NVIDIA GeForce GTX Titan Z price drops considerably at Overclockers UK

Anthony Garreffa | Video Cards & GPUs | Oct 19, 2014 7:35 PM CDT

When NVIDIA announced the GeForce GTX Titan Z back at GTC 2014 in March, it was an expensive beast at $3999, but now Overclockers UK has dropped the price on some of its Titan Z's, radically.

Just last week, the site dropped it from its launch price of $3863, to $3219, which is a decent drop. But, the company has just taken a massive $900 off its price, dropping it down to 'just' $2415. For $2415, you're getting a triple-slot, dual GPU card with 12GB of RAM, two full GK110 GPUs with 2880 stream processors, 240 texture units, an 48 raster operations pipelines.

You'd still be better off with two GeForce GTX 980s in SLI, but for some people a single card is what they want, and no single card can compete with the Titan Z right now.

Continue reading: NVIDIA GeForce GTX Titan Z price drops considerably at Overclockers UK (full post)

ASUS prepares massive motherboard marketing campaign

Anthony Garreffa | Motherboards | Oct 19, 2014 6:19 PM CDT

The competition between GIGABYTE and ASUS is as fierce as ever, but ASUS is set to lower the prices of its motherboards, and spend considerable amounts of money on furthering its marketing reach according to DigiTimes' industry sources.

ASUS has reportedly planned multiple promotions, where it will sell bundles with its GPUs and motherboards, hoping to gain thousands more consumers with its impressive line up of GPUs. DigiTimes' sources noted "GIGABYTE's motherboard and video card businesses are separate units and the two departments hardly cooperate over sales and marketing. Although GIGABYTE's motherboard business has been performing strongly recently, Asustek's new strategy is expected to impact GIGABYTE's motherboard business group".

Just how much is ASUS planning to spend on marketing? According to DigiTimes' sources, the Taiwanese manufacturer has already prepared between $32 million and $65 million to boost its marketing. The company is expecting to see its profits for 2014 drop because of this, but the marketing should gain more sales going into 2015. The sources continued "GIGABYTE had profits of NT$3-3.3 billion from the motherboard business in 2013. Although the company's shipments in 2014 are unlikely to achieve the targeted growth of one million units, profits in the year are expected to stay at around NT$3 billion because of the rising proportion of high-end models".

Continue reading: ASUS prepares massive motherboard marketing campaign (full post)

Apple's new 5K-capable iMac gets the iFixit teardown treatment

Anthony Garreffa | Computer Systems | Oct 19, 2014 2:06 AM CDT

Apple unveiled its new 27-inch iMac during the week, which featured a beautiful 5K display with a resolution 5120x2880, and now iFixit have given it the usual teardown treatment. So what better way to spend your day after you've spent thousands of dollars buying the new Retina 5K iMac, than to rip it apart, right?

iFixit's teardown reveals that Apple's new iMac features an easily accessible RAM upgrade panel, and when it came to the 5K panel, the iFixit crew found that it requires a steady hand to remove it, but it's not all that hard. The 27-inch 5K panel itself is made by LG, with most of the hardware powering it coming from Texas Instruments. Going deeper into the new iMac, the iFixit team found that the layout of supporting hardware was close to identical to that found in last year's model.

The new 27-inch 5K iMac received a repairability score of 5/10 from iFixit, with the team saying that the user-replaceable RAM, HDD and CPU were all good to see,but the HDD and CPU upgrades the removal of the entire display. iFixit did add that the glass and LCD being fused together, along with the fact that there is double-sided sticky tape there that needs to be replaced to remove and replace the display, received negative marks from iFixit.

Continue reading: Apple's new 5K-capable iMac gets the iFixit teardown treatment (full post)

The FCC begins the journey of 5G mobile Internet in the US

Anthony Garreffa | Connectivity & Cloud | Oct 18, 2014 8:35 PM CDT

The FCC is laying the ground work for 5G mobile Internet in the United States, with the council voting unoanmously to start looking at accessing the higher-than 2.4GHz frequency spectrum than was previously thought to be unusable by mobile networks.

This would pave the way for Gigabit Internet connections, similar to what South Korea is doing with its incredible 10Gbps Internet access. The FCC believes that using "millimeter waves" would have higher bandwidth made possible, for more people and devices with speeds that blow most other in-home broadband connections provide now.

The problem is, it only works over short distances - for now at least - and requires line-of-sight for their point-to-point microwave connections. This is what the FCC hopes to fix, with this unanimous vote meaning research can nnow begin to see this technology arrive in the hands of US broadband users. Current estimates have it pegged at being available by 2020, so let's hope they're right.

Continue reading: The FCC begins the journey of 5G mobile Internet in the US (full post)

The next Halo game launches on Nov 11, requires 20GB day-one patch

Anthony Garreffa | Gaming | Oct 18, 2014 6:23 PM CDT

Microsoft is positioning itself to launch the new Halo: Master Chief Collection on November 11 for its Xbox One console, and even though the game arrives on a Blu-ray jam-packed with 45GB of content, you'll still need a massive 20GB day-one download to get it working.

What comes in that wave of 20GB? Microsoft says "features and multiplayer content" for the game. The company explains: "From the start, our philosophy has been to give Halo fans the best possible experience and not compromise the quality or features of the collection. The result is that Halo: The Master Chief Collection will take up almost all of the usable space of a single Blu-ray (45 GB), and we will also issue a content update at launch that is estimated to be 20 GB".

Microsoft continued: "You'll be able to start playing Campaign and more as the content is installing, with some features and multiplayer content being added via the update. Yes, the update is large, but we weren't about to cut corners to save disc space. This ensures that you are getting every bit of Halo goodness we can fit in. Our work is not done, however, as we continue to tune, tweak and optimize the online experience to ensure a smooth multiplayer launch. This will continue right up until launch day".

Continue reading: The next Halo game launches on Nov 11, requires 20GB day-one patch (full post)

TSMC delays the mass production of 16nm FinFET chips by up to 6 months

Anthony Garreffa | Business, Financial & Legal | Oct 18, 2014 5:18 PM CDT

TSMC was meant to be ramping up its 16nm FinFET production any time before the end of the month, but the manufacturing company has provided an update for this, saying it is happy with the yield, but is pushing back mass production of 16nm to early 2015.

The company said this would happen in early 2015, but finished by saying it could even fall into Q3 2015. Once TSMC has reached mass production of its 16nm FinFET process, it will provide added performance and power savings when compared to current technologies. TSMC has said that it is happy with the first yields of 16nm FinFET, but will not start mass producing it until around the second half of next year. The company said: "On the yield learning side, the progress [of 16nm] is much better than our original plan".

TSMC continued "This is because the 16nm uses similar [BEOL] process to 20SOC, except for the transistor. Because of the excellent progress in yield learning and readiness in manufacturing maturity and also to meet customers' demand, we plan to pull in 16-nanometer volume production through the end of Q2 next year or early Q3 year 2015". The full reason behind the delay isn't known right now, but the demand of 20nm is growing quick with the launch of the new iPhone, with Apple tapping TSMC for the production of its A8 and A8X chips.

Continue reading: TSMC delays the mass production of 16nm FinFET chips by up to 6 months (full post)

Project Cars delayed to March 17, 2015, Steam OS version in late 2015

Anthony Garreffa | Gaming | Oct 18, 2014 9:31 AM CDT

Countless people were counting the days before Project Cars was released, which was meant to be before the end of the year, but the developer has delayed the game to March 17, 2015 in the US. Europeans will receive the game three days later on March 20, 2015.

The delay applies to the PC, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One versions of the game, pushing it from its original release date of November 18, 2014. Slighty Mad Studios, the developer behind the game, and its publisher Bandai Namco said the reason behind the day was to shift it away from the crowded fall 2014 release window, providing them with more time to pump into development. Slightly Mad Studios' boss, Ian Bell, explained "Whilst a tough decision to make, the change in release date allows the game the greatest chance of success and visibility, and the opportunity to polish the game even further to the high standards that both ourselves and our community demand and expect".

Considering we have some big titles like Far Cry 4, Assassin's Creed: Unity and many more coming out in the next couple of months, along with games that have already been released like Alien: Isolation, Destiny, and more, this decision could be very beneficial to the game. That doesn't stop me from being disappointed to hear about yet another game being delayed, which feels like it's happened quite often in the last 1-2 years.

Continue reading: Project Cars delayed to March 17, 2015, Steam OS version in late 2015 (full post)

South Korea planning new 10Gbps Internet: 1GB in less than 1 second

Anthony Garreffa | Connectivity & Cloud | Oct 18, 2014 9:09 AM CDT

South Korea is set to get the world jealous with an impressive new 10Gbps fiber Internet service, with SK Broadband to introduce the new super-fast Internet connection at the Plenipotentiary Conference of the International Telecommunications Union to be held at Busan's BEXCO Center, in partnership with the Ministry of Science, ICT and Future Planning and the National Information Society Agency on October 20.

Considering all of the advancements that broadband technology is experiencing in Asian countries like Japan and South Korea, citizens of both of these countries are product that they are far out and ahead of the United States. Natsuki Kumagai said: "In the 1960s the world watched NASA send men to the moon and many of us grew up amazed at the constant advancements of the Americans. Now the Americans watch us". Pyon Seo-Ju added: "In my travels to the United States, it is very plain they have lost their way in advancing broadband technology".

Seo-Ju continued: "Internet access is terribly slow and expensive because American politicians have sacrificed Americas's technology leadership to protect conglomerates and allow them to flourish. Although unfortunate for America, this has given Korea a chance to promote our own industry and enhance the success of companies like Samsung that are well-known in the United States today".

Continue reading: South Korea planning new 10Gbps Internet: 1GB in less than 1 second (full post)

Anonabox, the $45 privacy router misleads people, Kickstarter steps in

Anthony Garreffa | Hacking, Security & Privacy | Oct 18, 2014 8:15 AM CDT

Just days ago, August Germar showed off his Anonabox privacy router on Kickstarter, quickly flying past his pledge goal of $7500. Germar was promising a router that would give users near ultimate privacy, routing your Internet access through the Tor network. Germar raised $585,549 before Kickstarter suspended his Kickstarter, citing Germar "broke Kickstarter rules".

The Anonabox ball of thread began to unravel when some of its backers began to ask questions about Anonabox's custom hardware, as well as the promised security of its software. It snowballed to the point of many asking for the project to be cancelled, and asked others to report the misleading information to Kickstarter staff. Kickstarter emailed the project investors, telling backers that "a review of the project uncovered evidence that it broke Kickstarter's rules". These rules include the company to prohibit "offering purchased items and claiming to have made them yourself, presenting someone else's work as your own" and "misrepresenting or failing to disclose relevant facts about the project or its creator".

It all started on Tuesday night, with users seeing issues with the router's hardware, with its designer claiming was custom-designed. The backers found that all of the parts could be acquired from Chinese suppliers on sites such as Alibaba. Germar even confirmed with WIRED that the Anonabox prototype he had was built from "off-the-shelf case and a nearly stock board tweaked to add more flash memory storage, both sourced from the Chinese manufacturer Gainstrong", according to Wired.

Continue reading: Anonabox, the $45 privacy router misleads people, Kickstarter steps in (full post)

AMD isn't price cutting its GPUs, its partners are running promotions

Anthony Garreffa | Video Cards & GPUs | Oct 18, 2014 2:18 AM CDT

Back when we reported that AMD was dropping the price of its Radeon R9 290 and R9 290X GPUs in reaction to NVIDIA's new Maxwell-based GeForce GTX 970 and GTX 980 GPUs, we thought it was AMD which was dropping the prices of its high-end Radeons, but it's actually their partners who are doing the price reductions.

In the meantime, AMD has a new CEO in Lisa Su, with the company laying off some 710 employees after a tough quarter, some big changes and news for the company. During AMD's recent earnings call, the fresh CEO said that NVIDIA has released some very competitive products with their second generation Maxwell GPUs, and that the company needed to adjust to "some competitive dynamics", or repositioning other products. Su said: "We have certainly adjusted to some of the competitive dynamics, and we have made some positioning changes as well as some new marketing activities that you will see from us in the fourth quarter".

During an interview between AMD's Chief Gaming Scientist Richard Huddy and KitGuru, Huddy had the following to say about the Radeon price cuts: "We have not issued any price cuts, nor price protection and we have not announced any for the future. We are conducting some promotions with our AIB partners that enables them to reach such competitive pricing on the Radeon R9 290 and 290X". How long will the cheaper Radeons last? According to Huddy: "The best news is that we have very healthy stock levels for both the Radeon R9 290 and 290X in the channel and the time to buy is now, with channel promotions bringing such great deals. We've got phenomenal products in the market and there's plenty of it around".

Continue reading: AMD isn't price cutting its GPUs, its partners are running promotions (full post)

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