Alcatel 5V review — a worthy comeback?

Introduction

Alcatel is probably a name which you probably have not heard of recently. They were in Malaysia some time back, then sort of went under the radar without any new announcements here in Malaysia. Well, they are now back, and the latest crop of smartphones from Alcatel are pretty affordable, targeting a budget-conscious demographic. Premium-looking designs that don’t cost a bomb are always in, and perhaps that’s what Alcatel is gunning for with the Alcatel 5V. Let’s take a closer look.
Unboxing

The packaging of the Alcatel 5V is pretty standard, with a nice image of it on the front, some highlight features on the side and basic specifications on the back.

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It surely comes with a nice set of accessories! It even comes with a screen protector and a hard case. When was the last time you saw a device come with a hard case and a screen protector? There is also a pretty standard microUSB cable and 10W charger, as well as some earphones. Documentation is aplenty with the Alcatel 5V, for some reason.
Appearance

The front of the device is pretty nondescript, without any logos or marking that differentiates it from the masses. Not surprising to be honest, as that’s what every brand has been doing.

On the back, we are treated to a glossy back that unfortunately featured some weird patterns when examined under strong light. It’s plastic, so you would do well to use a case if you have any intention of keeping it nice and shiny.

On the right side is where you will find all the buttons. The power button is textured, which is a nice touch. The sides feature a matte finishing which is in contrast to the glossy back, giving the impression of a “frame” despite the fact that it features a plastic unibody.

The antiquated microUSB port still finds a home on the Alcatel 5V, flanked by two arrays of perforations which hide the speaker and primary microphone. Over on the top you will find the secondary microphone and the 3.5mm jack.
The design of the Alcatel 5V is pretty attractive for an entry level device, but the use of glossy plastic is definitely something we can’t agree to. We do like the contrasting finishes between the sides and back though, as it makes it slightly more comfortable to hold, aside from making the device look better in general.
Specifications

CPU/Chipset:
MediaTek Helio P22 (4 x Cortex-A53 @ 2.0 GHz + 4 x Cortex-A53 @ 1.5 GHz), 12nm FinFET

GPU:
PowerVR GE8320 @ 650 MHz

RAM:
3GB

Display:
6.2″, 19:9 HD+ (720p) IPS display, 88% screen-to-body ratio

Storage:
32GB (expandable via microSD up to 128GB)

Camera:
Main Camera(s)
Primary: 12MP f/2.2 (1.25μm pixels) + 2MP f/2.4
Dual tone LED flash, portrait mode, AI scene recognition, AI Beauty, filter, social mode
Front Camera
8MP f/2.8 (1.12μm pixels)
Beautification, filters, Social mode

OS:
Android 8.1 Oreo

Connectivity:
Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n (2.4 GHz)
Bluetooth 4.0
LTE-FDD: Band 1/3/7/8/20/28

SIM:
Hybrid dual nanoSIM (second SIM slot shared with microSD)

Battery:
Li-ion 4000 mAh (non-removable)

Dimensions:
153.7 x 74.55 x 8.5 mm

Weight:
158 g

The Alcatel 5V actually has a pretty decent specifications across the board, except for the screen and RAM. unifi Mobile users would be disappointed though to find that the Alcatel 5V lacks support for LTE Band 5. However those who are on Digi’s network would be nicely surprised to find VoLTE support out of the box. I haven’t seen support for VoLTE other than on my old tweaked Xiaomi Mi MIX 2 and also HUAWEI’s devices, so to find it in an entry-level smartphone was indeed a nice find for me.
Performance

Antutu sees the Alcatel 5V come up just ahead of the Redmi 6 which shares a similar chipset.

GPU performance of the Alcatel 5V actually surpasses the Redmi 6’s, but for some reason it didn’t manage to as well in Sling Shot Extreme (ES 3.1), clocking just one point less.

PCMark is where we see the Alcatel 5V score pretty well, matching up with the Snapdragon 630-powered ZenFone 4.

The Alcatel 5V makes a good showing here as well, trouncing the Redmi 6 by a huge margin with more than 3 hours longer battery life. The chipset appears to be quite inefficient, as it doesn’t impress despite the huge battery.
I clocked an excellent 2 days away from the charger, with 5 hours of total SOT. I wasn’t really using it as my main smartphone though. Charging speed is quite slow, with only 25% regained in 30 minutes of charging. The performance in day-to-day usage is acceptable, but stutters and delays are to be expected from a device of this caliber.
User Experience

The Alcatel 5V actually feels great in hand with the smooth curves and contrasting texture on the sides offering more grip. The hard case also has wide cutouts from the top, bottom and sides of the devices. The screen is pretty decent despite the HD+ resolution which may seem like a major turnoff in 2018. And of course there is the notch up top.

Fortunately, despite a notch that’s actually pretty wide, Alcatel still decided to slot in a notification ticker so that you know how many notifications icon you have hidden because you decided to pick a notchy phone. The overall user interface is pretty mature looking and definitely doesn’t put important settings where they shouldn’t be. There is even gesture navigation, as long as you think swiping up from the bottom is a good idea for back.

Moving on, the camera hardware is pretty interesting. It’s actually what flagships would tout a few years back. Seeing 1.25μm pixels trickle down to the entry level is a nice touch. And of course given how important portrait mode is, the Alcatel 5V doesn’t miss out on the trend with a secondary 2MP camera.

The camera UI wise is surprisingly cartoonish, with the AI scene detection mode icons looking like a kid designed them. There is no manual mode here, but you do get a few fun options to play with, like the Social mode, which allows you to create a collage of four images with a 3-second gap in between each, or manually, or just shoot with a 1:1 aspect ratio. You can even apply different filters to each of the images if you opt to take them manually. You then get the option to share them immediately with the lower half of the screen offering a preview of what it will look like in your Instagram feed.

Image quality is actually pretty decent in good lighting. It’s actually on par with some mid-range devices. The bokeh effects are passable, but not amazingly precise. Low light performance isn’t all that good, but at least images didn’t turn to mush when the noise reduction was applied. It does exhibit difficulty in focusing in poor lighting though. The shot-to-shot interval could stand to be faster, but then again this sort of leisurely pace isn’t too uncommon in the entry-level segment.
Conclusion
Now we kept mentioning that it is an entry-level device. It is one. Which leads to the one major problem with the Alcatel 5V. The pricing. Priced at RM898, it is more ambitious than we would like. It is priced too near the lower mid-range while only offering entry-level hardware, and that is a major problem to us. Tack on the fact that it offers no support for Band 5 LTE, and its practicality as a second device to me drops further. That’s probably just me though because I use a unifi Mobile SIM. The Alcatel 5V delivers a compelling plastic package, and even looks good enough to pass as a mid-range device, but it’s what inside that counts, and that’s where you will find the Alcatel 5V just a bit lacking.
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ASUS Z97-Deluxe (NFC & WLC) Review

You see, I have been an ROG (Republic Of Gamers) fan for a very long time now. In fact, my selection of hardware begins from ROG line-up first before I venture into other areas. The one reason many desktop users don’t practise this same idea is money. So if you are hunting for a well packed motherboard and do not wish to spend the ROG price, what are your options? My suggestion is this ASUS Z97-Deluxe motherboard. Be prepared as the specs of this bad boy is about to blow your mind off.

The ASUS Z97-Deluxe stands as the flagship model around their mainstream line-up. This beast has it all if you are looking for an Intel Z97 Chipset setup. ASUS has choked in the support for Intel’s Devil Canyon CPUs as well as the soon to land Broadwell processors, M.2 and SATA Express Storage connectors, Intel’s SRT support for SSDs and Device Protection with Boot Guard.

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5-Way Optimization
On the box, you will see the highlight of the product – 5-Way Optimization. Basically, ASUS has cramped the Dual Intelligent Processor 5 that combines TPU, EPU, DIGI+ Power Control, Fan Xpert v3 and TurboApp functionalities to push the system’s performance to its optimum. What this does is, the hardware will dynamically optimize your desktop based on real time scenarios offering the optimal output from several portions such as CPU performance, energy saving feature, stable digital power, optimized cool and quiet fan control and the best of all, speed up your apps using the TurboApp (I’ll come to this later).

Take it this way, the motherboard is capable of identifying your computing behaviour based on the load and maximizes the output you actually need. This is rather interesting as some misguided users tend to push the machine beyond limits even when they are just doing some document processing tasks. Leave the intelligence to the motherboard – that’s what ASUS is trying to achieve in this ASUS Z97-Deluxe motherboard.

The TurboApp is a story of it’s own! TurboApp was designed to provide an unrestrained overclocking system (YES! OverClocking..WHEE!) that is boundariless so that users can experience the customized system without actually having to dig into the technicals. Well, this is one part that ASUS has prospered over the years. Using the TurboApp, you can now have a balance between an overclocked system and power saving system,  both on the SAME system! How? You can now set custom profiles that distributes the CPU performance, Audio Scene and the LAN Performance individually to different apps accross your system. Hit up the CPU and LAN speed on your game but reduce the audio, reduce the CPU and LAN for your Media Player and boost up the audio, reduce the CPU and LAN speed as well as the audio on your browser so it runs in the background without disrupting your gaming, the choice is all yours. Gone are the days where you had to restart your system multiple times trying to get the sweet voltage point while tuning your system. Couldn’t have been easier, eh?
New UEFI BIOS Interface
The ASUS Z97-Deluxe motherboard features a whole new UEFI BIOS interface. The much simpler, bright and vibrant with neat and efficient technical design allows users to utilize the seamless modes for quick tweaks. The EZ mode provides an overview of the basic system information separated into 11 different segments as described in the image above.
SATA Express / M.2 (NGFF)
As the hunger for storage increases, the hidden demon is ignored, creating a gap in storage handling accordingly. Yes, the speed demon. For years now, we have been too comfortable with the 6Gbps speed defined by the SATA 3.0 specifications and now it’s time to move faster. This is where SATA Express excels. 10Gbps sure sounds yummy. It utilizes two lanes of the PCI Express 2.0 infrastructure delivering highspeed bandwidth on an ecosystem for client storage that SATA and PCIe solutions can coexist.
M.2 was also known as NGFF. It had the similar electrical characteristics as SATA-Express but for different user scenario with slots on board. Both of these are the next gen expansion interfaces that are designed to incorporate PCIe and SATA interface into one. However, M.2 is the preparation for new ULT, Tablet and Slate platforms that require high speed data deliverance in a much smaller size. The specification supports IRST caching and covers multiple slot on board from socket3 type 2260 and 2280 that can only be adopted with embedded onboard devices.
The difference between SATA Express and M.2 (NGFF) is tabulated below:

SATA Express
M.2 (NGFF)

User Scenario
External Devices
Embedded Devices

Storage Capacity
Capacity is not limited to the device volume
Capacity is limited to the device volume

Module Size
Large
Very Small

Connection
SATA Express Standard
From Type 1216 to 22110

Flexibility
Only storage at this moment
Supports variety of functions

Design Philosophy
Breaking through technology for existing SATA interface
Superb speed improvisation for system response

DRAM 3300 (OC) & Thunderbolt
On the ASUS Z97-Deluxe motherboard, the ASUS team has highly increased the DRAM frequency up to 3300 extreme frequencies support, utilizing ASUS’ exclusive DRAM layout design to increase the superb DRAM compatibility.
The thunderbolt technology provides massive 20Gbps per port data transfer bandwidth with 4K2K DP output and DP1.2 multi-stream transport support. It’s the technology that’s one cable for all implementations with high expansion capabilities.
NFC Express 2
NFC (Near Field Communication) Express is not a rare technology among us, yet its still not widely known. It has been incepted into our mobile phones for quite some time now. NFC uses radio frequency to connect two contactless devices and is used to either transfer data or instant device pairing. The ASUS Z97-Deluxe (NFC & WLC) is bundled with a brand new NFC Express station that combines together with a hub of two extra USB3.0 ports. On the software side, Video to go and Bluetooth Pairing are included, ready to serve.
Video to go – Just one tap of your portable device with NFC available, the on-going video will be streamed to your portable device in no time, and you’re on-the-go. Moreover, streaming from PC to TV in real time can also be done by setting up the NFC tag through NFC Express application to memorize the TV as the next streaming target, next step is simply tag to the host device that you wish to share the streaming.
Bluetooth Pairing – Having trouble setting up your Bluetooth for pairing? Just easily tag your mobile device onto the NFC Express station, the app will automatically paring up your mobile Bluetooth and streaming directly to your PC without hassle.
Windows 8 login – With one touch, you can log in to Windows 8 without having to remember your password!
Quick Launch – Code favorite applications, games, and websites to your bundled tag and get them going with a quick touch on NFC EXPRESS. This is perfect for launching the content you access most frequently with shorter load times. In addition to the bundled tag, setup multiple quick launch functions on your smart device, which acts as a virtual tag.
Photo Express – Cable-free! Transfer photos and videos from NFC-supporting devices to PC with a tap, and intelligently backup all photos and videos added since last sync.
Remote Desktop – Working with NFC-compatible smart devices, NFC EXPRESS allows you to use Remote Desktop in the Wi-Fi GO! utility with no complicated setup. Sit back and relax and control your desktop PC from the comfort of your living room or anywhere else at home.
Crystal Sound 2
Crystal Sound 2 provides the best audio signal path onboard from top to the bottom, with seven exclusive technologies for users in searching of acoustic sound and superb sonic quality experience on the audio.

Realtek ALC 1150 HD Audio – The highest SNR HD CODEC in the industry for high signal integrity.
Analog/Digital Shielding – Layout technique to separate the coupling noise between analog and digital, the more continuous the moat shaped will be providing better shielding for your purity sound.
EMI Protection Covering – Metallic cover to resist any EMI noise interference from outside to the CODEC.
Left/Right Channel Track Separation – Layout technique to separate left/right channel track, to reduce any possible interference.
Nichicon Audio Capacitor – Nichicon provides the best acoustic audio capacitor, which was well known on high grade audio Hi-Fi sound, mostly was used to featuring the excellent audio performance.
Audio AMP – Powerful audio boost to covering from high resistance headphone sets to low resistance headphone sets.
Audio Preset – Different scene for user to switch with, each mode provides the best audio experiences for user to enjoy the powerful audio equalizing in Game mode, Music mode and Movie mode.
DTS Ultra PC II – Delivers exceptional 7.1 surround through the most popular PC audio setups for your existing stereo speakers or headphones. With Audio Restoration and Symmetry technologies,
users experience better home theatre audio with ease.
DTS Connect – Expand your PC audio experience by combining DTS Neo and DTS Interactive technologies for incredible 7.1 channels surround sound and performing multi-channel encoding of DTS bitstreams on personal computers, designed to deliver audio to an external decoder.

Overall
You do get what you pay for with this motherboard. If you are aiming at a mid or high-end gaming rig, this one will swallow every bit you throw at it seamlessly. While this motherboard is future ready, if you already own a Z87 based motherboard, the upgrade will not bear much significant performance difference.

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Samsung Galaxy S23 FE Confirmed to Feature Exynos 2200 Chipset

The upcoming Samsung Galaxy S23 FE, with the model number SM-S711B, made an appearance on Geekbench, showcasing the Exynos 2200 SoC and 8GB of RAM. Running on Android 13, the Galaxy S23 FE is poised to deliver a powerful performance with improved camera capabilities.
Samsung Galaxy S23 FE Powered By Exynos 2200?

Rumours about the Galaxy S23 FE utilizing Samsung’s Exynos chipset have been circulating for some time, and the benchmark results further solidify this information. Last year’s Galaxy S22 line in Europe featured the Exynos 2200, while the S23 models this year opted for Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 8 Gen 2. However, multiple sources suggest that the S23 FE will stick with the Exynos 2200 globally.

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Following the release of the S21 FE in January 2022, which offered two versions powered by either the Snapdragon 888 or the Exynos 2100, Samsung’s decision to equip the S23 FE with the Exynos 2200 seems logical. The Exynos 2200 serves as the successor to the Exynos 2100 found in certain variants of the S21 FE. It is worth noting that Samsung chose to skip the S22 FE entirely.

Speculation suggests that Samsung’s choice to incorporate the Exynos 2200 in the S23 FE is aimed at reducing excess stock of the chipset. As the phone is expected to hit the market sometime in the third quarter of this year, potentially between now and September, users can anticipate notable enhancements to the camera system compared to its predecessor, the S21 FE.
Source
Pokdepinion: The confirmation of the device featuring the Exynos 2200 chipset through a benchmark run has generated excitement among Samsung enthusiasts. This shift in chipset aligns with Samsung’s strategy and offers an opportunity to leverage the powerful performance and camera improvements of the Exynos 2200.
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AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX Review – At A Disadvantage

AMD has made themselves clear that they are not competing in the ultra-enthusiast, no-holds-barred GPU segment this time around (say, RTX 4090) – so, as it stands, this Radeon RX 7900 XTX is pretty much the fastest Team Red card you could get, for now. The card set its sights against RTX 4090’s next-in-line, the RTX 4080; so how would things play out for these two flagship-class GPUs?
Unboxing
Box front
Box interior
Opening the box is very straightforward – lift the cover and the GPU is presented right in front of you. There is a slight difference in presentation compared to its XT sibling though: here, as you lift the cover up, the GPU itself tilts slightly forward; whereas the XT continues to lay flat when you lift the cover all the way up. The same “Welcome To The Red Team” message is here as well.
Box contents
Like the 7900 XT, you get a User Manual, a Red Team card, and the GPU itself – nothing else.

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Appearance
GPU front
The all-black GPU shroud is larger than its XT sibling, to accommodate a full 355 watts worth of cooling. On the center you get two strips of RGB, both fully addressable. That being said, the Radeon logo itself isn’t illuminated, though. It’s also heavier – 1.8kg to 1.52kg of the 7900 XT.
GPU top
Unlike the 7900 XT with its heatsink fins recessed and flat, the fins now are extended in height in the middle to from a beveled edge. Despite being a 355W card, only two PCIe connectors are needed to feed all the power it needs. The RADEON logo is now largely facing downwards if you put it in a conventional position in the case – but I suppose AMD somewhat expects owners of this flagship GPU may as well mount it vertically with the RGB in the mix as well.
GPU bottom
Down the bottom, there’s no space wasted – the clearance given to the cables are relatively minimal as well. Everything down to the cables are all painted black, but it’s unlikely you’d be looking at your GPU at this direction anyway.
GPU rear (backplate)
If you ignore the physical dimensions of both the 7900 XTX and 7900 XT, there’s virtually no difference in terms of the backplate design. One very tiny difference is a fifth Philips screw, and if you want to play the game of Spot The Difference – you can see and compare the backplate of the 7900 XT in our review right here.
I/O layout
All the regulatory labels are pushed into this PCIe bracket, some may prefer it this way, others may not. Nonetheless, we’re looking at four ports – two of them are DisplayPort 2.1 which are yet to have any equal-spec monitors to pair it with, for now. When the time comes, you can run up to 4K480 or 8K165 with them. Another two are a single USB-C port, as well as HDMI 2.1 port that finds home in many contemporary displays and TVs.

There are, in fact, RGBs – by default, the lighting is white; but if you prefer to change it to anything else, AMD has an app (based on Cooler Master’s RGB LED Tool) that lets you do all kinds of RGB effects, which by all standards are surprisingly customizable (there’s even Morse Codes!). You can even sync it with Razer Chroma if you happen to own other Razer products or any peripherals that uses this RGB standard.
Specifications
AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX

GPU Core & VRAM:

GPU Core Variant
Navi 31 XTX

Microarchitecture
RDNA 3

Process Node
TSMC N5 (GCD)
TSMC N6 (MCD)

Transistors
58.0 billion

Die size
306mm² (GCD)
6x 37.5mm² (MCD)

Compute Units
96

Stream Processors
6144

Ray Accelerators
96

Cache
96MB L3 (6x 16MB Infinity Cache)

VRAM Configuration
24GB GDDR6 384-bit

Memory Bandwidth
20Gbps, 960GB/s peak

Add-in board:

Game/Boost Clock
2300 / 2500 MHz

TDP (TBP)
355W

Recommended PSU
800W

Dual BIOS Mode
No

Display Outputs
2x DisplayPort 2.1
1x USB-C (DisplayPort 2.1 Alt Mode)
1x HDMI 2.1
*Max output resolution: 7680×4320 (8K) @165Hz, 12-bit HDR

Power Connector
2x 8-pin PCIe connector

Bus Interface
PCIe 4.0 x16

Dimensions
2.5-slot, 287mm length

Test System

CPU
Intel Core i9-13900K

Cooling
ASUS ROG Ryujin II 360 AIO
Cooler Master MasterGel Maker

Motherboard
ASUS ROG Maximus Z790 HERO

GPU
AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX

Memory
Kingston FURY RENEGADE RGB DDR5-6400 CL32 (2x16GB)

Storage
Samsung SSD 980 PRO 256GB (Boot)
Kingston NV1 1TB

Power Supply
Cooler Master MWE Gold 1250 V2 Full Modular 1250W

Case
VECTOR Bench Case (Open-air chassis)

Operating System
Windows 11 Pro 22H2

Performance
All benchmarks are done in out-of-the-box settings, unless otherwise specified. Games are tested under these settings (upscaling features such as AMD FSR or RSR are turned off):

Forza Horizon 5 (RT ON)
Maximum settings (all settings maxed out to EXTREME preset when available, Ray Tracing set to EXTREME).
Forza Horizon 5 (RT OFF)
Ultra High preset – Ray Tracing turned off.
Red Dead Redemption 2
All settings set to ULTRA – slightly higher quality over ‘Favor Quality’ from the in-game settings slider.
Shadow of the Tomb Raider (RT ON)
HIGHEST preset. RT Shadows set to ULTRA (which overrides default Shadow settings).
Shadow of the Tomb Raider (RT OFF)
Same as the previous run – with the exception of RT Shadows turned OFF, with Shadow settings set to ULTRA instead.
F1 2022 (RT ON)
ULTRA HIGH preset. Ray Tracing is set to HIGH under this preset.

Synthetic Benchmarks

So the numbers here have more or less set the tone here for the gaming test later on: the Radeon RX 7900 XTX pretty much found a gap in between RTX 4080 and RTX 4070 Ti, and made itself at home right in the middle. Same goes to the RX 7900 XT – but that card occupies the lower end of the gap for the most part, except raytracing – where even the XTX lost some ground against both Team Green cards.
Gaming – 4K (3840×2160)

First up we ran the games in 4K resolution – and we got some pretty interesting data. Forza’s game engine seems to favor NVIDIA GPUs slightly which has given both Team Green cards a bit of a lead against their equivalents, and the raytracing doesn’t seem to affect the gap that much. Red Dead Redemption 2 represents the other end of the spectrum: the Rockstar RAGE engine prefers AMD GPUs more and as a result, both the XTX and XT has a pretty easy time keeping up with their respective competition.
When it comes to raytracing, they all clearly reflects the same results as seen on the Port Royal test earlier on – with the 7900 XTX just about leading the 4070 Ti by a hair while the 4080 leads by  a sizable margin ahead. Keep in mind that the 7900 XTX is a 355W card – and the NVIDIA RTX 4080 consumes 5 watts less at 350W, so that isn’t really shining the best light on Team Red right now.
Gaming – 1440p (2560×1440)

As we go down to 1440p though, we see the general trend pointing to 7900 XTX falling behind RTX 4080 across pretty much all games. Pretty odd considering that in theory, the Radeon has a faster VRAM bandwidth (960GB/s vs 717GB/s) – but it’s very likely that thanks to the much increased L2 cache on the RTX cards, that may have given the RTX 4080 the edge here despite the VRAM bandwidth deficit. (AMD’s Infinity Cache is technically L3 cache – which is slower than L2 cache.)
Gaming – 1080p (1920×1080)

We go down further to 1080p resolution where it’s more likely to stumble on CPU bottlenecks. Take SOTTR without RT for example – all cards, short for previous gen RTX 3080 Ti pretty much stays within each other’s error margins; but in other titles like F1 2022, the RTX 4080 simply just leaves everything in the dust. In the case of Forza Horizon 5 without RT, the gap have shortened somewhat, though the RTX 3080 Ti does get an odd joint-victory with its successor.
Even RDR2 didn’t help the 7900 XTX to keep up with RTX 4080 down at this resolution, and more often than not it lost out to RTX 4070 Ti in some of the games as well. Some of them could be down to optimization, as more games are just designed to fit better with NVIDIA’s architectures; or it’s likely that the huge L2 cache has helped out NVIDIA in winning the charts in more ways than one.
Thermals

On the Furmark 10-minute stress test, we see the GPU actually didn’t quite reach it’s rated power of 355W. The actual consumption stays around 348W, and as far as GPU temperatures go, it’s pretty decent. Core temperature peaked at 72°C but slightly dipped down to 71°C at the end of the test; and while the VRAM hit 92°C at the 10th minute, there’s still some gap to where most people would deem to be too hot (e.g. >100°C).
The fan curve exhibits a bit of unusual behavior though. At around 30 seconds, the fans instantly kicked in to around 600 RPM before dipping slightly to ~530 RPM, then climbed back up to around 1,700 RPM. It stayed there for two minutes further, before kicking up a gear again to around 1,850 RPM until the end of the 10-minute run. For reference, the 7900 XT reached around 1,400 RPM and the curve is smoother overall. (Side note – the max fan speeds can reach 2,880 RPM.)

Onto Time Spy Extreme test – the test is a 10-loop run that lasts around 9-10 minutes. Unlike NVIDIA GPUs where the TDP may rise and fall in between benchmark loops, AMD cards seem to keep themselves pinned all the way, but that didn’t matter too much in the grand scheme of things. We see very little temperature deviations in between the Furmark run and TSE run, all thermal metrics are pretty much within 2°C of each other at most.
The fan behaves slightly differently this time, however. From 550 RPM it slowly climbed up to the same 1,700 RPM threshold, but this time it stayed until the end of 5th minute before it kicks into another gear and spinning the fans up to 1,800 RPM in the peaks that follows. The fan curve appears to follow the same cadence as the benchmark loops; but realistically we didn’t see any obvious temperature change as a result (the difference of 100 RPM could be small enough to be virtually negligible).
Conclusion
Being the first MCM-based gaming GPU, the public at least has some level of expectations that it should perform competitively against NVIDIA’s counterparts, given its innovative chip packaging solutions. However, there’s one thing that remained out of AMD’s control: process node. While AMD made the jump from TSMC 7nm to TSMC 5nm+6nm, NVIDIA has leapfrogged them from Samsung 8nm (which in itself is basically enhanced 10nm process) all the way to TSMC 4nm (which is enhanced 5nm) – effectively a jump of two full process nodes.
That gave NVIDIA advantage when it comes to power efficiency – smaller nodes means less power used, it’s a very basic principle when it comes to semiconductors. The RTX 4080 is rated at 350W but in reality are much more performant against the 7900 XTX, which uses 5 watts more than it does. That alone has already put the 7900 XTX in an disadvantage on a metric that AMD cares a lot about in recent years – performance-per-watt.

Still, as the card itself – it’s a fairly small card by modern standards and it did pretty well in accommodating 355 watts of power and heat. Unlike most AIBs cards where you see huge shrouds or massive RGB strips, or just cutouts here and there for styling reasons – this card stayed fairly practical and understated to those who want a more low-profile PC builds. That doesn’t mean it looks boring, though: the RGB options are pretty well laid out if you want a bit more flair on your “party piece”.
Performance-wise, let’s say it’s not as competitive as RX 6000 series used to do. Last generation AMD got it really close to NVIDIA’s best, and even toppled that huge card in certain games outright. Here, it’s generally weaker across the board; and if you take raytracing into account, it brought itself down a tier and ended up fighting against the RTX 4070 Ti instead, which consumes way less power than it does (at 285W).

So where does the 7900 XTX go from here? Frankly, only by price. The sticker price for this card is RM5,399 right now, and while RTX 4080 used to have pricing that’s frankly distasteful, the market has seemed to at least forced the price down quite a bit – cheapest AIB models of RTX 4080 can be found at around RM5,900 or so. Would you pay RM500, or 9% more for a card that’s potentially more than 10% faster? I’ll leave it up to you to decide.

Special thanks to AMD Malaysia for providing the Radeon RX 7900 XTX for the purpose of this review.
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The Asia Pacific Predator League 2020 With USD 400,000 Prize Pool Gets Underway

The Asia Pacific Predator League 2020, which will be held in Manila 22-23 February 2019, will see PUBG and Dota 2 players vie for the total prize pool of USD 400,000 across participating regions.
With the tournament being regional, gamers in Malaysia are also welcomed for the RM100,000 prize pool for the Malaysian leg.
For Dota 2, there will be 4 on-ground qualifier matches, which will be held in Mineski Infinity Kuala Lumpur, Mineski Esports Arena Selangor, Eternity Esports Penang, and Gizmo Arena Sarawak and 2 online qualifiers. For the qualified teams, they will meet for the Malaysian Grand Finals at Level Up KL (KLCC) on 9-10 November.

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On the other hand, PUBG will have 4 stages of online qualifiers, where the top four teams of each qualifier will face each other at the Malaysian Grand Finals on 7-8 December at Battle Arena, Jaya Shopping Centre.
The prize pool breakdown is RM50,000 cash for Dota 2 and RM24,000 for PUBG, with another RM26,000 worth of prizes. The Malaysian leg champions will also be heading to Manila in February 2020 to battle it out for the championship.
Think that you got what it takes? You can sign up for the Asia Pacific Predator League 2020 by going to the link here.
Pokdepinion: So what are you waiting for? ;)
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ASUS climbs above Apple in PC shipments for Q2 2016

PC sales are generally slowing down worldwide, but Apple has shown a certain level of resistance to the trend, and even showing increasing market share globally and in the US. However the latest quarterly reports are in, and Apple is seen to be also suffering from the slowing PC market.

According to IDC’s report, ASUS posted 4.5 million worldwide PC shipments, edging out Apple with 4.4 million shipments. ASUS also shows a year-over-year growth of 5.4%, while Apple saw a 8.3% decline in terms of worldwide PC shipments. Leading the pack was Lenovo with a 13.2 million PCs shipped in Q2 2016, with a market share of 21.2%.

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In the United States alone, Apple has shown a -9.3% decline year-over-year in shipments. Lenovo, while leading in worldwide shipments, is ranked third in US PC shipments, with 2.2 million shipments this quarter. ASUS falls behind Apple in the US, with 751 000 shipments, exhibiting a 4.2% growth year-over-year.
9to5Mac was quick to point out that most Apple fans are holding out for an upcoming Macbook Pro refresh. The refreshed Macbook Pro line-up is expected to arrive later this year with Touch ID, an OLED touch bar and a thinner design.

Pokdepinion: Could ASUS’ growth be due to the exciting new products launched at Zenvolution @ Computex 2016? Gamers were also treated to an amazing display of ASUS’ expertise in gaming hardware, which could also translate to more ASUS computers shipped.
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Kanchenjunga K2 District Tournament on this 25th April

A local tounament event will be held on 25th Aptil 2015 (April) at Kanchenjunga,Cyberjaya (LAN). The tournament will include total of 5 games, which is DOTA2 (5V5), Call of Duty 4 (3V3), Need For Speed: NFSMW / NFSU (1V1), Counter Strike 1.6 (1V1) and Mortal Kombat 9 PC (1V1). Ops not done yet, there will be live performance, PC showcase from APES and of course free foods.

Highest price pool on DOTA2 stake at MYR 1000, and rest of the game winner will get MYR 500. Contestant may fill up their registration here Kanchenjunga K2 District Tournament Signup. Update for DOTA2, it seem all 16 teams registered to the main event but other event might be available so grab the sit for the event now!

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for more information you may visit Kanchenjunga – K2 Facebook.
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The “Thin and Powerful” Razer Blade 14 is Now in Malaysia

Razer Blade 14 Now Out in Malaysia

Last year, the Razer Blade 14 was first released as the first Razer Blade that is powered by AMD Processor. Razer then released the upgraded version of the laptop this year, which features the AMD Ryzen 9 6900HX Processor for a more powerful performance. This Razer laptop remains the thinnest 14″ gaming laptop that maintains its performance and mobility, powered by NVIDIA GeForce RTX 30 series GPU and DDR5 RAM.
The Razer Blade 14 has a MUX Switch to conveniently toggle the iGPU, a fingerprint-resistant casing, and a Full HD 1080p IR webcam with Windows Hello integration.

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Check out below here for its full specifications:
Razer Blade 14 Specifications

CPU:
Intel Core i7-12800H @ 1.8GHz (up to 4.8 GHz Boost), 14C/20T, 24M, 45W TDP, 10nm SF

RAM:
16GB 4800MHz DDR5 (upgradable to 64GB)

GPU:
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 GDDR6 6GB
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 Ti GDDR6 8GB

Storage:
1TB PCIe Gen 4 NVMe SSD (upgradable to 2TB)
1 x M.2 slot (up to 2TB)

Connectivity:
Wireless
Intel AX1690 Wi-Fi 6E (802.11ax)
Bluetooth 5.2
Wired
2 x Thunderbolt 4
3 x USB 3.2 Gen2 Type-A
1 x UHS-II card reader
1 x Kensington Lock

Display:
15.6″ QHD (2560 x 1440) IPS-grade, 240Hz, 100% DCI-P3, G-SYNC, Advanced Optimus, matte display, 4.9mm bezels
15.6″ FHD (1920 x 1080) IPS-grade, 360Hz, 100% sRGB, 2ms response, matte display, 4.9mm bezels
1 x HDMI 2.1 ([email protected])

Audio:
1 x 3.5mm combo audio jack
Array microphone

Power:
230W power adapter
80Whr Li-Polymer battery

Dimensions:
355 x 235 x 16.9 mm

Weight:
2.02kg

The Razer Blade 14 is priced at RM12,599 and is now available at authorized stores in Malaysia.
Pokdepinion: I hope the processor and GPU can make up for the portability and battery life.
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These 4 Games Are Now FREE for PC Gamers

One of the perks for being a PC gamer is that there’s bound to be games that’s being offered for free, and this time around, there’s a total of four games that you can get free of charge from GOG.
4 Free PC Games On GOG
Well if you haven’t heard about GOG before, they are an online gaming retailer that sells, well basically games and sometimes those games are on discounts.
The four games that are on this list are all from the 90s, so here are the games.

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Tyrian 2000
Shadow Warrior Classic Complete
Stargunner
Bio Menace

Tyrian 2000 is a fast vertical shooter that requires you to fly though space while fighting your way through enemy ships with the help of a customizable array of weapons. You probably know the makers of Shadow Warrior, 3D Realms, which brought the classic title Duke Nukem 3D. Similar to the latter, Shadow Warrior is a first-person shooter. Stargunner is your classic side-scrolling ship shooter and last but not least is Bio Menace, which is an action platformer game.
So if you’re feeling like going to a trip down to memory lane, be sure to check out these games and claim them.
Pokdepinion: Although these games may not be everyone’s cup of tea, but hey, they’re still free. What is there to lose?
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Xiaomi surpasses Samsung in Europe

Xiaomi has gone from strength to strength, and overtook Apple in global shipments recently. Their growth is truly mind-boggling, and it seems like there is still more good news to come for the Chinese smartphone maker. Xiaomi is now the top smartphone vendor in Europe.

According to data from Strategy Analytics, Xiaomi is top ranked in Europe in terms of smartphone shipments, with 12.7 million units shipped in the last quarter. Market share is at 25.3%, edging out Samsung with their 12 million units shipped and 24% market share. Xiaomi also charts an impressive 67.1% year-on-year growth, while Samsung declined 7% from last year.

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Apple also surprisingly managed to enjoy a decent 15.7% growth, with 9.6 million units shipped and a 19.2% market share. Other Chinese smartphone brands like OPPO and realme are also enjoying good growth figures, with OPPO charting 100% growth year-on-year, and realme recording an insane 1800% growth.

Xiaomi’s bang for buck devices may have driven their popularity up, but they do offer some premium flagships as well, like the Mi 11 Ultra and also the Mi Mix series. What I am also very interested to see is whether Samsung’s upcoming foldables which are supposedly more affordable will turn the tide for them and allow them to regain their top spot.
I also look forward to seeing Xiaomi overtake Samsung in the global market as well. They have shown that they are capable of beating Apple, so Samsung is just the next rung to climb. Let’s go!
Source
Pokdepinion: Xiaomi’s strategy of offering a wide range of products that ensures that there’s something for everyone is clearly working out for them.
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Official Xbox Games with Gold January 2018; Kicking Off the New Year With…Somewhat of a Bang

Didn’t think information would surface this early but the official free games lineup for Xbox Games with Gold January 2018 is here. Kicking the new year off with a bang, perhaps?
Official Xbox Games with Gold January 2018

We’re still about a week away from the end of 2017 but surprisingly, Microsoft has already unveiled the official free games lineup for Xbox Games with Gold January 2018. Maybe someone was trying to do their work early so they can enjoy their holidays but either way, getting this kind of news early is a good thing for everyone…unless you’re not an Xbox gamer.
The Incredible Adventures of Van Helsing III for Xbox One and Tomb Raider Underworld for Xbox 360 will lead the charge on January 1st 2018, with the latter only available until January 15th 2018, while the former will be up all month. Ubisoft’s former Wii U exclusive Zombi for Xbox One will drop on January 15th 2018 and cross into February 2018, while EA Montreal’s old TPS Army of Two will cover the second half of January for Xbox 360.

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Full Lineup for Xbox Games with Gold January 2018

The Incredible Adventures of Van Helsing III – Xbox One
Tomb Raider Underworld – Xbox 360
Zombi – Xbox One
Army of Two – Xbox 360

If you’re not familiar with the games, the house of Xbox also released a handy trailer introducing them, and you can check them out below.
Do keep in mind,that at the moment, the first month of Xbox Live gold can be purchased for $1 for a limited time, so if you never subscribed, you might as well give it a shot. You’re also still in time to get most of the games that came for December.

Pokdepinion: Well, I wasn’t expecting this appear so early but, here you go. It’s an okay lineup in my opinion so I expect a mixed reaction from the gaming crowd in general.
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Xiaomi Mi A3 Set For July 17 2019 Launch

Previously we’ve reported on the Xiaomi Mi A3, where a leak revealed its specification and design straight from its box. Now Xiaomi Spain has confirmed that the device is set to be launched tomorrow, 17th of July 2019.

There will be two versions, Mi A3 and Mi A3 Lite to be exact. For those of you who don’t know, they are actually the global versions of the Xiaomi Mi CC9 and CC9e and will be running stock Android.

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Additionally, the company’s Twitter account posted teasers of the phones’ key highlight that’s better than the previous Mi A2 that includes faster performance, in-display fingerprint sensor, and a longer lasting battery.
Xiaomi Mi A3 Specs

Snapdragon 665, octa-core up to 2.0 GHz, 11nm FinFET
Up to 6GB RAM
Up to 128GB storage
6.08″ FHD+ AMOLED display, dot-drop notch
48MP f/1.8 + 8MP ultra-wide + 2MP depth sensor
32MP f/2.0 selfie camera
4030 mAh battery, 18W fast charge
Android One

Pokdepinion: I don’t know about you, but I’m still disappointed that they chose a Snapdragon 665 instead of the Snapdragon 730 that was previously leaked..
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If you’re in the market for a gaming phone, then you might want to wait just a few more days. The Lenovo Legion Phone Duel has been launched, and you get your hands on the device soon.
Lenovo Legion Phone Duel Officially Launched in Malaysia

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For those of you who aren’t aware, the Lenovo Legion Phone Duel is a gaming smartphone powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 865+ chipset. It has a 6.59-inch Full HD+ (2340 x 1080) display with 144Hz refresh rate and an in-display fingerprint scanner, The touch sampling rate is 240Hz, which is said to minimize input lag. Apart from that, you get dual front-facing speakers and two ultrasonic air trigger buttons on the side.
All of this will be powered by a 5,000mAh battery with 90W Turbo Power Charging technology, which is split in two for improved thermals. It is said to be capable of being fully charged in just 30 minutes, provided that you make use of both USB-C ports for charging. As for memory, it’s expected to have two variants; 12GB LPDDR5 RAM with 256GB UFS 3.1 storage and 16GB LPDDR5 RAM with 512GB UFS 3.1 storage.

As for the camera, you get a dual-camera setup consisting of a 64MP f/1.9 wide angle camera and a 16MP f/2.2 ultra-wide angle camera. What makes the Lenovo Legion Phone Duel unique is the side-mounted pop-up camera module for the 20MP f/2.2 selfie camera.
For a detailed look at the specifications, check it out right below here:
Lenovo Legion Phone Duel Specifications

CPU:
Snapdragon 865+ (1 x 3.09GHz Kryo 585 + 3 x 2.42GHz Kryo 585 + 4 x 1.8GHz Kryo 585) 7nm+

GPU:
Adreno 650

RAM:
12GB / 16GB LPDDR5

Display:
6.59″ FHD+ (2340 x 1080) AMOLED, HDR10+, 144 Hz refresh rate, 240 Hz touch sampling

Storage:
256GB / 512GB UFS 3.1

Camera:
Camera(s)
64MP f/1.9, 1/1.72″ wide
16MP f/2.2 ultra-wide, 120° FoV
Dual-LED dual-tone flash, panorama, HDR, 4K 30FPS video, gyro-EIS
Front camera
Motorized pop-up 20MP f/2.2
LED flash, HDR, 4K 30FPS video

OS:
Legion OS / ZUI 12 (Android 10)

Connectivity:
5G Band n77/n78
LTE Band 1/2/3/4/5/7/8/12/17/18/19/20/26/28/34/38/39/40/41/42
Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac/ax (2.4 GHz, 5 GHz)
Bluetooth 5.0 with A2DP, LE, aptX HD, aptX Adaptive
NFC
Dual-band GPS

SIM:
Dual SIM (nano SIM)

Battery:
Li-Po 5000 mAh (non-removable)
65W fast charge

Dimensions:
169.2 x 78.5 x 9.9 mm

Weight:
239 g

Ingress protection:
None, only water-repellent coating

The Lenovo Legion Phone Duel will be available in Malaysia starting 26th October 2020 with retail prices starting from RM3,399. Anyone who purchase the smartphone on the official website and selected retail partners from 26th October 2020 to 30th November 2020 will be getting the Legion H500 Pro 7.1 headphones worth RM329.
Pokdepinion: Really curious to see how well this gaming phone performs. Can’t wait to try it out.
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Intel’s Foundry May Soon Build Chips From Arm Following Latest Deal

The new IFS (Intel Foundry Service) has secured what is likely its first major customer.

Mobile chip designer Arm, and chip giant Intel has struck a deal that is set to produce Arm’s future chips under Team Blue’s chip manufacturing facilities. Intel’s foundry business is relatively new, which is started off by current CEO, Pat Gelsinger, when he first announced the IDM 2.0 strategy back in 2021, shortly after his return to the company since his first departure in 2009. Prior to this, the foundries manufacture chips exclusively for themselves.

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The new business plan is set to regain ground against other major silicon fabrication companies, including Samsung and TSMC. Many ‘fabless’ chipmakers, including Apple, NVIDIA and AMD all use TSMC’s fabs, and Intel is set to attract these companies to use their facilities at some point in the future. The deal signed on last Wednesday (12/4) covers “multigeneration agreement” which is set to start with Team Blue’s upcoming 18A process node – which is expected to go online in late 2024.
“The collaboration will focus on mobile SoC designs first, but allow for potential design expansion into automotive, Internet of Things (IoT), data center, aerospace and government applications,” according to the joint statement. With this, Intel is looking to compete against TSMC in the game that Taiwanese giant knows best – it remains to be seen on whether the Chipzilla may have the technological advantage in its 18A node against TSMC’s equivalent 2nm process.
Source: PCMag
Pokdepinion: Samsung has tried and failed for years to regain foothold against TSMC, let’s see if Chipzilla can give TSMC some proper competition.
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Get Free HUAWEI FreeBuds 3i When You Buy The HUAWEI Mate40 Pro

HUAWEI is offering a free pair of HUAWEI FreeBuds 3i TWS earbuds (worth RM399) when you purchase a new HUAWEI Mate40 Pro. The free HUAWEI FreeBuds 3i promo was originally set to end this coming 28 February but due to popular response, HUAWEI will be extending the promo until 31 March.
Buy HUAWEI Mate40 Pro and get free HUAWEI FreeBuds 3i
To get your free pair of HUAWEI FReeBuds 3i is pretty simple, just make your purchase of the HUAWEI Mate40 Pro at the HUAWEI Online Store or any HUAWEI Experience Store, Senheng and Courts outlets. After that, you’re ready to receive your brand new pair of HUAWEI true wireless earbuds!

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The HUAWEI Mate40 Pro features the world’s first 5 nanometer 5G SoC in the Kirin 9000 and a quad-camera “Ultra Vision Cine Camera” system which consists of a 50MP wide-angle Ultra Vision Camera, a 20MP ultra-wide Cine Camera, a 12MP Telephoto Camera with OIS and a laser camera. It also features a 6.76-inch Full HD+ OLED display with a 90Hz refresh rate, 8GB of RAM and 256GB of UFS 3.1 storage.
The HUAWEI Mate40 Pro is available now for RM4,299.
Pokdepinion: What are you waiting for? Buy, buy, BUY!
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Does ROG see cloud gaming as a threat?

ASUS, being a hardware manufacturer, has every reason to feel threatened by the rise of cloud gaming. It means that gamers will no longer have to buy expensive hardware to play the latest AAA titles. We interviewed ASUS Malaysia’s Jason Hsu, who’s in charge of ROG laptops here in Malaysia, to ask him just a few questions. You can watch the interview below:

So we didn’t directly ask him what does he think about cloud gaming. In fact, he himself brought it up, as he believes that cloud gaming would be the next big trend in the industry. As to whether he thinks its a threat, he doesn’t think so, as he mentioned that the Republic of Gamers will provide the personalized tools that gamers will use to enjoy cloud gaming. Makes sense, considering you can’t game without at least something capable of streaming the games.

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We also asked him about the gaming smartphone market. So far, the only major player in the gaming industry that’s making gaming smartphones is ROG. Jason says that he still finds desktop gaming more immersive than smartphone gaming, but ROG is not averse to catering to all gamers with the ROG Phone II for mobile gamers, and a large range of gaming laptops for those who want to still experience PC gaming.
In addition to that, Jason shared that he takes the name “Republic of Gamers” very seriously by taking into account the community feedback and gamers’ opinions to deliver better innovation into their new products. To that end, they do not compromise on product quality to ensure that everyone enjoys the best ROG has to offer in different price bands.

Last but not least, Jason described his experience working with Taiwan Excellence as “an honor”. He finds the Taiwan Excellence Esports Cup an excellent opportunity to communicate with gamers and users.
Did you check out our interviews with Acer and MSI? Stay tuned though as we will be sharing our interview with GIGABYTE very soon!
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Setel’s ‘One-Tap Fuelling’ Makes Refuelling Easy

Setel’s ‘One-Tap Fuelling’ Makes Refuel Easy

Motorists rejoice! Setel announces ‘One-Tap Fuelling’ feature for instant refuelling as you arrive at any of the PETRONAS stations nationwide, with just one tap – and rewards you with Mesra points instantly.
As Setel begins its rollout phase, this solution is currently available to first 1,000 registered Setel users nationwide, with a staggered rollout in the coming two months. To opt-in for early bird access, post an Instagram Story or a Tweet containing the Dah Setel So Far page with the caption: “I want One-Tap Fuelling now”, and mention @setel plus #SetelOneTapFuelling hashtag. From now until 4 October 2022, Setel users also stand a chance to win limited edition Setel gift boxes when they upload the most creative clips on Instagram and Twitter showing their experience using the One-Tap Fuelling feature – by tagging @setel and include #SetelOneTapFuelling hashtag.

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Upcoming enhancements down the line include pre-set fuelling amount (by litres or full tank), pre-set preferred payment method which includes CardTerus direct payments via credit or debit card, as well as Setel Share – enabling up to two other users to share their Setel Wallet, paying the amount and earning the Mesra points jointly.
The latest version of Setel app are available on all major mobile platforms, including Apple App Store, Google Play Store and Huawei AppGallery.
For more information on Setel, click here.
Pokdepinion: This should make refuelling process much more streamlined, which is always good news for motorists out there.
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Genshin Impact 2.2 Leak Shows Rerun Characters for Thoma Banner

The latest Genshin Impact 2.2 leak has potentially revealed the character reruns that will be coming as part of the upcoming Thoma banner.
Genshin Impact 2.2 Leak: Rerun Characters for Thoma Banner

[CORRECTION] It has been brought to our attention that the aforementioned screenshot is misleading, as is was isolated from further context (see attached.)
TZ (Tangzhu) is a trustworthy leaker, meaning Hu Tao + Thoma in the second half of 2.2 remains a strong possibility. pic.twitter.com/BbvcRA8ytY
— Save Your Primos // saveyourprimos.carrd.co (@SaveYourPrimos) September 25, 2021

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Twitter user @SaveYourPrimos recently shared about the characters coming in Genshin Impact 2.2 as part of the Thoma banner. It appears that Hu Tao will be the 5-star character appearing alongside him, which coincides with previous leaks that we reported earlier.
Interestingly, Thoma is not expected to be part of the first round of banners in the upcoming update, which is odd as new characters typically arrive first. Instead, we are expected to see a Childe rerun banner, which is something many gamers have been looking forward to for some time now.
Previously, Yae was expected to be part of this update but now, Thoma will be the only new character. She will be appearing either in 2.3 or 2.4 for now assuming there are no further issues regarding the character. For now, there is an anniversary concert coming soon so we do expect to hear more at the event.
Genshin Impact is currently available for free on the PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Android, iOS, and PC. A Nintendo Switch port of the game coming in the near future.
Source
Pokdepinion: A friend of mine who has yet to get Hu Tao is gonna be very excited to hear this. Of course, if he already spent most, if not all of his Primogems, I’m just gonna be there to laugh at him.
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ASUS could launch ASUS ZenFone 4 at Computex 2017 — Aims to ship over 20M smartphones in 2017

ASUS has shipped more than 17.5 million smartphones in 2016. Which is lower compared to in 2015 where 25 million devices were shipped according to the sources. ASUS sudden move towards the premium market with the ZenFone 3 family might have backfired as consumers were too used to the affordable ZenFone 2 series. This situation has put ASUS in a dangerous position as more competitor brands are pushing the sales targeting the budget range devices. Still, ASUS is not one to give up quickly, with the ASUS ZenFone 3 Zoom and innovative ZenFone AR set to launch in February. With that, it seems like ASUS also plans to launch another new ZenFone smartphone in order to double the sales in 2017, the ZenFone 4.

The rumored ASUS ZenFone 4 is said will be focusing back on the mid-range market with a sub-RM1K price tag. The specifications are still yet to be confirmed but some of the information has already leaked out since 31st December 2016.

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Listed as “ASUS_X00GD”, the ASUS ZenFone 4 is said to feature an octa-core SoC clocked at 1.5 GHz, up to 4GB of RAM and 64GB of storage, expandable via microSD. Rumors point towards the MediaTek MT7650 SoC, which pairs 4 1.5 GHz cores with 4 1.0 GHz cores.
The display is touted to be 5.2″, with a relatively low resolution at 1280×720 pixels. For the battery, the ASUS ZenFone 4 is said to pack a 4850 mAh battery, bigger than the 4100 mAh one in the ASUS ZenFone 3 Max we reviewed previously. A 16MP rear camera and 8MP front camera rounds up the list of specifications.
The ASUS ZenFone 4 is also set to go for a front fingerprint sensor. The ASUS ZenFone 4 will also be the first ASUS’s smartphone with Android Nougat 7.0 out of box. It will be available in gold, rose gold and black color variant.
Pokdepinion: We don’t really need much more performance in our phones, but the MediaTek MT6750 has had its time, and is way overdue to be phased out of mid-range device. A Snapdragon 625 would have been a lot more preferable, but ASUS might not be able to keep the price as low with that SoC.
Also, I do hope to see the PadFone series revived this year, as the smartphone+tablet form factor is really one with great potential. Throw in stylus support, ASUS Tru2Life+ technology and a decent camera, and we may have the perfect smartphone.
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Here are 10 reasons why the HUAWEI Mate 30 Pro is the most intelligent smartphone out there

Virtually every one of us owns a smartphone nowadays. It is the portal to the internet that’s always accessible. And it’s so convenient to carry around! But hey, while there are plenty of smartphones launched every year, some of them do stand out. One of them is the HUAWEI Mate 30 Pro. But how is it better than the slurry of flagships every other OEM pumps out?
1. World’s first smartphone with two 40MP cameras
Most, if not all, smartphones today feature high resolution sensors. 48MP, 64MP even 108MP. But while the main camera packs these sensors, the secondary cameras often fall short. Not the HUAWEI Mate 30 Pro, as it comes with a primary 40MP SuperSensing RYYB sensor and another 40MP ultra-wide Cine camera with a standard RGGB matrix.

The cameras come together to give it industry-leading photo and videography capabilities, letting you capture rich details and clarity regardless whether its day or night, thanks to the perfect marriage of hardware and HUAWEI’s AI expertise.

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2. 7680 fps ultra slow-mo videography
Ever wondered about what does a balloon look like when it pops? Well, with up to 7680 fps or 256x slow-mo on the HUAWEI Mate 30 Pro, you don’t have to wonder anymore and just go see for yourself. By using the insanely overkill capabilities of the 40MP Cine camera, you can slow down time with 720p videos at a staggering 7680 fps, 1080p at 960 fps. And while slow-mo videography requires a lot of light due to the extreme shutter speeds required, the HUAWEI Mate 30 Pro’s extreme ISO 51200 sensitivity lets it capture awesome slow-mo footage even in poor lighting.

If you prefer more “conventional” videos, the 40MP Cine Camera on the HUAWEI Mate 30 Pro also lets you shoot videos with real-time bokeh, 4K HDR+ Cinematic Time-lapses and even ultra low-light ultra-wide time lapses for astrophotography aficionados.
3. Six cameras in the palm of your hand

On the back of the HUAWEI Mate 30 Pro, there are four cameras. Aside from the two 40MP cameras, there is also a telephoto lens equipped with 3x optical zoom lens and optical image stabilization (OIS). Coupled with HUAWEI’s AI chops, the HUAWEI Mate 30 Pro can deliver up to 30x digital zoom. There’s also a 3D ToF camera for better depth detection for more professional bokeh results.

Meanwhile over on the front there’s a 32MP selfie camera supported by a 3D Depth camera. The 3D Depth camera here is an integral part of the experience on the HUAWEI Mate 30 Pro, whereby it doesn’t only let you take better selfies with enhanced bokeh, but it is also involved in the security and also gestures on this smartphone along with the other sensors housed in the notch above the screen.
4. World’s first 27W Wireless Charging

Fast charging has become mainstream, with almost every flagship in the market having one form or another of fast charging. The HUAWEI Mate 30 Pro pushes the boundaries with Wireless HUAWEI SuperCharge which delivers 27W wirelessly to charge its sizeable 4500 mAh battery. Quick charging and a large battery essentially ensures that the HUAWEI Mate 30 Pro will be ready to go anytime you are.
5. Kirin 990 promises better efficiency and performance than ever before

An impressive smartphone like the HUAWEI Mate 30 Pro deserves an equally groundbreaking chipset to power it. The Kirin 990 offers not only a faster CPU and GPU, but also innovates the NPU design. Instead of just throwing more cores or clocking them higher, HUAWEI now packs a big core and a tiny core in the NPU, allowing it to be more efficient than ever while still retaining the AI performance edge HUAWEI has always enjoyed over the competition.What can you do with all that AI performance? Well, stuff like AI Private View, AI auto-rotation and AI Smart Gestures.
6. AI Private View
AI Private View is a necessity when the HUAWEI Mate 30 Pro has such impressive productivity capabilities. If the HUAWEI Mate 30 Pro detects unrecognized faces trying to view your private messages, it will intelligently hide them away.

HUAWEI has built the HUAWEI Mate 30 Pro to be the perfect companion for professionals, with a microkernel which achieved CC EAL 5+, which is the highest ever achieved by a smartphone thus far. The isolated secure system separates biometric ID info and financial info from the public OS serving in all applications.
7. AI auto-rotation

The HUAWEI Mate 30 Pro uses the 3D Depth camera to track your face’s orientation. It doesn’t just rely on the gyroscope like other devices, which can get very annoying. Instead of having to toggle the screen rotation manually each time you want to watch a video full-screen, the HUAWEI Mate 30 Pro always knows when you want to rotate the screen, and when you don’t.
8. AI Smart Gestures
How does hands-free navigation of your smartphone sound to you? The HUAWEI Mate 30 Pro lets you do just that by using the 3D Depth camera and gesture sensor in the notch at the top of the screen to identify your facial features and detect the movement of your hands. This capability is powered by the NPU in the Kirin 990 chipset, giving you the ability to perform actions on the smartphone by simply waving over it.

9. Multi-screen Collaboration

The HUAWEI Mate 30 Pro lets you mesh your smartphone and laptop into one, letting you use the device that best fits your usage at the moment to complete your task faster. On-going tasks on your the HUAWEI Mate 30 Pro can seamlessly resume on the HUAWEI MateBook 13. It also lets you type on the HUAWEI Mate 30 Pro using the laptop’s keyboard. Improve your workflow with seamless cross-device integration.
10. Stunning design and colors

The HUAWEI Mate 30 Pro is beautiful both on the inside as well as the outside. With elegant color options like Emerald Green, Black and Space Silver, the HUAWEI Mate 30 draws inspiration from nature to give you one of the most beautiful devices they have ever created.

In addition to the beautiful colors, the front also offers you a true edge to edge experience with the HUAWEI Horizon Display curving at 88° over the sides to give you a stunning view in addition to all-new usage experience.
The HUAWEI Mate 30 Pro is now available nationwide, giving you the key to experience the HUAWEI Smart Life now. Learn more about HUAWEI Smart Life here.

The entire HUAWEI Smart Life range is now available in Malaysia as follows:
HUAWEI Mate 30 Series, from RM2799HUAWEI MateBook 13, from RM3599HUAWEI Watch GT2, from RM799HUAWEI x Gentle Monster, RM1599HUAWEI FreeBuds 3, RM679HUAWEI WiFi Q2 Pro, RM499
For more information about the HUAWEI Mate 30 Pro, head over to the following link. Do what your phone can’t with the HUAWEI Mate 30 Pro.
Check out the HUAWEI Mate 30 Pro!
This is an exclusive article for HUAWEI Malaysia.
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Get A Refresher of the Kingdom Hearts Series With These Memory Archive Videos

The Kingdom Hearts series has arguable the most convoluted storyline in gaming history. Probably more so if you include movies, TV series, and comics in general even. With Kingdom Hearts 3 now out, some of you may need a refresher since our last main entry was over a decade ago, and we have just that.
The Kingdom Hearts official Twitter account has tweeted out a link to some videos that can give everyone a quick refresher before they pop into the latest entry into the ginormous franchise, Kingdom Hearts 3. The first of five videos is at the top of this post whereas the remaining four is located at the bottom.
From our own experience playing the game, it would be very hard to really enjoy the game without playing any of the previous entries. While some of the side games can be avoided, the best is still to play every single one of them. Of course, you don’t actually have to buy new systems just for that as Square Enix did release the compilation of all the Kingdom Hearts games released prior to Kingdom Hearts for the PlayStation 4.

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Kingdom Hearts 3 is available now on Xbox One and PS4 in both Japanese and English. We will be reviewing the game so stay tuned to Pokde for that.

Pokdepinion: I’m sure many gamers are already busy enjoying the game but if at some points you feel lost as to why certain things are happening or who some characters are, this would be a good time for a refresher.
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13th Gen Intel Core “Raptor Lake” CPU Officially Revealed

The highly anticipated and rumoured 13th Gen Intel Core CPU, codenamed Raptor Lake, has finally been revealed in its entirety.
13th Gen Intel Core “Raptor Lake” CPU

We have a total of six new CPUs, three if you consider each one having a variant with and without internal graphics, in the 13th Gen Intel Core “Raptor Lake” CPU. Starting off with the Intel Core i9-13900K / 13900KF, it has 24 cores consisting of 8 performance cores and 16 efficiency cores with 68MB combined L2 and L3 cache. The boost clock can go up to 5.8GHz and it will be retailing for $589 and $564 respectively.

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Then we have the more mainstream choice, the 13th Gen Intel Core i7-13700K / 13700KF. with 16 cores consisting of 8 performance and efficiency cores. They will be retailing for $409 and $384 respectively. As for the cheapest model, the Intel Core i5-13600K / 13600KF, it 14 cores consisting of 6 performance cores and 8 efficiency cores. These will be retailing for $319 and $294 respectively.

From what we know thus far, Intel claims that these new processors will bring up to 15% improved single threaded performance and up to 41% improvement in multi-threaded performance. It’s worth noting that the upgrades are mostly due to increased frequency and number of threads. As for the new and top of the line Intel Z790 motherboard for this CPU series, you get more PCIe Gen4 lanes and USB 3.0 Gen 2×2 20Gbps.
It’s said that the Intel Core i9-13900K is 37% faster while still using the same 241W TDP. As for when you can get your hands on these CPUs, it will be available starting 20th October 2022 alongside the new Z790 motherboards.
Source
Pokdepinion: I just upgraded to an i5-12600K, and this is making me think on whether I should buy it or not.
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The new TUF Gaming F15/17 and TUF Dash F15 offer something for every gamer out there

ASUS TUF Gaming F15
ASUS TUF Dash F15
ASUS has focused on delivering maximum bang for buck to gamers with the ASUS TUF Gaming series, delivering potent configurations to gamers at more affordable prices than the ROG Strix and ROG Zephyrus lineups. With the recent addition of the ASUS TUF Gaming F15 and TUF Dash F15, ASUS has expanded the options available to gamers. But even though they have very similar names, these two laptop models are very different, and we will help you pick the one that suits your usage best.
ASUS TUF Dash F15 – performance to go

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The ROG Zephyrus series is renowned for their portability while still delivering excellent gaming performance. The ASUS TUF Dash F15 borrows some of that DNA to provide gamers with an option to get a premium thin-and-light gaming laptop, but without the price tag that’s usually associated with these sleek designs.
Portable yet Durable

It doesn’t mean that ASUS skimped on the ASUS TUF Dash F15 though. The svelte 19.9mm chassis is MIL-STD 810H rated to ensure that it will survive pretty much anything you can. The entire package weighs less than 2kg, and with support for USB-PD 100W charging, you can also cut down on the overall weight by packing a smaller USB-PD charger when you are on the go.
Cool and Powerful

You also get the latest components under the hood, with the latest quad-core 11th Gen Intel Core H35 processors under the hood along with up to the GeForce RTX 3070 Laptop GPU for serious horsepower to handle any game you can throw at it with aplomb. ASUS baked in Dynamic Boost 2.0 to allow the GPU and CPU to balance their power budgets, providing for better performance in all applications.
I know one of the major concerns with thinner laptops is the cooling capabilities, and ASUS has addressed this in the TUF Dash F15 with its two fan, five heatpipes, and quad-heatsinks with a total of 205 fins.

To make your gaming experience more comfortable, there’s the CoolZone Keyboard that draws air from the keyboard deck to keep the keyboard nice and cool even during the most intense of gaming sessions. There’s even 0dB technology to ensure that your laptop is absolutely silent under low load scenarios, perfect for quiet places like the library. Or for watching A Quiet Place.
Premium Visual and Aural Experience
Speaking of watching movies, the TUF Dash F15 can be configured with a lightning-fast 240Hz display that can display the full sRGB gamut. You can not only watch movies, but also make movies on it if you want. For gamers, the display boasts of Adaptive Sync technology for smooth, tearing-free gaming experience.

To truly enjoy a game, you need to be able to enjoy the sound as well. The DTS:X Ultra feature ensures that the speakers in the TUF Dash F15 can perform at their utmost best by providing a virtual 7.1 surround sound directly from the built-in speakers. The speakers are also improved, promising deeper bass and louder volume than previous generations.
Another advantage that ASUS has baked into their recent products is two-way AI noise cancellation, letting you not only remove background noise from your microphone, but also from incoming feeds like your friend’s noisy voice comms that can really get annoying when you are just trying to listen for your enemies. It’s fully customizable as well, letting you tune out what you don’t want to hear, and keep those that you do want to be able to listen to.
Who is it for?
The ASUS TUF Dash F15 is designed for gamers and content creators who are always on the go, yet require a bit more performance out of their laptops than what non-gaming machines can deliver. With its powerful yet efficient hardware, the TUF Dash F15 promises long battery life and excellent portability, perfect for those who need to be ready to do their best, without being tied down to a wall socket.
ASUS TUF Gaming F15/17 – performance-focused

The ASUS TUF Dash F15 offers excellent performance for gamers who are always on the go, but the ASUS TUF Gaming F15/17 are more conventional gaming laptops. They are quite a bit heavier and thicker than the TUF Dash F15, but they offers even greater performance in its beefier chassis, that’s also MIL-STD 810H certified.
Performance on tap
The TUF Gaming F15/17 can be configured with up to the latest octa-core 11th Gen Intel Core H-series processors, offering oodles of CPU power on tap. They can also be paired up with the GeForce RTX 3060 Laptop GPU running at up to 95W with Dynamic Boost 2.0 for strong performance in everything, be it gaming or content creation applications.

To ensure that the TUF Gaming F15/17 can deliver all that performance optimally, an improved thermal module ensures that the TUF Gaming F15/17 will run cooler and at lower noise levels than its predecessors. Two 83-blade fans push air through three heatsinks to quickly dissipate the heat from the CPU and GPU.
Expandable to meet your needs
The TUF Gaming F15/17 are well prepared for you to connect it to next-gen devices with a Thunderbolt 4 port that also supports DisplayPort Alt Mode for more external displays. If you want to connect other older devices, there are three USB 3.0 ports and also RJ45 LAN. There’s integrated Bluetooth 5.2 and WiFi 6 too for wireless connectivity.

Under the hood, the TUF Gaming F15/17 is designed for full upgradeability as well. Two SO-DIMM slots allow you to add up to 32GB of memory, while the two M.2 slots lets you equip the TUF Gaming F15/17 with plenty of fast storage.
Who is it for?
The TUF Gaming F15/17 is for gamers and content creators who don’t mind carrying around a bit extra weight to enjoy the additional performance. It is also designed to offer more performance per ringgit, which is great news if you don’t require an ultraportable gaming machine like the TUF Dash F15.
New TUF Gaming Laptops offer Something for Everyone
While previously the value-for-money TUF Gaming laptops were only available in conventional gaming laptop form factors like the TUF Gaming F15/17, the addition of the new TUF Dash F15 means that ultraportable gaming machines are now more accessible with TUF Gaming’s signature focus on bang-for-buck and military-grade durability.

You can check out the TUF Dash F15 and TUF Gaming F15/17 via the links below:
ASUS TUF Gaming F15
ASUS TUF Dash F15
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Android 8.0 Oreo Coming to Selected Motorola Devices in Malaysia – Say hello to Android Oreo

MotOREOla

Good news for owners of Motorola devices here in Malaysia! Motorola has just announced a list of their smartphones that will be updated to the latest Android 8.0 Oreo. However, not all Motorola devices will receive the update unfortunately.

Below is the full list of the Motorola smartphones that will be getting the Oreo OS upgrade:

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Moto Z
Moto Z Play
Moto Z2 Play
Moto X4
Moto G5 Plus
Moto G5S Plus

What’s so special about Android 8.0 Oreo you might ask?
Apart from getting a face lift in terms of appearance, Android 8.0 Oreo promises a much better performance with faster boot speed as well as smart background activity which limits the power consumption of any apps running in the background. This results in improved processing power as well as longer lasting battery performance.

Android Oreo also brings better security as well as some nifty features like Autofill, Picture-in-Picture, and a brand new line of emojis (which includes a hijabsta emoji!). For a better and more complete rundown on the new features Android 8.0 Oreo will be introducing, head on down here.
Motorola haven’t exactly revealed when exactly they will start rolling out the Android Oreo OS updates however they did say to expect updates to start in the coming months. For more info about updates on Motorola software upgrades check out their official website here.
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Resident Evil 4 Remake Voice Actor Leaves Social Media Following Online Harassment

Lily Gao, the voice actor for Ada Wong in Resident Evil 4 Remake, has been facing intense harassment and criticism on social media. The harassment has led her to remove most of her content from her accounts.
Resident Evil 4 Remake Voice Actor Faces Intense Harassment

what’s happening with ada’s VA in resident evil 4 (2023) is beyond unacceptable. everyone has opinions according to their own experience, but going to her social media (and even past VAs of the character) to offend her is sickening and deplorable.
respect lily gao and her work. pic.twitter.com/VxByjojlME
— ada wong archives. (@archiveadawong) April 2, 2023

Ada Wong voice actor Lily Gao is reportedly taking a break from social media after facing intense harassment and criticism from the Resident Evil fan community. Gao recently provided the voice for Ada Wong in the Resident Evil 4 Remake, replacing longtime Resident Evil veteran Jolene Anderson. Fans were upset with the casting decision when it was announced last year, and the frustration seems to have boiled over following the remake’s release. The harassment and criticism faced by Gao on social media led her to pare down her Instagram account to a single post.

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The one remaining post on Gao’s Instagram account is titled “The Role of Privilege” and discusses the concept of race, specifically how some white Americans mistakenly equate racial colorblindness with progressive attitudes. While Gao and the fictional Wong are both of Chinese descent, Wong is a U.S. American, while Gao hails from Canada.

Despite the harsh criticism and harassment faced by Gao, many fans have jumped to her defense, with some calling the actions of the Resident Evil fan community “beyond unacceptable” and “sickening and deplorable.” Some fans have criticized Gao’s performance, but many have also shamed her attackers for their behavior.
This is not Gao’s first time playing the role of Wong, as she also portrayed her in the 2021 film Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City. Fans may also recognize Gao from her recurring appearances on the comedy show Letterkenny and her one appearance on Hulu’s original adaptation of The Handmaiden’s Tale.
While the criticism of an actor’s performance is not new, the intensity and harassment directed towards Gao is a reminder of the toxic and often abusive nature of online fandoms. It’s important for fans to remember that the people behind the characters they love are real human beings who deserve respect and kindness.
Source
Pokdepinion: Not liking a certain aspect of the game is perfectly fine. Harassing / bullying the people who played a role in that aspect you disliked is not cool. Voice out your criticisms, not unleash the hate. Grow up, be better.
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GPU Prices Expected to Skyrocket in 2020 – Time for an Upgrade?

GPU Prices Expected to Skyrocket in 2020

If you have been planning to upgrade your GPU for whatever reason, you may want to do it as soon as you can. It appears that graphics cards are expected to skyrocket in price in 2020.
According to the TrendForce market research firm, there is expected to be a “sharp upturn” in graphics DRAM prices in first quarter of 2020. Server DRAM prices will see the biggest spike in price due to supply constraints by unstable yields of 1x-nanometer processes.
Graphics DRAM prices will see a corresponding sharp rebound. Graphics DRAM is more sensitive to demand change than other types of memory products, so its price fluctuations can be dramatic as well. With OEM clients raising their stock-up demand, Graphics DRAM contract prices are projected to increase by over 5 percent QoQ, the highest among all memory products.Arvil Wu, TrendForce analyst
There are a number of factors as to why GPU prices could skyrocket in 2020 based on overall market demand. For starters, we’re starting to transition from GDDR5 to GDDR6 memory chips, with there being an expectation on production boosts for the latter. The GeForce RTX cards and AMD Navi cards use GDDR6 memory.

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Furthermore, 2020 will see the launch of both the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X. Both consoles use AMD Navi-based GPUs, and both companies will definitely want to manufacture enough consoles to meet the demands of the gaming market at launch.
As such, there will be higher demand than supply, which will inevitably lead to prices skyrocketing for GPUs, particularly those using GDDR6 memory. Graphics DRAM is said to have higher production cost per chip, which resulted in it being the group of memory products to incur operating loss for suppliers for the past several quarters. This led to adjustments made in order for suppliers to start profiting.
Keep in mind that this does not guarantee that there will a price hike. Anything can happen in the market, but this the more likely prediction to come true. With competition growing fierce between NVIDIA and AMD, and with Intel creeping up as a 3rd competitor in the graphics department, we may see some interesting business strategies implemented in 2020.
Source: Hothardware
Pokdepinion: Just when I was planning to save up for a new one, I might just need to buy it in the next few days. Well, guess I’ll be eating bread for a few months.
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Tekken 7 Season 2: Is It Worth Buying the New DLC Pass?
What is new in Tekken 7 Season 2

The most notable thing in Season 2 of Tekken 7 is balance changes to every single playable character in the roster. Some characters will have certain moves become less effective (nerfed) while others may see some noticeable improvements (buffed) such as the move being able to execute faster or has better tracking than before.

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Another change in terms of gameplay for Tekken 7 introduced in Season 2 is the new wall bounce mechanic. Every character now has a move which can strike at the enemy so hard, they will hit the wall and bounce off of it, thus allowing you to continue unleashing your devastating combos. It is by no means a huge game changer, especially since a lot of characters have rather awkward timings to unleash the wall bounce, but it does add versatility to how you go about your combos.

To encourage more players to start playing Tekken 7, Season 2 introduced the new Simple Combos feature. While holding down the assist button, you can just press a single button three times to launch, send them into a corkscrew motion to continue juggling the enemy, and finish the combo. This is meant to make the game easier to play for beginners while also not breaking game balance among seasoned players as it is not the most optimum combo for the characters.

Season 2 also sees some changes in the user interface, though this is just a change in aesthetics, as well as a new theme song for the main menu. It is actually still the same song that we’ve all grown accustomed to over the past year, Solitude, just that the song has been remixed. Both the change in song and user interface certainly does make the game feel surprisingly refreshing.
However, all of these are actually free of charge and can be accessed as soon as you update Tekken 7 to the latest version. So what is the point of purchasing the new season pass, especially if you have purchased last year’s season pass?
What is Included in Season Pass 2?

The Season Pass 2 for Tekken 7, which will cost you RM89, will yield a number of interesting new additions to the main game. You are guaranteed to have six additional playable characters to the roster, with only three of them currently known; Tekken legacy characters Anna Williams and Lei Wulong, and yet another guest character in the form of The Walking Dead’s Negan.
This is certainly very exciting for plenty of Tekken fans as they have not seen both Anna Williams and Lei Wulong since Tekken 6 as these two characters have appeared in pretty much every single Tekken game. Negan’s reception was rather lukewarm as it seemed like a rather odd choice for many, but it is interesting as Tekken 7 now has a better mainstream appeal.

There are other items included, which are just cosmetics that can be used to customize your favourite characters but the main attraction here is the additional playable characters. Season Pass 1, priced at RM109, will get you Tekken’s own Eliza, and guest characters Geese Howard from SNK’s Fatal Fury and Final Fantasy XV’s Noctis. It is interesting but that’s half the additional characters compared to Season 2.
It’s worth noting that you don’t need to purchase Season Pass 1 in order to enjoy the new Season Pass so if the first one is of no interest to you, don’t worry about it. The characters will just appear locked in the character select screen. The remaining three mystery characters will be unveiled at a later date, and we expect it to be an announcement that will surely entice many Tekken fans across the globe.

If you were expecting additional story content for Tekken 7, especially after the conclusion of the fight between Kazuya and Akuma or after Jin has finally awakened from his comatose state as seen in the ending of the game, there will be none of that here. In fact, there are no additional individual character episodes for the new characters, at least at the moment.
Is It Worth Buying?

As an avid Tekken 7 player, I have found myself enjoying the game more and more, and the idea of getting more playable characters in the near future is something I look forward to. If you ask me if it is worth it, I will definitely say yes. However, it may not be the same case for you. If you’re wondering whether it’s worth buying it or not, I would say it depends on a number of factors:

Will you be playing Tekken 7 for a long time?
Will you be playing Tekken 7 online with other players?
Do you have friends to play the game with?
Are you looking to learn / master new characters?

If your answer to most, if not all the questions above are yes, then Season Pass 2 will definitely be worth it for you. Otherwise, I would recommend you to hold on to that purchase as you may end up regretting it. The main game itself is still fun to play so if you’re not sure, just keep playing it and see if the game will continue to interest you in the long run. If becoming an eSports player for Tekken 7 is something that you’re considering, then that automatically makes it worth purchasing.
At the moment, those who have purchased Season Pass 2 for Tekken 7 can already access new playable characters Anna Williams and Lei Wulong. Guest character Negan from The Walking Dead will be added at a later date. It will be available for every single platform that the game is released on, which is the PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC.
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realme XT’s Android 10 and realme UI update is rolling out

realme has just released the realme UI update for the realme 3 Pro a few days back, and it seems like the second in line is the realme XT. The realme XT is realme’s most premium mid-range device, so it does make sense that it will receive the update as early as possible.
The latest update brings realme UI 1.0 and Android 10 to the realme XT. realme UI is to replace OPPO’s ColorOS, which is widely regarded as not up to par with most of the Android skins in the market. realme’s new customized Android skin is expected to bring a more “stock-like” experience, which should satisfy the Android purists and enthusiasts out there.

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In addition to that, the update for the realme XT will come with a number of improvements as well across the board, which means that it not an update to be missed. Not like we recommend you to skip any updates, as most updates bring with them security patches and bug fixes.
With that said, it appears that the update has yet to arrive for Malaysian realme XT users. The update’s build number is RMX1921_11_C.01, so do let us know if you receive the rather sizable 3.52GB update. As usual, it will be released in a staggered rollout, so check for updates every once in a while. Hopefully you will receive a pleasant surprise soon!
Pokdepinion: I can’t wait to get my hands on realme UI. I wonder if they only switched out the launcher to differentiate from ColorOS ala POCO, or they actually went deeper than that.
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Samsung Malaysia Announce Price Drop For Galaxy A12 And Galaxy Tab S6 Lite Tablets

Looking for a smartphone or tablet in the market? Well the folks at Samsung Malaysia has today revealed of their new price reduction for a trio of their devices.
Samsung Malaysia smartphone and tablet price reduction

Starting from today, the company has announced that the new recommended retail price for the Samsung Galaxy A12 is now at RM699, which saves you RM100 from its original RM799 price tag.

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In addition to the Galaxy A12, they’ve also reduced the price for both the Samsung Galaxy Tab S6 Lite WiFi and the Samsung Galaxy Tab S6 Lite LTE where you can enjoy RM200 savings from their original prices. The former now retails at RM1,499 and RM1,799 for the LTE version.
If you’re wondering on what exactly the Samsung Galaxy A12 offers, do check that out by clicking on the link right here. For more on the latest tech and gaming news plus reviews, stay tuned to Pokde.net.
Pokdepinion: I’m pretty sure everyone loves price reductions. It would’ve been more awesome if they’d do it for their S-series, Note-series, or even for the S20 FE! That would be an attractive deal.
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Celcom And Hong Leong Joins Arms – Offering Exclusive Rebates And Rewards!

Celcom Axiata Berhad has announced today of their joint partnership with Hong Leong Bank where it will bring consumers more value as well as privileges and benefits in coming months.
Celcom Partners With Hong Leong Bank
With the deal signed, Celcom FIRST postpaid consumers and Hong Leong credit card owners are entitled to enjoy between RM300 to RM800 in cash backs and savings when they purchase the latest smartphone device bundles from Celcom using selected Hong Leong credit cards starting from today until this 31st of July 2018.
Celcom’s list of bundle rebate includes the latest flagship smartphones such as iPhone X, iPhone 8, iPhone 8 Plus, HUAWEI P20, Samsung Galaxy S9 to name a few.

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As for Hong Leong credit users, they will also enjoy cash rebates when they purchase Celcom’s device bundles using Hong Leong Sutera, GSC Gold/Platinum and also Infinite credit cards.
Besides that, users will also enjoy rebate for Celcom Passport, which is worth RM138 when they spend a minimum of RM2,000, although you need to make at least one overseas transaction with Hong Leong credit cards. The 7-day 3-in-1 pass allows travelers to roam with 3GB internet, unlimited calls and SMS in over 30 countries.
To check out more on the offer, you can click on the link right here or visit any of Celcom Bluecube in the country. You can also apply for Hong Leong credit cards by going through here.
Pokdepinion: If you’re both a Celcom and a Hong Leong credit card user, well this deal is meant for you. Be sure to check out the deals (not to forget the rebates) that they are offering.

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