Ambient Irony

Sunday, April 19

Daily News Stuff 19 April 2026

Nova Terra Edition

How bad are things for PC gaming right now? The most anticipated products for 2026 are relaunches of AMD's 5800X3D CPU, which first appeared in 2022, and Nvidia's RTX 3060 graphics cards, which originally came out in 2021. (WCCFTech)

The 5800X3D has AMD's 3D-Vcache, so while it uses DDR4 memory it doesn't lose a lot of speed from it. And the 3060 has 12GB of memory, so in that respect it is better than current low-end cards.
Also relaunching this year after a long time away is SNK's Neo Geo console. (Tom's Hardware)

If you missed out on this the first time because you couldn't afford the price tag or weren't yet born in 1991, the updated version will slash the cost from $649 to $249. And $649 in 1991 dollars is over $1500 today, so that's a heck of a discount.

And while there are some modern conveniences like HDMI video and a rechargeable wireless option for the controllers, this is not emulated - not in software or in hardware. They actually spent the money for a new production run of the custom chips, and it's fully compatible with the original controllers and cartridges.

And there are ten of the original games back as well. You can pre-order the whole lot - console, controllers, and the ten game cartridges - for $1000.

The same company is also behind an Amiga 1200 reproduction and a number of other classic systems.

Which is the best $200 CPU right now - AMD's 9600X or Intel's new Core Ultra 250K? (Tom's Hardware)

Ignoring the platform expiry elephant in the room for the moment, the 250K is a clear winner. For gaming it's a very close match, and while the 250K can use almost twice as much power in multi-threaded tasks, it is also almost twice as fast in multi-threaded tasks, so that's honestly a win too.

The problem comes if you plan to upgrade your system in the future. AMD plans at least one and probably two new generations of processors in the AM5 socket, while Intel's Socket 1851 disappears later this year with the introduction of Nova Lake and its Socket 1954.
China's CXMT is rescuing LPDDR4 customers abandoned by Samsung. (WCCFTech)

CXMT, like Taiwan's Nanya, mostly still produces DDR4 memory, which Samsung is dropping as it shifts capacity to higher-margin chips like HBM for AI.

But LPDDR4 is very widely used in products from lower-cost phones and tables, to SSDs, to embedded cards like the Raspberry Pi.
Memory prices rose 110% and SSD prices 147% in Q1. (WCCFTech)

Despite that computer sales actually rose slightly, as customers panic-bought everything in sight. Not that you would catch me doing that. Not since I ran out of money, anyway.

Huh. Postmodern Jukebox is performing at the Sydney Opera House in July. Almost enough to get me to make the trip.

Disclaimer: The fire extinguisher on the piano shows they were practising safe sax.

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