Latest news with #WCCFTech
Yahoo
01-08-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Why Did Micron Stock Drop Today?
Key Points Samsung says the market for HBM memory for artificial intelligence (AI) functions is getting oversupplied. Samsung will cut prices on the most powerful HBM3E product in an attempt to win market share. Wells Fargo says this is bad news for Micron. 10 stocks we like better than Micron Technology › Shares of computer memory-maker Micron Technology (NASDAQ: MU) tumbled 5.2% through 11:25 a.m. ET Thursday -- but as far as I can tell, it wasn't anything Micron did to deserve this. Instead, it was Samsung that's to blame. What Samsung said about high-bandwidth memory (HBM) As WCCFTech reports this morning, Samsung has just announced it's lowering prices on HBM3E (that's "High Bandwidth Memory 3 Enhanced," currently the most capable kind of HBM memory, designed for use in artificial intelligence and machine learning). Samsung explained that on the one hand, it hasn't been able to win as much HBM business from Nvidia (NASDAQ: NVDA) as it would like, while on the other hand, the HBM market seems oversupplied right now. And the solution to both problems -- to help Samsung move product -- is to lower prices. Is Micron stock a sell? For Micron, this poses a problem -- because Micron also wants to sell HBM3E memory, and now Samsung has effectively declared a price war in the HBM market. In order to fight it, Micron will have to lower its own prices (hurting Micron's revenue and profit), or else it will lose market share to Samsung (also hurting Micron's revenue and profit!) And if that sounds like a lose-lose proposition for Micron, that's because it is. In a note on The Fly this morning, Wells Fargo warned that Samsung's action will "impact market prices," drying up much of the premium in prices between HBM3E and plain-vanilla DRAM memory, perhaps as early as H2 2025 (i.e., now). Priced at just 20x trailing earnings, Micron stock may not look too expensive. But if profits are about to dry up as Samsung's price cuts take hold, Micron stock could look expensive in a hurry. Savvy investors might want to sell before that happens. Should you invest $1,000 in Micron Technology right now? Before you buy stock in Micron Technology, consider this: The Motley Fool Stock Advisor analyst team just identified what they believe are the for investors to buy now… and Micron Technology wasn't one of them. The 10 stocks that made the cut could produce monster returns in the coming years. Consider when Netflix made this list on December 17, 2004... if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you'd have $638,629!* Or when Nvidia made this list on April 15, 2005... if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you'd have $1,098,838!* Now, it's worth noting Stock Advisor's total average return is 1,049% — a market-crushing outperformance compared to 182% for the S&P 500. Don't miss out on the latest top 10 list, available when you join Stock Advisor. See the 10 stocks » *Stock Advisor returns as of July 29, 2025 Wells Fargo is an advertising partner of Motley Fool Money. Rich Smith has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Nvidia. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy. Why Did Micron Stock Drop Today? was originally published by The Motley Fool Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
Tom's Guide
17-07-2025
- Tom's Guide
Nvidia wants to make 8GB GPUs great again with AI texture compression — but I'm not convinced
If you're annoyed by just getting 8GB of video memory (VRAM) on your Nvidia RTX 5060 Ti, RTX 5060 or RTX 5050 GPU, there may be a fix coming. And just like a lot of Team Green's work, it's all about AI. In 2025, when plenty of games are requiring more than this from the jump, it's simply not enough (and PC gamers are letting Nvidia and AMD know with their wallets). Which is why Nvidia is looking to neural trickery — it's bread and butter with the likes of DLSS 4 and multi-frame gen. You may already know of Neural Texture Compression (or NTC), which is exactly what it says on the tin: taking those detailed in-game textures and compressing them for efficiency of loading and frame rate. As WCCFTech reports, NTC has seemingly taken another giant step forward by taking advantage of Microsoft's new Cooperative Vector in DirectX Raytracing 1.2 — resulting in one test showing an up-to-90% reduction in VRAM consumption for textures. To someone who is always wanting to make sure people get the best PC gaming bang for their buck, this sounds amazing. But I'm a little weary for three key reasons. As you can see in tests run by Osvaldo Pinali Doederlein on X (using a prerelease driver), this update to make the pipeline of loading textures more efficient with AI is significant. Texture size dropped from 79 MB all the way to just 9 MB — dropping the VRAM consumption by nearly 90%. How does it perform? Disabling v-sync, RTX 5080, demo at the startup position: (explained next tweet)Default: 2,350fps / 9.20MBNo FP8: 2,160fps / 9.20MBNo Int8: 2,350fps / 9.20MBDP4A: 1,030fps / 9.14MBTranscoded: 2,600fps / 79.38MBJuly 15, 2025 Just like DLSS 4 and other technologies extracting a higher frame rate and better graphical fidelity out of RTX 50-series GPUs, NTC requires developers to code it in. Get instant access to breaking news, the hottest reviews, great deals and helpful tips. And while Nvidia is one of the better companies in terms of game support for its AI magic (so far over 125 games support DLSS 4), it's still a relatively small number when you think of the many thousands of PC titles that launch every year. Of course, this is not a burn on Doederlein here. This testing is great! But it is one example that doesn't take into account the broader landscape of challenges that are faced in a game — a test scene of a mask with several different textures isn't the same as rendering an entire level. So while this near-90% number is impressive nonetheless, when put to a far bigger challenge, I anticipate that number will be much lower on average. But when it comes to 8GB GPUs, every little bit helps! So yes, on paper, Nvidia's NTC could be the savior of 8GB GPUs, and it could extract more value from your budget graphics card. But let's address the elephant in the room — graphics cards with this low amount of video memory have been around for years, games in 2025 have proven that it's not enough and neural texture compression looks to me like a sticking plaster. I don't want to ignore the benefits here, though, because any chance to make budget tech even better through software and AI is always going to be a big win for me. But with the ever-increasing demands of developers (especially with Unreal Engine 5 bringing ever-more demanding visual masterpieces like The Witcher 4 to the front), how far can AI compression really go? Follow Tom's Guide on Google News to get our up-to-date news, how-tos, and reviews in your feeds. Make sure to click the Follow button.
Yahoo
19-05-2025
- Yahoo
Asus' New eGPU Dock Uses Thunderbolt 5 for Up to 80Gbps Bandwidth
Asus is driving the concept of external graphics forward with a next-generation design that has everything it needs to support the latest, most capable GPUs from Nvidia and AMD. The ROG XG Station 3 leverages the Thunderbolt 5 interface to deliver up to 80Gbps bandwidth, allowing connected GPUs to run at almost the same speeds as those plugged natively into a standard high-end desktop. This raises the potential performance of lightweight, portable laptops that can use a static GPU dock like this for high-end gaming when needed. Shown off at Computex in Taipei, the Asus ROG XG Station 3 Dock really doubles down on the idea of an external GPU, by having the graphics card be external to the dock itself. It sits on top of it, plugged into a top-mounted PCI Express slot. It's not entirely clear from WCCFTech's images where the card's power cables are, but it's possible they've been left unattached for aesthetic reasons. The system itself has a mains power connection, with the body of the eGPU dock housing the power supply. That's of an unknown wattage, too, though likely in excess of the 600W used in previous generations of the dock. Credit: Asus/WCCFTech Asus has some graphs showing the performance of an RTX 4090 using the XG Station 3. In these first-party tests, the card performs almost as well as when it is plugged straight into a desktop PC's motherboard. As impressive as that is, though, it's arguably more important to see the comparison with the mobile RTX 4090 GPU—otherwise one of the fastest graphics solutions for mobile computing. This is all made possible thanks to the 80 Gbps Thunderbolt 5 connection, we're told. That upgrade from Thunderbolt 4 may be less impactful for weaker GPUs, but certainly for high-end cards, the added bandwidth makes a difference. The difference with even more powerful GPUs, like the RTX 5090 and mobile 5090, would presumably be even more pronounced. Although showcased with a last-generation card, Asus has confirmed this new dock is fully compatible with the RTX 50-series GPUs, including the 5090, and AMD's RX 9000 series cards, like the 9070 XT. Elsewhere, the dock adds some additional connectivity for connected laptops, including three USB-C 10 Gbps connections. That could be good for connecting a keyboard and mouse, letting users with highly portable laptops used for work sit down at a desk, plug into the eGPU dock, and play games with an already-connected set of gaming peripherals.
