40 posts
The Hot Take: Why did it disappear in the first place?
AMD has confirmed that it will restore Transparent Secure Memory Encryption (TSME) support on consumer Ryzen processors after previously removing the feature through AGESA firmware updates.
Read the full articleThe Hot Take: It seems Nvidia is hedging two architectures against each other. x86 vs ARM. They've been working with MediaTek to create the Spark SoC.
According to an exclusive report by VideoCardz, Intel's first x86 system-on-chip (SoC) integrating an Nvidia RTX GPU has been added to its internal product roadmap and is expected to launch in the first quarter of 2028, potentially making its public debut at CES 2028.
Read the full articleThe Hot Take: AMD getting ready for Intel refocus on HPDT?
With Threadripper, it has always been a bit like heavy-haul transport on the motorway: massively overdimensioned for normal users, but for certain workloads exactly the kind of tool where every additional lane matters. Now AMD’s next workstation generation has become tangible for the first time. An entry for “TR6 Mustang Peak” has appeared in AMD’s […]
Read the full articleThe Hot Take: I question this very much.
Servers employing x86 chips from AMD and Intel now account for little more than half of server revenue, according to the latest figures from IDC. In its Worldwide Quarterly Server Tracker for Q1 2026, the analyst firm says that non-x86 server revenue hit $58.7 billion, representing a startling increase of 107 percent over the same period last year. The results mean that those non-x86 servers make up 47.9 percent of the market revenue, closing in rapidly on the amount of cash spent on x86 boxes. The growth in non-x86 turnover is likely thanks to systems powered by Nvidia’s AI chips featuring Arm cores. Although there is high demand for these, they also cost a pretty packet compared to an average datacenter box. In fact, IDC noted a stark divide shaping the worldwide server market, which reached $122.6 billion in vendor revenue during this period, a 30.4 percent increase year-on-year. On the one hand, AI infrastructure investment from hyperscalers and large cloud providers is “running at a scale that shows no sign of plateauing,” while everything else - the non-accelerated segment - faces a supply-constrained environment, thanks largely to that AI infrastructure spending. As Reg readers will know, memory chipmakers are prioritizing manufacturing capacity for higher margin products for AI servers and GPUs, starving the rest of the market of supply. Component availability, particularly DRAM and NAND flash, is limiting near-term shipment volumes from vendors, IDC says, though order pipelines are strong. Supply of the right chips is therefore the chief limiting factor on server market growth. Revenue for x86 servers still reached $63.9 billion, but this was a decline of 2.9 percent due to those component supply constraints impacting shipment volumes. GPU accelerated servers pulled in $68.9 billion for the vendors, up nearly 25 percent year-on-year, while other accelerated servers surged a massive 122 percent to $17.7 billion. The latter category represents AI systems configured with FPGAs or ASICs rather than GPUs. IDC’s spin on the data is that AI infrastructure adoption is no longer limited to hyperscalers, thanks to developments such as government-led sovereign AI initiatives, while the non-accelerated segment tells a more nuanced story. Although revenue here declined, underlying demand remains strong, but many enterprise customers are holding out against elevated component prices. “Companies aren’t pulling back from infrastructure investment; they’re just not getting servers as fast as they need them. Longer term, emerging workloads, including agentic applications and physical AI ecosystems, will keep demand elevated well beyond the current cycle,” commented IDC research director Juan Seminara. The firm says it expects to see supply normalization beginning in 2027, with capacity relief coming as chipmakers bring new fabrication plants online. Across the last two decades, non-x86 servers accounted for less than ten percent of revenue, and most of that went to IBM which emerged as the last vendor of proprietary servers as Oracle lost interest in Sun and the likes of HPE decided they couldn't sustain businesses built on exotic architectures. ®
Read the full articleThe Hot Take: This is an interesting collaboration between the two seeing intel keeps saying they're not going to stop GPU development.
Intel's Serpent Lake SoCs featuring NVIDIA's RTX GPU tiles as integrated graphics are expected to roll out by Q1 2028. Intel & NVIDIA's Co-Developed Serpent Lake SoCs Featuring Next-Gen CPU & GPU Architectures Rumored For Q1 2028 Last year, Intel announced that it was working with NVIDIA on a custom SoC that would incorporate NVIDIA's RTX GPU tiles. Intel stated that these SoCs will power a wide range of PCs that require the integration of these levels of CPUs & GPUs together into a single package. It looks like we have our first timeline of when these SoCs will be […]Read full article at https://wccftech.com/intel-serpent-lake-socs-with-nvidia-rtx-gpu-tiles-reportedly-arrive-in-q1-2028/
Read the full articleThe Hot Take: Question is, do I go HPDT with Z990 or Consumer Z970? I guess I'll have to see the benches on if HPDT does anything for Gaming.
The Z990 PCH for Nova Lake motherboards is apparently 22% smaller than Z890, despite featuring a higher power maximum power draw of up to 14W. The leaked picture of the PCH shows a 11.15 x 6.5mm die and 25 x 24mm package, but we're unsure what motherboard it actually comes from.
Read the full articleThe Hot Take: CISC muscle on display... When you don't care about how many watts your cpu consumes ARM/RISC will never touch the raw throughput of these chips.
AMD has shared the first official results for its 256-core EPYC Venice CPU, saying it beats Nvidia's Vera by 3.3x in a rack-level deployment.
Read the full articleThe Hot Take: Motherboard bending = BAD.
Intel appears to be cooking up a beefier Nova Lake socket clamp to stop its future desktop chips getting bendy or crispy. If you are a hardware enthusiast, you probably know Intel’s independent loading mechanism, or ILM, can warp CPUs over time. The ILM is the retention clamp that holds the CPU in the socket, which sounds dull until your chip starts looking like a Pringle. According to Hot Hardware Chipzilla released a reduced-load version of the ILM with Arrow Lake, which mostly fixed the issue, but made it optional. Now Chipzilla appears to have another ILM variant coming with Nova Lake. This one looks less about correcting curvature and more about dealing with high current. Older processors used pin grid array sockets, or PGA, where the pins sat on the CPU itself. Modern chips use land grid array sockets, or LGA, where the pins live in the socket instead. LGA has plenty of advantages, including denser pins, better electrical performance and CPUs that are less likely to be mangled by ham-fisted builders. The downside is that it needs a precise compression force to ensure the CPU and socket contact each other properly. That is why Intel uses ILMs, while…
Read the full articleThe Hot Take: Creeps back into the chips...
AMD’s Zen 5 looked efficient, but weak demand and a dodgy RDSEED bug have taken the shine off. For those with long memories, AMD’s Ryzen 9000 series arrived in 2024, promising strong efficiency and decent IPC gains. Months later, the launch looks messier. Sales were soft, prices fell quickly, and a documented random-number flaw has spooked some buyers. The line-up included the 16-core Ryzen 9 9950X, 12-core 9900X, eight-core 9700X and six-core 9600X. Early benchmarks were mixed. Gaming gains were often single-digit at higher resolutions, while productivity wins varied by workload. Reviewers liked the cooler running and lower power use, but Zen 4 owners saw little reason to upgrade. AMD leaned harder into X3D chips, where stacked cache delivered clearer frame-rate gains for gamers. According to Webpro News in late 2025, AMD detailed an RDSEED flaw affecting all Zen 5 processors. The bug, tracked as AMD-SB-7055 and CVE-2025-62626, hits the 16-bit and 32-bit versions of RDSEED. They can return zero far more often than proper randomness allows, while the carry flag still reports success. That means software trusting the hardware output can swallow predictable data, which is grim news for cryptography. Linux patches moved to disable the affected instruction or use other sources, but AMD has not issued a recall and points to microcode and software mitigations. By early 2026, AMD was preparing refreshed SKUs to counter Intel’s Arrow Lake updates. Leaks pointed to Ryzen 7 9750X and Ryzen 5 9650X models with higher TDPs, higher clocks and improved memory support in some setups. That looks like squeezing more speed from existing silicon. Power rises and Zen 5’s efficiency pitch gets thinner. Corporate buyers have reason to wait until mitigations are stable. Gamers are likely to favour X3D models, which offer clearer frame-rate gains and less early-launch baggage. Server and workstation buyers have more to worry about because secure boot, VPNs and database encryption depend on reliable entropy. Zen 5 still brought gains in branch prediction, cache design and TSMC N4P fabrication. The RDSEED bug does not erase that work, but it exposes an awkward validation gap. AMD keeps shipping Zen 5 parts, and AM5 support remains a useful strength. Still, modest adoption, a documented RNG flaw and fast refresh plans make Zen 5 look less tidy than AMD wanted. System builders running cryptographic workloads should avoid first-wave Zen 5 chips unless mitigations are tested. Everyone else should look harder at refreshed SKUs or X3D parts while AMD patches the trust problem.
Read the full articleThe Hot Take: Interested to see if they catch up on the new platform.
Intel and its partners have prepared for the Nova Lake launch, and even though we are months away, we might witness more leaks like these. Intel Socket LGA 1954 Spotted in Taipei, Intel's Platform for the Next-Gen Nova Lake-S Processors With Dual Retention Design The LGA 1954 socket appeared out of nowhere in Taipei, and it's probably the first time we've seen a real one. The user @laurentschoice posted a pic of an LGA 1954 socket, mentioning that it was spotted in Taipei. It might be one of the early samples, prepared by some motherboard vendor, but it's not clear […]Read full article at https://wccftech.com/intel-next-gen-lga-1954-socket-for-nova-lake-makes-online-appearance-for-the-first-time/
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