Latest News - Page 386

Windows 11's most recent (optional) update has been causing serious problems with Call of Duty: Black Ops 6, according to some reports - though Microsoft has also fixed a separate issue with this patch.

Let's start with that nasty Black Ops 6 bug, with the game seemingly being scuppered by KB5052093, which is the preview update for February 2025 for Windows 11 24H2.

Windows Latest picked up on this and points out that reports of this happening seem to be scattered, with just a reader complaining and a couple of gamers on Reddit.

If you want to easy find out if your new NVIDIA GeForce RTX 50 series GPU is missing any ROPs, CPU-Z Validator will now test your system and warn you if you've got missing ROPs.

CPU-Z can already provide basic information on your graphics card, but it doesn't have the same feature set as GPU-Z, which is dedicated to GPUs. CPU-Z covers multiple components: CPU, RAM, motherboard, and GPU specs but in a new update to the Validator, it will warn users if they've got an affected RTX 50 series GPU with missing ROPs that reduce performance (and need to be sent away to be replaced to the AIB manufacturer, more on that in the stories below).

CPU-Z Validator will warn users "This GPU is supposed to have X ROPs" which would point to your RTX 5090, RTX 5080, or RTX 5070 Ti with missing ROPs.

TSMC is expected to begin mass production of its next-gen A16 process node in Taiwan by the second half of 2026, and then "connect Taiwan and the United States" by introducing A16 process production at its third factory in Arizona, USA by 2028.

In a new report from UDN, we're learning that TSMC's first wafer fab in Arizona has begun mass production, with TSMC's Q1 2025 board meeting specially held in the Arizona plant to allow board members to receive first-hand knowledge that mass production was achieved at its new plant in the US.

UDN reports that the market believes that TSMC is showing its attention to the US market, and goodwill to the US government and the new Trump administration. TSMC's next-gen A16 process node is the first angstrom (smaller than nano) process node used by TSMC, with the company's nano process technology named the N series (N3, N4, N5, etc).

File this one under 'o' for ominous, but there's been yet more chatter that NVIDIA's RTX 5070 GPU is going to be a bit of a no-show stock-wise on its launch day - this time from a big Swedish retailer.

As a quick refresher, the RTX 5070 is the next GPU due to emerge from the Blackwell stable (and the only remaining officially announced graphics card). It's set to go on sale March 5, in just two days, although the GPU was delayed from an original release timeframe of February (a date wasn't specified by NVIDIA, just the month).

Rumors have indicated for some time that RTX 5070 stock could end up very thin on the ground - and that slight delay would seem to back up this idea - but now VideoCardz spotted a message from said major retailer in Sweden stating that essentially it hasn't got any of these GPUs at all yet.

NetEase is ready to support Marvel Rivals for the long run as the company simultaneously shutters studios and cancels other projects.

Gaming's new live service darling Marvel Rivals is doing incredibly well right now with over 40 million players to date. The game isn't without controversy though: despite the F2P shooter's mega success, NetEase laid off the Western team that worked on Marvel Rivals as part of its new restructuring plan (this same plan also saw NetEase cutting back investments in fledgling game studios and projects).

Now we have comments from NetEase on Marvel Rivals' performance and what's to come. The game has done so well that the billion-dollar Chinese games giant is ready to support Marvel Rivals for a full decade. Crossover events and promos are also coming, but we're not sure exactly what this means--will Rivals become the next Fortnite, or will the crossovers be in-universe?

Rockstar Games has added a 13th group to its worldwide support studio ahead of Grand Theft Auto 6's expected Fall 2025 release.

Today, Rockstar Games announced that it has acquired Video Games Deluxe, a long-time collaborator that has assisted development on a number of projects. The Pyrmont, Sydney-based studio will now become Rockstar Australia, and the 13th company in a regional webwork that spans everywhere from India to Toronto.

Rockstar Australia could end up being a smaller team, at least at the start: LinkedIn estimates that Video Game Deluxe has 2-10 employees. The studio had previously worked alongside Rockstar on games like the LA Noire VR release and even helped optimize the new GTA trilogy for mobiles and consoles--the latter of which received some hefty visual tweaks and improvements.

AI servers have been used in a fraud case that Singapore announced last week, with NVIDIA AI GPUs that were supplied by US companies like Dell, with banned AI chips from entering China according to a government minister on Monday.

Singapore has charged three men with a fraud case involving smuggling NVIDIA AI GPUs from the city-state to Chinese AI firm DeepSeek. Channel News Asia reports that the cases were linked to the alleged movement of NVIDIA chips from Singapore to be used by DeepSeek, "without identifying its source" reports Reuters.

Singapore's Home Affairs and Law Minister K Shanmugam told reporters on Monday that AI servers involved in the case were supplied by Dell Technologies and Super Micro Computer, before they were sent to Malaysia. He said: "whether Malaysia was the final destination... we do not know for a certain at this point" adding that authorities were investigating the case independently after an anonymous tip-off.

EK has just unveiled its first waterblock for NVIDIA's new in-house GeForce RTX 5090 Founders Edition, with the introduction of the new Quantum Vector³ FE RTX™ 5090 waterblock.

The new EK Quantum Vector³ FE RTX™ 5090 waterblock has been designed to specifically handle the three-part PCB design of the RTX 5090 Founders Edition: GPU/VRM/Power, PCIe interface, and display connectors. It's also compatible with EK's Matrix7 RGB system, with the backplate serving as a structural element for the RTX 5090 PCB parts, where you can connect daughterboards and it also serves as a passive c ooler.

We don't have any thermal performance results from EK just yet, but we do know that it will retail for 329 euros, which works out to around $342 USD or so. If you are splashing down the cash for NVIDIA's new GeForce RTX 5090 Founders Edition and wanted what should be one of the best water blocks made for the RTX 5090 FE specifically, then you are already clicking the 'buy now' button.

Intel has officially delayed the construction of its new Ohio One semiconductor manufacturing site, delaying the launch of its new fab into the next decade.

The company originally planned its Ohio semiconductor fab for 2025, but moved it to 2027-2028 not too long ago, and now that has been pushed back again until at least 2030. The first phase of the Ohio site (Mod 1) will now be completed in 2030, with production starting between 2030 and 2031, while Mod 2 is expected in 2031, with operations in 2032.

Intel's $28 billion Ohio chipmaking factories are located in New Albany, with the semiconductor fab plan changes made so that Intel can align its factory operations with market demand and "manage capital responsibility" said Naga Chandrasekaran, general manager of Intel Foundry Manufacturing in an email to staffers that was shared in a press release.

Apple will be announcing its new M4 MacBook Air laptops, powered by its new in-house M4 processor... any day this week according to the latest reports, as well as the new M4 iPad Air.

In his latest PowerOn newsletter, Bloomberg writer Mark Gurman reports that Apple plans to launch the new M4 MacBook Air models as soon as this week, with the new M4 iPad Air and iPad 11 "probably won't come in the next few days". We should expect the new M4 MacBook Air announcement on its own, like the iPhone 16e had.

Apple is beginning to wind down inventory of its current-gen iPad Air at its retail stores, a trend Gurman writes is similar to the now-discontinued iPhone SE and existing MacBook Air. This is paving the way for the soon-to-be-announced M4 iPad Air and M4 MacBook Air.

Former Intel CEO Craig Garrett has written a new opinion piece on Fortune, where he wraps up the article by saying "fire the Intel board and rehire Pat Gelsinger".

Garrett has an informative piece on Fortunte, writing a fantastic explanation into the situation with Intel from the former CEOs perspective. Garrett says that the only solution for Intel's problems is to break the company into two pieces: a design company and a wafer fabrication (foundry) company, and he also agrees that Intel shouldn't sell its foundry division (IFS) to TSMC, but "strongly disagree with their argument that Intel should be broken up".

He whips: "The board members are well meaning but off target. They are two academics and two former government bureaucrats, just the type of folks you want dictating strategy in the ruggedly competitive semiconductor industry".

AMD's next-generation "Medusa Point" APUs based on the new Zen 6 architecture were rumored to feature an RDNA 4, RDNA 5, or unified UDNA GPU, but fresh rumors suggest that's not happening and that an updated RDNA 3.X GPU will be used in the new monster APU.

The next-generation Zen 6-based Medusa Point APU is reportedly not using the just-launched RDNA 4 architecture, or the upcoming RDNA 5 or UDNA chips, but rather an upgraded RDNA 3.X GPU according to leaker Golden Pig Upgrade on Weibo. There have been rumors of RDNA 5 or UDNA on Medusa Point and Zen 6, but the new APUs will continue using the proven RDNA 3.X GPU.

AMD has used its new RDNA 3.5 GPUs inside of its recent Zen 5-based Strix Point and just-launched Strix Halo APUs, with 16 GPU cores inside of Strix Point and a whopping 40 GPU cores inside of Strix Halo. AMD could beef up the GPU cores again for Medusa Point, without the advancements and features from RDNA 4/5 or UDNA, given its an APU and not meant for high-end ray-traced gaming.

Activision is making a new Guitar Hero game...for mobile.

It looks like a new Guitar Hero game is in the works, but it's not the one that we were all hoping for. Instead, it's Guitar Hero Mobile. Things get even tougher for Activision when the accidental leak came from its own Instagram account, and the advertisement uses AI (as a reminder, Activision is a multi-billion dollar video games publisher that made $7.5 billion in 2022).

"Play your way - Guitar Hero goes mobile," the ad reads. Activision had published the post 2 days ago and it's riddled with comments about the AI usage.

Amazon has announced Alexa+, its new generative AI-powered Alexa voice assistant that has beaten Apple to the punch.

Amazon's new Alexa+ is conversational, proactive, capable of reason and inference, and can learn from context and your life. It is a big leap into the true AI assistant world, where Alexa+ can plan a date, book a restaurant, text your loved ones, create a travel itinerary and add it to everyone's calendar, read your study guide, and give you a test on the answers, remember your favorite foods and movies, as well as finding your smart devices and take action. Phew.

It's not just boasting a host of new AI abilities, but Alexa+ will now be better than everything it used to do, no longer having to use precise phrasing or constantly having to say "Alexa". In the place of Skills, Amazon now has Experts, which is Alexa's various large language models (LLMs) that smartly tap into deliver on your requests however you phrase them -- this includes ordering food, turning on lights, through to things like who has been at your door, and what to cook for dinner.

Tesla has reportedly tapped TSMC to make its new FSD chips for China, using the company's 4nm-5nm process nodes according to the latest reports, just as the company has expanded its Full Self-Driving capabilities to its vehicles in China.

In a new report from UDN, we're learning that as Tesla's huge Full Self-Driving (FSD) rollout in mainland in China is happening right now to great success, industry sources suggest TSMC has secured orders for Tesla's new FSD chips built on the company's 4nm-5nm process node.

Samsung is still providing production and memory support for older Tesla FSD chips, so not all of the chips are in TSMC's basket: pun not intended, but I couldn't not write that. Tesla's Dojo AI supercomputer trains its FSD system, running on chips made by TSMC on its 5nm process with advanced InFo-SoW packaging to provide customized high-speed computing needs.

Steam has set a new multi-million user milestone, ending its first quarter with 40 million+ concurrent users.

PC gaming is on the rise and Valve's digital storefront continues breaking new records. Earlier today around 8:30AM EST, Steam broke 40 million concurrent users for the first time in history. The exact count is 40.26 million by Valve's official Steam Charts, and 40.27 million by SteamDB.

It's worth noting that the vast majority of these users weren't actually playing games. Out of the estimated 40.27 million accounts that were logged into and using Steam at once, only 12.8 million of them, or about 31%, were playing a video game at the time. It's hard to say what the others were doing but they could be buying games and/or content. Nonetheless, these are incredible numbers and Valve also set a new all-time concurrent in-game player peak as well.

PowerColor has officially unveiled its new custom Radeon RX 9070 XT and Radeon RX 9070 graphics cards in its RDNA 4-powered Red Devil, Hellhound, and Reaper series cards.

The new Red Devil Radeon RX 9070 XT and RX 9070 graphics cards are the flagship RDNA 4 cards from the company, with factory overclocking for maximum performance. PowerColor's new Red Devil series has high-end VRMs, Honeywell PTM7950 thermal pads, and a premium cooling solution with an optimal heat pipe arrangement across its 12-layer PCB.

PowerColor is using a multi-facted design called Hellstone on its new Red Devil RX 9070 series GPUs, with the new RDNA 4-powered cards feature Keystone: PowerColor's new software control hub. Better yet, PowerColor has a Limited Red Devil Edition for both the RX 9070 XT and RX 9070 graphics cards that includes the Red Devil Metal Keycap.

Broadcom has reportedly seen its huge ByteDance project canceled, after the parent company of TikTok tasked the US company to design a new AI accelerator.

In a new post by insider @Jukanlosreve, we're hearing that as US semiconductor restrictions tighten on China, HBM-based chip designs are being categorized as AI-related and subject to tighter controls. Over the last few months, there has been a sustained decline in CoWoS advanced packaging orders from Chinese companies.

The post continues, explaining that Chinese customers including T-Head has "significantly reduced" its CoWoS orders, "which we believe will eventually drop to zero, Sanechip shipments are halted after completing its production in 1Q25, and Broadcom's ByteDance project has also been suspended".

Apple's much-anticipated AI-powered update for Siri was originally slated for release within iOS 19, but it has been delayed according to reports, further highlighting Apple's failure in AI so far.

In his new report on Bloomberg, insider Mark Gurman writes in his PowerOn newsletter that Apple's plans to release an "LLM Siri" that could keep up in world with ChatGPT, Grok, and Alexa+ have been delayed. Right now, Siri inside of iOS 18 essentially has two brains: one that operates the regular Siri commands like timers and making calls, while another handles advanced quieries.

But, in order for Apple Intelligence to be baked into iOS 18, Apple rushed and didn't spend the time melding the two systems together, meaning it doesn't work anywhere near as good, and rivals haven't just caught up, but leap-frogged Apple when it comes to integrating AI into their systems.

Two games have been cancelled at WB Montreal since the disappointing release of Gotham Knights, sources tell Bloomberg's Jason Schreier.

After booking $384 million in impairment charges from two costly failures, WB Games has been restructured. Executive leadership has departed, studios like Middle-earth Shadow of Mordor developer Monolith Productions have been closed down, and top brass has ordered a strict greenlight process that focuses on just a handful of IPs and franchises.

With all the talk about studio closures, gamers want to know: What's happening with WB Montreal? The studio did make Batman: Arkham Origins, which has received high praise. According to Bloomberg's Jason Schreier, WB Montreal has mostly become a support studio rather than a group leading its own projects, but the team has apparently pitched a Game of Thrones project.