Welcome back friends of the channel for this week’s edition of news from around the PC world!
It has certainly been a week of ups and downs along with some excellent product releases
on the mobile front from the likes of AMD. To start things off I'll cover Best Buy being super
scummy, or just being a dummy, when they decided to lock high-end graphics card purchases behind
a subscription paywall. Also, Intel revealed a ton of information on its upcoming roadmap,
but we’re going to zero in on the Arc information. Crucial has put the
kibosh on a fan-favorite brand and it’s quite sad to see it go. And I’ll wrap up
on how the launch of the new AMD Ryzen 6000 Series mobile parts was received.
Whew, that’s a good bit to get through today so let’s not waste any more time, shall we?
Look, getting graphics cards for anywhere near MSRP is still a nearly fruitless effort. Yes,
I get it, some folks out there have had the opportunity to pick up cards at that
coveted MSRP, and kudos to you. I recently got my notification from EVGA to get an RTX 3060 Black,
but I passed as I no longer need it. Unfortunately
many would have picked it up and flipped it. It’s just the reality.
So who could blame Best Buy for finding ways to keep the prices reasonable,
right? Well, up until recently I would have applauded Best Buy for the regular GPU drops,
but now it seems that’s a thing of the past.
Have you heard of Best Buy’s “Totaltech Perks Program”? Well if you haven’t you’ll need to
get really familiar with it if you’re wanting to buy high-end graphics cards.
And guess what? It’s only $200 to be a member *queue eye roll*
As Micheal Crider pointed out in his article, on the surface it sounds almost like a good idea. Pay
$200 so you can buy a $500 at that price rather than a “Third-party” $1000 and save $300. But
it’s the precedent that is garbage. Not to mention it gives scalpers a front-row ticket. I personally
just left a local PC gaming group because one guy was using this to try and flip GPUs, all with Best
Buy picked up tags still on the box mind you, for still double the MSRP and claiming he was trying
to ‘help people’. He can get out of here with that and so can Best Buy, you dollar sucking monsters.
Continuing in the world of graphics cards, we have the upcoming Intel Arc. No matter
where you sit on the fanboy wars you can’t deny the anticipation so many people have
for a third contender in the graphics card space and it’s almost time. I mean, how does
“More than 4 million discrete Arc GPUs in 2022” sound? Sounds like music to my ears if you ask me.
We still have time before the actual launch of the Intel Arc Alchemist line of graphics cards,
but roadmaps are for what’s on the horizon, not what’s on deck. So it was reassuring to see Intel
speak confidently regarding the next wave of its gaming graphics cards, called ‘Battlemage’.
Intel spoke about how it will feature a ‘tiled architecture’ and will be working its way from
the enthusiast-class down to integrated GPU on the Meteor Lake CPUs that will be launching in 2023.
Of course, roadmaps are always subject to change, and the last two years have
proven that more than ever. I was honestly hoping to see Alchemist in our midst by now
but we’re still going to have to wait a bit. Intel wouldn’t spill the beans on that date,
or who would be making the AIB cards. But, Intel does have more than 50 design wins
for the Alchemist lineup so fingers crossed for wide availability and good performance.
This bit of news is fairly sad, mostly because it does hold a special place in my PC building
history. It's also a brand I’ve seen work with some wonderful people like Shellback Tech who
has been delivering custom-built PCs free of charge to disabled veterans and first responders.
But if you haven’t heard by now then let me be the one to break the news:
Crucial has decided to bring its iconic Ballistix RAM line to an end.
So, no more chances of Ballistix Tracer memory, a pioneer in flashy memory modules. But Crucial
will continue on offering memory to businesses at a commercial level. My
guess would be it’s simply a more lucrative and efficient way to keep business solvent.
It’s easier to package 100 modules in one order than shipping 50 pairs
stuffed into expensive blister packaging to 20 different vendors. Still sad to see in my opinion.
I tell you what, if the last bit of news wasn’t a culmination of all these topics
I don’t know what would be. I'm talking about none other than the
drop of the AMD Ryzen 6000 Mobile CPUs to the computing world. These
parts dropped like a fat stack of hotcakes on a Sunday morning at the breakfast table.
I feel like this has honestly been one of the most well-received launches in the mobile world
for quite some time. Reviews went live just a few days ago and what people are saying is quite
encouraging for those in the market for a new laptop. Our very own Gordon Mah Ung got his hands
on the ASUS Zephyrus G14 featuring the Ryzen 9 6900HS and he called it “Game-changing performance
for tiny laptops”. As an OG Zephyrus owner myself I’m certainly eyeballing an upgrade.
The Ryzen 6000 mobile parts are all based on the Zen 3+ architecture manufactured
on the 6nm node. For now, they come in either a 6 core 12 thread or 8 core
16 thread arrangement with DDR5 support. But the big kicker is the sunsetting of Vega for the iGPU
and moving to RDNA2 integrated graphics. While I’m personally excited to see the kind of performance
laid down by the new chips, I’m holding off until I can get a solid option without a
discrete graphics card. Thinner, lighter, and even longer battery life, sign me up.
And with that, I’m going to sign out of this week and leave everyone to do what they do. To wrap up,
we saw Best Buy being a bad buy for locking high-end graphics cards behind a paywall. We
got some insight on where the future of Intel Arc is headed. Crucial put to bed one of the
most recognizable memory brands. And AMD had a successful launch of the Ryzen 6000 Mobile CPUs.
I want to thank you all for being here again and as always, if there’s something more important
than what I covered this week (like how Newegg updated its open-box return policy after Gamers
Nexus came down hard on them) then put that down in the comment section to share with us
and the rest of our friends of the channel. While you’re down there let me know what you
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