Hardware

Taiwan’s Powerchip sells legacy fab it opened just 19 months ago after spending $9.5 billion

Soon enough, you might not even be able to buy a calculator.

Nvidia is among those to blame, says Nomura Securities.

The historic Steve Jobs & the Computer Revolution: The Apple 50th Anniversary Auction sale has kicked-off.

This is seemingly a temporary halt to H200 orders.

But there is a catch, or two.

It's just a DIY project, but I want one badly.

Sometimes just the thought of choosing components, designing a PCB, and assembling and testing the hardware is enough to kill a perfectly good idea for a new electronic gadget. That’s a lot of work, and when we are deciding what to do with our free time, work is not usually the number one choice. It is for this reason that hobbyists need to have tools available to them that will help them cut some corners to get a prototype up and running quickly.

PC components are neatly fixed beneath the belly of this cast iron hulk.

Mirari is expected to be ready for prime time in mid-2026, costing from around US$600.

And it will continue to do so.

DIY DDR5.

The PAS 5500/1150C is capable of producing wafers at a resolution of ≤ 90 nm with a wavelength of 193 nm, according to THIS DOCUMENT. It's a machine from the 90s and gets support through 2035.

Price and reliability don't scale.

Micron is making more money than ever thanks to AI.

Much earlier than expected

The semiconductor industry is poised to grow in the coming years.

Amazon's most powerful CPU to date.

Siemens and GlobalFoundries have announced a strategic partnership focused on AI-driven automation of semiconductor production. The agreements are laid out in a memorandum of understanding and focus on chip factories, software, and digital production processes.

Samsung is reportedly scaling down its HBM production, shifting focus of DRAM production to DDR5 modules because there's FAR more profits to be made.

New industry analysis argues the AI era is reshaping every part of the chip market at once.

Two heads are better than one?

re:invent: The homegrown chips now account for half of all new CPUs added to AWS over the past three years

It is great to see legendary old hardware that is still able to work in the latest PC systems.

A Reddit user says a Best Buy order for an ASUS TUF GeForce RTX 5080 ended with a box of rocks instead of a $1,200 graphics card. The buyer placed the order on 25 November and received it on 28 November. According to his post, the card shipped with shipping labels stuck directly to the retail GPU box, no outer brown carton, and a seal that already looked tampered with.

Every single computer, including DIY boards like the Raspberry Pi, will cost more, and it's only going to get worse.

U.S. chipmaker set to expand Hiroshima site with heavy support from Tokyo.

The company claims to have doubled rendering performance and had demos running at ICCAD 2025.

The beloved Cherry MX switches will stay safe with the company, though.

How do they work?

It's allegedly 1.5 times the speed of Nvidia's A100 GPU from 2020.

Near memory computing could do wonders.

Maker David Johnson-Davies has designed a compact board for anyone looking to turn a USB Power Delivery (PD)-capable power supply into a user-selectable fixed voltage for their breadboard projects and more: the USB-C Power Delivery Dongle.

The punched card computer era finally shuttered in 1984, when IBM discontinued card manufacturing, but some people miss it.

When Qualcomm announced its acquisition of Arduino in October 2025, the tinkerer and maker community watched nervously. Large corporate acquisitions rarely end well for open platforms after all, and enshittification is something that often follows.

Most language learning apps live on phones, competing with notifications, social media, and every other distraction fighting for your attention. Opening Duolingo between classes usually turns into five minutes of vocabulary followed by twenty minutes of scrolling through feeds you’ve already checked twice. Designers are starting to build tiny, single-purpose devices that turn fragmented time into focused practice instead of another excuse to stare at your phone screen until your eyes hurt.

A few years ago Solder Party started selling tiny USB keyboards made by combining an actual BlackBerry keyboard (ripped from an old device) with a custom PCB and USB-C connector. But since BlackBerry is out of business, eventually it’s going to get harder to find devices to cannibalize for their keyboards.

Microsoft has unveiled its next-generation, in-house-developed ARM processor, the Cobalt 200, for Azure VMs, claiming up to 50% higher performance than its predecessor.

Just about every “getting started with microcontrollers” kit, Arduino or otherwise, includes an ultrasonic distance sensor module. Given the power of microcontrollers these days, it was only a matter of time before someone asked: “Could I do better without the module?” Well, [Martin Pittermann] asked, and his answer, at least with the Pi Pico, is a resounding “Yes”. A micro and a couple of transducers can offer a better view of the world.

This pioneering microprocessor was a classified military secret from 1970 to 1989, as a vital part of an advanced fighter aircraft’s control systems.

It's not a matter of if; rather when.

No relief in sight for RAM buyers.

A new DARPA- and Texas-backed facility will focus on 3D heterogeneous integration, stacking, and combining multiple materials and chip types to advance U.S. capabilities in defense, AI, and HPC.

New quantum hardware and software upgrades put IBM on track for a 2026 quantum advantage claim

Microsoft has detailed a new Azure AI datacenter site in Atlanta, which will connect to its Wisconsin site and existing supercomputers.

If you want to build an actual HAL 9000, all you need is an LED, some carpentry skills, and any laptop accessing a talking AI. If you want to build your own R2D2, you’ll have a tougher job assembling a range of materials, motors, and electronics. But what if you wanted to make your own working version of TARS, that bizarre, blocky robot from Christopher Nolan’s Interstellar that looks like a stainless steel ATM with metal posts for legs sprouting from its shoulders?

SteamOS-powered headset sports semi-modular design, wireless “low-latency” PC streaming.

SteamOS-powered cube for your TV targets early 2026 launch, no pricing details.

New components make it more useful and powerful but no less odd.

Supply will remain deficient for a few years.

But chipmakers already know this empirically.

Jalisco plans to develop the first state-owned chip design park in Latin America to expand Mexico’s semiconductor production capacity.

Following development

Bolt talks the software behind its upcoming GPU; AI not mentioned once

RISC-V is an industry standard, like USB or Wi-Fi. The specifications are publicly available under the Creative Commons license and every engineer, wherever they are in the world, can use them to design their products locally, while engaging with the global RISC-V ecosystem.

Fungi make up a massive, interconnected part of Earth’s ecosystems, yet they’re vastly underrepresented in research and public consciousness compared to plants and animals. That may change in the future though, as a group of researchers at The Ohio State University have found a way to use fungi as organic memristors — hinting at a possible future where fungal networks help power our computing devices.

But will they beat AMD's and Nvidia's offerings?

The top model, with an AMD Ryzen 7 chip, has many modern features - and a Blu-ray drive - built in.

cross-posted from: https://piefed.ca/post/295112

AMD, Apple, Nvidia and others may have to raise prices yet again

CXMT is getting ready for its initial public offering.

Super sharp imagery reveals the structure of this milestone CPU from Intel.