TechPowerUP NEWS

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United Microelectronics Corporation (NYSE: UMC: TWSE: 2303) ("UMC"), a leading global semiconductor foundry, and Polar Semiconductor, LLC ("Polar"), a U.S.-owned and operated foundry specializing in high-voltage, power, and sensor technologies, today announced they have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to explore collaboration on delivering scalable U.S.-based 8-inch production of high-quality wafers that are essential across pillar industries including automotive, data centers, consumer electronics, and aerospace & defense.

Under the MOU, Polar and UMC will identify devices for Polar to manufacture at its recently expanded 8-inch facility in Minnesota. By combining Polar's proven manufacturing capabilities with UMC's comprehensive 8-inch technology portfolio and global customer base, this partnership is set to drive growth for both companies while supporting customers' multi-sourcing strategies. In addition, the collaboration will strengthen 8-inch wafer manufacturing in the U.S., contributing to supply chain resilience amid shifting geopolitical dynamics and ensuring a secure domestic supply of power semiconductors critical to automotive, electric grids, robotic manufacturing, data centers, and more.
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Yesterday, Chinese PC hardware press outlets covered the domestic launch of ZOTAC's ZBOX MAGNUS ONE mini PC system. This brand-new offering boasts enlarged credentials, both proportionally and technologically—the EU27507TC SKU's 8.48 liter enclosure is a definite step-up in volume when compared to a much smaller MAGNUS (EN275060TC) sibling. ZOTAC's newest candidate turns to Team Blue and Green for key desktop-grade internals. An Intel Core Ultra 7 265K processor is paired up with a GeForce RTX 5070 Ti 16 GB graphics card. Previously, the Singaporean manufacturer's engineering team managed to bung a discrete GeForce RTX 5060 Ti 16 GB card into the other ZBOX MAGNUS model's tiny 2.65 L case.

According to a MyDrivers article, the ZBOX MAGNUS ONE EU27507TC is classed as a high-performance edge computing product. Additionally, it is advertised as the "world's smallest complete system equipped with a desktop-grade GeForce 5070 Ti GPU." An "ingenious" internal structural design grants enough clearance for a (likely) custom profile mid-level "Blackwell" gaming card. In addition, a 650 W Platinum-rated power supply unit is squeezed into the capable package. ITHome has stumbled upon a JD.com listing, bearing a wince-inducing 20,999 Yuan price tag (~$2970 USD). Due to the barebones nature of ZOTAC's MAGNUS ecosystem, customers are expected to provide their own DDR5 RAM (up to 96 GB, across two CSODIMM slots) and SSD storage.

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While it's only been a few short weeks since our first Closed Alpha back in November, we're eager to get right back into things by kicking off our second round of Closed Alpha testing taking place December 12th through 15th. While this next round of testing will remain relatively small in size, we're looking to bring on some new testers alongside our existing group of Closed Alpha Testers to provide feedback on the game as we work to shape the future of Dawn of War IV together.

As a reminder, these tests utilize an early Alpha Build of the game, with selected testers being required to sign an NDA, as well as agree not to share, discuss, screenshot, or record any part of the test. Additionally, if you don't already have one, you'll need to create a free Discord account if selected.
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Mid-week Samsung's smartphone marketing division kicked off an Exynos 2600 marketing campaign. A short video teaser proclaimed that the upcoming flagship mobile processor has been "refined at the core" and "optimized at every level." Industry experts believe that the 2 nm chip will be deployed within a portion of next wave Galaxy S-series devices. A new product launch window could be scheduled for the first quarter of 2026. Despite freshly optimistic promotional fanfare, certain South Korean industry insiders have expressed doubt about the megacorp's present day foundry capabilities.

Buried at the bottom half of a Money Today SK news article—mostly covering Samsung HBM developments—is a short paragraph that proposes an alternative perspective of the foundry service's SF2 production line status. The report posits that the cutting-edge facility is cutting things a little fine: "Exynos 2600, a 2 nm (GAA) application processor (AP) for smartphones, is expected to enter mass production soon. It is expected to feature in the Galaxy S26 series, which will be released next year. In an unusual move, Samsung Foundry recently released a teaser video for the Exynos 2600." Going back to late September, semiconductor industry insiders believed that high-volume production had started ahead of schedule—citing pleasing progress with "50% yield rates." Partially reaffirming Money Today SK's freshest claim, DigiTimes Asia reported (last week) about a late November initiation of mass production.

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[NextPowerUP]

ATK has introduced the A9 Air, a lightweight wireless gaming mouse built around flagship-grade components while targeting the mid-range market. The mouse is built on the ATK Shark MAX platform, measures 125 × 63.5 × 40 mm making it suitable for medium to large hands and weighs just 47 g. It is built around a PAW3950 Ultra sensor, offering up to 30,000 DPI, 750 IPS tracking rate, and 50 G acceleration. Paired with a Nordic 54L15 controller, the mouse is capable of reaching polling rates of up to 8,000 Hz. It uses ATK SwiftLight optical switches with 0.181 ms latency. The A9 Air supports wired USB-C, Bluetooth, and 2.4 GHz wireless modes. ATK also included the new GEM 8K receiver for stable high-speed polling and bidirectional 8-track transmission in noisy RF environments. Additional hardware includes a TTC Gold scroll wheel, several sets of interchangeable Teflon-based mouse feet, and a 300 mAh battery rated for up to 300 hours at 1000 Hz.

The A9 Air edition is almost identical to ATK's A9 Ultra Max 2.0 and A9 Ultimate mice, with those two having a larger 800 mAh battery and a weight of 53 g. Thus, it is safe to say that the weight reduction in A9 Air (47 g) comes most likely from its smaller battery (300 mAh vs 800 mAh). The ATK A9 Air gaming mouse is available in four colors: black, white, midnight white, and phantom orange, for $79.98 on the company's official store.

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AI training workloads are pushing the limits of modern GPU architectures. With the release of AMD ROCm 7.0 software, AMD is raising the bar for high-performance training by delivering optimized support for LLM workloads across the JAX and PyTorch frameworks. The latest v25.9 Training Dockers demonstrate exceptional scaling efficiency for both single-node and multi-node setups, empowering researchers and developers to push model sizes and complexity further than ever.

By integrating Primus, a unified and flexible LLM training framework, the PyTorch training docker streamlines LLM development on AMD Instinct GPUs. Primus now supports both TorchTitan and Megatron-LM backends, while Primus-Turbo accelerates Transformer models, further boosting training throughput on AMD Instinct MI355X GPUs. Try Primus-Repo here.
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Last month, ASUS started a teaser campaign that alluded to a brand-new ROG Mini motherboard design. Promo material provided a very pixellated preview of a pale Mini-ITX form factor product. Earlier this week, a single render leaked out—image quality was good enough to identify the unreleased SKU as a white spin-off of the already launched Strix B850-I Gaming WiFi7 board design. At some point within the past couple of days, the main ASUS web presence was updated with a dedicated "W" model product page. We suspect that their next move will be the publication of press material, unless staffers deem this SKU's slight redecoration unworthy of such attention. Annoyingly, the White Edition's detailed web portal does not provide a clear view of the board's back section.

Unsurprisingly, the Taiwanese manufacturer has rolled out the standard black variant's exact same description and specs: "(our latest model) integrates cutting-edge technology into a sleek Mini-ITX form factor. It features PCIe 5.0 slots for graphics and storage, dual-channel DDR5 slots and robust power delivery for top-tier gaming and heavy workloads. Meanwhile, advanced cooling solutions maintain peak performance, and Wi-Fi 7 ensures ultra-fast connectivity. This platform delivers the power and connectivity that advanced AI PC applications demand." One major difference, at least on digital paper, is the White Edition's deployment of a "64 MB BIOS." The larger ASUS BIOS chip is advertised as offering a "more powerful interface" and "support for future AM5 processors."

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[NextPowerUP]

Every new era of Total War starts with the right foundations. For our Core Technology team, that meant creating a new evolution of our game engine—and we're calling it Warcore. When we looked at the lineup of future Total War titles, it was clear that our existing technology needed to level-up and Warcore is the result. It's the most advanced engine foundation in the franchise's history, empowering our developers with powerful tools to make gameplay more immersive, dynamic, and responsive than ever before.

But it's important to highlight that this isn't a one-time upgrade. Our talented team have designed it with a long-term vision, so whilst it will be in its infancy at the outset, the intent is for it to evolve over time and unlock groundbreaking new capabilities that ensure Total War stays at the cutting edge of strategy gaming for years to come.
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With its largest advancement since the NVIDIA CUDA platform was invented in 2006, CUDA 13.1 is launching NVIDIA CUDA Tile. This exciting innovation introduces a virtual instruction set for tile-based parallel programming, focusing on the ability to write algorithms at a higher level and abstract away the details of specialized hardware, such as tensor cores. CUDA exposes a single-instruction, multiple-thread (SIMT) hardware and programming model for developers. This requires (and enables) you to exhibit fine-grained control over how your code is executed with maximum flexibility and specificity. However, it can also require considerable effort to write code that performs well, especially across multiple GPU architectures.

There are many libraries to help developers extract performance, such as NVIDIA CUDA-X and NVIDIA CUTLASS. CUDA Tile introduces a new way to program GPUs at a higher level than SIMT. With the evolution of computational workloads, especially in AI, tensors have become a fundamental data type. NVIDIA has developed specialized hardware to operate on tensors, such as NVIDIA Tensor Cores (TC) and NVIDIA Tensor Memory Accelerators (TMA), which are now integral to every new GPU architecture. With more complex hardware, more software is needed to help harness these capabilities. CUDA Tile abstracts away tensor cores and their programming models so that code using CUDA Tile is compatible with current and future tensor core architectures.
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Two days ago, a low-key Reuters news article described recent efforts made by Fushan Technology (a Foxconn subsidiary) and Luxshare-ICT (a Chinese firm) to expand games console production facilities in Vietnam. Insiders believe that Fushan Tech is seeking permission to bolster an existing plant—leaked documents, submitted to a local government body, mention a major manufacturing goal. Once permitted, the Foxconn off-shoot supposedly wants to produce "up to 4.8 million Microsoft Xbox gaming devices (per annum), as well as "parts of the consoles, and other unspecified electromagnetic devices." Allegedly, Luxshare-ICT has lodged a similar request—pending a decision regarding an upgraded facility's annual "(up to) 4.5 million game consoles" production target.

Ongoing trade wars have caused manufacturers to pivot away from a traditional reliance on Chinese hubs. Instead, facilities located in nearby nations offer relief from severe tariffing. Jez Corden, of Windows Central fame, has weighed in on the topic of an alleged geopolitically-motivated change of plans at Microsoft's computer games division. Availability of current-gen Xbox consoles has declined across a fair number of regions, with big name retail outlets no longer selling the big green brand. Corden noted a decline in hardware supplies: "posted nearly every quarter for the past couple of years. To make matters worse, (Xbox leadership) was forced to raise prices a few months ago, making the Xbox Series X, and in some cases, the less powerful Xbox Series S more expensive than some PS5 models. Tariffs have played a huge part in making Xbox Series X|S less competitive."
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TechPowerUp and iRocks in November brought you the 2025 Worldwide Giveaway, offering our readers from around the globe a chance to grab a piece of iRocks gaming gear. We are thrilled to report that there are ten lucky winners who win from a pool of iRocks K103R and iRocks K85R keyboards; and iRocks M31R mice. Up for grabs are three iRocks K85R keyboards, that's one each of Crystal White, Blue, and Mocha Brown; two iRocks K103R keyboards, that's Milk Tea and Milk Tea Silent; and various trims of iRocks M31R gaming mice. Without further ado, here are the winners!

• OC-Ghost from Finland, Michael from the United States, and Francesco from Germany, each get an iRocks K85R keyboard
• Remixedcat from the United States, and Jacek from Poland, each get an iRocks K103R keyboard
• Amiruddin from Malaysia, Paula from the United Kingdom, Caelin from the United States, Derryl from Indonesia, and Juan from the United States, each get an iRocks M31R mouse

Huge congratulations to our ten winners from around the world! TechPowerUp and iRocks will return with more such interesting giveaways!

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BIOSTAR, a leading manufacturer of edge computing solutions, industrial motherboards, graphics cards, and storage devices, today introduces the BIW88-AHS industrial motherboard, designed for intelligent infrastructure requiring high-speed computing and smart system management. Built to support a broad range of industrial and AI-driven deployments, the BIW88-AHS combines strong performance with versatile expansion and reliable connectivity.

The BIW88-AHS is an ideal platform for system integrators who need a dependable foundation for customer information systems, transaction management, and communication workflows. Its extensive expansion options and stable connectivity provide the long-term reliability that SI projects depend on, ensuring smooth operation and efficient workflow management. For AIOT applications, the BIW88-AHS offers the expansion and interface support required to integrate communication modules and AI accelerators. Support for dual graphics cards via two PCIe 5.0 x16 slots and multiple PCIe interfaces enables efficient interaction with AI processors, bringing analytics and machine intelligence closer to the devices generating real-time data.
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The wait is over! OCTOPATH TRAVELER 0 is available now for Nintendo Switch 2, Nintendo Switch, PS5, PS4, Xbox Series X|S, Windows, and Steam! But what exactly can you expect from this beautiful new HD-2D adventure? Read on and we'll tell you all about it!

Start from zero and discover the newest entry in the OCTOPATH TRAVELER series. Experience a story of restoration and retribution over the divine rings—an epic saga that unfolds across the realm of Orsterra. Enjoy familiar features such as the series' HD-2D graphics, a fusion of retro pixel art and 3DCG; the player's ability to roleplay using Path Actions of their choice; and the Break and Boost system that can turn the tide of battle. Additionally, brand-new features such as character creation and town building allow you to create your own character and restore your hometown.
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The cadence of AMD Ryzen 7 9850X3D-related leaks has increased over the past week and a half; trickling out from an official outlet (by mistake), and shipping information. This uptick suggests an imminent launch of finalized units, possibly at next month's CES trade show. The highly visible event will provide opportune moments to introduce new and refreshed products alike. Weeks ahead of grand proceedings, Team Red's motherboard partners seem to be taking the (predicted) next 8-core gaming champion for a spin. Geekbench Browser database entries turned up mid-way through November, but were discovered weeks later by Gray/Olrak29. Test rigs utilized Maxsun's MS-eSport B850ITX mainboard model, and Colorful's CVN B850M GAMING FROZEN V14A design.

Both validated sets of Geekbench 6.3 (under Windows 11 64-bit) results indicate performance in the ballpark of AMD's readily available Ryzen 7 9800X3D CPU, with multicore scores tallies lower than anticipated. It should be noted that the Maxsun and Colorful test rigs were not running system memory (both 32 GB in total) at maximum transfer rates. Sub-4800 MT/s levels were recorded during mid-November sessions. VideoCardz notes other possible factors, including the early/in-progress nature of firmware and cautious implementation of power parameters. The Colorful mainboard-based build managed to coax its hosted processor's core clock up to 5602 MHz, whilst the Maxsun's CPU sample trailed behind at 5385 MHz. The two database entries list identical credentials for the much-leaked Ryzen 7 9850X3D SKU: 8 cores, 16 threads, 4.70 GHz base clock, and 96 MB of L3 cache. Both test subjects are identified as "Authentic AMD Family 26 Model 68 Stepping 0" units, belonging to the "Granite Ridge" processor generation.

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[NextPowerUP]

A fresh update of AMD's chipset driver package seems to contain a major reference to an unreleased mobile processor series. The "pmf_ryzen_ai400series" directory was found within Team Red's Chipset Software v7.10.02.711 release. By simple deduction, PC hardware news outlets reckon that the "Gorgon Point" family is ready for validation at OEMs. Related leaks have come from mid-year shipping manifests, and recent benchmark diagnostics. Industry observers believe that AMD will unveil this "refreshed" product lineup at next month's CES trade event. Attendees will likely witness a redeployment of trusted current-gen technologies: Zen 5 + Zen 5c CPU cores, RDNA 3.5 iGPUs, and XDNA 2 NPUs. Simply put, the "Gorgon Point" laptop/notebook-oriented processor lineup will likely arrive as a mild upgrade over readily available Ryzen AI 300 "Strix Point" forebears. Until "Zen 6" heads to mobile platforms later on in 2026, interim Ryzen AI 400 APUs are expected to drive a new wave of portable AI PCs.

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