Tsinghua Unigroup last week communicated its interest to acquire Micron Technology to the company, but did not present a formal offer. Moreover, according to sources close to the producer of DRAM and flash, the U.S. authorities would block the deal because Micron is strategically important for the country. China-based Tsinghua …
Read More »Intel Core i7-6700K ‘Skylake’ overclocked to 5.20GHz with air cooling
Intel Corp.’s upcoming Core i7-6700K “Skylake” processor will hit the market only in August, but samples of the chips have already been shipped to select Intel’s partners, who test them in their labs. According to a new report from a Chinese web-site, the new chips are pretty good overclockers: one …
Read More »TSMC’s 7nm tech will use 10nm elements, production starts in 2018
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. this week disclosed some additional details about its 7nm fabrication process. TSMC reiterated plans to start qualifications of the technology in early 2017 and then initiate volume production in 2018. The 7nm process will use certain elements derived from the 10nm fabrication process, which will help …
Read More »AMD begins development of its third major semi-custom design
Advanced Micro Devices recently started to design its third semi-custom accelerated processing unit for an undisclosed customer. Some believe that this third semi-custom system-on-chip will eventually power Nintendo’s next-generation game console code-named “NX”. However, AMD claims that the new SoC “expands the base” of its semi-custom business beyond gaming, which …
Read More »TSMC: 10nm is on-track for volume production start in Q4 2016
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. this week denied any delays of risk or mass production of chips using its 10nm process technology. The company intends to start volume production of semiconductors at 10nm node late next year, which means that its clients will receive their first 10nm chips in the first quarter …
Read More »AMD vows to keep R&D investments at appropriate levels
Despite of tough times, Advanced Micro Devices plans to sustain its research and development investments on certain levels in a bid to ensure that its products are competitive in the future. Research and development are two corner stones of high-tech companies. Without fundamental research of things that may not seem important today …
Read More »EVGA offers £20/€25 cashback on its GeForce GTX 960 graphics cards
For a limited time only EVGA offers a special discount in the form of cashback on its Nvidia GeForce GTX graphics cards. The promotion is open to residents of the U.K., European Union, EEA countries as well as Switzerland. Customers, who buy any EVGA GeForce GTX 960 graphics card from …
Read More »Asus Radeon R9 Fury Strix DC3 OC
Today we take a look at the second Fury card to hit our labs, the Asus Radeon R9 Fury Strix. This card ships with the latest Asus DirectCU III cooler and a very modest overclock, activated directly via ASUS GPU Tweak 2 software. I was impressed with the Sapphire Tri-X …
Read More »TSMC begins shipments of chips made using 16nm FinFET process tech
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. announced on Thursday that it had started volume production of chips using its 16nm FinFET manufacturing technology in the second quarter of 2015. The world’s largest contract maker of semiconductors is delivering the first batch of products made at 16nm node to its customers right now, …
Read More »Caselabs publishes retraction over Thermaltake case theft claims
One of the most scandalous claims in recent years hit the tech industry in early June this year, when CaseLabs, maker of some quite innovative chassis designs accused industry giant Thermaltake of ripping off its cases, as well as the designs of other manufacturers like Fractal and NZXT. While this …
Read More »be quiet! offers Silent Base 800 case in new competition
If you are in the market for a new case, be quiet! may have the solution for you and you won't even have to pay for it! On the company's Facebook page, it's currently giving away one of its new Silent Base 800 Window chassis. It offers customised airflow control, …
Read More »AMD: We have taped out our first FinFET products
Advanced Micro Devices said on Thursday that it had taped out its first products, which will be made using a FinFET process technology. While AMD does not reveal which products it had taped out, it is highly-likely that one of them is a highly-anticipated microprocessor based on “Zen” micro-architecture. “We …
Read More »Shipments of Intel Core i7 processors set records in Q2 – company
Despite of lowering sales of personal computers and slow demand for consumer electronics in general, Intel Corp. claims that shipments of its high-end Core i7 microprocessors were record-high in the second quarter of 2015. Although Intel Corp. posted mixed results for the second quarter of the year and made a rather …
Read More »Asustek and Gigabyte remain world’s top mainboard makers as market shrinks
Asustek Computer and Gigabyte Technology remained the top mainboard makers in the first half of this year, according to a media report. Each company shipped about eight million motherboards globally, which was below their initial plans. In fact, the market of mainboards shrunk pretty significantly in 1H 2015. Gigabyte managed …
Read More »Intel wants to use EUV lithography for 7nm process technology
Intel Corp. has implied a number of times that it did not need to use extreme ultraviolet lithography for its 7nm manufacturing process. However, after facing problems with multi-patterning methods at 14nm and 10nm fabrication technologies, it seems that the company has changed its mind. This week Intel said that …
Read More »Intel confirms delay of 10nm chips to 2017, blames difficulties
Intel Corp. on Wednesday confirmed the delay of mass production of central processing units using 10nm fabrication process to 2017. The company said that it ran into difficulties with its 10nm technology and decided to stretch the life-cycle of 14nm process with one more family of CPU products code-named “Kaby …
Read More »EVGA shows off its GTX 980 Ti K|NGP|N Edition as launch looms
Vince “K|NGP|N” Lucido, a legendary overclocker that works with EVGA, has published the first official images of the upcoming EVGA GeForce GTX 980 Ti K|NGP|N Edition graphics card. The new board looks somewhat similar to previous-generation K|NGP|N Edition products, but it still features a number of differences that promise to …
Read More »GlobalFoundries: We are producing 14nm chips for our customers, yields on-track
GlobalFoundries on Wednesday confirmed that it is had initiated high-volume production of chips for its customers using 14nm FinFET (14LPE) process technology. The company claims that yields of its 14nm semiconductors are comparable to yields at Samsung Foundry, the company that developed the 14LPE. “Our 14nm ramp is right on …
Read More »K|NGP|N: Overvoltaging alone does not help ‘Maxwell’ to overclock
Nvidia Corp.’s latest graphics processing units based on “Maxwell” architecture are rather good overclockers, but only to a certain degree. According to Vince “K|NGP|N” Lucido, a professional overclocker, without extreme methods of cooling (such as use of liquid nitrogen, chiller or other), most “Maxwell” GPUs just do not work at …
Read More »TSMC cuts prices of 20nm and 28nm chips by 10%
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. reduced prices of chip production using its 20nm and 28nm fabrication processes earlier this quarter, according to a media report. Customers of TSMC lowered orders for 20nm and 28nm chips and the company wants to increase utilization of its capacities by slashing prices. Potentially, the price-cuts …
Read More »Palit GeForce GTX 980Ti Super Jetstream Review
Today we take a look at the latest high end solution from Palit, the new GTX980 Ti Super JetStream. This card ships with a custom cooler, out of the box clock enhancements, and the price point has dropped to £539.99 inc vat. How does it compare to leading GTX980 Ti …
Read More »Plextor officially introduces low-cost TLC NAND-based SSDs
Plextor, a leading maker of solid-state drives primarily known for high-end SSDs, this week officially introduced its M6V family of products that target customers in budget. The new M6V lineup features triple-level-cell (TLC) NAND flash memory and an inexpensive controller. Nonetheless, Plextor claims that the drives boast with the company’s …
Read More »be quiet! Silent Base 800 (window) Review
KitGuru had a sneak preview of the be quiet! Silent Base 800 Window at Computex and now we have got our hands on the finished case (we're still waiting to see the Silent Base 600, however). The quick take is that the Silent Base 800 is unchanged, the windowed panel …
Read More »Acquisition of Micron by Tsinghua could lead to DRAM oversupply
Financial analysts believe that the rumoured takeover of Micron Technology by China-based Tsinghua Unigroup could lead to a major change of Micron’s policies in regards of expansion of production capacities. If Tsinghua acquires Micron and starts to build new fabs to gain market share, this could result in oversupply of …
Read More »Chinese group could acquire Micron to boost local memory industry
Tsinghua Unigroup, a China-based investment company that controls Spreadtrum Communications and RDA Microelectronics, reportedly wants to acquire Micron Technology, the world’s third largest maker of DRAM and the No. 4 maker of NAND flash. China may need Micron in a bid to boost its homegrown memory industry and secure supply …
Read More »Asmedia and Intel cut prices of USB 3.1 chips, speed up adoption
Asmedia and Intel Corp. have started to reduce prices of their USB 3.1 controllers in a bid to gain market share. Intel Corp.’s “Alpine Ridge” chip offers Thunderbolt 3 in addition to USB 3.1, but Asmedia’s controller is significantly cheaper to make and can be sold a very low price. …
Read More »AMD reportedly has priority supply agreement regarding HBM, HBM2
The first-generation high-bandwidth memory provides extreme performance, but is clearly not perfect for high-end graphics cards due to capacity limitations. A good news is that second-gen high-bandwidth memory is on the way and is due in 2016. Advanced Micro Devices may get it faster and in higher volumes than its …
Read More »CableMod ModFlex Cables
For some while now CableMod has been happy to provide a kit of cables for your modular power supply. They cover specific models of BeQuiet!, Corsair, EVGA and SeaSonic at a cost about £70 with the idea is that you bin your dull black cables for a braided set in …
Read More »Western Digital quietly rolls-out new WD Blue SSHDs with 8GB NAND cache
Western Digital has quietly started to sell its new WD Blue solid-state hybrid drives with ‘self-learning’ NAND flash cache. The drives are designed to offer solid-state drive-like performance in select applications, but are not expected to be too expensive since they belong to WD’s mainstream family of products. Initially Western …
Read More »Seagate cuts HDD sales forecast amid weak demand for PCs
Seagate Technology, the world’s second largest maker of hard disk drives, on Monday slashed its forecast of hard disk drives sales in the fourth quarter of its fiscal year 2015. Seagate expects shipments of its HDDs to hit a five-year low, a bad news for the whole high-tech industry. Seagate …
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