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There are three key things that make up a Christmas light show: the lights, the control circuitry, and the sequencing. The lights are arranged together to form different props like leaping arches, snowflakes, stars, megatrees, and more. You couple those lights with controllers and power supplies to make them work as expected. There is specialized computer software that tells the controllers when to turn on and off the lights according to the music being played....

The latest report from TrendForce notes that memory pricing started declining in the fourth quarter of 2021. The usually lucrative peak season was a disappointment due to weakening demand combined with skyrocketing inflation, the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and pandemic policies, all of which caused a build-up of inventory. The report notes that the average contract price of mainstream capacity wafers has fallen so much that some manufacturers are close to selling at a loss....

But what exactly are threads and why is it so important that CPUs can crunch through more than just one? In this article, we’ll answer these questions and more. A stitch in time: What is a thread? We can begin to delve into the world of processor threads by jumping straight in and answering the opening question: just what is a thread? In the simplest of terms, a processor thread is the shortest sequence of instructions required to do a computing task....

Such good questions all deserve thorough answers, so in this article we’ll cover all of that. What is SSD trimming? SSD trimming is a process that helps to maintain the performance of a solid-state drive over time. Trim works by periodically erasing blocks of data that are no longer in use. The trimmed data isn’t always removed straight away, as a complex process decides exactly when this takes place. But when it does, not only does it free up space on the drive, it helps the SSD perform better and last longer, too....

Incredibly, when running at 2560x1600 using the second highest quality preset and no anti-aliasing, Far Cry 3 almost managed to cripple the current-gen flagships, with the HD 7970GHz Edition and GTX 680 both averaging 46fps – enough for playable performance, but below the more desirable 60fps. Anything below the HD 7870 couldn’t deliver playable results at 2560x1600, including the GTX 580 and HD 6970.

News that an AI would represent a defendant fighting a speeding ticket in court on February 22 arrived earlier this month. It would have involved an iPhone equipped with an AI app being placed in the defendant’s pocket. Combined with an earpiece and smart glasses, the defendant would have been able to record court proceedings while the AI provided arguments that would hopefully win the case. The system relies on AI text generators, including ChatGPT and DaVinci, writes NPR....

But of course, World of Tanks hasn’t become this popular for its graphics, but for its gameplay, free access, and constant updates. Although the environment isn’t that visually amazing, the tanks are. The attention to detail on vehicles is impressive. This is likely enough to keep fans happy and the bright side is that they’ll be able to play on upper quality settings without spending big on a GPU. If you want to play World of Tanks on maximum at 1920x1200, you could get by with a $250 GPU like the Radeon R9 270 or GeForce GTX 760 and the fun only gets less expensive from there....

Besides concerns about its availability and true street price, we’re thrilled with the GTX 670 as it was 15% faster than the HD 7950 on average and on par with the HD 7970. It also bested Nvidia’s last-gen single-GPU flagship by 21% at 2560x1600 and it was only 6% slower than the GTX 680 while being 20% cheaper – awesome news for value-minded enthusiasts who still want top-end performance....

Critics praised the game’s visuals, gameplay and multiplayer mode, and the soundtrack wasn’t too bad either. In fact, the game’s pause screen music sort of developed a life of its own. Composer Grant Kirkhope recently recalled on Twitter that the pause screen music took about 20 minutes to write and that he didn’t really have a clue what he was doing. Kirkhope was responsible for around half of the music in GoldenEye 007, with fellow composer Graeme Norgate handling the other half....

The GTX 960 consumed 14% less power than the GTX 760 when testing with BioShock Infinite and with its system consumption of just 183 watts, the GTX 960 was comparable to the R9 270X or around 27% more efficient than the R9 285. The system power consumption crept up to 209 watts and this time the GTX 960 used only 8% less power than the GTX 760 along with drawing 21% less power than the R9 285, which reached a system power consumption of 265 watts....

So far and for the past few months, our advice since has been as follows: if you can, avoid buying a high-end graphics card such as the RTX 3080 or better. We believe these are still overpriced and prices will continue to drop, particularly after next-gen GPUs land in a few months. But if you’re desperate for a GPU and have waited out the crypto boom, we recommend going for something more mid-range to low-end as these products won’t decline as much in terms of pricing, and their replacements are still far off in comparison....

That’s quite a drop for the RTX 3060 which was closer to $500 a few weeks ago, while the 6600 XT was around $440. Meanwhile, supply for the 6600 XT appears to be drying up and that’s probably due to the imminent release of the 6650 XT. For testing we’ve used our Ryzen 9 5950X test system with 32GB of DDR4-3200 CL14 dual-rank, dual-channel memory. Both GPUs were tested using the default AMD and Nvidia clock specifications at 1080p and 1440p across 50 games with Resizable Bar enabled....

It’s a certainty that Nvidia will bring at least some of these GPUs to gaming laptops after the desktop launch, and a few tidbits we’ve heard from industry sources suggest it’ll be around November when we hear about GeForce 20 GPUs for laptops. That’s about a month after the release of the RTX 2070, which makes sense considering with the 10 series, laptop parts were announced about 2 months after the GTX 1070....

The G1.Sniper2 features an eight-phase power design that utilizes low core energy loss Ferrite Core Chokes as well as Low RDS(on) Driver-MOSFETs. These components are said to handle a higher current load while offering better power efficiency and lower operating temperatures. Each power phase of the motherboard has three main components, one choke, one capacitor and one MOSFET. Gigabyte has also included its Dual Power Switching design, which is meant to maximize the board’s lifespan....

Settling with 97.8fps, the Gigabyte R9 290X OC was 15% slower than the Palit GTX 780 Ti JetStream in Dirt 3 while the R9 290 OC was 18% slower, though the R9 290 OC was 8% faster than a standard GTX 780. When testing with Far Cry 3, the R9 290X OC was 11% slower than the GTX 780 Ti JetStream while the R9 290 OC topped the GTX 780 by 1%....

Current-gen Pixels use what Google calls HDR+ with Bracketing, a method that captures several short exposure shots before the shutter press and one long exposure after the shutter press. These frames are then merged using a proprietary algorithm, creating a high dynamic range image with reduced noise in darker areas and no clipped highlights. Staggered HDR improves the time it takes to capture all the different exposures. Instead of taking short and long exposure shots in quick succession, the new technology allows the sensor to capture them simultaneously....

The shutting down of Stadia’s first-party game studio last year strongly hinted at Google’s faltering gaming ambitions with the service. It was also when Google announced that its focus would now be on Stadia’s underlying streaming technology, developing it as a platform to enable white-label deals like the one with AT&T that let wireless subscribers play/stream Batman: Arkham Knight for free. Now, a new report from Business Insider has revealed that Google also pitched this service under a new “Google Stream” label to companies including Peloton, Capcom and Bungie....

By now, it’s no secret the days of highly-profitable GPU mining are behind us. A combination of surging energy prices and a sharp drop in Ethereum’s value has put a damper on many people’s dreams of “printing money” with little effort using consumer hardware that they can always resell to gamers on the second-hand market. At the same time, gamers are reluctant to pay even manufacturer-suggested prices for graphics cards when a new generation is right around the corner....

The patch was in response to a March update to Gran Turismo 7 that had players up in arms because it nerfed the awards on certain races. Fans viewed it as a money grab since many were not thrilled with the forced choice of grinding for 20 hours (average) per legendary car or purchasing hundreds of dollars worth of in-game credits to fill their liveries with expensive exotics. The move caused players to review bomb the game on Metacritic and figure out a way to earn credits while AFK....

Kojima said he could not be specific right now, but pointed to the trailer that just debuted and hinted that there are several clues waiting to be discovered in it. Keighley pointed out a couple of the game’s cast members in attendance before asking how the pandemic impacted Kojima’s storytelling and the theme of the game. Kojima said he had the story written before the pandemic but after experiencing it, he rewrote the whole thing from scratch....