AMD's Radeon RX 9070 16 GB graphics card design launched along with a more capable and popular XT sibling, three months ago. Since then, the first wave of RDNA 4 desktop gaming products have hovered above suggested price baselines—much to the chagrin of brand champions. Yesterday, Germany's ComputerBase highlighted a brief fluctuation in elevated trends. Team Red's general European MSRP—for Radeon RX 9070 cards—is €629, including VAT. A price fluctuation report observed (on June 3): "Alternate.de is currently selling an XFX QuickSilver RX 9070 OC Gaming Edition for the first time at €613 (inc. VAT), thus below the MSRP. The (ComputerBase) editorial team was alerted to this by the community, and the bot for prices and availability for Radeon RX 9000 now also show this offer." Naturally, graphics connoisseur will scoff at this unusually low offer—after all, a mild upcharge grants access to the superior Radeon RX 9070 XT tier (MSRP: €689). The slightly cheaper option does have supporters; mainly due to its more energy efficient operation.

Members of the HotUKDeals community have become obsessed with finding deep graphics card discounts; a lucky few have boasted about acquiring current-gen AMD-based flagships at well below recommended price points. Several discerning customers have taken advantage of anomalous listings, and roundabout utilization of various eBay promotion codes. Pleasingly, a dual-fan Sapphire PULSE RX 9070 16 GB model floated just below British MSRP (£569.99, inc. VAT). Amazon UK's stock—of this barebones option—was quickly depleted, thanks to a tempting £10 reduction. Until the emergence of a current-gen Great Radeon Edition (GRE) design, (generally) AMD's Radeon RX 9070 model was considered an odd duck. A permanent price cut could raise its profile in the future.

Acer was late with its contribution of custom RDNA 4 graphics card; introductory press material was issued after the fact, and potential buyers have waited a while for retail stock to reach end destinations. The Taiwanese manufacturer's opening salvo consisted of premium "Predator BiFrost" and sub-flagship "Nitro" overclocked Radeon RX 9070 XT models, but non-XT options did not launch at the same time. This morning, VideoCardz noted the availability of Predator BiFrost RX 9070 OC 16 GB cards in Japan. The company's regional office has opened its direct-to-customer order book; to the tune of 128,800 yen (including sales tax) per unit—converting to roughly ~$902 (USD).

Unlike XT equivalents, Acer's Predator BiFrost OC and Nitro OC RX 9070 models feature two 8-pin power connectors (instead of three units). Currently, the Geizhals/Skinflint price aggregator denotes stock—of both SKUs—being present at e-tailers in Germany and Austria. According to comparisons, the best Predator BiFrost RX 9070 OC deal comes in at €709 (inc. VAT), at GALAXUS. PLAYOX and Office-Partner.de offer the lowest Nitro RX 9070 OC price tags: €669 (inc. VAT), plus €4.99 processing fees. Acer has not publicly disclosed the reasons behind subsequent sluggish launches of its RDNA 4 portfolio. Curiously enough, Yeston—best known for dealing in eccentric card designs—foresaw a post-April stabilization of Radeon RX 9070 series shipments.

Graphics card vendors are setting up product pages for AMD's upcoming Radeon RX 9060 XT ahead of its June 5th release date. Tom's Hardware reports that well-known leaker @momomo_us discovered early retail listings from Central Computers (US) showing preliminary pricing that begins at $319.99. The California-based retailer has posted three ASRock variants of the RX 9060 XT with the Challenger 8 GB priced at $319.99, the Challenger 16 GB at $369.99, and the Steel Legend 16 GB at $389.99. Both Challenger variants carry a $20 premium over AMD's suggested retail pricing for their respective memory configurations, while the Steel Legend brings a $40 markup above MSRP. These higher prices, compared to AMD's MSRP ($299 for the 8 GB version and $349 for the 16 GB model), likely reflect factory overclocking implementations across all three models. VideoCardz also spotted UK retailer Overclockers UK briefly displaying pricing ranging from £289.99 to £359.99 before masking their listings to conceal actual launch pricing.

AMD's RX 9060 XT 8 GB and 16 GB target the mainstream segment competing directly with NVIDIA's RTX 5060 and RTX 5060 Ti. Both RX 9060 XT models are based on the 4 nm "Navi 44" silicon, with upgrades to the latest RDNA 4 architecture and new features such as FSR 4 and the upcoming FSR "Project Redstone" feature set. The company claims that the RX 9060 XT 16 GB should beat the GeForce RTX 5060 Ti 8 GB by 6% on average, tested across 40 game titles, at 1440p. The RX 9060 XT debuts with official pricing starting at $299 for the 8 GB version and $349 for the 16 GB model.

Earlier in the week, Yeston revealed a sci-fi/cyberpunk character-themed Radeon RX 9060 XT 16 GB Game Ace SKU. Eager followers of the Chinese brand were wondering whether additional custom designs—based on AMD's Navi 44 XT GPU—were in the pipeline, possibly ready in time for an official June 5 launch. In Yeston's case, they expect to start shipping on June 7—exclusively for the Chinese market. Fortunately, several dual-fan "GAEA" and triple-fan "Game Ace White" models have turned up on Yeston's JD.com storefront. VideoCardz has pored over the fundamentals, and quickly realized that there are key differences—in terms of GPU clock speeds—when cross-referencing entry-level/barebones GAEA 16 GB and 8 GB card specifications.

The latter variant seems to exist as Yeston's absolute baseline MSRP option; its pre-order tag is 2499 RMB, including VAT. Curiously, pre-launch info seems to show the 16 GB sibling (2899 RMB, inc. VAT) possessing elevated boost and game clocks: 3230 MHz and 2620 GHz (respectively). The lesser model makes do with Team Red's reference figures: 3130 MHz and 2530 MHz (respectively). VideoCardz believes that this is an isolated case; they have not stumbled upon similar spec disparities between product family members—be it with other AIBs or within Yeston's stable. It could be safe to assume that Yeston's product pages contain inaccurate or placeholder numbers.

Prior to AMD's official unveiling of the Radeon RX 9060 XT series, Sapphire's Computex booth teased a forthcoming lineup of custom graphics card options. Hours later, the TechPowerUp crew inspected freshly wall-mounted specimens. To the surprise of many, the Hong Kong-based manufacturer is readying a premium Radeon RX 9060 XT 16 GB NITRO+ SKU for launch time (on June 5). The usual suspects—in PULSE and PURE guises—were also exhibited within the walls of the Taipei Nangang Exhibition Centre. Not long after the closing of ceremonies, Sapphire China's JD.com store has opened up pre-orders for six launch day products.

Yesterday, a VideoCardz investigative piece delved into pre-release price points (including VAT). Keen potential customers can secure finalized retail units via a deposit system; demanding a 50 RMB (~$7 USD) upfront fee. Unsurprisingly, the largest tag is affixed to Sapphire's triple-fan 16 GB NITRO+ model—3299 RMB (~$458 USD). This top-tier option sits 800 RMB above Team Red's suggested guideline. The AIB's barebones dual-fan Radeon RX 9060 XT PULSE 8 GB package adheres to official MSRP: 2499 RMB (~$347 USD). Their PULSE 16 GB model sits almost in the middle of the lineup—in terms of pricing—at 2899 RMB (~$402 USD). VideoCardz believes that another PULSE color/finish variant will emerge, at some point post-launch—bringing the total number of items up to seven distinct products.

Acer released four new graphics cards in the Intel Arc and AMD Radeon lineups, and we found them on display in Acer's booth here at Computex 2025. The Acer Nitro Intel Arc B580 OC is now available in white, with 2x FrostBlade fans (alongside the existing black version). It features 12 GB memory running at up to 2,740 MHz with Intel Xe2 architecture, supporting 1440p gaming and 8K displays (1x HDMI 2.1 and 3x DisplayPort 2.1 outputs) with ray tracing, XeSS frame generation, and low latency technology. The Intel Nitro Arc A380 LP is a low-profile card with 6 GB memory, powered by one 8-pin PCIe connector and 2,000 MHz clocks, built on Xe architecture with DirectX 12 Ultimate support, ray tracing capabilities, and XeSS upscaling for content creation and gaming.

The two Acer Nitro Radeon RX 9060 XT OC models come in 16 GB and 8 GB variants, both delivering boost clocks up to 3,320 MHz and game clocks up to 2,780 MHz. Both models came in a two-slot format with dual-fans, metal backplates and 1x HDMI 2.1a and 2x DP 2.1 outputs.

We wanted to give you a quick update on the estimated shipping schedule for our upcoming CRKD Gibson Les Paul Guitar Controller. Over the past few weeks, we've run into some inbound component delays with our manufacturing partner—largely due to ongoing uncertainty around international tariffs and broader supply chain challenges. As a result, we're making a slight adjustment to our estimated shipping windows to finalize production and better navigate the current logistics environment.

While we've taken steps to mitigate the impact of tariffs, a portion of these costs must be passed on. All U.S. pre-orders placed before June 1 will be honored at their original price. International pricing remains unchanged at this time. All pre-orders placed before June 1 on crkd.gg—U.S. and international—will also receive a complimentary CRKD Gradient Guitar Strap and Collector's Pin.

Not long after the launch of its "standard" Astral GeForce RTX 5090 (air-cooled) flagship card, ASUS ROG unveiled a gaudy golden alternative. According to a past weekend VideoCardz news report, the brand's extremely special "Astral RTX 5090 Dhahab OC Edition" has finally settled on retail shelves in the Middle East. During preview events, ASUS did not let slip any pre-release pricing details—industry watchdogs theorized numbers well above the regular "OC" version's (then) $3000+ tag. A Jensen Huang-signed specimen was auctioned off—for charity—during NVIDIA's GTC 2025 conference week. The latest investigations have unearthed varying costs of ownership; VideoCardz found listings across MENA (Middle-East and North Africa) territories.

The cheapest example was priced at $6700, while a "jaw-dropping" entry was discovered going for ~$10,600. The online publication's detective work concluded that price variations were dependent on differing conditions within each country. An ASUS-authored "Certificate of Authenticity" demonstrates the use of a key premium material; 6.5 grams of "999 Gold Fineness." Official grading indicates the very best purity of this precious metal—largely reserved (and prized) by prime Middle Eastern markets. ASUS is reportedly working on a (presumably) less expensive GeForce RTX 5080 variant—enabled via the selection of lesser silicon, rather than a downgraded level of decoration. Special edition ASUS ROG Astral enthusiasts—outside of MENA—could be eyeing up a DOOM prequel-themed option.

We're excited to present IBM Granite 4.0 Tiny Preview, a preliminary version of the smallest model in the upcoming Granite 4.0 family of language models, to the open source community. Granite 4.0 Tiny Preview is extremely compact and compute efficient: at FP8 precision, several concurrent sessions performing long context (128K) tasks can be run on consumer grade hardware, including GPUs commonly available for under $350 USD. Though the model is only partially trained—it has only seen 2.5T of a planned 15T or more training tokens—it already offers performance rivaling that of IBM Granite 3.3 2B Instruct despite fewer active parameters and a roughly 72% reduction in memory requirements. We anticipate Granite 4.0 Tiny's performance to be on par with that of Granite 3.3 8B Instruct by the time it has completed training and post-training.

As its name suggests, Granite 4.0 Tiny will be among the smallest offerings in the Granite 4.0 model family. It will be officially released this summer as part of a model lineup that also includes Granite 4.0 Small and Granite 4.0 Medium. Granite 4.0 continues IBM's firm commitment to making efficiency and practicality the cornerstone of its enterprise LLM development. This preliminary version of Granite 4.0 Tiny is now available on Hugging Face—though we do not yet recommend the preview version for enterprise use—under a standard Apache 2.0 license. Our intent is to allow even GPU-poor developers to experiment and tinker with the model on consumer-grade GPUs. The model's novel architecture is pending support in Hugging Face transformers and vLLM, which we anticipate will be completed shortly for both projects. Official support to run this model locally through platform partners including Ollama and LMStudio is expected in time for the full model release later this summer.

Earlier this month, Kingston's new Fury Renegade G5 PCIe 5.0 NVMe SSD leaked, albeit without pricing, but now the company has revealed the pricing both in the US and the UK and to be frank, it's not all that competitively priced. As reported, the Fury Renegade G5 will come in three sizes, 1 TB, 2 TB and 4 TB and Kingston went with Silicon Motions SM2508 controller, rather than the more commonly used Phison E26, for its first PCIe 5.0 NVMe SSD. There's little between the two controllers in real world performance tests, but the SM2508 is faster on paper.

So what about the pricing then you ask? Well, the 1 TB SKU starts at US$203.99 or £182.16 (inc VAT) if you live in the UK. Considering you can get a 1 TB Crucial T705 for US$160 or a 1 TB Samsung 9100 Pro for US$199.99, it seems like Kingston's pricing is a bit off, since their Fury Renegade G5 is unlikely to offer any tangible performance advantages. The 2 TB SKU is listed at US$329.99 / £295.92, while the 4 TB SKU comes in at US$629.99 / £563.04, making the 4 TB SKU one of the most expensive 4 TB consumer NVMe SSDs in the market. Samsung's 9100 Pro retails for around US$550 in comparison, although the Crucial T705 comes in at US$687 in the 4 TB SKU. It seems like PCIe 5.0 NVMe SSD's, especially at larger storage sizes are going to continue to be a premium product for now.

Earlier today, NVIDIA's public relations department published their "GeForce RTX 5060 Desktop Family" introductory article. Curiously, the company's brand-new GeForce RTX 5060 Ti graphics cards do not headline Team Green's "dedicated" PR release—instead, the general "game changing" GeForce RTX 5060 series is advertised with a starting price point of $299. Clarification arrives several paragraphs deep into the blurb—as explained with some "PR" magic: "starting April 16th, we're bringing DLSS 4 and Blackwell's suite of innovations to every gamer with the launch of the GeForce RTX 5060 desktop family, beginning with the release of the GeForce RTX 5060 Ti. And in May, the GeForce RTX 5060 arrives, with prices starting at $299." Very specific cost of ownership digits leaked last week; indicating a refreshing reduction over earlier (disappointing) predictions.

Team Green's publicity team has confirmed starting MSRPs of $429 for 16 GB models, and $379 for 8 GB variants. These official numbers are buried three-quarters of the way into NVIDIA's PR document. Older evidence pointed to a possible repeat of lower end GeForce RTX 40-series guide prices—as it turns out, the GeForce RTX 5060 card's $299 "cost of entry" aligns with its predecessor's launch figure. Based on leaked pre-built PC listings, industry watchdogs deduced the $299 MSRP earlier on in the month. Additionally, Team Green's PR material teased the upcoming launch of related mobile hardware: "the same features, innovations and advantages of the GeForce RTX 5060 desktop family are coming to laptops this May, when GeForce RTX 5060 laptops arrive on shop shelves, starting at $1099." Real life scenario prices are expected to remain "sky-high," even for rumored cheaper devices—equipped with GeForce RTX 5050 Mobile GPUs.

Since teasing its next-gen flagship motherboard design—at CES 2025—the ASUS Republic of Gamers (ROG) team has spent time finalizing an option that is even more extravagant than their hardcore overclocking-oriented Crosshair X870E Apex model. Naturally, the premium sub-brand did not reveal pricing during preview events—instead, premature European e-tail listings suggested a €1200 (~$1350 USD) tag. Tony Wu and colleagues at ASUS China introduced an impressive swath of brand-new products at an official in-person showcase last week, in Changsha.

During proceedings, company representatives introduced their top-flight E-ATX format board with a hefty day one price: 9999 RMB ($1360 USD). The ASUS ROG Crosshair X870E Extreme is expected to launch later this month; likely starting off with the Chinese domestic market. At the time of writing, the manufacturer's various global branches have not disclosed localized details—be it pricing or availability. Last week's presser did not produce any surprises, since plenty of specification details (and promo shots) leaked out late last month. One interesting and very over the top feature is the model's integration of an adjustable full-color 5-inch LCD screen. The primary M.2 storage solution will be cooled by an "innovative" 3D vapor chamber heatsink. Well-heeled customers will be relieved to know that ASUS has outfitted the AAA board design with their revamped Q-Release Slim mechanism.

Sony has announced that it has increased its pricing for the Playstation 5 consoles by around 25 percent from today in several regions. For now, it's Europe, Middle East, Africa, Australia and New Zealand that are being affected, but there are reports of Sony also planning on increasing the price in the US by at least 30 percent. Sony's official reason behind the rather steep price increase is due to "a backdrop of a challenging economic environment, including high inflation and fluctuating exchange rates".

The new pricing for the PS5 Digital Edition will be €499.99 in the Eurozone, £429.99 in the UK, AU$749.95 in Australia and NZ$859.95 in New Zealand. Sony didn't reveal pricing in other currencies and instead says to check with your local retailer for the new pricing. For now, the EU and the UK avoid price hikes on the PS5 with Ultra HD Blu-ray disc drive as Sony so elegantly calls it, whereas in Australia it'll increase to US$829.95 and in New Zealand it'll cost NZ$949.95. Sony will also announced a decrease in the price on the stand alone Blu-ray drive today and it will cost €79.99, £69.99, AU$124.95 and NZ$139.95. The PS5 Pro is not receiving a price hike for the time being.

Not too long after delivering its in-depth Switch 2 showcase, Nintendo of America and retail partners postponed pre-launch reservations for the forthcoming hybrid gaming console. An official announcement stated: "pre-orders for Nintendo Switch 2 in the U.S. will not start April 9, 2025 in order to assess the potential impact of tariffs and evolving market conditions. Nintendo will update timing at a later date. The launch date of June 5, 2025 is unchanged." The vast majority of industry watchdogs reckon that company will be assessing an adjustment of launch day product MSRPs. Last week's North American presentation outlined price points of $449.99 and $499.99; for a standard package and a Mario Kart World Pack (respectively). Theorized adjustments could extend to physical copies of games, as well as accessories; e.g. the Switch 2 Pro Controller.

Gamers further north—in the neighboring nation of Canada—were relieved about last week's alert being non-applicable to their market region. Up until yesterday, pre-orders were on track at CA$629.99 (base console) and CA$699.99 (with Mario Kart World). Unfortunately, the House of Mario's Canuck branch has confirmed that recent events have had a knock-on effect for local customers. As disclosed in a statement to MobileSyrup, Nintendo of Canada explained: "pre-orders for Nintendo Switch 2 in Canada will not start on April 9, 2025 in order to align with the timing of pre-orders to be determined in the U.S....Nintendo will provide updated information at a later date. The launch date of June 5, 2025 is unchanged." MobileSyrup's report was updated yesterday evening; with links to social media bulletins posted by the regional arms of Walmart and GameStop. Both retail outlets repeated Nintendo of Canada's disappointing message.

MangoBoost, a provider of cutting-edge system solutions designed to maximize AI data center efficiency, has set a new industry benchmark with its latest MLPerf Inference v5.0 submission. The company's Mango LLMBoost AI Enterprise MLOps software has demonstrated unparalleled performance on AMD Instinct MI300X GPUs, delivering the highest-ever recorded results for Llama2-70B in the offline inference category. This milestone marks the first-ever multi-node MLPerf inference result on AMD Instinct MI300X GPUs. By harnessing the power of 32 MI300X GPUs across four server nodes, Mango LLMBoost has surpassed all previous MLPerf inference results, including those from competitors using NVIDIA H100 GPUs.

Unmatched Performance and Cost Efficiency
MangoBoost's MLPerf submission demonstrates a 24% performance advantage over the best-published MLPerf result from Juniper Networks utilizing 32 NVIDIA H100 GPUs. Mango LLMBoost achieved 103,182 tokens per second (TPS) in the offline scenario and 93,039 TPS in the server scenario on AMD MI300X GPUs, outperforming the previous best result of 82,749 TPS on NVIDIA H100 GPUs. In addition to superior performance, Mango LLMBoost + MI300X offers significant cost advantages. With AMD MI300X GPUs priced between $15,000 and $17,000—compared to the $32,000-$40,000 cost of NVIDIA H100 GPUs (source: Tom's Hardware—H100 vs. MI300X Pricing)—Mango LLMBoost delivers up to 62% cost savings while maintaining industry-leading inference throughput.

Just over two weeks ago, Acer unveiled its brand-new Predator BiFrost and Nitro Radeon RX 9070 Series graphics cards. Despite being a late contributor to AMD's opening salvo of RDNA 4, the Taiwanese manufacturer made a big impression with its reveal of four premium specced models. In particular, Acer's Predator BiFrost Radeon RX 9070 OC 16 GB and Nitro Radeon RX 9070 XT OC 16 GB SKUs will be joining an elite group of custom options that boast 3100 MHz boost clocks. Mid-March press material did not provide any insight into launch pricing—weeks later, Overclockers UK has opened up pre-orders for the four Predator BiFrost and Nitro RX 9070 XT and RX 9070 cards. Just prior to RDNA 4 launch time, Overclockers UK (OcUK) received plenty of press attention—in particular, their building of a sizable cube out of an impressive quantity of Sapphire PULSE Radeon RX 9070 XT retail stock.

The British retailer seemed confident with its pre-kickoff accumulation of various AIB models, but demand quickly outstripped supply on day one. Unfortunately, OcUK has implemented dreaded price hikes across its Radeon RX 9070 Series product listings. Looking at Acer's main competition in the premium custom Radeon RX 9070 XT tier, OcUK has jacked up prices by £20 to £30 (approx.). ASRock's Radeon RX 9070 XT Taichi OC model—one of the elite 3.1 GHz boosters—launched at £700 (including VAT, shipping fee is extra), but was adjusted up to £728.99 (~$943 USD) at some point last month. The British store's pre-order price for the "cheaper" Nitro Radeon RX 9070 XT OC SKU is £749.99 (inc. VAT), while the flagship Predator BiFrost costs £779.99 (inc. VAT) for reservation. GIGABYTE's (almost) £800 AORUS RX 9070 XT ELITE model is the only other 3.1 GHz boost-capable option sitting above the £750 mark. Looking at "on paper" information (e.g. aluminium backplates, state-of-the-art cooling, etc.)—Acer's two headliners are impressive offerings, but rival cards already exist with similar credentials at "lower prices." Historically, TechPowerUp's resident GPU reviewer—W1zzard—has not received any graphics card samples from the manufacturer. Perhaps this drought will end in the near future...

ASUS and MSI's price hiking of GeForce RTX 50-series graphics cards is already a well explored subject matter (news-wise), but GPU market watchdogs have spent time investigating circumstances further down from the perch of NVIDIA's most visible board partner players. Citing evidence presented on the official Team Green subreddit, VideoCardz has levelled criticism in ZOTAC's direction. Apparently, the brand's North American store has—quite recently—jacked up asking prices for its custom GeForce RTX 5090 designs. The Hong Kong-based manufacturer only offers a choice of two models via its US webstore: SOLID OC and AMP Extreme INFINITY. At the time of writing, ZOTAC's webshop is undergoing "construction work"—fortunately, screenshots and crucial points of info were preserved by Redditors and media outlets. The flagship AMP Extreme INFINITY SKU has hit an unprecedented $2999.99 price point, although not reaching the heights of ASUS Astral ($3359.99!). A mid-March Wayback Machine save state reveals a previous RTX 5090 AMP Extreme INFINITY listing at $2599.99, but its initial launch price was $2499.99. Naturally, a flagship design—comprised of a robust cooling solution, fancy features/accessories and ARGB lighting—demands a premium upcharge, but ZOTAC's top-tier SKU is priced $1001 above Team Green's $1999 MSRP baseline.

ZOTAC's GeForce RTX 5090 SOLID (non-OC) SKU was supposed to act as the "barebones" baseline MSRP-conformant model, but price watchers noted that ZOTAC USA had removed this entry from the official webstore. Tom's Hardware reckons that the last recorded cost of ownership was $2199.99. ZOTAC's next best option is the brand's factory-overclocked variant—GeForce RTX 5090 SOLID OC—now adjusted up to $2699.99. Launch pricing was somewhere just above $2200, but that figure has changed over time. It was $2369.99, prior to this week—according to a Wayback Machine archived state. As reported last month, ZOTAC rolled out a "Priority Access Campaign" via Discord—this anti-scalping strategy received praise upon initiation, but VideoCardz's watchful eye has kept track of very few successful transactions. According to their latest investigative piece, a "top secret" ZOTAC Discord group was formed—this separate elite member-focused channel offers even "easier access" to coveted cutting-edge gaming graphics card.

During GTC 2025, NVIDIA unveiled the professional (PRO) side of its "Blackwell" GPU line—headlined by a monstrous GDDR7 96 GB option, that unleashes the full potential of their GB202 die. Industry watchdogs anticipated sky-high pricing, as befits such a potent specification sheet/feature set. As reported by VideoCardz over the past weekend, a North American enterprise PC hardware store—Connection—has populated its webshop with several of Team Green's brand-new RTX PRO Blackwell Series SKUs. The publication received tip-offs from a portion of its readership; including some well-heeled individuals who have already claimed pre-orders. Starting off, the investigation highlighted upper crust offerings: "the flagship model, called the RTX PRO 6000 with 96 GB of VRAM, will launch at $8435 (bulk) to $8565 (box), and this price seemingly applies to both models: the Workstation Edition and a sub-variant called Max-Q. Both are equipped with the same specs, but the latter is capped at 300 W TDP while retaining 88% of the Al performance, claimed NVIDIA."

Connection has removed its RTX PRO 6000 Blackwell and RTX PRO 6000 Blackwell Max-Q product pages, but the rest of Team Green's professional stack is still visible (see relevant screenshot below). The RTX PRO 5000 Blackwell 48 GB card is priced at $4569.24 (or $4439.50 for bulk). The cheapest offering is a $696.54 RTX PRO 2000 Blackwell 8 GB model. Officially, NVIDIA and its main professional series board partner—PNY—only revealed 4500, 5000 and 6000 product tiers. VideoCardz put a spotlight on some of these unannounced options, including: "the RTX 4000 non-SFF version, while this retailer has six listings for such SKUs (two SFF and two non-SFF, both in bulk and box variants). Presumably, this would suggest that NVIDIA may launch a non-SFF version later. However, the company didn't put 'SFF' in the official card's name, so perhaps this information is no longer valid, and there's only one model." According to a GDM/Hermitage AkiHabara Japan press release, a local reseller—Elsa—is preparing NVIDIA RTX PRO 6000 Blackwell Workstation Edition and RTX PRO 6000 Blackwell Max-Q Workstation Edition stock for scheduled release "in May 2025, while the other models are scheduled for release around summer." Additionally, another retailer (ASK Co., Ltd.): "has stated that the price and release date are subject to inquiry."

Graphics card price watchers have highlighted refreshing downward motion in Europe, apparently affecting three out of the four GeForce RTX 50 series graphics cards. VideoCardz received a couple of email tip-offs from its pan-European audience, prompting the publication of a short investigative piece. NVIDIA's slight adjustment of official pricing for GeForce RTX 5090, RTX 5080, and RTX 5070 models is the result of a strengthened Euro. The US dollar's value has dropped by roughly 3.9 %; according to recent detective work, focusing on German trends. Team Green's "generous" reductions have arrived roughly two weeks after a stabilization of the USD-EUR exchange rate.

Curiously, the GeForce RTX 5070 Ti is an outlier here—NVIDIA did not reduce its German guide price (€879 + VAT) for this upper-mid-range offer. A Founders Edition does not exist at this GPU level, so Team Green has tasked its board partners with the creation of so-called "MSRP conformant" alternatives. One of VideoCardz's tipsters has observed various GeForce RTX 50 series models simply "rotting on shelves," due to potential buyers balking at unreasonable retailer-implemented price hikes. NVIDIA's minor changes (4.3 to 4.6 %) are unlikely to make a noticeable impact across the Euro zone.

Greetings Warriors! Piranha Games is excited to announce MechWarrior 5: Clans—Ghost Bear Flash Storm! Leo Showers is dead. As Ulric Kerensky changes the rules of engagement, Clan Ghost Bear khans Bjorn Jorgenson and Aletha Kabrinski plot their next moves as they strive to take the lead in the race towards Terra. Take command of the Silveroot Keshik, an elite unit tasked with proving Ghost Bear's strength and reclaiming lost glory.

Engage in a Trial of Possession to claim the powerful Ebon Jaguar and Night Gyr 'Mechs. Face off against the legendary Second Sword of Light in a battle for control of Alshain, a world replete with 'Mech factories and orbital shipyards capable or producing warships. Unleash 4 new OmniMechs and 4 new BattleMechs, and command Elementals as you take the fight to space and beyond in this thrilling expansion!

Earlier today, AMD confirmed finalized price points and a launch date for its two incoming additions to the Ryzen 9000X3D processor lineup. The current Zen 5 processor population (with 3D V-Cache onboard) has a count of one—Team Red's reigning gaming champion: the eight-core Ryzen 7 9800X3D model. AMD's Senior Vice President and General Manager of Computing and Graphics was the first staffer to make an official announcement regarding definitive talking points. Jack Huynh stated (via a social media post): the world's best processor for gaming and content creation is almost here. Available starting March 12th. Ryzen 9 9950X3D—$699. Ryzen 9 9900X3D—$599. A huge thank you to our incredible community of gamers, creators, and innovators for your continued support. Together, we're shaping the future of gaming and content creation! Let's level up together!"

The sixteen-core Ryzen 9 9950X3D and twelve-core 9900X3D SKUs were officially unveiled at CES 2025, in early January. Since then, many leaks have emerged online—certain soothsayers were bang on with their predictions. Almost a month ago, speculative $699 and $599 price points were leaked. On two separate occasions, a—now confirmed—March 12 launch day was projected. AMD is expected to lift media embargoes on March 11; reviews of finalized silicon will finally reveal whether the two new players can beat their incumbent sibling in gaming performance benchmarks. As reported this afternoon, China's JD.com retail platform has opened its order book to customers—a limited quantity of Ryzen 9 9950X3D and 9900X3D units were made available for a short period of time.

ASUS has taken the unusual step of formally announcing day one availability of its brand-new offerings—in TUF Gaming and PRIME forms—to the NVIDIA subreddit community. Today (March 5) marks the retail rollout of AIB-built GeForce RTX 5070 graphics cards—unfortunately, NVIDIA Founders Edition enthusiasts will have to wait a little longer for a now delayed launch. VideoCardz has called out ASUS on a number of occasions over the past month and a half, regarding alleged GeForce RTX 50-series "price manipulation" practices. In their latest bit of company coverage, the publication concedes that ASUS representatives are doing a better job in communicating launch day circumstances to its target audience. In contrast, other board partners have (reportedly) not reached out to the hardware gaming community.

The ASUS_MKTLeeM account has produced a useful "Day 1 Pricing and Availability in US and CA" buying guide for TUF Gaming GeForce RTX 5070 OC Edition ($739.99 USD) and ASUS Prime GeForce RTX 5070 models (standard: $549.99, OC: $699.99). The company rep disclosed the outlook for this opening salvo: "we expect that most, if not all of these will be available at 6am PST for the US. Of course, things happen sometimes; and a particular e-tailer or retailer may have a website issue or may be pending for stock to reach them. Feel free to ask later in the day and we can track this down...For Canada, I do not have confirmation on which stores will have Day 1 stock at this time, unfortunately. If I receive confirmation before the end of the day I will update it." They noted that Best Buy Canada may experience delayed shipments (1-3 weeks) of TUF Gaming RTX 5070 OC Edition stock. Unfortunately, higher-end options are not releasing alongside "cheaper" brethren parts—MKTLeeM stated: "the ROG Strix cards will not be available Day 1. There is currently no ETA for when these cards will be available, but we will update the post and/or the availability post in the comments when we have an update." Press outlets have highlighted the apparent limited range of ASUS launch day models. Interestingly, the TUF Gaming RTX 5070 (non-OC) option was not included in MKTLeeM's subreddit thread.

Chinese manufacturers have seized significant market share in legacy chip production, driving prices down and creating intense competitive pressure that Western competitors cannot match. The so-called "China shock" in the semiconductor sector appears as mature node production shifts East at accelerating rates. Legacy process nodes, which are usually 16/20/22/24 nm and larger, form the backbone of consumer electronics and automotive applications while providing established manufacturers with stable revenue streams for R&D investment. However, this economic framework now faces structural disruption as Chinese fabs leverage domestic demand and government support to expand capacity. By Q4 2025, Chinese facilities will control 28% of global mature chip production, with projections indicating further expansion to 39% by 2027.

This rapid capacity growth directly results from Beijing's strategic pivot following US export controls on advanced semiconductor equipment, which redirected investment toward mature nodes where technological barriers remain lower. This is happening in parallel with companies like SMIC, although isolated, which are developing lithography solutions for cutting-edge 5 nm and 3 nm wafer production. For older nodes, The market impact appears most pronounced in specialized materials like silicon carbide (SiC). Industry benchmark 6-inch SiC wafers from Wolfspeed were previously $1,500, compared to current $500 pricing from Guangzhou Summit Crystal Semiconductor—representing a 67% price compression that Western manufacturers cannot profitably match. Multiple semiconductor firms report significant financial strain from this pricing pressure. Wolfspeed has implemented 20% workforce reductions following a 96% market capitalization decline, while Onsemi recently announced 9% staff cuts. With more Chinese expansion into the mature node category, Western companies can't keep up with the lowered costs of what is now becoming a commodity.

Late last week, AMD posted a helpful reminder; a special RDNA 4 Friday (February 28) event is on the calendar. Additionally, they quietly confirmed that the upcoming launch of Radeon RX 9070 series graphics cards will not include reference/MBA models. Team Red enthusiasts and other interested parties are anticipating an official unveiling of performance data, technical specifications, and decisive pricing. Recent leaks have produced speculative figures for various board partner options, but industry whispers suggest that AMD's guide MSRP has fluctuated over the past couple of weeks. An almost definitive answer has arrived online, courtesy of another VideoCardz investigative piece.

The article does not class the latest pre-release disclosure as a true "leak," VideoCardz believes that their sharing of AMD press briefing slides serves as an intriguing teaser. The report dismisses yet another case of pre-launch retail spillage: "there are many rumors about relatively high prices for the RX 9070 series. For instance, a Reddit thread allegedly shows prices from Best Buy's internal system, with prices starting at $739 (see screenshot below)... From what we have been told and shared during the media briefing, AMD showed one slide that may confirm where the prices will be. The Radeon RX 9070 series is focusing on a sub-$700 price point, and AMD wants their cards to be 'more accessible.' AMD says that 85% of gamers buy cards below $700, and this is what the RDNA 4 series will focus on." Another leaked presentation slide indicates that Team Red is targeting higher resolutions (1440p and 4K), better performance; especially with "ray tracing games," as well as "easy upgrades." The last point emphasizes drop-in 8-pin power connector options. ASRock and Sapphire appear to be breaking away from this traditional connection mold with their upcoming premium-tier designs, but the majority of AIB cards are expected to stick with a tried and trusted solution.

LG Electronics USA (LG) today announced pricing and pre-order availability of its 2025 AI-enabled LG gram lineup, the company's first on-device AI-laptops powered by Intel Core Ultra Series 2 CPUs. Introduced at CES 2025, the new lineup includes the LG gram Pro Z90TP ($1999 to $2399), LG gram Pro Copilot+PC Z90TS ($1849 to $2399), LG gram Pro 2-in-1 T90TP ($1999 to $2399) and LG gram Copilot+PC Z90TL ($1999 to $2399). Leveraging LG's gram AI technology, and cloud AI capabilities powered by GPT-4o, these laptops deliver impressive hybrid AI performance while preserving the LG gram's iconic slim and lightweight design.

Throughout the duration of the pre-order period (Feb. 24, 2025 to March 23, 2025), customers will receive an LG gram +view IPS portable monitor (349.99 value) at no additional cost and $200 savings on select models. All standard terms of purchase apply.