Gaming

In an interview with News18, OnePlus CEO Pete Lau confirmed that the OnePlus 9R, an "affordable" gaming smartphone, will launch in India alongside the OnePlus 9 and OnePlus 9 Pro. Lau stated that the 9R will be similar to the OnePlus Nord in terms of pricing but will aim to bring a flagship-level experience, particularly with regards to gaming, without breaking the bank.

Xiaomi's Black Shark premium gaming brand has announced that its new, Snapdragon 888-powered flagship is to launch on March 23, 2021 in China. The 4 is slated to have improved, "360-degree, 3D" cooling, triple rear cameras and the shoulder buttons from its 3 Pro forebear. The 2 phones are also likely to have very different designs.

The ASUS ROG Phone 5 may be one of the most powerful smartphones on the market, but it is also one of the weakest. Unfortunately for ASUS, its latest gaming smartphone does not hold up to the rigours of a JerryRigEverything durability test.

Sony has unveiled its new PS5 VR controllers that feature a completely new design and some exciting features such as finger detection, adaptive triggers, haptic feedback, and more. Its price and availability will be revealed later.

AMD plans to release its answer to Nvidia DLSS across all major gaming platforms, yet launch details are still sketchy. FidelityFX Super Resolution could be launched this year on PC at least, but AMD admits it is still pondering on which technique would best suit all gaming platforms.

Cherry has successfully shrunk its mechanical keys for ultrathin laptops to make it theoretically possible for models like the MSI GS66, Aorus 15, or Asus Zephyrus to come with integrated Cherry keyboard options. The first laptops to sport the new Cherry keys will the Alienware m15 and m17.

Linux kernel code has revealed some details about AMD’s Van Gogh Ryzen 5000 ULV mobile APU series. Apparently, the processors will offer support for 256-bit DDR5 memory, which is a step up from Renoir APUs. Unsurprisingly, the appearance of an AMD APU with greater potential graphics processing has led to renewed Microsoft handheld/Xbox portable console rumors.

The MSI Optix MAG272CQP is a 27-inch curved gaming monitor with a native WQHD resolution and 165 Hz refresh rate. The VA panel has 1 ms (MPRT) response times, a 1500R curvature and supports AMD FreeSync Premium. The Optix MAG272CQP has a USB hub too that includes a Type-C port with support for DisplayPort Alternate.

Thanks to the new UE4 DLSS plugin created in collaboration with Epic, game developers can now add DLSS support to their games in less than a day. The performance boost offered through the DLSS implementation can especially be seen in games with ray tracing enabled where the fps counts can be increased by 2.5X.

The Geekbench OpenCL tests reveal a few new specs for both the GPU and the CPU, but the actual results appear to be too low to reflect the performance of the final product. Intel is probably testing the stability of the chips, as the drivers are not optimized enough for now.

The second Doom Eternal DLC, The Ancient Gods Part 2, will be available for download starting March 18 on PC, PlayStation, Xbox and Google Stadia. Much like its predecessor, it will add new gameplay elements such as monsters and weapons. Doom Eternal: The Ancient Gods Part 2 also concludes the Doom Slayer's storyline introduced in Doom 2016.

It turns out that disabling the ETH hash rate limiter on the GeForce RTX 3060 is as simple as installing a GeForce development driver that NVIDIA published on its website. NVIDIA has admitted that the driver removes the limiter, contrary to claims that a secure handshake existed between multiple elements. Unfortunately for NVIDIA, the driver remains freely available to download.

Another Samsung laptop has appeared on Geekbench with a potent combination of Ampere-based GPU and Tiger Lake CPU. The possible Samsung Notebook 7 Force device featured an Nvidia GeForce RTX 3050 Ti part and Intel Core i7-11800H chip, with the system producing an OpenCL result that sits very close to the GeForce GTX 1660 Ti.

A YouTuber has discovered how to significantly reduce temperatures on the GeForce RTX 3090 Founders Edition. Replacing the stock thermal pads can drop VRAM temperatures by upwards of 25 °C, allowing the card to be pushed harder before it thermal throttles.

We've already expressed our disappointment on the mobile GeForce RTX 30 series when compared to its desktop counterparts, but how does it fare against last year's mobile GeForce RTX 20 series? The data looks promising for mobile Ampere at least for the moment.

Dell is ridding last year's budget model for a fairly low price considering the balanced specifications. Some users may not like the visual design of the system, but the easy serviceability and Thunderbolt support are admirable nonetheless.

Today (March 16, 2021), MSI has confirmed that its esports-focused lines of desktops have been refreshed with Tiger Lake CPUs. Accordingly, the next-gen Aegis, Codex R, Infinite RS and Trident rigs will have 11th-gen platforms, with the PCIe Gen 4 support that entails in most cases, as well as RTX 3000-series cards, including the 3050.

RedMagic has confirmed that its latest 6 and 6 Pro Android gaming flagship phones are to be released globally, bringing their new 165Hz AMOLED displays and Snapdragon 888 processors with them. However, it seems that the 6 Pro may not pack the ultra-fast 120W charging system it had when launched in China.

A new DigiTimes report suggests that the RTX 3000 shortages could persist towards the end of the year, despite Nvidia's efforts to limit the crypto miners and introduce GPUs specifically designed for miners. Samsung's 8 nm nodes are still not able to present high enough yields and the rumored jump to TSMC's 7 nm nodes might not even happen this year.

OnePlus will replace the 8T as its newest flagship soon. However, the OEM has news for those who would prefer to stick with the phone: it is now part of the Open Beta project at the company. This channel of new Android updates might unlock access to new features before they hit the "normal" stable versions.

Multiple sources have confirmed that they have managed to bypass the Nvidia GeForce RX 3060's Etherium mining rate limiter. Installing the GeForce 470.05 development driver seems to do the trick, but one party insists that a custom VBIOS is necessary, too.

Dying Light 2 developer Techland recent promised to deliver an update on the troubled game's progress on March 17th. This could shed light into the status of the game, what it looks like now, and when it'll actually ship.

New rumors indicate that the RTX 3080 Ti may finally launch sometime in mid-April. The exact specifications of the RTX 3080 Ti are still elusive, but rumor is that the card would feature 12 GB GDDR6X VRAM and 10,240 CUDA cores at a US$999 price point.

A bunch of Vietnamese cryptocurrency miners quite literally have taken PC hardware to new depths by submerging eight Nvidia GeForce RTX 3090 graphics cards in mineral oil. While their operating parameters are not visible, empirical data tells us that mineral oil can cool PC components with the same efficiency as air or water. Some components also last longer due to the constant, uniform cooling offered by the medium.

Microsoft snapping up Sega is the rumor that will never go away, but it now seems that Konami could also be in the sights of the parent company of the Xbox Game Studios. Microsoft could do with a boost in Japan as recent sales figures reported 10 Xbox One consoles sold compared to 78,134 Nintendo Switch units.

The engineering card appears to be equipped with CPU-grade heatsink + cooler and it is connected to an Alder Lake motherboard through a PCIe riser. Koduri does not really mention that this is the DG2 card, but the test system is running 3DMark with the Port Royal ray tracing test in the test suite, and we know only DG2 GPUs among Intel's upcoming discrete models support ray tracing.

The AMD Radeon RX 6700 XT graphics card has been baring some serious fangs on the Ashes of the Singularity benchmark. In a case of Navi 22 XT vs. Navi 10 XT, the upcoming board scored up to +35% higher than the RX 5700 XT. The RX 6700 XT even managed to beat the Navi 10-based unit in a 4K vs. 1080p face-off.

The last weekend of Lenovo's Annual Sale in the US has arrived. It still has some decent deals, however, which include dropping the price of the Intel Core i7-10750H-powered Legion 7i to US$1,199. Alternatively, the Legion Tower 7i gaming desktop and IdeaPad Gaming 3i are also available at discounts.

Crytek has announced that DLSS can be switched on in Crysis Remastered with the game's latest update. Therefore, its performance while running on NVIDIA GeForce graphics cards with RTX may be boosted considerably. Then again, the new potential advantage is also affected by some initial bugs.

The latest Linux-based laptops from Tuxedo offer quite a wide array of options when it comes to displays and GPUs. The i7-10870H CPU might not be the best solution when the AMD Ryzen 5000H are already available, but users can choose among RTX 3060 / 3070 / 3080 Max-Q GPU options plus 144 Hz / 300 Hz FHD IPS displays and even 4K OLED or IPS screens with 60 Hz refresh rates.

The AMD Radeon RX 6700 XT graphics card has pitted against its main competitors, the Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060 Ti and RTX 3070. The AMD mid-ranger manages to best the RTX 3070 in only a handful of titles while managing to consistently remain ahead of the RTX 3060 Ti. However, the 6700 XT's raytracing performance leaves a lot to be desired, though.

Specifications of the Intel 11th gen Core i7 and Core i9 Rocket Lake-S processors have leaked indicating a total of five SKUs each. The variants under each processor include K, KF, F, non-K, and T. A gaming comparison between the Core i9-11900K and the Core i9-10900K has also leaked indicating between 8% to 14% higher scores for the former depending on the title.

The ROG Phone 5 has now descended on the Android gaming scene, with its super-powered Pro and Ultimate variants for good measure. However, a tech blog claims to have found what could be their successor on the Bluetooth SIG certification website already. Then again, the evidence of this unusually advanced leak is now nowhere to be found.

A reddit post explains why the Anandtech i7-11700K review may have presented poor results in most gaming and synthetic benchmarks. This could be due to Intel misleadingly advertising inferior stock settings for the RAM controllers on all SKUs below the i9-11900K(F).

Xbox Game Pass subscribers will be pleased to know that they will soon be able to play Bethesda classics such as Fallout 4, Skyrim, and Doom on the platform starting on March 12. A total of 20 games have been added to the platform, some of which will be available on PC, console and cloud.

An AMD Radeon RX 6600M has been spotted as part of the hardware configuration for a device apparently being tested on a well-known gaming benchmark. Not only does this seemingly confirm the RX 6600M should be coming soon, but the GPU also appears alongside a surprising Ryzen 5000 CPU that hints at a Zen 3/RDNA 2 laptop in the works for 2021.

The Schenker XMG Core 15 brings all modern computer games smoothly onto the responsive screen (WQHD, IPS, 165 Hz). This is complemented by an NVMe SSD, 16 GB of RAM (dual-channel mode), and decent battery life. The new Control Center provides extensive options to adjust the performance of the APU and GPU.

Xbox insider Shpeshal Ed says that several Bethesda games will be available on Xbox Game Pass. We're probably looking at UPlay+ integration with Microsoft's subscription services, which is expected to cost US$5 extra. This is expected to happen by the end of 2021.

The performance gap is definitely there, but it's nothing that we haven't seen before from previous generation Max-Q and non Max-Q designs. Gamers will see about 15 to 20 percent slower performance if jumping from a 130 W GeForce RTX 3060 GPU to the 75 W version.

NateDrake on the ResetEra forums claims that the DLSS-compatible Switch may differ from the upcoming Switch Pro with OLED screen and 4K support, and, due to the ongoing chip shortages, the DLSS version could end up pushed back to 2022. We should be seeing a new Nvidia SoC, though, and the DLSS hardware features will be supported on the handheld SoC rather than the dock SoC.

An intrepid MSI employee tried to mine cryptocurrency on the MSI GE76 Raider gaming laptop. It can apparently mine at 52.8MH/s, a smidgen slower than the desktop Nvidia GeForce RTX 3070's 52.9MH/s hash rate. MSI says that it will continue its 'experiment' for a month before posting results.

The latest update to War Thunder, labeled 2.5 "Ixwa Strike" and unleashed earlier today, brings more than 20 new ground vehicles (including a South African separate branch in the British tech tree), first sweep-wing aircraft (Su-17M), 5 new ships, new locations, a pilot HUD, new graphical effects, and more.

Ambitious miners have successfully managed to best the Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060's hash rate limiter less than a month after it was launched. The graphics card can now mine crypto at 45MH/s. With the restriction in place, its mining rate was restricted to 20MH/s.

When the screen on your smartphone proves too small for productivity tasks, you can just use the new Beelink Expand X dock to hook your mobile device to a PC monitor and a keyboard / mouse setup. You can also watch movies from the phone or even play handheld console games on a big 4K TV through the included HDMI connector.

PlayStation 5 devkit images seemingly sourced from the National Communications Commission (NCC) of Taiwan have offered up an interesting reminder of what could have been. A PlayStation Store mailshot has reaffirmed that the expanded and enhanced version of Grand Theft Auto V for the PS5 appears to be still on schedule.

Microsoft has purchased ZeniMax Media for US$7.5 billion, bringing popular game development studios like Bethesda and id Software under the Xbox umbrella. This may mark the beginning of Xbox exclusivity for series like The Elder Scrolls, DOOM, Fallout, and more.