THIEAUDIO Showcases Flagship Valhalla IEMs with 38-Driver System

During CES 2025, THIEAUDIO showed off its most ambitious creation yet: the Valhalla in-ear monitors. This flagship model, priced at $1999, represents an engineering marvel in personal audio technology, combining significant driver configuration with meticulous handcrafting. The Valhalla's most striking feature is its remarkable 38-driver architecture, with 19 balanced armature drivers positioned in each earpiece. It incorporates premium components from renowned manufacturers Knowles and Sonion, enabling the IEMs to reproduce sound with exceptional precision across the entire frequency spectrum. At the heart of Valhalla's innovative design lies the proprietary Precision Bass System (PBS), which helps with low-frequency reproduction in IEMs. By housing multiple bass drivers within a specially engineered resonance chamber, the PBS delivers subwoofer-quality bass response reaching down to 5 Hz while minimizing listener fatigue.

The production process of each Valhalla unit is equally complex. A single engineer dedicates an entire day to handcrafting each set, carefully measuring and matching drivers before assembly. The implementation of a sophisticated 4-way passive crossover network, combined with advanced acoustic tubing, helps seamless frequency transitions and optimal tonal balance throughout the audio spectrum. Complementing the Valhalla's acoustic prowess is the EliteNoir cable, which features silver-plated LCOFC wires that maximize signal integrity and durability. This premium cable enhances the IEMs' already impressive soundstage and imaging capabilities. Preorders are now open, and production times are estimated at 2-3 weeks. The design is equally interesting, and you can see it in the pictures below.


https://www.techpowerup.com/331036/thiea...ver-system

This Week in Gaming (Week 3)

Welcome to the middle of January and a busy week of new game releases. We kick off this week with some driving, on tracks though, as these cars might not be entirely road legal. If cars aren't your thing, then how about a city builder, but in the sky? If that doesn't tickle your fancy, how about a unique looking ARPG? This is followed by something of a PC clone of recent Zelda games, just without any defined goals. This brings us a futuristic side scroller where you fight demons. We round off the week with some Chinese hack and slash action back in the feudal era.

Assetto Corsa EVO / This week's major release / Thursday 16 January
As with its predecessor, Assetto Corsa EVO will include cars from different classes spanning across years of motoring history. From road cars, classics, hypercars, and race cars. The most iconic representation of the automotive and motorsport world. Each vehicle is reproduced through an advanced system that simulates mechanical, electronic, and aerodynamic performance, combined with the fidelity of the circuits created using Laserscan technology. Steam link Read full story


https://www.techpowerup.com/331012/this-...ing-week-3

Huion Showcases Kamvas 16 Gen 3 Professional Pen-Display

Huion specializes in graphics tablets and pen displays. Its products go up against those from Wacom. We've seen a host of announcements at the 2024 Computex, but the company was saving its next-gen for the 2025 CES. The company showed us their latest Kamvas 16 Gen 3, a 16-inch high-precision pen display for hand-drawn graphics applications. The display comes with a QHD resolution (2560 x 1440 pixels), which lends a respectable 184 ppi of pixel density. The display also features a 120% sRGB wide color gamut. The display features Huion's PenTech 4.0 technology, a high-resolution graphics pen input interface that the company introduced in 2024. This gives the input surface 16,384 pressure sensitivity levels. The display is compatible with Huion's PW600, and PW600S digital pens.


https://www.techpowerup.com/330968/huion...en-display

Cougar Debuts New Omnyx & Airface Cases at CES 2025

The TechPowerUp team was invited up to Cougar's Las Vegas suite where two new PC cases sat alongside a familiar product. A brand rep started proceedings by introducing the white Omnyx RGB case—featuring a symmetric design with two tempered glass panels (one on top and another across the front face). Cougar's engineering team has implemented a novel modular I/O system—users can reposition this panel around the enclosure's base. The Omnyx's lower chamber provides a convenient hideaway space for a power supply, while the spacious upper section is dedicated to displaying visually striking components.

Cougar's Omnyx RGB case is supplied with four pre-installed 160 mm RGB cooling fans—an additional three can be added aftermarket. The enclosure's cable management compartment resides behind the motherboard tray, thus keeping clutter away from the main interior chamber. The Omnyx is ready to support motherboards with back connectors—convenient timing, since hardware manufacturers are sending more of these products to market. Read full story


https://www.techpowerup.com/330892/couga...t-ces-2025

ZOTAC Shows New ZONE GAMING Handheld Prototype with AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 at CES 2025

We had a chance to get close and personal with the new ZOTAC ZONE GAMING prototype at the CES 2025 show. While it is not a final product, we had a chance to see it in action as it is a working prototype and thanks to updated hardware, it should provide much higher performance compared to the ZOTAC Zone that we had a chance to review last year.

The biggest update is the 4 nm Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 processor. The Strix Point architecture brings 12-core/24-thread CPU (four performance and eight efficiency) based on Zen 5 architecture, 24 MB of shared L3 cache and 1 MB of L2 cache per core. It also comes with Radeon 890M, a RDNA 3.5 architecture GPU with 16 Compute Units. ZOTAC also increased the amount of LPDDR5X RAM to 32 GB and raised M.2 2280 PCIe 4.0 SSD storage space to 1 TB. The Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 has a standard TDP of 28 W, and a configurable TDP between 15 W and 54 W, so it gives ZOTAC a lot of room to work with. It also features 50 TOPS XDNA NPU. Read full story


https://www.techpowerup.com/330826/zotac...t-ces-2025

NVIDIA 2025 International CES Keynote: Liveblog

NVIDIA kicks off the 2025 International CES with a bang. The company is expected to debut its new GeForce "Blackwell" RTX 5000 generation of gaming graphics cards. It is also expected to launch new technology, such as neural rendering, and DLSS 4. The company is also expected to highlight a new piece of silicon for Windows on Arm laptops, showcase the next in its Drive PX FSD hardware, and probably even talk about its next-generation "Blackwell Ultra" AI GPU, and if we're lucky, even namedrop "Rubin." Join us, as we liveblog CEO Jensen Huang's keynote address.02:22 UTC: The show is finally underway! Read full story


https://www.techpowerup.com/330611/nvidi...e-liveblog

First NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 GPU with 32 GB GDDR7 Memory Leaks Ahead of CES Keynote

NVIDIA's unannounced GeForce RTX 5090 graphics card has leaked, confirming key specifications of the next-generation GPU. Thanks to exclusive information from VideoCardz, we can see the packaging of Inno3D's RTX 5090 iChill X3 model, which confirms that the graphics card will feature 32 GB of GDDR7 memory. The leaked materials show that Inno3D's variant will use a 3.5-slot cooling system, suggesting significant cooling requirements for the flagship card. According to earlier leaks, the RTX 5090 will be based on the GB202 GPU and include 21,760 CUDA cores. The card's memory system is a significant upgrade, with its 32 GB of GDDR7 memory running on a 512-bit memory bus at 28 Gbps, capable of delivering nearly 1.8 TB/s of bandwidth. This represents twice the memory capacity of the upcoming RTX 5080, which is expected to ship with 16 GB capacity but 30 Gbps GDDR7 modules.

Power consumption has increased significantly, with the RTX 5090's TDP rated at 575 W and TGP of 600 W, marking a 125-watt increase over the previous RTX 4090 in raw TDP. NVIDIA is scheduled to hold its CES keynote today at 06:30 pm PT time, where the company is expected to announce several new graphics cards officially. The lineup should include the RTX 5090, RTX 5080, RTX 5070 Ti, RTX 5070, and an RTX 5090D model specifically for the Chinese market. Early indications are that the RTX 5080 will be the first card to reach consumers, with a planned release date of January 21st. Release dates for other models, including the flagship RTX 5090, have not yet been confirmed. The RTX 5090 is currently the only card in the RTX 50 series planned to use the GB202 GPU. Pricing information and additional specifications are expected to be revealed during the upcoming announcement.


https://www.techpowerup.com/330538/first...es-keynote

This Week in Gaming (Week 2)

Welcome to the first full week of the new year and the month of January. This week's major release involves building pointy buildings in the desert, just south of the Mediterranean. The rest of this week's new releases involves getting imprisoned by aliens, making steampunk chocolate, work as a robot assassin, purging the land and doing hard time in a futuristic version of Japan.

Builders of Egypt / This week's major release / Wednesday 8 January
In Builders of Egypt, you can explore the land of the pharaohs through the ages, from the Nile Delta to Nubia. Build cities, manage trade, economy, and resources, make strategic decisions, control armies and engage in battles, foster religious development, and ensure the well-being of your citizens. Play through a complete campaign or unleash your creativity in Sandbox mode. Steam link Read full story


https://www.techpowerup.com/330520/this-...ing-week-2

BOOX Note Max with 13.3-inch E-Ink Display Launches Worldwide

E-Ink aficionados have been on the rise in recent years, and for good reason. E-Ink displays, despite their undeniable downsides, are excellent for note-taking and reading without having to worry about eye-strain. The 13.3-inch BOOX Note Max is an excellent option for its targeted demographic, and is now available for purchase worldwide for a relatively affordable price of $649.

The Note Max sports Android support, specifically Android 13. Needless to say, this means that a plethora of apps and functionality can be installed separately. The 13.3-inch capacitive touch display with 4,096 levels of pressure sensitivity sports a resolution for 3200 x 2400, amounting to a commendable PPI value of 300. An octa-core 2.8 GHz CPU takes care of all the computing needs, paired with 6 GB of memory. Of course, the Note Max is not meant to be a powerhouse, but decent performance is always welcome. Read full story


https://www.techpowerup.com/330504/boox-...-worldwide

(PR) SK hynix to Unveil Full Stack AI Memory Provider Vision at CES 2025

SK hynix Inc. announced today that it will showcase its innovative AI memory technologies at CES 2025, to be held in Las Vegas from January 7 to 10 (local time). A large number of C-level executives, including CEO Kwak No-jung, CMO (Chief Marketing Officer) Justin Kim and Chief Development Officer (CDO) Ahn Hyun, will attend the event. "We will broadly introduce solutions optimized for on-device AI and next-generation AI memories, as well as representative AI memory products such as HBM and eSSD at this CES," said Justin Kim. "Through this, we will publicize our technological competitiveness to prepare for the future as a Full Stack AI Memory Provider."

SK hynix will also run a joint exhibition booth with SK Telecom, SKC and SK Enmove, under the theme "Innovative AI, Sustainable Tomorrow." The booth will showcase how SK Group's AI infrastructure and services are transforming the world, represented in waves of light. SK hynix, which is the world's first to produce 12-layer HBM products for 5th generation and supply them to customers, will showcase samples of HBM3E 16-layer products, which were officially developed in November last year. This product uses the advanced MR-MUF process to achieve the industry's highest 16-layer configuration while controlling chip warpage and maximizing heat dissipation performance. Read full story


https://www.techpowerup.com/330452/sk-hy...t-ces-2025