General Gaming Article |
- Newegg Daily Deals: MSI 970 Gaming AM3+ Mobo, Asus Core i7 Laptop, and More!
- AMD's Working on Beta Catalyst Drivers to Solve Hairworks Issue in Witcher 3
- Consumers Continue to Buy Chromebooks as Secondary PCs, Enterprise Still Uninterested
- Razer's Firefly Hard Gaming Mouse Mat Brings the LED Bling
| Newegg Daily Deals: MSI 970 Gaming AM3+ Mobo, Asus Core i7 Laptop, and More! Posted: 21 May 2015 02:48 PM PDT Top Deal: Going the budget route on your next build? In that case, AMD might be calling your name. The question is, where should you start? If you're stumped, then check out today's top deal for an MSI 970 Gaming AM3+ Motherboard for $76.49 with free shipping (normally $99.99 - use coupon code: [AFEX150515]). This board boasts USB 3.0 connectivity, Killer Gigabit LAN, half a dozen SATA 6Gbps ports, and lots more. Other Deals: Mushkin Enhanced ECO2 MKNSSDEC240GB 2.5-inch 240GB SATA III MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD) for $87.99 with free shipping (normally $99.99) MSI Z97 Gaming 5 LGA 1150 Intel Z97 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard for $134.99 with free shipping (normally $149.99) Asus N56JK-DB72 Gaming Laptop Intel Core i7 4710HQ (2.50GHz) 12GB Memory 1TB HDD for $949 with free shipping (normally $1049) WD 2TB WD Elements Portable USB 3.0 Hard Drive Storage (WDBU6Y0020BBK-NESN) for $84.99 with free shipping (normally $109.99 - use coupon code: [0521USMDM31]) |
| AMD's Working on Beta Catalyst Drivers to Solve Hairworks Issue in Witcher 3 Posted: 21 May 2015 10:58 AM PDT Fixing a hairy situationThere have been complaints that enabling Nvidia's proprietary Hairworks technology in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt results in what seems like an unnecessary hit on performance, in particular on AMD Radeon graphics cards. Well, there's good news, both from developer and publisher CD Projeckt Red and AMD. CD Projeckt Red will release a patch today for the PC version that aims to improve stability and performance in both cutscenes and gameplay, fix a bunch of bugs, and improve Hairworks performance (a patch for consoles is coming soon). Here's a full list of what the patch brings to the table:
Good stuff, right? Well, we'll have to wait and see how it affects AMD Radeon graphics card owners, and if you're one of them, don't despair. AMD said it's working on a beta driver release that will improve performance in both Witcher 3 and Project CARS. It will be available "soon," though in the meantime, AMD posted some tips on how to deal with performance issues specifically related to Hairworks in Witcher 3. |
| Consumers Continue to Buy Chromebooks as Secondary PCs, Enterprise Still Uninterested Posted: 21 May 2015 10:29 AM PDT The platform that refuses to go awayChromebooks received a lukewarm reception when Google introduced them several years ago, though in more recent times, they've grown in popularity. Education remains the primary market for Chromebooks, followed by home consumers looking for a second system. Businesses aren't all that big on Chrome OS, but even with limited contribution from the enterprise market, Chromebook sales in 2015 are expected to rise 27 percent year-over-year, Gartner says. Around the world, Gartner reckons Chromebook sales will reach 7.3 million units. That's not a very big number in the grand scheme of things, but what's interesting to note is the growing interest -- these cloud based systems are slowly capturing more market share rather than fading away in the wake of lower priced Windows laptops. In the U.S., the education segment accounted for 60 percent of Chromebook sales last year, while home consumers approached 40 percent. Other businesses made up just over 1 percent of Chromebook sales. "The majority of Chromebook users are tech-savvy individuals who purchase one as a companion device to their primary notebook or desktop PC. Others are buying a Chromebook for the household to use as a second low-cost PC alternative," said Isabelle Durand, principal analyst at Gartner. "The major factors that affect the adoption of Chromebooks by consumers remain the connectivity issue in emerging markets, but also the ability for users to understand and get used to cloud-based applications, and keep content in the cloud and ecosystem," Durand added. North America is where the bulk of Chromebooks end up -- 84 percent of them, Gartner says. Part of the reason for that could be that Samsung exited the European Chromebook market so that it could focus on tablets. |
| Razer's Firefly Hard Gaming Mouse Mat Brings the LED Bling Posted: 21 May 2015 08:53 AM PDT Let there be lightShow of hands, how many of you always wished for a mouse mat with LED lighting? Anyone? We're willing to bet that the majority never even thought of such a thing, but Razer did, and the result is the Firefly, a hard gaming mouse mat infused with the company's Chroma lighting feature. Razer equipped the Firefly with lighting along its left, right, and bottom borders. The three zones are customizable with up to 16.8 million color options and various lighting effects like reactive, wave, and spectrum -- the same ones found on Razer's Chroma-enabled keyboards. Speaking of which, you can sync Firefly with other Chroma devices. The mouse mat itself features a micro-textured finish that's supposed to offer a balance between control and speed. It has a reflective surface that's been optimized for precise mouse movements and rapid in-game responsiveness, Razer says. Razer intends to include Firefly in its Chroma SDK, which will give game developers the ability to incorporate custom lighting effects into their game. For example, a developer could make it so that your Chroma devices flash incessantly when a bomb goes off near you, or turn red when your in-game health is in critical condition. The Firefly runs $60 and is available to pre-order now; it will ship in June. |
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