PC build, reducing DRAM capacity requirements by up to 40% in specific scenarios.

Based on internal testing, Lexar managed to run the Qwen 3.5 122B AI model on a local PC. Traditionally, users would need to invest about $4,500 in a PC with a decent CPU and 128 GB of DRAM to run this model. Through hardware and software optimization, the Lexar AI suite with the Lexar AI SSD can reduce the DRAM requirement to 32 GB and run the model with 35 billion parameters at 15.6 tokens per second, compared to only 5.2 tokens per second using traditional frameworks. When attempting to load the 122B model on 32 GB of DRAM, the traditional Llama.cpp fails to load and crashes, while Lexar's SSD offloading provides about 4.4 tokens per second.

For more than 13 years, Surface has been shaped by the people who use it. Architects sketch buildings, developers train models, students build startups and field engineers solve problems that rarely make headlines. We didn't intend to design for one audience, but the people who've chosen Surface have defined it through their work. They build, shape, solve and ship, often before anyone else sees what's coming. That pattern is now the platform: new devices, new features and a continued commitment to the makers who show us what Surface means by how they use it.

Expanding Surface for the work ahead
2026 has brought important updates for Surface. We delivered our broadest Surface for Business lineup to date, with new enterprise features including an integrated privacy screen. Later this year, we'll deliver Surface Laptop Ultra, our most powerful Surface Laptop ever, built for developers and creative professionals pushing their work further. We'll also deliver Surface RTX Spark Dev Box, an entirely new category of Surface hardware purpose-built for AI developers who need sustained local compute. Surface is investing everywhere: from entry points to ultra-premium performance, from the enterprise to the individual maker. Today, we're introducing the next Surface Pro and Surface Laptop, powered by Snapdragon X2 processors.

Today Lenovo introduced the Tab Plus Gen 2, the next generation of its tablet created for the increasingly fluid ways people move between media consumption, multitasking, and shared experiences. With upgrades spanning audio, visuals, versatility, and intelligent features, it expands the role of the tablet across a broader range of activities and environments.

"Entertainment today isn't tied to a single place or routine," said Tony Chen, Vice President of Tablets, Intelligent Devices Group, Lenovo. "People are moving seamlessly between work, travel, and downtime, and they expect their devices to move just as naturally with them. With the Lenovo Tab Plus Gen 2, we created a device that keeps up with that rhythm, giving users the freedom to enjoy content on their terms."

Maono, a global leader in hybrid microphone technology that combines wireless freedom (2.4 GHz) with wired-level professionalism (USB/XLR), today announced the launch of the Maono P Series Hybrid Audio Interface, a new range designed to meet the evolving needs of creators working across multiple devices, platforms and workflows. The Maono P Series is now available on Amazon US and the Maono website for $129.99. There is currently a 10% off Discount available with code MAONOP110 from 15th to 21st June.

As content creation expands across platforms, creators increasingly move between laptops, smartphones, tablets, and camera-based setups, blending recording, livestreaming, and production workflows. The Maono P Series addresses this shift through a hybrid approach to connectivity and usability, enabling streamlined multi-device creation without added technical complexity.

Goodram expands its portfolio with a new gaming brand - Goodram RIVAL. Its first product is the Goodram RIVAL DDR5 SODIMM series: memory modules designed for gaming laptops and compact mobile workstations built to perform without hardware limitations.

The RIVAL brand was created for gamers, PC enthusiasts, and users who expect stability, speed, and predictable performance under load. DDR5 SODIMM is its mobile-focused lineup - an upgrade for users who want to get more from their laptop without replacing the entire platform.

Synology today announced the release of DiskStation Manager (DSM) 7.4, delivering DSM Agent, Synology ChatPlus and Meet, and Synology HDD-based post-processing deduplication and compression.

"As AI becomes more capable, the real challenge is no longer building intelligence itself, but putting it to work where data lives," said Bie-i Chu, Executive Vice President of the Synology NAS Group. "With DSM 7.4, we're providing users with a platform where AI drives greater productivity and smarter management, while keeping them in full control of their data and infrastructure."

Cable Matters, a leading innovator in connectivity solutions, today announced the launch of its new USB-C KVM Switch for 2 Computers, 1 Monitor, a powerful workspace upgrade designed for professionals who need to control two USB-C or Thunderbolt-enabled computers from a single desk setup.

Built for modern hybrid workstations, shared desks, content creators, IT professionals, and power users, the new Cable Matters USB-C KVM Switch lets users share one HDMI monitor, keyboard, mouse, USB peripherals, and charging source between two connected host computers.

SiMa.ai, a leader in Physical AI, today launched Palette Neat, the industry's first agentic development environment for Physical AI that collapses complex application timelines from months to days. The open source, purpose-built, integrated development environment combines a Physical AI execution library and agent workflow layer for productivity-focused agentic development. When paired with the full-production Modalix MLSoC System-on-Module (SoM) or its new PCIe companion card form factor, the unified platform delivers unmatched performance-per-watt for high-demand Physical AI workloads across robotics, automotive, drones, industrial automation, aerospace and defense, smart vision, and healthcare.

"SiMa.ai is an AI software company that builds its own silicon," said Krishna Rangasayee, founder and CEO of SiMa.ai. "Today, we are delivering the industry's first agentic development environment for Physical AI. Together, Palette Neat and our pin-compatible SoM dismantle the incumbent GPU moat, allowing developers to design systems in plain English and develop them in days—and in many cases, hours."

SAMA, a global leader in performance PC hardware, announces the S50, a compact ATX case that balances space efficiency, airflow, and high-end hardware support. The S50 features a tempered glass side panel and high-density mesh on the front and top for strong, balanced airflow. Its innovative front-mounted PSU compartment reduces the chassis footprint, enabling a compact size without sacrificing compatibility or cooling capacity. The S50 comes pre-installed with four 120 mm ARGB PWM fans for strong out-of-the-box airflow and lighting. It supports ATX, microATX, Mini-ITX, and back-connect ATX and microATX motherboards, along with graphics cards up to 410 mm, CPU coolers up to 165 mm, and ATX power supplies up to 180 mm. For expanded cooling and easier building, the case supports up to eleven 120 mm fans, a top-mounted 360 mm radiator, tool-less quick-release panels, 47 mm of cable management space, and a removable storage bracket.

NVIDIA has released its latest GeForce 610.62 WHQL game-ready drivers today, bringing support for the ultra-fast 6v6 shooter game "Empulse," which is scheduled for release on June 24, just a few days from now. NVIDIA is providing pre-release drivers to ensure gamers have day-one support when the game launches on Steam. The company also included a few bug fixes to improve the quality of use with GeForce RTX GPUs. For example, this driver release brings many fixes to World of Warcraft for improved stability during gameplay, as well as a remedy for visual corruption issues that occurred in Apex Legends at random times. Additionally, DLSS settings, which sometimes could gray out, have been fixed for regular contrast and access. Interestingly, this driver release also includes a crucial fix for the "Ada Lovelace" GeForce RTX 40 Series, which experienced frame pacing issues on some monitors when G-SYNC was enabled. General stability improvements have also been applied, making this driver release a worthwhile upgrade even for those not seeking day-one game support or using last-generation GeForce RTX GPUs.

DOWNLOAD: NVIDIA GeForce 610.62 WHQL

AMD and Rackspace Technology, a global enterprise AI infrastructure and solutions provider, today announced the signing of a definitive agreement for the phased deployment of an initial 30 MW footprint dedicated to AMD-based compute deployments across Rackspace's global data centers beginning in late 2026 through 2028. The agreement operationalizes the Memorandum of Understanding announced May 7, 2026, and establishes AMD as a strategic technology partner at the silicon layer of Rackspace's governed AI stack.

At full deployment, 30 MW of dedicated AMD compute across Rackspace's footprint will represent meaningful capacity to serve regulated enterprise workloads, including healthcare providers who have expressed early interest in accelerated compute for clinical AI and inference at scale. This collaboration incorporates both AMD Instinct GPUs (including MI355X, MI350P, and future successor solutions) and AMD EPYC CPUs inside an integrated Enterprise AI Cloud architecture, enabling Rackspace to route each workload to the right compute with full accountability for performance and outcomes end to end.

TechPowerUp today released the latest version of TechPowerUp GPU-Z, the graphics subsystem information, monitoring, and diagnostics utility for gamers and PC enthusiasts. Version 2.70.0 improves the security of the kernel-mode driver of the application, and you are highly encouraged to update to this latest version. This latest update also adds support for a whole range of new GPUs.

To begin with, support is added for Qualcomm Adreno 741, Snapdragon X2 Elite, Adreno 778G, and Adreno 782G iGPUs. Support is also added for Intel Arc Pro "Battlemage" B70 and B65 graphics cards; the A60 engineering sample, and certain Core "Alder Lake" engineering samples. Over in the NVIDIA front, support is added for NVIDIA RTX 6000D, RTX PRO 500 "Blackwell" Embedded GPU; Tesla V100-DGXS 32 GB; and PG500-216. Graphics card vendor detection has been added for AWES and HKC or Sambada.

DOWNLOAD: TechPowerUp GPU-Z v2.70.0The change-log follows.

Beyerdynamic presents a new in-ear monitor for musicians who want to get the most out of their performance. The DT 30 IE boasts balanced monitoring sound, high passive noise isolation of up to 39 dB, and an IP54-certified design that can withstand even the most intense performances - whether in the rehearsal room, at a club gig, or on the big stage.

DT 30 IE is specifically designed to meet the demands of modern live performances. Its powerful 11-mm dynamic driver delivers a balanced sound signature spanning a frequency range of 5-20,000 Hz. As a result, it enables ambitious musicians to perform with clarity and control, even in environments with high ambient noise levels, complex mixes or changing venue acoustics.

Noctua today introduced its first all-in-one liquid CPU coolers. With first-class cooling performance, superb quietness of operation and industry-leading reliability, the new NL-LC1 series brings classic Noctua virtues to the world of closed-loop liquid cooling. "The performance headroom of liquid cooling has always been tempting to us, but we first had to make sure that acoustics and reliability met the strict standards that customers expect from a Noctua product," said Roland Mossig, CEO of Noctua. "With the NL-LC1, we are proud to have achieved a level of thermal performance, acoustic refinement and dependability that sets a new standard."

The NL-LC1 series is based on Asetek's renowned, premium-grade Emma V2 platform, which has established itself as a gold standard for both thermal efficiency and long-term dependability. What makes the NL-LC1 coolers unique is Noctua's custom-engineered NL-PNA1 pump noise absorber: Leveraging a three-layer acoustic soundproofing structure and the tuned-mass damper effect, the NL-PNA1 reduces both air-borne noise and structure-borne vibrations, which can yield significant improvements in pump acoustics.

[Editor's note: Our in-depth review of NL-LC1-36 is now live]

KIOXIA today introduced a 4 TB variant to its Exceria G3 series of mid-range M.2 Gen 5 NVMe SSDs. The company had debuted this series last December, with only 1 TB and 2 TB variants at the time. It features a combination of Phison E31T series DRAMless controller, paired with Kioxia's own 218-layer BiCS8 3D QLC NAND flash memory, but now comes in a 4 TB variant.

The new 4 TB variant offers mostly similar performance to the existing 2 TB variant, with up to 10 GB/s sequential reads, and up to 9.6 GB/s sequential writes; along with up to 1.45 million IOPS for 4K random reads and writes. Write endurance is rated at 2,400 TBW. With a whole-drive peak power draw of just 6.4 W, the drive doesn't come with any cooling solution. The company didn't reveal pricing. The drive is backed by a 5-year warranty.

Following the unveiling of the new Intel Core processors (Series 3) (formerly Wildcat Lake) in April, AAEON's UP brand has announced its development timeline for four new platforms that will feature the processor line, with both developer boards and edge systems included. Expected to enter mass production in late Q3, 2026, the developer boards included in AAEON's roadmap are the UP WCL and UP Nexus WCL. The first of these is a credit card-sized board consistent with the original UP board's form factor, while the UP Nexus WCL represents a branding shift for the UP Squared Pro form factor, measuring 101.6 mm × 101.6 mm. Both boards will also offer a fully embedded edge system version, the UP WCL Edge and UP Nexus WCL Edge, designed to appeal to customers requiring plug-and-play systems.

All four platforms will be available with the option of Intel Core 7 processor 350 and Intel Core 5 processor 320 CPUs from the Wildcat Lake family, while the UP WCL will also provide SKUs with the Intel Core 3 processor 304. Delivering up to 40 TOPS of AI performance via integrated GPU and NPU but with a CPU prioritizing low power E-cores, the Intel Core series' first integrated heterogeneous compute architecture sees AAEON position its upcoming products as suitable for building advanced applications across market segments, but with the benefit of a lower power footprint than platforms tailored to high-performance computing needs.

AMD's upcoming Ryzen 10000 series of desktop processors, codenamed "Olympic Ridge" and based on the "Zen 6" CPU architecture, are rumored to introduce some interesting platform changes. According to the latest leak from X account "Gotou_3rd," AMD's upcoming AM5 platform is likely to replace its integrated graphics processing unit (GPU) with an integrated Neural Processing Unit (NPU), marking a significant shift from the current setup. Since the "Zen 4" based "Raphael" processors, part of the Ryzen 7000 series, AMD has included integrated graphics solutions with its desktop CPUs. This trend continued with the "Zen 5" based "Granite Ridge" Ryzen 9000 series, which also featured an integrated GPU for basic graphics output and boot functionality.

However, with the next-generation Ryzen 10000 series, AMD seems to be reallocating the silicon area for different purposes, as the role of integrated GPUs in desktop systems diminishes. Most PC builders pair a dedicated GPU with their DIY or OEM PC builds, using integrated graphics mainly for debugging when the discrete GPU encounters issues. Since the silicon space in the CPU can be repurposed, AMD might switch to an NPU to enhance local AI capabilities and offload some AI tasks from the GPU to the CPU's integrated NPU. This could mean the platform might become Copilot+ AI PC certified if the NPU achieves over 40 TOPS of compute power.

Logitech G today announced the expansion of the G3 Series suite of PC Gaming products. Designed to bring pro-inspired performance to more gamers, the extended lineup features the G305 X SUPERLIGHT wireless gaming mouse and the G316 X 98 wired mechanical gaming keyboard. These new products join the recently launched Logitech G325 gaming headset, completing the G3 series, a comprehensive high-performance desktop ecosystem that delivers excellent performance, world-class features, and unique customization at an affordable price point.

"By fusing elite precision, like our sub-micron HERO 44K sensor and 8 kHz report rates, with high-end heritage design, we are enabling everyday gamers the ability to level up their gaming experience at an approachable price tag," said Arnaud Perret-Gentil, Head of Product PC Gaming and Creators at Logitech G. "The G3 Series represents a strategic evolution in our mission to facilitate 'Play for All.'"

Modern data center infrastructure is evolving rapidly, and customers are increasingly facing a common challenge: access to memory. As AI models, data analytics, virtualization and high-performance computing workloads grow in size and complexity, memory has become a critical constraint across cloud and enterprise environments. For customers, addressing these bottlenecks is essential to improving performance per dollar, increasing efficiency and accelerating deployments at scale. AMD is addressing this challenge by acquiring MEXT, a pioneer in AI-driven memory optimization technology.

MEXT has developed innovative AI-powered predictive memory technology designed to make flash behave more like DRAM, helping expand usable memory capacity while maintaining performance and efficiency. This approach has the potential to reduce infrastructure costs, improve resource utilization, and help customers more effectively scale general-purpose and AI workloads.

A little over a year since the game launched, Ubisoft has announced the final content update, Title Update 1.1.11, for Assassin's Creed Shadows, launching on June 16, and delivering the final end-game quest, called Black Tides, to finally conclude the story of Yasuke and Naoe. Black Tides sees players go up against two mysterious Templars who have journeyed to Japan to hunt Yasuke and Naoe and fulfill their own ulterior motives along the way. Players will need to complete all previous free post-launch content drops in order to access the Black Tides quest, except for Claws of Awaji. The update also adds Domains, a new, replayable, arena-based endgame activity that challenges players and encourages build diversity.

Domains will feature boss battles and missions, but each level of difficulty (1-10) will apply additional modifiers to make things even more difficult. There are five separate gameplay simulations in Domains, and each one will challenge players in different ways. Players will be able to buy Domain-specific items from the Domain shop with a special in-game currency. Domain activities will also reward players with special weapons and cosmetics that will never be available outside the challenges. Black Tides will also link Shadows to Black Flag Resynced with two new live projects, Riptide and Undertow, wherein players can earn rewards that will cross over between the two games. As usual, there are also a host of new bug fixes and UI improvements, which can be seen in the full update notes. Trailers for Domains and the Black Tides quest follow.

Cooler Master, a global leader in innovative thermal solutions and PC hardware today announced Q300L V3, the next generation of its popular compact microATX case platform. Designed for first-time builders, price-conscious gamers, and system integrators, the Q300L V3 delivers a more capable build experience with improved airflow, stronger structure, tempered glass, and updated front I/O connectivity.

The Q300L V3 builds on the familiar identity of the Q300L series while addressing the needs of modern compact systems. With support for Mini-ITX and microATX motherboards, CPU air coolers up to 178 mm tall, graphics cards up to 366 mm long, and up to six fans, the case gives builders more room to work while keeping the small footprint that made the series popular.

It appears as though Xbox's recent financial troubles, which are expected to result in layoffs in July, may also result in studio closures, with Insider Gaming's Mike Straw reporting on Bluesky that Arkane Lyon (responsible for Deathloop, Dishonored, and the ongoing development of Marvel's Blade) and Compulsion Games (of Contrast, We Happy Few, and South of Midnight) may be facing potential closure in the coming months. This is according to sources inside those game studios, who say that internal communications and overheard conversations at Xbox Game Studios have them "scared" for the future of their studios.

Insiders are reporting that even game studios that had previously been insulated from potential layoffs and closures may be facing just that eventuality. A report by Bloomberg's Jason Schreier, corroborates these reports, stating that Double Fine Productions, Compulsion Games, and Ninja Theory—the latter, responsible for the Hellblade series, was informed of the closure in a call on June 15—are all in negotiations with Microsoft to reach a separation deal that would see the game studios become independent or be bought out in order to avoid closure. Insiders say that even successful buyout deals are likely to result in significant layoffs. Allegedly, some employees have already been informed of the financial instability and advised to proactively seek employment.

MSI revealed the new Intel Arc-powered Claw 8 EX AI+ gaming handhelds shortly ahead of Computex 2026, but pricing was still a mystery at that point in time, with availability and pricing announcements slated for June 23. However, it appears as though MSI has listed the new gaming handheld ahead of the official announcement. According to the apparent premature listing for the Claw 8 EX AI+ (CG3EM-024US) will cost $1,799, which isn't far off the €1,500 predictions from early leaks and rumors.

The MSI online store listing also confirms that the Claw 8 EX AI+ will start shipping on June 23, suggesting that component and memory shortages have not severely hampered the brand's ability to produce at least an initial production run for the launch. Hardware specifications are also unchanged from what MSI showed off at Computex, with the handheld still featuring 32 GB of LPDDR5x-8533 RAM, a 1 TB PCIe SSD, and an 80 Wh battery, alongside an 8-inch, 1080p, 120 Hz display with VRR and 500 nits peak brightness. The MSI store listing confirms that the Claw 8 EX AI+ will launch with Intel's Arc G3 Extreme, and there doesn't appear to be any word on a version of the new MSI handheld powered by the regular Intel Arc G3, which has an Intel Arc B370 iGPU, which has 10 Xe3 cores instead of the 12 found in the G3 Extreme.

Windows 10 support ended last year, so PCs still running it no longer get security patches and are becoming an easier target by the day. Moving up to Windows 11 Pro closes that gap, and the Pro edition layers on protection that Home leaves out. During StackSocial's version of Prime Day, a lifetime license is on sale for $9.97 (reg. $199).

Windows 11 Pro is the version for people who want to lock things down. The security tools that set it apart from Home include

• BitLocker drive encryption: scrambles your whole drive, so a lost or stolen laptop doesn't hand your files to whoever finds it.
• Windows Sandbox: a throwaway, walled-off space to open sketchy files or test untrusted software without it ever touching your main system.
• Hyper-V: runs full virtual machines, useful for isolating risky work or testing on a clean install.
• Azure AD: ties into business identity and access management for managed, secure sign-ins.
• TPM 2.0 with biometrics: backs fingerprint and facial login with hardware-level security instead of a guessable password.

Until June 28 at 11:59 p.m. PT, it's only $9.97 to get Windows 11 Pro.

Browse the full deal collection during StackSocial's answer to Prime Day.

Following the recent updates to the Keychron wireless keyboard line-up, with new ZMK firmware and mechanical and Hall effect models reaching gamers, Keychron has started to tease an upcoming version of its V6 keyboard that it is calling a next-gen keyboard architecture. The post on X revealing the keyboard's design and existence reveals that it will have TMR sensing technology, which is known to be more efficient than Hall-effect sensors, and a "Nova Socket architecture," with a hybrid platform. This all suggests that Keychron, which has long used TMR sensors in its wireless "HE" keyboard series, will leverage TMR sensors in order to support both mechanical and analogue magnetic switches.

A hybrid socket would allow users to switch between the feel of mechanical switches and the customization and performance benefits of magnetic switches. As for the hardware, the first keyboard apparently launching with the hybrid design is a full-size V6 keyboard, suggesting it will have a plastic case (usually, Keychron Q-series keyboards are aluminium, while K- and V-series are plastic). The image shared by the brand also reveals a proper full-size layout, replete with a programmable knob above the backspace key, a full-size navigation cluster over the arrow keys, a num pad with a full-width zero key, and a four-key macro row above the num pad. The keycaps in the image are Keychron's in-house OSA design, which use OEM height with more rounded edges and a cylindrical top.

We recently reported on comments by Xbox Gaming Chief Strategy Officer, Matthew Ball, about a future of Xbox Gaming experiences subsidized by non-intrusive in-game advertising, although it seemed as though Microsoft had yet to actually go down that route. More recently, EA (Electronic Arts) has announced EA Advertising, which it says will allow brands to "tap into the power of play," and access views from "some of the most invested gaming communities online." The idea is that brands can partner with EA to include ads in the gaming giant's games without breaking player immersion. EA chief experiences officer, David Tinson, said that the new ad platform "gives brands a meaningful opportunity to show up in ways that add value and respect the player experience, while maintaining authenticity in the worlds our teams are building."

The examples given on the official EA Advertising page include the Skate x Vans collaboration, which has existed since the launch of Skate, the Coach clothing brand in The Sims 4, and Visa and Chime field paint in EA Sports College Football. Reportedly, ad spots will include various integrations, including banners, digital ad boards, scoreboards, and broadcast overlays. EA has updated its Frostbite engine with integrations for the new ads program, adding a purpose-built ad server and SDK that allows advertisers to receive information on impressions, adjust targeting, and generally gather data about their ad campaigns in a "privacy-safe way."

Most people who open Claude treat it like a smarter search box: ask a question, copy the answer, move on. That barely scratches what it can do. This Claude AI Professional E-Degree takes you from those basic chats to building real workflows, and you can get it on sale for $19.99 (reg. $49).

This course pack includes four courses, more than 100 lectures, and over eight hours of video, plus quizzes and projects to keep it hands-on. You start with prompt engineering that goes well past "write me an email," learning context management and chain-of-thought techniques that get you sharper, more reliable answers. From there, it moves into agentic coding, where Claude writes, debugs, and works inside VS Code alongside you.

Get the Claude AI Professional E-Degree on sale for $19.99.

AMD has updated its product portfolio with three "new" processors, Ryzen 7 4700LE, Ryzen 5 3501U and Ryzen 3 3100U. These "new" processors revive the older Zen2 and Zen+ architectures for OEM and entry-level systems. Worth mentioning that the Zen+ architecture was launched in 2018, while the Zen2 was introduced in 2019. The Ryzen 7 4700LE is a Zen2 based CPU with eight cores, 16 threads, 3.6 GHz base clock, up to 4.2 GHz boost, and a 65 W TDP. The processor uses the AM4 socket and is listed as an OEM-only part. Unlike most Renoir desktop APUs, the AMD specifications page does not mention integrated graphics.

In the Ryzen 3000U series AMD has also added two Zen+, Picasso-based mobile processors. The Ryzen 5 3501U is a four-core, eight-thread CPU with a 2.1 GHz base clock and 3.7 GHz boost. The Ryzen 3 3100U is a dual-core, two-thread processor with a 1.9 GHz base frequency and up to 3.2 GHz boost. The two processors share identical specifications: Radeon Vega 8 iGPU with eight compute units at 1,200 MHz, support for DDR4-2400 memory and the FP5 package. AMD lists a 15 W as the default TDP, configurable between 12 W and 35 W depending on system design requirements. According to the AMD product pages, both Ryzen 3000U models are scheduled for Q2 2026. The Ryzen 7 4700LE is OEM dedicated, while the Ryzen 5 3501U and Ryzen 3 3100U are likely intended for low-cost notebooks and embedded platforms. No pricing information has been disclosed.

Gears of War: E-Day is officially slated to launch on October 6, 2026, and ahead of that launch date, Xbox Game Studios has published the recommended and minimum hardware specifications for E-Day, and it's yet another relatively low-power GPU, much like Forza Horizon 6. According to the game's Steam Store page, which was updated on June 15 with the minimum specifications, Gears of War: E-Day will require at least an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 or RTX 5050 or higher to play. The lowest-tier AMD or Intel GPU that will be able to play E-Day is the Intel Arc A580 or AMD Radeon RX 6600 GPU. Aside from the GPU specs, E-Day requires at least 130 GB of SSD storage, 12 GB of RAM, and an AMD Ryzen 5 2600X, Intel Core i7-6850K, or Core i5-10400.

Curiously, the recommended hardware specifications don't call for much more powerful hardware, with an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 or 3060 Ti, AMD Radeon RX 6700 XT, or 9060 XT, or an Intel Arc B580 GPU, 16 GB of RAM, and an AMD Ryzen 5 5600 or Intel Core i5-11600K CPU. While it may seem, at first glance, as though The Coalition and Xbox Game Studios are opting for ray tracing-capable GPUs, it's worth noting that NVIDIA's Pascal GPU generation is officially out of active support, making the RTX 2060 part of the oldest GPU series still supported by NVIDIA. The GTX 1660 Ti is technically part of the same generation, but, in our testing, it is anywhere between 18 and 23% slower than the RTX 2060, even without ray tracing enabled. Of course, there are still questions surrounding the minimum and recommended specifications, the most important of which is the target resolution and frame rates, although those details will only likely be teased out after the game launches.

This week, at the 2026 IEEE/JSAP Symposium on VLSI Technology and Circuits, imec, a world-leading research and innovation hub in advanced semiconductor technologies, in partnership with the lithography solution provider ASML, and semiconductor foundry TSMC, presents a novel, robust and scalable 300 mm integration route for 2D-material based n and pFETs. For the first time, scaled nFETs (implementing MoS2 as the channel material) and pFETs (either WS2 or WSe2-based) with 50 nm contacted poly pitch (CPP) could be demonstrated, with good current-voltage characteristics. These results represent a crucial step in the lab-to-fab transition of 2D-material based transistors, envisioned for ultra-scaled logic as well as for back-end and wafer backside applications.

2D transition metal dichalcogenides (TMDs, such as MoS2, WS2, and WSe2) have the potential to extend and augment the logic scaling technology roadmap. When integrated as atomically thin conduction channels replacing Si, these materials enable high-performance scaled transistors - attractive for ultra-scaled logic as well as for back-end-of-line and wafer backside applications. They owe this promise to their good electrostatic channel control while maintaining acceptable carrier mobilities, even at ultra-scaled gate and channel lengths. But the path to industrial adoption has so far been hampered by the lack of a 300 mm integration route that can offer TMD-based n and pFETs at industry-relevant dimensions, while preserving the performance that has extensively been demonstrated on a lab scale.

It seems as though CD Projekt Red is not in the business of resting on its laurels, with the studio recently celebrating the 13th anniversary of The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt with a newly revealed update and DLC for the game, working on both The Witcher 4 and a Witcher 1 remake, Cyberpunk 2, and apparently a new co-op Witcher game, which has started to appear in rumors of late. The rumors of a co-op Witcher game started with a spin-off game called under the codename Sirrius, that would be primarily a single-player game with optional multiplayer layered over the top. Project Sirrius seems to align with rumors of a new Witcher co-op game, as reported by MP1st. The biggest change from previous games in the Witcher universe is that this will be a multiplayer co-op experience, with players working together to hunt and take down monsters.

CDPR has yet to reveal the game or any gameplay details, but the rumors purport that the co-op Witcher game will be free-to-play and launch for both PC and mobile—presumably both Android and iOS. Allegedly, Sirrius will be set in 1230, when Geralt was already active as a witcher. However, players will not play as Geralt or another established witcher. Instead, the game will feature typical ARPG customization and a matching skill tree. Combat will largely be skills-based, relying on dodging, blocking, parrying, and executions, and players will be able to select from different witcher schools for their class, combat style, and skills. The aforementioned skills and combat system will include Signs and casting as well as potion brewing. CD Projekt Red hinted in a March earnings report that the company's next collaboration with Scopely, a mobile developer the studio worked with on prior Witcher mobile games, would certainly not launch in 2026, so a 2027 or even 2028 launch date seem more realistic, depending on how far along development is.

At Computex 2026, we had the opportunity to interview AMD's Chief Software Officer, Andrej Zdravkovic, and Terry Makedon, Senior Director of Software at AMD, to discuss various developments happening in AMD's labs. One of our questions focused on the FSR 4.1 Upscaling algorithm, which is currently exclusive to the RDNA 4 generation with the Radeon RX 9000 series of graphics cards. However, it is expected to be available this July for RDNA 3-based Radeon RX 7000 series GPUs. We were curious whether the FSR 4.1 Upscaling model that currently runs on RDNA 4 would be the same one used on RDNA 3. AMD explained that the underlying model is slightly different, but the end result will be of the same quality. This is reassuring news for millions of RDNA 3 and RDNA 2 gamers worldwide, especially during a time when upgrading PC hardware is more challenging than it has been in years.

For example, we know there are some fundamental differences in the RDNA generations regarding microarchitecture. For RDNA 3, this means there is no 8-bit floating point support in older generations, as only the latest RDNA 4 uses FP8. To run the FSR 4.1 Upscaling model on RDNA 3, AMD must convert this to 8-bit integer data, since RDNA 3 hardware uses INT8 data types without FP8 support. Generally, integer math is sufficient to optimize these models, but the conversion work is necessary, hence the delay between RDNA 4 and RDNA 3 support. This difference requires AMD to completely modify the FSR 4.1 model for the new data type and ensure there is no quality loss in the final visual output. AMD's software officials have confirmed that the company has been working hard on this issue, and more information will be released next month, in July, as the launch approaches.

Intel is planning a new line of processors featuring integrated graphics solutions by NVIDIA, according to a report by tech journalist Erdi Özüağ. The company is planning to introduce these processors by CES 2028. There are no details on what the processor will be. Intel has, in the past, sourced big integrated GPUs from third-party vendors. For example, the 7th Gen Core "Kaby Lake-G," a limited production-run mobile processor that paired a 4-core "Kaby Lake" CPU die with an AMD Radeon RX Vega M GPU on a multi-chip module.

Fast-forward to today, and there are several approaches Intel could take to developing such a chip. Given that it makes tile-based disaggregated client processors with SoC tiles made on TSMC nodes, it's possible that this chip could be a "Panther Lake" or "Nova Lake" derivative that combines Compute and a truncated SoC tile from Intel; with a GPU tile from NVIDIA. Unlike Intel's own Graphics tile, the NVIDIA tile could also integrate display engines and media accelerators. In related news, Özüağ says that Apple is in advanced stages of consultation with Intel over using its Intel 18A foundry node for manufacturing of some of its Apple Silicon products.

Baseus today announced the launch of the Baseus Spacemate RD1 Pro 15-in-1 Docking Station, a next-generation desktop solution that combines intelligent charging, advanced connectivity, and streamlined workspace organization in one compact device.

Baseus Spacemate RD1 Pro combines multi-device charging, smart functionality and versatile connectivity in a compact design. Designed for modern professionals working across home, office and hybrid environments, dual-display capability streamlines complex workflows across separate screens, driving productivity in both everyday operations and creative projects. Beyond performance, Baseus Spacemate RD1 Pro also reduces plugs and cable clutter, elevating both workspace efficiency and desktop aesthetics.

Thrustmaster unveils a new Sim Racing wheel born from a unique collaboration with Ferrari, the 24 Hours of Le Mans, and Le Mans Ultimate: the Ferrari 499P Centenary Winner Edition. Produced in a limited run of 499 individually numbered units, this exclusive piece celebrates the historic victory of the Ferrari 499P #51 at the centenary edition of 24H LE MANS, marking Ferrari's triumphant return to the pinnacle of endurance racing.

Designed at 1:1 scale, inspired by the Ferrari 499P steering wheel, this product represents the ultimate convergence between endurance motorsport and sim racing. Combining a molded carbon back cover, a 4.3-inch screen, LEDs, and backlit controls, it delivers an unprecedented level of ergonomics and immersion, bringing drivers closer than ever to the cockpit of the winning Hypercar.

The premium CPU water blocks of the DeltaMate MPII series have been designed to the highest standards and are manufactured and assembled under strict quality controls. Only high-quality materials are used in production to meet the demands of hardware enthusiasts and set new industry standards:

• The nickel-plated Ultra-High-Performance cold plate is milled from copper.
• The solid nickel-plated housing with G1/4-inch ports is made of brass.
• The viewing window is made of borosilicate glass, whose edges are sanded after cutting.
• The cover is made of anodized aluminium.

Stylish RGB LED lighting highlights the elegant design of the water block when illumination is desired. The RGB LEDs can be controlled via a 3-pin ARGB header (+5V/DATA/GND) through the motherboard.

ASUS today announced the availability of ASUS ExpertCenter Pro ET900N G3, a next-generation deskside AI supercomputer engineered to bring data-center-class AI performance directly to enterprises, AI developers, researchers, and data scientists. Powered by NVIDIA GB300 Grace Blackwell Ultra Desktop Superchip and built on NVIDIA DGX Station GB300 architecture, ExpertCenter Pro ET900N G3 delivers exceptional AI compute, massive coherent memory capacity, and enterprise-grade AI infrastructure in a deskside form factor, with future support planned for Windows-based AI development and agentic environments.

As AI adoption rapidly expands across industries, organizations increasingly require powerful local AI infrastructure capable of supporting large-scale AI training, inference, and autonomous agentic AI workflows without relying entirely on cloud computing. ExpertCenter Pro ET900N G3 addresses this growing demand by enabling enterprises to deploy advanced AI capabilities locally with greater control, lower latency, predictable operational costs, and enhanced data privacy. The system is now available worldwide. To learn more or explore deployment opportunities, visit the Contact Me page for further information and consultation.

NVIDIA over the weekend released the GeForce Hotfix driver version 610.52. Hotfixes are non-WHQL drivers is released out of turn to address glaring bugs or issues affecting users from a recent driver release. Version 610.52 addresses a frame-pacing bug affecting certain monitors with G-SYNC being enabled on a machine with GeForce RTX 40-series "Ada" GPUs. The drivers also resolve an issue that prevented EDID from being read on certain monitors, causing them to be identified as "NVIDIA NV-Failsafe." Gaming stability on multi-monitor configurations with V-Sync and DLSS Frame Generation being enabled, has been improved. A bug that caused certain monitors to not correctly wake up from sleep, causing users to restart the monitors, has been fixed.

The Hotfix also addresses certain other issues. Certain gaming stability issues with "World of Warcraft" have been fixed. An issue that causes jittering or ghosting in DirectX 11 games with Smooth Motion enabled, has been fixed. Another issue that caused certain games to crash at launch with Smooth Motion enabled, has been fixed. The drivers also introduce stability issues related to the system when it fails to create a new allocation.

DOWNLOAD: NVIDIA GeForce Hotfix Driver version 610.52

Since the 13th Gen Core "Raptor Lake" microarchitecture already got its refresh with the 14th Gen Core "Raptor Lake Refresh," the company decided to go with "Raptor Lake Next" as codename for its next line of Socket LGA1700 desktop processors. These chips are born out of necessity, to provide options to PC buyers stuck with the decade-old DDR4 memory standard in wake of the DDR5 memory pricing crisis, given that the current Core Ultra "Arrow Lake" processors lack DDR4 backwards compatibility.

An inside report by JayKihn suggests that Intel could switch to the newer Core Series 3 processor model numbering scheme for its new processors, without the "Ultra" brand extension, denoting the lack of an integrated NPU. Intel could use the opportunity to carve out new combinations of CPU P-core counts, E-core counts, and L3 cache sizes, with the top part in the series expected to be 8P+8E, and not 8P+16E that the "Raptor Lake-S" silicon physically has. These chips could occupy price points in the entry-thru-performance segments, and Intel will ensure they don't tread on the market space of its next-generation Core Ultra "Nova Lake-S"

Welcome to midsummer week and a tad slower week when it comes to new releases. This week's major release is an anime inspired APRG set in its own universe. If that's not your style, then the week kicks off with some underground drilling, followed by driving cars in a city and a salvage operation. We round the week off with a new RPG from Square Enix and a job interview from your worst nightmares.

Zenless Zone Zero / This week's major release / Wednesday 17 June
Zenless Zone Zero is HoYoverse's brand-new urban fantasy ARPG. Players act as "Proxies" who explore Hollows alongside a wide range of unique Agents, fighting enemies, and completing commissions on their journey to unveil the mysteries behind New Eridu. Steam link

AMD announced in May 2026 that the Ryzen AI Halo Developer Platform mini PC would arrive in June, and launch day has apparently arrived, with the Strix Halo-powered mini PC now available for pre-order via Micro Center in the US. The Ryzen AI Halo developer kit is mostly aimed at AI developers, and although there are two SKUs, both have identical hardware, featuring the AMD Ryzen AI Max+ 395 CPU, with its Radeon 8060S iGPU, and 128 GB of LPDDR5x-8000 memory shared across both the CPU and GPU cores. The mini PC is launching with 2 TB of SSD storage, and it includes a 120 W PSU.

Pricing is set at $3,999, and the only difference between the two available SKUs is that one ships with Linux, while the other ships with Windows 11 Pro. No shipment date has yet been confirmed. Physical I/O is limited to USB Type-C, with three unspecified USB Type-C ports, likely USB 3.2 Gen 2×2 or USB4, one of which has DisplayPort Alt Mode support, an HDMI 2.1 port, a 10 Gbps Ethernet port, and a USB Type-C port for power input. It will also ship with both Bluetooth 5.4 and Wi-Fi 7. The mini PC itself measures just 149 × 149 × 43.18 mm, and the chassis appears to be mostly aluminium.

The Arch User Repository (AUR for short) is a community-driven software repository for Arch Linux and its derivatives, often touted as one of the major benefits of using Arch Linux, due to its unmatched software availability. Unfortunately, it was recently discovered that several malicious accounts—it's unclear whether they belonged to a single bad actor or multiple users—had made submissions to some AUR packages to inject malware that added the NPM package manager, which would go on to install a keylogger or info stealer when affected apps were installed.

The issue was detailed in a recent AUR public mailing list thread, where over 400 packages were analyzed and found to be malicious by the Arch Linux community and its maintainers. It doesn't seem as though any packages were outright removed, though, with junior package maintainer, Jonathan Grotelüschen, commenting in the thread that the maintenance team was "working hard to reset/delete all malicious commits and ban the accounts." Regardless, it might be prudent to hold off on updating any Arch distros until it's confirmed that the purge is over, especially if you know you have AUR packages installed.

Despite having launched in 2021, adoption of Windows 11 has been somewhat slow-going, with Microsoft's latest desktop OS only overtaking Windows 10 nearly four years after launch and only reaching 1 billion users in 2026. If Valve's Steam Hardware and Software survey is anything to go by, it looks as though Windows 11 adoption has continued to grow in recent months. The survey results for May 2026 point to a 2.02% increase in the number of PC gamers on Windows 11, with Windows 10 losing 1.64% and Linux losing 0.53%, despite Valve's ongoing work on SteamOS and the never-ending proclamations of "the year of the Linux desktop."

Overall, however, these changes have barely moved the needle, with Windows gaining 0.38% of Steam's user share, and macOS gaining 0.15%. It's worth noting that English-language users are somewhat overrepresented in this particular Steam Survey, with 2.71% more English users than in the previous survey. These sorts of biases have previously skewed results, as certain groups may have status quo biases that play into their choice of operating system and hardware. The rest of the Steam Hardware and Software Survey results are more or less business as usual, with 16 GB of RAM and 1080p monitor resolution continuing to be the standard, although the latter has lost a negligible amount of market share. The same is true for GPUs, where the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 continues to be the most popular GPU on Steam. It appears as though the fix for Steam's recent faulty detection of Radeon GPUs has been released out of beta, though, as the survey reports that the AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT has gained 1.24%.

BenQ, under its gaming peripherals brand, Zowie, has just announced two new wireless gaming mice, the FK1-DW and the ZA12-DW, which are the brand's first gaming mice in several years to launch in larger sizes. The FK1-DW is a new large version of the FK-DW mouse shape, and the ZA12-DW is a medium version of the ZA-DW mouse. Both new mice are symmetrical shapes, but the FK1-DW has a lower hump and a shell designed specifically to allow more micro-adjustments, while the ZA12-DW has a higher hump placed slightly to the rear of the mouse. The ZA12-DW is meant to provide more palm support and reduce fatigue and discomfort. Availability is region-dependent at launch, with US availability starting in August on the official Zowie store and in September on Amazon. European gamers can start picking up the new Zowie mice by the end of July via Zowie directly or in September on Amazon, and Canadian buyers can look to Memory Express and Best Buy Canada in mid-September for retail availability.

Not much has been revealed about the internals of either the ZA12-DW or the FK1-DW, aside from a few key specs listed in the brief product description, which confirm both a 4K polling rate and the absence of any fancy magnetic switch tech, suggesting Zowie will likely continue using the typical Huano mechanical switches and likely either the PixArt PAW3950 or PAW3955 sensor. Both mice will also only be available in white with a matte coating at launch, and both the large FK1-DW and medium ZA12-DW will weigh in at 55 g. The FK1-DW measures 128.9 × 61.7 × 37.3 mm, while the ZA12-DW measures 125.8 × 41.4 × 61.7 mm. The new mice also come with the Enhanced Receiver, which doubles as a charging dock. The new shells also feature a revised design, with more angled side walls allowing for better grip for easier repositioning and lift-off.

Microsoft today rolled out Advanced Shader Delivery (ASD), a feature that allows game developers to ship pre-compiled shaders to end-users specific to graphics hardware, to minimize game loading times. Modern games perform runtime shader compilation on the end-user's machine, usually during the first startup of an installed game, or when graphics settings are significantly changed, to build or rebuild shaders specific to the installed hardware. This can sometimes take frustratingly long, as your machine is essentially compiling code for your GPU. Microsoft developed a framework to eliminate this on the XBOX PC app, but this requires participation of hardware vendors. AMD is onboard.

AMD announced that its recently released Adrenalin 26.6.1 WHQL drivers support Advanced Shader Delivery feature on the XBOX PC app. This allows game developers to stream pre-compiled shaders, reducing game loading times by up to 95%, or as if you're trying to launch the game after shader compilation. AMD says that the feature is rolling out to all RDNA architecture GPUs, which would mean Radeon RX 5000 series, RX 6000 series, RX 7000 series, and the current RX 9000 series; starting with 26.6.1 WHQL drivers, and the latest XBOX PC app from the Microsoft Store. "Forza Horizon 6" is the first game to support pre-compiled shader delivery.

Apacer has introduced GraTherX, an industrial-grade memory cooling technology aimed at addressing thermal challenges in high-speed DDR5 modules, particularly in fanless and space-constrained systems.

As demand for DDR5 continues to grow alongside AI applications, increasing thermal density and power consumption have raised concerns over system stability. According to the company, testing under high-load conditions shows that DDR5 modules equipped with GraTherX can achieve temperature reductions of up to 23.4°C, compared with the typical 3-5°C improvement seen in conventional cooling solutions. The design also improves heat dissipation across both sides of the module, helping maintain stable operation over extended periods.

We recently reported that Xbox seems to be having some troubles, with significant layoffs and a 100-day plan on the cards to bring the ship around. Some of Microsoft's issues include plummeting revenue, an affordability crisis, and low adoption rates. According to Xbox Gaming's Chief Stragety Officer, Matthew Ball, ad-supported tiers may be one potential tool to help improve things at Xbox. In an interview with The Game Business, Ball addresses the rising costs of gaming, saying that "the costs have gone up way too high on development, and at the same point, everyone feels terrible with prices going up on hardware or software or microtransactions. That is a challenge. It's not good if that is the only option." He goes on to compare it to streaming, noting that the vast majority of new streaming subscriptions in recent years have been on supported subscription tiers. The comparison to ad-supported streaming services suggests Ball is mostly talking about services like Xbox Game Pass, where there have been rumors of ad-supported tiers, or potentially even steeper subsidies for console hardware—an area Xbox is leaning into more and more since Asha Sharma took over as CEO in early 2026.

Despite his enthusiasm about the idea of ad-supported gaming experiences, Ball notes that he "has nothing to report on Microsoft's plans" regarding ad-supported gaming experiences. He is also careful to note that if such a strategy is adopted by Xbox, it would need to be in a way that doesn't interrupt gameplay. He went on to note that "The question is not 'Can we cram ads in everything?' The question is, 'Are there opportunities that allow the people who can't afford, or wouldn't try, to have an onboard to our properties and franchises?'" Following the interview, Ball posted on X to clarify what he meant in the interview, stating that "ads should be used to offer more affordable alternatives alongside today's ad-free experiences, in the hopes more could play as a result. Similar to how Netflix and Disney+ have ad-tiers with all the same content, but at half the price or so," and that "I personally believe interrupting gameplay experience would be bad." The apparent implication here is that any ads would be in places like loading screens, pause menus, and console home pages—parts of the Xbox experience that aren't in-game.

Thrustmaster is thrilled to unveil T.Flight Hotas 5 Microsoft Flight Simulator Edition for PS5, PS4 and PC. This full-featured, precise HOTAS joystick will offer gamers looking to immerse themselves in piloting an immersive flight experience and realistic sensations during their aerial adventures. Thrustmaster is expanding its product range resulting from its longstanding collaboration with Microsoft by launching its brand-new T.Flight Hotas 5 Microsoft Flight Simulator Edition, featuring the official Microsoft Flight Simulator logo in the iconic white, blue and black design and incorporating the buttons of a PS5 gamepad controller.

Designed to accompany gamers as they explore Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024, T.Flight Hotas 5 Microsoft Flight Simulator Edition lets them adjust the joystick's resistance - as well as the positions of the throttle and the control lever - for complete customization according to their preferences and comfort needs. Thanks to its Plug & Play system, T.Flight Hotas 5 Microsoft Flight Simulator Edition is instantly recognized on PS5, PS4 and PC (Windows 10/11), so you can go full throttle in Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 without further delay!

Motherboard vendors ASUS and MSI began releasing UEFI firmware updates to their AMD 600-series chipset motherboards that introduce support for AMD EXPO-ULL memory profiles. EXPO-ULL is an SPD extension that simplifies memory settings. While AMD Ryzen 7000 series and Ryzen 9000 series processors are relatively behind Intel in memory clock speeds, there is room for memory vendors to release memory kits with significantly tighter timings within their memory speed classes. An example of an EXPO-ULL profile would be DDR5-6000 with CL26, as opposed to the CL30-36 usually available for this speed.

ASUS began by releasing Beta BIOS 3803 version for its motherboards based on AMD X670E spanning the ROG Crosshair, ROG Strix, ProArt, and TUF Gaming product lines. These include EXPO-ULL support, and AGESA 1.3.0.1b. Meanwhile, MSI released a similar firmware update for its top MEG X670E GODLIIKE motherboard featuring EXPO-ULL support and AGESA 1.3.0.1b. More vendors are expected to catch on, as AMD hasn't restricted EXPO-ULL to any chipset generation.

Orico introduced the CNM2-U4-GY, an M.2 NVMe SSD enclosure featuring the 40 Gbps USB4 interface. The enclosure seats an M.2-2280 SSD with PCI-Express 4.0 x4 host interface, which it wires out as USB4. Its controller transparently exposes the drive as an NVMe device in USB4 mode, or as a USB mass-storage device with UASP support when connected to 20 Gbps USB 3.2 Gen 2x2 or older interfaces. The enclosure has mounting holes for 2280, 2260, 2243, and 2230 drive sizes, and supports capacities of up to 8 TB.

The enclosure features an aluminium alloy body with some amount of extrusion for heat dissipation, although the bulk of the cooling is in the hands of a 20 mm fan and its airflow. Under the hood, the enclosure uses an ASMedia ASM2464 controller, which is a single-chip solution for all interfaces and USB power management. The company includes a USB4 type-C cable which has a fixed type-C to type-A adapter, but when connected to type-A, the bandwidth drops to 10 Gbps. The enclosure is priced at around $70.

GIGABYTE, the world's leading computer brand, concluded COMPUTEX 2026 with multiple products recognized by international media and industry organizations. Presented under the 40th Anniversary theme ENTER INFINITY, the showcase highlighted advancements across AI, gaming, product design, and user experiences, earning numerous Best of COMPUTEX awards, Editor's Choice recognitions, and industry honors.⁠

Leading the showcase was the X870E AORUS INFINITY NEXT motherboard, which earned widespread recognition from international media for its combination of space-inspired engineering, advanced thermal technologies, and distinctive aesthetics. Featuring rocket-thruster-grade thermal materials, 3D metal-printing technologies, an AI Gyroid Structure that increases cooling surface area by up to 44%, and a 64-phase power design capable of delivering up to 5,120 amps, the motherboard was praised by Tom's Hardware as being "packed with never-before-used space-grade thermal engineering and a never-before-seen aesthetic." The launch also introduced the broader INFINITY Series, spanning motherboards, graphics cards, gaming peripherals, and chassis, extending the ENTER INFINITY vision across the entire PC build ecosystem.
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We covered a number of interesting and innovative peripherals in our recent Computex 2026 coverage, but a new Kickstarter, the Rotary Mouse by Airra, may take the cake for a subtle change that might make a world of difference to the right people. The Rotary Mouse is mostly just a regular wireless mouse—not even a particularly heavy one, at just 59 g—but it switches out the traditional scroll wheel for a horizontal dial that fulfills the same function. The Rotary Mouse is slated to be released on Kickstarter on June 17 with a 65% discount, bringing the price down to $49, from the original MSRP of $139.

The designer of the Rotary Mouse claims that it combines the high-speed scrolling of a free scroll wheel, as found on the likes of the Logitech MX Master series, with the accuracy of a traditional notched scroll wheel, since the Rotary Mouse still features detents in the rotary wheel. The Airra also says that the rotary scroll can help prevent finger joint RSIs that could be caused by the repetitive back and forth motion of a traditional scroll wheel. The product page of the Rotary Mouse demonstrates the rotary wheel's usefulness in a number of applications, from mundane office work involving long documents to timeline scrubbing and even a use case in racing games as steering input, although that will need to be manually programmed. The Rotary Mouse will feature both 2.4 GHz and Bluetooth for wireless connectivity, and it will have tactile left and right click buttons, although there do not seem to be any traditional backward and forward side buttons. The Kickstarter page also hints at a potential vertical version in the works, although there is no firm indication this is coming.

LG has launched the UltraGear 34GX90SB-W, a 34-inch curved OLED gaming monitor that can act as a standalone streaming device through the built-in webOS without the need for a PC or console. The OLED panel has a 3440 x 1440 resolution and features the Micro Lens Array Plus (MLA+). This MLA technology directs more light toward the viewer improving brightness efficiency up to 1300 cd/m² from (Typ.) 275 cd/m² / (Min.) 250 cd/m². The monitor has a refresh rate of 240 Hz with 0.03 ms GtG response time and support for AMD FreeSync Premium Pro, NVIDIA G-Sync Compatible, and VESA AdaptiveSync. It also sports VESA DisplayHDR True Black 400 certification and 98.5% of DCI-P3.

For connectivity, it features a USB-C port with 65 W power delivery, HDMI 2.1, DisplayPort 1.4, a LAN port, headphone jack and Wi-Fi 5. The built-in speakers are 5 W + 5 W stereo with AI Sound Pro processing via the alpha 8 AI Processor 4K Gen 3 handles real-time sound and picture optimization. The webOS integration and an internet connection allow the monitor to run streaming apps including Netflix and YouTube. Also, users can play games via Xbox Cloud Gaming, GeForce NOW and Amazon Luna via the LG Gaming Portal, all without a connected device. The LG UltraGear 34GX90SB-W is priced at $999.99.

StarTech.com will showcase its new 4-Port Thunderbolt 5 Hub with Thunderbolt Share (303NA-TB5-HUB) at InfoComm 2026, booth C5022. Designed for creative, development, and enterprise IT environments, the hub combines next-generation Thunderbolt 5 performance with integrated multi-system collaboration capabilities that help reduce desktop complexity and streamline workstation deployments.

The included Thunderbolt Share software allows two PCs to share a keyboard, mouse, and display through a single Thunderbolt connection without requiring a dedicated KVM switch. Users can also transfer files directly between systems, making the hub well suited for collaborative workspaces, and dual-system workflows.

Bloomberg's Jason Schreier has recently reported that "significant" layoffs are planned for Xbox Gaming after the end of June 2026, citing insider sources familiar with the situation. It's unclear what the exact scale and scope of the layoffs will be, but other indications suggest that the situation at Xbox is somewhat dire. In a recent blog post, Asha Sharma posted an email previously shared internally at Microsoft, detailing some of the company's struggles, specifically surrounding profitability and sustainability. The blog post also reveals that Sharma is planing a company-wide reset that she hopes will "revive Xbox." The Xbox Wire blog post published by Asha Sharma and Matt Booty on June 10 calls out the fact that, aside from Activision Blizzard King, despite spending nearly $20 billion in the last five years, annual revenue has declined by "nearly half a billion" during the same period.

The executives go on to mention the ongoing hardware crisis and how the decisions made by Xbox in the past have resulted in the company being hit harder by component price hikes and shortages than other hardware vendors. The blog post also touched on complexity and the fact that Xbox has over-extended itself as a result of executing on too many changing strategies instead of investing in "more readily available content," while not adequately funding its "industry-defining franchises," for success. Xbox is also doubling down on exclusives, with the post stating that "a reliable pipeline of first- and third-party exclusives and new IP are critical to our success." Going forward, it seems as though Xbox Gaming will focus on building its self-reliance in the hardware space, instead of relying on third-party vendors, making hardware more readily available and affordable for players to buy, and streamlining its operations, both in terms of development and studio acquisitions.

Intel earlier this week released the latest version of the Arc GPU Graphics drivers. Version 101.8826 WHQL comes with optimization for "Gothic 1 Remake," "F1 25: 2026 Season," and "Fortnite Chapter 7: Season 3." The drivers fix glaring issues with XeSS frame generation causing visual tearing during gameplay, with its Core Ultra Series 3 (Xe3 Celestial) iGPU, Arc B-series "Battlemage" discrete GPUs, Arc A-series "Alchemist" discrete GPUs, and the iGPUs of Core Ultra Series 1 "Meteor Lake," and Series 2 "Arrow Lake" processors.

DOWNLOAD: Intel Arc GPU Graphics Drivers 101.8826 WHQL

Here are some of the first pictures of the AWS Graviton5, the company's in-house server processor designed by Annapurna Labs, which it developed not just for running its own server infrastructure, but also its AI inferencing infrastructure. The package has four chiplets, each built on the TSMC 3 nm foundry node. It has a total CPU core count of 192, all of which are Arm V3 performance cores with 1 MB of dedicated cache. The package has a 12-channel DDR5 memory interface that supports speeds of up to DDR5-8800 for whole-package memory bandwidth of over 800 GB/s. It also features a 96-lane PCI-Express Gen 6 root complex.

Although a disaggregated chip, AWS designed the Graviton 5 to feature full cache coherency among its chiplets, enabled by its 420 GB/s die-to-die interconnect bandwidth. Each chiplet has a quarter of the package's resources—48 Arm V3 cores, 3-channel DDR5 IMC, and a 24-lane PCIe Gen 6 root complex. AWS is gunning for a 25% performance improvement over the company's AWS G4 instances that are powered by Intel Xeon Scalable "Cascade Lake" or AMD EPYC "Genoa" processors.

At Computex 2026 in Taipei, NVIDIA invited the press to a hands-on walkthrough of the RTX Spark platform, spread across multiple rooms covering gaming, creator, and AI workloads. Everything ran on Microsoft Surface Laptops, and Microsoft was also present—a clear signal that Redmond is fully committed to making Windows on Arm succeed this time around. Microsoft revealed that it has made several kernel-level optimizations to Windows 11 specifically for RTX Spark, changes that notably were never made for Qualcomm's Snapdragon platforms.

At the heart of RTX Spark is the NVIDIA N1X chip, which pairs a 20-core NVIDIA Grace Arm-based CPU with a Blackwell RTX GPU packing 6,144 CUDA cores and 5th Generation Tensor Cores with FP4 math precision, all connected via NVLink-C2C. The chip supports up to 128 GB of LPDDR5X unified memory in a 45-80 W power envelope (H-segment), and NVIDIA claims up to 1 petaFLOP/s of AI compute. A lower-end N1 variant with 5,120 CUDA cores is also planned. RTX Spark is not strictly a laptop platform either—NVIDIA also showed compact desktop mini PCs and the DGX Spark, targeting creators and developers who want the same silicon in a stationary form factor. And, looking at that power envelope, I wouldn't be surprised if N1X (or a variant) eventually ends up in a handheld gaming console—it just makes a lot of sense. A chip like this could also compete with semi-custom AMD chips for the next Xbox or PlayStation.

Montage Technology today announced the sampling of its Gen 6 DDR5 Registering Clock Driver chip (RCD06) with key customers. Designed for next-generation DDR5 Registered Dual In-line Memory Modules (RDIMMs), the chip is set to accelerate performance and reliability for upcoming server platforms.

The RCD06 supports data transfer rates of up to 9200 MT/s, a 15% increase over the previous generation, addressing the stringent high-bandwidth demands of next-generation server platforms. The chip features a dual-channel independent architecture in which both sub-channels share clock logic while operating independently, enabling separate parity checking without cross-channel interference. The device also integrates Continuous Time Linear Equalization (CTLE) and a low-jitter Phase-Locked Loop (PLL), improving signal integrity while ensuring precise and stable clock distribution.

Gigabyte, the world's leading computer brand, showcased the AORUS GeForce RTX 50 Series AI BOX powered by NVIDIA Blackwell architecture, delivering desktop-class performance for ultrabook laptops at COMPUTEX 2026. Designed to bring game-changing capabilities, the lineup includes the flagship AORUS GeForce RTX 5090 AI BOX and the compact AORUS GeForce RTX 5060 Ti AI BOX, catering to gamers, creators, and AI explorers. Complementing the hardware, the AI BOX GPU Selector software further enhances flexibility by simplifying workload distribution for optimized performance.

The flagship AORUS GeForce RTX 5090 AI BOX delivers over 3,000 AI TOPS of FP4 computing power with 32 GB VRAM, supporting large language models, generative AI, inference, and demanding creative workloads. Meanwhile, the compact AORUS GeForce RTX 5060 Ti AI BOX offers an accessible solution for ultrabooks with a lightweight design. It enables 1080p to 2K gaming, smooth local image generation, 3D rendering, and everyday AI tasks with 16 GB VRAM.

It's no secret that Ubisoft has had a rough time of things of late, with the gaming giant announcing sweeping changes to its structure in early 2026, followed by layoffs a few short months ago. Now, it seems as though Ubisoft is conducting even more layoffs, with the layoffs this time resulting in several studio closures as well. According to Insider Gaming, insider sources at Ubisoft have confirmed that as many as 380 workers have been laid off.

The studios most affected were Ubisoft Winnipeg, where 65 employees were laid off, and the studio was closed, and Ubisoft Belgrade, which suffered the same fate after around 100 employees were laid off. 51 employees lost their jobs at Ubisoft Barcelona, and an undisclosed number of staff were laid off at Ubisoft San Francisco. Meanwhile, 120 employees were "ramped off," or removed, from Rainbow Six Siege at Ubisoft Montreal, with Ubisoft explaining in a statement that "it is normal practice to adjust team size and resource allocation based on evolving priorities and operational needs." Ubisoft announced the layoffs internally via a memo, which was leaked to the press ahead of schedule and before some of the staff had even learned of the redundancies. The original statement follows.

Following up the recent updated HE75 V2 keyboard, Epomaker has officially unveiled the HE65 V2 TMR gaming keyboard in a recent livestream on YouTube. The HE65 V2 TMR, as the name suggests, updates the Hall effect gaming keyboard to TMR (tunnel magnetoresistance) tech, which has the benefit of having improved efficiency over Hall effect, while still delivering the low latency, adjustable actuation distance, and analogue features that HE keyboards deliver. The HE65 V2 is a 65% keyboard, which sacrifices the function row, navigation cluster, and num pad in favor of a smaller footprint, however, the HE65 V2 still has a dedicated arrow cluster, a three-key navigation column, and a programmable knob on the right side of the alphanumeric keys.

There is no official product page or pricing for the Epomaker HE65 V2, but Epomaker's livestream shows off some of the design and features of the upcoming budget TMR keyboard. For starters, the HE65 V2 TMR will be available in both black—or dark smoky gray—and white—or clear, more accurately. Both versions of the keyboard will feature similar Cherry profile keycaps, although the white version's keycaps are completely clear, with UV printed lettering, while the black keyboard's keycaps are significantly more opaque while still letting light through from the south-facing per-key RGB backlighting. The HE65 V2 TMR will have a plastic top and bottom case, which allows Epomaker to include two-stage flip-out feet and integrated dongle storage for the 2.4 GHz dongle right next to the keyboard's power switch. It will also have both Bluetooth and USB-C wired connectivity, in addition to the aforementioned 2.4 GHz connection, and that wireless connectivity will be supported by a built-in 4,000 mAh battery.The livestream video follows.

Most people using AI tools in 2026 have quietly ended up in the same situation: one app for writing, another for research, a third for images, and ChatGPT still open in a pinned tab just in case. It works, but it's a lot of friction for something that's supposed to save time. A ChatOn AI Assistant Premium 1-year subscription is on sale for $29.99 right now (regularly $39.99) through June 14.

The 1-year plan is worth considering specifically because it's not a lifetime commitment. You get a full year to find out whether consolidating your AI tools into one app actually works for how you use them—without locking in for longer than you need to.

Get the ChatOn AI Assistant Premium 1-year subscription for $29.99 right now (regularly $39.99) through June 14 at 11:59 p.m. PT.

If your Microsoft 365 subscription has been quietly renewing every month without much thought, this is a good time to rethink that. A lifetime license to Microsoft Office Professional 2021 for Windows is currently available for just $32.97 (regularly $219.99). Pay once, install it, and never see another Office charge on your statement again.

This isn't a lite version or a limited trial. It's the complete professional desktop suite that businesses and individuals have relied on for years—Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, OneNote, Publisher, Access, and the free version of Teams. It installs directly on your PC, works completely offline, and doesn't require a Microsoft account to keep running. No cloud dependency, no login prompts, just the software doing its job.

Get a lifetime license to Microsoft Office Professional 2021 for Windows for $32.97 (regularly $219.99). Prices subject to change.