Gaming

Steam Trading Cards Reward Gamers with DLC and Game Coupons

Pulkit Chandna — Thu, 16 May 2013 14:47:28 +0000

The feature is currently limited to only six games

A mysterious database entry for something called the Steam Trading Card popped up in the Steam database late last week and all sorts of theories began doing the rounds on the Web. Some saw it as a harbinger of a trading game being developed by Valve, while others suspected it to be a new Steam service for facilitating the trade of in-game items.

Valve on Wednesday finally put all that speculation to rest when it officially announced Steam Trading Cards, a new service that rewards gamers for, well, gaming. In its press release, the company described the new service thus: “Released in beta today, Steam Trading Cards allows customers to earn Steam rewards for playing the games they love. Those who participate will receive game-specific trading cards that can be collected to earn rewards such as game badges, profile backgrounds, emoticons, coupons, and more.”

But how does one go about collecting these cards? To begin with, you will need to join the Steam Trading Cards beta, which is currently limited to Don't Starve, Dota 2, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, Team Fortress 2, Portal 2 and Half-Life. You can then collect up to half the card set through the actual act of playing, while the other half has to be collected from other community member.

Once you complete a card set for one of the above participating games, you can craft them into a game badge. Just like current badges, game badges are associated with your game account. According to the official Steam Trading Cards page, these badges bring with them “marketable” rewards like emoticons, profile backgrounds, and DLC/game coupons, What’s more, they can be levelled up as many as five times, allowing you to earn more items.

“All badges now have XP which contributes to your Steam Level, a summary of your badge collection,” reads the Steam Trading Cards page. “You can view someone’s Steam Level by hovering over their avatar. Leveling up earns you non-tradable items like profile showcases, extra friends list slots, and more”

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Nvidia Announces Project Shield Release Date, Price

Pulkit Chandna — Wed, 15 May 2013 02:27:15 +0000

Company now accepting pre-orders for the handheld from the most eager "fans"

At a time when dedicated handheld gaming devices are struggling to remain relevant, Nvidia is pressing ahead with plans to launch a handheld of its own. The chipmaker on Monday made its Tegra 4-powered Project Shield (codename) handheld available for pre-order to those who took the trouble of signing up for Shield-related updates by clicking ‘Notify Me’ on the official Shield website.

The upcoming Android-running device, which it unveiled at the Consumer Electronics Show in January, will now be known simply as Shield and set consumers back $349, the company announced today. Nvidia will start taking pre-orders from the general public through Newegg, GameStop, Micro Center, Canada Computers and the Shield website on May 20, 2013, with the first units expected to reach customers in late June.

Shield runs what Nvidia says is “pure” Android (Jelly Bean). With Nvidia deciding against locking down the OS (à la Amazon Kindle Fire), gamers will have access to all the latest and greatest games and apps in the Play Store. In fact, a couple of games will come bundled with it.

However, it would be foolish to think that its console-esque controller is merely aimed at making the many touch-unfriendly Android games out there a touch (pardon the pun) more playable. Shield’s controller is sure to come in very handy when gamers choose to stream their favorite PC games from their GeForce GTX GPU-powered PCs to the handheld.

Here’s a quick rundown of its specs:

Processor: NVIDIA Tegra 4 Quad Core Mobile Processor with 2GB RAM
Controller: Console-grade controller with dual analog joysticks, a full-sized D-Pad, left and right analog triggers, full-sized bumpers and A/B/X/Y buttons
Display: 5-inch, 720p retinal multi-touch display
Audio: Integrated stereo speakers with built-in microphone
Games and Apps: Android titles in the Play Store and PC games via GeForce game streaming
Bundled Software: Google Play, TegraZone, Sonic 4 Episode II THD, Expendable: Rearmed, Hulu Plus, TwitchTV
Storage: 16GB Flash Memory
Wireless: 802.11n 2x2 Mimo Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 3.0 and GPS
Connectivity: Mini-HDMI output, Micro-USB 2.0, MicroSD storage slot, 3.5mm stereo headphone jack with microphone support
Motion Sensors: 3 Axis Gyro, 3 Axis Accelerometer
Battery: 28.8 Watt Hours

Has Nvidia put paid to Shield’s chances of success by pricing it in line with home consoles, or do you think that the handheld has enough juice to justify its hefty price tag? Do tell us what you think.

Sony Claims it Might Actually Make a Quick Profit off the PS4 Thanks to its PC Inspired Design

Justin Kerr — Mon, 13 May 2013 02:54:42 +0000

AMD picks up the R&D tab for this generation of consoles.

When the Xbox 360 and PS3 first faced off in the market, both companies took a bath on the hardware. The custom designs pitted two companies with two very different architectures against each other in the market, and consumers really had no way of knowing which was superior. Seven years later the general conscious seems to give Sony the slight nod when it comes to pure console performance potential, but ultimately Microsoft was much better at exposing functionality to developers. PS3 exclusives tended to feature tons of eye candy, but cross platform titles always seemed to work slightly better on the 360. Fast forward to 2013 and both companies appear to be targeting a super charged PC architecture powered by AMD, and as a result, they might actually make money this time.

Sony CFO Masaru Kato reassured investors on their most recent earnings call that, "Unlike PS3, we are not planning a major loss to be incurred with the launch of PS4. At the time we developed PS3, we made a lot of in-house investments to develop the chip, the Cell chip," he explained. "Development of the chip saw the silicon processing and all the facilities invested by us ourselves. But this time, yes we have a team working on chip development, but we already have existing technology to incorporate and also product investment and all the facilities will now be invested by our partners, other foundries, so we don't have to make all the investment in-house."

Making a profit off each console will make a huge difference for Sony who continues to struggle to maintain dominance, but not if it means the price tag comes in north of $400. Consumers have become conditioned to pay less for consoles, and those with a serious budget have turned to the PC. Comparing Sony and Microsoft hardware will probably be much easier this generation, so hopefully the competition will the keep pricing in line, and console games just need to pick an ecosystem.

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MOBAs Dominate Raptr’s List of Most Played Games of April 2013

Pulkit Chandna — Fri, 10 May 2013 20:51:47 +0000

Dota 2 trails League of Legends

Gaming social network Raptr, which has over the past few years published yearly lists of the most popular games based on its users’ gaming habits, last month began doing so on a monthly basis. Earlier this week, it published the second such monthly list of “most played games.”

With a total share of 8.73 percent, the top spot on Raptr’s list of most played Xbox 360 and PC games of April, 2013 belongs to Call of Duty Black Ops II , which had also topped the list last month. It is just one of six Xbox 360 games in the top 10.

Just like last month, League of Legends occupies the second spot with a 6.31 percent share, slightly up from the 5.97 percent it managed during the previous month. The next two are both PC titles as well.

Dota 2 climbed two places to snag the third spot from World of Warcraft, which is number four on the list. The fourth and final PC title in the top ten is Defiance, having debuted at number nine in April. Another PC title that merits a mention is SimCity, albeit for all the wrong reasons. The title, which somehow clung onto the twentieth and final spot last month, has now dropped out altogether.

It is clear from the site’s latest monthly data — for which it relies entirely on the willingness of its users to share their gamer ids — that multiplayer online battle arena (MOBA) games are very popular among the PC-doting section of the five-year-old site’s constituency, and SimCity isn’t (for obvious reasons, of course).

But, as far as we are concerned, the biggest highlight of Raptr’s first two monthly lists is the fact that Dota 2, which was recently said to have become the most played game, finds itself behind — and by quite a sizable margin at that — the game it had supposedly overtaken: League of Legends (LoL). This lends credence to Riot Games’ contention that Dota 2 is not even close to LoL when it comes to popularity, with the latter attracting as many as “500,000 peak concurrent players every day on just the EU West shard” compared to Dota 2’s peak of 325,897 concurrent users worldwide.

Image Credit: Raptr

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Origin PC Starts Shipping Beastly EON17-SLX SLI Laptops, Bundles Gaming Peripherals

Paul Lilly — Thu, 09 May 2013 15:20:30 +0000

Desktop power in a laptop form factor.

When you fire up Origin PC's EON17-SLX SLI laptop, it should play George Thorogood's "Bad to the Bone," lest anyone can think of a more appropriate song to describe the hardware inside. As the name suggests, this badass notebook has been fed not one, but TWO Nvidia GeForce GTX 680M graphics cards, both of which Origin PC takes the time to overclock before shipping out.

The ready-to-ship configuration includes an Intel Core i7 3840QM processor, a quad-core chip clocked at 2.8GHz (3.8GHz via Turbo) with 8MB of cache. You're not going to want for power with this thing, which also wields 16GB of Corsair Vengeance 1600MHZ RAM, 240GB solid state drive, 1TB hard drive for storage duties, a DVD burner, and Windows 7 Home Premium.

This particular model isn't customizable, hence the ready-to-ship status, though you can opt to increase the standard 45-day zero dead pixel guarantee to 90 days and/or increase the 1-year warranty up to 3 years, both for a fee. You can also add software and accessories to the package.

In addition to the above parts, Origin PC is bundling a few gaming peripherals, including a Razer Lachesis mouse, Corsair HS1A headset, and an Origin brand messenger bag.

Ready for the price? Take a deep breath -- it checks in at $3,399, a hefty sum for a laptop these days, albeit representative of a $500 savings, Origin PC says. Should you take the plunge, your system will ship out the next business day after payment is processed.

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Purported Pictures of Nvidia GTX 780 and GTX 770 Emerge

Pulkit Chandna — Wed, 08 May 2013 04:52:34 +0000

The 700-series graphics cards share the same cooling solution

The rumored Nvidia GeForce GTX 780 and GTX 770 graphics cards, which were said to be arriving in late May as of last week, have allegedly had their pictures leaked to the Web. The said pictures were posted on a Chinese forum on Monday.

Aesthetically, both cards are identical, save for the shoddy engravings of their names. Based on the leaked pictures, both cards seem to share the same NVTTM cooler found on the GTX Titan. But that is where the similarities end.

While the GTX 780 is said to be a GK110-based part (known internally as Titan LE), the GTX 770 is rumored to be a slightly higher-clocked variant of the GTX 680 that will be based on the GK104-425 core just like the archetype.

According to reports, the GTX 780 will cost somewhere between $699 and $759 and feature a GK110 core with 2496 CUDA cores, 208 TMUs, 40 ROPs, 5GB GDDR5 memory and 384/320-bit memory interface. The GTX 770 is expected to cost around $400 and pack a GK104-425 core with 1536 CUDA cores, 128 TMUs, 32 ROPs, 2GB GDDR5 memory and 256-bit memory interface.

Images Courtesy: Chiphell

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Crysis Not Averted: MSI's GX70 Gaming Laptop Can Handle Crysis 3

Paul Lilly — Tue, 07 May 2013 15:09:17 +0000

Yes, it can run Crysis 3.

Ultrabooks and tablets are fine for what they're intended to do, but if you want to play a game like Crysis 3 at a high resolution, good luck trying to so on Integrated graphics. Gaming notebooks, while bulky, flex significantly more pixel pushing power, and that's especially true of MSI's new GX70 laptop, a system the company claims is "officially recommended for Crysis 3." MSI's marketing spin aside, this thing wields a pretty powerful Radeon HD 8970M GPU.

MSI also tapped AMD for central processing chores, which is handled by an A10-5750M quad-core APU (Accelerated Processing Unit) clocked at 2.5GHz to 3.5GHz. It's not Ivy Bridge, but respectable nonetheless, especially when paired with the high-end discrete graphics.

Other hardware features and options include up to 32GB of DDR3L-1600 memory (two DIMM slots), 128GB solid state drive (RAID 0) paired with either a 500GB or 750GB hard drive (7200 RPM), up to a Blu-ray writer for optical duties, two USB 3.0 ports, two USB 2.0 ports, SD card reader, HD webcam, 802.11b/g/n, Bluetooth 4.0, Killer Gaming LAN, HDMI 1.4 output, DisplayPort, D-Sub, 9-cell battery, and Windows 8. It also has a full color backlit LED keyboard built by SteelSeries.

No word on price or availability.

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Lenovo IdeaPad Y500 Review

Jimmy Thang — Mon, 06 May 2013 21:56:58 +0000

A good idea and a great value

What’s not to like about the Lenovo IdeaPad Y500? Imagine a 2.4GHz Core i7-3630QM CPU notebook armed with two GeForce GT 650Ms, 16GB of RAM, and a 1TB hard drive with a 16GB caching SSD, all for $1,250!

If the impressive specs weren’t enough, the Y500 is also quite handsome with its sharp angles, rounded corners, and brushed aluminum finish. It eschews the “extreme” gaming laptop design in favor of a simple and clean aesthetic, but a flaming-red, LED-backlit keyboard adds just enough flare to keep things interesting. Its 15.2x10.2x1.4-inch chassis also makes it much smaller and more portable than our 15.6-inch MSI GT60 zero-point laptop, and the Y500 weighs in at just six pounds, 6.8 ounces. Although it may not be Ultrabook-light, it’s lighter than the very-slim Razer Blade gaming laptop (reviewed Holiday 2012), but it’s much heftier power brick does increase its carry weight by more than a pound.

One unique design feature is the Y500’s modular ultrabay underneath the notebook, which allows you to swap in different components. Our unit came with a second 650M GPU, but you can easily unlock this and swap it out with Lenovo’s expanded 750GB HDD tray ($190), a DVD burner ($70), or cooling fan ($30). The extra flexibility is appreciated, as it allows you to transform the gaming laptop into a workstation or entertainment system.

You’ll be able to enjoy each configuration with the Y500’s excellent JBL speakers and sharp 15.6-inch display. Even though the 1920x1080-resolution screen is a TN panel, it offers very good viewing angles all around, and the audio is loud and crisp, partially thanks to Dolby’s Home Theatre V4 software. While it can’t quite compare to a dedicated 2.1 setup, laptop speakers don’t get much better than this.

We also really liked the chiclet keyboard and found the keys to be quiet and responsive. Unfortunately, the trackpad was a big letdown. It supports all of Windows 8 multitouch gestures, like swiping in the Charms bar and pinch-to-zoom, but we often found ourselves triggering these gestures on accident. Though we were able to disable these features, which largely fixed the annoyances, but there were still occasions where the trackpad proved unresponsive. In addition, because both click buttons are clunkily integrated beneath the trackpad rather than being separate buttons, we often found ourselves unintentionally sliding the cursor when clicking.

Fortunately, the internal components performed quite well—beyond what we’d expect given the Y500’s affordability. This is the first time we’ve reviewed a laptop with two 650M GPUs in SLI and we’re happy to say it had no problems blowing away our zero-point’s single GeForce 670M. In both our STALKER and 3DMark 11 graphics benchmarks, it smoked the zero-point by more than 20 percent. The only issue we experienced was that we had to enable SLI in the Nvidia control panel, as it was disabled by default. The Y500’s Core i7-3630QM’s100MHz advantage over the GT60’s Core i7-3610QM gave the former a marginal advantage—Lenovo’s biggest lead here was 2.5 percent in the multithread-hungry x264 benchmark.

In our experiential gameplay tests, the Y500 handled Portal 2 like a piece of cake, as it were, and achieved average frame rates in the 130 range. On the much more graphically formidable Far Cry 3, it achieved a 40fps average at 1080p on the default medium settings, which we consider to be in the realm of playable. But the laptop does falter when it comes to battery life, as it only lasted 163 minutes in our test—24 minutes less than the GT60.

While we’re withholding a Kick Ass rating on account of the lackluster battery and frustrating trackpad, those issues can be mitigated if you carry a mouse and charger with you. In general, this is a handsome, portable notebook that can compete in performance with laptops that cost hundreds more. True to its name, the IdeaPad sounds like a great idea to us.

$1,250, www.lenovo.com

Stinky Footboard Controller Skips Past Funding Goal

Paul Lilly — Mon, 06 May 2013 15:47:52 +0000

It was close, but the Stinky Footboard Kickstarter campaign was ultimately successful.

Imagine using your foot to cast a spell or to kick an opponent in the gut when he charges so close you can smell what he ate for lunch through your monitor. Or maybe you'd step down when you want to crouch, jump, or sprint. These are just some ways you might use the Stinky Footboard, a PC game controller for your foot that recently hit its goal on Kickstarter with a few thousand dollars to spare.

The Stinky Footboard campaign drew interest from 479 backers who pledged a combined $79,562, surpassing the company's $75,000 goal. As such, the project will go forward, and we're told you'll be able to buy the peripheral in June for $119.

In case you missed our previous coverage, the Stinky Footboard is a 4-button gaming footboard with up to 16 game supported modifiers. The buttons use Cherry MX switches, which are nestled underneath heavy duty plastics, a steel U-channel backbone, and a T6 aluminum top plate.

There are no proprietary drivers to install; it's USB HID compatible, just like a USB footpedal. Unlike a traditional foot pedal, however, the Stinky Footboard comes with six spare replaceable springs and you can adjust the stiffness and responsiveness via the tension box. It also sports on-board memory to store active profiles.

Do you think this is something you'd be interested in using? Sound off in the comments section below!

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Nvidia Rumored to Release GeForce GTX 780 Graphics Card on May 23

Paul Lilly — Fri, 03 May 2013 17:49:03 +0000

The GPU wars are heating up.

Analysts can talk all they want about the demise of desktops and the rise of tablets, we're not buying it. And you know what? Neither are discrete graphics card makers. If they were, Nvidia wouldn't be getting to release a GeForce GTX 780 video card, which if the latest web chatter is true, will be launching in just a few weeks. After that, Nvidia has another GTX 700 Series card to unleash.

According to Fudzilla, the GTX 780 part is scheduled to launch on May 23, 2013 at precisely 6:00 AM PDT. Exactly one week later to the minute, Nvidia will follow that up by launching its GeForce GTX 770 graphics card, both of which will be sold by top tier vendors.

The GTX 780 is based on the GK110 architecture found in Nvidia's Titan cards, and the GTX 770 is based on GK104 425, which Fudzilla says is an improved version of the original 28nm part.

Other than those details, we don't know much about either card, though we expect both to be at least marginally faster than the 600 Series they're replacing.

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Electronic Arts Announces Another Round of Layoffs

Pulkit Chandna — Fri, 26 Apr 2013 13:32:44 +0000

Actual count not confirmed, but could be as high as 10 percent of the publisher’s global workforce

Close on the heels of significant layoffs at its Montreal game studio, Electronic Arts once again wielded the axe on Thursday. Although EA was quick to confirm reports of the layoffs, their number remains a point of contention, with wildly different figures being thrown around in absence of an official announcement in this regard.

“In recent weeks, EA has aligned all elements of its organizational structure behind priorities in new technologies and mobile. This has led to some difficult decisions to reduce the workforce in some locations,” the publisher said in a terse statement, which as it later turned out was actually an excerpt from an internal memo announcing the layoffs.

There are varying reports about the size of this latest downsizing exercise at EA. If you ask our friends over at Kotaku, they will tell you the company has handed out pink slips to as much as 10 percent of its workforce. Meanwhile, other reports place the the number of those released in the hundreds.

“The workforce reductions which we communicated in the last two weeks represent the majority of our planned personnel actions,” interim CEO Larry Probst wrote in an internal memo. “We are extremely grateful for the contributions made by each of these individuals – they will be missed by their colleagues and friends at EA.”

He also announced some changes to the company’s organizational structure. These include: the consolidation of core marketing functions under COO Peter Moore and the transfer of Origin to Frank Gibeau’s Labels organization, where it will be headed by executive vice president Andrew Wilson.

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Rumor: Xbox 720 to be Based on ‘Core’ Windows 8

Pulkit Chandna — Fri, 26 Apr 2013 03:36:36 +0000

Will allegedly hit the market in November

The long wait for the terribly long-in-the-tooth Xbox 360’s successor is set to end on May 21, when Microsoft says it will finally lift the curtain on its eighth-generation console at a special event. Despite Microsoft’s formal announcement of the Xbox 720 curtain-raiser event, the rumor mill hasn’t stopped buzzing. With Xbox 720 rumors thus far running the gamut from the unlikely to the unreasonable, no one can blame you for thinking that you have heard it all. But have you?

The latest Xbox 720 rumors worthy of your attention come from a rather credible source; someone renowned for breaking Microsoft-related stories ahead of everyone else. If you haven’t guessed it already, we are talking about Paul Thurrott, who last month revealed May 21 to be the date of the Xbox 720’s unveiling — nearly a month before the official announcement in this regard.

According to Thurrott, among the many things that he knows about the next Xbox is the fact that it will be based on the “Core” version of Windows 8 and that it will, as a consequence, have a similar, if not the same, apps platform as Windows 8.

Other Xbox 720 details that he claims to know include the presence of a Blu-ray optical drive and the need of an active Internet connection in order for the console to be usable. Thurrott claims that when the console hits the market later this year — November if he is to be believed — it will be available either as “a standalone version for $499 and a $299 version that requires a two-year Xbox LIVE Gold commitment at an expected price of $10 per month.”

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Digital Storm's Vanquish Gaming PCs Nearly Eliminate Pre Built Pricing Premium

Paul Lilly — Wed, 24 Apr 2013 16:14:38 +0000

New Vanquish line of gaming PCs make a strong argument in favor of pre built versus DIY.

One of the beneifts of rolling your own rig is that you can potentially save money versus buying a pre built machine. That isn't always true of bulk OEMs that shovel piles of trialware and other third-party bloat as a way of reducing costs, but more often than not, boutique system builders attach hefty premiums to off-the-shelf parts you can purchase and assemble on your own. Digital Storm is looking to change the game.

The boutique system builder today made a strong statement in favor of pre built machines by launching its new Vanquish line of gaming PCs. What makes the Vanquish line notable is that Digital Storm was able to reduce the pricing premium to less than the cost of a triple AAA video game.

"For years, enthusiasts have claimed they could build systems with the same high-end components Digital Storm configures for significantly less. The Vanquish line narrows that gap to a mere $23-$58 difference making the difference a no brainer -- DIY is simply not worth the hassle," Digital Storm said in a statement.

We don't agree that going the DIY route isn't "worth the hassle" since part of the fun is the actual building process, but we still have to hand it to Digital Storm for offering a cost effective alternative for gamers who don't have the time or interest to research and piece together their own system.

The Vanquish line is available in four "Levels" ranging in price from $699 (Level 1) to $1,399 (Level 4). A baseline Level 4 setup features a Corsair Carbide Series 300R case (with window), Intel Core i7 3770K processor, Asus P8Z77-V LX motherboard, 8GB of DDR3-1600 Corsair Vengeance RAM, Corsair CX 600W power supply, Corsair Neutron GTX Series 120GB solid state drive, 1TB hard drive (7200 RPM, 32MB cache), DVD writer, GeForce GTX 660 Ti video card, Corsair H60 liquid cooler, internal case lighting, Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit, and "Stage 1" overclocking (Digital Storm will goose the CPU to 4GHz to 4.4GHz).

Digital Storm's Vanquish line is available to configure and purchase now.

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Giveaway: Arena of Heroes Gold Founders Pack

Pulkit Chandna — Wed, 24 Apr 2013 00:46:09 +0000

Worth $50, the Gold Founders Pack includes access to the turn-based MOBA’s closed beta and more

A turn-based multiplayer online battle arena (MOBA) game is an oxymoron, right? Guess what? Such a game does exist now in the form of Arena of Heroes (PC, Mac and iOS), which developer Sneaky Games recently managed to sneak into the market. An otherwise free-to-play title, the innovative title is currently in closed beta and open only to those who purchase one of the three available Founders Packages that cost between $20 and $120.

Thankfully, Maximum PC has twelve Gold Founder Packs and every intention of giving them away right here, right now on a first-come, first-serve basis. So, without further ado, here’s the first activation code: 43HD2ZFSAMTK3. Hit the jump for the remaining eleven codes.

The Gold Founder Pack, which costs $50, not only includes beta access (PC or Mac only), but also 500 halycite gems, gold founder in-game badge, six heroes and four skins. Now that we have apprised you of the gold pack’s monetary value and contents, here are the rest of the codes:

NMXU8BQ4N82K3

DM36QLGBWEHK3

P4CGMDQ75KYK3

UCMBGEA34SCK4

3368YFDA3VMK4

WMWKZGAPY56M4

B4NDTJWXHN8M4

JC9U8KMN2F9M4

S3Z6QP8JTPZM4

XMBGCQMVRVLM4

54DVEQSW75EM4

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Nvidia Reportedly Prepping GTX Titan Ultra and Titan LE SKUs

Pulkit Chandna — Tue, 23 Apr 2013 07:38:19 +0000

Not one, but two new Titans said to be in the works

With AMD’s answer to the the $1,000 Nvidia GTX Titan expected to hit the market later this week, you need something special to prevent AMD’s upcoming dual-chip beast, the Radeon HD 7990 “Malta”, from hogging each and every ray of the spotlight that the tech media has reserved for graphics cards. The two-month-old GTX Titan has managed to do just that thanks to rumors that it is about to be turned into a mini graphics card brand.

Talk of a budget version of the two-month-old GPU, dubbed the GTX Titan LE, is nothing new, but German site 3DCenter.org is now reporting that a third, more powerful SKU, likely to be called either Titan Ultra or Titan II, is also on the cards and is expected to debut during the fourth quarter of 2013.

This SKU will reportedly utilize all of the GK110’s 15 SMX clusters, giving it an edge over the regular Titan which has one cluster disabled with a total of 2,688 CUDA cores and 240 TMUs. As as result, the Titan Ultra will boast the full quota of 2880 shader cores and 256 texture units. Further, as opposed to the original’s 837 MHz clock speed and 206-Watt power appetite, the Ultra will have a 950 MHz clock speed and a 225W TDP.

As for the Titan LE, it will reportedly have 2496 CUDA cores, 208 TMUs, 40 ROPs, 320-bit DDR memory interface, 5 GB of GDDR5 and a 180-190W TDP. As per the German site, the Titan LE is likely to come out sometime during “summer 2013.”

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