Latest News - Page 18

Titan Army has showcased a new 27-inch gaming monitor, the M27E6V-3D, which it advertises as a glasses-free 3D monitor. It unveiled the display at the 2026 Nuclear Fusion Game Carnival in Shenzhen this weekend. The 27-inch monitor is built around a BOE ADS Pro panel with 4K resolution, a 190Hz refresh rate, and a peak brightness of 2,000 nits in XDR mode.

The M27E6V-3D uses a third-generation liquid-crystal resin prism optical design and a binocular eye-tracking module mounted below the screen. The module uses two cameras and two infrared fill lights to track the viewer's eyes with what Titan Army claims is a millisecond-level response time. Paired with a binocular 3D imaging algorithm, the monitor keeps image crosstalk below 2%, reducing the ghosting and visual discomfort that have historically made 3D displays a bad investment.

For gaming compatibility, Titan Army has partnered with Tencent WeGame to optimize several titles for native 3D output. An AI depth estimation algorithm also handles real-time 2D-to-3D conversion for games and media that lack native support, though the quality of that conversion will naturally vary by title and scene.

AMD introduced EXPO Ultra Low Latency at Computex 2026 as an updated memory profile standard, promising tighter timings and around 4% better gaming performance over standard EXPO. AMD also suggested pricing would stay close to existing EXPO kits. But the first retail listings from G.Skill show that unlocking those gains will cost you.

G.Skill's Trident Z5 NeoX RGB series has appeared on Newegg in 32GB DDR5-6000 configurations with EXPO ULL support. The premium over the standard Trident Z5 Neo kits ranges from 10% to as high as 79%, depending on the timing tier.

The C26 NeoX kit is listed at $1,099.99, compared to $699.99 for the standard C26, translating to about a 57% premium. The C28 NeoX is $999.99, compared to $559.99 for the standard version, which amounts to a 79% premium for a kit with two fewer CAS cycles. The gap narrows considerably at looser timings, with the C30 NeoX at $619.99 running 14% above the standard C30, and the C36 NeoX at $549.99 sitting just 10% higher. In other words, the price jumps are steepest where the latency gains are most aggressive.

Digital Foundry has weighed in again on GTA 6's console performance, and the outlook for 60 FPS isn't improving. Analyst William Judd argues that the level of detail Rockstar has shown so far, particularly the simulation-heavy elements such as traffic, NPC density, and physics, would be extremely difficult to scale down for a smooth 60 FPS experience on current hardware.

The PS5 Pro doesn't change much here. Judd notes the console barely improves on CPU performance over the base PS5, with most of its upgrade coming from a stronger GPU, better ray tracing, and PSSR upscaling support. None of that helps with the kind of CPU load GTA 6 is expected to demand. So even on Sony's most powerful console, a 30 FPS or 40 FPS mode looks far more realistic than a true 60 FPS option.

This lines up with what TweakTown has reported since 2024, when Digital Foundry's Richard Leadbetter made a nearly identical CPU-bottleneck argument. A former Rockstar animator also said something similar last year, expecting Rockstar to lock the game at 30 FPS and worry about higher frame rates after launch, much like it did with GTA 5 and Red Dead Redemption 2.

Microsoft may close up to five Xbox studios as part of next month's brutal layoffs, sources tell The Verge's Tom Warren.

Following years of underperformance, and a disastrous annual 3% profit margin, Microsoft is making extreme cuts to try to save its business. Gamers and fans just didn't know how bad things were at Xbox, but the new guard is exposing hard truths: Xbox has to change or die. High levels of cost cutting are expected, and reports say that Xbox may shut down, spin off, or sell five game studio groups in a mass layoff starting July 6--Compulsion Games, Undead Labs, Double Fine, Ninja Theory, and Arkane could be affected.

Sources tell The Verge's Tom Warren that these five game developers are being targeted in Microsoft's aggressive cost-cutting. There's been rumblings that the cuts will be a "bloodbath" for Xbox, and management has commented with a memo issued on June 10 that strongly indicates layoffs are part of Xbox's new process.

Thanks to the AI boom, Valve has opted to ship the Steam Machine with a single 16GB DDR5 SO-DIMM to offset supply issues in the current memory market. Sadly, this configuration also causes performance regressions due to the Steam Machine's memory sub-system not running in a dual-channel configuration. Gamers Nexus on YouTube benchmarked the performance difference between the Steam Machine's out-of-the-box single-channel setup and its dual-channel configuration by filling both slots. They found performance improvements of up to 20% from the extra bandwidth afforded by the extra RAM stick.

Gamers Nexus tested the Steam Machine with the two aforementioned memory configurations in a variety of benchmarks, including some non-gaming-related tests. 7-Zip file compression showed the strengths of the dual-channel DDR5 configuration the most, with a 19% performance improvement with two sticks compared to a single stick. This behavior was reversed, however, with file decompression, where the two configurations were essentially tied.

In Baldur's Gate 3, the dual-stick configuration was 15% faster, achieving 69.4 FPS vs 60.2 FPS. In Resident Evil 4, the dual-stick configuration was 10% faster, achieving 129.9 FPS vs 118.1 FPS. In Black Myth: Wukong, Stellaris, and Final Fantasy XIV, performance was essentially tied between the two memory configurations. In The Outer Worlds 2, the dual-stick configuration was 14% faster, and in Starfield, the two-stick configuration was 3% faster.

NVIDIA's rumored RTX 5050 9GB might not happen at all. According to leaker MEGAsizeGPU, the card is "canceled, or permanently delayed," and board partners say they haven't gotten any fresh info on it either. The same source claims NVIDIA reissued the GeForce RTX 3060 12GB for that exact segment, which makes a new 5050 variant pretty redundant for now.

This isn't the first time MEGAsizeGPU has called this one correctly. Back in April, the leaker said NVIDIA was pausing the RTX 5050's bump from 8GB to 9GB because the RTX 3060 12GB was coming back in June. That part already checked out, the RTX 3060 12GB has started showing up at retail, spotted in China around $325 to $347, and in parts of Europe for more than its original $329 launch price.

The rumored 9GB 5050 always looked like an awkward card anyway. It would have swapped GDDR6 for GDDR7 but cut the memory bus from 128-bit to 96-bit, so bandwidth barely moved (336GB/s versus 320GB/s) for just 1GB of extra VRAM. Bringing back a 5-year-old Ampere chip on Samsung's 8nm node looks like the easier move for NVIDIA, especially with GDDR7 supply and TSMC's 4nm capacity tied up by RTX 40 and 50 series production during the ongoing memory crunch.

Sony clearly tells consumers that it won't take major losses with its next-gen PlayStation 6, potentially preparing users for sticker shock.

New reports suggest the PS6's bill of materials, or BOM, is now close to $1,000, fueling speculation of a high-priced Gen 10 console from Sony.

While nothing has been officially confirmed regarding pricing, Sony management has put out a new Q&A with PlayStation boss Hideaki Nishino that briefly discusses what gamers can expect from the future. In short, Sony has no plans to heavily subsidize the PlayStation 6, meaning Sony doesn't want to produce its next-gen console at a major loss.

The console rumor mill is abuzz with the idea that Nintendo could be using a new panel for the Switch 2, leaving some gamers hopeful that maybe it might address the complaints around ghosting issues with the handheld.

As it stands, the Nintendo Switch 2 reportedly has an Innolux panel, but as VideoCardz highlighted, based on a post by Nintendo Patents Watch‬ on Bluesky, there could be a different one, made by Sharp, being used now.

Or at least the model number indicates it's manufactured by Sharp, with a Chinese reseller showing the LCD on its site. As Nintendo Patents Watch pointed out, the "exposed circuit, connector, and cables are significantly different" compared to the Innolux panel. That suggests this isn't a small revision, but a fully updated design that could pack some meaningful changes.

WhatsApp is implementing a major change in rolling out new usernames for accounts, allowing for better levels of privacy as a result - and you'll be able to reserve yours soon enough.

The move means that instead of having to give out your mobile phone number when adding somebody to your contacts, you'll be able to provide a username to them instead. That's obviously a preferable situation when it comes to privacy.

TechRadar reports that Meta has announced that usernames will be rolling out to over three billion WhatsApp users during the "coming months", and that you'll be able to reserve your preferred name.

It seems like every day we find a new Amazon customer complaining about their order being mixed up or their components not being what was advertised. After we broke the news of a user receiving a Core i9-10900K in a 9800X3D box in our TweakTown exclusive, many affected customers reached out to us.

One particular email we received was especially shocking: a buyer had ordered a Samsung 990 PRO SSD but instead received a 970 EVO with stickers to make it look like a 990 PRO. He had ordered the SSD on June 19th and received it early the next morning. At first sight, nothing seemed out of the ordinary.

The box itself was of a 990 PRO, sealed normally, and the SSD would have passed a visual inspection, but our contact noticed something was off about the sticker application. It seemed sloppy, and peeling off from the right end, not what you would expect from a Samsung product. He thought nothing of it and installed it in his PC to format it. Then the first red flag became apparent: the drive's capacity was only 1TB.

Samsung Electronics, SK Hynix, and Micron Technology are being sued in federal court for alleged collusion and price-fixing in the memory market. The lawsuit was filed in the Northern District of California, alleging that these three companies have deliberately engineered DRAM scarcity in the consumer and commercial markets to inflate prices.

If you've been following recent news about Apple, Xbox, and other companies increasing the cost of their consumer-facing technology products due to the rapid, exponential rise in memory (and flash storage) prices, you might be nodding in agreement. The current situation, born of the memory crisis, is that consumer technology pricing will continue to rise with no real end in sight. Lenovo is calling it the "new normal" and that this trend is set to continue through 2030.

As the three big players in the memory space, Samsung Electronics, SK Hynix, and Micron Technology have all transitioned their manufacturing and production capacities to producing High-Bandwidth Memory (HBM), specifically for the booming AI and data center markets. And with that, the lawsuit claims that production of legacy technologies like DDR3 and DDR4 has been wound down to pursue higher profits. And with demand for commodity DRAM still there, prices have increased by around 700% over four years. The lawsuit even references the name many have given the situation: the "RAMpocalypse."

As home to two of the world's largest memory makers, Samsung and SK Hynix, the South Korean economy is definitely benefiting from the current memory crisis, which has seen prices and profits hit unforeseen levels. Long story short, in the AI era of LLMs, agents, inference, and cloud-based computing, the demand for high-bandwidth memory (HBM) chips has reached a point where supply would take years to catch up.

And with that, South Korean President Lee Jae Myung has announced a $520 billion USD public and private investment to expand the chipmaking capabilities of Samsung and SK Hynix so the country can remain a leader in the AI race and the memory market. And the announcement was made in a televised address with Samsung Electronics Chairman Lee Jae-yong and SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won.

According to the announcement, the majority of the $520 billion will be put toward the construction of four new fabs, two for Samsung and two for SK Hynix. The two plants will reportedly be built outside Seoul, in a mostly rural area. They will focus on producing lucrative HBM for the AI and data center markets rather than memory for the consumer technology market.

When Valve finally lifted the lid on its long-rumored Steam Machine late last year, hardware skin and accessory maker Dbrand began teasing a Steam Machine Companion Cube skin modeled and inspired by the Aperture Science Weighted Companion Cube found in Valve's Portal and Portal 2, with the iconic heart design that doubles as a nod to the not-so-nice AI GLaDOS that messes with players. So yeah, getting a Steam Machine 'Companion Cube' skin feels like a match made in heaven, or Test Chamber 17.

According to Dbrand, over 15,000 people registered their interest in picking up the Steam Machine 'Companion Cube' late last year. And although the recent Steam Machine launch meant that the skin would finally go on sale, it turns out Dbrand forgot to ask Valve for permission to create something based on one of its most recognized properties.

It wasn't too long ago that we began to hear rumblings that NVIDIA was planning to re-release the Ampere-era GeForce RTX 3060 as a response to the current component and memory crisis. The idea is that it would be a more cost-effective mainstream solution due to its use of 12GB of GDDR6 memory compared to the more advanced GDDR7 memory found on the GeForce RTX 50 Series lineup, including the GeForce RTX 5060.

According to a new report from the German outlet hardwareLUXX, the GeForce RTX 3060's return with GDDR6 memory has arrived, with a brand-new ASUS Dual GeForce RTX 3060 OC V2 popping up in various retail outlets. The report notes that the lowest price of 333.64 EUR (about $380 USD) is notably higher than the RTX 3060's historic price of 245 EUR.

Although the big selling point compared to 8GB cards like the GeForce RTX 5050, RTX 5060, and RTX 5060 Ti 8GB is the increased VRAM capacity, the value proposition compared to the more affordable GeForce RTX 5060 is questionable based on the improved DLSS 4.5 support that includes Dynamic Frame Generation not being available. Even when it comes to raw 1080p and even 1440p gaming performance in titles that aren't VRAM capacity constrained, the GeForce RTX 5060 is still decidedly faster.

Just over a week ago, AMD Software: Adrenalin Edition 26.6.2 Driver was released for Radeon GPUs, and it was something of a surprise drop as it introduced FSR 4.1 Upscaling support to RDNA 3 graphics cards earlier than expected. For many Radeon RX 7000 Series owners, including those with the previous-gen Radeon RX 7900 XTX flagship, it was akin to getting a free double-digit performance upgrade.

However, not long after the driver was released, users began reporting errors when trying to get the new Adrenalin software to fire up on Windows 10. AMD, to its credit, responded in a timely fashion, advising users to roll back as it worked on a solution. And it arrived a few days later as the AMD Software: Adrenalin Edition 26.6.3 Hotfix Preview Driver, a non-WHQL release to resolve the problem and get RDNA 3 gamers on board with the FSR 4.1 hype train.

Cut to this week, and we've now got the AMD Software: Adrenalin Edition 26.6.4 Driver, an official WHQL release for Radeon RX 7000 Series owners that resolved the Windows 10 issue alongside fixing crashes in "some games" when enabling FSR 4.1 Upscaling.

MetaPCs is launching a new prebuilt gaming PC with SteamOS installed, making it one of, if not the first, pre-built manufacturers to ship a product with the same operating system powering the Steam Deck and Steam Machine. Dubbed the "Steamroller", the SteamOS-powered pre-built starts at $1,299 and comes in a Micro-ATX form factor.

The Steamroller is geared towards Steam Machine buyers as an alternative solution featuring fully upgradable parts. The system features standard PC components including a Ryzen 5 9600X, RX 7600, 16GB of DDR5-5600 memory, B650M/B850M motherboard with onboard WiFi, 240mm AIO liquid cooler, 1TB NVMe SSD and 650W PSU. MetaPCs is also providing the system with an optional warranty costing $180 for two years or $240 for three years.

Pricing of MetaPC's Steam Machine competitor is in the same price range as the Steam Machine (the 2TB variant costs $1,349 at the time of writing), but comes with noticeably faster hardware. The Ryzen 9600X in the Steamroller features six standard Zen 4 cores with a clock speed of up to 5.4 GHz and a 65W TDP. By contrast, the Steam Machine's Zen 4 CPU comes with a mixture of Zen 4 and Zen 4C cores, a turbo boost frequency of up to 4.8GHz and a 30W TDP. GPU performance is more similar between the two systems; regardless, the RX 7600 in the Steamroller is beefier than the Steam Deck's GPU with more compute units, higher clock speed, and much higher TDP. The RX 7600 features 32 CUs, a 2.65 GHz boost clock, and a 165W TDP. The custom GPU in the Steam Machine features 28 CUs, 2.45GHz sustained clock speed, and 110W TDP.

Sony management explains what's next for PlayStation, says that profit is now the #1 main goal for the brand as the company navigates the new normal of high-cost hardware production.

The ongoing RAMpocalypse is forcing console-makers to re-think their business strategies. PlayStation, the market-leader by revenue, now says that it will focus more on immediate profits than grand long-term goals. This is an interesting thing to say when PlayStation just reported its best-ever yearly operating profit in history with over $3.10 billion profit made on $31 billion gross sales--a triumphant return to double-digit USD-converted profits with a 10% margin.

In a recent Q&A with investors, Sony Interactive Entertainment president and CEO Hideaki Nishino highlights PlayStation's current business priorities. The group is shifting its focus away from raw monthly active user (MAU) growth and more towards making more profit on a per-user basis--this metric is called LTV, or lifetime value, and represents how much money a PS5 owner spends over a period. Sony says that the typical PS5 customer's LTV was $846 as of March 2025, and the company seeks to increase it.

AMD is actively working on a trimmed-down version of FSR 4 for RDNA 3/3.5 iGPUs, but there is no confirmation of when it will be arriving. In the meantime, a YouTuber has discovered a method of injecting FSR 4 at the driver level that works with RDNA 3/3.5 iGPUs. Channel AncientGameplays published a video showing how to do this using a third-party tool known as RadeonTuner.

RadeonTuner is designed to serve as a lightweight alternative to AMD's Adrenalin software. The application is functionally very similar to Adrenalin, with support for GPU overclocking and fan tuning. The application also allows users to change driver-related graphics settings and display settings. The main feature AncientGameplays was most interested in is the app's built-in overrides for FSR upscaling, frame generation and ray regeneration.

In testing with Spider-Man 2, the YouTuber discovered that RadeonTuner uses the same FSR override method as AMD's Adrenalin software to inject newer iterations of FSR into games. With the FSR override disabled, Spider-Man 2 showed upscaling support for FSR 3.1.5, but turning on the override changed the FSR version in-game to FSR 4.1.1. Spider-Man 2 also showed an asterisk next to the FSR 4.1.1 name, confirming the FSR version was being injected from the GPU driver. The YouTuber also tested several games using this FSR override method using a Strix Halo APU with an RDNA 3.5 iGPU and found it worked almost flawlessly (some issues with shadows and reflections reportedly occur at aggressive upscaling settings).

The shift from physical media to digital libraries and streaming has been a major one for the entertainment industry, whether you're talking about games, movies, or music. Thanks to the convenience of digital media, the era of physical media is ending, or at the very least, becoming a niche market for collectors. However, it's worth remembering that a digital purchase and accessing a digital library are very different things from a shelf full of discs. It's license-based, and it can disappear at any moment.

Case in point: Sony has just informed PlayStation users in Europe that, from September 1, 2026, all previously purchased Studio Canal movies and series will be removed and no longer accessible. It's a long list of titles, including classics like Terminator 2: Judgment Day, Highlander, From Dusk Till Dawn, Apocalypse Now, and more.

Basically, Sony's content licensing agreement with Studio Canal is ending, and users who purchased these movies or shows will no longer be able to access them. Sony's communication doesn't mention refunds or any form of compensation either.

Last week, Apple raised prices across its entire hardware line. It was a decision born of the steep increase in component costs, specifically memory and storage, made because the situation had become "untenable" and it was no longer possible to shield its customers from rising manufacturing and procurement costs. The MacBook Pro saw one of the steepest price increases, by $300, specifically because of its advanced processor, memory, and storage configuration.

The situation has reached the point where Apple is reportedly lobbying the US government and the Trump administration to allow it to buy memory chips from the Chinese company CXMT without ramifications. As for why it's lobbying the government, well, CXMT is currently on a list of companies that US-based tech giants like Apple shouldn't engage with due to alleged ties to the Chinese military.

Apparently, this Pentagon list doesn't have any legal ramifications: companies aren't explicitly banned or in legal trouble for procuring memory from a company like CXMT. However, CXMT is apparently also on another US Commerce Department list for a trade blacklist, which would certainly prohibit any such agreement with Apple for memory.