Laptop Batteries, Chargers and AC Adapters

AMD achieved its highest ever share of the global CPU market in the last quarter of 2021, figures show. The US chip maker was responsible for 25.6% of all shipments between October and December, beating its previous high of 25.3% from 2006.

That’s according to data from Mercury Research, which suggests the growth was driven by strong sales of x86 chips. You’ll find these in consoles such as the Xbox Series X, which may have prioritised due to ongoing chip shortages. That may explain the slight fall in desktop and mobile market share – AMD previously admitted it has had to divert resources away from more affordable CPUs.

AMD’s market share should be bolstered by the arrival of Ryzen 6000 Series mobile CPUs, which the company revealed at CES 2022. These are expected to make their way into laptops over the next few months, but we’ll be waiting until the Ryzen 7000 Series for new desktop chips.

Of course, AMD’s slice of the CPU pie remains much lower than Intel, its main rival when it comes to processors. Given Intel also released new laptop CPUs at CES, it could be difficult for AMD to make many major inroads in 2022.

Still, it’s a remarkable rise for a company that only began making Ryzen CPUs in 2017. It also coincides with record revenue for AMD in Q4 of 2021. The company made $4.8 billion between October and December last year, a 49% year-on-year increase.

Despite a big launch at the start of the year, it looks like AMD still has big plans for the rest of 2022. The chip maker has confirmed that the Ryzen 7000 Series will launch at some point in the second half of year, using its new Zen 4 architecture.

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Four months after its first true flagship-level smartphone chips were announced, MediaTek is back for more.

At MWC 2022, the firm unveiled the Dimensity 8000 Series, pitching it as the little brother of the top-spec Dimensity 9000. But this doesn’t mean sacrifices have been made to performance. Despite returning to a 5nm process, the octa-core Dimensity 8000 and 8100 are still very much flagship SoCs (systems-on-a-chip).

Those eight CPU cores include four of Arm’s performance-focused Cortex-A78, which enable maximum clock speeds of 2.75GHz for the 8000 and 2.85GHz for the 8100. A further four cores prioritise power efficiency, for when battery life is more important than performance.

Combined with a Mali-G610 integrated GPU and support for super-fast LPDDR5 RAM, top-tier performance still feels well within reach.

With that in mind, it’s no surprise that MediaTek specifically advertises the Dimensity 8000 Series’ suitability for gaming. The company claims the 8100 can reach 170fps in GFXBench’s Manhattan graphics test, while the 8000 isn’t far behind on 140fps. However, actual in-game performance will vary by device.

The variation between the two frame rates, though, can be partially explained by some subtle differences in CPU performance and around 10% higher GPU frequency on the Dimensity 8100.

Integrated ‘HyperEngine’ tech is designed to improve power efficiency, which should increase battery life, though MediaTek didn’t offer any details on how it achieves this.

Theoretically, the Dimensity 8000 Series could power upcoming gaming phones, but only time will tell.

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AMD is finally returning to the budget scene with the announcement of six new ‘mainstream’ chips: three based on Zen 2 architecture and the other three using the latest Zen 3.

They’ll range from quad-core to octa-core, and one includes built-in Radeon graphics. All are under $200 (around £150), bar the Ryzen 7 5700X which will cost $299 (around £230).

They’ll go on sale starting on 4 April 2022. UK prices have not yet been officially announced.

You can see their main features and prices in this handy table.

Ryzen 7 5800X3D price & release date
Announced at CES 2022, the Ryzen 7 5800X3D now has a price and a release date. It goes on sale on 20 April and will cost $449 – around £345.

AMD says it’s the world’s fastest gaming CPU, which also happens to be the first consumer CPU with vertically stacked L3 cache. Adding this extra 3D V-Cache memory makes it 15% faster than the Ryzen 9 5900X.

BIOS updates for 300-series motherboards
Initially, AMD said that Zen 3 chips wouldn’t work on 300 or 400-series motherboards, but as part of its spring announcement, it says it has been working for months on adding support and has now provided version 1207 to its motherboard partners.

What this means is that any of the seven new chips – including the 5800X3D – can be dropped into an X370 or B350 board (that’s had the update) and they will work. Seeing support for motherboards coming up to six years old is great to see.

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Apple launched the fifth-gen iPad Air alongside the new iPhone SE at its March 2022 event, boasting impressive performance gains compared to its predecessor. Not only does it offer 5G connectivity and improved USB-C transfer speeds, but the new iPad Air sports the same Apple M1 chipset as the company’s top-end iPad Pro range – and all without a price hike.

Here’s all there is to know about the new iPad Air ahead of full release tomorrow.

When will the new iPad Air be released?
As was rumoured, Apple revealed the new iPad Air during its March 2022 event. The fifth-gen tablet is on sale as of 18 March.

Buy the new iPad Air in the UK
Buy the new iPad Air in the US
As well as the Apple Store, it’s also available to buy at popular retailers like Amazon and Argos in the UK, and Best Buy in the US. For more options, see our dedicated article on where to buy the iPad Air 5.

To see what it’ll be up against, take a look at our choice of the best iPads available right now.

How much does the new iPad Air cost?
The iPad Air saw a noticeable price hike when the redesigned model was introduced in October 2020, going from a starting price of £479/$499 to £579/$599, representing an increase of £100/$100.

Thankfully, that wasn’t the case this time around, with identical pricing to the iPad Air 4 range for the Wi-Fi variant – in fact, it’s £10 cheaper in the UK!

The cellular models are a little more expensive this time around though, likely down to the inclusion of upgraded 5G connectivity.

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If you’re a Sonic the Hedgehog fan and want to level up your home with some unique smart lighting, you’re in luck. Nanoleaf is releasing a Sonic Limited Edition of its Shapes Starter Kit to celebrate the release of the movie, Sonic the Hedgehog 2 – the sequel to the box office smash video game film adaptation.

Nanoleaf is one of the best-known brands in the smart lighting industry. The products come in a series of shapes, which customers can piece together however they like to create an installation that can be hooked onto a wall. Nanoleaf is particularly popular with gamers and streamers, so a Sonic-themed product is quite apt.

The 32 lights included in the pack allow users to build a portrait of either Sonic the Hedgehog, Miles ‘Tails’ Prower or Knuckles the Echidna – the three main characters in the upcoming animated movie. Three colours (Sonic Blue, Tails Yellow and Knuckles Red) are also programmed in the Sonic 2 playlist in the Nanoleaf app to streamline the build process.

Alternatively, if users want something that is not related to the speedy blue hedgehog, they can build the Nanoleaf shapes in a different custom configuration and choose from over 16 million colours.

The panels feature a screen mirror mode, which means that they will reflect the colours shown on a screen in real-time. There is also a rhythm feature, where panels react to sound and music.

The Nanoleaf Shapes Starter Kit features triangular and mini-triangular panels. If that doesn’t suit your tastes, you can opt from a range of styles, including the Hexagonal product, and the rectangular Canvas version. For something a little more sophisticated, there is also the wood-effect Elements lights.

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