Evga Geforce GT 640

Core Specs

• 384 CUDA Cores
• GPU Clock: 901 MHz
• Bus: PCI-E 3.0¹
• Texture Fill Rate: 28.8 GT/s

Memory Specs

• Memory Detail: 2048 MB DDR3
• Memory Bit Width: 128 Bit
• Memory Clock: 1782 MHz
• Memory Bandwidth: 28.5 GB/sec

Key Features

• NVIDIA SMX Engine
• NVIDIA Adaptive Vertical Sync
• NVIDIA Surround
• Supports three concurrent displays; two dual-link DVI connectors, one Mini HDMI
• Microsoft DirectX 11 with Direct Compute 5.0 support
• NVIDIA PhysX Technology
• NVIDIA 3D Vision Ready**
• NVIDIA CUDA Technology
• PCI Express 3.0 Support
• OpenGL 4.2 Support
• OpenCL Support

Evga Power Bundle

Ultimate Power Bundle

Looking for a sweet deal on a brand new EVGA GeForce GTX 690, and an EVGA Classified SR-2 motherboard? You have come to the right place! EVGA is giving you the opportunity to snag both of these for only $1,449.99... $100 off MSRP! Quantity is VERY limited so it is first come, first served.

Corsair 3GHz DDR3 This Summer

Corsair Memory introduced its original Dominator-series of memory modules back in 2006 to coincide with the launch of Intel Core 2 Duo and Core 2 Quad microprocessors. The Dominator modules quickly became popular for their high performance, reliability, overclockability and wide availability worldwide. This summer, Corsair plans to revolutionize the memory market once again with the Dominator Platinum family of products.
Corsair Dominator Platinum DDR3 memory modules will use a new printed  board (PCB) with internal cooling planes/layers as well as external copper thermal pads that are specifically tailored to install specials DHX (dual-path heat exchange) aluminum fins that dissipate the heat absorbed by the PCB. The Dominator Platinum modules will also continue to use aluminum heat-spreaders installed onto memory chips themselves. In a bid to make Dominator Platinum even more desired by performance enthusiasts and PC modders, Corsair will equip them with special light bars and light pipes that can be customized to change the look of memory modules. Finally, the Dominator Platinum will support Corsair Link technology that allows to precisely monitor and control their operation.

Among the first offerings in the Corsair Dominator Platinum family will be DDR3 memory modules based on latest-generation 4Gb memory chips rated to run at whopping 3.0GHz. The first breed of modules will also include various dual-channel and quad-channel options for Intel Core i-series 3000 microprocessors running on Z77 (LGA1156) and X79 (LGA2011) platforms that support Intel XMP 1.3 profiles, according to an ad published in a fresh issue of Computer Power User magazine. The new modules will also be compatible with other DDR3 platforms from AMD and Intel.

In the recent years Corsair's rivals started to catch up with the Dominator-series modules in terms of speed. For example, the first 3000MHz memory modules were announced several weeks ago. But with all the advancements made to cooling system and PCB, the Dominator Platinum will not bring just new speed bins to the Dominator family, but will enable further overclocking potential for those looking forward performance records.
But while Corsair Dominator may be described as unmatched in terms of performance, reliability, overclocking potential and other characteristic, there is just one that clearly does not describe this family: affordability, the modules made to perform do cost a lot. Expect in stores this summer

Max Payne 3 Hands On

It’s almost surreal if you really stop to think about it. We’ve been waiting for a new Max Payne game since Fall of Max Payne, which if I recall correctly was all the way back in 2003. And all those nine years later, this game shows up. To say it’s a step above what we had with the series before would be a textbook understatement. To say it’s the best Max Payne game yet – well, obviously that’s up for debate, but for me this is a foregone conclusion. Then again, it isn’t exactly fair, as the new release has several generations of technology separating it from the previous entries, not to mention a lot of progress made by games as far as story telling and direction are concerned.

Good old Max, looking grimmer than ever, minus Sam Lake's notorious grin, thankfully...

On PC, Max Payne 3 is a proper DX11 product, although it does suffer from that annoying tendency to have the in-engine cutscenes look a lot worse than the game proper. At any rate, if you like handsome graphics, this may not be the pack leader per se, but it’s a decidedly nice-looking game with some very decent DX11 implementation.

Nice vistas, overlooking the different sides of Sao Paolo. You can expect much more human commentary in this game than was in the other two.

The options are not super-detailed, but give enough control over your experience to make it clear you’re playing this on PC rather than console. The one thing that did bother me is that you can’t get to the options screen when starting the game as far as I could tell, as you are basically forced to sit through the opening cinematic. You also have to sign up for Rockstar’s Social Club in order to activate and play Max Payne 3. This gives us access to very detailed stats and of course the more in-depth aspects of the multiplayer, but does require one more password to remember, handing over your details, etc. etc. Rockstar games were awesome before without asking us to do this, and I’m not entirely sure it’s necessary now.

Yes, Max now has the ability to aim more or less down the sights

In the build up to the launch over the last year or so, somewhat of a debate arose whether or not this is a legitimate Max Payne title. If the dark streets of NYC are nowhere to be seen, and if there’s no snow or rain, then surely it’s not Max Payne I think anyone who sees it like that is quite wrong, and I’ve already stated my assertion that to me this is the finest release in the franchise. First of all, the writing is good, with sarcastic/deadpan delivery coming in thick and fast. And you know it’s Max Payne alright when you hear that good old mob-movie music playing over the title screen. In case you were worried, James McCaffrey is back as the voice  of Max Payne, and he sounds just like he did back in the first two outings.

Let's not forget the new cover mechanic. Note the detailed DX11 tessellation on Max's suit.

There are plenty of characters about, all of them very well done with superb capture and voice acting. You will soon come to like your partner Raul Passos (performed by Julian Dean), and many of the the other characters. Since Max finds himself primarily in Sao Paolo this time, it’s quite commendable that supporting and background characters do speak Portuguese, although overall the major dialog does go to English. The story is told “live” rather than via graphic novel style, and Max doesn’t sound like a poet anymore – he talks like a real person instead of going on about rain pouring from the skies like sheets of lead, a damp cold chill descending on my soul. Well, that may not be an accurate quote but you know what I mean.

Environmental deformation is quite nicely done

I don’t want to give the story away and I only did play the first two hours or so, but suffice it to say Max has seen better days. He’s still the same ascerbic character, but has more depth and emotion now, getting drunk, smoking, even openly crying right in front of us. To say he’s down on his luck would not be accurate – Max is definitely in his element here. But the years have taken their toll on him. For anyone who’s never played the first two games, the story won’t be a problem. You can hop in and enjoy it on its own, though many of the references will be lost on you. Come to think of it, it’s not made immediately clear why Max ended up in Brazil, but I’m guessing that exposition comes later in the story.

Max together with his cool new partner, Raul Passos

As far as action goes, this is basically a mix between classic Max Payne and your typical third-person cover shooter. Bullet time is back, and can be activated either on its own or by going into one of Max’s bullet opera dives. The world is riddled with convenient stuff to take cover behind, which I’m sure many purists may find quite annoying. I mean, Max needs a cover mechanic? Personally I think he does, as this is a tough game. Even on normal, you get blown away by the many hundreds of opponets often. They are more bullet-spongy than the baddies in the first two titles, which can be odd at times. But a headshot is still a headshot.

Who quickly proves himself one of the most likable and competent shooter NPCs ever

As a whole, cover and aiming work well, but can be a tad too sticky and slightly inconsistent at times. There’s more variety to the settings, sniping from a helicopter, and lots of shaky cam, making Max Payne 3 somewhat reminiscent of Kane and Lynch 2, which is ironic because the latter was essentially an ode to the original Max Payne games.

Naturally there has to be a nightclub scene

You should definitely get back on the Payne train for this one. Shooter fans will love it for the non-stop action, story fans will get into the clever writing, and long-standing Max supporters will find a much more meaningful character to like. Haven’t tried the multiplayer yet, but I hear it’s quite alright, making this a very full package, which on PC clocks in at almost 30GB. I believe Rockstar have delivered the goods with this highly anticipated release, but do let us know what you think!bysudsmcsoapdish

AMD Discontinues Monthly Driver Updates

The last month or so has been one of transition for AMD’s Catalyst driver crew. Alongside the launch of AMD’s Trinity APU – complete with what’s only AMD’s 2^nd VLIW4 GPU – AMD has also been hard at work on preparing their next Windows 8 drivers, and on the development side of things AMD also put plans into motion to move their DX10 GPU families to legacy status. Capping this off, AMD’s driver team is embarking on one more change, and for long-time AMD followers it’s going to be a doozy.
For the better part of a decade now AMD (née ATI) has released new WQHL-certified video drivers on a monthly basis. In principle this enables AMD to offer driver updates on a predictable schedule, and to spread out major driver changes over a few versions of the driver. In practice this is exactly how things have worked up until the last couple of years, which is why we’ve been fans of AMD’s driver update schedule for the longest time.

ATI Catalyst 3.8

With that said, that time has come to a close. AMD has announced that starting with Catalyst 12.6 AMD will be ceasing their monthly driver update schedule in favor of releasing drivers on a dynamic/as-needed basis, effectively taking up NVIDIA’s driver release schedule. Instead of 12 monthly WHQL releases plus a smattering of beta and hotfix drivers, AMD will have what we’d estimate to be around half as many WHQL releases alongside an unknown number of beta driver releases. It’s a significant change for AMD’s Catalyst crew and one we’re glad to see they’re making.
Why? As we briefly mentioned before, the benefits of AMD’s monthly driver release schedule were realized in practice for quite some time, but only up until the last couple of years. Starting around the release of the HD 5000 series though those benefits became harder to realize and less meaningful. The issue is at its basic level one of complexity – AMD’s drivers continue to grow in size and complexity, with the latest release weighing in at 170MB. Video drivers have effectively eclipsed Windows 95 in complexity and size in the last couple of years, which reflects the fact that these devices really have become processors, complete with all the intricacies of code compilation and scheduling, and basically in need of a mini-OS just to run them.

The result has been that AMD  have both seen their driver development schedules become more drawn out. For AMD this has meant fewer major driver branches are released in any given year as it takes them longer to research, develop, and assemble the various optimizations and features that are added to their drivers. Consequently the need to release drivers on a monthly basis has led to some driver releases that bring few if any changes, as AMD has no new additions to that driver branch as they work on the next branch. In other words, AMD’s monthly commitment meant AMD had to release drivers whether they had something new or not.
Really this branch problem came to a head in the later part of last year with AMD’s disastrous October driver releases where they ended up with several different drivers being released in the same month; a regular Catalyst release, a BF3 release, and a Rage release that didn’t contain the BF3 improvements. Even without a fixed driver release schedule AMD will still have driver branches and the need to manage the development of multiple branches at once – that’s just the reality of this kind of software development – but it will free up resources that previously needed to be committed to the monthly driver, and in all likelihood it will make project management easier for AMD by making it push major development along a single branch.
As it stands AMD has already missed one monthly driver drop with Catalyst 12.2 (the first regular driver in the 7000 series branch), and AMD will have missed another monthly driver drop with 12.5, which missed its May deadline. It’s clear that thanks in large part to these jumps in complexity and development time that monthly driver releases have become unsustainable for AMD, and behind the scenes we’ve been prodding AMD to move to a dynamic schedule for that exact reason. This makes us all the more glad to see that rather than foolishly try to keep up with this schedule that they’re backing off from trying to release so many drivers.

Modern Catalyst Control Center

However it would be remiss of us to not point out a second, more practical reason for this change too: a reduced necessity. Prior to 2010, full Catalyst driver releases were the only way for AMD to release any kind of driver change. That changed with Catalyst 10.2, which saw the introduction of Catalyst Application Profiles (CAPs). CAPs were primarily created to ease the distribution of new game profiles for Crossfire, but in some cases more general single-GPU problems can be fixed in those profiles. By manipulating the various compatibility settings in their profiles AMD can fix some issues without requiring a driver update, such as CAP 12.4-2 which improved the performance of Max Payne 3 for both single video cards and Crossfire configurations. Larger issues still require a full driver release of course, but compared to years before the advent of CAPs there’s definitely a reduced need thanks to the separation of driver and profile.
Going Forward
As we stated earlier, AMD will be moving to a dynamic/as-needed schedule for driver releases. It’s their hope – as it is ours – that they’ll be able to further improve on the quality and meaningfulness of Catalyst driver releases. Certainly this will cut out the release of near-useless Catalyst drivers, whereas quality as always remains to be judged. Realistically AMD’s most immediate goal should be to do a better job of getting drivers out for major new games as necessary, as that’s something they’ve particularly struggled with and is the thing the new schedule should help the most with by freeing up resources.
To that end the Catalyst 12.6 driver, released in beta form today, will be the first such driver release. We haven’t had a chance to evaluate these drivers in depth yet, but they are from AMD’s latest driver branch and should contain the typical assortment of performance improvements and bug fixes that we’ve come to expect from a major Catalyst release.
Also, it should be noted that while AMD is changing their release schedule their naming schedule is not changing. Catalyst drivers will still be named by [Year].[Month], which unfortunately means there are going to be holes in AMD’s numbering scheme. A month without a driver will simply be empty, so they could go from 12.6 to 12.8, for example. Importantly for non-technical users however this means that they maintain the date in the driver number, making it easy to tell whether a driver is recent or not.
On that note, the one thing AMD hasn’t changed so far but bears mentioning as something we’d like to see changed is AMD’s website. It has always been difficult to find AMD’s beta drivers from inside their website, a problem that is only going to become worse with the change in the release schedule. AMD needs to use this opportunity to change their site so that beta drivers are as easy to find as WHQL drivers, something that quite frankly NVIDIA has done a solid job of.
Finally, alongside the change to their driver release schedule AMD is also instituting a new driver report form to replace the older Catalyst Crew Feedback Form, which is being called the AMD Issue Report Form. The goal is the same, but AMD is moving to this new form in an attempt to gather better feedback from users than what the old form collected. If nothing else, we hope that AMD does a better job of keeping the form visible, as there seems to have been a lot of AMD users that simply never knew about the Catalyst Crew form.
Addendum: We've been informed by AMD that with the release of the Catalyst 12.6 betas, Catalyst 12.5 has been canceled entirely. 12.6 is what 12.5 would have been, and this has special significance for AMD's DX10 generation GPUs. 12.5 was supposed to be the last monthly Catalyst release that supported those GPUs but Catalyst 12.6 beta doesn't support them. So it's not clear when DX10 GPU owners will see a new driver; if this is the start of AMD's "quarterly" update cycle, then it may be a few months, making 12.4 the final driver for the time being.by ryan smith

Nvidia's Most Valuable Business

Nvidia has traditionally designed discrete and integrated GPUs for notebooks, desktops and workstations. After its exit from the integrated graphics business with the introduction of APUs from Intel and AMD, the company is looking at other avenues for revenue growth. And the most important growth driver right now is its expansion into the mobile computing market.
Currently, Tegra and other related products contribute close to 7% to our price estimate of $20.98. But we believe this division has the potential to become the largest revenue contributor by the end of our forecast period. (See: How Tegra Can Become Nvidia’s Most Valuable Segment)

Here we highlight a few important factors that reinforce our positive outlook for Nvidia’s Tegra business.

Nvidia Riding High on Tegra3 Growth
After a successful 2011 with its dual-core Tegra2 processors, Nvidia introduced its Tegra3 processors which excel more than two times in speed and performance than Tegra2. Tegra3 is based on the company’s low-power quad-core architecture optimized for tablets and smartphones, and its launch marked a jump for Nvidia into the mobile computing bandwagon. While Tegra2 featured in 15 smartphones last year, Tegra3 is expected to power around 30 devices in 2012. It is believed to have by far the strongest software system for graphics in the mobile world.
Amid a decline in its overall Q1 2012 earnings, the company posted a 21% rise in revenues from the consumer products portfolio. It witnessed an increase in Tegra related sales and expects to ship about 25 million Tegra processors in 2012, almost double its shipments in 2011.
The growth in Tegra 3 sales reinforce the general belief that Nvidia is a dominant force in the tablet market and is expanding rapidly in the smartphone business globally. HTC launched the first Tegra 3 phone in February and other phone wins around the corner include ZTE with Tegra plus Icera phones, Fujitsu, LG and K-Touch.
Icera LTE Chips Approved to Run on AT&T’s 4G LTE Network
Recently Nvidia announced that its Icera 410 LTE modem chips for notebooks and tablets are officially approved to run on AT&T‘s 4G LTE network. This could give way to Icera-powered mobile devices as soon as this year. The move makes Nvidia one of the select few multimode LTE modems to have been approved for use on AT&T’s 4G networks, which could significantly broaden its mobile device market over the next few years.

The Icera 410 LTE chipset was added to Nvidia’s product lineup last year, with the acquisition of the UK-based baseband chip maker Icera. The deal gave Nvidia access to Icera’s more than 550 patents for 3G and 4G wireless modem components, positioning it to offer not only the chipsets that power smartphones and tablets but also their wireless connectivity capabilities as well.

ANTEC Quattro 1200

Combining 1200 watts of stable and quiet power with cutting-edge efficiency and style, the TruePower Quattro 1200 blasts ahead of the competition. Six +12V rails deliver unbeatably stable power that earns the rare 80 PLUS® Silver distinction, the highest independently certified standard in energy efficiency. Factor in the ultra-quiet Pulse Width Modulation fan, advanced cable management and the stylish racing stripe paint job, and the TruePower Quattro 1200 leaves every other power supply in the dust.

Features:

PowerCache™, a high-performance capacitor that delivers an extra power reserve when and where users need it most

NVIDIA™ SLI™ - ready certified and ATI CrossFire™ certified

80PLUS® Silver Certified - 85% or more efficiency at 20%, 50%, and 100% load

Designed to support quad core, Core i7 and Core i5 CPUs, quad GPUs

Six 12V output circuits and DC to DC Voltage Regulator Modules ensure supreme system stability

80mm cooling fan uses Pulse Width Modulation for whisper-quiet operation

Advanced sleeved cable management improves airflow and reduces clutter

Gold plated connectors for superior conductivity

Industrial grade protection: OVP (Over Voltage Protection), UVP (Under Current Protection), SCP (Short Circuit Protection), and OCP (Over Current Protection)

Universal Input and Active PFC allow the Quattro to operate efficiently on any power grid in the world

Operating Temperature:

Approvals: UL, CUL, FCC, TüV, CE, C-tick, CCC, CB, BSMI

TPQ-1200 OC edition available from select Antec resellers with the following overclocking features:
- Speed control knob for PSU cooling fan (Min. - Max.)
- +12V output voltage knob (11.8V - 12.4V)
- Two additional 6 PCI-E Connectors
- Two additional 8 (6+2) PCI-E Connectors

Unit Dimensions:
- 3.4" (H) x 5.9" (W) x 7.9" (D)
- 86mm (H) x 150mm (W) x 200mm (D)

Package Dimensions:
- 9.4" (H) x 12.4" (W) x 5.3" (D)
- 240mm (H) x 315mm (W) x 135mm (D)

Net Weight: 7.0 lbs / 2.72 kg

Gross Weight: 10.0 lbs / 4.53 kg

Certification: