Bitcoin crackdown sends graphics cards prices plummeting in China after Sichuan terminated mining operations

https://www.scmp.com/tech/policy/article/3138130/bitcoin-crackdown-sends-graphics-cards-prices-plummeting-china-after



Get your wallets ready bois!

Holy shit, there's more folks playing Starbound than BFV and CS Source...

Like I haven't touched the game since last year, but I'm still amazed that there's this many ppl still playing the game, despite the fact that Chucklefish abandoned it since 2017 (in order to act as their own publisher and pub other indies). There's still tons of workshop mod content to last anyone years though.

FSR reviews are out

The jist is that it depends on the game but Ultra Quality settings always look close to Native when upscaling to 4k while giving you 40-50% performance boost in Godfall with Ray Tracing enabled on a 6800XT. The rest of the settings heavily varies. On certain games like Anno where there isn't much motion, you can get away with Quality and lower settings. But with games like Godfall where there's lots of details, motion and etc, it gets noticeable. Upscaling to 1440p and lower is where it starts to fall apart. Ultra Quality upscaled to 1440p still looks good but anything below is a no thanks situation unless you are desperate for performance. It looks better than lower resolution in every instance though. It is also very easy to implement.

So overall, DLSS 2.0 > FSR > DLSS 1.0

Good first attempt but I'd like to see FSR being compared against other Temporal Upscaling Solutions instead of just against Native. But it is a good performance boost that will work with a ton of GPUs. If the game supports DLSS 2.0 or higher and you have RTX card, you should obviously go with that but for everyone else, FSR is a good alternative mainly at 4k.

Mining demand is strongly going down due to crackdowns in China. I think it's far more probable that the supply in Nvidia GPUs rose simply because it's main customers now broke away due to the crackdowns.

Interesting how the US are barely affected so far. According the PCPartPicker, AMD GPU prices peaked a couple weeks ago (apart from the 6700XT who just came out) and are now somewhat cheaper, while NVidia cards are all still around their peak price. Most notably down are however the old Polaris GPUs (RX 570 and 580), who really rose to ludicrous prices ( average prices for a 570 rose to $500+, 580 even over $800. The RX 580 cost about as much as an RX 6800 non-XT at the same time, which is also at ~$800) and now are finally sliding down.

In other news

AMD ends driver support for Radeon 200, 300 and Fury series

https://videocardz.com/newz/amd-ends-driver-support-for-radeon-200-300-and-fury-series

Surprised they dropped 300/Fury when Nvidia is still supporting Maxwell. Especially as Fury was released in 2015 where as Maxwell was released in 2014.

TSMC to Prioritize Chip Orders for Apple Due to the Ongoing Shortage

https://wccftech.com/tsmc-prioritize-chip-orders-for-apple/

Intel Notebook Market Share Could Shrink To 80% As Apple Reportedly Planning To Cut 50% Of Orders

https://wccftech.com/intel-notebook-market-share-could-shrink-to-80-as-apple-reportedly-planning-to-cut-50-of-orders/

How the mighty have fallen

Intel to Adopt SiFive's New High-Performance P550 RISC-V Cores With 7nm Platform

https://www.tomshardware.com/news/intel-to-adopt-sifives-new-high-performance-p550-risc-v-cores

Tuesday news:

SALES /PLAYER COUNT & DEALS

NieR Automata & NieR Replicant ver.1.22474487139… have shipped 6 and 1 million copies, respectively
https://www.dsogaming.com/news/nier-automata-nier-replicant-ver-1-22474487139-have-shipped-7-and-1-million-copies-respectively/
Square Enix today announced that the worldwide shipments and digital sales of NieR Replicant ver.1.22474487139… have surpassed one million units. In addition, the company announced that NieR Automata has over six million shipments and digital sales.
Furthermore, the Steam version of NieR Replicant ver.1.22474487139… recently received a digital update that optimizes the game’s performance on PC. Not only that, but Square Enix plans to release a new update for NieR Automata that will improve performance and will remove Denuvo.

Steam has two new deals and the weeklong deals... which is curious given that the Summer Sale will start this Thursday. Anyway:

• The daily deal is ATOM RPG Trudograd, still in Early Access and 25% off: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1139940/ATOM_RPG_Trudograd/
• Predator: Hunting Grounds is 50% off until Thursday: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1556200/Predator_Hunting_Grounds/
• ... Normally you'd expect to see a small sample of those weeklong deals in here, but 1) there are so little of them; 2) very, very few of them have enough reviews to know if they're good or not; 3) and a lot of them have the same theme. Because of that, it's better that you take a look by yourselves.

The Humble Store has three new sales:

• The Mortal Kombat Franchise Sale comes with up to 80% discounts during the next 3 days: https://www.humblebundle.com/store/promo/mortal-kombat-franchise-sale/
• The Sandbox Sale comes with up to 75% deals during the next 6 days. The keys are for Steam, GOG and/or EGS: https://www.humblebundle.com/store/promo/sandbox-games-sale/
• And the Pride Month Sale brings up to 80% discounts during the next 6 days. The keys are for Steam and/or GOG: https://www.humblebundle.com/store/promo/pride-month-sale/

Fanatical has a new bundle and three flash sales from the Summer Scorcher Sale:

• The first flash sale is It Takes Two, 35% off during the next 24 hours. The key is for Origin: https://www.fanatical.com/en/game/it-takes-two
• The Jackbox Party Pack 7 is the second one,with a 45% discount: https://www.fanatical.com/en/game/the-jackbox-party-pack-7
• And the third flash sale is Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon Breakpoint - Ultimate Edition, 82% off and for UPlay: https://www.fanatical.com/en/game/tom-clancy-s-ghost-recon-breakpoint-ultimate-edition
• And the new bundle is the Build Your Own Hidden Object Bundle 2, with 18 games to build your 1, 5 or 10 games bundle during the next 14 days: https://www.fanatical.com/en/pick-and-mix/build-your-own-hidden-object-bundle-2

SOFTWARE & DRIVERS

AMD Radeon Software Adrenalin 21.6.1 released, adds official support for FidelityFX Super Resolution
https://www.dsogaming.com/news/amd-radeon-software-adrenalin-21-6-1-released-adds-official-support-for-fidelityfx-super-resolution/
AMD has released a brand new driver for its graphics cards. According to the red team, the AMD Radeon Software Adrenalin 21.6.1 driver adds official support for FidelityFX Super Resolution for select titles.
In addition, this driver adds support for the AMD Radeon RX 6800M GPU and Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance.
Moreover, this new driver fixes a number of bugs and issues. For instance, it fixes a crash in Anno 1800 upon launching the game when running DirectX 12. It also resolves a crash that could occur when enabling Ray Tracing in Ring of Elysium on DirectX 12.
>> Available from here.

Unreal Engine 5 adds official support for NVIDIA’s DLSS tech
https://www.dsogaming.com/news/unreal-engine-5-adds-official-support-for-nvidia-dlss-tech/
NVIDIA has announced that Unreal Engine 5 now officially supports its DLSS tech. This basically means that developers can use both UE5’s Super Resolution, as well as DLSS. Furthermore, and from what we know so far, there are no plans for native support of AMD’s FidelityFX Super Resolution.

MODS, EMULATORS & FAN PROJECTS

Grand Theft Auto 5 looks glorious in 8K with Ray Tracing Reshade & Mods
https://www.dsogaming.com/pc-performance-analyses/grand-theft-auto-5-8k-ray-tracing-reshade-mods/
Digital Dreams has shared a new video, showcasing Grand Theft Auto 5 running in 8K on an NVIDIA RTX 3090. Alongside the QuantV and GTA5 Real Life Pack, Digital Dreams also used Ray Tracing Reshade in order to enhance the game’s visuals. The end result is what we’d expect from a new remaster of GTA5 for current-gen systems.
Now the good news here is that QuantV is available for free, and you can download it from here. As for Raytracing Reshade, you can gain access to it by supporting Pascal “Marty McFly” Gilcher on Patreon. GTA5 Real Life Pack adds real-life cars and objects, so you can basically skip that mod.

GAMING NEWS

Bloodborne Remaster rumors re-surface, coming this year on PS5 and later on PC
https://www.dsogaming.com/news/bloodborne-remaster-rumors-re-surface-coming-this-year-on-ps5-and-later-on-pc/
Back in June 2020, we reported on a rumor suggesting that Bloodborne was coming to PC. And now, almost a year after that rumor, a new rumor surfaced. This latest rumor suggests that Bloodborne Remaster will come out on PS5 this year, and later on PC.
>> Once again with this rumor.

Battlefield 2042’s secret game mode may be called Battlehub, first details
https://www.dsogaming.com/pc-performance-analyses/battlefield-2042-secret-game-mode-battlehub-first-details/
Tom Henderson, a well-known Battlefield and Call of Duty leaker, has revealed the secret game mode that will be in Battlefield 2042. According to Henderson, this mode is called Battlehub and will be the ultimate sandbox experience, with remastered maps from previous Battlefield games.

Part two of the news:

Rust is getting a free Nvidia DLSS performance uplift in July
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/rust-dlss-support/
Nvidia is bringing DLSS—Deep Learning Super Sampling—to Rust early next month, along with a bundle of other games.
DLSS support for the survival game rolls in on July 1. It accompanies Nvidia Reflex, which was added back in May to help reduce system latency. The update should be a nice performance boost to players in what has traditionally been a bit of a poorly optimised game.

This genre-bender is a creepy marriage of Factorio and Don't Starve
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/this-genre-bender-is-a-creepy-marriage-of-factorio-and-dont-starve/
In Atrio: The Dark Wild you're an android in an abandoned, neon cyber city. Everything is dark, the city is filled with rogue, vicious cyborg animals, and you need to get the lights back on. It's an open world survival crafting game fused with an automation-factory building game. Also, because it's about horrible dog-things with pusher plates for heads pouncing out of the darkness to murder you, you're likely to get spooked at least once.

Fortnite is throwing another concert, this time at London's O2 Arena
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/fortnite-is-throwing-another-concert-this-time-at-londons-o2-arena/
More gigs are coming to Fortnite, this time in a virtual O2 London Arena.
The venue has been constructed in Fortnite Creative as part of a "week-long celebration" in collaboration between Epic, O2 and Island Records. It's a surprisingly faithful recreation from the outside, though the interior has been hammed up in typical Fortnite fashion. There's a bundle of secret rooms to explore, along with challenges to complete throughout the week.

Tetris Effect: Connected will become a free upgrade, get crossplay
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/tetris-effect-connected-will-become-a-free-upgrade-get-crossplay/
When Tetris Effect: Connected, the multiplayer upgrade to Tetris Effect, launched last November, it was only available to new adopters—you either had to purchase a new copy of Tetris Effect or download the game via Game Pass. This summer Tetris Effect: Connected will finally turn into a free upgrade for all players regardless of platform. Furthermore, it will also launch on Steam in late July.

Thanks for posting. Looks like the results are better than expected, mostly because we expected it to be garbage and it's not so bad.

I have no doubt that the recent problems with mining have a bigger impact than the limited GPUs from Nvidia did, but it's also easy to see that Nvidia prices are falling faster than AMD ones. And that faster fall could be caused, in part, because of the mining cards that are now being sold to gamers have to compete with the cheaper capped cards, resulting in that faster price drop.

FSR ultra quality sounds promising for consoles displaying near 4K quality while running internally at around 1440p requirements.

Disgusting 30 fps, begone!

Ah didn't know FSR reviews are today.. Gotta say, was expecting much worst results. On Ultra at 1440P and above it looks very passable indeed.

Nice, quite impressed tbh. Not bad free performance boost. Also interested to see the results and performance VS DLSS if there are any games that support both FSR and DLSS.