APC July 2020

It’s on again. Intel vs AMD. The world is back to normal. Phew. I’ve missed this… As Chris discovered through his long hours of testing fore this issue, Intel has indeed come back into the fight – though it’s not a ‘win’. Taking the lead in a few games with the usual single-digit percentage nose ahead isn’t decisive, and for multi-core productivity work Intel is still playing catchup. Still stuck on the 14nm node, and still with an albeit evolved Skylake core that’s been with us since the 6th gen, Intel has taken the relatively obvious route of cranking up the clocks with new and aggressive Turbo modes. “There are many that have looked past AMD’s Ryzen and Threadripper range thinking all the noise coming from enthusiasts around the world,…

Full version worth $40 Live inside your media Go surround sound with Ashampoo Soundstage 2020. Download link: Visit www.ashampoo.com/lpa/apc to access the link Looking for ways to enjoy surround sound through your PC headphones? Ashampoo Soundstage Pro 2020 makes it possible. The software converts existing 5.1, 6.1 and 7.1 instantly into binaural stereo and sends it to your headphones so you can get a true surround experience without expensive hardware. Whether you’re watching movies, listening to music, or playing 3D games, Ashampoo Soundstage Pro 2020 provides a nuanced audio experience comparable to that of a genuine surround sound system, but with customisable room settings for subtle fine-tuning. In addition, built-in presets for several headphones provide optimal settings instantly for popular models. Full version worth $50 Protect your precious files Go…

APC is Australia’s oldest consumer technology magazine – having been consistently in print for forty years, since our first issue way back in May 1980 – and we take that heritage and responsibility very seriously. While our focus is obviously on the personal computer the very definition of the PC has changed and shifted markedly since the early 1980s. As such, we touch on many other areas of tech, too, from smartphones and apps to peripherals, accessories, and beyond. We have two goals: to find the best modern tech and to help you make the most of it. We’re also an open church in terms of platforms. We know most people aren’t wed to a single brand’s products and use a variety of devices. And, like you, APC’s journalists want…

Microsoft announces massive AI supercomputer CLAIMS TOP 5 RANKING. Microsoft has announced it’s built a supercomputer hosted in its Azure cloud services, which it claims is among the top five supercomputers in the world. The announcement came at its Build 2020 developer conference in May, being hosted online due to COVID-19. The supercomputer was built for OpenAI, a San Francisco-based artificial intelligence lab, and should be able to train large-scale AI models and make the framework for training them available to more developers. Microsoft’s computer is a system with “more than 285,000 CPU cores, 10,000 GPUs and 400 gigabits per second of network connectivity for each GPU server.” That’s enough, the company says, to rank among the top five in the TOP500 supercomputers list of the most powerful in the…

Intel has acquired a rival in the Wi-Fi space. It purchased Rivet Networks, which makes the Killer-branded Wi-Fi cards and ethernet in gaming laptops from Alienware, Dell, Lenovo, HP and more. No price was disclosed when Intel announced the news via press release. The Rivet Networks team will join Intel’s wireless solutions group, a subset of Intel’s client computing group. Intel will roll the Killer brand into its own Wi-Fi lineup. Rivet also produced the Killer-branded software that minimised latency and allowed users to prioritise which software got access to bandwidth. “Intel will continue to sell Rivet Networks’ software technologies and the Killer line of products to customers,” an Intel spokesperson told Tom’s Hardware. “Intel plans to continue the vast majority of Rivet Networks’ existing products and services. Some minor…

Epic Games recently showed off its new Unreal Engine 5 demo, which blew us away with its impressive graphics. Running on an AMD RDNA-infused PlayStation 5 (PS5) it made console gaming – or at least its future – look exciting and promising. And just in time for the PS5 vs. Xbox Series X next-gen console war to start raging. But what about the best gaming PCs? Did Unreal’s demo prove that consoles are finally clawing their way to the gaming throne? We wouldn’t bank on it yet. World Today News quoted Epic Games CTO Kim Libreri as saying the awe-inspiring demo will work “pretty good” on a PC running an Nvidia GeForce RTX 2070 Super graphics card. You’d also need a good NVMe SSD, (the PS5 also has an SSD).…